Heaven for dogs, and if the dog you found was a good dog, then it has gone to Heaven.’
Since I had no idea whether Tennyson had been a good dog, Mr Mulholland’s answer proved nothing concerning the splendidness of an education. Unimpressed, unconvinced, but unwilling to argue with him so early in our relationship, I sucked my Butter Ball.
‘I believe you encountered my wife’s hairdresser.’
‘Yes. She did this.’ I pointed at my head.
‘Did she indeed? What do you think of it?’
‘Father says you can’t win them all.’
‘Mmm. Very true. Charming woman though, eccentricity with her scissors notwithstanding … Wobble. Weeble. Or something.’
‘Wivvle.’
Saying Wipple was hard with a boiled sweet in my mouth.
He smacked the desk and pointed his finger at me: ‘That’s her! I knew it started with W. Good old Mrs Wivvle! She cuts my hair too.’ He bent forward and patted his as-good-as-bald crown, which made me snurfle and choke on my Butter Ball.
‘Because of our common acquaintance, Mrs Wivvle of hedge-sculpting fame, I shall keenly follow your progress, Edward. Good luck.’ Mr Mulholland smiled me back over the threshold.
December came at last. The final days of my first term were upon me. We had two terms each year: the first lasting until Christmas and the second until June. The blessed final day glowed fractionally beyond the tips of my fingers like Sophia’s face when she held a torch up to it in the dark – frighteningly exciting in its grotesque otherness. I’d never had a final day of term before.
The entire school spent the run-up to its annual Christmas play preparing for the extravaganza. This year’s offering would be a traditional nativity. The student population’s good and gifted – predominantly music and drama club members from the senior school – began rehearsing in mid-November. The student population’s keen but talentless, those who would fill the stage as trees and potted plants – including me – had been preparing too, painting and cutting out knotty branches and sunflower face masks.
One morning, a senior pupil delivered a note to Miss Walker while , with blunt scissors, I hacked at cardboard hoping it would evolve into a petal for a kinetic tree – whatever a kinetic tree might be.
Blinky Mulholland had summoned me to his office.
Again? Twice in a single term?
I feared that he had intercepted my letters to Sophia, discovered how much I hated school, and planned to punish me in some unspeakable way.
Counting my steps, I walked many long corridors to get to his office on two very short legs. I walked half of the corridors walking forwards, and the other half walking backwards to see if the backward half got me to my destination in fewer steps and quicker. The forward steps went 12345 … and the backward steps went 1 2 3 4 5. I lost count when I backed into Mr Clarke and he told me to watch where I was going, stupid boy. Anyway, I didn’t know if walking backwards was quicker because I didn’t have a watch.
When I got there, I knocked on his door breathing nervously, but breathing, thankfully, none the less.
‘Enter.’
I did.
Blinky’s office was bright and dusty, like the man himself. Like the man himself, it smelled of polish and pipe tobacco.
‘Edward! How glad I am that you could spare the time to see me. Have a seat. Make yourself at home.’ The chair in front of his desk was unusually high. Either it was a different chair from the one I sat on last time or I had shrunk. I managed to mount it with a small leap. ‘I know how busy you are, what with the nativity dramatization and so on. That’s one of the things I wanted to see you about: the nativity. You’re not actually doing anything on stage, are you? I understand that you don’t have a role.’
My jaw, I think, hung open for a time. When he said role, I thought of soup. The best reply I could think of was ‘Not on me’. But it didn’t seem right. In fact, it didn’t seem to
Since I had no idea whether Tennyson had been a good dog, Mr Mulholland’s answer proved nothing concerning the splendidness of an education. Unimpressed, unconvinced, but unwilling to argue with him so early in our relationship, I sucked my Butter Ball.
‘I believe you encountered my wife’s hairdresser.’
‘Yes. She did this.’ I pointed at my head.
‘Did she indeed? What do you think of it?’
‘Father says you can’t win them all.’
‘Mmm. Very true. Charming woman though, eccentricity with her scissors notwithstanding … Wobble. Weeble. Or something.’
‘Wivvle.’
Saying Wipple was hard with a boiled sweet in my mouth.
He smacked the desk and pointed his finger at me: ‘That’s her! I knew it started with W. Good old Mrs Wivvle! She cuts my hair too.’ He bent forward and patted his as-good-as-bald crown, which made me snurfle and choke on my Butter Ball.
‘Because of our common acquaintance, Mrs Wivvle of hedge-sculpting fame, I shall keenly follow your progress, Edward. Good luck.’ Mr Mulholland smiled me back over the threshold.
December came at last. The final days of my first term were upon me. We had two terms each year: the first lasting until Christmas and the second until June. The blessed final day glowed fractionally beyond the tips of my fingers like Sophia’s face when she held a torch up to it in the dark – frighteningly exciting in its grotesque otherness. I’d never had a final day of term before.
The entire school spent the run-up to its annual Christmas play preparing for the extravaganza. This year’s offering would be a traditional nativity. The student population’s good and gifted – predominantly music and drama club members from the senior school – began rehearsing in mid-November. The student population’s keen but talentless, those who would fill the stage as trees and potted plants – including me – had been preparing too, painting and cutting out knotty branches and sunflower face masks.
One morning, a senior pupil delivered a note to Miss Walker while , with blunt scissors, I hacked at cardboard hoping it would evolve into a petal for a kinetic tree – whatever a kinetic tree might be.
Blinky Mulholland had summoned me to his office.
Again? Twice in a single term?
I feared that he had intercepted my letters to Sophia, discovered how much I hated school, and planned to punish me in some unspeakable way.
Counting my steps, I walked many long corridors to get to his office on two very short legs. I walked half of the corridors walking forwards, and the other half walking backwards to see if the backward half got me to my destination in fewer steps and quicker. The forward steps went 12345 … and the backward steps went 1 2 3 4 5. I lost count when I backed into Mr Clarke and he told me to watch where I was going, stupid boy. Anyway, I didn’t know if walking backwards was quicker because I didn’t have a watch.
When I got there, I knocked on his door breathing nervously, but breathing, thankfully, none the less.
‘Enter.’
I did.
Blinky’s office was bright and dusty, like the man himself. Like the man himself, it smelled of polish and pipe tobacco.
‘Edward! How glad I am that you could spare the time to see me. Have a seat. Make yourself at home.’ The chair in front of his desk was unusually high. Either it was a different chair from the one I sat on last time or I had shrunk. I managed to mount it with a small leap. ‘I know how busy you are, what with the nativity dramatization and so on. That’s one of the things I wanted to see you about: the nativity. You’re not actually doing anything on stage, are you? I understand that you don’t have a role.’
My jaw, I think, hung open for a time. When he said role, I thought of soup. The best reply I could think of was ‘Not on me’. But it didn’t seem right. In fact, it didn’t seem to
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