6

“In remembering Oxford,” said Berry, “I find it peculiarly difficult to observe our excellent rules. My own personality becomes immediately obtrusive. I shall, therefore, confine myself to an episode which no one but I can relate, for the other participant is dead. Many would dismiss it as a coincidence. But that, I am unable to do. And I don’t think you’ll do it, either. God knows, I am no moralist. I’m sure you’ll support me there. But I should be, I think, a strange man, if, having subscribed to this business, I thought agnosticism the only creed.

“And now for a brief introduction to this most true report.

“It seemed good to my elders and betters – for I belong to a school that allowed that there might be men who were better than they – that I should take pains to acquire an Honours Degree. This was, of course, so much tripe, for an Honours Degree is of just about as much use as a—”

“Now do be careful,” said Jill.

“–flute in a fanfare. I didn’t dare put it like that, for I was afflicted with respect, a vile and malignant malady, now very nearly unknown. I think Lord Dunghill touches for it – I can’t be sure. He used to run the dockers’ strikes. When he’d lost five million working hours, they shoved him up. Still, I pointed out more than once that academic distinction was not a line of country which I could ride and that it was but the froth upon the tankard of life. But they thought otherwise. In return for a handsome allowance, I had to undertake so to satisfy the examiners that they would award me a class. I made immediate inquiry which was the easiest school. And everybody said ‘Law’. And so I turned to Law. But I had many calls upon my time, and I must confess that lectures bored me stiff. The text-books, I couldn’t stomach: I don’t think they were compiled by understanding men. When I’d still one year to go, I took to a coach. And Cousins was one of the best, as you can testify.”

“That’s very true,” said I. “Learned, efficient, human. And he was very modest. It never occurred to him that he was a brilliant man.”

“Well, things got steadily worse. With my last year, my engagements seemed to increase, yet Time maintained his steady, inexorable pace. I wrote down all Cousins said, but I couldn’t read what I’d written, and, when I could, it didn’t seem to make sense. Now there was a bloke, Roy —, of BNC: and he and I and some others were in the same desperate state. And it came to our knowledge that Cousins had taken an inn in Cornwall for the whole of the Easter recess. And that there he proposed to throw a reading-party… Now we’d read about reading-parties in lady-novelists’ works: and I’m sure Dean Farrar must have had one in his ‘Tale of College Life’. Till now, we hadn’t fallen for the ultra-gorgeous prospect they seemed to present: but ‘Schools’, as we used to call them, were drawing unpleasantly near, and we felt we must cling to Cousins in whom were all our hopes. So down to Cornwall we went towards the end of March. We didn’t do so badly. The weather was set fair and we all got as fit as fleas. Out and about all day. And the village rose to the occasion. I used to strike for the blacksmith – and his wife and his pretty daughters would give us tea.”

“A nice reading-party,” said Daphne. “I can’t believe Dean Farrar’s—”

“Not on your life,” said Berry. “If they saw a maiden approaching they offered up a short prayer and went and hid in a wood. And the one who didn’t was ‘sent to Coventry’. Never mind. The blacksmith’s wife had a very fat reminiscence.”

“Bung it in,” said I. “Hadn’t the daughters any?”

“Too young,” said Berry. “They seemed to live for the present. But there you are, you know – youth must be served. Well, their mother told me this. Her father was a notable smuggler; and a number of kegs of brandy were safely delivered to his house at the moment at which her mother was herself to be delivered of the lady who told me the tale. But on that particular night the excise officers were out. So the kegs were carried upstairs and hidden beneath the great bed. Armed with a warrant, the officers came to the house. They searched the rooms downstairs, but when they came to the bedroom, the midwife barred their path. They were allowed a glimpse. When they saw there was a woman in labour, they searched the rest of the house and went empty away. Very soon after they left, the blacksmith’s wife was born. The birth was surprisingly easy. This was because her mother had been anaesthetized. The fumes of the brandy, rising through the mattress, had put her out.

