The History Boys (4 page)

Hector
Dakin. Où voudriez-vous travailler aujourd'hui?

Dakin
Je voudrais travailler… dans une maison de passe.

Hector
Oo-la-la.

Boys
Qu'est ce que c'est?

Qu'est-ce qu'une maison de passe?

Posner
A brothel.

Hector
Très bien. Mais une maison de passe où tous les clients utilisent le subjonctif ou le conditionnel, oui?

He motions to Dakin, who goes off.

Dakin knocks on door
.

Voilà. Déjà un client!

Qui est la femme de chambre?

Posner
Moi. Je suis la femme de chambre.

Hector
Comment appelez-vous?

Posner
Je m'appelle Simone.

Dakin knocks again
.

Akthar
Simone, le monsieur ne peut pas attendre.

Posner opens the door and curtseys
.

Posner
Bonjour, monsieur.

Dakin
Bonjour, chérie.

Posner
Entrez, s'il vous plaît.

Voilà votre lit et voici votre prostituée.

Hector
Oh. Ici on appelle un chat un chat.

Dakin
Merci, madame.

Posner
Mademoiselle.

Dakin
Je veux m'étendre sur le lit.

Hector
Je voudrais … I would like to stretch out on the bed in the conditional or the subjunctive.

Dakin makes to lie down
.

Posner
Mais les chaussures, monsieur, pas sur le lit.

Et vos pantalons, s'il vous plaît.

Dakin
Excusez-moi, mademoiselle.

Posner
Oh! Quelles belles jambes!

Dakin
Watch it.

Posner
Et maintenant … Claudine (
Timms
).

Dakin
Oui, la prostituée, s'il vous plaît.

Scripps plays piano accompaniment, a version of ‘La
Vie en Rose'
.

Crowther
Monsieur, je pensais que vous voudriez des préliminaires?

Dakin
Quels préliminaires?

Posner
Claudine. Quels préliminaires sont sur le menu?

Timms
(
Claudine
) A quel prix?

Dakin
Dix francs.

Timms
(
Claudine
) Dix francs? Pour dix francs je peux vous montrer ma prodigieuse poitrine.

Dakin
Et maintenant, pourrais-je caresser la poitrine?

Timms
(
Claudine
) Ça vous couterait quinze francs.

Pour vingt francs vous pouvez poser votre bouche sur ma poitrine en agitant …

Lockwood
En agitant quoi?

There is a knock at the door
.

Posner
Un autre client. (
He lets them in
.)

Hector
Ah, cher Monsieur le Directeur.

The Headmaster comes in with Irwin
.

Headmaster
Mr Hector, I hope I'm not …

Hector holds up an admonitory finger
.

Hector
L'Anglais, c'est interdit. Ici on ne parle que français, en accordant une importance particulière au subjonctif.

Headmaster
Oh, ah.

Et qu'est ce-que ce passe ici?

Pourquoi cet garçon … Dakin, isn't it? … est sans ses … trousers?

Hector
Quelqu'un? Ne soit pas timide. Dites à cher Monsieur le Directeur ce que nous faisons.

The boys are frozen
.

Dakin
Je suis un homme qui …

Hector
Vous n'êtes pas un homme. Vous êtes un soldat … un soldat blessé; vous comprenez, cher Monsieur le Directeur … soldat blessé?

Headmaster
Wounded soldier, of course, yes.

Hector
Ici c'est un hôpital en Belgique.

Headmaster
Belgique? Pourquoi Belgique?

Akthar
À Ypres, sir. Ypres. Pendant la Guerre Mondiale Numéro
Une
.

Hector
C'est ça. Dakin est un soldat blessé, un mutilé de guerre et les autres sont des médecins, infirmières et tout le personnel d'un grand établissement médical et thérapeutique.

Continuez, mes enfants.

Headmaster
Mais …

A boy begins to moan
.

Akthar
Qu'il souffre!

