Tom Sharpe - Porterhouse Blue

“Things have changed for the better since then,” said the Bursar.

“Nonsense,” said the Chaplain. “The fall in the number of suicides is the clearest indication of the decline of morality. Undergraduates don’t seem to be as conscience-stricken as they were in my young days.”

“You don’t think it has to do with the introduction of natural gas?” asked the Senior Tutor.

“Natural gas? No such thing,” said the Dean. “I agree with the Chaplain. Things have gone to pot.”

“Pot,” shouted the Chaplain. “Did I hear somebody say pot?”

“I was merely saying…” began the Dean.

“At least nobody has suggested that young Zipser was on drugs,” interrupted the Bursar. “The police made a very thorough investigation, you know, and they found nothing.”

The Dean raised his eyebrows. “Nothing?” he asked. “To the best of my knowledge they took away an entire sackful of… er… contraceptives.”

“I was talking of drugs, Dean. There was the question of motive, you understand. The police seemed to think Zipser was in the grip of an irrational impulse.”

“From what I heard he was in the grip of Mrs Biggs,” said the Senior Tutor. “I suppose you can call Mrs Biggs an irrational impulse. Certainly a very tasteless one. And as for the other things, I must admit I find a predilection for gas-filled contraceptives quite unaccountable.”

“According to the police, there were two hundred and fifty,” said the Bursar.

“No accounting for tastes,” said the Dean, “though for my part I prefer… to regard the whole deplorable affair as being politically motivated. This fellow Zipser was clearly an anarchist. He had a lot of left-wing literature in his rooms.”

“I understood him to be doing research into pumpernickel,” said the Bursar. “Its origins in sixteenth-century Germany.”

“He also belonged to a number of subversive societies,” the Dean continued.

“I’d hardly call the United Nations Association subversive, Dean,” the Bursar protested.

“I would,” said the Dean. “All political societies are subversive. Must be. Stands to reason. Wouldn’t exist if they weren’t trying to subvert something or other.”

“Certainly a most extraordinary way of going about things,” said the Bursar. “And it still doesn’t explain the presence of Mrs Biggs.”

“I’m inclined to agree with the Dean,” said the Senior Tutor. “Anyone who could go to bed with Mrs Biggs must have been either demented or motivated by a grossly distorted sense of social duty and to have launched two hundred and fifty lethal contraceptives on an unsuspecting world argues a fanaticism…”

“On the other hand,” said the Bursar, “he had been to see you about his… er… compulsion for the good woman. You mentioned it at the time.”

“Yes, well, perhaps he did,” the Senior Tutor admitted, “though I’d question your use of good as far as Mrs Biggs was concerned. In any case, I sent him on to the Chaplain.”

They looked at the Chaplain questioningly. “Mrs Biggs good?” shouted the Chaplain. “I should say so. Splendid woman.”

“We were wondering if Zipser gave you any hint as to his motives,” the Bursar explained.

“Motives?” said the Chaplain. “Perfectly obvious. Good old-fashioned lust.”

“That hardly explains the explosive nature of his end,” said the Senior Tutor.

“You can’t put new wine in old bottles,” said the Chaplain. The Dean shook his head. “Whatever his motives,” he said, “Zipser has certainly made our own position extremely awkward. It is difficult to argue against the need for change when members of the College make such an exhibition of themselves. The meeting of the Porterhouse Society has been cancelled.” The Fellows looked at him in amazement. “But I understood the General had agreed to call it,” said the Senior Tutor. “He’s surely not backing down now.”

“Cathcart has proved himself a broken reed,” said the Dean mournfully. “He phoned me this morning to say that he thought we should wait until this whole affair had blown over. An unfortunate phrase but one sees his point. The College can hardly afford another scandal just yet.”

“Damn Zipser,” said the Senior Tutor. The Fellows finished their dinner in silence.

In the Master’s Lodge Sir Godber and Lady Mary mourned the passing of Zipser more austerely over scrambled eggs. As was ever the case, tragedy had lent Lady Mary a fresh vitality. and the strange circumstances of Zipser’s end had given a fillip to her interest in psychology.

“The poor boy must have had a fetish,” she said, peeling a banana with a dispassionate interest that reminded Sir Godber of his honeymoon. “Just like that case of the boy who was found inside a plastic bag in the lavatory on a railway train.”

“Seems an odd place to be,” said Sir Godber, helping himself to some tinned raspberries.

“Of course, that was a much clearer case of the mother complex at work,” continued Lady Mary. “The plastic bag was obviously a substitute placenta.”

Sir Godber pushed his plate away. “I suppose you’re going to tell me that filling contraceptives with gas is a sure indication that the poor fellow had penis envy,” he said.

“Boys don’t have penis envy, Godber,” said Lady Mary austerely. “That’s a girls’ complaint.”

“Is it? Well, perhaps the bedder suffered from it then. I mean there’s no indication that Zipser was actually responsible for stuffing them up the chimney. We know that he obtained the things, but for all we know Mrs Biggs filled them with gas and put them up the chimney.”

“And that’s another thing,” Lady Mary said. “The Dean’s remarks about Mrs Biggs were in the worst of taste. He seemed to find the fact that the boy was having an affair with his bedder proof that Zipser was insane. A more glaring example of class prejudice it would be hard to imagine, but then I’ve always thought the Dean was a singularly common little man.”

Sir Godber looked at his wife with open admiration. The illogicality of her attitudes never ceased to amaze him. Lady Mary’s egalitarianism stemmed from a sense of innate superiority which not even her marriage to Sir Godber had diminished. There were times when he wondered if her acceptance of his proposal had not been yet another political decision, a demonstration of her liberal pretensions. He brushed aside this domestic reverie and thought about the consequences of Zipser’s death.

“It’s going to be very difficult to quell the Dean now,” he said thoughtfully. “He’s already maintaining that this whole affair is a result of sexual permissiveness.”

Lady Mary snorted. “Absolute nonsense,” she snapped predictably. “If there had been women in College this thing would never have happened.”

“In the Dean’s view, it was precisely the presence of Mrs Biggs in Zipser’s rooms that caused the disaster,” Sir Godber pointed out.

“The Dean,” said Lady Mary with feeling, “is a male chauvinist pig. A sensible policy of coeducation would avoid the sexual repressions that result in fetishism. You must make the point at the next Council meeting.”

“My dear,” said Sir Godber wearily, “you don’t seem to understand the difficulty I am in. I can hardly resign the Mastership now. It would look as if I was admitting some responsibility for what has happened. As it is my time is going to be taken up raising money for the Restoration Fund. It’s going to cost a quarter of a million to repair the Tower.”

Lady Mary regarded him sternly. “Godber,” she said, “you must not weaken now. You must not compromise your principles. You must stick to your guns.”

“Guns, my dear?”