The Affair by C. P. Snow

Author:C. P. Snow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: The Affair
ISBN: 9780755120055
Publisher: House of Stratus
Published: 2012-05-10T04:00:00+00:00

22: “Under Which King, Bezonian?”

SITTING in my room the following afternoon, I found myself with nothing to do. The bargain with the university was made, except for a formality which I could knock off next day: Luke had returned to London: I could stretch myself out on the sofa like an undergraduate, and read a book. I had the luxurious feeling that all time was spread out ahead. Did one feel that as a young man, and if so, did one chafe against it? Was it luxurious now just because it was the contradiction of the official life?

Before I lay down, the head porter had rung up to know if I was in my rooms. It seemed a little odd: I thought it might have to do with Arthur Brown’s dinner party that night. At what he called “shamefully short notice”, Brown was organising a dinner in his rooms. For whom, and for what, I wasn’t told, only that he needed me. It sounded as though he were acting fast, as though he were not glossing over the previous night.

I had not been reading for half an hour when I heard steps, a muttering of steps, outside. A tap on the door, and then the head porter, bowler-hat in hand, unctuously calling out my name, and announcing: “Professor Gay!”

The old man was wrapped in a fur coat, with a silk muffler under his beard and round his neck. On his head he wore a wide-brimmed homburg, such as I had not seen for a generation. The head porter was supporting one arm, an assistant porter the other. Another college servant had been conscripted to follow behind, and so a phalanx of four entered the room.

“Ha, ha, my dear fellow! I’ve run you to earth, indeed I have!”

There was nothing for it but to get him into an armchair. He progressed in movements a few inches at a time, but neither embarrassed, nor, so far as I could see, physically discomforted. His lungs did not seem to be troubling him, his breathing was easy. He dismissed the porters with a jaunty wave. “Stay at your posts, men. We shall require you later. When we have conducted our business. We shall summon you by telephone. That’s what we shall do.”

When they had gone, he informed me that he was going to continue to wear his hat – “the draughts in these old rooms, one has to be careful of them nowadays.”

He looked at me, cheeks blooming, pupils white-rimmed but glance eager.

“Well, this is a surprise and a half for you, I’ll be bound!”

It was.

“You can guess what’s brought me here, I’ll guarantee you can guess that.”

I could.

“But you couldn’t guess that I should be able to find you, indeed you couldn’t. Ha, ha. I have good spies. They keep me au fait, my spies do. I know more of what is going on than some people in this college realise. Why, you hadn’t been in Cambridge half a day before I had you taped, my dear chap.

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