The Brave (3 page)

It had only recently begun to dawn on Tommy that his parents were a lot older than those of other children his age. His mother was nearly fifty and his father nearly sixty. People often thought they were his grandparents. His mother had once explained that they had tried for many years for a little brother or sister for Diane but that God hadn't wanted it to happen. Then, at last, along came Tommy. He was a blessing, she said. What had changed God's mind Tommy didn't know. And he wasn't quite sure about the blessing bit either, because he'd once overheard Auntie Vera describe him as an accident. Perhaps it was possible to be both.

"Good heavens. Still awake, are we?"

His father was peering in from the landing outside Tommy's bedroom, his unlit pipe sticking like Popeye's from the corner of his mouth. This meant he had to talk with his teeth clenched, which made him sound like a ventriloquist's dummy. The opposite of Tommy's mother in almost every respect, his father was tall and thin, with lots of bony angles to him. His clothes always seemed to have enough room for two of him. His hair was thick and floppy and silvery white except at the front where it was stained yellow by smoke from his pipe.

"Wagon Train," Tommy explained.

"Ah."

He stood, swaying a little, outside the bedroom door as if he couldn't decide whether to come in or say goodnight from where he was. He made a little jutting movement with his chin.

"That old fellow's going to miss you."

Tommy didn't know what this meant. He put Custer's Last Stand down and watched his father step carefully among all the toy cowboys and Indians who waged constant war across the carpet. He looked as if he wanted to sit down on the bed but then noticed its strange angle and the logs propping it up and decided it was safer to stand. The bedside lamp made his baggy cavalry twill trousers glow while his top half remained in shadow. He plucked the teddy bear from the pillow and Tommy realized that this was the "old fellow" he'd been talking about.

"Hmm. Poor old chap's looking a bit worse for wear."

It was true. Old Ted had bald patches and bore the scars of many repairs. He'd once belonged to Diane and had been the victim of countless fantastic misfortunes. He'd been tortured and hanged, burnt at the stake, tossed from windows and subjected to hugely invasive surgery.

"Can't I take him with me?"

His father laughed.

"Teddy bears at prep school? Good heavens, no! What would they think?"

"What would who think?"

"Staff, other boys, everyone."

"Doesn't everyone have a teddy bear?"

"Only when they're little."

He ruffled Tommy's hair.

"Don't worry, we'll look after him."

He tucked the bear back into bed.

"Well, better see what the old girl's done to my supper. Lights out now."

He bent down and for a moment Tommy thought he was going to kiss him, which he hadn't done for years. But he was just looking for the lamp switch. His tweed jacket smelled of smoke and the whisky he'd been drinking at the golf club.

"Emptied the bilges, have we?"

"Yes."

"Let's see if we can have a dry night then, hmm?"

"I'll try."

"That's the spirit. Night-night, old chap."

"Night."

Tommy lay on his back, staring at the slice of yellow light that angled across the ceiling from the landing while he performed his nightly ritual, reciting in a whisper one hundred times, I will not wet the bed, I will not wet the bed, I will not wet the bed...

His parents were watching the TV news in the sitting room. A man was talking about President Eisenhower coming back to London from Scotland where he'd been to visit the queen. His first name was Dwight but everyone called him Ike. He seemed like a nice old man. Tommy had a photo of him shaking hands with John Wayne.

His thoughts drifted back to Flint and how clever he was to have found those hoofprints by the river. He wondered what would have happened to the little girl if she hadn't been rescued from the Indians. Worse than boarding school, for sure. Just two days more at home and that was where he would be. The place had looked pleasant enough in the spring when his mother and father had taken him to see it. Vast rolling lawns and lots of trees. Football pitches. A gym with ropes you could climb. Maybe it wouldn't be too bad after all.

Somewhere in the float of these thoughts, Tommy must have fallen asleep because the next thing he knew was that the house was all quiet and the landing light had been switched off. Someone was stroking his forehead.

"Diane?"

"Hello, my darling," she whispered.

She was kneeling beside his bed and he had the impression that she'd been there for some time. She leaned closer and kissed his cheek. She was still wearing her raincoat. Her hair smelled of flowers.

