The Girl in a Swing Read online

both the warmth and the assertiveness to lodge arrows in

  others' hearts, and indeed it did not occur to me to try. I

  simply took people as I found them and left it at that.

  During the summer term at Bradfield there were three halfholidays

  a week. Cricket was not compulsory after the end of

  one's second year and one was free to roam the local countryside,

  with or without a bicycle. To be alone suited me, and I

  gained official approval for my ways by going in for wild

  flowers and bird photography, once winning a prize in the

  annual scientific exhibition with a small display of my better

  pictures. I remember a lucky one of a heron alighting on its

  nest, which attracted praise from several of the staff. For

  organized games I had neither taste nor aptitude, though I

  did get my colours for fencing. The sabre meant little to me,

  but in the more delicate, precise discipline of foil and epee I

  found satisfaction and even delight. The masked opponent,

  reciprocal rather than adverse, the rectangle of alert judges,

  the metallic slither and tap of the blades, the sudden, irrupt14

  ing cry of 'Stop!', followed by the umpire's detailed resume

  and adjudication: these, controlled, formal and dignified,

  comprised for me all that a sport should be.

  Swimming, too, I greatly enjoyed. I was never a competitive

  swimmer, but came to love the solitude and rhythm of

  unhurriedly covering a long distance in the same way as one

  might go for a walk. On fine summer mornings I often used

  to get up at six for the pleasure of strolling down through

  the marshes and swimming half a mile in the almost-deserted

  bath: no sound penetrating the splash and tumble of water

  against the ear; no disturbance of the regular accord of limbs

  and breathing. Coming out, I sometimes used to indulge the

  fancy that I had actually made - created - the swim, so that

  it was now standing, like a wood-carving or painting, in

  some impalpable, personal pantheon. Chess I learned, and

  put a fair amount of effort into, but contract bridge, more

  social and gregarious, had little appeal.

  One might almost say that I studied to be a nonentity at

  Bradfield, leaving unsought, through a kind of natural diffidence,

  any opportunity to distinguish myself or become a

  'blood'. Certainly I rejected the only real chance that came

  my way of showing myself to possess an unusual gift.

  It happened in this way. During my third summer - that

  is to say, when I was sixteen and, having taken my '0' levels

  the previous year, had begun to specialize in modern languages

  - one of the assistant science masters, a man named

  Cook, let it be known that he was interested in extra-sensory

  perception and was looking for volunteers to help him to

  carry out some experiments. Naturally there was a fair flow

  of applicants, all but a few of whom Cook turned down.

  Probably he was afraid less that his leg would be pulled by

  hoaxers than that over-enthusiasm would mislead people

  into tackling the business without proper detachment and in

  an un-scientific way. He was after cool heads and turnip

  temperaments - boys not likely to act the prima donna or

  make an ego-trip out of anything unusual which might happen

  to show up.

  Although I was now officially a fifth-form modern linguist

  I still had, in my spare time, a fair amount to do with the

  15

  scientific side, on account of my natural history activities. It

  had not occurred to me to volunteer for Cook's scheme, but

  he himself tackled me one day in the labs, and, as they say,

  twisted my arm. 'I need steady, unexcitable people', he said.

  'You might be just the chap, Desland.' It sounded harmless

  enough and no particular trouble. I agreed to oblige him,

  though without any particular enthusiasm.

  I remember little about the tests with numbered cards,

  dice and so on. I don't think they yielded anything much. In

  any case Cook was reticent about his actual findings - rather

  like a doctor who questions you on your symptoms but carefully

  shows no reaction to your answers. Perhaps he had been

  cautioned by the headmaster to see that boys didn't become

  excited or 'silly' over the business. However that may be, I

  had already become rather bored with the whole thing when

  one Friday he asked me to tea at his home the following

  afternoon, together with a boy in 'B' House, whom I knew

  slightly, by the name of Sharp.

  Cook's wife, a strikingly pretty girl who took an active

  part in College life and was much admired by the older boys,

  gave us an excellent tea and made herself most agreeable.