Lockwood
Ma mère! Ma mère!

Akthar
Il appelle sa mère.

Lockwood
Mon père!

Akthar
Il appelle son père.

Lockwood
Ma tante!

Headmaster
Sa tante?

Timms
La famille entière.

Hector
Il est distrait. Il est distrait.

Irwin
Il est commotionné, peut-être?

The classroom falls silent at this unexpected intrusion
.

Hector
Comment?

Irwin
Commotionné. Shell-shocked.

There is a perceptible moment
.

Hector
C'est possible. Commotionné. Oui, c'est le mot juste.

Headmaster
Permettez-moi d'introduire M. Irwin, notre nouveau professeur.

Hector
Enchanté.

Headmaster
Ce que je veux …

Hector
Veuille … veu … ille …

Headmaster
Vei-uille. Enough of this… silliness. Not silliness, no … but … Mr Hector, you are aware that these pupils are Oxbridge candidates.

Hector
Are they? Are you sure? Nobody has told me.

Headmaster
Mr Irwin will be coaching them, but it's a question of time. I have found him three lessons a week and I was wondering …

Hector
No, Headmaster. (
He covers his ears
.)

Headmaster
Purely on a temporary basis. It will be the last time, I promise.

Hector
Last time was the last time also.

Headmaster
I am thinking of the boys.

Hector
I, too. Non. Absolument non. Non. Non. Non. C'est hors de question. Et puis, si vous voulez m'excuser, je dois continuer la leçon. ~À tout à l'heure.

Headmaster looks at Irwin
.

Headmaster
Fuck.

They go as the bell goes
.

Rudge
It's true, though, sir. We don't have much time.

Hector
Now, who goes home?

There are no offers
.

Surely I can give someone a lift?

Who's on pillion duty?

Dakin?

Dakin
Not me, sir. Going into town.

Hector
Crowther?

Crowther
Off for a run, sir.

Hector
Akthar?

Akthar
Computer club, sir.

Posner
I'll come, sir.

Hector
No. No. Never mind.

Scripps
(
resignedly
) I'll come, sir.

Hector
Ah, Scripps.

Hector goes
.

Scripps
The things I do for Jesus. (A
s he goes he gives
Dakin the finger
.)

Posner
I'd go.

I'm never asked.

Dakin
You don't fit the bill.

Timms
Me neither.

Dakin
I tell you, be grateful.

Irwin
(
distributing exercise books
) Dull.

Dull.

Abysmally dull.

A triumph … the dullest of the lot.

Dakin
I got all the points.

Irwin
I didn't say it was wrong. I said it was dull.

Its sheer competence was staggering.

Interest nil.

Oddity nil.

Singularity nowhere.

Dakin
Actually, sir, I know tradition requires it of the eccentric schoolmaster, but do you mind not throwing the books? They tend to fall apart.

Crowther
It's the way we've been taught, sir.

Lockwood
Mrs Lintott discourages the dramatic, sir.

‘This is history not histrionics.'

Timms
You've got crap handwriting, sir.

I read Irwin as ‘I ruin'. Significant or what?

Irwin
It's your eyesight that's bad and we know what that's caused by.

Timms
Sir! Is that a coded reference to the mythical dangers of self-abuse?

Irwin
Possibly. It might even be a joke.

Timms
A joke, sir. Oh. Are jokes going to be a feature, sir? We need to know as it affects our mind-set.

Akthar
You don't object to our using the expression, ‘mind-set', do you, sir? Mr Hector doesn't care for it. He says if he catches any of us using it he'll kick our arses from bollocks to sundown, sir.

Irwin regards them for a moment or two in silence
.

Irwin
At the time of the Reformation there were fourteen foreskins of Christ preserved, but it was thought that the church of St John Lateran in Rome had the authentic prepuce.

Dakin
Don't think we're shocked by your mention of the word ‘foreskin', sir.

