The following Monday morning Mr Jones gave his presentation and it wasn’t bad and that afternoon he played squash with Professor Millin in the gym. Millin was number six on the ladder, not a serious opponent. An older man, a physics lecturer, well into his forties, although last week he had taken a game off Dunleavy who was currently in second place and Dunleavy was the sort who never let anyone have a game, ever.
“Heard you gave old Fred Dunleavy a run for his money,” Donald said conversationally as they walked down to the court.
“The big Scots ganch, I showed him! He’s slipping, he’s really slipping, getting a paunch. I tell you, you’ll cream him next time you play him, cream him,” Millin said.
Donald was happy to hear this. Dunleavy was a young Physical Education lecturer and for some time it had been his fear that Dunleavy would one day pull a superb game out of the bag and beat him.
“He’s been avoiding me for weeks, I suppose that’s why,” Donald said with satisfaction.
They paused outside the court to stretch. Donald looked at the squash ladder and was surprised to see a new name way down at the bottom, at number sixteen: V. M. Sinya.
“Who’s that?” he said, pointing at the name. Millin was the Ladder Secretary for this term, so he should know.
“Oh, yes, new fella, foreigner, bloody Pak…er, I mean, uh, an Indian gent, I think. Initials stand for Victor Mohammed so I suppose he’s a Muslim. He’s from Computer Science. A lot of those boys do computers nowadays.”
“Is he any good?” Donald asked with a hint of nervousness in his voice. Anyone new could be trouble and several world champions had come from Pakistan.
“How the hell should I know?” Millin replied with great indifference.
“All right, let’s go in,” Donald said putting all ominous thoughts of the newcomer out of his mind.
He let Millin have a few points early before cruising to an easy victory in four games. He showered, picked up Susan and drove home.
On Thursday the Dean told him that his student evaluations were up since last term and, after buttering him up, asked if he’d ever considered standing for the University Council. He had no such intention but the thought that the Dean was interested in him pleased him immensely.
On Friday he had a game with McCann who was number twelve on the ladder. McCann had been quite a useful little player until the drink had become the dominant force in his life. Now all he was left with was a powerful serve and a few trick shots. He had no stamina and he couldn’t get about the court. Donald never usually bothered to play anyone this low down but McCann was a friend. When he got to the court he was pleased to see that Mr V. M. Sinya was still at number sixteen. He hadn’t even been able to beat old Franklin at fifteen, clearly the man wasn’t much of a threat. He found that he was tremendously relieved by this. Was the ladder so important to him that the thought of a mysterious stranger had given him the jitters? He laughed at himself. What a dunderhead you are, he said to himself, and to prove his good humour he let McCann take a couple of games.
On Saturday he was still feeling sufficiently good to help out at the soup kitchen. Also at the weekend he received a letter to say that one of his papers on Chaucer was going to be anthologized in the new collection by Dalrimple. Things, in fact, were going so well that he began to be suspicious that something terrible was about to happen. Perhaps he would be informed that he had some dreadful illness or maybe he would crash the car.
Just in case, he took the train to work on Monday, sitting in a back carriage near the emergency exit and steeling himself for a sudden derailment.
Nothing happened except for fifty gum-chewing, messy, obnoxious children getting on at Greenisland who tormented him all the way to Central Station with their music and pointless celebrity gossip.
His fears of impending disaster were somewhat realized when he showed up at the court to play Dunleavy and he saw that the mysterious Mr Sinya was at number ten on the squash ladder. The man had demolished five opponents in a week! This meant, of course, he had displaced McCann, so at least he could interrogate his friend at lunch.
In an unusually brutal and hurried match he thrashed Dunleavy, showered quickly and found McCann in the office, eating toast and drinking tea mixed with whisky.
“What’s Sinya like?” he blurted out before even saying hello.
“Sinya, I’ve no idea, mate.”
“You played him.”
“I gave him a bye, he wanted to play me on Friday lunchtime and I just couldn’t be bothered.”
“You gave him a bye?”
“Yes.”
“So maybe that’s why he’s jumped up the ladder? People have been giving him byes.”
“Aye, could be,” McCann said, not at all interested.
Relief sank over Donald like chloroform and again he chastised himself for the importance he attached to something so silly as the squash ladder.
The relief lasted until Wednesday when he bumped into Millin coming out of the university bookshop. Millin informed him that Sinya had demolished him and that he, Sinya, was now number five on the ladder.
“What’s he like?” Donald asked, trying not to sound frantic or panicked.
“Oh, he’s good. Going to give you a pretty tough game.”
“What’s he like?” Donald insisted.
“Don’t get your knickers in a twist. He’s Pakistani. I suppose forty, perhaps older, it’s hard to tell with them. He’s fast, and my God…that serve, those returns! It’s a nightmare. You give him any opportunity and he destroys you. Our match was over in half an hour.”
Donald went home that night in a state of distress. He barely talked to Susan and he couldn’t concentrate on his proofs for the Dalrimple book.
From his upstairs study he stared at the boats in Carrickfergus marina and the grey castle beyond. The halyards were muzzled by the wind, the granite castle walls kept their own counsel.
Could it be that the squash ladder was perhaps the one thing that gave him any satisfaction, any sense of accomplishment, in what was really a rather pathetic, little, nondescript life?
Not the teaching, not the writing, not even Susan.
And now, inevitably, he was going to face his Nemesis. It was a melodramatic thought but he couldn’t shake it.
A few days later the phone rang in his office. With a sense of dread he picked up the receiver. Naturally it was Sinya. He had beaten Fenton and Dunleavy and he would like to play Donald whenever it was convenient.
His voice was pleasant enough, foreign but not very foreign, and gentle. Aye, that’s how they get you, Donald thought. Softly softly. Lull you and then go for the jugular. Bastards. Well, he wouldn’t let them. He wouldn’t take this lying down. This was his league, his campus. Who did this guy think he was, for Christ’s sake? He’d been going easy on these chumps, he could take them all with one hand behind his back. This guy was no different. Try to spook me? See about that. He realized that during this prolonged internal soliloquy Sinya had been waiting for a reply on the other end of the phone.
“This afternoon’s fine with me. One p.m.” he said quickly, hung up and attempted to bury himself in work until just before the match.
He arrived early but Sinya was already there, changed, waiting for him. They shook hands. Sinya was tall, bearded, good-looking. He had a very charming way about him. He smiled easily and was polite. He asked Donald how he was and enquired about Donald’s new (bought yesterday) super-light, super-strong, carbon-fibre, state-of-the-art Khan Slazenger Pro racket.
Sinya won the spin, served, and launched a tremendous dying serve that Donald barely returned, but of course Sinya was already at the front wall waiting to volley Donald’s weak backhand. Donald, anticipating a crushing return, ran to the back right of the court, but Sinya placed a perfect drop shot in the left front corner, flat-footing Donald and winning the point. Sinya won the next four points and then missed one. On Donald’s serve, Sinya volleyed the ball back so fast Donald didn’t even see it until it was too late.