  While she was clearing it away, Cook continued chatting.

  Evidently he was waiting for her to rejoin us, for as soon as

  she had done so he said that he'd asked us to come because

  he was keen to try one or two experiments of a rather different

  kind.

  'I don't know whether you've ever heard of this,' he said,

  'but one school of thought has it that there are people with a

  kind of extra-sensory perception - or at any rate, some sort

  of hitherto-unexplained faculty - which tends to come out

  more strongly in connection with anything sinister or lethal

  - anything evil, if you like. You know, Gaelic second sight

  into disaster and all that.'

  He went on to tell us about an eighteenth-century 'murder

  diviner', who apparently is said to have enabled the authorities

  to follow two criminals to Marseilles, where they were

  arrested for a crime committed in Paris. I have never felt

  any inclination to find out more about this case and all I

  16

  can remember of it is the little that Cook told us that day.

  'Anyway,' he concluded, smiling, 'I'm not going to ask either

  of you to divine a murder, so don't worry. What I've got in

  mind is something completely harmless. Perhaps you

  wouldn't mind waiting in the next room for just a short time,

  Desland, while we get to work on Master Sharp.'

  Between five and ten minutes later Sharp came in to call

  me back. In reply to my raised eyebrows he whispered, 'Absolute

  balls. Still, decent tea, wasn't it? To say nothing of Ma

  Cook.'

  He returned with me into the drawing-room, where the

  first thing I saw was a row of five identical lab. beakers standing

  in a row on the table, each half-full of a colourless liquid.

  Cook did his usual piece about banishing volition, making

  the mind a blank and so on, and then said, 'Now, Desland,

  four of these are full of water and one of sulphuric acid. My

  wife's going to drink from each in turn. She doesn't know

  which is which any more than you do. Speak up if you get

  the idea that she's starting on the acid. If you don't I shall, of

  course.'

  There was nothing at all dramatic about what followed. I

  had no odd premonitions, no visions of Mrs Cook writhing

  in agony or anything of that sort. She poured some of the

  first beaker into a
tumbler and drank it, and as she was pouring

  another dose out of the second I had a vague but perfectly

  straightforward feeling that it would be better if she

  let it alone; rather as one feels when someone is about to

  open a window which will let in the rain, or put a hot dish

  down on a polished table. I waved my hand rather hesitantly

  and said, 'Er -.'

  'That's right,' said Cook at once. 'Now, can you tell me

  what exactly came into your mind, Desland?'

  I replied, 'Nothing, sir. Just - well - nothing, honestly.'

  'But is it really sulphuric acid, sir?1 asked Sharp. Cook

  tore off a strip of blue litmus and dipped it into the beaker.

  It turned red as smartly as anyone could wish.

  'Would you care to try it again, Desland?' he asked. I felt

  no particular pleasure or satisfaction in what had happened

  17

  and was already beginning to wonder how to persuade Sharp

  to keep quiet about it in College; but I could hardly refuse,

  so I went outside again while Cook set the thing up.

  This second time I felt completely bored and switched-off,

  and simply sat enjoying the sight of Mrs Cook as she bent

  forward to pick up the various beakers. In fact I had, in an

  odd way, forgotten what we were all supposed to be doing,

  when I suddenly realized that she had just drunk from the

  fifth and last beaker. I suppose I must have shown some sort

  of alarm, because Cook immediately jumped up and put a

  hand on my shoulder.

  'Don't worry,' he said. 'They were all water that time. I

  played a trick on you; but you - or whatever it is - weren't

  taken in, were you? Very interesting, Desland. Can you tell

  us anything now about the way you felt?'

  'No, I can't, sir,' I answered - much too brusquely for a

  boy speaking to a master, 'and if you don't mind, I'd rather

  not do any more just for the moment.'

  I had begun to have a vague feeling, first of anxiety though

  of what I had no idea - and secondly that Cook had

  no - well, I suppose no moral business to be doing this; that

  he was acting selfishly and irresponsibly, even though he

  might not be aware of it himself. It might be nothing but an

  experiment to him. To me, for some reason, it was turning

  out to be something in which I felt I didn't want to get involved

  any further.

