Gaudy Night (33 page)

“Hullo!” said Mr. Pomfret. “You been saluting the sunrise?”

“Yes. Not a very good sunrise, but quite a good salute.”

“
I
think it’s going to rain,” said Mr. Pomfret. “But I said I would bathe and I am bathing.”

“Much the same here,” said Harriet. “I said I’d scull, and I’m sculling.”

“Aren’t we a pair of heroes?” said Mr. Pomfret. He accompanied her to Magdalen Bridge, was hailed by an irritable friend in a canoe, who said he had been waiting for half an hour, and went off up-river, grumbling that nobody loved him and that he knew it was going to rain.

Harriet joined Miss Edwards, who said, on hearing about the girl:

“Well, you might have got her name, I suppose. But I don’t see what one could do about it. It wasn’t one of our people, I suppose?”

“I didn’t recognise her. And she didn’t seem to recognise me.”

“Then it probably wasn’t. Pity you didn’t get the name, all the same. People oughtn’t to do that kind of thing. Inconsiderate. Will you take bow or stroke?”

As a Tulipant to the Sun (which our herbalists call Narcissus) when it shines, is
admirandus flos ad radios solis se pandens,
a glorious Flower exposing itself; but when the Sun sets, or a tempest comes, it hides itself, pines away, and hath no pleasure left... do all Enamoratoes to their Mistress.

—ROBERT BURTON

The mind most effectually works upon the body, producing by his passions and perturbations miraculous alterations, as melancholy, despair, cruel diseases, and sometimes death itself.... They that live in fear are never free, resolute, secure, never merry, but in continual pain.... It causeth oft-times sudden madness.

—ID.

The arrival of Miss Edwards, together with the rearrangements of residences due to the completion of the Library Building, greatly strengthened the hands of authority at the opening of the Trinity Term. Miss Barton, Miss Burrows and Miss de Vine moved into the three new sets on the ground floor of the Library; Miss Chilperic was transferred to the New Quad, and a general redistribution took place; so that Tudor and Burleigh Buildings were left entirely denuded of dons. Miss Martin, Harriet, Miss Edwards and Miss Lydgate established a system of patrols, by which the New Quad, Queen Elizabeth and the Library Building could be visited nightly at irregular intervals and an eye kept on all suspicious movements..

Thanks to this arrangement, the more violent demonstrations of the Poison-Pen received a check. It is true that a few anonymous letters continued to arrive by post, containing scurrilous insinuations and threats of revenge against various persons. Harriet was carefully docketing as many of these as she could hear of or lay hands on—she noticed that by this time every member of the S.C.R. had been persecuted, with the exception of Mrs. Goodwin and Miss Chilperic; in addition, the Third Year taking Schools began to receive sinister prognostications about their prospects, while Miss Flaxman was presented with an ill-executed picture of a harpy tearing the flesh of a gentleman in a mortar-board.

Harriet had tried to eliminate Miss Pyke and Miss Burrows from suspicion, on the ground that they were both fairly skilful with a pencil, and would therefore be incapable of producing such bad drawings, even by taking thought; she discovered, however, that, though both were dexterous, neither of them was ambidexterous, and that their left-handed efforts were quite as bad as anything produced by the Poison-Pen, if not worse. Miss Pyke, indeed, on being shown the Harpy picture, pointed out that it was, in several respects, inconsistent with the classical conception of this monster; but there again it was clearly easy enough for the expert to assume ignorance; and perhaps the eagerness with which she drew attention to the incidental errors told as much against her as in her favour.

Another trifling but curious episode, occurring on the third Monday in term, was the complaint of an agitated and conscientious First-Year that she had left a harmless modern novel open upon the table in the Fiction Library, and that on her return to fetch it after an afternoon on the river, she had found several pages from the middle of the book—just where she was reading—ripped out and strewn about the room. The First-Year, who was a County Council Scholar, and as poor as a church mouse, was almost in tears; it really wasn’t her fault; should she have to replace the book? The Dean, to whom the question was addressed, said, No; it certainly didn’t seem to be the First-Year’s fault. She made a note of the outrage: “
The Search
by C. P. Snow, pp. 327 to 340 removed and mutilated, May 13th,” and passed the information on to Harriet, who incorporated it in her diary of the case, together with such items as: “March 7—abusive letter by post to Miss de Vine,” “March 11—ditto. to Miss Hillyard and Miss Layton,” “April 29—Harpy drawing to Miss Flaxman,” of which she had now quite a formidable list.

