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Authors: Paul Binding

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After Brock (6 page)

BOOK: After Brock
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Dr Pringle said: ‘Nat, do you live in South London too? I suppose you must if you're a friend of Josh's.'

‘Yup, just round the corner. Herne Hill. Close to the station.'

Dr Pringle appeared to struggle for a reply to this far from interesting statement. ‘You a musician too, Nat?' was the best he could do.

‘Not really, I'm afraid.'

‘“Not really!” Why, this guy's tone deaf!' This was Josh who had, without us noticing, come downstairs into the hall. I was pretty glad he was there then because all the time I spoke I was aware of the violin teacher's colourless eyelashes blinking very fast, as though batting away some disturbing memory, and of a look of none-too-flattering curiosity in Emily's wonderful dark (near-black) eyes.

‘Josh is being a bit unfair,' I said. ‘I almost always know Bach when I hear it, and Mozart and Beethoven too (well, mostly). And some Shropshire mates of mine are members of a pretty successful band, The Tiger's Last Chance – called that 'cause tigers are nearing extinction, sadly. And there's an idea that this summer I'll write a song for them, to play at their gigs.'

But Dr Pringle, I could tell, was having difficulty in focusing on my words. Somehow the preoccupied look on his face reminded me of my dad when (as happens a sight too often) he's gone off on some mental trail of his own instead of concentrating on what other people are saying to him. And when this famous violinist replied, ‘Certainly the tiger must be saved. It'll be a disgrace to humanity, if tigers are allowed to perish!' he sounded like he was hauling himself out of some quagmire, and the words weren't the ones uppermost in his mind.

Rollo evidently thought all this notice taken of me (not sufficiently important to be called by his right name) had gone on long enough. He said, with an odd concern for his sister: ‘Em's playing brilliant as ever, Dr Pringle?'

‘I am very pleased with her,' said her teacher flatly. Then turning to me he said: ‘I have pupils of
all
different kinds, you know. Whether they're so-called “musical” or “accomplished” isn't a prime consideration with me.' This, one in the eye for Rollo, was said, I felt, because Dr Pringle was stopping himself talking about something else. ‘Basically, Nat, I instruct pupils in the Kodály Method.'

This meant nothing to me, of course, although Rollo nodded and went ‘Mmm!' But then he'd likely heard about it before, and from the same source.

‘It's named after the great Hungarian composer, Zoltán Kodály who developed it for use in the schools of his own country. But it's spread everywhere since, long after he died in 1967. I tend to teach the method through my own instrument, the violin, starting pupils just as early as I can.'

I pulled my most interested face. It must have succeeded.

‘But many Kodály teachers begin with no instrument at all – with just singing or chanting, or using hand gestures. We help children to feel their way into their natural birthright of music through their instincts and growing bodies.'

‘I wish I'd begun with Dr Pringle earlier,' enthused Emily.

I maybe should have said something like that too, but couldn't think what. I've done a bit of drumming, but didn't say so here because even I know I'm not very good. My dad and mum would have approved of this doctor's ideas, if they could have taken off time from their own troubles to think about them. But to be fair, my dad always encouraged me, as a very small kid, to be free with the paint and paste and paper around the studios at the Sunbeam Press.

I had the odd and awkward feeling that the five of us, Dr Pringle, Emily, Rollo, Josh and myself, were shipwrecked folk marooned in the middle of this tiled spacious hall with its potted plants and basket chairs, without a boat to rescue us.

‘I have one of my cards on me somewhere,' said the doctor of music, ‘I'd like to give you one, Nat.'

Impressive though it sounded, he mustn't get the idea I was ready to start on this great Hungarian Method myself.

‘Thanks,' I said, ‘but like Josh here I've only just got shot of A Levels, and this Sunday coming I am going up to my dad's in Shropshire. For a working holiday!'

‘Working after exams?' smiled Dr Pringle, clearly doing his utmost, given his very apparent agitation, to sound like a normal man talking to a normal lad.

‘A working holiday,' I corrected, ‘my dad's not too bad, though he does keep me pretty busy. Specially if I can save him doing stuff he doesn't like.'

