that our aim today is to nut out a shortlist?’
That wasn’t a difficult task, because it allowed all of them to ensure that at least their candidate of first choice survived, and without showing their hand completely as to the other selections. They ended with coffee, and a list of four that they would mull over before a second meeting to make the final decision. Gordy would surely come down for Robert Malcolm, but Sheff thought if he supported the one woman on the shortlist, then he and Annabel would be united.
Annabel knew Sheff had resigned from the paper, and asked himabout it when business had lapsed. Both she and Gordy claimed to be jealous of the freedom he’d been rash enough to establish, but were glad of their own security. Gordy began a humorous account of his department’s battle against the bureaucrats within the university. It was at once self-deprecating yet suggestive of his own role as a champion of disinterested scholarship. Sheff was attentive for a time, as much to the performance as the story, but gradually his gaze and thoughts turned to the park not far away, the open space, the various tones of green, the large trees diminishing in perspective. He remembered running there, sometimes with winter darkness bowling in and his sweat chilled, more often with low sun and warm breeze, and people cutting by on the lower cycle paths. Those recollections became somehow conflated with the scenes from Yellowstone he had witnessed the night before, until he too was pursued through the mountain forest and across high meadows plumed by geysers. He was so lost there that he was unable to respond intelligently when Annabel asked for his opinion on Gordy’s monologue.
‘But you were lecturing for while, weren’t you?’ she said. ‘You must know what it’s like?’
‘Journalists tend to come and go in the system. Hardly any of us see it as a full career thing, and so try to avoid being sucked into internal politics,’ Sheff said. ‘And it’s a very small department – no cliques, no threat to the major players.’
‘Still, you know what I’m on about then,’ said Gordy. ‘The university is a strange world, isn’t it?’ He went on to say more about his experience there, but with slightly less bravura and dogmatism after realising Sheff himself had some experience of academic life.
Both Annabel and Gordy were intelligent, interesting people, making an effort to be agreeable. A few years before, Sheff would have responded in kind. Now he was aware of a variety of impatience, even withdrawal, within himself that he disliked, but was unable to suppress. In the attempt he encouraged Gordy to further mockery ofbureaucratic formalism, and laughed with Annabel at the response. Nothing of their real lives was being shared: they were merely passing time in one other’s obliging company. Sheff had experienced relationships that meant so much more, but they had become painful to revisit.
He left soon after, and walked into the park. Gordy remained, waiting to be picked up by a friend with whom he was to stay the night. Nothing had been said about the names, Sheff realised. Nothing about Powell and Howell. Perhaps the two of them stood at Annabel’s window and watched him heading off through the trees on the green slope, using him as a topic of conversation as they got to know each other better. Maybe they were already forming a majority opinion as to the next winner of the McInnes Foundation award. If so, Sheff didn’t really give a bugger. He was wondering if he’d done a stupid thing by tossing in his job.
Three young guys were practising with their short irons, probably in defiance of park regulations. Sheff was reminded of his father’s new voice of illness as it had been on the phone. Golf had been his father’s game: such a predictable choice for an accountant, but there was fascination behind the selection, not just the pragmatic wisdom of making and maintaining business contacts. Some of
That wasn’t a difficult task, because it allowed all of them to ensure that at least their candidate of first choice survived, and without showing their hand completely as to the other selections. They ended with coffee, and a list of four that they would mull over before a second meeting to make the final decision. Gordy would surely come down for Robert Malcolm, but Sheff thought if he supported the one woman on the shortlist, then he and Annabel would be united.
Annabel knew Sheff had resigned from the paper, and asked himabout it when business had lapsed. Both she and Gordy claimed to be jealous of the freedom he’d been rash enough to establish, but were glad of their own security. Gordy began a humorous account of his department’s battle against the bureaucrats within the university. It was at once self-deprecating yet suggestive of his own role as a champion of disinterested scholarship. Sheff was attentive for a time, as much to the performance as the story, but gradually his gaze and thoughts turned to the park not far away, the open space, the various tones of green, the large trees diminishing in perspective. He remembered running there, sometimes with winter darkness bowling in and his sweat chilled, more often with low sun and warm breeze, and people cutting by on the lower cycle paths. Those recollections became somehow conflated with the scenes from Yellowstone he had witnessed the night before, until he too was pursued through the mountain forest and across high meadows plumed by geysers. He was so lost there that he was unable to respond intelligently when Annabel asked for his opinion on Gordy’s monologue.
‘But you were lecturing for while, weren’t you?’ she said. ‘You must know what it’s like?’
‘Journalists tend to come and go in the system. Hardly any of us see it as a full career thing, and so try to avoid being sucked into internal politics,’ Sheff said. ‘And it’s a very small department – no cliques, no threat to the major players.’
‘Still, you know what I’m on about then,’ said Gordy. ‘The university is a strange world, isn’t it?’ He went on to say more about his experience there, but with slightly less bravura and dogmatism after realising Sheff himself had some experience of academic life.
Both Annabel and Gordy were intelligent, interesting people, making an effort to be agreeable. A few years before, Sheff would have responded in kind. Now he was aware of a variety of impatience, even withdrawal, within himself that he disliked, but was unable to suppress. In the attempt he encouraged Gordy to further mockery ofbureaucratic formalism, and laughed with Annabel at the response. Nothing of their real lives was being shared: they were merely passing time in one other’s obliging company. Sheff had experienced relationships that meant so much more, but they had become painful to revisit.
He left soon after, and walked into the park. Gordy remained, waiting to be picked up by a friend with whom he was to stay the night. Nothing had been said about the names, Sheff realised. Nothing about Powell and Howell. Perhaps the two of them stood at Annabel’s window and watched him heading off through the trees on the green slope, using him as a topic of conversation as they got to know each other better. Maybe they were already forming a majority opinion as to the next winner of the McInnes Foundation award. If so, Sheff didn’t really give a bugger. He was wondering if he’d done a stupid thing by tossing in his job.
Three young guys were practising with their short irons, probably in defiance of park regulations. Sheff was reminded of his father’s new voice of illness as it had been on the phone. Golf had been his father’s game: such a predictable choice for an accountant, but there was fascination behind the selection, not just the pragmatic wisdom of making and maintaining business contacts. Some of
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