"Have you just got here?"

"Yes."

She kept stroking his forehead. Her hand felt soft and cool. In the dark he couldn't see her face clearly but her smile was sad and somehow he knew she'd been crying.

"What's the matter?"

She put her finger to her lips.

"Sshh. You'll wake them. Nothing's the matter. Just happy to see you, that's all."

Now it was his eyes that welled with tears.

"Diane?"

"What, darling? What is it?"

"I don't want to go to boarding school."

He started to cry and that started her off again. She gathered him up in her arms and he buried his face in the warm scented softness of her neck. And they clung to each other and wept.

ASHLAWN PREPARATORY School for Boys was an imposing Gothic mansion in red brick, complete with ramparts, ornate turrets and various reputed ghosts. It stood on a low hill in twenty acres of parkland planted with oaks and cedars and girdled by a six-foot wall topped with barbed wire of ambiguous purpose. The mansion had been built by a Victorian industrialist who had risen from the slums of Birmingham to make his fortune in the colonies, a fortune which he promptly lost, whereupon the building, intended as a monument to his elevated social standing, became instead, for the next seventy years, a home for the mentally deranged.

During the First World War the clientele was expanded to accommodate a hundred and twenty shell-shocked soldiers and only when the last of them had died or otherwise departed were its decaying corridors and dormitories modestly refurbished as a school. There were smarter, more expensive prep schools in the county to which the sons of established upper- and middle-class families were dispatched. Ashlawn was for the more transitional, both upward and downward, whose social aspirations or pretensions outstretched their means.

For the benefit of the outside world and fee-paying parents, the impressive iron gates, adorned with the school crest and motto, Semper Fortis, were regularly repainted and the half-mile meander of driveway rigorously weeded. But in the darker, more remote reaches of the mansion itself, where parents were less likely to stray, little had changed in half a century. The flaking gloss paint, in shades of institutional brown and pale green, remained untouched; the original pipework clanked beneath the worm-ridden floorboards; the iron-framed beds, painted in chipped black enamel, still had slots for the canvas straps that had once restrained the unruly; and the wooden benches of the dank and fetid changing room still bore the etched initials of the demented and the desperate.

For the new arrivals, or newbugs, as they were not so affectionately known, fresh faced and swamped by their oversized uniforms, the changing room was one of Ashlawn's most fearful places. One of the first things they discovered was that this was the chamber to which boys were summoned after lights-out for official beatings by the staff and, at almost any other time, for less official but much more inventive torture by the school's many bullies. The walls above the engraved benches were lined with neatly named pegs and wire cages where the boys kept their sports kit. The air was laced with the smell of wet and putrefying socks. Except for a grimy skylight in the adjoining shower room, the only light came from a single bare bulb that dangled from a fraying cord.

It was here that Tommy Bedford, three days and three miraculously dry nights after his arrival, now stood in his baggy knee-length rugby shorts and spotless white shirt, trying to untie the laces of his rugby boots. They had been knotted tightly and intricately to the wire of his cage and his fingernails were bitten too short to free them. His games group was being supervised by the house tutor, Mr Brent, who Tommy already knew was the strictest and meanest of all the masters. The other boys had already set off for the playing fields and, as the echo of their voices faded from the corridor outside, panic was rising in his chest.

"Naughty newbug. Going to be late for games, aren't we?"

Tommy didn't yet know many of the older boys but he knew this one. Everybody knew to steer clear of Critchley. And of his henchman, Judd, whose leering face now appeared in the doorway behind him. They were probably about eleven years old and were in Remove B, otherwise known as Dumbos, the class they put you in if you were stupid or lazy or both.

"Oh, dear. Got our laces in a muddle, have we?" Judd said.

"Yes."

"What's your name, newbug?"

"Bedford."

"Oh, you're the Log Boy, aren't you?" Critchley said.