Tiny bit unfair perhaps, and here Josh piped up from where he was standing behind me (wrong phrase – Josh has got a deep gravelly voice which some people say I've tried to copy): ‘Nat's dad is a great guy, Dr Pringle. And I should know, because I've stayed with him. And worked for him too. He treats you like a mate, never lets stupid little upsets get the better of him. And he's interested in loads and loads of different subjects, always ready for something new to come his way.' Great of Josh to butt in with this nice portrait of Dad, though it's not the picture of him I would make. ‘I'd leap at another chance,' went on Josh, ‘of going up to Shropshire, and helping Pete in High Flyers.'

I was on the point of saying maybe then he shouldn't go off to Italy next week as planned but join me in Lydcastle instead. But before I could speak, I became aware that Dr Pringle was having what my mum's mum used to call ‘a funny turn'. His face had turned so white it was now virtually green, with sweat breaking out of it. So strangely overcome did he look that Rollo shoved one of the basket chairs over to him so he could sit down. And he needed to. He seated himself cautiously, almost gingerly, as though afraid he might collapse.

Then, ‘
What
was that you just said?' he gasped, sounding more distressed even than over my name, ‘
HIGH FLYERS?
No, it's not possible.' He closed his eyes, as if he preferred blankness to seeing the people he was with. ‘Whatever could
that
be? A travelling quiz show, I suppose.'

Josh stepped in, almost as if avenging an insult. ‘
Quiz show?
' he echoed. He obviously didn't mind being disrespectful to somebody of high reputation whom it was an honour for his sister to be taught by, ‘
High Flyers
is one of the leading kite shops in the whole of the UK.'

‘…You must forgive me! It must have been what our forebears called “a touch of the sun”,' said Dr Pringle.

Then he heaved himself up, a little shakily, from the basket chair, and valiantly tried to give us all a friendly smile. ‘Here you go, Nat!' he said, and he took from his trouser pocket a wallet, from which he extracted one of the cards he'd spoken of. He kind of lurched forward, like somebody still not feeling himself, and handed it to me.

While the others made clumsy conversation to see him out and say goodbye-till-next-time in as ordinary a way as they could, I glanced at what I'd been given:

   

Dr JULIAN PRINGLE

B. Mus D. Mus. (Royal Academy of Music)

M.A. Kodály Music Pedagogy (Kodály Institute) 

[email protected]

   

The address below was in Walworth Road. He lived within easy reach of my own home, a convenience I knew I would act on.

‘Well, whatever was all that about?' said Josh, ‘it was weird!'

‘Just a bit.'

‘Personal stuff, huh?'

My impression too, though I wouldn't admit this. ‘Don't see how!'

‘Skeletons in the old cupboard?'

‘Not in mine!' I said.

‘Well, these last ten minutes have been pretty fucking bizarre,' said Josh, ‘so, Nat, why don't we go out into the garden, and, mate, you can test me on some of my martial arts postures.'

Though this was handy for him, I could tell he was asking to distract me. (But from what?) That's what I like about Josh; he understands my moods, my states of mind, without prying too closely.

   

Mum was engrossed in making an Indian meal for my end-of-exam celebration when I arrived back, so I decided I'd keep my day to myself. I probably would have anyway. Mum likes life to be harmonious and ‘stress-free'. South Indian food involves great quantities of tamarind and fenugreek, coconut, plantain and ginger, and the little kitchen was already smelling strongly and pleasantly of all these. The two of us, as I had guessed beforehand, were not going to eat by ourselves. Doug McBride would be coming round, as so often, as so
very
often. (I don't mind this as much as that last sentence suggests. I am indifferent.) Ever since Mum, who does admin in a primary school, went on a course about actual and ideal classroom sizes, where Mr McBride was giving a lecture, it's been Doug this and Doug that and Doug whatever. Though his head is buzzing with budgets and long-term forecasts (he's spectacularly unlike my dad in this, as in other respects), Doug does his best with me to be a laid-back regular guy. But he gives his true anorak self away in so many ways. Like: ‘I can't help worrying, Nat, that all
three
of your A Levels are what we nowadays call s
oft
subjects. I wonder why your teachers didn't point that out to you. Those choices could go against you when whichever-University-it-is has to decide about its new intake.'

‘Even the University of Bedfordshire?'

‘I'm sorry. Why should that have different policies from elsewhere?'