“Well, Time went pleasantly on. March gave way to April, and the weather was that of June. After dinner we always studied, but, after all day in such air, our powers of concentration were not at their best.

“We had three more days to go, and Roy and I were alone, in a ground-floor room. I’ve called the house an inn, but it was half a hotel. The room was on the small side, but it had a fine French window and this was open wide. And we were sitting at a table, trying to get the hang of a subject called ‘Torts’. The time was half-past ten, and the night was windless and dark. We were well up above a cove, and the tide was on the ebb. The regular lap of the waves enchanted the ear. But we were too much depressed to fall under any spells.

“At last I shut my volume and looked at Roy.

“‘We’ll never do it,’ I said, ‘because it can’t be done. In eleven weeks from now the slaughter-house doors will open and we shall go in. In gowns and caps and white ties. And after a fortnight of nightmares, we shall emerge. But it won’t be worth going in, for the subjects are eight in number and we are familiar with none. I don’t know what some of them mean. As for knowing their habits and manners – when Cousins tries to explain them, I cannot construe his words.’

“‘I can’t put it better,’ said Roy. ‘But I can put it more shortly. Dress it up as you please, we both of us know we’re sunk.’

“‘But I can’t be sunk,’ I cried. ‘I gave my word I’d get a degree with honours.’

“‘So did I,’ said Roy. ‘But we’ve missed the tide. We should have worked for three years. You can’t compress three years’ study into eleven weeks.’

“This was an obvious truth. And the obvious truth is always the most unpleasant. Like any bull of Basan, it gapes upon you with its mouth.

“‘You’ve said it,’ said I. ‘But I’d give six months of my life to get an honours degree.’

“My words seemed to make Roy think.

“‘So would I,’ he said quietly. ‘And I mean that. Do you?’

“‘I certainly do,’ said I. ‘What the hell’s six months?’

“‘Then let’s do a deal,’ said Roy. ‘A deal with the Prince of Darkness. He gets us through Schools and we give him six months of our lives.’

“‘I’m on,’ said I.

“I’ve no defence to offer for what we did. But we were young and foolish and, I fear, like Gallio, we ‘cared for none of those things’. We rose and recited our contract. And then we resumed our seats.”

“My darling,” said Daphne, “I’m inexpressibly shocked.”

“You have every right to be. But let me go on.

“For some moments neither of us spoke. But I think I shall always hear the lap of the waves below. And the darkness seemed thicker than ever.

“I took a sudden resolution.

“‘Roy,’ I said, ‘we’re damned fools. Let’s take our words back.’

“He laughed what I said to scorn and accused me of having cold feet. ‘You’re right,’ I said. ‘I have. I’m going to revoke what I said and I beg that you’ll do the same.’ But he only laughed the more.

“I stood up and ate my words. I solemnly revoked my contract, while Roy sat there and laughed. And then I sat down. Soon after, we went to bed.

“The reading-party dispersed. I went back to White Ladies and Roy went up to Scotland to get a week or two’s fishing before the term began.

“I went up to Oxford early, and when I was settled in, I had a word with my servant and sported my oak.”

“Translation, please,” said Jill.

“Every set of rooms in Oxford has a massive outside door, which is called ‘the oak’. Except when the owner is ‘down’, it is never shut. When it is shut or ‘sported’, it cannot be opened from without, except with a key. The key is in the charge of your servant. If, therefore, you pay a call, to find ‘the oak sported’, it means that your friend is away or must not be disturbed. Except in my own case, I’ve never known an oak sported, unless the fellow was ‘down’. But I was determined to work with all my might, and I knew that I could not do this, unless my front door was shut. My acquaintance was too wide.

“For the next eight weeks, I worked ten hours a day. I came out to go to Cousins and dine in Hall. I took no exercise. My servant served my breakfast and luncheon: thereafter he brought me cider every two hours: and a clean towel and fresh water, for I worked with a towel round my head.

