'But I've just told you '
'I know what you've told me and I'm not taking any chances on your opinion. Now get out.'
As Slymne bundled the Major's wheelchair through the door, the Headmaster put his head in his hands. The situation was far worse than he had imagined. It had been bad enough to suppose that Glodstone had merely taken the wretched boy on some jaunt round the country, but that he'd almost certainly gone abroad with the lout on a so-called 'secret mission' to rescue another boy's mother verged on the insane.
The Headmaster corrected himself. It was insane. Finally, collecting what thoughts he could, he reached for the phone.
'Get on to International Enquiries and put a call through to Wanderby's mother in France. Her name's the Countess of Montcon. You'll find the address in the files. And put her straight through to me.'
As he slammed the phone down he saw the Clyde-Brownes' car drive up. The moment he had dreaded had come. What on earth was he going tell them? Something soothing, some mild remark...No, that wouldn't work. With an almost manic smile he got up to greet them. But Mr Clyde-Browne had come to be heard, not to listen. He was armed with a battery of arguments.
Peregrine had been in the school's care; he had last been seen on the school premises (the Headmaster decided not to mention Mrs Brossy's sighting in the village); the school, and on a more personal level, the Headmaster, had been and still were responsible for his well-being; Mr Clyde-Browne had paid the exorbitant sum of ten thousand pounds in advance fees; and if, as seemed likely, his son had been abducted by a possibly paedophilic master he was going to see that the name Groxbourne went down in legal history and was expunged from the Public Schools Yearbook, where, in his opinion, it should never have been in the first place. And what had the Headmaster to say to that?
The Headmaster fought for words. 'I'm sure there's a perfectly simple and straightforward...' he began without any conviction, but Mrs Clyde-Browne's sobs stopped him. She appeared to have gone into premature mourning. 'I can only promise...'
'I am not interested in promises,' said Mr Clyde-Browne, 'my son is missing and I want him found. Now, have you any idea where he is?'
The Headmaster shuddered to think, and had his agitation increased by the telephone.
'I can't get any number,' said the School Secretary when he picked it up, 'International Enquiries say there's no Countess de...'
'Thank you, Miss Crabley, but I'm engaged just at the moment,' he said to stifle any shrill disclosures. 'Please tell the Bishop I'll call him back as soon as I'm free.' And, hoping he had impressed the Clyde-Brownes, he replaced the receiver and leant across the desk. 'I really don't think you have anything to worry about...' he began and knew he was wrong. Through the window he could see Slymne crossing the quad carrying two revolvers. God alone knew what would happen if he marched in and...The Headmaster got to his feet. 'If you'll just excuse me for a moment,' he said hoarsely, 'I'm afraid my bowels...er...my stomach has been playing me up.'
'So have mine,' said Mr Clyde-Browne unsympathetically, but the Headmaster was already through the door and had intercepted Slymne. 'For God's sake put those beastly things away,' he whispered ferociously.
'The thing is...' Slymne began but the Headmaster dragged him into the lavatory and locked the door. 'They're only replicas.'
'I don't care what...They're what?' said the Headmaster.
'I said they're replicas,' said Slymne, edging up against the washbasin nervously.
'Replicas? You mean '
'Two real revolvers are missing. We found these in their place.'
'Shit!' said the Headmaster, and slumped onto the seat. His bowels were genuinely playing him up now.
'The Major is checking the ammunition boxes,' continued Slymne, 'I just thought you'd want to know about these.'
The Headmaster stared bleakly at a herb chart his wife had pinned up on the wall to add a botanical air to the place. Even the basil held no charms for him now. Somewhere in Europe Glodstone and that litigious bastard's idiot son were wandering about armed with property belonging to the Ministry of Defence. And if the Clyde-Brownes found out...They mustn't.
Rising swiftly he wrenched the top off the cistern. 'Put the damned things in there,' he said. Slymne raised his eyebrows and did as he was told. If the Headmaster wanted replica firearms in his water closet that was his business. 'And now go back to the Armoury and tell that Fetherington not to move until I've got rid of the parents. I'll come over myself.'
He opened the door and was confronted by Mr Clyde-Browne, for whom the mention of stomachs and lavatories had precipitated another bout of Adriatic tummy. 'Er...' said the Headmaster, but Mr Clyde-Browne shoved past him and promptly backed out again followed by Slymne. 'The toilet's not working. Mr Slymne here has been helping me fix it.'
'Really?' said Mr Clyde-Browne with an inflection he relied on in cases involving consenting adults charged with making improper use of public urinals, and before the Headmaster could invite him to use the toilet upstairs he was back inside and had locked the door.
'You don't think...'said Slymne injudiciously.
'Get lost,' said the Headmaster. 'And see that...the Major doesn't stir.'
Slymne took the hint and hurried back to the armoury. The Major was looking disconsolately at several empty boxes in the ammunition locker. 'Bad news, Slimey old chap,' he said. 'Two hundred bloody rounds gone. The Army isn't going to like it one little bit. I've got to account for every fucking one.'
'Not your fault,' said Slymne. 'If Glodstone chooses to go mad and pinch the key...'
'He didn't. Peregrine had the thing. And to think I used to like that boy.'
'Well, the Head's got his hands full with the Clyde-Brownes and I don't think he's having an easy time.'
The Major almost sympathized. 'I don't see how he can avoid sacking me. I'd sack myself in the circumstances. More than flesh and blood can stand, that bloody couple.' He wheeled himself across to a rack of bayonets.
'Don't tell me they've taken some of those too,' said Slymne.
'I wish to God they had,' said the Major. 'The Army wouldn't worry so much. Mind you, I hate to think what Perry would get up to. Born bayoneteer. You should see what he can do with a rifle and bayonet to a bag of straw. And talking about guts I suppose if I were a Jap the Head would expect me to commit Mata Hari.'
Slymne ignored the mistake. He was beginning to feel distinctly sorry for the Major. After all, the man might be a fool but he'd never been as malicious as Glodstone and it had been no part of Slymne's plan to get him sacked.
'They probably won't use any of those bullets,' he said by way of consolation and wondered what he could do to save the Major's job.
It was not a consideration that had top priority with the Headmaster. Mr Clyde-Browne's eruption from the lavatory clutching the two replica revolvers he had dredged from the cistern in an attempt to make the thing flush had honed to a razor's edge the Headmaster's only gift, the capacity for extempore evasions.
'Well I never,' he said. 'Would you believe it?'
'No,' said Mr Clyde-Browne.
'Boys will be boys,' continued the Headmaster in the face of this blunt refusal to accept his rhetoric, 'always up to some practical jokes.'
Mr Clyde-Browne fingered the revolvers dangerously. He had yet to realize they were replicas. 'And maniacs will presumably be maniacs. Since when have you and that man Slymne made a habit of hiding offensive weapons in the cistern of your lavatory?'
'Are you suggesting '
'No. I'm stating,' said Mr Clyde-Browne, 'I intend to present these firearms to the police as proof that you are wholly unfit either by virtue of insanity or criminal tendency to be in charge of anything more morally responsible than an abattoir or a brickyard.'