Spud (15 page)

15:15   I had to stop The Guv abruptly in the middle of dramatising all the Shakespearian sonnets when I realised I was already fifteen minutes late for tea with Crispo. I sprinted along the road and at last came to an old looking house covered in ivy and surrounded by thick hedging. On a wide veranda, in an old rocking chair, sat my history teacher.

15:17   ‘If you were in military service, you’d be shot for desertion, young Milton.’ A wry smile played upon his face. ‘Of course,’ he continued, ‘seventeen minutes is about how long some countries held their nerve before squealing off like a bunch of wailing cowards. But let’s save those blasted Italians for later, shall we?’

‘Sorry I’m late, sir, I was held up…’ Crispo cut me off with a grunt and a wave of his scaly old hand. His maid, Gloria, set down some tea and biscuits and smiled warmly at me.

‘Lovely girl, that Gloria,’ said Crispo once she had left. Taken care of me since my Sybil passed away. Look at those beautiful lilies she planted. Arum lilies. As you get older it’s the small things that make one happy, Milton.’ For the first time I noticed a huge bed of white flowers, with a long yellow stem peeking out from the middle of each bloom. Crispo was right -just looking at them made you feel happy.

‘Now,’ he said suddenly, spitting out a volley of biscuit
pieces all over his cardigan, ‘where should I begin and what is it that you want to know?’ Before I could even answer, Crispo launched into the War, beginning with Hitler’s rise to power in the early thirties. The afternoon drifted away and we drank tea and ate biscuits, and I was lost in a terrifying world of long ago. Occasionally, I would ask a question, or gasp in real or fake surprise, but this was the ‘Crispo show’ and the old man was about as easy to stop as Fatty at a cake sale.

Afternoon became evening. Dinnertime and prep were approaching and I was still nowhere near bringing up Macarthur. (In fact, after nearly three hours of talking we were still only in the Spring of 1941!) Reluctantly, I excused myself, but Crispo refused to let me go. ‘Who’s your housemaster?’ he asked.

‘Spare-… er, Mr Wilson,’ I said. Crispo called for Gloria and she brought out the telephone. He called Sparerib and informed him that I would be working at his house this evening. And so it was done. Gloria brought out a blanket and spread it over Crispo’s legs to keep the autumn chill out of his bones and on we waded into the darkness of 1942.

After gorging myself on my second meal of roast beef of the day, we retired to the comfort of the log fire in his living room. The room was covered with maps and charts and War memorabilia. At last I seized on a moment of confusion on what day the Russian invasion began and turned the conversation back to the school. Crispo seemed thrilled when I mentioned the staff photograph of 1944! Ah, yes, 1944. I was carrying around half a ton of shrapnel in my shoulder. To think it – thirty-two years old and I am still here.’ There was a long silence as the years flashed past in the old man’s mind – it had to be now or never.

Tell me, sir, what happened to Mr Macarthur?’

For a moment there was a look of confusion on Crispo’s face as if he was searching for something,
and then suddenly his eyes seemed to darken in the firelight.

‘That is a memory long forgotten, young Milton. Why is it that you ask?’ Now it was my turn to be startled. I tried to stammer out a reply, but once again Crispo spoke without waiting for an answer. ‘He was a good man. A… a complex man. A good friend. We used to talk often – his son was also serving in the War.’ Another long silence followed with Crispo staring into the fire, seemingly lost in thought.

‘Why did he commit suicide?’ I decided to go for the jugular. (Excuse the pun.) Crispo looked at me with a strangely quizzical look. ‘Suicide?’ he asked. ‘Suicide, you say, Mr Milton? I… I’m, well…’ And then he stopped. Was he about to say that Macarthur’s death
wasn’t
suicide? Was it an accident then, or even murder? My heart was pounding – here was Spud Milton on the brink of solving the mystery of Macarthur.

