A moment later he knew with a terrible certainty that he was not safe. The doors at
the far end of the Hall under the Musicians’ Gallery had been flung open and four waiters
entered carrying on their shoulders like some monstrous bier a vast pig, a tusked boar
with a blackened apple in its mouth. Behind them came waiters with two more great roast
boar. And beside the first pig came Kudzuvine dressed from top to toe in black with an
enormous carving knife and fork in his hands. For several seconds Hartang gazed at the
ghastly beasts in frozen terror. At the long tables the undergraduates were shouting and
clapping enthusiastically. It was bedlam in the Hall. Then with a scream only he could
hear his mouth opened but no sound came out–the financier struggled to his feet unable to
take his eyes off the approaching monstrosity. This was death and Kudzuvine was its
herald. The Master’s great Chair fell back with a crash and Hartang recoiled in horror.
The Fellows had no eyes for him. They stared at the boar with astonishment and delight.
The Chaplain’s simple Grace, ‘For what we are about to receive may the good Lord be
thanked,’ had been answered in full measure. So had the Praelector’s intention. Hartang
staggered a few steps and fell.
‘Kudzuvine, attend your Master,’ ordered the Praelector and Kudzuvine came round the
table, but there was no need for his appearance to complete the charade. Hartang was
already dead.
‘A Porterhouse Blue, do you think?’ the Senior Tutor enquired when the body had been
removed and the great boar had been carved by the Chef.
‘Less a Blue than a yellow, if you ask me,’ said the Dean, who had suddenly remembered
Hartang’s phobia about pigs on the tape.
‘It looks as though we are going to have to look for another source of funding,’ said
‘the Bursar sadly. ‘It’s really most unfortunate.’
‘I don’t somehow think we need to worry about the College finances,’ the Praelector
said as he helped himself to some more apple sauce. ‘I happen to know he died without
making a will.’
‘You mean…’ the Senior Tutor began.
‘Intestate. No next of kin. And in such cases the Crown, as you know, is the
beneficiary. I think we will find we have not been forgotten. After all we have been most
cooperative in dealing with a very unpleasant situation.’
The Fellows gazed at him in amazement and almost stopped eating.
‘But that will mean the Prime Minister will appoint the new Master,’ said the Senior
Tutor. ‘We may well end up with Tebbit.’
‘I can think of worse choices,’ said the Dean with unintended perception.
‘You seem to forget that the Master is still with us,’ said the Praelector and
directed his gaze at Skullion. ‘He has the traditional right to name his successor, and
I can think of no better moment.’
At the end of the table Skullion raised his head and made his pronouncement. For one
terrible moment it looked as though the Dean was going to follow Hartang’s example, but
he had merely swallowed a piece of crackling the wrong way and tried to say something. When
he had stopped coughing and had been given another glass of Fonbadet he was still
incapable of speech.
‘What did the Dean say?’ shouted the Chaplain.
‘God knows,’ the Praelector said with the utmost tact.
It was mid-summer before Purefoy Osbert had completed the first edition of what he
now thought of as Skullion’s memoirs. It was by no means the final version, was
ostensibly no more than the punctuated transcript of the long monologue, but he felt it
was enough to indicate to Lady Mary that he had not been wasting his time. Mrs Ndhlovo
typed it out for him–Purefoy was far too busy cross-referencing the College archives even
to look at the final version. Then to save him the trouble she took it down to London and
delivered it to Lapline and Goodenough. Mr Lapline read the manuscript over and over again
and on each reading was more and more appalled. ‘We can’t possibly let her see this,’ he
told Goodenough. ‘It’s out of the question.’
‘I don’t see why not. After all, she asked for the facts and she has obviously got
them.’
‘Yes, but she didn’t know she was going to get the most scurrilous account of her
husband’s time as an undergraduate. I had no idea he was capable of such things. This bit
about blackmailing the Praelector would be enough to kill her. The man was an absolute
shit.’
