Opposite Sides (6 page)

That evening, he rummaged
through all the encyclopaedias and history books he could find
until he located an article about the British Parliament. He read
it, re-read it, scratched his head and re-read it again. What did
he know about this English queen, let alone about the British
Empire? Then, with the aid of an old dictionary, endeavoured to
translate it from English into German so that he knew which parts
he could use. To copy the text might cause further problems with
Miss Turner and he certainly did not want to be disciplined by Mr
Brinkwater.

“
What’s up,
Erwin . . . er, Hans?” Mr Brymer asked, glancing around the side of
his newspaper and at the same time removing his pipe from his
mouth. Mr Brymer always liked to have his pipe when reading even
though, on most occasions it was not lit. He had been made aware
that there was a problem when the sighs and mutterings of the youth
became louder and louder.

Hans lay stretched out on
the carpet, resting himself on one elbow. Open books and pages of
writing paper surrounded him like an open fan.

“
Ach
, Herr Brymer, this is
very
hard.”

“
What is?
What are you trying to do?”

“
My English .
. . this English . . . I must write over the Queen
Victoria.”

“
Sorry,
Hans,” replied the elderly man. “I did not learn when I was a boy
English history, especially with Queen Victoria. I had very little
schooling and managed to learn only a little arithmetic and
writing. You young people learn different things. If you try
yourself, it may be difficult but you will learn. Then, you make
progress and become the winner. You can only do your best. Always
must be your best.”

Mr Brymer shrugged his
shoulders, folded his newspaper, switched off his reading lamp and
walked out of the room. Even though he had been in England fourteen
years, his own knowledge of the English monarchs was not good. He
was content just knowing that King George was the present king and
knowing that Ramsay MacDonald was the new Prime Minister. Beyond
that, he had no stomach for politics, of any kind. It had been
politics, together with an uncertain future, that made him leave
his homeland. That was enough for him.

A few minutes later he
returned with a large, well-worn, brown-covered book which he
handed over to Hans,

“
This was my
book when I was young. It should help. It is in German and I think
there is a little about Queen Victoria when she was first made
queen.”

Hans was then left on his
own, to read and translate and then rewrite the whole thing again
as best he could in a language he was still not very familiar with.
It was a struggle but he managed to fill two entire pages,
carefully filling his nib with ink and taking care with rolling the
blotting paper over his writing so that there was not a single ink
splotch on either paper.

Hans handed in his essay
attempt the next morning as soon as he arrived. Miss Turner scanned
the document in silence. The constant ticking from the clock on the
wall was the only sound to be heard. Then, a brief rustle of paper
as she turned the page over. Again the awful silence and the
ticking returned. When Miss Turner had finished reading, she
stretched, drawing her body upright and looked at him full in the
face. The morning light caught the edge of her spectacles and made
the metal frames glint. Hans found the waiting unbearable and
crunched up his toes in his shoes.

“
This is
rubbish, Mister Resmel!” She waved the paper before him like
someone waving a protest flag. “Even some of the facts are wrong!”
She slapped the essay down on her desk with a distinguishable thud.
“And, you need to pay a lot more attention to your grammar.” She
waited, waiting for him to absorb her message. The silence was
awful. After a full minute, she asked, “Where did you get all this
misguided information?”

Hans had been rubbing the
side of his little finger while Miss Turner was reading and now
when he looked at it, it was as though he had run a hot iron over
the surface. Along the side of his finger was a stroke of inflamed
redness. It began to sting as the wounded finger throbbed in
empathy to his wounded feelings. He felt completely deflated and
hurt by the matron’s cruel remarks and he hoped she would be
willing to listen to his explanation.

“
I have
little English books. Mr Brymer, he give to me a book. It is in
German. I am not think in English. It is for me very
difficult.”

“
Then must
pay more attention to your English masters and work harder. Most
young men of your age are already out working, and have been doing
so for the past two years. You are most fortunate to be able to
continue your education so make the best of it.” She picked up the
essay again and skimmed through it once more. “Well, at least you
did produce something and I do admit it is tidy but, and take note
Mister Resmel, that it still would not have received a pass.” She
eyed him up and down and then promptly screwed up his essay and let
it drop, plop, into the waste bin beside her. “You need to improve
your standard of work if you have any hope of gaining your final
certificate. Another month and the present school year comes to an
end. In the meantime, standards cannot be lowered just for you. We
have high standards at this college. We have a very good name for
achievement and we wish to keep it long after you have left us. If
you wish to remain here for another year or two, you must make an
bigger effort: you must be vigilant in class and always do your
home study thoroughly. You could have used the books in the
library. That is why we have one: for students to use. You’ve been
sent here to succeed; not fail. Make your family proud of you. And,
if that is not enough for you, think of the sacrifices your
grandmother must have made that allowed you to come here. I also
know you are capable of higher standards, so the sooner you apply
yourself, the quicker. Better still, we will become friends. I am
not your enemy, Mister Resmel. No-one here is. Understand that. I
have confidence that you will do well in the end and leave this
college with honour and dignity.”

After that small
pep-talk, Hans decided he had better begin to make a big effort and
apply himself. He did realise how privileged he really was to be
given such a chance at such an exclusive school. Miss Turner knew
that this young man would show promise, if only he could be
persuaded to try. She knew more about Erwin Hans Resmel than he
realised and she knew that he had hidden and undeveloped qualities
that he did not even know himself.

