Breaking the Silence

 

It was the first thing you saw when you walked into the library at Salisbury College of Technology – the word SILENCE in prominent black letters posted on the opposite wall. There were at least half a dozen similar signs at strategic locations around the library – they were impossible to miss.

The job of College Librarian was my third professional post and the first in which I was actually in charge of a library. The first thing I did after greeting my new colleagues on my first morning was to take down all those signs.

My predecessor had been very “old school” in his approach to librarianship, and had retired not long before. I, on the other hand, was only six years out of training college and full of bright ideas about how a modern college library should work for the benefit of students in the late 20^th century, who were certainly not going to be encouraged to use a library that resembled a Trappist monastery.

The library had - in my view – been badly neglected for years, being full of tired old stock that was seriously out of date and in no way suited to support students who needed to be supplied with the latest information.

I therefore spent the following years upgrading the library, negotiating ever larger budgets to buy in new stock and removing vast numbers of books that had long outlived their usefulness. I had the full support of the College Principal in making this happen.

However, after four years I felt it was time to move on. My personal circumstances had changed and I needed to find a post that paid me enough to consider re-marrying and setting up a new home. I therefore started applying for jobs that looked suitable, wherever they might be. The new love of my life had just finished teacher training and was free to find a job just about anywhere, which gave me quite a free hand.

Offers of interviews came in fairly frequently, and I was pleased to see that the ratio of interviews to job applications was quite high. It would appear that my experience and qualifications, plus the statements I made in my applications, were good enough to make potential employers think that I was worth talking to, which was very satisfactory.

However, the downside was that none of the interviews resulted in a job offer. Over the course of about twelve months I attended something like 25 interviews, all over the country, but got nowhere in terms of landing one. On one occasion I was interviewed in Coventry in the morning and Leeds in the afternoon, after a frantic drive up the M1 in my ancient VW Beetle, but neither interview got me anywhere.

I was beginning to wonder if I would ever find a new post when I had a piece of good luck. It was not a job offer, but a conversation with one of my interviewers after yet another failed bid. This was at a college in Derby, and I had recognized one of the interview panel as someone who had been on the staff of the College of Librarianship in Aberystwyth where I had gained my postgrad diploma. He had not actually taught me, but had clearly seen the link on my application form and decided, after the interview, to take me to one side for a quick word.

“Do you realise”, he said, “that you will never get a job with a reference like that? It’s very much against convention for me to be telling you this, but I thought I owed it to you as a personal favour. You should not use your College Principal as a referee if he is going to be saying things like that about you.”

This was an absolute bombshell. I had no idea that the Principal, with whom I was on generally good terms, had been queering my pitch behind my back. When I got back to Salisbury I made a few enquiries and the true situation emerged.

This was that the Principal was unpopular with many of the college staff, who held him in contempt for the way he behaved towards them. He held grudges against people who displeased him and had been known to stand at his office window, armed with a stopwatch, when certain individuals went out at lunchtime to ensure that they did not overstay their permitted time off the premises, thus giving him a reason for being even more unpleasant towards them.

He had installed a tracking system on the telephone switchboard so that he could be sent lists of all the phone numbers of outgoing calls, from which he could challenge people about making private calls at the College’s expense.

As one might imagine, when staff members who were in his crosshairs had the opportunity to leave for pastures new, this is what they did. This had been noted by the County authorities who were concerned that staff turnover was a lot higher at Salisbury than at the other colleges in Wiltshire, and the Principal had been spoken to about this.

He had therefore adopted a new policy, which was to make it as difficult as possible for anyone to leave, whether they were on his hitlist or not. When someone employed by a college makes a job application, one of the references they give is almost always that of their college Principal – the applicant could expect to be asked a few awkward questions if they did not. If the reference is a poor one, maybe containing a few downright lies about the person in question, then their chances of landing a new job can go straight down the pan.

This had been my fate for the best part of a year, and presumably it would have continued had I not had the good fortune to encounter someone on an interview panel who was prepared to break a golden rule and tell a candidate what was really happening.

