Vikram Chandra - Red Earth and Pouring Rain

His voice rose and there was never such a wonderful thing as the flapping of the flags, the colours of the coats of arms and the pages’ uniforms, all against the dark sky, and all the boys’ faces as they looked at each other with eyes afire, and there was indeed there a band of brothers, and there was not one of us who could have said afterwards that he did not almost weep. All agreed it was the most splendid Parents’ Day that had ever been.

The Sixth were doughty knights, and they paid their allegiance to a king, and this was Haliburton, a favourite of Dr Lusk’s, a large andlumbering sort of fellow who got red in the face in the games of cricket and through his weight and momentum played a tolerable sort of football. He was good at everything but outstanding in nothing, generally kind to his juniors and sincere in prayers. I liked him, and it was known that Dr Lusk liked him, since he was made the ruler at our revels, and with his height he made a picturesque king. During the speech he sat at Dr Lusk’s side and I can see his face plain even now, believing and stirred as all of us. He had fine yellow hair and a trick of holding his head to one side when he smiled, which he did even with his cardboard crown on and his eyes fixed on the doctor. Aye the doctor moved us that afternoon with his vision of what we were, and what we could become, and I believed him as we all did as we must, but the day was not over yet, for I was to find yet the other half. After the speeches and the prizes there was a tea, buns and polite chatter on the lawn in front of Dr Lusk’s house; I stood with my parents, feeling shunned. Nobody was about to associate with them, she being scandalous still from the marriage, and he nobody; but them, he and she, exclaimed about the fragrance of the damn buns as if nothing was happening. I suppose they were accustomed to it, or rather judging from their panache they expected it and saw it as a martyrdom. But it was horrid, no introductions for me or them, no invitations to visit, and finally my father decided he had enough and looked around for the doctor. Must thank the doctor, said he, and bustled around, me in tow (she standing alone like Boadicea) until a flunkey told us the doctor had retired, very temporarily, to his study. So what must we do but go thumping into the doctor’s house, he had the confidence of the devil, my father; and we proceeded without hesitation into the domain of Dr Lusk, where I had never been, and no mortal boy as far as I know. And a dark place it was, full of enormous heavy furniture hideously carved and ornamented, all stuffed together until you couldn’t move without knocking your shins, samplers on the walls and a yellow light about it all. We found the study, murmuring inside, and my father knocked on the door, polite tap-tap-tap, and the wood slid aside, and there was Dr Lusk, sitting still with his arm out, and hunched across from him, the crown on his knee, Haliburton, his shoulders forward and his face serious, stopped in the middle of a sentence. Gratitude, wanted to thank you, said my father, and he and Dr Lusk walked a step or two away to theparlour to confab, leaving Haliburton and I a-staring at each other. Now there was something in his countenance so curious, so odd, anger it was, defiance, and something else, fear, no, terror; and I seeing this clearly said without thinking, I don’t know where it came from — what were you telling him, Haliburton? At this he sprang up, took two steps towards me, and said as if he were choking, shut up, shut up. And now suddenly I had that sensation again, secrets falling warm and fresh into my hands, barriers parting, I understood it all suddenly, all symmetry and perfection, and I said, smile on my face and tears of absolute joy starting to my eyes — Haliburton, you’re a bloody sneak. I mean I comprehended with utter clarity the doctor’s omnipotence, his knowledge; and Haliburton said no, but no, but then back came my father and the doctor, and we fell to good-byes and thank-you’s. Outside my mother waited, chewing pensively on a bun, what an appetite she had, but I was too excited to take offence even at her sticky hug and her farewell exhortations full of Jesus and prayers. No, I went in to breakfast the next day and ate the miserable bloody bread and butter in an absolute excitement at the gift I had received; Haliburton I didn’t see all day until he found me after school and suggested a walk. Now see here, he said, when we were out among the trees, now see here, I don’t know what you thought you were saying yesterday; and he looked as if he were good for a few more minutes of that sort of pap, which I think was supposed to frighten me, but I said shortly, Haliburton, let off with that, because you’re a bloody sneak. And at the word sneak he emptied, as if punctured, and I marvelled at this word I hadn’t even known a few weeks before. I had to learn it, and learn that at Norgate you could be a debauchee, a wastrel, a cheat, a thief, and still the boys would think nothing of it and certainly there were some who would think you a fine fellow for it; but if you were revealed to be a sneak it was the end of your career and your life. You were forever marked, and you were let known it by word and blow; it was the furthest insult to schoolboy honour, and so now the word sneak took the strength from Haliburton like a knife. Now look here, he said, but pleading-like now, Dr Lusk thinks you’re a fine fellow, and I’ve seen you looking at him, you know his task, and he needs to know things, it’s very important, you can’t run a school if you don’t know certain things, what’s going on, d’you see? I see you’re a sneak, Haliburton.There’s nothing dishonourable about it, said he, and Dr Lusk said so. You’re a bloody liar and a sneak, Haliburton, gentlemen don’t peach on their friends and fellows. So now he looked stricken and rushed off, and I let him go; stewing in his predicament, I suppose he was, and he couldn’t tell his mentor, because even if they found a pretext to expel me I would tell, by crook or hook or spite, and there was the end for him. The next day at Assembly he looked frightened, as if expecting the worst, I mean he was walking around looking into everyone’s faces as if trying to conjecture if they knew, and when he saw me he smiled a pursed little smile, and then I knew I had him. I sidled up to him after the talk (Dr Lusk in fine fettle about the field of honour) and whispered, see me in your rooms at four. At four I went up, amidst curious glances, because everybody knew I had been taken up by Durrell, so what was Haliburton about, but inside he was half-delirious with fear. As soon as the door shut he said, quavering, you haven’t told anyone, have you, old fellow? He had a spread laid out, toast and marmalade and tea and fat sausages, and I sat down and took a bite before I shrugged, no. Have some of this marmalade, he said, and coolly I took it, and said, listen here, Haliburton. I’m not going to tell anyone. Yes, he said, yes. He was leaning across the table, holding out a jar, and I put down my knife and reached across, the devil knows where I got the confidence, but I reached across and touched his hair, stroked it you could say, and let my knife-hand knuckle rub across his cheek, and he went from red to white and back. I won’t tell anyone, I said, if you do what I say. He shut his eyes, trembled, the jar still out to me and shaking, and eyes still shut he whispered yes. What, said I, what was that, Haliburton? Yes.

In the afternoon, before dinner, there was a furious game of football, the fellows of the Upper House and Gartner’s against the rest. The numbers varied but there were always enough for a huge hacking knot, all elbows and boots and knees, and somewhere the ball. You’d come out of it scraped and bleeding, panting and red in the face, wrung out as if you’d been to a battle. You’d lie down on the grass and feel your chest heave, your team sprawled beside you. Then somebody would say once more into the breach gentlemen and you’d say your mother but all the same you’d spring up, and it was glorious.