Jill by Philip Larkin Page A

remarkable: hardly ever was he at a loss for a quotation or a reference.
    Some months later Mr. Joseph Crouch was sitting in his lodgings reading a newspaper. “Pilots and crews of the aircraft which took part in the successful attack on the German naval bases of Wilhemshaven and BrunsbÜttel, at the entrance of the Kiel canal, returned to their bases in fine fettle,” it said. “They were proud to have been chosen to strike the first blow at the German war machine.”
    As he turned the page to read of news elsewhere, he heard the landlady admit someone at the front door, and in a few moments John was shown in. He wore a blue overcoat and no school cap, and Mr. Crouch saw him for a moment as merely an undistinguished boy of sixteen, who might be earning his living in a shop or as a clerk in some sort of office.
    “Hallo, Kemp; come in. I’m glad you’ve called. This is something we hadn’t bargained for.”
    “No, sir.”
    “No, indeed we hadn’t. I haven’t quite decided what the effect will be.” Mr. Crouch folded up his newspaper, lighted along spill at the gas fire, and applied it to his cigarette. “You’re sixteen, aren’t you?”
    “No, sir. Seventeen last month.”
    “And they’re calling up the twenties and over.” He stood looking over the park once more, where working men were digging an air raid shelter. The trees that lined the railings were still in full luxuriance of autumn decay. “Do you know,” he said slowly, “I almost think it would be better if you had a shot at that scholarship this year—after Christmas.”
    “But——”
    Mr. Crouch could feel without looking at him the bewilderment that his face held. It annoyed him slightly: he did not feel sufficiently secure himself to be over-considerate about the futures of others.
    “Yes, why not?”
    “But, sir—— Surely I couldn’t, sir.”
    “You mustn’t be so pessimistic.” The master turned to him with a grin that was almost hostile; a bar of sunlight on the wall by his head dimmed slightly. “Nothing venture, nothing win.”
    “But surely, sir——”
    “My dear boy, circumstances have changed. Nobody knows what’s going to happen. In five years time it may well be that Oxford and Cambridge will be nothing but ruins.” Mr. Crouch made an expressive gesture. “It seems to me that if you went up next autumn, you’d have nearly three clear years, if they allowed you deferment.… Of course, one just doesn’t know what line they’re going to take.”
    The boy moved to the table, his eyes lowered, and, taking up a strand of the tablecloth’s fringe, began to twist it and turn it slowly. Obviously Mr. Crouch’s suggestion had come as a great shock, and he was loth to adopt his mind to it. Mr. Crouch watched him impatiently. The outbreak of war had quickened the growth of a feeling he now recognized to have been growing for some time: an indifference to Kemp and his career, and a desire to get the whole business over as quickly as possible. The idea of tutoring the boy for two more years seemed intolerable, and he was prevented from being more curt than he was by the belief that in a few months, or perhaps even weeks, theywould be scattered irrevocably by greater events. Further, during the summer holidays he had come as near to falling in love as his temperament allowed, and being parted from the girl made him not sorrowful, but irritable, as a child is vexed by confiscation of a box of sweets.
    Finally, he felt he had been cheated. Although Kemp worked hard and intelligently, being quick to take suggestions and with a memory retentive enough to add every fresh thing to his mind, he was a burden to teach. His character was almost purely negative: if there had come one spontaneous idea from him during all the span of their acquaintanceship, Mr. Crouch would have felt repaid, but the hesitancy and heaviness that he had imagined would wear off as the boy’s imagination widened and deepened persisted month after month,