My next move was therefore to give up on the idea of getting a new job and instead to apply for a Master’s course at my old training college in Aberystwyth. That was somewhere that had no need for a reference from my current employer, and I was duly accepted to join the next intake of students, after which I made a fresh start on my career as a librarian.

Sometimes it is really helpful when a person breaks a silence and tells the truth.

© John Welford

The Man With The Cart

Walter was a strong hulk of a man who was used to trundling his cart over the drawbridge and through the imposing entrance gate of the Tower of London, with the rotting heads of traitors looking down at him from the stakes on to which they had been thrust.

Walter regularly ferried provisions to the house of the Constable of the Tower, who since King Henry’s victory at the Battle of Bosworth in August 1485 was Sir John Vere, Earl of Oxford. Sir John was one of the highest-ranked men in the land, and was not often in residence at the Tower, but today, the 10th of January 1486, was an exception. Sir John welcomed Walter in person.

Walter was expecting this, because he had been visited late in the evening some weeks previously by a messenger from the Tower. Walter had followed his instructions to the letter, although he had no idea why he was been being asked to do what he was now doing.

It was a long-standing tradition that the Constable of the Tower was entitled to any horse, pig or sheep that fell into the Thames from London Bridge. One of Walter’s tasks, as a servant of the Tower, was to keep watch for any such incident and recover the body whether dead or alive, but usually the former. Fresh meat was always welcome at the Tower, which had many mouths to feed.

As Walter was well aware it was not only stray animals that occasionally fell from the bridge but people. They might be victims of violence or merely unfortunates who had missed their footing for one reason or another. It was the bodies of two such individuals, covered by a thick cloth, that were now in Walter’s cart as he made his way to the Constable’s house.

“Your timing could not have been better”, said Sir John when the two men were able to talk without fear of being overheard. “I was getting worried that it might be too late to do what I intend.”

“May I ask what that is, Sire?” Walter asked.

“I have to insist that you carry out my instructions in absolute secrecy”, said Sir John. “Not a word of this to anyone. I am about to show you something that very few people have seen and even fewer have suspected. Follow me”.

So saying, Sir John led the way to a room on the upper floor of the house. He pushed the door open a fraction and invited Walter to peer through the gap. Walter could see two young men playing chess. “Should I know these fellows?” Walter asked.

“You should not,” said Sir John, “because everyone believes them to have been dead for at least a year. They are the former King Edward V and his brother Richard.”

“I don’t understand”, said Walter.

“I am King Henry’s man to the core”, said Sir John, gently closing the door. “I fought for him at Bosworth and would gladly do so again on any battlefield in England or abroad. But he is now asking me to do something that I simply cannot do.”

Sir John ushered Walter back down the stairs to the main room of the house and sat him down with a glass of mead as he explained the situation further.

“As you might or might not know” he said, “King Richard seized the throne from his nephew, the late King Edward’s son, and sent young Edward and his brother Richard here, where they were placed in the care of my predecessor, who was killed at Bosworth. King Richard claimed that the boys were bastards, because their parents’ marriage was invalid. With that claim enshrined in law, his path to the throne was assured.

“However, King Richard died at Bosworth and Henry is now the King. In order to bring the warring Houses of York and Lancaster together, Henry has proposed marriage to Elizabeth, the sister of the two young men you saw upstairs.”

“The bastards, as you called them?”

“Exactly”, said Sir John. “And if they are bastards, Elizabeth, who very soon will become Queen of England, is also officially a bastard.”

“She can’t like that much.”

“Indeed so. And what is to stop her asking her new husband, the most powerful man in the land, to undo the attainder that declares her so? Should that happen, then the boys also become legitimate and their claims to be the rightful King and heir become valid once more.”

“Does that matter, if Henry has the throne anyway?”

“It does if you are Henry! What would happen if the boys were to escape from the Tower? It would not be long before a new rebellion was under way, based on the fact that King Edward’s legitimate heirs were alive and well.”

“So why are you telling me all this now?” Walter asked.

“Because Henry wants to do now what he has told everyone else that King Richard did years ago, namely murder the Princes. I now have my orders to do precisely that.”

