Chapter 78: Chapter 79

James My mobile rings: Richard.

“James, I was having a word with Charlotte earlier. She’s a little upset that the university is kicking up a fuss over the way her course options are moving around. The training periods, academic time and so on. It was all supposed to be arranged, but apparently, they’re giving her a hard time over it.”

“Yes, I thought something like this might crop up. Did you have something in mind?”

“Absolutely. I know where this is coming from. The Chancellor, Wilmore, is fine, but the Bursar is an interfering busybody with an inflated sense of self-worth, who pokes his nose into every aspect of university life, whether it belongs there or not. If he didn’t have tenure he’d have been out years ago.”

“So…?”

“First, I like you to have a word with Charlotte….”

*****

The crook of my thumb and forefinger under her chin, I force her face to mine, “Charlotte, is it that you want to attend the university? Or that, in a couple of years’ time, you simply want the qualifications and the letters after your name?”

She’s nervous, and I’m deliberately keeping her that way. I want this dealt with once and for all….

…. Then I know what I’m dealing with….

She licks her lips. “I want the qualifications, Master. They’re the key to my getting on in the world.”

I kiss her. “Good girl. You’re thinking clearly. Keep what you just said in mind.”

*****

“No Beth today?” asks Michael. “I thought she’d be along to give Charlotte some moral support.”

Richard replies, watching him in the rearview mirror. “Elizabeth couldn’t make it today. She’s had to go see a sick relative.”

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. Someone close? Anything serious?”

“Her Uncle Albert. I don't think there's a cure for old age. He must be into his nineties and, well I'm not sure he's all there…” He taps his skull…. “…. any more. The last time we went to visit him, he kept thinking Elizabeth was his wife. I think it was his wife…. Some female relative anyway, long gone.

Elizabeth she's a bit of a favourite of the old man’s when she was a little girl, and she’s very fond of him.”

As we park up, “I don’t think I can add much to this,” says Michael. “I’ll go for a walk down by the river while you’re all in there. Give me a call when you’re done, and I’ll meet up with you.” He kisses Charlotte. “Good luck.” Then he saunters off.

“I’m afraid you can’t come in Charlotte,” says Richard, sounding apologetic. “I realise that seems unfair when we’re going to be talking about you….”

“Oh, that’s fine,” she says airily. “I’m going shopping.”

Shopping?

Charlotte?!?

“Charlotte, have you had a blow to the head recently?”

She chuckles. “I knew I wouldn’t be with you, Master. I’m going to do the rounds of the second-hand bookshops.”

And I chuckle too. “You’re nothing if not consistent. Have fun.” I kiss her forehead. “I’ll call you when we’re done.”

*****

As we stroll through the parkland campus, Richard comments “We'll get what we want but it's not going to be a walk in the park.”

“What makes you so sure we’ll get it then?”

“They owe me,” he says concisely.

On the steps to the main building, a security guard recognises Richard, opening the door for him with some show of ceremony.

He enters without a trace of either modesty or arrogance.

“You enjoy money, don't you?” I murmur from the side of my mouth.

“Damn right.” His words are equally quiet. “Money gives you power, and power is meant to be enjoyed.

Especially when it means I get to make a self-important shmuck like this dance to my tune.”

Ahead of us is a man, average height, average build, average everything. And right off, I understand why he gets Richard’s back up. Something in his body-language….

A toad of a man….

“What’s his name?” I whisper.

“I can never remember….”

He struts across to us….

Bantam….

“Mr Haswell.” He offers a hand. “Thank you so much for coming.”

As though we were here by invitation….

Richard gives the hand a brief tug, releasing it quickly. “Bursar, this is my Technical Director, James Alexanders.”

I am also offered the hand. As I take it, it is damp and soft. I release it equally quickly.

“Chancellor Wilmore is waiting for us,” he says.

Us…?

The Chancellor is a big, friendly-faced man.

The Bursar introduces us. “Mr Richard Haswell, Chancellor, and his Co-Director….”

He’s forgotten my name in the last two minutes?

Richard’s brow puckers.

Everything about Wilmore is built to scale and the ham-hand thrust at me envelopes mine. “James Alexanders,” I say.

Wilmore frowns, as though trying to bring something to mind, but the Bursar interrupts.

“If you recall Chancellor, Mr Haswell is here regarding the case of the Conners girl.”

“Ah, yes, Charlotte. A very talented girl. Excellent results. She has a difficulty of some kind I understand?”

“She is making special pleading Chancellor, for favours and treatment as a special case.”

“No,” interrupts Richard. “I am making special pleading for her….”

We spend an unpleasant fifteen minutes trying to have a conversation with Wilmore. However, the Bursar interferes at every point, blocking any and every point we make.

Finally, Richard loses patience. “You lean on me for a lot of favours, Chancellor,” he snaps. “And on this occasion, I am calling some of them in.” Richard makes a show of checking a notepad. And I know it to be show, because he reeled off the lot to me earlier in the day without so much as glancing at the pad.

“It’s quite a shopping list,” he says pensively. “At the head of the list are a new library wing and a replacement… um… transmission electron microscope. Personally, I have no idea what the contraption is, but James here tells me it is something that every self-respecting physics lab should have these days.”

The Chancellor frowns again as he looks at me. I begin to wonder if I have a piece of spinach stuck between my teeth.

“If we do it for one,” whines the Bursar, “we'd have to do it for all of them.”

“I'm not asking for all of them,” says Richard, his tone now curt. “And I am not willing to negotiate the principle of this. Only the details by which it is made possible. Your university asks much of me and my company. And for the most part, I give it. On this occasion, I am asking for something in return, and personally, I do not believe I am asking for anything unreasonable; simply that you assist one student in pursuing her studies in an equitable manner.”

I interrupt. I have never seen Richard lose his temper, but storm clouds are brewing. “We're not asking for any relaxation of standards,” I point out. “Charlotte would still have to do the coursework, pass all the exams with acceptable grades, and of course the Industrial training. I can handle all that in as much detail and volume as you feel necessary. It would simply be that the academic side of the work is done as distance learning. Charlotte could visit from time to time if you felt the need to talk with her face to face.”

Wilmore is wavering. The Bursar has a set to his chin.

“Look at it this way,” I say. “If she were disabled; partially sighted say, or in a wheelchair, you would make special arrangements for her. What's the difference?”

Richard breaks in. “And of course, when the Haswell corporation expands its apprenticeship and graduate trainee programs next year, it would be quite a claim for any student of the University to say they had trained under James Alexanders, designer and architect of the new City Renovation Scheme.”

Wilmore sits upright in his chair, stabbing a finger towards me. “Those are your designs? You’re that James Alexanders?”

I’m a little taken aback at his vehemence. “Indeed, they are. And, yes, I am.”

The Bursar whines in again. “That has absolutely no bearing on anything….”

“Bursar, don’t you have any ledgers to balance or some-such?” snaps Wilmore. “I think you have made your contribution to this discussion.”

The toad reddens, nods curtly and leaves.

Wilmore turns back to me, ignoring Richard, apparently to his amusement. “And Charlotte is your, um, personal project? It all becomes clear now.”

I doubt that….

“Yes, despite her personal circumstances, I have made it my business to see that she receives the education and training she wishes for and deserves….”

And not one word of a lie was spoken….

*****