Chapter 14. Another fight, and a plan
The next evening, before Compline, the first years assembled in the ruins. James had chosen Sebastian as his second, whilst Adam had Albert. The others formed a semicircle around the combatants. It was dark, and everyone had brought torches, lighting up the scene like a stage, and shedding an eerie light over the crumbling tombstones.
James pulled off his blazer, and gave it to Sebastian.
“Adam”, he said, “you are accused of sneaking on Mandy and all of us, to father Abbot”.
“I never did” protested Adam.
“Well that's what this fight is going to decide” said Sebastian. Adam was shaking so much he could hardly remove his blazer. Eventually Albert took it off for him. The two boys sized each other up.
“Adam never sneaked on Mandy” said Cecilia, “look, Mandy is still here.”
“He said himself that he did” said James, “went to Father Abbot to say Mandy was dealing drugs. Can't think of a clearer case of sneaking.”
“I was there,” said Cecilia, “and you weren't. Adam never did sneak on Mandy, honestly.”
“I call on the Lord our God to give victory to His own” said Sebastian.
“Too right” said short Mary, “get on with it.”
“Come on Adam, afraid?” taunted James, “You're shaking like a spastic.”
“You can thump him, Adam” said Abagail.
James closed in on Adam, and slapped his face. There was a cheer.
“Now the sneak's getting what he deserves” said blonde Mary.
Smarting from the blow, Adam realised he was committed to the fight. He lunged at James. James stepped aside, and punched him. Adam felt the taste of blood in his cheek. He grabbed at James tie, and the pushed him in a crude judo throw. To his surprise, James went over, tripping over a jagged piece of wall, and landing heavily on the grass beyond it.
“Kick him, Adam” said Abagail.
Adam looked at the prone figure before him in the torchlight, but was somehow paralyed into inaction. James regained his feet.
“I can get you back for that Adam.” he said, squaring up for another attack.
“Look what does this prove?” said Cecilia, “that James and Sebastian are bigger than Adam and Albert? Any idiot can see that.”
“Adam should have thought of that, before sneaking” said James.
“And if you cared for Mandy you'd never have bought drugs off her.” said Cecilia, “We can all go to other schools if we're expelled, she can't. It's back in the council care home for her if she's found out. So don't pretend to care for Mandy. You're just a big bully, James.”
“And Adam could have stamped you in the face, if he'd wanted to” said Abagail.
“Why didn't he then?” said blonde Mary.
“Maybe because he's not a vicious thug” said Cecilia, “I don't know why he ever agreed to this fight in the first place. Drop it.”
“Mandy?” asked Sebastian.
Mandy looked shy and frightened.
“Do you still accuse Adam of sneaking on you?” asked Sebastian.
“I don't know” said Mandy, “I wish I'd never started all this.”
“It's not just Mandy he sneaked on” said blonde Mary, “Adam has sneaked on all of us.”
“If Mandy's not sure then the fight's over”, said Sebastian, ignoring her.
“Shake hands, gentlemen.”
“Shake hands with a sneak?” said James.
“You've got Albert and Abbey and Cecilia and now even Mandy against you” said Sebastian, “I'd call that an even split. Time to call it quits, James. Adam's got a right to oppose drugs if he wants to. I'm not saying I agree with him. But he's a right to his opinion. Shake hands.”
Reluctantly James agreed. The two boys shook hands, stiffly, and the meeting broke up. Adam and James had just washed off the evidence when it was time for Compline.
“That was disappointing” said blonde Mary, to Mandy, later that evening, “I was looking forward to my first real fight. I wanted James to win, of course, but when Adam threw him over, wasn't it so exciting? To see the underdog winning. Trust Cecilia to step in and stop it just when it started getting interesting.”
“Fights aren't so interesting” said Mandy, “once you've seen a few. But what are we to do, Mary? Sneaking or no sneaking, it's obvious that Father Abbot knows about us. And I owe Mike three hundred pounds for the drugs Adam and Albert threw into the sea.”
“I'm not sure he does know” said blonde Mary. “He knows we're using, sure, Adam told him that. But then if he has any sense at all he'd know that already, everybody does. It's the dealers they're after. So we've got to sit tight, and make them think it came from Jade and Olivia.”
“Then what happens to Jade and Olivia?” asked Mandy.
“It's their rap” said blonde Mary, “they should have thought of that before they started pushing. We won't shop them, of course, but lead Father Abbot to the conclusion that they are the source.”
“But if we don't sell, how can I make the money to pay Mike?” asked Mandy.
“He'll get it back eventually” said blonde Mary, “sometimes in this life you've just got to give people bad news. It's not as if he can go to the police”.
“We've got the face it, we've got a split” said Sebastian, in the dorm that night, “Adam will never agree to the use of cannabis, James will never agree to stop using it. It's irreconcilable. We've tried arguing, we've tried a vote in the JC, we've tried a fight. Still no solution.”