‘
Bed
fordshire. Beds are usually soft, aren't they? Unless they're futons.'

‘Ah, I get it! But, seriously Nat, I have reason to think a number of top universities have “black lists” of subjects (meaning the soft ones). They tend to get lumped as things that only certain kinds of students take.'

‘Well, I just went for the subjects I was any good at, Doug. English Language, English Literature, Media Studies. End of…!'

But tonight he was fairly bearable, talking away about India where he went some months back on a fact-finding visit. A lot of people would have found it interesting, but I can't say I exactly did because half the time (at least) I was aware of the rapt look on Mum's face. She was looking very nice tonight, had taken trouble to do so after she'd finished in the kitchen. She'd tied her sandy-coloured hair in a brief pony-tail, and wore her best peacock blue top. I don't look like either of my parents much, but I've inherited Mum's wide-apart set of eyes, though hers are a green-flecked brown, not grey. Doug greatly appreciated her appearance, I could tell.

The meal was delicious, as Doug said at least a hundred times. First we had
sambar
or vegetable stew, with aubergines, tomatoes and yellow cucumbers; then
rasam,
a soup made from tamarind juice and lentils, but Mum serves it up with rice and yoghurt-soaked fritters. Before we tucked into all this though, Doug produced a bottle of champagne to toast me and my results. So there we go! I still can't see why Mum prefers (at least I assume she does) a nerd like Doug to my dad. But then of course it was Dad who wouldn't stay with her/us, wasn't it?

   

Once I was by myself again and in my own room, I knew what I would do – I would go to the bookshelf on which stands the omnibus edition of
Sherlock Holmes Short Stories
which was Dad's as a boy. I knew I'd never thrown away that scrap of paper marking the whereabouts of that awesome story, ‘The Speckled Band'. Quite yellowed with time it is. I took it out, and you might have thought I was deciphering code.

   

November 30 & Dec 7 1973

Violin lessons to Julian Kempsey given at

‘Woodgarth', Etnam Street, Leominster

£7

Received with thanks Dec 7th 1973

Gregory Pringle L.R.A.M.

   

The idea that comes to me is, to quote Josh, ‘pretty fucking bizarre', and I don't know how I will get to sleep with it pressing on my mind. But I no longer have an exam to wake up early for. So why not, once Doug has left, and Mum is in her room, creep out of the flat, out of the whole building, and follow one of our local foxes – or better, a pair of them? Sleuth them to their dens, or stopping places? I love their slinking gait, their graceful muscular jumps of walls and defiance of gates or fences, their capacity for rapid movement while completely keeping their cool. There's nothing London foxes like better (this is hard fact) than fish and chips, so a good place to wait for them is the qui-etest spot near a chippie you can find. If you're properly patient, a pair will emerge from somewhere you've never suspected any creatures could be hiding, and – snap! – like lightning they've snatched a bit of batter-soaked cod or a few greasy congealing chips spilled from some wrapping. Then off they dance with their finds into the recesses of Herne Hill and Camberwell gardens and backyards. And I like to go with them.

   

Next morning, I didn't celebrate No School by dawdling over breakfast in the kitchen after Mum had left for work. Instead I left the building, crossed the road, and made for the 68 bus stop. Amazingly a bus came along as soon as I arrived. But traffic was heavier than normal and was held up for so long at Camberwell Green that I was tempted to get off and walk. But it's a long haul to where Camberwell Road becomes Walworth Road, and Dr Pringle, I knew from the number on his card, lives at least halfway up. And I didn't want to arrive at his home sweaty and breathless, but cool and collected, with both my curiosity and my social skills intact.

I could, of course, have rung him beforehand to check he'd be at home, but I hate speaking on the phone to someone I don't know well. And though I had his email address, I'd no idea how often the doctor looked at his messages. Mine might hang around in cyberspace a long time, possibly for the rest of the week, which wouldn't suit me at all.

His house was in a perfectly ordinary terrace on the Kennington side of the street, less well looked after than its immediate neighbours and, like every other in the row, divided up into flats. I guessed the doctor went out to teach pupils rather than saw them in this unprepossessing place. I felt nervous and bold, both together, as I walked up to the door. Above the second bell from the bottom I saw the name PRINGLE in handwriting, tacked on with a piece of sellotape.

BOOK: After Brock
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