Walter suddenly got wind of what Sir John had in mind. He stood up and glared angrily at Sir John.

“No!” he shouted. “I won’t do it. You can’t make me. I’m not a murderer. I know I have the strength to strangle two young men with my bare hands, but I don’t have the heart or soul for such an evil deed.”

“Calm yourself,” said Sir John, pouring Walter a fresh glass of mead. “That’s not what I mean at all. I have absolutely no intention of killing the Princes, because I also have a heart. Your task is to help them escape. Show me what you have in your cart.”

Walter took Sir John outside and showed him the bodies of two drowned young men, of roughly the same ages as the Princes upstairs.

“Perfect”, said Sir John. “At least they will get a decent burial, as opposed to floating down the river and being eaten by the fish. Please help me carry them to where their coffins are waiting.

“We won’t nail the lids down just yet, just in case King Henry sends a spy to check that the job has been done. The only person who really knows what the Princes look like is their sister, and she has long believed them to be dead. I’ll put the Princes’ rings on their fingers, which should be enough to convince anyone else.”

Sir John then went upstairs and brought the Princes down with him. He asked them to take off their outer clothes as well as their rings. When they realized that this was all being done in order to save their lives, they did so without much protest. They then climbed aboard Walter’s cart and were covered by the same cloth that had previously covered the corpses.

“What will happen to them now?” Walter asked Sir John, making sure that the boys couldn’t overhear.

“Take them to All Hallows Church”, said Sir John. “A priest will meet you and take the boys into his care. I have arranged for them to be taken to a monastery in Suffolk where they will be accepted as novices and may in time be accepted into the order.”

“Not quite the same as being royal princes”, said Walter.

“It’s a very wealthy monastery”, said Sir John. “Believe me, they’ll live like princes all right, with a few prayers thrown in, and they’ll have a much safer life than that lived by real kings and princes”.

“But how do I get them out?” Walter asked. “I always arrive with a full cart and leave with an empty one. Won’t having a load in the cart on the way out make somebody ask a few awkward questions?”

“Leave that to me”, said Sir John.

Before Walter had reached the gate, Sir John had called out “Guards! Guards! Prisoner escaping!”, while pointing in the opposite direction to where Walter was heading. It did the trick perfectly.

© John Welford

To WB, 1808: a villanelle

I much admire the words you write
In which you never cease to make
Strong armour for my mental fight

Clouds unfold and doubt takes flight
For green and pleasant England’s sake
I much admire the words you write

If conflict comes by day or night
Along with sleepless sword I’ll take
Strong armour for my mental fight

My golden bow is burning bright
To dreaming time from when I wake
I much admire the words you write

Desiring arrows set in flight
All inspired by what you spake
Strong armour for my mental fight

Your fiery chariot gives me might
To render void tormenting ache
I much admire the words you write
Strong armour for my mental fight

© John Welford

Paws For Thought: a silly poem

When your brain is in a fog
Can you remember types of dog?
You’re in luck – I will confide
To you my foolproof doggy guide.
This is all you’ll ever need
For right-on knowledge of the breed.
You’ll want to tell what’s good or trash
Before you part with hard-earned cash.
It’s black and white? Friendly? Jolly?
It well might be a Border Collie.
With loyalty that can’t get better
Could it be an English Setter?
Companionship? You can be sure
If you buy a Labrador.
A long-term friendship will ensue
With a handsome Kerry Blue.
You need a dog to reconnoitre?
It’s obvious – an English Pointer.
It comes up to a midget’s knees?
Possibly a Bichon Frise.
Sharp of bite and strong of muscle?
You’ve got yourself a fierce Jack Russell.
Its coat can be both light and dusky
I refer to the Alaskan Husky.
It looks ideal to mop the floor,
Hairy Hungarian Komondor.
A spotty dog is your fixation?
No choice other than Dalmatian.
It blocks the light and fills the lane?
Can only be a huge Great Dane.
You leap a burn or brook in one bound?
So does a feisty Irish Wolfhound.
A dog to run round any barrier?
Maybe a beagle or a harrier.
Is there one dog here or two -
The crazy mixed-up Cockapoo?
So there you are, a canine glut
From which to make your choice of mutt.
Now you know just where it’s at –
What do you mean, you want a cat? 