  There was a rather awkward silence. Cook seemed at a bit

  of a loss. Then Mrs Cook took matters upon herself. She

  got up, stood beside my chair and laid the palm of her hand

  gently on my forehead.

  'You feel all right, Desland, don't you?' she asked. 'There's

  nothing to get upset about, you know. This is quite a recognized

  phenomenon and one day it'll be fully understood. You

  needn't worry about it at all.'

  The soft firmness of one of her breasts - she was wearing

  a thin, pale-blue twin-set, I remember - just touched the side

  of my face and I could smell her light, warm femininity;

  scented soap and the faintest trace of fresh sweat. I felt myself

  erect - instantly and fully, as a boy does - and became

  18

  horribly embarrassed. I could not tell whether or not anyone

  else had noticed. I stood up, coughing, and set things to

  rights under cover of taking my handkerchief out of my

  trousers pocket and unnecessarily blowing my nose.

  Mrs Cook looked into my eyes and smiled as though we

  had been entirely alone.

  'Do you think you could do one more experiment - just for

  me, Desland?' she asked. 'Something quite different? You

  needn't if you don't want to, but I hope you will.'

  At that moment I became as good as certain that Mrs Cook

  had been the moving spirit behind this business all along and

  that Cook, though not indifferent, was really acting in the

  nature of her agent. I also knew - though I could not have

  put it into words - that she enjoyed using her sexual attractiveness

  to get her own way. I felt altogether out of my

  depth: on the one hand excited and flattered by her attention,

  the first such experience I had ever known; on the

  other, oppressed by a cloudy notion that, although her interest

  could not exactly be called frivolous or trifling, she

  nevertheless had not the right to be putting this sort of

  pressure on me, having no more idea than I of what the cost

  might be. The difference between us was that I was nervous

  - even afraid - and she wasn't. She was being unthinkingly

  selfish from habit, like a spoilt child, or an Oriental princess

  urging a young courtier to attempt some dangerous feat

  purely for her titillation and amusement.

  Naturally I agreed - I could hardly do anything else - and

  she began to tell me about Professor Gilbert Murray's strange

  ability - which, she said, he had always refused to exercise

  except as a pastime - to perceive and identify some idea or

  object which his family and friends had agreed to concentrate

  upon while he was out of the room. This certainly

  struck me as less sinister than a dose of sulphuric acid, and I

  went outside for the third time, leaving the other three to

  concert their subject.

  This exercise stepped off into a total frost. I had no idea

  how to go about the task that had been thrust upon me whether

  to gaze into the eyes of the other three in search of

  some 'message', or just to look at the floor and wait for in19

  spiration; whether to speak my thoughts aloud and let them

  lead me on, or simply to stand in a tranced silence and

  await the gleam of revelation. Nothing happened. 'Daffodils',

  I remember, turned out to be their first idea, but I cannot

  recall the second. I had already caught Sharp's eye in a silent

  appeal for help and departure, when Mrs Cook said she

  thought we might have one last try.

  This time I came back into the room feeling foolish and

  embarrassed, but at the same time relieved and more relaxed.

  The silly thing didn't work, thank goodness, and now

  they would let me alone. There would be time to go down

  to the Pang and throw a fly for twenty minutes before College

  tea (which you had to attend, whether or not you had

  been out to tea with a master). As I sat down, my glance

  fell on a rectangular flower-bed outside the window and a

  garden fork which had been left sticking in the newly-dug

  ground. Without knowing why, I continued looking at the

  fork. At first it was very much as though I were observing a

  goldfinch on a gorse-bush, or a beetle on a patch of turf. That

  is to say, the fork became the entire object of my attention

  and interest, to the exclusion of all around it, and I took in

  its e^ery detail. Then, with a kind of clammy thickness, repulsion

  and fear came down upon me like the folds of a collapsing

  tent. My feelings, so far as I can remember them,

  might be compared to those of some war-time housewife

  who, having begun by being mildly intrigued to see through

  the window a policeman approaching her door and carrying<
br />
  a telegram, suddenly realizes what this must mean. I seemed

