The Good Apprentice Read Online Free PDF Page B

And he must go and pack, he’s done nothing!’ Ursula looked indulgently upon Willy’s chaste passion for Midge, it seemed even to cause hersome satisfaction.
    ‘You’re lucky,’ said Harry, ‘no problems with Giles, he just goes on from one triumph to another. I wonder if you could ask him to write to Stuart and tell him not to be such a fool?’
    ‘Don’t go yet, have another drink,’ said Thomas.
    ‘I’m afraid Willy got onto the whisky in the kitchen,’ said Midge.
    Willy cast a glance of dread towards the terrible figure of suffering Edward. He hated it when his pupils had troubles. He always drank the detestable ‘mixture’ out of politeness. Thomas, perhaps out of some rabbinical ancestral puritanism, had made a positive rite of it. Midge caught Harry’s eye and smiled, then turned away to look at Edward. She went to him and with a flurry and a soft hiss of the striped dress knelt on one knee, and, with a gesture which resembled her son’s, touched his jacket and then laid her red-tipped fingers lightly upon the back of his hand. Edward shuddered and withdrew his hand, then forced a smile. Midge sighed and rose. ‘Edward, dear, do come and join us, have a drink.’ But the words were uttered tonelessly, without hope of effect, as she turned away.
    ‘Stuart is late,’ said Thomas.
    ‘He’s probably at a prayer meeting,’ said Harry.
    ‘But Stuart doesn’t believe in God,’ said Midge.
    ‘That doesn’t stop him. And to do him justice, I don’t really think it’s a sect, he’s doing it all on his own, he thinks he’s got a mission to mankind, he’s waiting for it all to start, he’s expecting the first miracle.’
    ‘I’ll have some jugs of water ready for him in the kitchen.’
    ‘I suppose he reads lots of oriental books like they all do,’ said Willy.
    ‘No, he doesn’t, he reads nothing, he doesn’t like any form of art, he hasn’t any friends, he just sits wrestling with himself, wondering what the purehearted young idealist does now!’
    ‘It’s an out-of-date question,’ said Midge.
    ‘He’s an out-of-date boy.’
    ‘You said once he wanted to be a soldier.’
    ‘That was ages ago, just symbolic, the idea of duty and obedience, and a life of monkish deprivation. He wants to be like Job, always in the wrong before God, only he’s got to do it without God.’
    ‘Does he want martyrdom then?’ said Ursula.
    ‘I expect so. He’ll probably die young, in the sea or underneath a train or — ’
    ‘Not suicide?’
    ‘No, no, stupidly trying to save somebody’s life. He’s a retarded schoolboy.’
    ‘Stuart thinks before he laughs at a joke,’ said Midge, ‘and then if he does laugh, he laughs loudly like a child.’
    ‘No risqué jokes when he’s around!’
    ‘Is it true he’s taken an oath of celibacy?’ said Willy. ‘How’s it done?’
    ‘At his age it’s impossible,’ said Midge, ‘he just lacks confidence. I’ll find him a girl. He wants to draw attention to himself. It’s a cry for help.’
    ‘No, he takes it all seriously,’ said Harry.
    ‘All what?’ said Thomas.
    ‘About being good, being perfect!’
    ‘Well, I suppose it was meant to be — ’
    ‘Can he do anything for Edward?’ said Willy.
    ‘No, he’s too self-obsessed, he scarcely knows that Edward exists, and they never really got on — ’
    ‘I think Stuart was wrongly advised at the start,’ said Ursula, ‘don’t you agree, Willy? He ought to have done biological sciences. But really he’s all right, he’s just having a schoolboy religious crisis a bit late in the day, he always was a slow sort of chap.’
    ‘I suppose it’s nuclear war,’ said Midge, ‘the young say it hangs over us all.’
    ‘I confess I don’t notice it all that much,’ said Ursula, ‘but then I’m so busy.’
    ‘Stuart is more worried about computers,’ said Harry.
    ‘Computers?’ said Ursula. ‘But they’re man’s best friends. They’re invaluable in medicine.’
    ‘Harry,