© John Welford

Lead Us Not: a story

I look forward to my visits to Mrs Perkins, who is a well-known local poet. She is now well over 80 and, although in reasonably good health, she is not as mobile as she once was and was very happy to accept my offer to take her dog Sylvia for a walk every morning.

Mrs Perkins is a late riser so I let myself in at about 9 o’clock to be greeted enthusiastically by Sylvia, her not-so-young weimaraner, who looks forward to being taken out bright and early. Being named after Sylvia Plath does not seem to have gone to her head.

The usual arrangement is that Mrs Perkins leaves notes on her kitchen blackboard if there is anything she needs, such as some simple shopping that can be done in town and for which she will pay me later. The dog walk can easily take us through the open-air market on certain days of the week, and so having Sylvia with me is not a problem on these occasions.

Last Friday was one such day, and Mrs Perkins had written “New lead” on her blackboard. We had talked about Sylvia’s dog lead some weeks previously, because it was getting a bit tatty and would need to be replaced at some time. Mrs Perkins clearly thought that that time had arrived.

There is a stall on the market that sells bits and pieces for dogs and other pets, so that was where we headed. The stallholder was delighted to show me a range of dog leads so I chose one that looked OK.

“How heavy is your dog?” The stallholder asked.

“I don’t know”, I said. “Does that matter?”

“It certainly does”, said the stallholder. “That lead is only suitable for dogs under 50 kilos. If your dog weighs more, you’ll need a heavy-duty lead.”

“I don’t know how much she weighs. She’s not my dog” I said.

This delay was a nuisance. It was starting to rain and I had no intention of spending any longer getting wet than was absolutely necessary. I could see that Sylvia was not too happy about the situation either. On the other hand I needed a new lead for her and it had to be the right one.

“You’ll have to get the dog weighed”, said the stallholder.

“How do I do that?” I asked.

“You take her to the vet’s place and put her on their scales. There’s no charge.”

“So where’s the vet’s place?”

The stallholder gave me directions. The vet’s surgery was more than a mile away and it was now beginning to rain more heavily. I did not fancy walking more than two miles in the rain just so that I could come back to where I was to buy a new dog lead. But I could see no alternative.

“Your dog’s going to get wet”, said the stallholder.

That was obvious, as was the fact that Sylvia was starting to shiver. Being short-haired and fine-boned she simply hated getting rained on. She did have quite a nice waterproof dog jacket, but course I had forgotten to put it on her before we left Mrs Perkins’s house.

“I’ve got a lovely dog jacket here”, said the stallholder. “It would fit your dog perfectly”.

I could see that it would. “How much?” I asked.

“Only £34.99”, said the stallholder.

“How much?” I said again, two octaves higher.

“You said this wasn’t your dog”, said the stallholder. “It would be terrible if she caught pneumonia because you couldn’t see your way to buying a lovely waterproof dog jacket. What would her owner have to say?”

So I bought the jacket, put it on Sylvia, and set off into the rain. We had only gone about a hundred yards when the rain stopped completely, the sun came out and Sylvia gave me a look that said: “please take this ridiculous thing off me before I boil”. So I did.

When we reached the vet’s getting Sylvia weighed was no trouble at all.

“Is she under 50 kilograms?” I asked the veterinary nurse.

“Of course she is”, the nurse laughed back at me. “Do you know what a 50 kilogram dog looks like? Your dog’s less than half that weight”.

When we got back to the market I told the stallholder that Sylvia only weighed 23 kilograms.

“Yes”, he said, “that’s what I thought, but it’s best to be on the safe side”.

A rough translation of that might be: “I know a right mug when I see one and a short sharp shower of rain gives me the perfect opportunity to sell not only a dog lead but a totally unnecessary overpriced dog jacket.”

Mrs Perkins had asked me to get a new dog lead, not a second dog jacket, so this was a cost I would have to take on myself. But at least I did have the lead, and I was sure that she would be very happy with that.