“No-one's forcing Adam to smoke if he doesn't want to” said James, “but why is he trying to impose his view on the rest of us? I've got a right to smoke if I want to.”
“No you don't” said Adam.
“Shut up, Adam” said James, “we've had enough of your stupid opinions. You can't stop me from doing what I want.” “Then light up a joint now” said Adam.
“What, in this dorm, with all the monks crawling about?” said James.
“Precisely” said Adam.
“Adam's got a point” said Sebastian, “if a monk overheard you, you'd be out of this school, James. We can't smoke in this dorm, because it's in the monastery proper. So we smoke outside, and Adam and Albert don't have to know about it.”
“And what when we come back high?” said James, “are you going to sneak us up, Adam?”
“I don't sneak” said Adam, “but if you're going to turn yourself into a dopehead, everyone will know you're a dopehead. You've just got take that risk, James”.
“It's a poor do when you can't even trust your own dorm-mates” said James.
“Then don't smoke” said Adam.
“Look Adam,” said James, “I can appreciate that you yourself will never touch dope. OK. But how does it affect you? How does it affect you, what we choose to do?”
“You said it James” said Adam, “It's a poor do when you can't even trust your own dorm-mates.”
“It's irreconcilable” said Sebastian, “you can't both have your own way. One has got to give.”
“Well it won't be me” said James.
“I won't be me” said Adam.
That same night, Mike entered the great double doors of a luxurious mansion, set in five hundred acres of forest grounds. The butler greeted him, and ushered him in past a metal detector arch and two sets of security doors. All the woodwork was polished oak, and the rooms were decorated with marble statues of figures from Greek myth. Priceless original paintings hung upon the walls, together with Persian rugs painstakingly hand-knotted by child labour. There were also trophies of foxes and of deer, their stuffed heads mounted on wooden shields, and many antique weapons. Real log fires roared in the fireplaces. After the last set of security doors Mike reached the inner sanctum, the office of Mr Baines himself. The great man was seated on a huge leather chair, smoking a cigar. A police superintendent, in full uniform, was sitting opposite, the two men in deep conference. Neither invited Mike to sit down. Mike proffered a wad of notes. Mr Baines flicked through it, not bothering to count it accurately.
“Is that all?” he asked, in a deep voice. “We're developing St Tom's, Sir”, said Mike, “I need a bit of time to get the market established. And we've got competition.”
“Competition?”
“There's another guy who was already supplying the older years. I've had to reduce prices to try to get him out.”
“We'll see if we can't close him down”, said the big man. The superintendent nodded sagely. “Mike, don't give me this rubbish. I want full penetration of that school. We've got new supplies coming through from Pakistan, serious, quality cannabis resin. I want to raise prices on it. Don't let me down, Mike, no-one's making any money on five quid a twist.” He lit another cigar. “Make sure the kid understands that”, he said, “She's got to work for her money”.
Mike drove away along the long darkened drive, trees shading his car from above. He was worried. The few pieces of cannabis Mandy was selling were nowhere near enough to satisfy Mr Baines.
Things were still very frosty with James, but there was no further violence. James and Sebastian couldn't get drugs easily from Mandy any longer, as she had run out of supplies. It was also very difficult if not impossible to smoke in the monastery proper. James and Sebastian reluctantly accepted the situation. Ibrahim, however, continued to get drugs from Jade and Olivia. Adam could tell he was still smoking. His eyes were dull, and he answered in the languid monotone of cannabis users that made Adam want to hit him.
Cecilia was as good as her word and had made a private resolution never to touch the stuff again. Abagail, blonde Mary and Mandy got drugs from Jade and Olivia, but didn't dare to pass them onto the boys for fear of Adam. They also cut out short Mary.
Short Mary initially consoled herself with the thought that she didn't really want to get involved in cannabis anyway. There was one little difficulty. Short Mary found herself craving something. She didn't know what it was, but it wasn't the sickly smell of cannabis.
It kept her distracted all night and all day, an itch she couldn't scratch. Then, outside the boy's boarding house, she came across a still-smoking butt discarded by one of the third years, and she realised what it was. She was addicted to nicotine. She picked up the butt and raised it to her lips, and instantly felt relief.
Cigarettes were just as much contraband as cannabis at St Tom's, of course, but at least they were not illegal. She could obtain them quite easily from the upper years. Which she did, only one or two a day, but it was a constant habit and a constant discipline. It also ate away at her pocket money. A box of twenty was over five pounds, and individual cigarettes cost 30p from the third years. Her father was a doctor, so of course she had been exposed to constant anti-smoking ads and propaganda.
"I'm going to get lung cancer" she told herself, "I know I'll die of lung cancer." It was a high price to pay for a few days of social weakness.