Then Crispo said, ‘I never saw his end and I was glad of it. By then I was on my way back to North Africa. I shall always remember him as a proud and vital man. A good man.’ Another long silence followed. I wanted to press him for more but didn’t know how to do it. In the firelight Crispo’s face suddenly seemed tired and drained. I was reminded of Bilbo Baggins’ words to Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings, that The Guv and I had read earlier in the afternoon. The old hobbit said to the wizard: ‘I’m tired, Gandalf. I feel like butter spread over too much bread.’

Then Crispo spoke again, this time in a low, flat voice. ‘They say his ghost still patrols the school. Some have seen his image in the chapel and indeed in the old school buildings, places like your dormitory, Milton. A restless figure searching for rest or resolution perhaps… who knows – I myself have never believed in such things…’

We stared into the fire together, an old man full of
memories and stories, and a young boy whose memories lay before him. After a while he turned to me and said, ‘I hear they call you Spud.’ I nodded and felt the blood rushing to my face. Then he smiled and said, ‘That’s what they called me too. A late bloomer, I was.’ I looked at Crispo and tried to imagine him as a Spud. It was impossible – he was too old.

Another long silence followed and then Crispo spoke again. This time his gaze didn’t shift from the roaring orange flames and his voice seemed strangely distant, like a voice that used to be his and had long since faded away. ‘Remember, boy, God gave us the greatest gift of all. Not love, health, or beauty, not even life. But choice. God’s greatest gift is choice.’

He looked at me for a moment and then his attention returned to the flames. The grandfather clock chimed yet again. 23:00! I leapt out of my chair and thanked Crispo for his hospitality. The old man seemed lost in the fire and nodded without looking at me. I turned and walked to the door. As I pulled the swing door open Crispo called after me. ‘Come back again, dear boy, there’s still so much left to tell.’ I thanked him again and left him to his fire. The night was dark and I found myself running back to the house, keeping a sharp eye out for Macarthur!

08:00   I gave Fatty a full report of my evening with Crispo. He said I must reveal my findings to the dormitory tomorrow night.

12:00   On the noticeboard:

OLIVER AUDITIONS. Smith, Winter and Milton please report to the music room at 17:00.

Bada bing! Three left standing, who will be king?

The day went by in a daze. I kept having daydreams about killing Winter and Smith and taking the lead role.

17:00   The three contenders met outside the music room. Smith is a tallish boy with a cheeky face and a cocky manner. He told us that the auditions were a farce as Viking had already promised him the role of Oliver. For a first year he was incredibly arrogant. (I reckon a night in our dormitory would wipe that smug grin off his smacker.) Winter looked small and fragile and a lot like a girl. Blond hair and blue eyes and a very Oliverish look. With my brown hair and olive green eyes I have to say I thought my chances were slim.

Viking ushered us into the band room and sitting faithfully on the piano stool was Ms Roberts, who could always be relied upon to smile warmly and blow her nose on a pink tissue as a result of her allergies.

‘Right, gentlemen, as you can see we’re down to the wire. I won’t bugger you about. One of you three will get the role of Oliver. The sixty-four million dollar question is, who?’ Smith smiled and ran his fingers through his floppy blond hair. I am already beginning to loathe him. Winter looked nervous and had eyes like saucers, which made him look even more perfect for the part. God knows how I looked, but my mouth was dry and I was sweating.

Over the next hour we sang constantly. Sometimes we all sang together; at other times we sang duets or solos. We sang all sorts of songs and tried different voices. Viking even made us read poetry and recite a monologue. It soon became obvious that Winter’s voice was dodgy, but his look was perfect. Smith had a lot of confidence and bravado but an average voice. I had a good voice but I didn’t look at all like Oliver.

On the way back to the dining hall, Smith rabbited
on about his acting exploits and how he was on a television advert for some diet margarine that neither Winter nor I had ever heard of. He once again assured us that he had the part wrapped up and that Winter and I were fighting it out for the role of his understudy. As we were nearing the dining hall a long stringy boy who looked about twenty-three ran up to us, hoofed Smith in the backside and ordered him to sort out his room. The sudden change in Smith was unbelievable. He dropped the bravado immediately and became a whining little wimp scampering off to clean his prefect’s room. It’s hard not to love this life!

