Going Down Slow by John Metcalf

Author:John Metcalf
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Biblioasis
Published: 2011-09-05T04:00:00+00:00

“Thank you,” said David.

Just before the holiday, he had bought two copies of The Family of Man and mounted most of the photographs on the pieces of cardboard that came back from the cleaner’s with his shirts. He’d hoped that some of the pictures might spark memories or feelings which he could fashion in his composition lessons. It was not for a couple of minutes that he noticed the gaps in the rows.

He walked round noting what was missing.

Missing were photographs of:

a boy and girl lying in the grass kissing

a sailor with two girls

a pregnant woman lying on a bed

a pregnant woman looking out of a window

a baby being delivered

a woman breast-feeding

a bare-bum African boy hurling a spear

a family group of Australian aborigines.

Enquiry would be merely ritual. He felt irritated but too tired to bother. The bloody kid who took them must have been in a really bad way. Why couldn’t he have stolen Nightstand books from a cigar store or peered at underwear ads in Cosmopolitan? Even the Ed Sullivan Show was raunchier than a group of shrivelled, dughanging aborigines.

While Ronnie Biggin distributed the exam papers, David slumped in his chair staring towards the window remembering suddenly Ossie Prosser. Ossie, thirteen or so then, masturbated countless times a day, storing the proceeds in a Brylcreem jar which he flashed to the class whenever the master was writing on the board. They’d watched him carefully for the legendary signs of divine retribution, but Ossie, though pale, had not succumbed.

Young boys were grubby. Poor sods.

Still, it was irritating that the sequences, the comparisons and contrasts of the photographs had been spoiled.

“Right!” said David. “Settle down. Your exam. I was not pleased by your performance on the essay question. And I am being polite.”

But by the last period in the morning David was in a savage mood. His stomach was eating itself; he felt sick and dizzy with coffee; hot grit grated behind his eyes.

He had been harassed by Miss Burgeon; a wad of forms he distinctly remembered having thrown in the garbage before the holiday. He had promised them for the afternoon.

He had been pressured again by Visual Aid to hand in outstanding monies for the Year Book, monies he had spent. He would have to approach Jim for a loan.

He had been pestered by the Secretary about the mathematics of his last monthly register-total.

His free period, the one following recess, had been taken away by Grierson who had commanded him to muster two hundred kids to form an audience for a visit from the McGill Chamber Orchestra. Grierson, forced by Board policy to suffer these cultural intrusions from time to time, had instructed him not to disturb regular classes but to press only Practical Classes and the basement inhabitants of the Wood, Metal, and Auto Shops. These retardees had then been regaled with a programme of Bach and Vivaldi while he and three of the basement men walked the floor trying to prevent whistles, groping, match ignition, and loud speculations on the sexual habits of the lady cellist.

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