When we got back to the house Mrs Perkins was up and about.

“I’ve got the dog lead” I said, absolutely certain that Mrs Perkins would approve of my purchase.

But that was not her reaction at all.

“Dog lead?” she said. “I didn’t say anything about a dog lead.”

“But you wrote ‘New lead’ on the blackboard”, I said.

“Oh dear”, said Mrs Perkins. “That wasn’t what I meant at all.”

“It wasn’t?”

“No. You see, I have always written my poems with a propelling pencil. I’m finding it all a bit too fiddly these days, so that was why I left my pencil on the kitchen table and wrote what I did on the blackboard. I wanted you to help me by fitting it with a new lead”.

© John Welford

A Mixed-Up Bag

Mabel, Doris and Alice, the residents of Blasted Heath Cottage, were pondering what to do about their entry for the next craft show at Glamis Castle, the home of Lord and Lady Macbeth. This annual event was not to be missed, and the three ladies had been regular participants for many years.

However, comments had been made after last year’s show that maybe they should make a few changes, given that their entries in the Pickles and Preserves class had given the judges particularly nasty stomach bugs and even caused one of them to lose a toe and grow an extra finger. Nobody thought they should be banned altogether – apart that is, from the unfortunate judge who now had all the correct digits but not necessarily in the right order – but perhaps they should consider entering show classes that did not actually involve the judges having to eat anything they had prepared.

It was after a visit to Sainsbury’s that Doris got the bright idea of what they could do. She had been scanning the shelves for fresh supplies of batwing pressé - without success – when she spotted Lady Macduff who was carrying a very attractive shopping bag made from evenly-sized patches of differently patterned material sewn together. Surely, she thought to herself, the three of them could come up with something similar to enter in the Bags and Accessories class at the craft show?

“That’s what we should do”, she said to the others when she got home. “We’ll make a tote bag.”

“A toad bag?” said Alice, whose hearing was far from perfect. “Your pet toad for example? We could cut of his head, scoop out his innards …”

“No!” said Doris. “If you touch my toad, I’ll turn your cat into a bag …”

“Hold it, sisters.” said Mabel, pulling them apart. “I reckon this tote bag idea is a good one. We just need to get as many people as we can to contribute patches of material and we’ll sew them together to make a bag. Could be a winner!”

So the three of them split up, went their separate ways, and met again a week later when they had collected contributions from people they knew.

Doris had been to see Iago, whose offering was the handkerchief he had pinched from Desdemona. “This rag has got everyone into so much trouble”, he had told her, “that sewing it into a tote bag is probably the best thing to do with it.”

Alice’s contribution was two bright yellow stockings. “I was given these by Malvolio”, she said. “He reckons that they should be perfect for a tote bag competition, as long as yellow-hating Olivia is not on the judging panel.”

“If she is”, said Doris, “we can always feed her some of our newt chutney before the judging starts. That should take her out of the reckoning for long enough.”

Mabel had been to see Hamlet, who had provided a piece of fine damask cloth that could be made into several patches.

“He said that this had been part of the arras curtain in his mother’s bedroom, but it had been ruined when he stuck his sword through it and killed Polonius who was hiding on the other side. He said that his mother was pretty cut up about it.”

“Presumably not quite as cut up as Polonius”, Alice offered.

“I got the impression that she was more bothered about the arras”, said Mabel. “She’d paid good money for it and gave Hamlet a piece of her mind afterwards. The bloodstains were very difficult to shift.”

“No matter”, said Doris. “That’s nothing new for Glamis Castle – her ladyship is always complaining about that sort of thing.”

Doris was able to supply some other bloodstained fabric squares, courtesy of Shylock who had explained that blood spatter was sometimes inevitable when extracting pounds of flesh from recalcitrant customers.

Richard III had also sent along some quite expensive looking pieces that he said were no longer needed by their former owners, although he was not prepared to give any further details.

“I reckon we’ve got enough”, said Mabel. “Now who’s going to sew them together to make a bag?”

“Not me”, said Alice. “With these great thick fingers? I can’t even thread a needle, let alone sew.”

