Wilt (21 page)

The Principal sat behind his desk and regarded Wilt incredulously. ‘Promotion?’ he
said. ‘Did I hear you mention the word “promotion”?’

‘You did,’ said Wilt. ‘And what is more you also heard “Head of Liberal Studies”
too.’

‘After all you’ve done. You mean to say you have the nerve to come in here and demand to
be made Head of Liberal Studies?’

‘Yes,’ said Wilt.

The Principal struggled to find words to match his feelings. It wasn’t easy. In front of
him sat the man who was responsible for the series of disasters that had put an end to
his fondest hopes. The Tech would never be a Poly now. The Joint Honours degree’s
rejection had seen to that. And then there was the adverse publicity, the cut in the
budget, his battles with the Education Committee, the humiliation of being heralded
as the Principal of Dollfuckers Hall…

‘You’re fired’ he shouted.

Wilt smiled. ‘I think not,’ he said. ‘Here are my terms…’

‘Your what?’

‘Terms,’ said Wilt. ‘In return for my appointment as Head of Liberal Studies, I shall
not institute proceedings against you for unfair dismissal with all the attendant
publicity that would entail. I shall withdraw my case against the police for unlawful
arrest. The contract I have here with the Sunday Post for a series of articles on the
true nature of Liberal Studies–I intend to call them Exposure to Barbarism–will remain
unsigned. I will cancel the lectures I had promised to give for the Sex Education Centre.
I will not appear on Panorama next Monday. In short I will abjure the pleasures and
rewards of public exposure…’

The Principal raised a shaky hand. ‘Enough,’ he said, ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

Wilt got to his feet. ‘Let me know your answer by lunchtime,’ he said. ‘I’ll be in my
office.’

‘Your office?’ said the Principal.

‘It used to belong to Mr Morris,’ said Wilt and closed the door. Behind him the
Principal picked up the phone. There had been no mistaking the seriousness of Wilt’s
threats. He would have to hurry.

Wilt strolled down the corridor to the Liberal Studies Department and stood looking
at the books on the shelves. There were changes he had in mind. The Lord of the Flies would go
and with it Shane, Women in Love, Orwell’s Essays and Catcher in the Rye, all those
symptoms of intellectual condescension those dangled worms of sensibility. In
future Gasfitters One and Meat Two would learn the how of things not why. How to read and
write. How to make beer. How to fiddle their income tax returns. How to cope with the
police when arrested. How to make an incompatible marriage work. Wilt would give the
last two lessons himself. There would be objections from the staff, even threats of
resignation, but it would make no difference. He might well accept several
resignations from those who persisted in opposing his ideas. After all you didn’t
require a degree in English literature to teach Gasfitters the how of anything. Come to
think of it, they had taught him more than they had learnt from him. Much more. He went into
Mr Morris’s empty office and sat down at the desk and composed a memorandum to Liberal
Studies Staff. It was headed Notes on a System of Self-Teaching for Day Release Classes.
He had just written ‘non-hierarchical’ for the fifth time when the phone rang. It was the
Principal.

‘Thank you,’ said the new Head of Liberal Studies.

Eva Wilt walked gaily up Parkview Avenue from the doctor’s office. She had made
breakfast for Henry and Hoovered the front room and polished the hall and cleaned the
windows and Harpicked the loo and been round to the Harmony Community Centre and helped
with Xeroxing an appeal for a new play group and done the shopping and paid the milkman
and been to the doctor to ask if there was any point in taking a course of fertility drugs
and there was. ‘Of course we’ll have to do tests,’ the doctor had told her, ‘but there’s no
reason to think they’d prove negative. The only danger is that you might have
sextuplets.’ It wasn’t a danger to Eva. It was what she had always wanted, a house full of
children. And all at once. Henry would be pleased. And so the sun shone brighter, the sky was
bluer, the flowers in the gardens were rosier and even Parkview Avenue itself seemed to
have taken on a new and brighter aspect. It was one of Eva Wilt’s better days.

The End