Tom Sharpe - Grantchester Grind

'Oh gee, General, it's such a privilege to be of help to you,' the blonde said. 'Just anything you say.'

'Very good of you to say so,' said the General and went upstairs, wondering not for the first time what it was about Americans that made them such amazing experts in some of life's most complicated operations and absolute ignoramuses in simple matters like geography. He put it down to specialization. That and not being European. Not that Myrtle Ransby was any brighter. God alone knew what she'd have made of penology.

At Porterhouse there were frequent occasions when the grosser tastes of past Masters seemed never to have gone away. This was particularly true on Thursday nights. Thursday dinner was always a very good one. Friday was fish day, fish for lunch; and fish again for dinner originally for religious reasons but now simply a tradition followed implacably by the Chef. However, fish being an insubstantial dish when filleted or with too many bones to make for large mouthfuls and easy eating, on Thursday nights the Fellows could fill up on meat and something especially nutritious and with body to it. And on the second Thursday after Easter _Canards pressés à la Porterhouse_ was always on the menu. It was on Thursday that General Sir Cathcart D'Eath came to dine in College. 'Got to put in an appearance for the good of the Society, that great community of Old Porterthusians whose spirit spans the continents,' he boomed in the Combination Room where the Fellows had gathered for sherry. There was one of those sudden silences that inflicts itself at random on such gatherings.

The Chaplain broke it. 'What did Cathcart say?' he yelled. He had forgotten to turn his hearing aid on.

Dr Buscott took the opportunity he had been waiting for ever since the General had mistaken him for a junior porter and had told him to get his hair cut or lose his job. 'General Sir Cathcart D'Eath,' he announced in tones that would have done credit to a toastmaster at a rowdy banquet, 'General Sir Cathcart D'Eath, KCMG, etcetera, has just stated that the spirit of the Old Porterthusians spans the continents.'

'What on earth can he mean?'

'I've no idea,' said Dr Buscott, and moved away into the company of his fellow scientists where he felt safer.

The Senior Tutor prevailed upon the General to have some more Amontillado. 'It's the Special Old one, you know. We only bring it out on certain occasions,' he said.

'Where's the Dean?' asked the General, who felt like saying he hadn't come to be insulted by long-haired louts who only deemed his DSO worth an etcetera. In any case he had a special reason for being there that night. He was hoping to meet Dr Osbert and assess his suitability for the ordeal of Myrtle Ransby. 'No use wasting a perfectly foul old bag on some swine of a sexual athlete who doesn't mind being filmed under half a ton of lard trussed up in rubber. Got to gauge his psychology, don't you know. Some chaps like that sort of thing,' he had said to his secretary, who already knew it. Now, clutching his sherry, he peered round the exceptionally crowded Combination Room in search of the Dean.

'I don't seem to see him here,' the Senior Tutor commented. 'Mind you, he's been a bit off colour lately. We all have. Those terrible American TV people and the damage to the Chapel, you know.'

'Well of course,' the General boomed, 'but the rumour I've heard is that the compensation is going to be enormous. Bound to be. Kentucky Fry tells me they're worth billions.'

'Kentucky Fry?' said the Senior Tutor. 'I can't for the life of me understand how people can stomach that stuff. I made the mistake one night in London somewhere. Most indigestible.'

'Really?' said the General and looked at the Senior Tutor suspiciously He had the feeling that someone was taking the piss out of him.

It was confirmed by the Chaplain who had got his hearing aid going again. 'Colonel Someone's Chicken,' he shouted. 'I had some once. You had to lick your fingers afterwards. I can't remember why. Mind you, the waitresses were most attractive. Lovely legs and things.'

'What's this new chap, the Godber Evans Fellow, like?' the General asked, to change the subject.

'He died, you know,' bellowed the Chaplain. 'I'm surprised no one told you. Murdered, they say.'

'What?' said the General. 'Murdered? Already?' He looked round for the Senior Tutor but he had disappeared in the crowd.

