A Bit on the Side Read Online Free Page B

one the birds were dropped into it. Macluse piled back the day and then the capturing of replacement birds began.
    *
    Long before Olivier came to the school there had been incidents in the past that word of mouth had since made famous: the ringing of the Chapel bell in the middle of the night; the removal of a Renoir print – ‘Young Girl Reading’ – from its place between the windows in one of the prefects’ common-rooms; the purloining of a cigarette lighter and a pipe from a pocket of Dobie-Gordon’s overcoat; the mysterious collapse of the central-heating system. Occurring over many years, the incidents had in common only that no culprit had ever been brought to book; nor did it seem possible that the same hand could have been responsible for any two of the occurrences – let alone all of them – since the length of a boy’s stay at the school did not allow it. Seven years ago – long before Olivier’s arrival – there’d been the trouble in the bicycle sheds: the random deflating of tyres. Then nothing had happened until the killing of the jackdaws.
    It was purely intuition that caused Olivier to suspect the girl, not just of the latest outrage but of the others too. And though certain that he was right, so sure was his instinct, so unassailable his sensing of a purpose in all this, he could not think why one of the dining-hall maids should wish to alert the school to fire at one o’clock in the morning or what possible use she could have had for Dobie-Gordon’s pipe. Somewhere here there was revenge, he had conjectured when first he’d had his idea, but had since rejected the speculation, for he considered it too pat and obvious. He thought so again on the day of Leggett’s duffing up when at teatime he stared at the girl, trying to catch her when she wasn’t looking. He was skilled at breaking into privacies without the knowledge of the person observed; he prided himself on that, but twice, or even three times, he suddenly had to drop his scrutiny, taken unawares by having his gaze returned. Bella this maid’s name was, but ‘the girl’ identified her in the dining hall and beyond it.
    Along one arm, plates touching to keep them balanced, the dining-hall maids could carry five at a time, each bearing a sausage roll, or toast with beans or scrambled eggs. Today it was sausage roll, two sausages in each envelope of pastry, the pastry dark brown and flaky. At St Andrew’s Second Table you passed your sausage roll to Chom, who ate it for you. Elsewhere in the dining hall more usual conventions prevailed, unwanted sausage rolls disposed of later.
    Olivier’s place this evening at St David’s Third Table was on the prefect’s right, a position that recurred every twelve days, each boy but for the prefect moving on a place each day. The prefect did not speak except to request the salt or pepper or jam; it was his privilege to be aloof. The warm plates were passed along each row of boys, the prefect’s fetched at the last moment and mustard brought with it.
    The maid who interested Olivier did not serve this table. He watched her at the far end of the dining hall, where the St Patrick’s tables were, where Accrington and Newcombe and Hambrose sat. Only Olivier, among the boys who tamed jackdaws, was in St David’s. Forrogale and Maduse and Napier were in St George’s, the House renowned for games.
    The noise in the dining hall was considerable, but the only snatches of conversation that reached Olivier were from his own table, all else being lost in the general din. The Saturday-evening debate this week was to be about the existence or otherwise of ghosts. This was talked about in advance; and an item of national news – the conviction of a medical doctor who had murdered a number of his female patients – was discussed, the death penalty advocated or opposed. Olivier drank his tea and passed his cup and saucer to where a large metal teapot was in the charge of the two boys at the table’s other