She shot me a sympathetic smile. “Everything all right?”

I shrugged. “All the better for seeing you. You must have come in very early.”

I thought she coloured a little. “Well, the Head starts early,” she said. “And, of course, I work flexible hours.”

“He doesn’t deserve you,” I told her, making it sound like a joke.

She laughed. “None of you deserve me,” she said. “Now, how about a cup of tea?”

It was a long, long day today. Domestic matters; marking books; an altercation between two boys. I was on duty all lunchtime, opposite Devine in the yard, and then I was teaching all afternoon. I didn’t have the chance to open Harry’s box until I got home; at which point I was almost reluctant to look inside.

I left it on the hall table as I went to make myself a snack: I hadn’t had time for lunch, and so had been forced to compensate by eating biscuits between lessons—against my doctor’s advice, but how does he expect me to plan sensible meals when there’s always so much to be done?

I poured myself a glass of wine and made myself a Welsh rarebit. Whole-grain mustard and cheddar cheese on a fat brown doorstep of granary bread. Here again, the upstart who calls himself my doctor would have had more than a few things to say, but how can you take the advice of a boy who, only a few years ago, was incapable of distinguishing a present from a past participle?

I poured myself another glass. A man has to unwind somehow. I finished the rarebit and opened the box, still feeling vaguely apprehensive.

Is this all it comes to? Is this a man’s life? A ceramic urn of the plainest kind, the lid secured with masking tape. Some photographs in an envelope; some newspaper clippings; a vinyl record. Some letters, bound with a rubber band. Old St. Oswald’s diaries—over a dozen of them, the kind in which Harry used to write his classroom notes. An assortment of smaller objects that must have meant something to him once—a watch; a ring; a paperweight; a medal; cuff links; a penknife. The flotsam and jetsam of a life—and then, a package, tied with string, and carefully labeled with the words:

To Roy Straitley:

Use it well.

I took the package out of the box. Narrow at one end, thicker at the other, it seemed about the same shape as a wine bottle, though weighing rather less. I poured myself another drink. I tore off the wrapping paper. And then I took out the object and put it on the mantelpiece next to my clock and the plastic urn and the photographs of my parents. It looks a little strange there—perhaps a little sinister. Still, no one is likely to see it—at least, not until I put it to use.