Charles Snow - The Masters

‘Would you like to stay and hear it, Winslow?’ said Despard-Smith.

‘If you please,’ Winslow said indifferently. ‘If you please.’

‘Right,’ said Chrystal. ‘First of all I want to count heads. I regard Jago as having five votes certain as far as votes can be certain in a college — I mean three of us here and our two young men, Calvert and Luke. Pilbrow has promised to vote several times — but I’m not going to mince matters either way. He may even not come back, he’s not specially interested in this election.’

‘That’s fair enough,’ said Francis Getliffe with a sudden creased smile.

Chrystal went on: ‘I regard your side as having four votes certain. Yourselves and Nightingale. Nightingale can’t cross over again, or he’ll make the place too hot to hold him. You’re also counting on Gay, but I set him off against Pilbrow. He may have forgotten the name of your candidate before the election. He may vote for himself.’

‘I have no doubt,’ said Despard-Smith, ‘that Gay will weigh his vote.’

‘No, we’ve got to be fair,’ said Francis Getliffe. ‘We can’t rely on him. Chrystal has been quite objective.’

‘Remarkably so,’ Winslow added. ‘But what does it all lead to? Bring it to a point, my dear Dean.’

‘I shall get there in one minute,’ said Chrystal. ‘But I didn’t want to hide the facts. Jago is in the stronger position. There are no two ways about it. I don’t want to hide it: if I did, you would have a right to think I was going in for sharp practice. What I’m going to suggest may put Jago in. It will almost certainly put one of the two in. It will save us from the Visitor.’ He paused and then said with extreme crispness: ‘I suggest that we make ourselves clear to the two candidates. We tell them that four of us — or five or six if Brown or Winslow like to come in — will not tolerate this matter going to the Visitor. We tell them that they must vote for each other. It’s the only way to bring a majority within reach. If they refuse, we say that we’ll form a majority for another person. This will be someone we decide on. Not an outsider fobbed off on us by the Bishop. If we’re forced to have a third candidate, we’ll choose him ourselves.’ Chrystal broke into a smile. ‘But it will never come to that.’

‘I must say that it’s a beautiful thought,’ said Winslow.

‘It doesn’t look unreasonable,’ said Francis Getliffe.

‘I take it that it hasn’t escaped you, Dean,’ said Winslow, ‘that your candidate commands a probable six votes — and Crawford’s will neatly get him home?’

‘I went out of my way to explain that,’ said Chrystal. ‘I said perfectly clearly that it might happen. I repeat: this is a way to escape the Visitor. So far as I can see; it’s the only way.’

‘That may very well be true,’ said Francis Getliffe.

‘I cannot remember any step of this kind during my association with the college. It is a grave step even to consider. It is absolutely unprecedented,’ said Despard-Smith. ‘But I feel we owe it to the college to consider the suggestion with the utmost seriousness. To let the Visitor s-saddle us with some incubus of his own would in my judgement be an unmitigated disaster.’

From those first moments it was certain that Despard-Smith and Francis would support Chrystal’s move in the long run. Their first response was ‘yes!’, however much they wrapped it round later. They seemed to be saying yes spontaneously even though it looked like giving Jago the game. They seemed to have lost their heads. Yet they were each of them strong-willed and hard-headed men.

I had no illusion that they were not calculating the chances. They thought, rightly or wrongly, that this was the best move for Crawford, although I could not imagine how they arrived at it.

I felt more than ever certain that they must have learned at least some piece of gossip about the Bishop’s intention. They must have become quite certain that, if the Bishop had the power, Crawford would stand no chance. For a second, I suspected also that they had some information, unknown to us, about one of Jago’s side. But later I doubted it. It did not seem that they had any well-backed hope. It seemed most likely that in secret they were sure of Gay, and had a vague hope of Pilbrow and even (so I gathered with incredulity from a chance remark) of Roy Calvert, some of whose comments Despard-Smith took literally and misunderstood. So far as I could detect, they knew nothing definite that we did not know.

Those seemed their motives on the plane of reason. But they were also moved by some of the inexplicable currents that sweep through any intricate politics. Despard-Smith and Francis, just like Chrystal and I myself, suddenly panicked at the idea of an outsider for Master. It was as though our privacy were threatened: magic was being taken from us: this intimate world would not be so much in our power. It was nonsense when we thought of it in cold blood, but we shied violently from the mere idea. And also we enjoyed — there was no escaping the satisfaction — the chance of asserting ourselves against our candidate. There are some hidden streaks in any politics, which only flash to the surface in an intense election such as this. Suddenly they leap out: one finds to one’s astonishment that there are moments when one loves one’s rival — despises one’s supporters — hates one’s candidate. Usually these streaks do not make any difference in action, but in a crisis it is prudent to watch them.

Despard-Smith let fall some solemn misgivings and qualifications; Francis Getliffe was guarded, though anxious to seem open to reason; but Chrystal knew he had won them over. He took it as a triumph of his own. And in fact it had been an impressive display. For the first time in this election, he had thrown his whole will into the struggle. He had something definite to achieve; and, even against men as tough as his opponents, his will told.

The talk went on. Winslow said: ‘Even the idyllic spectacle of the lion lying down with the lamb does not entirely reconcile me to the Dean’s ingenious idea.’

Later, Brown finished up for the night: ‘In any case, before I come to any conclusion, I shall certainly want to sleep on it.’

‘That goes without saying,’ said Despard-Smith. ‘It would be nothing less than s-scandalous for any of us to commit ourselves tonight.’

I was surprised to hear a couple of days later that Winslow had decided to join. He had talked to his party: what had been said, I did not know: I was uneasy, but I noticed that so was Francis Getliffe. I was surprised that Winslow had not pushed his dislike of Jago to the limit. Was there a shade of affection, underneath the contempt? Once Jago had supported him: was there some faint feeling of obligation? Or was it simply that, despite his exterior, despite all his attempts to seem it, Winslow was really not a ruthless man?

Winslow’s decision made it hard for Brown to stay outside. He felt his hand was forced, and he acquiesced with a good grace. But he was too cautious, too shrewd, too suspicious, and too stubborn a man to be pleased about it. ‘I still don’t like it,’ he confided to me in private. ‘I know it improves Jago’s chances, but I can’t come round to liking it. I’d rather it had come later after we’d had one stalemate vote in the chapel. I’d rather Chrystal was thinking more about getting Jago in and less about shutting the Visitor out. I wish he were a bit stronger against Crawford.

‘Nevertheless,’ Brown added, ‘I admit it gives Jago a great chance. It ought to establish him in as strong a position as we’ve reached so far. It gives him a wonderful chance.’

The six of us met again, and drafted a note to the two candidates. Despard-Smith did most of the writing, but Brown, for all his reluctance to join the ‘memorialists’ (as Despard-Smith kept calling us), could not resist turning a sentence or two. After a long period of writing, rewriting, editing, and patching up, we agreed on a final draft: