Jamieson’s eyes bugged and his jaw dropped, but before he could explode Harry added: ‘I reversed the diagonals, that’s all. It was the obvious answer, the only logical answer. Any other way’s a game of chance, trial and error. And hit and miss isn’t good enough. Not for me . . .’
Jamieson stood up, flopped down again, pointed an enraged finger at the door. ‘Hannant, get – that – boy -out – of – here! Then come back in and speak to me.’
Hannant grabbed Keogh’s arm, dragged him out into the corridor. He had the feeling that if he hadn’t physically taken hold of the boy, then Keogh might well have fainted. As it was he propped him up against the wall, hissed ‘Wait here!’ and left him there looking slightly dazed and sick.
Back inside Jamieson’s study, Hannant found the headmaster soaking sweat from his brow with a large sheet of school blotting paper. He was staring fixedly at Harry’s solution and muttering to himself. ‘Reversed the diagonals! Hmm! And so he has!’ But as Hannant closed the door behind him Jamieson looked up and grinned somewhat feebly. He had obviously regained his self control and continued to dab away at the sweat on his forehead and neck. ‘This bloody heat!’ he said, waving a limp hand and indicating that Hannant should take a seat.
Hannant, whose shirt was sticking to his back beneath his jacket, said, ‘I know. It’s murder, isn’t it? The school’s like a furnace – and it’s just as bad for the kids.’ He remained standing.
Jamieson saw his meaning and nodded. ‘Yes, well that’s no excuse for insolence – or arrogance.’
Hannant knew he should keep quiet but couldn’t. ‘ he was being insolent,’ he said. ‘Thing is, I believe he was simply stating a fact. It was the same when I crossed him yesterday. It seems that as soon as you crowd him he gets his back up. The lad’s brilliant – but he’d like to pretend not to be! He does his damnedest to keep it hidden.’
‘But why? Surely that’s not normal. Most boys of his age like the chance to show off. Is it simply that he’s shy – or does it go deeper than that?’
Hannant shook his head. ‘I don’t know. Let me tell you about yesterday.’
When he was through, the head said: ‘Almost exactly parallel to what we’ve just seen.’
‘That’s right.’
Jamieson grew thoughtful. ‘If he really is as clever as you seem to think he is – and certainly he seems to have an intuitive knack in some directions – then I’d hate to be the one to deprive him of a chance to get somewhere in life.’ He sat back. ‘Very well, it’s decided. Keogh missed the exams through no fault of his own, so … I’ll speak to Jack Harmon at the Tech., see if we can fix up some
sort of private examination for him. Of course I can’t promise anything, but – ‘ ‘It’s better than nothing,’ Hannant finished it for him.
‘Thanks, Howard.’
Tine, fine. I’ll let you know how I get on.’ Nodding, Hannant went out into the corridor where
Keogh was waiting.
Over the next two days Hannant tried to put Keogh to the back of his mind but it didn’t work. In the middle of lessons, or at home during the long autumn evenings, even occasionally in the dead of night, the boy’s young-old face would be there, hovering on the periphery of Hannant’s awareness. Friday night saw the teacher awake at 3:00 a.m., all his windows open to let in what little breeze there was, prowling the house in his pyjamas. He had come awake with that picture in his mind of Harry Keogh, clutching Jamieson’s folded sheet of A4, heading off across the schoolyard of milling boys in the direction of the back gate under the stone archway; then of the boy crossing the dusty summer lane and passing in through the iron gates of the cemetery. And Hannant had believed that he knew where Harry was going. And suddenly, though the night had not grown noticeably cooler, Hannant had felt chilly in a way he was now becoming used to. It could only be a psychic chill, he suspected, warning him that something was dreadfully wrong. There was something uncanny about Keogh, certainly, but what it was defied conjecture – or rather, challenged it. One thing was certain: George Hannant hoped to God the kid could pass whatever exams Howard Jamieson and Jack Harmon of Hartlepool Tech. cooked up for him. And it was no longer simply that he wanted the boy to realise his full potential. No, it was more basic than that. Frankly, he wanted Keogh out of here, out of the school, away from the other kids. Those perfectly ordinary, normal boys at Harden Secondary Modern.