Skippy Dies by Paul Murray (Excerpt)

872019 Skippy Dies by Paul Murray (Excerpt)

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullskippy-dies-by-paul-murray-excerpt 110



Skippy Dies

983152983137983157983148 983149983157983154983154 983137983161

983110983105983106983109983122 983105983118983108 983110983105983106983109983122 983113983118983107

An affi liate of Farrar Straus and Giroux

New York



9

In winter months from his seat in the middle desk of the middlerow Howard used to look out the window of the History Roomand watch the whole school go up in 1047298ames The rugby pitchesthe basketball court the car park and the trees beyond ndash for one

beautiful instant everything would be engulfed and though thespell was quickly broken ndash the light deepening and reddening and1047298attening out leaving the school and its environs intact ndash youwould know at least that the day was almost over Today he stands at the head of the class the wrong angle andthe wrong time of year to view the sunset He knows howeverthat 1047297fteen minutes remain on the clock and so pinching his

nose sighing imperceptibly he tries again lsquoCome on now Themain protagonists Just the main ones Anybodyrsquo The torpid silence remains undisturbed The radiators are

blazing though it is not particularly cold outside the heatingsystem is elderly and erratic like most things at this end of theschool and over the course of the day the heat builds to a swampymalarial fug Howard complains of course like the other teach-

ers but he is secretly not ungrateful combined with the powerfulsopori1047297c effects of history itself it means the disorder levels of hislater classes rarely extend beyond a low drone of chatter and theoccasional paper aeroplane

lsquoAnyonersquo he repeats looking over the class deliberatelyignoring Ruprecht Van Dorenrsquos upstretched hand beneathwhich the rest of Ruprecht strains breathlessly The rest of the

boys blink back at Howard as if to reproach him for disturbingtheir peace In Howardrsquos old seat Daniel lsquoSkippyrsquo Juster starescatatonically into space for all the world as if hersquos been druggedin the back-row suntrap Henry Lafayette has made a little nest



10

of his arms in which to lay his head Even the clock sounds likeitrsquos half asleep

lsquoWersquove been talking about this for the last two days Are you

telling me no one can name a single one of the countries involvedCome on yoursquore not getting out of here till yoursquove shown methat you know thisrsquo

lsquoUruguayrsquo Bob Shambles incants vaguely as if summoningthe answer from magical vapours

lsquoNorsquo Howard says glancing down at the book spread open onhis lectern just to make sure lsquo Known at the time as ldquothe war to end

all warsrdquorsquo the caption reads below a picture of a vast water-logged moonscape from which all signs of life natural or man-made have been comprehensively removed

lsquoThe Jewsrsquo Ultan OrsquoDowd says lsquoThe Jews are not a country Mariorsquo lsquoWhatrsquo Mario Bianchirsquos head snaps up from whatever he isattending to probably his phone under the desk lsquoOh it was

it was ndash ow stop ndash sir Dennis is feeling my leg Stop feeling mefeelerrsquo lsquoStop feeling his leg Dennisrsquo lsquoI wasnrsquot sirrsquo Dennis Hoey all wounded innocence

On the blackboard lsquoMAINrsquo ndash Militarism Alliances Industriali-zation Nationalism ndash copied out of the textbook at the start ofclass is slowly bleached out by the lowering sun lsquoYes Mariorsquo

lsquoUh rsquo Mario prevaricates lsquoWell Italy rsquo lsquoItaly was in charge of the cateringrsquo Niall Henaghan suggests lsquoHeyrsquo Mario warns

lsquoSir Mario calls his wang Il Ducersquo says Dennis lsquoSirrsquo lsquoDennisrsquo lsquoBut he does ndash you do Irsquove heard you ldquoTime to rise Ducerdquo

you say ldquoYour people await you Ducerdquorsquo lsquoAt least I have a wang and am not a boy with Instead of awang he has just a blank piece of rsquo lsquoI feel wersquore straying off the point herersquo Howard intervenes



11

lsquoCome on guys The protagonists of the First World War Irsquoll give you a clue Germany Germany was involved Who were Ger-manyrsquos allies ndash yes Henryrsquo as Henry Lafayette whatever he is

dreaming of emits a loud snort Hearing his name he raiseshis head and gazes at Howard with dizzy bewildered eyeslsquoElvesrsquo he ventures

The classroom explodes into hystericslsquoWell what was the questionrsquo Henry asks somewhat wound-

edlyHoward is on the brink of accepting defeat and beginning the

class all over again A glance at the clock however absolves himfrom any further effort today so instead he directs them back tothe textbook and has Geoff Sproke read out the poem reproducedthere lsquoldquoIn Flanders Fieldsrdquorsquo Geoff obliges lsquoBy Lieutenant JohnMcCraersquo lsquoJohn McGayrsquo glosses John Reidy

lsquoThatrsquos enoughrsquo lsquoldquoIn Flanders 1047297eldsrdquorsquo Geoff reads lsquoldquothe poppies blowrdquo

lsquoBetween the crosses row on rowThat mark our place and in the skyThe larks still bravely singing 1047298yScarce heard amid the guns below

