Unseen Academicals

‘I would very much like to know the truth myself, Mister Nutt, thank you very much,’ said Glenda, folding her arms and trying to look stern while all the time a voice in her head was whispering Chaise longue! Chaise longue! When no one else is here you can have a go at languishing!

‘It’s a kind of medicine with words,’ said Nutt, carefully. ‘Sometimes people fool themselves into believing things that aren’t true. Sometimes that can be quite dangerous for the person. They see the world in a wrong way. They won’t let themselves see that what they believe is wrong. But often there is a part of the mind that does know, and the right words can let it out.’ He gave them a worried look.

‘Well, that’s nice,’ said Juliet.

‘It sounds like hocus pocus to me,’ said Glenda. ‘Folk know their own minds!’ She folded her arms again, and saw Nutt glance at them.

‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘Haven’t you ever seen elbows before?’

‘Never such pretty dimpled ones, Miss Glenda, on such tightly folded arms.’

Up until that point Glenda had never realized that Juliet had such a dirty laugh, to which, Glenda fervently hoped, she was not entitled.

‘Glenda’s got a bee-oh! Glenda’s got a bee-ooh!’

‘It’s “beau”, actually,’ Glenda said, swiping to the back of her mind the recollection that it had taken her years to find that out herself. ‘And I was just helping. We’re helping him, aren’t we, Mister Nutt?’

‘Doesn’t he look sweet lying there?’ said Juliet. ‘All pink.’ She stroked Trev’s greasy hair inexpertly. ‘Just like a little boy!’

‘Yes, he’s always been good at that,’ said Glenda. ‘Why don’t you go and get the little boy a cup of tea? And a biscuit. Not one of the chocolate ones. That’ll take some time,’ she said as the girl shimmied away. ‘She tends to get distracted. Her mind wanders and amuses itself elsewhere.’

‘Trev tells me that despite your more mature appearance you are the same age as her,’ said Nutt.

‘You really don’t talk to many ladies, do you, Mister Nutt?’

‘Oh dear, have I made another faux pas?’ said Nutt, suddenly all nerves again, to such an extent that she took pity on him.

‘Would this be “faux pas” that looks as if it should be said like “forks pass”?’

‘Er, yes.’

Glenda nodded, satisfied, another literary puzzle solved. ‘Better not use the word “mature” unless you are talking about cheese or wine. Not good to use it for ladies.’

She stared at him, wondering how to pose the next question. She opted for directness; she wasn’t very good at anything else.

‘Trev is sure you sort of died and came alive again.’

‘So I understand.’

‘Not many people do that.’

‘The vast majority do not, I believe.’

‘How did you do it?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘This is rather late in the day, I must admit, but you don’t feel any hunger for blood or brains, do you?’

‘Not at all. Just pies. I like pies. I am very ashamed about the pies. It will not happen again, Miss Glenda. I fear my body was acting on its own. It needed instant nourishment.’

‘Trev says you used to be chained to an anvil?’

‘Yes. That was because I was worthless. Then I was taken to see Ladyship and she told me: You are worthless but, I think, not unworthy, and I will give you worth.’

‘But you must have had parents!’

‘I do not know. There are many things I don’t know. There is a door.’

‘What?’

‘A door in my head. Some things are behind the door and I don’t know them. But that is all right, Ladyship says.’

Glenda felt like giving up. Nutt answered questions, yes, but really all you ended up with was more questions. But she persevered. It was like stabbing away at a tin can, hoping to find a way in. ‘Ladyship is a real lady, is she? Castles and servants and whatnot?’

‘Oh, yes. Even a whatnot. She is my friend. And she is mature like cheese and wine, because she has lived for a long time and is not old.’

‘But she sent you here, yes? Did she teach you… whatever it was you used on Trev?’

Beside Glenda, Trev stirred.

‘No,’ said Nutt. ‘I read the works of the masters in the library all by myself. But she did tell me that people, too, were a kind of living book, and I would have to learn to read them.’

‘Well, you read Trev well enough. Be told, though: don’t try that stuff on me or you’ll never see another pie!’

‘Yes, Miss Glenda. Sorry, Miss Glenda.’

She sighed. What is it about me? The moment they look downcast I feel sorry for them! She looked up. He was watching her.

‘Stop that!’

‘Sorry, Miss Glenda.’

‘But you got to see the football, at least. Did you enjoy it?’

Nutt’s face lit up. ‘Yes. It was wonderful. The noise, the crowds, the chanting, oh the chanting! It becomes a second blood! The unison! To not be alone! To be not just one but one and all, of one mind and purpose!… excuse me.’ He had seen her face.

‘So you quite liked it, then,’ said Glenda. The intensity of Nutt’s outburst had been like opening an oven door. It was a mercy her hair hadn’t frizzled.

‘Oh yes! The ambience was wonderful!’

‘I didn’t try those,’ Glenda hazarded, ‘but the pease pudding is usually good.’