Maeve Binchy - Evening Class

'Aidan, you can't have gone on believing that it was going to be you. Did that old blatherer Walsh not tell you? They all thought he would mark your card about it, he actually said that he bad told you.'

'He said it was likely that you might get it, and I might add that he said he would be very sorry indeed if you did.'

A child put his head around the library door and stared with amazement at the two red-faced teachers facing each other across a table.

Tony O'Brien let out a roar that nearly lifted the child up in the air. 'Get the hell out of here, you interfering young pup, and back to your classroom.'

White-faced, the boy looked at Aidan Dunne for confirmation.

'That's the boy, Declan. Tell the class to open their Virgil, I'll be along shortly.' The door closed.

'You know all their names,' Tony O'Brien said wonderingly.

'You hardly know any of them,' Aidan Dunne said flatly.

'Being Principal doesn't have anything to do with being a Dale Carnegie figure, a Mister Nice Guy, you know.'

'Evidently not,' Aidan agreed. They were much calmer now, the heat and fury had gone from both of them.

'I'm going to need you, Aidan, to help me, if we're going to keep this place afloat at all.'

But Aidan was stiff, rigid with his disappointment and humiliation. 'No, it's too much to ask. I may be easy-going but I can't do this. I couldn't stay on here. Not now.'

'But what will you do, in the name of God?'

'I'm not completely washed up you know, there are places who would be glad of me, even though this one doesn't seem to be.'

'They rely on you here, you great fool. You're the cornerstone of Mountainview, you know that.'

'Not cornerstone enough to want me as Principal.'

'Do I have to spell it out for you? The job of Principal is changing. They don't want a wise preacher up in that office… they need someone with a loud voice, who's not afraid to argue with the VEC, with the Department of Education, to get the guards in here if there's vandalism or drugs, to deal with the parents if they start bleating…'

'I couldn't work under you, Tony, I don't respect you as a teacher.'

'You don't have to respect me as a teacher.'

'Yes I would. You see, I couldn't go along with the things that you would want or the things you'd ignore.'

'Give me one example, one, now this minute. What did you think of as you were coming in the school gate… what one thing would you do as Principal?'

'I'd get the place painted, it's dirty, shabby…'

'Okay, snap. That's what I'd do too.'

'Oh you just say that.'

'No, Aidan, I don't bloody say that, but even better I know how I'm going to do it. You wouldn't know where to start. I'm going to get a young fellow I know on the evening paper to come up here with a photographer and do an article called Magnificent Mountain-view, showing the peeling paint, the rusty railings, the sign with the letters missing.'

'You'd never humiliate the place like that?'

'It wouldn't be humiliation. The day after the article appears I'll have the Board agree to a huge refurbishing job. We can announce details of it, say it was all on line and that local sponsors are going to take part… list who is going to do what… you know, garden centres, paint shops, that wrought-iron place for the school sign… I've a list as long as my arm.'

Aidan looked down at his hands. He knew that he himself could not have set up something like this, a plan that was sure to work. This time next year Mountainview would have a facelift, one that he would never have been able to organise. It left him more bereft than ever. 'I couldn't stay, Tony. I'd feel so humbled, passed over.'

'But no one here thought you were going to get it.'

'I thought it.' He said it simply.

'Well then, the humiliation that you speak of is only in your mind.'

'And my family, of course… they think it is in the bag for me… they're waiting to celebrate.'

There was a lump in Tony O'Brien's throat. He knew this was true. This man's glowing daughter was so proud of her father's new post. But there was no time for sentiment, only action.

'Then give them something to celebrate.'

'Like what, for example?'

'Suppose there was no race to be Principal. Suppose you could have some position in the school, bring in something new… set up something… What would you like to do?'

'Look, I know you mean well, Tony, and I'm grateful to you for it, but I'm not into let's pretend at the moment.'

'I'm the Principal, can't you get that into your head. I can do what I like, there's no let's pretend about it. I want you on my side. I want you to be enthusiastic, not a Moaning Minnie. Tell me what you'd do for God's sake, man - if you were given the go-ahead.'

'Well, you wouldn't wear it because it's not got much to do with the school, but I think we should have evening classes.'

'What?'

'There, I knew you wouldn't want it.'

'I didn't say I didn't want it. What kind of evening classes?'

The two men talked on in the library, and oddly, their classrooms were curiously quiet. Normally the noise of any room left without a teacher could reach a very high decibel level indeed. But the two studious girls who had been thrown out of the library by Mr. O'Brien had scuttled to their classroom with news of their eviction and of Mr. O'Brien's face. It was agreed that the Geography teacher was on the warpath and it was probably better to keep things fairly low until he arrived. They had all seen him in a temper at some stage, and it wasn't something you'd want to bring on yourselves.

Declan, who had been instructed to tell his class to get out their Virgil, spoke in low tones. 'I think they were arm wrestling,' he said. 'They were purple in the face, both of them, and Mr. Dunne spoke as if there was a knife held in his back.'

They looked at him, round-eyed. Declan was not a boy with much imagination, it must be true. They got out their Virgils obediently. They didn't study them or translate them or anything, that had not been part of the instructions, but every child in the class had an open copy of The Aeneid Book IV ready, and they looked at the door fearfully in case Mr. Dunne should come staggering in with blood coming down his shoulderblades.

The announcement was made that afternoon. It was in two parts.

A pilot scheme for Adult Education Classes would begin in September under the supervision of Mr. Aidan Dunne. The present

Principal Mr. John Walsh having reached retirement age would now stand down, and his post would be filled by Mr. Anthony O'Brien.

In the staffroom there seemed to be as many congratulations for Aidan as for Tony. Two bottles of sparkling wine were opened, and people's health was drunk from mugs.

Imagine evening classes. The subject had been brought up before but always to be knocked down. It was the wrong area, too much competition from other Adult Education Centres, trouble heating the school, the business of keeping on the caretaker after hours, the whole notion of classes being self-funding. How had it happened now?

'Apparently Aidan persuaded them,' Tony O'Brien said, pouring more fizzy drink into the school mugs.

It was time to go home.

'I don't know what to say,' Aidan said to his new Principal.

'We made a deal. You got what you wanted, you are to go straight home to your wife and family and present it as that. Because this is what you want. You don't want all the shit of fighting with people morning, noon and night, which is what being the Principal is about. Just remember that, present it to them as it is.'

'Can I ask you something, Tony? Why does it matter to you one way or the other how I present things to my family?'

'Simple. I need you, I told you that. But I need you as a happy, successful man. If you present yourself in this old self-pitying I-was-passed-over role, then you'll begin to believe it all over again.'