A Javelin for Jonah

get height and perhaps use the mid-air kick instead of the hang, I believe we’ve got a real prospect in our stable.”

“I’ll do what I can,” promised Hamish, “but, as you know, I spend most of my time at the pool. I’ve got a prospect there, too. It’s Paul-Pierre, that misfit from Nantes who was chucked out of Rendlesbury for knifing the science master. He’s clocking just under eighteen minutes for the fifteen hundred metres free-style. He could get into the next Olympics if he sweats at it.”

“Yes, for France, though, not for us.”

“Come, come!” said Hamish. “Think European! What about the Common Market? Besides, I believe I’ve got a second string who is coming along very nicely, or will be, once I can get through to him. Patriotism, although still, in some of its aspects, a dirty word, retains a certain amount of influence on my mind, same as on yours, and this young fellow is a Scot. It took me some little time to spot him. He’s a dour, black-browed character with a chip on his shoulder because he thinks he was unfairly expelled from school. He trains without help and spends most of his time churning out length after length with no regard for speed, style or fatigue, but I believe he’s got what it takes.”

The youth’s name was Neil. He had no intimates, let alone friends, and, when spoken to, would reply either in the briefest possible manner or not at all.

“A difficult bloke,” continued Hamish, “but—and this is where patriotism rears its bloody but still unbowed although diminished head—he is a fellow Scot, as I say. Wonder what his surname is?”

This turned out, upon friendly enquiry, to be Menzies.

“My mother’s maiden name,” said Hamish, delighted by this coincidence.

“Aye,” said the scowling youth. “I’ll tell ye this, mon,” he continued, “I could beat yon Froggie over the fifteen hundred.”

“Paul-Pierre?”

“Aye.”

“Well, let’s ask him whether he’d like to try you out. He’ll be Olympic class if he keeps up his training, though, and you’ve never actually timed yourself over the distance, have you?”

“I can swim his bluidy head off.”

The match was arranged and Paul-Pierre won it, but so narrowly that Henry, who was watching, was astounded. Paul-Pierre swaggered.

“I was not really trying, me,” he said. Neil turned and clouted him.

“We’ll dae it again, when ye are trying,” he said, when the Frenchman scrambled out of the water into which he had been knocked. Paul-Pierre scowled and muttered, and, after that, Hamish arranged so that their training-times did not coincide. Neil, he decided, might be content to say it with fists, but Paul-Pierre’s proved handiness with a knife was not a matter he intended should be displayed in any circumstance over which he himself had control.

A fortnight later Neil approached him.

“Gin I apologized to yon Frog for belting him into the water, think you he’d swim me again?”

“Well, it’s a handsome, manly offer, Neil. I’ll ask him. But it’s to be a proper apology, mind. None of our backhanded Hieland insults.”

For the first time since Hamish had known him, the boy grinned.

“That’s a’ richt,” he agreed. Paul-Pierre accepted the apology superciliously but without giving actual offence, and the match was arranged for the following day. In the morning, at the staff breakfast-table, Miss Yale announced that she was off to London for the day to keep a dental appointment.

“Oh, no, nothing special,” she replied, in response to a kind enquiry from Henry. “Just routine. Don’t suppose he’ll find anything to do. I’ve got teeth like a horse.”

As this was only too true, nobody knew what to say about it, and Henry hastily went on, “I’m off myself this morning, but I’ll be back for lunch. Got to charm Gottswalds into letting us have that landing-area for the high jump sooner than they think they can give it to us. I’d like to surprise Barry with it when he gets back. He’ll be delighted.”

“That takes two of us off the field, then,” said Miss Yale. “Can you lend a hand, James?”

“Only until eleven,” replied Hamish. “I’ve got a timed fifteen hundred metres coming off in the pool, and I must be there, not only stop-watch in hand, but ready to break up the fight which may ensue when the race is over.”

“Oh, it’s another race, is it?” asked Henry, interested, in his dedicated way, in all that went on in the College. “Sorry I can’t manage to stay and watch.”

“Yes. Neil has challenged Paul-Pierre again. As P-P. won last time by less than a yard, I think that, this time, Neil might turn the tables.”

“But if Neil can beat him, he’s an Olympic prospect, isn’t he?” asked the lovely Lesley.

“We shall see.”

With two of the staff absent there were to be no lectures that morning, so Hamish went on to the field immediately breakfast was over and watched the long jump as he had promised. Men and girls trained together where the facilities allowed for this, and there was a mixed bag of long-jumpers, some serious-minded, some frivolous, lined up at the top of the runway.

At the end of the line was Colin, Barry’s prospect for the inter-college record. He was well-built for long- jumping—tall, long-legged, flexible, beautifully muscled and very fast indeed from his starting-mark down to the take-off board. Moreover, he very, very seldom missed the board and, when he did, he was behind it, not over its front edge, and so his jump counted.

Hamish watched in silence for a bit. Then, while the pit was being raked, he walked over to the line of athletes