The silent world of Nicholas Quinn Read Online Free Page B

flats, converted into hotels, taken over by doctors, by dentists, by English Language schools for foreign
    students, by University faculties, by hospital departments—and, in the case of one
    large and well-appointed property in Chaucer Road, by the Foreign Examinations
    Syndicate.
    The Syndicate building stands some twenty yards back from the comparatively quiet
    road which links the busy Banbury and Woodstock thoroughfares, and is modestly
    sheltered from inquisitive eyes behind a row of tall horse-chestnut trees. It is
    approached from the front (there is no back entrance) by a curving gravelled drive,
    allowing space sufficient for the parking of a dozen or so cars. But the Syndicate staff
    has grown so much of late that this space is now inadequate, and the drive has been
    extended along the left-hand side of the building, leading to a small concreted yard at
    the rear, where it has become the custom of the graduates themselves to park their
    cars.
    There are five graduates on the permanent staff of the Syndicate, four men and one
    woman, severally superintending the fields of study corresponding, in the main, to the
    disciplines which they had pursued for their university degrees, and to the subjects
    taught in their subsequent careers. For it is an invariable rule that no graduate may
    apply for a post with the Syndicate unless he (or she) has spent a minimum of five
    years teaching in the schools. The names of the five graduates are printed in bold blue
    letters at the top of the Syndicate's official notepaper; and on such notepaper, in a
    large converted bedroom on the first floor, on Friday, 31st October (the day after
    Quinn's deliberations with the History Committee), four of the five young shorthand
    typists are tapping out letters to the headmasters and headmistresses of those
    overseas schools (a select, but growing band) who are happy to entrust the public
    examination of their O- and A-level candidates to the Syndicate's benevolence and
    expertise. The four girls pick at their typewriters with varying degrees of competence;
    frequently one of them leans forward to delete a mis-spelling or a careless
    transposition of letters; occasionally a sheet is torn from a typewriter carriage, the
    carbon salvaged, but the top sheet and the under-copies savagely consigned to the
    wastepaper basket. The fifth girl has been reading Woman's Weekly , but now puts it aside and opens her dictation book. She'd better get started. Automatically she
    reaches for her ruler and neatly crosses through the third name on the headed
    notepaper. Dr Bartlett has insisted that until the new stocks are ready the girls shall
    manually correct each single sheet—and Margaret Freeman usually does as she is
    told:
    T. G. Bartlett, PhD, MA Secretary
    P. Ogleby, MA Deputy Secretary
    G. Bland, MA
    Miss M. M Height, MA
    D. J. Martin, BA
    Beneath the last name she types 'N. Quinn, MA'—her new boss.
    After Margaret Freeman had left him, Quinn opened one of his filing cabinets, took out
    the drafts of the History question papers, deciding that a further couple of hours should see them ready for press. All in all, he felt quite pleased with life. His dictation (for him, a completely new skill) had gone well, and at last he was beginning to get the knack of
    expressing his thoughts directly into words, instead of first having to write them down
    on paper. He was his own boss, too; for Bartlett knew 1how to delegate, and unless
    something went sadly askew he allowed his staff to work entirely on their own. Yes,
    Quinn was enjoying his new job. It was only the phones that caused him trouble and
    (he admitted it) considerable embarrassment. There were two of them in each office: a
    white one for internal extensions, and a grey one for outside calls. And there they sat,
    squat and menacing, on the right-hand side of Quinn's desk as he sat writing; and he
    prayed they wouldn't ring, for he was still unable to quell the panic which welled up
    within him