I have no great expectation of this, however. Anderton-Pullitt has been indulged far more than is good for him, and now that he has a Syndrome, I fully expect him to use it. I anticipate many meetings with Mrs. Anderton-Pullitt, in which she attempts to persuade me that her son needs extra time in exams, exemption from Games (which he dislikes), and permission to ignore any homework that gets in the way of his interests. I sense a confrontation. And if the New Head has taken his side—

“So, no Mulberry girls,” said McNair.

“Not for us,” said Allen-Jones.

“As if you’d care,” said Pink.

He grinned. “This class is a fruit-free zone.”

Pink gave a snort of laughter. The rest of my Brodie Boys joined in. I thought there was an edge to the sound—something not quite familiar—and I caught Allen-Jones looking at me, just for a moment, obliquely, as if to gauge the level of my interest.

“Do Mulberry girls count as fruit?” said McNair.

“Only if you’re making a pie,” said Pink, and they were off again into a burst of that laughter that comes so easily to boys; the almost existential mirth that simply comes of being young. The feel of it; the rib-­racking way it grabs you and shakes you breathless—I almost remember how that felt, in the days when I was fourteen. That feeling of something wound up tight, like a clockwork animal, springing into action somewhere within the region of the solar plexus and coming out as laughter. Nowadays that mechanism has become old and rusty. I rarely laugh aloud any more. And when I do, it sounds like the call of a lonely bird, ungainly and harsh.

What is it with me nowadays? I never used to be so sentimental. Perhaps it’s this Harrington business, coming back to haunt me. Dammit, why did he have to come here? There must be a hundred “failing schools” in need of the touch of a Super Head. Why here? Why St. Oswald’s? Even allowing for the peculiar nostalgia of a man approaching middle age, his memories of the dear old place can hardly be the sweetest.

The bell rang, marking the start of the first lesson. The boys all left for their classes, some more efficiently than others. Anderton-Pullitt was the last to go, still rummaging in his desk even after most of my group (a first-form class) had already found their places.