by Ruth Newman
Bert the porter was telling off some tourists for walking on the perfect lawn as Lesley passed through the gates to Goodesford College. The unnerved sightseers were having a hard time understanding Bert’s thick fenland accent, and had to be rescued by their tour guide. Bert turned back to the Porters’ Lodge, swearing under his breath.
“It’s not like we don’t say it in four languages!” he said to Lesley, pointing to the multilingual sign on the lawn that read ‘please keep off the grass’. “Anyway, how are you Lesley my love? Looking forward to tonight?”
Lesley’s supervisor, Professor Stanley Juniper, had persuaded her to enter her MPhil dissertation in an extremely prestigious national competition. That week she’d heard she had won first prize, and the College was so delighted that they’d invited her to a private dinner with the senior fellows. Lesley had been carrying the invitation around with her since Wednesday.
“I can’t wait!” she said.
Bert gave her a Snickers bar from his waistcoat pocket. “Just something to keep you going till then.”
“Bert!” she admonished, but she laughed as she put it in her pocket. “I’ll never fit in my dress at this rate.” Lesley had been Bert’s favourite since getting a starred first class degree the year before. The other students teased her about the muffins and chocolate that regularly appeared in her pigeonhole, but she appreciated the fact Bert cared about her and her sweet tooth.
In the College bar, her friend Ayesha was deep in that week’s edition of Varsity. Lesley read the story over her shoulder.
“They’re not still going on about Michael Pears?”
“Says they’ve found his car abandoned on the Norfolk coast.” Ayesha looked at Lesley, worried. “Promise me you’re not going overdo it and end up like this? Forgetting there’s life outside of Cambridge?”
Michael Pears was a doctoral student at Goodesford. He’d gone missing the term before, and everyone was assuming he’d topped himself. One of Cambridge’s brilliant overachievers – well-known to his tutors, but barely recognised by his fellow students – only his immediate neighbours had been able to tell the police anything:
“He liked Wagner. And early 80s German techno music.”
“He had an IQ of 172.”
“Yeah, I think he wore glasses. Did he?”
He was wearing glasses in Varsity’s picture. He was also wearing trousers about an inch too short for him, and a geometrically-patterned woolly jumper. His hair fluffed out at the sides.
“Poor Michael,” Lesley said, and went to get herself a mocha.
Old portraits of long-dead academics hung from the deep red walls of the fellows’ dining room. Many of their faces seemed to have a greenish tinge in the candlelight, casting them in tarnished copper. Sir Maurice Goodesford, founder of the College, glowered down at Lesley from under his burr-like eyebrows. His eyes were the shiny black of a beetle’s shell.
“Not the most pleasant portrait of Sir Maurice,” said Professor Juniper, who had appeared at her side. “Are you ready for dinner my dear girl?”
The wine was served first, a crisp white with a hint of gooseberries and honeysuckle. The fellows focused their attentions on Lesley, asking her question after question, not just about her astrophysics research, but her views on politics, religion, philosophy. She easily absorbed the attentions and charmed everyone, as Professor Juniper refilled her wine glass. Soon she was tipsy, and still no food had arrived.
“Tell me, Miss Davies, did you know Michael Pears?” asked another ancient fellow. There was an old joke around Cambridge that it was impossible to get a post at Goodesford because the fellows there lived to be 150. “Do you believe he’s taken his own life?”
The wine was beginning to make her head spin. “Probably. You need a hard skin to make it at Cambridge, and he always seemed too soft.”
“I found him quite tough,” said one fellow, and received a swift poke in the ribs from his neighbour.
Lesley looked round to see if the food was coming, and realised she was seeing double.
“Tell me, Lesley, do you know much about the Iroquois?” Professor Juniper was asking. “Sir Maurice was fascinated by them. Especially their belief that, through the consumption of one’s enemies, one could gain that enemy’s ability and power.”
“I wrote my most eloquent paper yet following our dinner with young Master Pears,” said an old fellow down the other end of the table. “I hope this one’s as useful.”
Lesley was trying to stand up, but the room was accordioning before her.
“Apparently she’s vegetarian,” said another through his bushy white beard. “They always have a particularly nice flavour.”
Just then Bert burst through the door.
“Bert!” croaked Lesley, but he didn’t even look at her.
“Not too late then,” he said.
“Not at all,” replied Juniper. “Let’s all raise a glass to Bert for the excellent job he’s done in fattening up Miss Davies. Smith, get the spit going, will you?”