'So Jarlath wasn't afraid to speak up, then? I mean you knew his opinions readily in a class of two hundred.'
'We were in the same tutorial group. He stuck to his guns even when it didn't make sense. His position was eventually tautological. He ended up with these unopened boxes like 'culture' or 'nationalism' or 'parliamentary democracy'-American stuff, like Coke. Hymns to the status quo.'
Minogue began to appreciate the deadly gifts that brought Roche to where he was. A liking for the phrase matched with a passion and knowledge he tried to conceal. 'Tautological,' if you please.
'I think I know what you mean. 'The best of all possible worlds,' don't they say?' essayed Minogue.
Roche looked at him and grinned, then nodded his head lightly.
'Exactly, Sergeant. He was the property of his class. Why wouldn't he follow that line.'
Meaning you don't, because you've seen through it all, Minogue thought.
'Northern Ireland is a rather mysterious set of events for the likes of Jarlath and the parvenus who'd just as soon forget they came from the bog. In one sense they're right when they say that nothing worth learning can be taught…'
'Oscar Wilde said a lot of things like that. What do you call them?' Minogue murmured.
'Aphorisms. Conceits. Sophistry.'
Must be a holy terror for the lecturers here if he has things like that at the tips of his fingers. Minogue wondered if he had made any ground with the dig about Wilde. A fellow who could remember stuff like that would be a favourite with the girls, no doubt, especially with his grim, illusionless sight of reality. Outside the window, Minogue saw the ordered history of the college, all grey and angled with manicured lawns, worn steps to the chapel, professors waltzing around in gowns.
'You'll know that Jarlath was in the Fine Gael association here, Sergeant. He bought into them calling themselves social democrats, not fascists. I'm more or less an anarchist, on Saturday nights anyway.'
Ah, a joke, Minogue recognised.
'Actually I'm a grumbler in the Labour Party. I spend most of my time trying to get grants for students. I have time for rhetoric usually after office hours. If it's friend or foe with this thing of Jarlath, chalk me up as friend. He didn't deserve what happened. He would have changed, I know it, he would have come round. You know what would have brought him around? His girlfriend. Agnes McGuire. She lived in the real world.'
'Isn't she the young lady that accompanied him to the Trinity Ball?' inquired Minogue.
'How did you know that?'
'I might well ask you the same thing,' Minogue replied.
For the first time, Roche looked ill at ease. His eyes widened, then he regained his composure.
'Wasn't she my girlfriend in first year?' Roche said with a decidedly emphatic irony. A fraction would have conveyed it to Minogue. So they still called them boyfriend and girlfriend, Minogue thought. Isn't that rich. Touche, the atmosphere changed. Minogue asked Roche if he remembered any particularly acrimonious debate involving Walsh. They were all acrimonious, Roche replied. Demonstrations? Out of fashion, said Roche. Other issues? Roche replied after a pause:
'Well, I know that he irritated some people who run the Students' Union magazine with his yarns. We, or rather the editorial board, wouldn't run them because they weren't researched. That's putting it mildly really. They were figments of his imagination. Wild swipes at things.'
'Such as?'
'Oh I don't remember a lot of it. Misappropriation of money; you know, the executive filling up on free beer at student expense. Or politics.'
'Anything on drugs maybe?'
Roche looked directly at Minogue. Minogue thought he was flicking through his list of possible answers.
'No. I wish he had. Might have brought home some news about the real world.'
'I don't get it. Drugs bring you reality?' Minogue asked.
'Do you know what heavy drugs are doing to a lot of kids in Dublin? Well, I do. You wouldn't believe it. No one wants to know about it. Stuff like pot is a joke. It's stupid to chase people for that. I know that heavy stuff surfaces here in college a lot more than people think, but Walsh wasn't going to help anyone with his approach. If you ask me, he was setting himself up for a go at journalism after college. Building a rep for himself here.'
'I see. That was Jarlath at his, let's say, most tendentious then?'
'Yeah. He'd jump on the bandwagon with rumours about IRA here in Trinity. No one takes those comments seriously. I mean, look around. What would they be doing here with all the boys and girls from the stockbroker belt going to school here? Ask around. He was just trying to start up some stuff so he would be known.'
'Something to think about. Thanks, Mick. If I need to see you again, is it O.K. to phone the Students' Union office?'
Roche stood up to leave.
'Well, yeah. But just give your name. Forget the Sergeant stuff.'
As he listened to the feet clattering down the stairs, Minogue privately remarked upon titles. Hadn't Master Roche been the one who insisted on it in the conversation?
Minogue gathered his papers but left his impressions scattered. He followed Roche down the bare stairs. He was looking forward to dinner. The Junior Dean had arranged everything. They would eat in the Staff Lunchroom, if you don't mind.
Minogue stepped out onto the cobbles and took in some of the sulphurous air of Dublin. He felt sprightly. He eyed a few girls, students, dressed up to look ugly but in a certain good taste which Minogue couldn't put his finger on. This was the new wave, then. He felt the sharpness of the square in the sounds it held and echoed. A blind man was tapping over the cobblestones. A bicycle tinkled by him. Laughs and footfalls came abruptly over the air. Something ascetic about it, like a Protestant chapel, Minogue mused. Then it struck him that he knew nothing about Protestant chapels.
Professor Griffiths was like a man out of the thirties. A gown over a tweedy suit, stiff collar and red brogues. A face like a horse, hair a bit long. He greeted Minogue by lifting his eyebrows and extending an awn in the direction of a door at the front of the dining hall.
'Upstairs, Mr Minoooog.'
He wondered if he was putting on the Bertie Wooster stuff. Minogue ate an indifferent dinner at a well-laid table in company with the college Security Officer and Griffiths. Huge painted figures of dead bishops and scholars looked down at them. Cutlery clanked, food was prompt. Captain Loftus, the Security Officer so-called, kept his army rank in conversation as well as in other forms of intercourse, Minogue realised. Well, in verbal intercourse anyway.
Loftus was a Corkman. He liked to dress well. He was one of the few men Minogue had met in the last few weeks of whom it could be said he looked very upright. Minogue had heard that he had done tours of duty with the UN or peacekeepers before springing into this cushy job in Trinity. A modest beeper poked from his pocket.
By way of taking his attention from the metallic taste of the cabbage, Minogue spoke:
'Well now, Captain Loftus. Has there been stuff like this before?'
Loftus affected puzzlement.
'This boy Walsh, done in,' Minogue added. Loftus leaned forward and confided that there hadn't. Griffiths, no doubt daydreaming about Homer or 'The Rape of Lucrece,' looked to Loftus and then began stuffing a pipe.
'Is there anything about politics here amongst the student body that'd go to this extent?'
Loftus looked at him without answering. Griffiths, with a peculiar crack in his face which Minogue suddenly realised was a smile, murmured,
'None other than the boy was a member of the Fine Gael association, Sergeant Minogue. Hardly just cause.'
'There was talk of drugs,' Minogue said.
'Mr Walsh was a conscientious student, Mr Minogue. His lecturers thought very highly of him,' said Griffiths.
The politesse and containment began to grate on Minogue. The fun was gone out of this place very quickly. The boy was dead. These two stuffed shirts were sitting on the fence.
'An interest in journalism?' Minogue tried.
'As much as any other student, Sergeant Minogue,' replied Griffiths.
