Gentlemen & Players by Joanne Harris

weakly, promising to investigate the incident, with the result that Sutcliff, McNair, and Allen-Jones spent most of my Latin lesson standing outside Pat Bishop’s office, having been named amongst Knight’s chief tormentors, and I had received a summons via Dr. Devine, inviting me to explain the situation to the Head at my earliest convenience.
    Of course, I ignored it. Some of us have lessons to teach; duties to perform; papers to read—not to mention the filing cabinets in the new German office, as I pointed out to Dr. Devine when he delivered the message.
    Still, I was annoyed at the Head’s unwarranted interference. This was a domestic matter—something that could and should be resolved by a form tutor. Gods preserve us from an administrator with too much time on his hands; when a Head starts getting involved in matters of discipline, the results can be catastrophic.
    Allen-Jones said as much to me at lunchtime. “We were only winding him up,” he told me, looking awkward. “We just went a bit far. You know what it’s like.”
    I did. Bishop did. I also knew that the Head did not. Ten to one he suspects some kind of conspiracy. I can see weeks of phone calls, letters home, multiple detentions, suspensions, and other administrative nuisances before the matter can be laid to rest. It annoys me. Sutcliff is on a scholarship, which can be withdrawn in a case of serious misbehavior; McNair’s father is quarrelsome and will not submit meekly to a suspension; and Allen-Jones senior is an army man whose exasperation with his bright, rebellious son too often tends to violence.
    Left to my own devices, I would have dealt with the culprits rapidly and efficiently, without the need for parental intrusion—for although listening to boys is bad enough, to listen to their parents is fatal—but it’s too late for that now. I was in a dark mood as I descended the stairs toward the Common Room, and when the idiot Meek bumped into me on the way in, almost knocking me over, I sent him on his way with a choice epithet.
    “Bloody hell, who rattled your cage?” said Jeff Light, the Games teacher, sprawling from beneath his copy of the Mirror .
    I looked at where he was sitting. Third from the window, under the clock. It’s stupid, I know, but the Tweed Jacket is a territorial creature, and I had been goaded almost beyond endurance already. Of course I didn’t expect the freshers to know, but Pearman and Roach were there, drinking coffee, Kitty Teague was marking books nearby, and McDonaugh was in his usual place, reading. All four of them glanced at Light as if he were a spillage someone had forgotten to clean up.
    Roach coughed helpfully. “I think you’re in Roy’s chair,” he said.
    Light shrugged but did not move. Next to him, Easy, the sandy-faced geographer, was eating cold rice pudding out of a Tupperware box. Keane, the would-be novelist, was looking out of the window, from which I could just see the lonesome figure of Pat Bishop, running laps.
    “No really, mate,” said Roach. “He always sits there. He’s practically a fixture.”
    Light stretched his interminable legs, earning himself a smoldering glance from Isabelle Tapi in the yogurt corner. “Latin, isn’t it?” he said. “Queers in togas. Give me a good cross-country any day.”
    “Ecce, stercus pro cerebro habes,” I told him, causing McDonaugh to frown and Pearman to nod in a remote fashion, as if it were a quotation he vaguely recognized. Penny Nation gave me one of her pitying smiles and patted the seat next to her.
    “It’s all right,” I said. “I’m not staying.” Gods help me, I wasn’t that desperate. Instead, I put the kettle on and opened the sink cupboard to find my mug.

    You can tell a lot about a teacher’s personality from his coffee mug. Geoff and Penny Nation have twin mugs with CAPITAINE and SOUS-FIFRE written across them. Roach has Homer Simpson; Grachvogel has The X-Files . Hillary Monument’s gruff image is belied