The Heat of the Sun

out, Elmsley.’
    Elmsley, like a rodent, scurried to the door, but turned back to Trouble with a sneer and said: ‘Scranway’s going to smash your teeth down your throat.’
    My anger at Elmsley left me shaken. I was a bookish boy, and solitary. But I wanted so much to beat Elmsley that afterwards I half-regretted I had not done it. I told myself that Elmsley could
bring out murderous passions in a saint. But dimly I realized another explanation for my fury. It was Trouble: Trouble was dangerous. He had in him an excitability that had to go to extremes. And I
wanted to go with him.
    As the fight of the century drew near, I lived in a trance of longing. One day Mr Gregg asked me if anything was wrong.
    ‘No, sir. Nothing.’ I mumbled something about Elizabethan lyrics. After Trouble had sung the song from Cymbeline , I had enquired, shyly, of Mr Gregg where I could find more
verses like that. My question delighted him, and he pushed into my hands a copy of The Golden Pomp , an anthology of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century verse edited by Sir Arthur
Quiller-Couch. Now I was returning it, endeavouring to thank him.
    He asked me if I had profited from it.
    ‘Yes, sir. Oh, yes.’ For weeks the little book had sailed beside me, enchanting me with its cargo of Shakespeare and Campion, Sidney and Fletcher, Spenser and Herrick and John Donne.
In the rhythms of these pages, clanging like cymbals, exploding like fireworks, meandering like streams, I sensed a connection with Trouble’s magic.
    ‘This enthusiasm for verse is something new , Mr Sharpless?’
    I said, before I could stop myself: ‘I’m going to be a poet.’
    ‘Dear me, it’s as bad as that? Hmm... perhaps, then, this is the place to go next.’ From a shelf behind his desk Mr Gregg brought down another book, larger this time.
‘Sir Arthur again. But now the big picture – the whole story, as it were.’
    The Oxford Book of English Verse was a volume considerably more substantial than The Golden Pomp . Both daunted and grateful, I riffled through the pages. Awkwardly, I thanked
him.
    I had reached the door when Mr Gregg called me back.
    ‘Tell me, you seem to be thick with Mr Pinkerton these days. Perhaps you could make him join the Glee Club? It’s not as if they’re overburdened with talent, and that
performance of his in class was remarkable.’
    He cleared his throat. Distractedly, he tidied some papers on his desk.
    ‘You know, I’ve never believed this nonsense about being an all-rounder,’ he went on. ‘One should capitalize on one’s areas of strength. A little chap like that
will never make a pugilist, for example.’
    ‘No, sir. I suppose not, sir.’
    In Mr Gregg’s eyes was both a certainty and a demand. I knew where he was leading. He had offered a way out, a release from the spell that bound me.
    Fumbling, I reached into my jacket for the challenge. I held it out to him.
    ‘Well,’ he said, when he had read it. ‘Well, well.’
    We were in Geography the next morning when the message came for Trouble to report to the headmaster. Fellows exchanged glances. There were murmurs, raised eyebrows.
    After the lesson I was making my way upstairs, lagging behind the others, when Trouble appeared on the landing. At once a group of fellows surrounded him, quizzing him. One pushed him in the
chest. Several jeered. Only with difficulty did he break away.
    I gripped his arm. ‘What happened?’
    ‘It was frightful. There was me, there was Scranway, there was the old boy glaring at us over that enormous ugly desk. And those ears of his, have you seen those ears up close?’
    ‘What? What are you talking about?’
    ‘The hairs! Huge sprouty tufts. Wouldn’t you say it behooves a man of his age to remove the coarse hairs that grow from his nose and ears? I’d have said it was common
courtesy.’
    I almost shook him. ‘Trouble!’
    ‘Oh, we’ve got to call the whole thing off. Finished. Over. Or we’re both out.’
    ‘No! But how did he know?’ I tried to sound shocked.
    Trouble laughed. ‘It was satisfying up to a point. Mr Scranway, you ought to be ashamed of yourself . Well, I’ve always thought that , but not that I’m an
imbecile and irresponsible and a disruptive influence.’ He kicked the banisters. ‘Damn it. Damn it to hell!’
    ‘Come on, it’s not so bad, is it?’ I said.
    ‘Who squealed?’
    ‘Obvious, isn’t it? Scranway couldn’t go through with it. A job cut out for Elmsley, wouldn’t you