repeat. From the crossroads in the middle of the town you can see a full mile in both directions. And coming from what must have been Aldermaston was the march. Right in the distance, turning the bend, was the front banner itself, a huge black and white and red job, and beyond it a whole lot of other ones in different colours. The road slopes down to the crossroads, and then on and up again, so I had a splendid view, and shattered I was by it, I may say. I’m sure that in all its history Cartersfield never saw anything like it.
‘For God’s sake!’ I said to the dim pupil, whose mouth was hanging open like a letter-box. But he simply looked at me again as though I was mad and ran off, telling his friends, I dare say. So I turned to a perfect stranger beside me, a policeman as it happened, and said: ‘But I thought it was supposed to go along the by-pass?’
‘Special request,’ said the policeman. ‘Coming down here instead. Got the message this morning.’
And then I realized. Harry had really pulled a trick to shatter his home-town. But if he’d fooled us, then so had the march fooled him, because it was much bigger than he’d estimated. I should say his five hundred was exceeded several times, not that I know. I dare say there are statistics somewhere if you want to find out. The marchers came on and on, like a medieval army, flags flying, banners streaming , just like the pictures in fact. I kept thinking of Henry V , though I didn’t notice Laurence Olivier out there leading them into the breach. In fact as the front of the procession came nearer I saw thatthe leaders, about a dozen of them, included (you’ve guessed, of course) Harry Mengel, and he’d got someone on the other end of his banner, and he was strutting along at the front as though he was the Great Panjandrum himself, his chest swollen up like a balloon and his eyes front as though he was back in the Army. A band somewhere farther back was playing ‘When the Saints Go Marching In’. Very appropriate.
Well, when I saw him it was too much for me, much too much. I wasn’t letting him get away with it that easy. I just jumped straight in and took the other pole of his banner away from whatever nabob of the march had a hold of it, and shouted at him. What I shouted isn’t altogether repeatable, but the gist of it was, what did he think he was doing, how the hell had he managed it, and what about his precious Easter eggs?
‘You’ll see!’ he yelled back, and really he looked so happy I didn’t want to spoil it for him by being narky, so I just marched along beside him at the head of the carnival, that bloody great procession, and whenever I saw anyone I knew, and I know most of the people in Cartersfield, I said: ‘Join the march’ in my most ferocious schoolmaster’s voice, and as most of them had been my pupils at some time or another, quite a lot of them were sufficiently frightened or awed or something that they di d join in, so that we had a pretty impressive Cartersfield group banning the bomb by the time we came out the other side of the town. I don’t know what had got into me, but when they came up to us—the big-wigs, I mean—and said: ‘O.K., you’ve had your glory, Cartersfield, back with the boys now,’ I was about to brain them with the banner, but Harry said: ‘That’s right, and thanks a lot.’ So off we went to the back, or rather, since the back was so far away, to the middle or thereabouts, in with a lot of students from (it had to be) Reading University. By this time I was cooling down, and beginning to realize just what a fool I’d made of myself, but then the procession stopped for a moment, and I had a good look at it.
All through the town, and up the hill over the crossroads, themarch beetled along, people singing, waving, shuffling, striding, as though there wasn’t a by-pass round Cartersfield at all, and the life had come back to it again, and things mattered—you know what I mean? For a moment I
‘For God’s sake!’ I said to the dim pupil, whose mouth was hanging open like a letter-box. But he simply looked at me again as though I was mad and ran off, telling his friends, I dare say. So I turned to a perfect stranger beside me, a policeman as it happened, and said: ‘But I thought it was supposed to go along the by-pass?’
‘Special request,’ said the policeman. ‘Coming down here instead. Got the message this morning.’
And then I realized. Harry had really pulled a trick to shatter his home-town. But if he’d fooled us, then so had the march fooled him, because it was much bigger than he’d estimated. I should say his five hundred was exceeded several times, not that I know. I dare say there are statistics somewhere if you want to find out. The marchers came on and on, like a medieval army, flags flying, banners streaming , just like the pictures in fact. I kept thinking of Henry V , though I didn’t notice Laurence Olivier out there leading them into the breach. In fact as the front of the procession came nearer I saw thatthe leaders, about a dozen of them, included (you’ve guessed, of course) Harry Mengel, and he’d got someone on the other end of his banner, and he was strutting along at the front as though he was the Great Panjandrum himself, his chest swollen up like a balloon and his eyes front as though he was back in the Army. A band somewhere farther back was playing ‘When the Saints Go Marching In’. Very appropriate.
Well, when I saw him it was too much for me, much too much. I wasn’t letting him get away with it that easy. I just jumped straight in and took the other pole of his banner away from whatever nabob of the march had a hold of it, and shouted at him. What I shouted isn’t altogether repeatable, but the gist of it was, what did he think he was doing, how the hell had he managed it, and what about his precious Easter eggs?
‘You’ll see!’ he yelled back, and really he looked so happy I didn’t want to spoil it for him by being narky, so I just marched along beside him at the head of the carnival, that bloody great procession, and whenever I saw anyone I knew, and I know most of the people in Cartersfield, I said: ‘Join the march’ in my most ferocious schoolmaster’s voice, and as most of them had been my pupils at some time or another, quite a lot of them were sufficiently frightened or awed or something that they di d join in, so that we had a pretty impressive Cartersfield group banning the bomb by the time we came out the other side of the town. I don’t know what had got into me, but when they came up to us—the big-wigs, I mean—and said: ‘O.K., you’ve had your glory, Cartersfield, back with the boys now,’ I was about to brain them with the banner, but Harry said: ‘That’s right, and thanks a lot.’ So off we went to the back, or rather, since the back was so far away, to the middle or thereabouts, in with a lot of students from (it had to be) Reading University. By this time I was cooling down, and beginning to realize just what a fool I’d made of myself, but then the procession stopped for a moment, and I had a good look at it.
All through the town, and up the hill over the crossroads, themarch beetled along, people singing, waving, shuffling, striding, as though there wasn’t a by-pass round Cartersfield at all, and the life had come back to it again, and things mattered—you know what I mean? For a moment I
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