He was tall and sinewy, with flaxen hair that flopped over his forehead. Judd was squat and broad, with a meaty butcher's-boy face. Tommy busied himself with the laces, pretending not to have heard. Nor did he look at them. One of the first things newbugs learned was not to get caught staring at older boys. If you did they would tell you to face off and probably punch you or get you in a headlock. From the corner of his eye he could see the two boys sauntering closer.

"Are you deaf as well as stupid, Log Boy?"

"No, sir—I mean, no, Critchley."

"I said, you're the Log Boy, aren't you?"

"What are they for then?" Judd said.

"What are what for?" His voice sounded tiny, crimped with fear.

"The logs, you slimy little turd."

Matron had been informed about Tommy's bed-wetting but, so far, nobody else knew. He'd already been teased about the logs and, on Diane's advice, had told anyone who asked that he suffered from poor circulation and that sleeping at an angle helped his blood flow better. He started to explain this but didn't get very far. Critchley grabbed hold of his ear and began to twist it.

"Get off!"

He lashed out and knocked the hand away. His knees were shaking and he felt his bladder begin to loosen.

"Oooh, look." Critchley sneered. "Log Boy's got a temper."

Tommy glared at them, his heart thumping.

"Face off!" Critchley yelled.

Tommy looked down and in the same instant, Judd stepped behind him and pinned his arms behind his back. Critchley had hold of both ears now and twisted them until Tommy thought they were going to rip loose from his head. He felt the tears starting to roll down his face and, far worse, a warm trickle down the inside of his thigh. Critchley must have smelled it for he let go of Tommy's ears and stepped back to watch.

"Oh, dearie, dearie me, what's going on here?"

Tommy's long green woollen socks absorbed some of the flow but soon he was standing in a small but spreading puddle. Judd released his arms and stood beside Critchley, their two faces contorting with delight and revulsion.

"Ugh!"

"How disgusting. Log Boy, you are disgusting. What are you?"

Tommy didn't answer. Judd grabbed him by the ear.

"What are you?"

"Disgusting," Tommy said quietly, trying not to whimper.

"That's right. Disgusting."

There were footsteps coming down the corridor now and from the important click of steel-tipped heels all three boys knew it was one of the masters.

"Tell him we're here, Log Boy, and you're dead meat. Okay?"

Tommy nodded and the two boys darted past him and disappeared into the adjoining shower room. Tommy stood where he was, ears aglow, while the footsteps came closer and stopped. The kind and ruddy face of Mr Lawrence, who taught English and Latin, leaned in around the open door.

"Hello, who have we here?"

"Bedford, sir."

"Bedford."

"Yes, sir."

Mr Lawrence glanced down at the puddle at Tommy's feet.

"Ah. Hard luck, old chap. Let's get you cleaned up, shall we?"

Fifteen minutes later, Mr Lawrence delivered Tommy, in a giant pair of borrowed shorts, down to the muddy plateau of the playing fields. It was starting to rain. Mr Lawrence had a quiet word with Mr Brent, who nodded and snapped at Tommy not to be late again then started yelling at another boy whose shirt wasn't properly tucked in. Tommy must have looked petrified because Mr Lawrence, as he left, put a hand on his shoulder and winked.

"Semper fortis, Bedford," he said quietly. "Semper fortis."

"Sir."

Mr Brent blew his whistle and, with the icy autumn rain whipping around their knees, Tommy and two dozen other miserable eight-year-olds spent the next ninety minutes running around in the mud and hurting one another and being constantly hectored by Mr Brent.

It seemed more like years than days since he'd stood on the gravel forecourt, waving goodbye to his parents and Diane. He could still see his sister's distraught face looking back at him through the rear window as the Rover pulled away down the driveway. She had been more upset than any of them, even Tommy. The new boys had been told to report to school an hour earlier than the older boys. Tommy had helped his father and Diane haul his trunk and tuck box into the hall, where Mr and Mrs Rawlston, the headmaster and his wife, stood chatting with the other new parents. When it was their turn, his father gave his customary hard handshake (perhaps even a Masonic one) and Tommy noticed Mrs Rawlston wince a little. Diane didn't shake hands because she was crying too much.

"Righty-o then, Tommy," his father said. "We'll be off now."