Adam, Abagail, Cecilia, and Albert met up the next day to discuss plans for the hunt.
“We need a way of getting the bows and arrows and other equipment into the forest, and a way of slipping the prefects when we get there.” said Adam.
“That's impossible” said Cecilia.
“No, it's easy” said Abagail, “There's a train station in the village near the forest. All we need is for someone to get permission to get off the island for some reason – a family wedding, or someone ill, something like that. They take the bows in their suitcase, buy a ticket to that small station, and hide them somewhere. We can pick them up days later, if need be.”
“Short Mary's got a cello case” said Cecilia, “that'll hide a set of bows and arrows.”
The prefects were more difficult. Abagail wracked her brains in pursuit of a trick. She spoke to the second years and got the general idea. If the pattern followed that of the previous year, the class would be split into two groups, each under a prefect, to lay the traps, one in the broadleaf and one in the conifer forest. Br Kieran would remain with the minibus in case of any emergencies. The prefects would then take each group on a nature walk, and they would have lunch. This was meant to be a picnic held outside, but Abagail had it on certain intelligence that the prefects went to a country pub for a quick pint. Then late in the afternoon the groups would split again, go back to the insect traps, and collect the samples to take back to the school for analysis.
She thought about it all through Vespers, and at dinner, and at prep. Prep was religious education. The question read
"Summarise the events leading up to Pharaoh's decision to allow the Israelites to leave Egypt. How historically accurate do you think the Bible's account is?"
Abagail got out her Bible, and turned to the relevant chapter of Exodus. She read
"5:1 Moses and Aaron then went to Pharaoh and said, 'This is what YHVH, God of the Hebrews, declares: 'Let My people leave, so they can sacrifice to Me in the desert.' ' 5:2 Pharaoh replied, 'Who is YHVH that I should obey Him and let Israel go? I do not recognize YHVH. Nor will I let Israel leave.' 5:3 'The God of the Hebrews has revealed Himself to us,' said [Moses and Aaron]. 'Please, allow us to take a three day journey into the desert, and let us sacrifice to YHVH our God. Otherwise, He may strike us down with the plague or the sword.' "
Abagail thought, there was her answer.
"Adam," she said, "what's the breviary for the day of the trip?"
Adam was silent for a moment to dodge the patrolling prefect, then he looked up the office and passed it to Abagail.
"Perfect" thought Abagail.
The children were excited as the trip to the forest approached.
"This is a diagram of a coal-fired power station" said Br Kieran, "now what do you think of the location?"
The diagram consisted of a river, a town, a wood and an airport. There was a soft grey ring about two miles wide around the site of the power station, labelled, "zone of maximum pollution from 200 yard chimney."
"The zone of pollution goes over the wood" said Abagail, "it will kill the wildlife."
"Where would you rather it go?" asked Br Kieran. "Over the sea." said Abagail.
"We're talking about mild smoke pollution" said Br Kieran, "not a blanket smog that will asphyxiate everything."
"We could take samples from the polluted wood and the one outside the zone of pollution" said Adam, "And compute the Shannon indices".
"I see" said Br Kieran, "you're all pepped up about the trip. Very well, let's put this book about power stations away, and start talking about biodiversity. Who can give me an example of a diverse environment?"
"The tropical rainforest" said everyone.
"And a non-diverse environment?"
That was a bit more difficult.
"The polar icecaps?" suggested James.
"Not bad" said Br Kieran, "and what do you find in the high north, in Scandinavia and Canada?"
"Coniferous forests." said James.
"Generally all of the same species" said Br Kieran, "you might have one or two species of pines. Huge stands of trees, all the same, stretching as far as they eye can see. Totally different from the tropical forest. And the interesting thing is that no-one really knows why this is. The temperate broadleaf woodland is intermediate. You don't have anything like the same number of species as in the tropical forest. And you do have large woods all of oak, for instance. But generally there is more diversity than in the colder forests."
"So it's temperature" said Mandy, "the hotter it is, the more fertile the land."
"But why would that lead to more species?" said Br Kieran, "Anyway, the coniferous forest you will be investigating is artificial. It was planted by humans deliberately all of one species, to provide uniform timber. The broadleaf forest is seeded naturally. So we can't use species counts of trees to conclude anything. But the forests are at approximately the same latitude, so any difference in insect count will not be due to temperature, directly."
"Diversity breeds diversity" said Adam, "as the trees become more diverse, they offer more different kinds of homes for the insects. The as the insects become more diverse, the insects and birds that feed on them become more diverse. So the effect is runaway."
"So how would you test that?" asked Br Kieran.
Adam was stumped. However James, without putting up his hand, came to the rescue.