We are the Dead Short days agoWe lived ndashrsquo

At this point the bell rings In a single motion the daydreamingand somnolent snap awake grab their bags stow their books andmove as one for the door lsquoFor tomorrow read the end of the

chapterrsquo Howard calls over the melee lsquoAnd while yoursquore at itread the stuff you were supposed to read for todayrsquo But the classhas already 1047297zzed away and Howard is left as he always is won-dering if anyone has been listening to a single thing hersquos said he



1983090

can practically see his words crumpled up on the 1047298oor He packsaway his own book wipes clean the board and sets off to 1047297ght hisway through the home-time throng to the staffroom

In Our Ladyrsquos Hall hormonal surges have made giants andmidgets of the crowd The tang of adolescence impervious todeodorant or opened windows hangs heavy and the air tintin-nabulates with bleeps chimes and trebly shards of music as twohundred mobile phones banned during the school day areswitched back on with the urgency of divers reconnecting to theiroxygen supply From her alcove a safe elevation above it the plas-

ter Madonna with the starred halo and the peaches-and-creamcomplexion pouts coquettishly at the rampaging maleness belowlsquoHey Flubberrsquo Dennis Hoey scampers across Howardrsquos path

to waylay William lsquoFlubberrsquo Cooke lsquoHey I just wanted to ask youa questionrsquo

lsquoWhatrsquo Flubber immediately suspicious lsquoUh I was just wondering ndash are you a bummer tied to a treersquo

Brows creasing Flubber ndash fourteen stone and on his third tripthrough second year ndash turns this overlsquoItrsquos not a trick or anythingrsquo promises Dennis lsquoI just wanted to

know you know if yoursquore a bummer tied to a treersquolsquoNorsquo Flubber resolves at which Dennis takes 1047298ight declaring

exuberantly lsquoBummer on the loose Bummer on the loosersquo Flub- ber lets out a roar and prepares to give chase then stops abruptly

and ducks off in the other direction as the crowd parts and a tallcadaverous 1047297gure comes striding through Father Jerome Green teacher of French coordinator of Sea-

brookrsquos charitable works and by some stretch the schoolrsquos mostterrifying personage Wherever he goes it is with two or three

bodiesrsquo worth of empty space around him as if hersquos accompanied by an invisible retinue of pitchfork-wielding goblins ready to jab

at anyone who happens to be harbouring an impure thought Ashe passes Howard musters a weak smile the priest glares back athim the same way he does at everyone with a kind of ready



13

impersonal disapproval so adept at looking into manrsquos soul andseeing sin desire ferment that he does it now like ticking a box Sometimes Howard feels dispiritedly as if not one thing has

changed here in the ten years since he graduated The priests inparticular bring this out in him The hale ones are still hale thedoddery ones still dodder Father Green still collects canned foodfor Africa and terrorizes the boys Father Laughton still getsteary-eyed when he presents the works of Bach to his unheedingclasses Father Foley still gives lsquoguidancersquo to troubled youngstersinvariably in the form of an admonition to play more rugby On

bad days Howard sees their endurance as a kind of personalrebuke ndash as if that almost-decade of life between matriculationand his ignominious return here had because of his own inepti-tude been rolled back struck from the record deemed merelyso much fudge

Of course this is pure paranoia The priests are not immortalThe Holy Paraclete Fathers are experiencing the same problem

as every other Catholic order they are dying out Few of thepriests in Seabrook are under sixty and the newest recruit to thepastoral programme ndash one of an ever-dwindling number ndash is a

young seminarian from somewhere outside Kinshasa when theschool principal Father Desmond Furlong fell ill at the begin-ning of September it was a layman ndash economics teacher Greg-ory L Costigan ndash who took the reins for the 1047297rst time in

Seabrookrsquos historyLeaving behind the wood-panelled halls of the Old BuildingHoward passes up the Annexe climbs the stairs and openswith the usual frisson of weirdness the door marked lsquoStaff-roomrsquo Inside a half-dozen of his colleagues are kvetchingmarking homework or changing their nicotine patches With-out addressing anyone or otherwise signalling his presence

Howard goes to his locker and throws a couple of books and apile of copies into his briefcase then moving crab-like to avoideye contact he steals out of the room again He clatters back



14

down the stairs and the now-deserted corridor eyes 1047297xed deter-minedly on the exit ndash when he is arrested by the sound of a

young female voice

It appears that although the bell for the end of the school dayrang a good 1047297ve minutes ago class in the Geography Room is stillin full swing Crouching slightly Howard peers through the nar-row window set in the door The boys inside show no sign ofimpatience in fact by their expressions they are quite obliviousto the passage of time