He held out his hand and Tommy braced himself for the squeeze. "Good luck, old chap."

There were tears in his mother's eyes now too. He'd never seen her cry before. She kissed him on the cheek. Tommy was biting his lip. His father had told him several times that to be seen blubbing wasn't a good idea.

"Matron's got the logs," his mother whispered. "Don't let her forget."

"I won't."

It was the way Diane hugged him that finally put him over the edge and turned on his own tears. She was sobbing and her face was streaked black from her eye make-up.

"Come on, old chap," his father said, glancing around. "Let's have none of that."

When the parents had all gone, the newbugs were shepherded into the dining hall for tea with Matron. There were about twenty of them, some still snivelling, some simply wide-eyed with shock. They were all told to stand around a long table laid with plates of sandwiches and lurid yellow fruitcake. Miss Davies, the matron, was short and wide and wore a blue uniform and round glasses whose lenses were so thick they made her eyes appear huge and fierce. This, along with the starched white wings of her headdress, made her seem like an overweight bird of prey preparing to swoop. She took her place at the head of the table, bowed her head and clasped her hands together. Tommy noticed she had long whiskers on her chin.

"May the Lord make us truly grateful," she said in a broad Welsh accent. "Amen."

One or two of them muttered Amen. But clearly not enough for Matron. She made everyone repeat it.

"And say it as if you mean it."

They did and she told them they could be seated.

"Tuck in now, boys."

There was a choice of water, milk or tea from a huge metal teapot. Tommy chose milk.

For about five minutes nobody, not even Matron, uttered another word. She kept checking the time on the small stainless steel watch pinned to her bosom. Outside in the corridors they could hear the voices of the older boys arriving. They sounded happy to be back, which Tommy found both perplexing and slightly encouraging. He studied his fellow newbugs. Nobody seemed hungry. They were mostly just staring at their plates. The only one still crying was the boy sitting next to him. He had a podgy pink face and dark curly hair and glasses with pink frames in which the left lens was frosted so that you couldn't see his eye. The name tape on his sodden handkerchief said WADLOW. P. His crying was so loud and vigorous that it was soon the focus of attention for the entire table.

"Hush now, boy," Matron chided gently. "That's enough. Eat your sandwich."

Wadlow obeyed but it didn't stop his crying, merely modified its tone. Tommy noticed the boy sitting opposite him was grinning. He had freckles and a shock of dark red hair and was the only one at the table who seemed to be enjoying himself. He was by now on his fourth sandwich. He gave Tommy a wink and Tommy, who had never been able to master the art of winking, gave him a forced little smile instead. He was just starting to think he might have found a friend, when Wadlow started to make a strange gurgling sound, leaned forward and threw up, spectacularly, all over the table. A dozen other boys promptly burst into tears.

The red-haired boy was called Dickie Jessop and Tommy was pleased to find they were in the same dormitory and in the same class. Over the next couple of days the two of them became friends. Dickie's parents lived in Hong Kong and he only saw them once a year when he flew out there for the summer. He had been at various boarding schools since he was five years old and after just one day told Tommy that Ashlawn wasn't half as bad as others he'd known. He was funny and was always cracking jokes and didn't seem afraid of anyone or anything. He was cheeky with some of the teachers and the older boys but did it with such charm that they didn't seem to mind. Best of all, he adored westerns and knew almost as much about them as Tommy did. Tommy asked him who his number one cowboy was and without a moment's hesitation Dickie said it was Flint McCullough from Wagon Train. They shook on it.

At teatime on that third day, after rugby, Tommy told him quietly about his encounter with Critchley and Judd in the changing room, though he left out the part about wetting his pants and pretended to have acted rather more courageously than in fact he had.

Dickie heard him out then nodded gravely.

"We'll get 'em," he said.

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"Don't worry. You don't have to. I will."

Tommy was dry again that night. That made four nights in a row. He'd never gone that long before and felt cautiously elated. He had upped his nightly recitation of I will not wet the bed to two hundred times and it seemed to be working. After breakfast, when he went to Matron's room for his daily spoonful of cod liver oil, she almost smiled at him.