21:00   Gecko, with an enormous white bandage wrapped around his head, made yet another comeback from his second home, the sanatorium. We all cheered as he walked into the dormitory and Gecko responded by taking a mock swing at his light socket, just to let us know that he still had his sense of humour.

Fatty allowed me to light the candles and out of the shadows crawled six boys and a cat, like preprogrammed robots making their way to Fatty’s cubicle to hear the tale of my evening with Crispo. I told the Crazy Eight about how afternoon tea became dinner and then a late night. You could hear a pin drop when I mentioned the fact that Crispo might not think that Macarthur’s death was a suicide. Some heated discussion followed and Mad Dog pushed forward with his theory of a gruesome murder. Gecko (who had always thought it was murder) nodded in agreement. In the candlelight, his bandaged head made him look like an astronaut.

Like any half decent storyteller I left the ghost story for last. I noticed even Rambo’s jaw dropping as I told them about Macarthur’s ghost and how it skulks
around the buildings of the old school and likes to hang out in the chapel and our dormitory (which used to be a part of the old chapel building). Vern looked terrified. It could have been the candlelight but it appeared as if Roger’s fur was standing straight up, tall and spiky. Boggo snorted and said that there were no such thing as ghosts. Fatty, who had thus far remained silent, at last cleared his throat. The dormitory fell silent again as we prepared ourselves to receive his great words of wisdom.

‘It’s true. There have been hundreds of sightings of this school ghost. His nickname is Mango but up until this point I had no idea that he was really the ghost of Macarthur!’ I noticed Simon looking around suspiciously as if the ghost might have sneaked up behind us while we were in our meeting. Then Roger scampered out the window making everybody jump. Fatty bit into a large bar of nougat and continued.

‘I suggest we all try and find something out about this ghost. Speak to your prefects or to masters, if you can. Spud will go back to Crispo and try and get more out of him. Next Wednesday we will report back. We have to solve this mystery before the holidays!’

As Fatty blew out the candles and we all melted away into the darkness a great feeling of relief floated over me. In nine days it will be the Easter holidays. Three weeks of home. Heaven.

I dreamed I was swimming with the Mermaid in a blue sea with white sandy beaches and huge palm trees. I could feel myself smiling and laughing in my sleep but it was only in the morning that I realised that I’d drooled on my pillow.

Had an urgent call from Dad who sounded ecstatic. He said that war had broken out between the ANC and the
Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP). He reckons things are fine as long as the blacks are killing each other and not the whites. He’s decided to de-barricade the house and donate his stockpile of tinned food to the Salvation Army. More good news was that the neighbours can’t press charges against my father as there were no witnesses to the slaying of their dog, and it would come down to my father’s word against the dead dog’s. Looks like Dad got the last bark after all.

Dad went on to say that his brother, Uncle Aubrey, has invited us up to his farm in Namibia for a week during the holidays but it all hinges on whether Mom insists on bringing Wombat along.

Julian skipped up to me at breaktime and said, ‘Well, well, well, guess who’s the lover boy!’ and dropped a red envelope into my hands. I immediately recognised the Mermaid’s handwriting and sprinted up to the dormitory to read the letter. The dormitory was deserted apart from Roger, who was napping in a shaft of sunlight on my bed. He looked rather irritated at the disturbance and hissed at me.

I carefully folded the letter after reading it for the fifth time and swaggered out of the dormitory.

Four pairs of my underpants are missing. The laundry denies losing them in the wash. (Having just two pairs of underpants left could lead to a lot of washing or a rather unhygienic final week.) I thought about telling somebody but chickened out – I might end up ratting on someone by default and get clonked on the head like rat-faced Scrawley