But Hans did not know
himself, let alone what Miss Turner knew about him. His teenage
years still made him vulnerable and prone to act rashly. Well, he
would have to show her. He would show them all, all these English
people. They would soon see that a person like Erwin Hans Resmel
was a force to be reckoned with. He did want to make a good
impression and he did want to succeed. But throughout the traumatic
readjustment he had to make, he had discovered that any small
criticism woke up a wild animal-like emotion in him that he had not
yet learnt how to control and he found that his anger and
frustration was being directed towards the younger, more vulnerable
students who constantly followed him around the school grounds. At
first, he found their constant curiosity somewhat annoying but then
he discovered those same boys could easily be coerced into doing
things for him. He hoped to gain a group of followers who would
support him against the older boys but soon discovered that loyalty
could not be enforced. First of all, he needed to prove that he was
deserving of any leadership. It all came back to being thought
honourable.

As early as the beginning
of July, the headmaster suggested to Miss Turner that the boys who
would be senior students next year could be given various duties to
help the younger boys during the last few weeks of term. In this
way the middle class students would have a sense of responsibility
and it would give the masters a chance to assess which students
would become senior leaders. The college thought it most important
for the boys to demonstrate any leadership skills, for these boys
were among the ones who would become the leaders in society and
industry, managers in businesses or officers in one of the military
forces.

The girls’
section of the college was kept quite separate from the boys’. This
college may have prided itself on being extremely modern in its
educational offerings but fraternisation between the sexes was
never permitted except in very special circumstances and under very
strict rules. Old habits and ideas concerning girls had not really
made much progress since the war and not very many families
considered a good education was important for the girls of the
family. It was normally expected that girls would become good wives
and mothers. In government-run schools, girls were taught only to
demonstrate excellent home-craft skills such as cleaning, cooking,
and sewing.
Prince Albert
College
, on the other hand, did offer its
girls such skills as book-keeping, music and letter writing as well
as
skills needed to run a household with
the minimal number of servants. In other words, to be able to keep
a good upper-middle class home in good order. The girls at
Prince Albert College
were fortunate. The small number of girls who were lucky
enough to be admitted had the good fortune to have parents who
realised that the education of a daughter was just as important as
a son. Anne Sutherland was just such a girl. She had been lucky
enough to have had a suffragette for a mother and an astute
business-minded man for a father. Also, Anne was admired by many of
the boys, Robert Brinkwater and Hans Resmel among them.

Boys were expected to
find themselves a good career for they would be the supporter of
the family. A man’s family standing depended entirely on his
capabilities and his recognition of exactly where he fitted into
society. Life for the boys continued as it had done for decades:
the older students making sure the younger ones knew their place;
the younger ones seeking out some form of protection from those
older boys who enjoyed the power they now had. Each boy had to earn
respect and each had to learn what is was to be loyal. It was the
way in which agreements, alliances and business were conducted
within the adult world.

Robert
Brinkwater felt sorry for the way some of the senior boys had been
treating Hans, especially Timmins, who chastised Hans for any small
uniform irregularity. As for the younger boys, they appeared to be
fascinated by the student who spoke the King’s English in a strange
way. They followed Hans until they were called upon by their house
leaders to show loyalty to their group. The younger boys were still
around but this time they stood in small groups and watched,
learning to conduct themselves in the ways of the older boys.
Sometimes, the taunting had turned cruel, as was often the case
with any new boy. During those first months, the harassments drove
Hans into such a fury that he had lashed out with fists and boots,
blooding the noses and bruising the shins of those who stirred up
his anger. Such
war wounds
were blamed on rough and tumble ‘sports games’
that supposedly took place out on the school field but these
battles happened well out of sight of the masters and senior
prefects.

Robert was the first to
realise that Hans was as little to blame for the fighting as he had
been when he first arrived at the school but Robert had been
content to submit to a ‘blooding’ as a mark of respect one has when
one is blooded on one’s first successful hunt. But that was
tradition and one never doubted or questioned a tradition that had
lasted for centuries. But Hans did not understand those ways.
Robert realised this and consequently he was becoming the one
friend Hans could rely on. The two boys were often seen going
around the school grounds together, closely followed by a small
band of younger boys who wanted to be present should anything
exciting take place.

Whenever Robert wanted to
be alone with Hans, it had to after classes had finished for the
day. He would borrow a second bike and the two were seen riding the
lanes together or wandering along one of the narrow pathways that
criss-crossed the rolling hills between the newly planted
fields.

Thus the
month progressed smoothly until, late in July when,
Prince Albert College
would close its doors for the long summer holidays. However,
just before the academic year ended, something happened that sent
shock waves right through the school. Some unknown person, after
5pm, had run down the college’s prized roses, snapping a large
number of them almost at ground level. Then, far worse, was the
destruction of a lovely sycamore tree at the back, often used by
the boys to sit under as they waited for their batting turn in the
numerous cricket games which were played. A pile of shrivelled
leaves and drooping branches announced the fact that the entire
tree had been ring barked sometime ago, and that throughout the
late spring and early summer, their favourite tree was being slowly
strangled and starved of life. And now the roses! Who could have
done such a thing?

Prefects and seniors,
together with a few younger boys willing for adventure, were told
to keep vigil. Everyone vowed to watch out for the vandals and to
stop them at ‘all costs.’ Students were happy to patrol the grounds
and show their loyalty to their school. Between 5 o’clock and well
into the sunny evenings while others in the grounds practised their
bowling or batting skills, watching for any sign that those
responsible for such an attack would be noticed straight away. Even
the girls offered to help keep watch and a roster system was drawn
up.