“First,” he says, “you will retrieve a towel. Then: strip. Pile your clothes here.” He points to the floor. “They will be incinerated. We deposited a change of clothes for each of you there.” He points to a door marked CHANGING ROOM. “Make sure to wash thoroughly.”

A murmur goes through the room. The clothes will be burnt! No inspection; no investigation. Whatever happened that day, it will not be added to any ledger of transgression. As relief floods the students, they grow chatty, almost giddy. Clothes are ripped off bodies; cotton tears, buttons pop; boys can be seen running half dressed through the room, flicking at one another with towels. As they push into the shower-baths and scrub at their skin, their noise begins to fill the entire hall. They are sharing the wonders they beheld in London, cleansing them of fear in the process; their day recast as adventure. Charlie listens to them distractedly, his own face raised into the tepid stream of the shower.

“Did you see the Negro street sweeper? He had but one hand. He was so black you could hardly see the Soot.”

“I swear she was selling heads, that one, only they were shrunk somehow. Size of a cricket ball, each of them, tied to a stick by the hair.”

“And as I was looking at her, she opens her coat all of a sudden, and underneath she’s starkers, I swear. Only she was so dirty you couldn’t see a thing.”

It takes but half an hour until everyone is clean, kempt, dressed in fresh clothing. The teachers, too, have cleaned up in an adjoining bathroom; some have found time to shave. A servant has come and is shovelling their dirties into the incinerator with a pitchfork, much as though he were moving manure. The fire’s heat has spread throughout the room and is bringing a rosy hue to Charlie’s cheeks. Nothing is left of the delirium of London other than the vaguest of yearnings: for irresponsibility, perhaps, for some hours spent in the thrall of base instinct. He wonders briefly whether all delirium leaves you with this trace. Then Renfrew calls them together, teachers and pupils, assembles them by the door.

“Well then,” he says, gently, triumphantly. “We have survived.”

The mood is such that the phrase is met by applause. Renfrew basks in it then silences the boys with a gesture, a conductor working a willing orchestra.

“There were those who doubted that we would. And more, many more”—his gaze wanders over his fellow teachers—“who doubted we should go in the first place. Why, after all, did we have to climb down into this pit of filth and infamy; breathe the air of crime; rub shoulders with the mob; and see our blood poisoned by their lust and hate and greed?”