25

Tuesday, June 15, cont.

The custodian at the boarding school was hauling out the dustbin when a man carrying a toolbox on a strap stopped him at the front door. “Excuse me,” Herman said, “I’m the electrician. I was asked to perform a safety examination of your wiring.”

John “Jack” Connery was a man who didn’t like surprises, so he didn’t like this stranger with the German accent popping up on his front doorstep and interrupting his day. “I weren’t told naught about it. Be off!”

Herman shrugged. “Sorry, sir, but if I don’t do my job, I don’t get paid. Surely you can understand that.”

Jack had enough experience with bosses to believe the man. “Awright, awright. Just give me a moment to dump the leavings from these spoiled brats. Trust me, lad, just because they can sing like angels, don’t make ’em heavenly.”

Herman nodded in sympathy, “Yes, I agree. Looks can be deceiving, can’t they? I’ll wait right here.”

After the most recent pile of dirt which the boys regularly tracked in had been tossed away, Jack wiped his hands on his trousers and led the waiting electrician into the foyer on the ground floor. “You want to check the whole building, or just the basement where the lines come in?”

“The entire building, please. There was a fire last week in Brighton, and as this building is occupied at night, someone thought a safety check was in order.” There had in fact been such a fire, though not in a boarding school, but it sounded truthful enough. Close enough to truth that the custodian swallowed it without a qualm, and they began their tour.

“Where’d you like to start, then? Top or bottom?”

“Basement first I think, though you’ve no need to follow me about. I’m sure you’re a busy man.”

Jack shrugged. “Fair enough. There’s always something. I’ll have to be with you when you’re in the dormitory. Can’t have strange men poking around there, you understand. I’ll be cleaning on the ground floor. Follow the stairs here down to the basement. After you’ve done the basement and the ground floor, we can go up to the dormitory together.”

“It’s very quiet for a school.”

“Aye, for now. Lads are all off to practice for the big ceremony. Keeps the young hellions off my back and out of mischief. Now off with you. We’ve both got work to do.”

Herman found the wiring recently installed and in good order. He estimated the building had been electrified within the past two years. He could look at the swirling mass of lines and see an order that was close to religious. Everything connected to something else, each an indispensable part of a larger whole, and it hurt his craftsman’s heart to create a flaw in the system. He added a small loop and a switch that opened it, connecting it to the main cable. Then, with the switch closed, he stripped the insulation from one side, and fastened the bare copper to a water pipe. When the switch was opened, the entire building would lose power.

After reconnecting the building’s wiring to the outside cable, he performed a safety check of the entire system in the basement. He wished the boys no harm, and it ensured he got his hands dirty and didn’t finish his work too quickly. Once done, he kept the power on and returned to the ground floor to perform various voltage checks to the satisfaction of the custodian. “I sleeps here meself with my missus, so good to know we’re being looked after.”

After the ground floor was complete, the two men climbed to the first of the two floors containing the dormitory and classrooms.

“I’m also here to check your protection against lightning strikes, so I’ll have to look at the outside of the building to check the cables and connections between your lightning rods and the ground.”

“Makes sense,” the custodian said, “It’s all electricity, ain’t it?”

Herman relaxed at the man’s ready acceptance of his explanation for his need to inspect the exterior. The hardest part’s done, he thought.

The window in the corner room on the first floor was possible. Just. The second floor was perfect. The direction was dead on, and the angle would allow him to fire over the crowd and mounted escort. The boys had bunk beds, and as the window was six feet above the floor, he would need to fire from the top bunk adjacent to the window. He would check the roof, but he reasoned he would likely be spotted from an adjacent building if he took any time at all to fire. Here he could lie back from the window and wait for the perfect moment. I won’t miss this time.

As Herman had suspected, the roof was a poor choice for a position, as the flat portion was skewed too far to the left with a large tree partially obscuring the view. The rest of the “inspection” went quickly, and the custodian was relieved the building got a good report. Herman handed the custodian two copies of a form to document the work that had been done. He used a blank invoice from Luigi’s previous electrician to give his visit the air of authenticity and to provide the custodian with an address near the antiquities shop.

“Keep a copy of the form,” Herman said, “should you require further work, though everything seems to be in perfect order.”

Jack “made his mark,” and they shook hands, one working man to another.

The long-suffering custodian went back to his endless task of undoing the damage the troop of bored young boys regularly inflicted on their home. If he had taken a moment to look out a window, he would have noted the electrician pacing back and forth between the steps of St. Paul’s and the corner of his building.

Eighty-eight paces, Herman wrote in his notebook after three trials. Then he reaffirmed his earlier thought, I won’t miss, not this time.

That afternoon, when the custodian submitted a copy of the form verifying the work on the boarding school had been completed, a clerk in the dean’s office found no record such work had been requested. He sent a strongly worded note to the address listed on the form denying payment, mentioned it in passing to the dean, then promptly forgot about it.