So the Summer Term set in, sun-flecked and lovely, a departing April whirled on wind-spurred feet towards a splendour of May. Tulips danced in the Fellows’ Garden; a fringe of golden green shimmered and deepened upon the secular beeches; the boats put out upon the Cher between the budding banks, and the wide reaches of the Isis were strenuous with practising eights. Black gowns and summer frocks fluttered up and down the streets of the city and through the College gates, making a careless heraldry with the green of smooth turf and the silver-sable of ancient stone; motorcar and bicycle raced perilously side by side through narrow turnings and the wail of gramophones made hideous the water-ways from Magdalen Bridge to far above the new By-pass. Sunbathers and untidy tea-parties desecrated Shrewsbury Old Quad, newly-whitened tennis-shoes broke out like strange, unwholesome flowers along plinth and window-ledge, and the Dean was forced to issue a ukase in the matter of the bathing-dresses which flapped and fluttered, flag-fashion, from every coign of vantage. Solicitous tutors began cluck and brood tenderly over such ripening eggs of scholarship as were destined to hatch out damply in the Examination Schools after their three years incubation; candidates, realising with a pang that they had now fewer than eight weeks in which to make up for cut lectures and misspent working hours, went flashing from Bodley to lecture-room and from Camera to coaching; and the thin trickle of abuse from the Poison-Pen was swamped and well-nigh forgotten in that stream of genial commination always poured out from the lips of examinees elect upon examining bodies. Nor, in the onset of Schools Fever, was a lighter note lacking to the general delirium. The draw for the Schools Sweep was made in the Senior Common Room, and Harrier found herself furnished with the names of two “horses,” one of whom, a Miss Newland, was said to be well fancied. Harriet asked who she was, having never to her knowledge seen or heard of her.

“I don’t suppose you have,” said the Dean. “She’s a shy child. But Miss Shaw thinks she’s pretty safe for a First.”

“She isn’t looking well this term, though,” said the Bursar. “I hope she isn’t going to have a break-down or anything. I told her the other day she ought not to cut Hall so often.”

“They
will
do it,” said the Dean. “It’s all very well to say they can’t be bothered to change when they come off the river and prefer pyjamas and an egg in their rooms; but I’m sure a boiled egg and a sardine aren’t sustaining enough to do Schools on.”

“And the mess it all makes for the scouts to clear up,” grumbled the Bursar. “It’s almost impossible to get the rooms done by eleven when they’re crammed with filthy crockery.”

“It isn’t being out on the river that’s the matter with Newland,” said the Dean. “That child works.”

“All the worse,” said the Bursar. “I distrust the candidate who swots in her last term. I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if your horse scratched, Miss Vane. She looks nervy to me.”

“That’s very depressing,” said Harriet. “Perhaps I’d better sell half my ticket while the price is good. I agree with Edgar Wallace, ‘Give me a good stupid horse who will eat his oats.’ Any offers for Newland?”

“What’s that about Newland?” demanded Miss Shaw, coming up to them. They were having coffee in the Fellows’ Garden at the time. “By the way, Dean, couldn’t you put up a notice about sitting on the grass in the New Quad? I have had to chase two parties off. We cannot have the place looking like Margate Beach.”

“Certainly not. They know quite
well
it isn’t allowed.
Why
are women undergraduates so sloppy?”

“They’re always exceedingly anxious to be like the men,” said Miss Hillyard, sarcastically, “but I notice the likeness doesn’t extend to showing respect for the College grounds.”

“Even you must admit that men have some virtues,” said Miss Shaw.

“More tradition and discipline, that’s all,” said Miss Hillyard.

“I don’t know,” said Miss Edwards. “I think women are messier by nature. They are naturally picnic-minded.”

“It’s nice to sit out in the open air in this lovely weather,” suggested Miss Chilperic, almost apologetically (for her student days were not far behind her), “and they don’t think how awful it looks.”

“In hot weather,” said Harriet, moving her chair back into the shade, “men have the common sense to stay indoors, where it’s cooler.”

“Men,” said Miss Hillyard, “have a passion for frowst.”

“Yes,” said Miss Shaw, “but what were you saying about Miss Newland? You weren’t offering to sell your chance. Miss Vane, were you? Because, take it from me, she’s a hot favourite. She’s the Latymer Scholar, and her
work’s
brilliant.”

“Somebody suggested she was off her feed and likely to be a non-starter.”