Crowther
No, sir. Some of us even have them.

Lockwood
Not Posner, though, sir. Posner's like, you know, Jewish.

It's one of several things Posner doesn't have.

Posner mouths ‘Fuck off
.'

Lockwood
That's not racist, though, sir.

Crowther
Isn't it?

Lockwood
It's race-related, but it's not racist.

Akthar
Actually, I've not got one either. Moslems don't.

Another pause while Irwin regards the class
.

Irwin
Has anybody been to Rome?

No? Well, you will be competing against boys and girls who have. And they will have been to Rome and Venice, Florence and Perugia, and they will doubtless have done courses on what they have seen there. So they will know when they come to do an essay like this on the Church on the eve of the Reformation that some silly nonsense on the foreskins of Christ will come in handy so that their essays, unlike yours, will not be dull.

Think bored examiners.

Think sixty, think a hundred and sixty papers even more competent than the last so that the fourteen foreskins of Christ will come as a real ray of sunshine.

Come the fourteen foreskins of Christ and they'll think they've won the pools.

Irwin pauses as before
.

You should hate them.

Crowther
Who, sir?

Irwin
Hate them because these boys and girls against whom you are to compete have been groomed like thoroughbreds for this one particular race. Put head to head with them and, on the evidence of these essays, you have none of you got a hope.

Crowther
So why are we bothering?

Irwin
I don't know.

I don't know at all.

You want it, I imagine. Or your parents want it. The Headmaster certainly wants it.

But I wouldn't waste the money. Judging by these, there is no point.

Go to Newcastle and be happy.

Long pause
.

Of course, there is another way.

Crowther
How?

Timms
Cheat?

Irwin
Possibly.

The bell rings and he is going out
.

And Dakin.

Dakin
Yes, sir?

Irwin
Don't take the piss.

There isn't time. (
He goes
.)

Timms
What a wanker.

Dakin
They all have to do it, don't they?

Crowther
Do what?

Dakin
Show you they're still in the game. Foreskins and stuff. ‘Ooh, sir! You devil!'

Scripps
Have a heart. He's only five minutes older than we are.

Dakin
What happened with Hector? On the bike?

Scripps
As per. Except I managed to get my bag down.

I think he thought he'd got me going. In fact it was my

Tudor Economic Documents, Volume Two
.

They stop talking as Posner comes up
.

Posner
Because I was late growing up I am not included in this kind of conversation. I am not supposed to understand. Actually, they would be surprised how much I know about them and their bodies and everything else.

Scripps
Dakin's navel, I remember, was small and hard like an unripe blackberry. Posner's navel was softer and more like that of the eponymous orange. Posner envied Dakin his navel and all the rest of him. That this envy might amount to love does not yet occur to Posner, as to date it has only caused him misery and dissatisfaction.

Posner goes and they resume the conversation
.

Dakin
I wish sometimes he'd just go for it.

Scripps
Posner?

Dakin
Hector.

Scripps
He does go for it. That's the trouble.

Dakin
In controlled conditions. Not on the fucking bike. I'm terrified.

Scripps
Of the sex?

Dakin
No. Of the next roundabout.

Rudge is having sex, apparently.

Rudge
Only on Fridays. I need the weekend free for rugger. And golf.

Nobody thinks I have a hope in this exam.

Fuck 'em.

Dakin
Currently I am seeing Fiona, the Headmaster's secretary, not that he knows. We haven't done it yet, but when we do I'm hoping one of the times might be on his study floor.

Scripps
Shit!

Dakin
It's like the Headmaster says: one should have targets.

Staff room
.

Mrs Lintott
The new man seems clever.

Hector
He does. Depressingly so.

Mrs Lintott
Men are, at history, of course.

Hector
Why history particularly?

Mrs Lintott
Story-telling so much of it, which is what men do naturally.

My ex, for instance. He told stories.

Hector
Was he an historian?