“Nor me”, said Doris. “Same problem.”

“And me”, said Mabel. “Looks like we’re stymied then.”

“In other words”, said Alice, there’s no way we can make a tote bag, so we can’t enter anything at the craft fair.”

“It’s back to Pickles and Preserves then”, said Doris. “But we’ve been banned from entering that class, due to the fact that whatever we submit usually has unforeseen consequences.”

“We’ll have to cheat, then” said Mabel. “Suppose we enter our Cockroach and Slug Surprise but use someone’s else’s name as a cover?”

“Great idea”, said Alice. “Got anyone in mind?”

“Do you think we’d get away with calling ourselves Juliet Capulet?”

© John Welford

Handle With Care

Alfie really fancied Emma, and he was quietly confident that she felt the same way about him. Their kissing and fumbling had become quite intense of late, and Alfie felt sure that it was time for him to make the next move. He had no reason to doubt that she would respond in a mutually satisfactory way when he did so.

With Christmas approaching, this seemed to be the ideal time to act. A visit to Ann Summers produced a suitably lascivious gift of sexy lingerie, which he intended to suggest that Emma wore when she came to his flat the night after Christmas.

To seal the deal, he wrote her a long letter full of details of the naughty games that he hoped they would play when she succumbed to his wicked plan. He had quite a vivid imagination when it came to such matters, and his letter could leave Emma in no doubt as to what she could expect.

Early on Christmas morning, Alfie slipped round to Emma’s house with the present in his arms. He left it on the doorstep rather than knocking on her door, which he thought would add to the element of surprise. He simply labelled the gift “To Emma, the Most Gorgeous Woman in the World”. The X-rated letter, tucked inside the parcel, had ended with “call me on this number when you’ve read this.” He just had to go home, sit back and wait.

Alfie’s Christmas looked like being a lonely one this year, after his wife had left him in February. He therefore fervently hoped that Emma would call him sooner rather than later. It would be great if they could spend as much time together as possible today. Perhaps she would arrive soon after she had had her Christmas dinner and would then stay over? He therefore had an agonizing wait for his phone to ring.

But nothing happened. His phone stayed silent all day, apart from one annoying call from what sounded like a much older woman than Emma who said that she needed to make a delivery to him and wanted to check his address. It amazed him that some of these companies kept going even on Christmas Day.

But the call he really wanted just didn’t happen. Maybe he was wrong? Perhaps Emma didn’t feel about him the way he felt about her? Were the sexy undies over the top? Could his raunchy letter have turned her off rather than on? There was only one way to find out. He had to phone her.

Her tone of voice when she answered was far from encouraging. “I’ve blown it”, he thought. “I went too far this time”.

But that was not the problem at all, as it soon became clear.

“Not even a card”, Emma said. “I thought you might remember me on Christmas Day of all days.”

He was flabbergasted. So she can’t have opened his present. Could it possibly still be sitting on her doorstep? But there was clearly more to Emma’s negative thoughts that just his apparent neglect of her.

“I’m really worried about Granny”, she said.

“Granny?”

“Yes. She stays with us for a few days at Christmas every year, but this time she’s been behaving very oddly. She’s 85 and I’m afraid that she’s starting to go a bit doolally.”

“How come?” Alfie asked.

“Well, she went downstairs this morning to let the cat in, and she’s not been the same person since. She rushed straight back to her room, and when she came down for breakfast there was a very strange glint in her eye.”

“How do you mean, strange?”

“It’s hard to say. I thought I knew Granny pretty well. We’ve always been close – I was called Emma after her, by the way – and that expression on her face … Do you know, it was almost like I think I must look after I’ve been alone with you sometimes.”

“How is she now?”

“I don’t know. You see, she’s disappeared. I don’t know where she is. I heard her using the phone earlier on – I couldn’t catch what she was saying – then about half an hour ago she said she had to go to her room to change all her clothes, and now she’s gone out. What am I going to do?”

“I’m, sorry, Emma,” said Alfie. “I’m going to have to call you back. There’s somebody at the door.”

© John Welford