Saturday morning, last of term, the usual chaos before they crammed into chapel. The school’s hymn, “Love Unknown,” felt to John like tradition even though they’d adopted it only four years before. Burton read a message from the Headmaster and then announced a closing hymn they didn’t know. As they flipped through hymn books, Kardleigh’s choir took the first verse a cappella.
Souls of men, why will ye scatter
Like a crowd of frightened sheep?
Foolish hearts, why will ye wander
From a love so true and deep?
Why, indeed? And what if his didn’t, anymore? They were bound, after all, for the City of Light, or would be once he could extract Meg from the hospital. Let everything not be ruined! Let her recover, and in time for Paris, that balm he’d longed for these cold, dark months. Let these miasmas stay far away from her. And let her daughter, his goddaughter still, let her be as she was, untouched and unchanged. Let all specters be shed with his term-time clothing when they boarded the train tomorrow.
Riding’s note got under his skin. Halton had to ask the Flea what the Latin words meant, and the man had waxed tragic on Queen Dido of Carthage, who after falling helplessly in love with Aeneas contrived to curse his descendants: May an avenger one day arise from my bones! The Flea said the avenger referred to Hannibal, which didn’t make Riding’s message any less offensive. Halton scraped his imagination for a clever reply; he even leafed through Kennedy for a suitable line of Latin. In the end he took inspiration from the story his sister had read him when they took that boat through the Suez Canal. He left a map in Riding’s pigeonhole, X in red and three brief words: Destroy it yourself!
Pearce had procrastinated, and now time had run out. He stood in the queue outside his Housemaster’s study, doing his best to organize the madness, sending those, like himself, who had the early train forward and telling the others to wait, all the while steeling himself to say what must be said. The whole end-of-term queue problem could be eliminated if Housemasters would let prefects distribute the journey money, but that wasn’t what he had to say to Mr. Grieves.
—Next!
He entered the study:
—Sir, if you don’t mind, a word?
Mr. Grieves looked up from his ledger, and after a glance at the clock, beckoned him closer. He wasn’t ready. He forgot his words.
—Well?
He should have come another time.
—It’s Austin, sir.
Mr. Grieves set down his pen.
—Of course. I’ve been meaning to thank you, Pearce, for your fine work this term stepping in when Austin was taken from his duties.
—You’re welcome, sir, and thank you, but that wasn’t what I …
Mr. Grieves raised his brow.
—I mean, I’ve been writing to Austin, sir, and he’s been writing me, advice and so forth, and he said he wouldn’t … I mean he might not be back next term.
—Oh, no?
—He thought it likely, I mean unlikely. He said his pater might send him to a crammer.
—Indeed?
—And what I wanted to say, sir, and I know it’s only on the off chance, you see my people want me to go up to Christ Church, and read law …
Mr. Grieves stood. People were waiting, trains going.
—My pater knows someone there, you see, one of the dons, and he knows the Head, and he says the docket system is the best preparation there is for—
—I see.
—You do, sir? I didn’t know how to say it.
—Obviously you’ll have the next available JCR post.
—Oh, thank you, sir, but it isn’t exactly that.
Mr. Grieves stepped around the desk.
—I mean it is, but, sir, Austin was Prefect of Hall, and if he should leave—
—Yes?
The clock raced. He should have written out what he had to say.
—I wanted to tell you, sir, that I believe in the truth, and I believe in the truth being told, and it seems to me that most of the time we’re more interested in avoiding awkwardness, but if we don’t tell the truth then we’re wandering in the dark, like what you say about those who don’t know their history.
—Pearce—
—And I should like to help the Academy that way, sir. I should like to help people see the truth and find the nerve to—
—For heaven’s sake, Pearce, you’ll be a prefect!
—But—
—As soon as possible, I promise. Stop fretting.
—It’s only—
—We can discuss it after the holidays. There’s no time now.
He passed him the journey money and shook his hand.
—Safe travels, happy Easter. Next!
He stumbled over the fringe of the rug. Outside, the queue glared.
—Must’ve been quite a tick-off, Moss said. Old Grievous read you the riot act?
Laughs, mock horror, Pious got a docket! And his hand was at Moss’s throat, and they were flailing, fists and feet, crashing together against the pigeonholes, and his arm was pinned, and Moss was landing blows, and pictures were flashing as they fell: Island, Green, Shepherd, Sheep. Like the voice in a whirlwind, the pictures told the truth. He was meant to read law, but they said something else. A shepherd of sheep on an island of green. If anyone should be Prefect of Chapel, it was he, not Moss.
—Pax!
The blows stopped, defeat his. Moss hauled him to his feet:
—Next time you get an attack of berserk, Pious, leave the pigeonholes out of it.
He couldn’t find her to say goodbye, but even if he could, there wouldn’t be a point. Good things always ended, bad things only paused. The school hymn was maudlin and the other song worse. He hated Lent. He hated Easter. Macabre, guilty, cloying, like the half-sweet smell of a sickroom.
The hunchback ignored him when he stepped into the room. Ultor, ultoris, ultori, ultorem. He took the journey money and put it in his pocket. Ultore—
—And this.
A letter addressed to his mother.
—Something to say, Riding?
Ultores, ultorum, ultoribus—
—What on earth?
Crash in the corridor, man to the door, he escaped the room and the House. The man had not concealed his disgust. He had seen the vileness inside him, pus no crucifixion could cure, and now he’d committed the fact to paper, sealed and addressed for the eyes of his mother. This world touched that one, and once she knew—ultores, ultoribus.