“Roy never went to Cousins. One day I asked where he was.

“I was told – in a nursing-home, very seriously ill. Blood-poisoning. Whilst he was fishing in Scotland, he had knelt on a pen-knife’s blade. This had entered the knee-cap. He had been within an ace of losing his leg. They might have to take it off yet, unless he improved.

“Time went on, and I worked like any madman, week after week. My system was simple. There were, for instance, two papers on Roman Law. I didn’t know what that meant, but I had a first-rate text-book three hundred pages long. One hundred and fifty pages, I learned by heart. I learned half of everything, and prayed for a question or two in the half that I knew. For one subject, I had no time. It was called ‘Jurisprudence’. I didn’t know what the word meant, but when I looked it up, it said ‘The Science of Law’. Well, I didn’t know what that meant, either. I had two enormous textbooks on Jurisprudence alone. The sight of them gave me a pain. But their leaves were uncut; so my servant took them back to the shop and they credited my account. But I learned ‘Cousins’ spots’ by heart.”

“Translation, please.”

“Cousins was a very good coach. And he had been a coach for a number of years. He always kept the papers which had been set, and when he saw that some questions had not been asked for some time he used to select those questions as likely to be asked. This, on every subject. Then to his chosen band he would dictate those questions and follow them up with the answers which they should give. It was the purest gamble. The questions were ten in number. He thought he’d done very well, if he’d spotted three. We called them ‘Cousins’ spots’.

“I was very scared when I’d only a week to go. I knew half my Roman Law: but if all of the questions came in the other half – well, I was properly sunk. I knew, let us say, a third of everything else. And knew it perfectly. I didn’t know what it meant, but I knew the words. But of Jurisprudence, I knew nothing – except ‘Cousins’ spots’. And the Jurisprudence paper was almost the last.

“At last the day came. We had ten days of it then…morning and afternoon…two papers a day. I had luck all along the line. Two-fifths of the questions asked were in the sections I knew. That meant four out of ten. Not too good, perhaps. But those four answers were perfect, for I knew the stuff by heart. But the Jurisprudence paper had yet to come. You see, the thing was this. I knew Cousins’ spots by heart, but I didn’t know what they meant. Cousins gave question and answer. Very good. But if the question was phrased in a different way, to recognize it would be beyond my power. Do you wonder that I was uneasy?

“When the paper was laid before me on a Friday afternoon, I was afraid to read it, and that is the honest truth. And when, at last, I did, I could hardly believe my eyes. Cousins had spotted eight of the ten questions in the very same words.

“I have no hesitation in saying that my papers on Jurisprudence were among the very finest that ever were handed in. I was still writing at the end of the long three hours. Still pouring out Cousins’ knowledge. Three hours was not long enough to get it all down.

“So I got my Honours Degree.

“Roy got his, too. He was given an Aegrotat.”

“Sorry. Translation, please.”

“Aegrotat is Latin. It means ‘He is sick’. To be awarded an Aegrotat Degree, a man must be too ill to enter the Schools. More. He must be in Oxford: the Examiners must see him and must be satisfied that he is too sick to attend: they must also question him, but that is a matter of form.

“Roy was brought down from Scotland by motor-ambulance. He then was carried into The Acland Home. There the Examiners saw him. Then he was driven to London and put back to bed. In time, he recovered completely. But the time from the day on which he knelt on the knife to the day on which he left his nursing-home was almost exactly six months.

“I have told you nothing but the truth. And now may I add a postscript to what I’ve said. The burden of The Bible apart, I’ve seen so many paintings – all of them works of art – of Heaven and Hell. In all the great galleries of Europe. I’ve studied their composition and found it beyond belief: I’ve studied their infinite detail and found it a miracle: but until I returned from Cousins’ reading-party, I fear I gave little thought to their raison d’être. Thereafter, I did. For I had been taught that the Powers of Good and of Evil do exist. You see, I had brushed against one…one lovely April night…on the Cornish coast.”