The reason for this stands at the head of the class Her name

is Miss McIntyre she is a substitute Howard has caughtglimpses of her in the staffroom and on the corridor but hehasnrsquot yet managed to speak to her In the cavernous depths ofthe Geography Room she draws the eye like a 1047298ame Her

blonde hair has that cascading quality you normally see onlyin TV ads for shampoo complemented by a sophisticated mag-nolia two-piece more suited to a boardroom than a transition-

year class her voice while soft and melodious has at the sametime an ungainsayable quality an undertone of command Inthe crook of her arm she cradles a globe which while shespeaks she caresses absently as if it were a fat spoiled housecatit almost seems to purr as it revolves langorously under her1047297ngertips lsquo just beneath the surface of the Earthrsquo she is saying lsquotem-

peratures so high that the rock itself is molten ndash can anyone tellme what itrsquos called this molten rockrsquo lsquoMagmarsquo croak several boys at once lsquoAnd what do you call it when it bursts up onto the Earthrsquossurface from a volcanorsquo lsquoLavarsquo they respond tremulously lsquoExcellent And millions of years ago there was an enormous

amount of volcanic activity with magma boiling up over theentire surface of the Earth non-stop The landscape around ustoday ndashrsquo she runs a lacquered 1047297ngernail down a swelling ridge ofmountain lsquondash is mostly the legacy of this era when the whole



15

planet was experiencing dramatic physical changes I suppose youcould call it Earthrsquos teenage yearsrsquo The class blushes to its collective roots and stares down at its

textbook She laughs again and spins the globe snapping it underher 1047297ngertips like a musician plucking the strings of a double bass then catches sight of her watch lsquoOh my gosh Oh you poorthings I should have let you out ten minutes ago Why didnrsquotsomeone say somethingrsquo The class mumbles inaudibly still looking at the book

lsquoWell all right rsquo She turns to write their homework on the

blackboard reaching up so that her skirt rises to expose the backof her knees moments later the door opens and the boys troopreluctantly out Howard affecting to study the photographs onthe noticeboard of the Hillwalking Clubrsquos recent outing to DjouceMountain watches from the corner of his eye until the 1047298ow ofgrey jumpers has ceased When she fails to appear he goes backto investindash

lsquoOhrsquo lsquoOh my God Irsquom so sorryrsquo He hunkers down beside her andhelps her re-amass the pages that have 1047298uttered all over the grittycorridor 1047298oor lsquoIrsquom so sorry I didnrsquot see you I was just rushing

back to a a meeting rsquo lsquoThatrsquos all rightrsquo she says lsquothanksrsquo as he places a sheaf of Ord-nance Survey maps on top of the stack shersquos gathered back in her

arms lsquoThank yoursquo she repeats looking directly into his eyes andcontinuing to look into them as they rise in unison to their feetso that Howard 1047297nding himself unable to look away feels a briefmoment of panic as if they have somehow become lockedtogether like those apocryphal stories you hear about the kidswho get their braces stuck together while kissing and have to getthe 1047297re brigade to cut them out

lsquoSorryrsquo he says again re1047298exivelylsquoStop apologizingrsquo she laughs He introduces himself lsquoIrsquom Howard Fallon I teach HistoryYoursquore standing in for Finian Oacute Daacutelaighrsquo



16

lsquoThatrsquos rightrsquo she says lsquoApparently hersquos going to be out tillChristmas whatever happened to himrsquo lsquoGallstonesrsquo Howard says

lsquoOhrsquo she says Howard wishes he could unsay gallstones lsquoSorsquo he rebegins effort-fully lsquoIrsquom actually on my way home Can I give you a liftrsquo She cocks her head lsquoDidnrsquot you have a meetingrsquo lsquoYesrsquo he remembers lsquoBut it isnrsquot really that importantrsquo

lsquoI have my own car thanks all the samersquo she says lsquoBut I sup-pose you could carry my books if you likersquo

lsquoOkayrsquo Howard says Possibly the offer is ironic but before shecan retract it he removes the stack of binders and textbooks fromher hands and ignoring the homicidal looks from a small clumpof her pupils still mooning about the corridor walks alongsideher towards the exit lsquoSo how are you 1047297nding itrsquo he asks attempting to haul theconversation to a more equilibrious state lsquoHave you taught much

before or is this your 1047297rst timersquo lsquoOh ndashrsquo she blows upwards at a wayward strand of goldenhair lsquondash Irsquom not a teacher by profession Irsquom just doing this as afavour for Greg really Mr Costigan I mean God Irsquod forgottenabout this Mister Miss stuff Itrsquos so funny Miss McIntyrersquo lsquoStaff are allowed to use 1047297rst names you knowrsquo lsquoMmm Actually Irsquom quite enjoying being Miss McIntyre

Anyhow Greg and I were talking one day and he was saying theywere having problems 1047297nding a good substitute and it so hap-pens that once upon a time I had fantasies of being a teacher andI was between contracts so I thought why notrsquo lsquoWhatrsquos your 1047297eld normallyrsquo He holds open the main door forher and they step out into the autumn air which has grown coldand crisp

lsquoInvestment bankingrsquo Howard receives this information with a studied neutralitythen says casually lsquoI used to work in that area myself actuallySpent about two years in the City Futures primarilyrsquo



Skippy Dies

983152983137983157983148 983149983157983154983154 983137983161

983110983105983106983109983122 983105983118983108 983110983105983106983109983122 983113983118983107

An affi liate of Farrar Straus and Giroux

New York



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Skippy Dies by Paul Murray (Excerpt)