“That’s very unkind,” said Miss Shaw, with indignation. “Nobody’s any right to say such things.”

“I think she looks harassed and on edge,” said the Bursar. “She’s too hard-working and conscientious. She hasn’t got the wind-up about Schools, has she?”

“There’s nothing wrong with her work,” said Miss Shaw. “She does look a little pale, but I expect it’s the sudden heat.”

“Possibly she’s worried about things at home,” suggested Mrs. Goodwin. She had returned to College on the 9th May, her boy having taken a fortunate turn for the better, though he was still not out of the wood. She looked anxious and sympathetic.

“She’d have told me if she had been,” said Miss Shaw. “I encourage my students to confide in me. Of course she’s a very reserved girl, but I have done my best to draw her out, and I feel sure I should have heard if there was anything on her mind.”

“Well,” said Harriet, “I must see this horse of mine before I decide what to do about my sweep-stake ticket. Somebody must point her out.”

“She’s up in the Library at this moment, I fancy,” said the Dean; “I saw her stewing away there just before dinner-cutting Hall as usual. I nearly spoke to her. Come and stroll through. Miss Vane. If she’s there, we’ll chase her out for the good of her soul. I want to look up a reference, anyhow.”

Harriet got up, laughing, and accompanied the Dean.

“I sometimes think,” said Miss Martin, “that Miss Shaw would get more real confidence from her pupils if she wasn’t always probing into their little insides. She likes people to be fond of her, which I think is rather a mistake. Be kind, but leave ’em alone, is my motto. The shy ones shrink into their shells when they’re poked, and the egotistical ones talk a lot of rubbish to attract attention. However, we all have our methods.”

She pushed open the Library door, halted in the end bay to consult a book and verify a quotation, and then led the way through the long room. At a table near the centre, a thin, fair girl was working amid a pile of reference books. The Dean stopped.

“You still here, Miss Newland? Haven’t you had any dinner?”

“I’ll have some later, Miss Martin. It was so hot, and I want to get this language paper done.”

The girt looked startled and uneasy. She pushed the damp hair back from her forehead. The whites of her eyes showed like those of a fidgety horse.

“Don’t you be a little juggins, said the Dean. “All work and no play is simply silly in your Schools term. If you go on like this, we’ll have to send you away for a rest-cure and forbid work altogether for a week or so. Have you got a headache? You look as if you had.”

“Not very much. Miss Martin.”

“For goodness’ sake,” said the Dean, “chuck that perishing old Ducange and Meyer-Lübke or whoever it is and go away and play. I’m always having to chase the Schools people off to the river and into the country,” she added, turning to Harriet. “I wish they’d all be like Miss Camperdown—she was after your time. She frightened Miss Pyke by dividing the whole of her Schools term between the river and the tennis courts, and she ended up with a First in Greats.”

Miss Newland looked more alarmed than ever. “I don’t seem able to think,” she confessed. “I forget things and go blank.”

“Of course you do,” said the Dean, briskly. “Sure sign you’re doing too much. Stop it at once. Get up now and get yourself some food and then take a nice novel or something, or find somebody to have a knock-up with you.”

“Please don’t bother. Miss Martin. I’d rather go on with this. I don’t feel like eating and I don’t care about tennis—I wish you wouldn’t bother!” she finished, rather hysterically.

“All right,” said the Dean; “bless you,
I
don’t want to fuss. But do be sensible.”

“I will, really. Miss Martin. I’ll just finish this paper. I couldn’t feel comfortable if I hadn’t. I’ll have something to eat then and go to bed. I promise I will.”

“That’s a good girl.” The Dean passed on, out of the Library, and said to Harriet:

“I don’t like to see them getting into that state. What do you think of your horse’s chance?”

“Not much,” said Harriet. “I do know her. That is, I’ve seen her before. I saw her last on Magdalen Tower.”

“What?” said the Dean. “Oh, lord!”

Of Lord Saint-George, Harriet had not seen very much during that first fortnight of term. His arm was out of a sling; but a remaining weakness in it had curbed his sporting activities, and when she did see him, he informed her that he was working. The matter of the telegraph pole and the insurance had been safely adjusted and the parental wrath avoided. “Uncle Peter,” to be sure, had had something to say about it, but Uncle Peter, though scathing, was as safe as houses. Harriet encouraged the young gentleman to persevere with his work and refused an invitation to dine and meet “his people.” She had no particular wish to meet the Denvers, and had hitherto successfully avoided doing so.