'I'm surprised nobody informed you,' the Chaplain continued. 'It happened quite a long time ago. I found it most distressing. Of course none of us liked him but…' Any further information that might have cleared the matter up was prevented by the arrival of the Praelector.

'I've just been hearing about Dr Osbert,' the General told him.

The Praelector looked at him curiously and shook his head. 'A nasty business,' he said. 'I blame the Senior Tutor myself.'

'The Senior Tutor?' said the General. 'You're not seriously telling me…" A waiter with the decanter slid between them and filled his glass.

'He should never have allowed the Fellow to be appointed,' the Praelector continued. 'We weren't properly informed. All we were told was that some City friends had put up the money. Now, of course, it's too late. The damage has been done.'

'It is never too late to repent,' bawled the Chaplain, who had been elbowed aside by the waiter and had only just rejoined them. 'On the other hand, when you're murdered you don't have much opportunity.'

This time it was the Praelector who was shocked. 'Don't use that word,' he told the Chaplain sharply. 'It isn't generally known. We can't have rumours spreading.'

'I should damned well think not,' said Sir Cathcart. 'I for one had no idea.'

'None of us did,' the Praelector said. 'I only learnt about it this afternoon.'

The Chaplain looked at him in some astonishment. 'But you were there when he admitted it. We all were. It was after his Induction Dinner. He got pickled.' But before the matter could be satisfactorily cleared up dinner was announced. They filed into the Hall and the Chaplain shouted Grace.

'Praelector,' said Sir Cathcart in a conspiratorial whisper when they were finally seated. 'I know we can't talk about Dr Osbert now, but perhaps we should have a word in private afterwards.'

'Just as you like,' said the Praelector with an insouciance that took the General's breath away, 'though frankly I should have thought it was the other…er…matter, you know, we should consider.'

Sir Cathcart glanced cautiously around. 'The other matter?' he asked through gritted teeth. 'Other matter?'

'Can't talk about it now for goodness' sake,' said the Praelector hurriedly. 'I just hope to God the Chaplain keeps his trap shut. I told the Dean only this afternoon not to mention it to anyone. If it got to the Senior Tutor's ears the fat would really be in the fire. The fellow's in a bad enough state already without provoking him any further. He's as unstable as the very devil.'

'Yes,' Sir Cathcart agreed, with the private thought that a man who had so recently murdered the Sir Godber Evans Memorial Fellow was bound to be in a pretty bad way. Unstable was putting it mildly. Mad as a hatter was more like it. He peered down the table at the Senior Tutor and was relieved to see him talking quite naturally to the Fellow beside him, exhibiting no signs of homicidal mania. He was so engrossed in the thoughts this news had provoked, and in particular how he was going to get back the half of the two thousand pounds he had given Myrtle Ransby, that he hardly noticed what he was eating until _Canards pressés à la Porterhouse_ was served.

Even by Porterhouse standards it was exceptional. In the belief that, with the collapse of the Chapel and the gloom emanating from the Bursar's office about the state of College finances, this was in all likelihood the last time he would be allowed the chance to do a Duck Dinner, the Chef had gone to town. To be exact, he had gone to three of East Anglia's largest duck farms and had returned with over one hundred and thirty plucked Aylesburys and the determination to so concentrate them that this last Duck Dinner would go down in the gastronomic annals of Porterhouse. For days the ancient presses had been groaning under the strain of achieving the greatest possible mass of duck in the least possible volume or, to put it another way, that three overweight ducks should be compressed into an oblong no larger than a matchbox. And while he hadn't entirely succeeded in this remarkable compression, what was finally placed in front of General Sir Cathcart D'Eath had so little resemblance to a duck or anything vaguely capable of flying or floating that he had munched his way with some difficulty through the first forkful before realizing what he had just swallowed. He turned a bulging eye to the menu and then looked down at his plate. 'Dear God, I thought this was some sort of pâté,' he muttered, and tried to dislodge a compacted feather from his dentures. "This isn't pressed duck, it's triple-distilled cholesterol. God alone knows what it does to the arteries.'