Iris Murdoch - The Sandcastle

Mr Everard’s note to Mor had said that Miss Carter would be waiting in the playground at the end of the first afternoon period. Mor looked quickly about, but could not see her. The strong sun was slanting in between the Library and the Phys and Gym, gilding the dark nobbly surface of the asphalt. Warmth arose from it, and the air quivered slightly. What Mor did see, at the corner of the playground near the far end of the Library, was his son Donald. Towards Donald, across the sunny asphalt, Jimmy Carde was making his way by a series of spectacular skips and jumps. He reached Donald and made violent impact with him like a bouncing ball. They spun round gripping each other’s shoulders. From a distance Mor saw this encounter without pleasure.

Mor began to walk across the playground in the direction of Library. He looked about him for Miss Carter, who was not to be seen, and kept the still rotating pair in the comer of his eye. As Mor neared the main door of Library he saw that Donald and Carde had noted his approach. They drew apart, and in a moment Carde had sped away back across the open space, leaping as he did so madly into the air and spreading out his arms with palms and fingers extended until at last, capering grotesquely, he disappeared through the door of School House. Carde was a scholar. Donald was left standing alone at the comer of the Library building. He was clearly uncertain what to do. He would have liked to slip away, but now that his father patently had him in his field of vision, it seemed improper to do this. On the other hand, Donald had no intention of making any approach to his father. He stood perfectly still, clutching his book and watching in a glassy way to see whether Mor would go into Library or pass round the far side of the building.

Mor also hesitated. Random encounters between himself and his son during school hours embarrassed both, and Mor avoided them as far as possible. However, he felt that he could not now ignore Donald. This might hurt the boy even more. So he turned towards him. Rooted to the spot, Donald awaited his father.

‘Hello, Don,’ said Mor, ‘how goes it?’

Donald looked at him, and looked away at once. He was tall enough now to look Mor in the eyes; indeed, there was scarcely an inch between them. His resemblance to his father was considerable. He had Mor’s crisp dark hair, his crooked nose and lop-sided smile. His eyes were darker though, and more suspicious. Mor’s eyes were a flecked grey, Donald’s a brooding brown. The black points upon his chin portended a dark and vigorous beard. His face was soft, however, still with the indeterminacy of boyhood. His mouth was shapeless and pouting, not firmly set.

Donald was long in growing up - too long, Mor felt with some sadness. He could not but grieve over his son’s strange lack of maturity. At an age when he himself had been devouring books of every kind in an insatiable hunger for knowledge, Donald appeared to have no intellectual interests at all. He worked at his chemistry in a desultory fashion, sufficiently to keep himself out of positive disgrace; but apart from this Donald seemed to do, as far as Mor could see, nothing whatever. He spent a lot of time hanging about, talking to Carde and others, or even, what seemed to Mor odder still, alone. He was to be seen for half an hour on end just leaning out of his window, or else sitting on the grass in the lower garden beyond the wood, his arms about his knees, doing absolutely nothing. This mode of existence was to Mor extremely mys — terious. But he had not yet ventured to chide or even question Donald concerning the employment of his time. Donald’s reading, such as it was, seemed to consist mainly of Three Men in a Boat , which he read over and over again, always laughing immoderately, and various books on climbing which he kept carefully concealed from his mother. During the holi — days he was a tireless and indiscriminate cinema-goer. As Mor looked at him now, at his suspicious and sideways-turning face, he felt a deep sadness that he was not able to express his love for his son, and that it could even be that Donald did not know at all that it existed.

‘All right,’ said Donald. ‘I’m just off down to the nets.’ Donald was a fanatical cricketer.

‘You’re in the house team, aren’t you?’ said Mor. Donald was in Mr Prewett’s house.

‘Yes, sir,’ said Donald. ‘I was last year.’

He half turned, not sure if it was now proper for him to go away.

But Mor wanted to keep him there, to keep him until something had been said which would be a real communication between them. He wished that Donald would meet his eyes. He hated his calling him ‘sir’.

‘Carde translated well in my Latin class,’ said Mor. He felt anxious to say something nice about Carde.

‘Ah, yes,’ said Donald.

Mor wondered whether Donald would tell Carde that he had said that, and whether it would please Carde to be told. How little he knew about them. He looked at the book under Donald’s arm. He knew from experience that the boy hated being asked what he was reading. But curiosity overcame his judgement. ‘What’s the book, Don?’ he asked.

Donald passed it over without a word. Mor looked at the title. Five Hundred Best Jokes and Puzzles.

‘Hmmm,’ said Mor. He could think of no comment on the book. He gave it back to his son.

At that moment Mor saw, over Donald’s shoulder, a small figure approaching. It was Miss Carter. Mor saw at once, with some annoyance, that she was wearing trousers. Donald half turned, saw her, and mumbling an excuse retreated rapidly and took to his heels, running in the direction of the playing fields.

‘I’m sorry to be so late,’ said Miss Carter, ‘and I hope I didn’t disturb you just now. One of your pupils?’

‘My son,’ said Mor.

Miss Carter seemed surprised. She looked at Mor curiously. ‘I did not think you could have a son so old,’ she said, her odd precise voice lilting slightly.

‘Well, you see I can, said Mor awkwardly. He wished that she had not made herself conspicuous by wearing trousers. They were close-fitting black ones, narrow at the ankles. With them Miss Carter wore a vivid blue shirt, blue canvas shoes, and no other adornments. She was slim enough; but all the same she looked in those garments, Mor thought, rather like a school child dressed to impersonate a Paris street boy.

‘It must be a wonderful thing to have a grown-up son,’ said Miss Carter.

‘It is good,’ said Mor, ‘but it has its stormy moments. Shall we go this way?’ They began to walk along towards the main door of Library.

‘I can see that you are irritated by my trousers,’ said Miss Carter, ‘and if I had thought more I would not have worn them. But I have them for working in, and it didn’t occur to me to change. I will next time.’

Mor laughed, and his irritation vanished completely. He led her up the stairs to show her the Library. As they walked in silence between the tables, now loaded with books over which the senior boys were bent at their work, Mor found himself wondering whether Miss Carter remembered with any sort of interest that in the garden last night she had taken his hand in hers. He did not imagine that she did. The speculation came quite quietly into Mor’s mind, and he entertained it without emotion. As they descended the stairs, he forgot it again.

They crossed the playground towards Main School. Mor thought he would show Miss Carter the hall next. They found it empty, its rows of windows open wide to show a slope of pine trees and a distant view of the playing fields. It was melancholy with summer. High in the rafters a few butterflies flitted to and fro. The velvet curtains on the stage swayed in the light breeze from the windows. Their feet echoed on the boards.