Read The Masters for Free Online

less stupid than young Winslow – but it’s a very very near thing.’
    ‘It’s not a near thing between their seniors,’ said Chrystal. ‘I’ll trade Winslow for Sir Horace any day.’
    ‘I was very much taken with Sir Horace when I met him.’ Brown liked agreeing with his friend. ‘You see, Eliot, Sir Horace came up for a night just about three weeks ago. He seemed to be pleased with what we were doing for the boy. And he specially asked to meet one or two people who were concerned with the policy of the college. So I gave a little dinner party. The Master was ill, of course, which, to tell you the truth, for this particular occasion was a relief. I decided it was only prudent to leave out Winslow. I had to ask Jago, but I dropped him a hint that this wasn’t the kind of business he’s really interested in. Naturally, I asked the Dean.’ He gave Chrystal his broad, shrewd, good-natured smile. ‘I think the rest of the story’s yours. I left everything else to you.’
    ‘Sir Horace came up,’ said Chrystal, ‘and Brown did him well. There were only the three of us. I should have enjoyed just meeting him. When you think what that man’s done – he controls an industry with a turnover of £20,000,000 a year. It makes you think, Eliot, it makes you think. But there was more to it than meeting him. I won’t make a secret of it. There’s a chance of a benefaction.’
    ‘If it comes off,’ Brown said, cautiously but contentedly, ‘it will be one of the biggest the college has ever had.’
    ‘Sir Horace wanted to know what our plans for the future were. I told him as much as I could. He seemed pleased with us. I was struck with the questions he asked,’ said Chrystal, ready to make a hero of Sir Horace. ‘You could see that he was used to getting to the bottom of things. After he’d been into it for a couple of hours, I’d back his judgement of the college against half our fellows. When he’d learned what he came down to find out, he asked me a direct question. He asked straight out: “What’s the most useful help any of us could provide for the college?” There was only one answer to that – and when there’s only one answer, I’ve found it a good rule to say it quick. So I told him: “Money. As much money as you could give us. And with as few conditions as you could possibly make.” And that’s where we stand.’
    ‘You handled him splendidly,’ said Brown. ‘He wasn’t quite happy about no conditions–’
    ‘He said he’d have to think about that,’ said Chrystal. ‘But I thought it would save trouble later if I got in first.’
    ‘I’m not ready to shout till we’ve got the money in the bank,’ Brown said, ‘but it’s a wonderful chance.’
    ‘We ought to get it – unless we make fools of ourselves,’ said Chrystal, ‘I know that by rights Winslow should handle this business now. It’s his job. But if he does, it’s a pound to a penny that he’ll put Sir Horace off.’
    I thought of Sir Horace, imaginative, thin-skinned despite all his success in action.
    ‘He certainly would,’ I said. ‘Just one of Winslow’s little jokes, and we’d have Sir H endowing an Oxford college on a very lavish scale.’
    ‘I’m glad you confirm that,’ said Chrystal. ‘We can’t afford to handle this wrong.’
    ‘We mustn’t miss it,’ said Brown. ‘It would be sinful to miss it now.’
    These two were the solid core of the college, I thought. Year by year they added to their influence; it was greater now than when I first came three years before. It had surprised me then that they should be so influential; now that I had lived with them, seen them at work, I understood it better.
    They were both genuinely humble men. They were profoundly different, at the roots of their natures, but neither thought that he was anything out of the ordinary. They knew that others round them were creative, as they were not; Chrystal had once been a competent classic, was still a first-rate