"You said the broadleaf forest had areas of the same trees, and areas of different trees" he said , "so put some traps in areas where all the trees are the same, and some where they are different. Then you can separate out the effect from diversity from the effect of being a conifer."
"Very good" said Br Kieran, "so now we're beginning to plan this."
"Oh yes, we've planned the expedition, Sir" said Abagail.
Albert finally plucked up courage to ask the prefects to take him and his lobster pot out onto the high sea.
"OK" grinned the prefects, and they were off. "Very nice lobster pot you have there, Albert. Fortunately the sea within 300 yards is ours, so we'll take you up to the limit and put the pot down. Wouldn't do to trespass on the local fishermen's territory."
"The crabs just move as they want" said Albert.
They put a few mussels in the pot as bait, then attached it to a long rope with a buoy on the top. The pot was lowered and the whole event took less than a few minutes.
"Now for a bit of a sail" said one of the prefects, and made course round the island.
Albert felt the spray ion his face, and the fresh sea air in his chest, somehow salted and different in quality to the air only a few feet on shore. He was gloriously happy. The boat neared an outcrop of rocks.
"We can land on these rocks" said the prefect, "though it's some way up." He hosted Albert onto the lowest ledge, which was slippery with spray. There was an iron staple fixed into the rock. The prefect passed a rope through it. "Must be safe" he said, and tied the other end round Albert's waist. "Now all you need do Albert" said the other prefect, "is keep a watch on the buoy to see nobody nicks it, and wait."
Albert gave a little cry, but they were off, the boat swiftly putting distance between them and the rocks. There was nothing for it but to wait. As the tide got up the spray got fiercer, and there seemed to be more of a wind. Albert tried to keep out of it, but eventually the battle was lost, and his shirt and trousers were sodden to saturation. Then real cold set it. The worst was the boredom. There was nothing to do except watch the seabirds as the soared and dived. Once one came out of the sea with a fish in its beak. However it was a monotonous few hours.
They didn't keep him there for longer than the afternoon. Before dusk, the boat reappeared, with the same two prefects as crew.
"That was to get you back for stealing our boat" said the prefects, "now let's get the lobster pot up."
They sailed the few hundred yards to the buoy. Albert yanked it up.
"Why, the jammy little brat" said a prefect.
Albert's face lit up with delight.
"A lobster."
Indeed, there it was, all strange and intimidating-looking, with its tentacles investigating the rope mesh of the cage, and with vicious, slightly dirty looking claws.
"Not a crab even, but a lobster." said the prefect, "Well done Albert." He took out some tape and, grasping the lobster deftly, taped shut its claws.
"A bit unsporting" he said, "but those things are vicious. We'll put it in a pail of water to keep it alive, and you're going to dine tomorrow, Albert."
Br Damian asked him who he wanted it with, and he chose Abagail. So Abagail and Albert were called to the kitchen the next day and shown how to make lobster thermidor. The sauce was made with cream, fish stock, Parmesan cheese, mustard, onions, and brandy. The lobster was thrown alive into a big pan of boiling slated water, at which point it screamed.
"Lobsters can't scream" explained Br Damian, "it's just the air coming out of its shell. It dies instantly."
Not quite reassured, Albert and Abagail cut it in half, mixed up the meat with the sauce, and stuffed it back into its shell.
They had to eat it in the kitchen to avoid exciting envy. "This is delicious" said Albert.
"First time I've had lobster thermidor" said Abagail, "and, with any luck, we'll have venison next week, St Tom's is looking up. I'll have those specs, Albert" she said, grabbing Albert's spectacles.
“Hey, I need those to see” said Albert.
“I know you do.” said Abagail, “Unfortunately you lost them in the sea when you were tied to that rock. It's an emergency and you need to go to the opticians to get new ones. Father Abbot's got to give you permission.”
“They saw that I had my glasses on” said Albert.
“They won’t notice” said Abagail.
So it proved. Albert was told to get the boat that very next morning, to replace his spectacles so he could see and do schoolwork. He set off early, with the bows and arrows packed into a cello case he had borrowed from short Mary. He also took James' knife, some rope, matches and a few barbecue utensils.
"What are you doing with a cello, Albert?" asked one of the second years, "I didn't know you even played it".
Albert motioned for him to shut it, and then he was on the ferry and on the road to freedom. He checked in at the railway station, and instead of buying a ticket straight through, bought one that stopped off at a little station in a village near the forest. A long driveway led from the village to the huge mansion of the owner of the estate. Like most estates in Scotland, there were paths through it which were open to the public, as long as they kept to the marked right of way. Albert entered a short way onto the estate, and concealed the cello case in a hole by a tree, taking a note of the position with his GPS phone. Then he returned to the village, and completed the visit to the optician's in Saltcoates. who tested his eyes and had new lenses specially ordered for him. He got back last thing that night.
All was set for the big trip out.