The Honours by Tim Clare

the desk and laced his fingers. ‘Then it is providential we find ourselves in each other’s company once more. Don’t interrupt me during my studies and you may consider your debt repaid in full.’ He returned his attention to the books spread before him.
    â€˜Aren’t you going to teach me something?’
    He set down his pencil heavily. ‘If I must. What would you like to learn?’
    Delphine produced a piece of paper. ‘I made a list.’
    The Professor leaned forward. ‘Go on.’
    She gripped the edge of the table, inhaled.
    â€˜Major sieges: 500 BC to Present, ballistics, what plants cure a fever, what plants can you crush up to make a poison, how to make a pit trap, how to skin an elephant, pressure points that stop the human heart, explosives, ju-jitsu, camouflage, espionage, code-breaking, how to survive if you crash-land in the Peruvian rainforest, how to survive if you crash-land in Arctic tundra, how to survive if you crash-land in the Soviet Union, Russian, French, sword technique, piracy, tunnelling, the Lincoln assassination, squids, the secrets of Freemasonry . . . ’ She turned the page over. ‘Animal calls, bomb-making, navigation, uh . . . poisoning . . . no, I’ve said that. Did I say that? How to make different poisons. How to catch a fish when you haven’t a net. Sailing. Oh, and how to drive a tank.’
    The Professor watched her for a moment.
    â€˜Nothing else?’
    â€˜No thank you. Sir.’
    He lifted a hand, beckoned. Delphine pushed back her chair and walked to his desk. Between her desk and his, a tasselled rug the colour of beef paste lay across bare floorboards.
    He slid a book from the bottom of the pile and thrust it towards her.
    Delphine took it. The book was crimson and heavy.
    â€˜What’s this?’
    The Professor did not look up from his work. ‘Read it then write a one-thousand-word essay on your understanding of its contents.’
    She tilted it and read the spine: Early Assyrian Art . ‘This isn’t about poisons.’
    â€˜Very shrewd, Miss Venner. Only nine hundred and ninety-six words to go.’ He crossed something out in a sharp slash of graphite. ‘And don’t “sir” me. I’m not a knight and I don’t care to be reminded of the fact. You may call me Professor Carmichael.’ He glanced up. ‘Stop gawping. I have important work to complete and you are disturbing me.’
    Delphine walked back to her desk in a daze. The stuffed hybrids watched as she sat down and opened the book in front of her. Its pages smelt of damp hay.

    Mother slept. When her eyelids had fluttered during lunch Delphine had bit back her excitement. Now Mother lay in her bedroom, slumped across the made bed, her breathing so shallow it was almost invisible. Delphine closed the partition door and crept out into the corridor. In the alcove opposite, an alabaster minotaur stood with its arms folded, chin raised and askance, a thick ring hanging from its snout.
    When she reached the landing, the Great Hall was empty. Everyone was with Mr Propp in the music room, awakening their kidneys. She went down the main staircase, across the chequerboard floor and out the front doors. The day was bright and gusty, twists of cloud scudding across a willow-pattern sky. She crossed the gravel and entered the stables through a side door.
    Inside was dark. Drying canvases lay against walls or propped in easels, forming a cramped labyrinth. The air was warm and still and ripe with turps. She pulled the collar of her blouse up over her nose and picked her way over jam jars and slabs of wood rainbowed in daubs.
    A narrow alley turned back on itself and opened out into a chamber. Four grey walls faced inwards. In the centre, beneath a single low-watt bulb, Daddy squatted on a three-legged stool with a cigarette in his lips, glaring at a big canvas. The palette in his right hand was a maelstrom of