‘We knew that already,’ said Goodenough. ‘Married for money and all that sort of
thing.’
‘I daresay, but not all this sort of thing.’
‘Quite a different kettle of fish, eh?’
Mr Lapline winced. ‘I wish you wouldn’t use expressions of that sort, Goodenough. It is
painful enough having to digest this filth without additional culinary references.
You’ll be telling me next that Porterhouse was a positive stew.’ He smiled bleakly at his
own pun.
‘It certainly makes Sir Cathcart D’Eath’s peculiar tendencies slightly more
understandable,’ Goodenough said. ‘Though why he should fancy large middle-aged women
in rubber beats me.’
‘Bedders and bedwetters,’ said Mr Lapline and left it at that.
‘Bedwetters? I missed that bit. Where is it?’
‘Never mind. The point is that we cannot possibly allow Lady Mary to see this…this
document. It would destroy what few illusions she has left. God knows she can’t have many
since the end of the Cold War. She shall carry her happy memories of her marriage to Sir
Godber to her grave.’
‘Reading that little lot I’d qualify the use of the word “happy”. Still, you’re
probably right. She’s old and there’s no use larding the bacon. Sorry, I meant rubbing
salt into the wound.’
In the secretary’s office Mrs Ndhlovo was explaining to Vera why she was leaving
Purefoy without telling him. ‘I don’t want to hurt him,’ she said.
Vera said she understood but doubted Purefoy would be hurt for long. ‘He falls in and
out of love all the time. He was once passionately in love with me or thought he was. And my
poor dear cousin is incapable of love or passion. He thinks all women are physical
versions of words. It’s the worst mistake possible. I doubt if he’ll ever get married to
anything more practical than a library. And at least you’ve got him off hanging. His
mother will be ever so grateful. She had a bad enough time with his father who was always
changing his mind. Purefoy’s mind never changes. He clings to consistent falsities.’
At Porterhouse Park Skullion and the Praelector sat on the verandah together and
stared out to sea across the mudflats and said-nothing. It was high summer and a few
holidaymakers wandered the coast path in search of escape from the boredom of having
nothing to do. The two old men knew better. There was no escape for them now. They had had
the good fortune to have had something to do and, each in his own way, they had achieved
something. The illusion sustained them now. There were no fishing boats out to sea and few
fish left to catch. Only the little dinghies and yachts remained aimlessly trawling the
wind for pleasure.
In the Master’s Lodge the new Master was explaining to Arthur the right proportions
needed for a really good Dog’s Nose. It was not easy. Arthur refused to understand that a
concoction made up of seven ounces of gin and thirteen ounces of beer could possibly add
up to three thirds. As he told Cheffy, ‘You’d think he had never been properly educated.
Talk about vague.’
‘Never known a don who wasn’t,’ said the Chef. ‘Not in their natures.’
Out, on his rock garden the Dean decided to get rid of the gunnera next to the pond. It
was gross and fleshy and coarsely out of place. Like so much he had come to detest, it came
from the Americas. He would replace it with something small and simple and elegant and
hardy. He was also thinking of the next Master. The Dog’s Nose man couldn’t last long. He
was drinking himself to death. It was the Dean’s one consolation.
His thoughts, inspired by the coming fate of the gunnera and the loathsome Pimpole,
turned towards the Japanese. What that infernal man Lapschott had said was true. The
Japanese were an island people, were in fact what the British had been, at once hardworking
and violent and ruthlessly efficient. They were inventive, and their engineering was
superb. They learnt from their mistakes, and they persevered. They were immensely rich,
they believed in discipline and the need for authority, and they understood the vital
importance of ritual and ceremony in preserving the decencies of life. Above all, they
had the virtues of courtesy and courage. They did their duty to the death. For the first time
in his life the Dean looked without shrinking into the face of the inconceivable and was
undismayed. He would work for the appointment of a Japanese Master of Porterhouse. And for
him.
It would be an honour.