  to be standing alone in a deserted silence. The harmless fork

  became a horror the mere sight of which filled me with choking

  nausea. The garden beneath it I now knew to contain the

  bodies of innocent, helpless victims, whose wanton murders

  nullified the sunlight and flowers, nullified Mrs Cook and her

  pretty breasts and cool hands. The worms - the worms were

  coming, wriggling, slimy and voracious, to fill my mouth. The

  world, I now saw clearly, was nothing but a dreary place, a

  mean, squalid dump, whose inhabitants were condemned for

  ever to torment each other for no reason and no purpose but

  the pleasure of cruelty: a wicked Eden, its equivalent of

  20

  Adam a foul travesty whose very name was a jeering pun

  on that of God's incarnate purity and compassion. Indeed

  these, I now saw plainly, were nothing but lies - mere figments

  to delude girls like Mrs Cook until their bodies could

  be clutched, strangled, defiled and buried; a travesty whose

  name was I

  fell to the floor, vomiting my tea over the carpet, battering

  blindly with my fists and choking out one word:

  'Christie! Christie!'

  Cook came out of it very well. He yanked me to my feet

  in a moment and supported me into the fresh air, mopping

  me up with some sort of towel or cloth which he must have

  snatched up on our way through the hall.

  'Come on, Desland,' he said, 'pull yourself together!' He

  tore up some ragwort and held the crushed, pungent leaves

  against my nose. 'How many telegraph wires are there up

  there? Come on, count them! Count them to me, out loud!'

  My teeth were chattering and I felt cold, but I did as he

  said.

  When we got back indoors Sharp had gone and Mrs

  Cook had cleared up the mess. I could see that she had been

  crying. She said, 'I'm most terribly sorry, Desland. Will you

  forgive me?' This took me aback, for I had been feeling - as

  one does at sixteen - that I was the one to blame. It was I

  who had displaced the mirth, broke the good meeting with

  most admired disorder. I believe I tried to say something to

  this effect, though I can't exactly remember. When I had

  rinsed out my mouth and more or less cleaned myself up with

  T.C.P. and warm water. Cook walked back with me to College.

  After a bit I said, 'Was that - you know - what you were

  all thinking about, sir?'

  'Yes, of course,' replied Cook shortly, in the tone of someone

  who wants a subject dropped at once. 'Entirely my fault.'

  (It wasn't, of course, and I knew it.)

  He pulled a stalk of foxtail grass out of the bank, chewed

  it for about half a minute and then said, 'Look, Desland,

  you've evidently got some unusual sort of - I don't know gift

  or faculty or something. Now, listen - I strongly advise

  21

  you to let it alone. Don't ever try to do anything like this

  again, do you see? I can only say I'm extremely sorry to have

  let you in for it. Sharp's promised my wife that he'll say

  nothing to anyone and I think you'd be well-advised to do

  the same. We'll consider the whole matter as closed and

  done with. No one's going to hear anything from me, I can

  assure you.'

  I felt grateful to him. It did not occur to me that both

  the headmaster and my parents, if they had known, would

  have thought him and not me to blame, nor that I had it in

  my power to make things awkward for him. I readily gave

  him my word to keep silent.

  However, the incident didn't remain altogether hushed up.

  I still felt queasy, faint and cold, and that evening after tea

  I went up to the house matron. She found nothing worse

  than a distinctly sub-normal temperature, but kept me in

  bed the next day and gave me a lecture about getting my

  feet wet fishing. I seized on this and used it to answer such

  few boys in the house as bothered to inquire what had been

  the matter with me. All the same, Sharp must have said

  something, for two days later Morton, a College prefect in

  'B' House who had never spoken a word to me before,

  stopped me coming out of Hall and said, 'Look, here, Desland,

  what's all this about you getting the screaming habdabs

  or something in Cook's drawing-room?'

  I had already begun to think of the whole thing as a