22: The Scent of Acacia
Then something happened which none of us had reckoned on. The course of the Master’s disease seemed to have slowed down. Just after the Easter vacation, we began to suspect that the election might not be held that summer. Sitting in the combination room, the smell of wisteria drifting through the open window, we heard Crawford expound: in his judgement, the Master would not die until the early autumn. He had been just as positive in forecasting a quick end, I remembered, but he commented on the new situation without humbug. ‘Speaking as a friend of Royce’s, I take it one should be glad. He’s only in discomfort, he’s not in pain, and I get the impression that he’s still interested in living. I expect he’d prefer to go on even as he is than have anyone accelerate the process. Speaking as a fellow, it upsets our arrangements, which is a nuisance and I’m not going to pretend otherwise,’ said Crawford. ‘I had hoped we should have made all our dispositions by next academic year, and it doesn’t look like that now.’
Imperturbably, Crawford gave us a physiological explanation of the slowing-down of the disease.
After that news, the air was laden with emotion. Each time I passed the wisteria in the court, I thought of the Master, who, Roy said, was amused at his reprieve: that odour was reaching him for the last time in his life. The college smelt of flowers all through the early summer: I thought of Joan, eating her heart out with love, and Roy, so saddened that I was constantly afraid.
As the news went round that the Master would live months longer, the college became more tense. Some people, such as Chrystal, were glad to forget the election altogether. Chrystal’s interest passed entirely to the negotiations with Sir Horace, which had not gone much further since the night of the feast; Sir Horace wrote frequently to Brown, but the letters were filled with questions about his nephew’s chances in the Tripos; occasionally he asked for a piece of information about the college, but Brown saw no hope of ‘bringing him to the boil’ until the boy’s examination was over. Brown himself was coaching him several hours a week during that term. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, ‘whether Sir Horace is ever going to turn up trumps. But I do know that our prospects vanish, presuming they exist at all, if our young friend has to go down without a degree.’
But Chrystal, along with Pilbrow, was an exception in shelving the Mastership. With most men, the antagonism became sharper just because of the delay. Nerves were on edge, there was no release in any kind of action, there seemed no end to this waiting. Nightingale’s gossip about Roy went inexorably on. It infected even Winslow, who normally showed a liking for Roy. Winslow was heard to say, ‘I used to think that my colleagues were more distinguished for character than for the more superficial gifts of intelligence. The Senior Tutor appears to have chosen supporters who seem determined to remove part of that impression.’
The gossip came round to Roy, though we tried to shield him. His spirits had been darker since the day he comforted Lady Muriel, and now, as he heard how he was being traduced, there were nights when he sank into despondency. Usually he would have cared less than most men what others said, but just then the sky had gone black for him. His was a despondency which others either did not notice or passed over; it would have struck no one as specially frightening, except him and me. Often we walked round the streets at night. The whole town smelt of gilliflower and lilac. The skies were luminous, windows were thrown open in the hot May evenings. I tried to lift Roy from sadness, if only for a minute: almost imperceptibly, he shook his head.
Nightingale was making other attacks, not only those on Roy. One night towards the end of May, Luke asked if he could talk to me. I took him up to my room, and he burst out: ‘I’ve had about as much as I can stand of this man Nightingale. I’m beginning to think I’ve been quiet in this college for almost long enough. One of these days I shall do the talking, and by God they’ll get a surprise.’
‘What’s Nightingale done now?’
‘He’s as good as told me that unless I switch over to Crawford they’ll see that I’m not made a permanency.’
‘I shouldn’t pay too much attention—’
‘Do you think I should pay attention? I told him as politely as I could — and I wished I hadn’t got to be so blasted polite — that I’d see him damned first. Do they think I’m the sort of lad they can bully into going through any bloody hoop?’
‘They probably do.’ I smiled, though I was angry myself. I was growing very fond of him. When he was angry, he was angry from head to toe, angry in every inch of his tough, square, powerful body. It was the same with every mood — his hopes or disappointments about his work, even his passionate discretion. He threw the whole of his nature into each of them. On this night he was angry as one whole human integer of flesh and bone. ‘They probably do. They’re wrong.’
‘They’ll be surprised how wrong they are,’ Luke fumed. ‘I should like to be kept in this college, it’s much nicer than the old dockyard, but do they think they’ve only got to whistle and I’m theirs? They can do their damnedest, and I shan’t starve. A decent scientist will get some sort of job. They’re just trying to blackmail me because I’m afraid to lose my comforts.’
I told him that ‘they’ could only be Nightingale himself. I could not believe that Francis Getliffe knew anything of this move, and I said that I would confront him with it. Luke, still angry, went off to his laboratory in the summer evening.
I should have spoken to Francis Getliffe the following night, but found that he had left Cambridge (the examinations had begun, and lectures were over for the year) for some Air Ministry experiments. He was not expected back for a fortnight, and so I told Brown about Luke.
‘Confound those people,’ he said. ‘I’m a mild man, but they’re going too far. I’m not prepared to tolerate many more of these outrages. I don’t know about you, but it makes me more determined to stick in my heels against Crawford. I’m damned if I’ll see them get away with it.’
We each found ourselves holding the other side collectively responsible for Nightingale’s doings. Just as young Luke stormed about what ‘they’ had threatened, so did Arthur Brown: and I felt the same. There were times when we all saw the other side through a film of enmity. We forgot who they were and what they were truly like. We were becoming victims of something like war hysteria. And that happened to Brown, who was as sensible, tolerant, and level-headed as a man can be: it happened to me, who was not a partisan by nature.
At that time we were a little ashamed of ourselves, and I thought, when I next saw Brown, that he was going a roundabout way to atone. ‘I’m wondering about enlarging the claret party this year.’
Brown’s claret party took place each year at the beginning of June. ‘I’m inclined to think it would be rather statesmanlike. After all, we’ve got to live with the present society even if we slide Jago in. Mind you, I’m all against trying to make arrangements with the other side over the election. But I should regard it as reasonable to remind them that we’re still capable of enjoying their company. It would be a decent gesture to invite some of them to the party.’
And so the claret party consisted of Winslow, Crawford, Pilbrow, Roy Calvert, me and Brown himself. Like so much of that summer, it tantalized me. The night was tranquil, the college had never looked more beautiful. I should be lucky if I had the chance to drink wine so good again. But Roy’s melancholy had got worse, and all the time I was fearing one of his outbursts. Most of that night, I could think of nothing else.