A Seat of Learning by Jonah
More of the adventures of Simon and Garret and their boys. This is a loving story of good people. It features men looking after boys but do not expect to find any indecency here. Only genuine love. Not one of the characters in this story is a real person or is, in any way, based on a real person. At least one character, however, is the creation of another author. I wish to thank Jacob Lion, in the USA, for his permission to use his characters in my stories.
I hope you will enjoy this story, and I'm grateful to Nifty for enabling me to bring it to you. Nifty does not charge either me or you for doing so, but it does cost money to do it. Please consider donating to Nifty at https://donate.nifty.org/ to help keep this site going.
Chapter 11
There was no rain on Thursday morning - in fact the sun was shining. In the fields around Newton St Faith the combine harvesters would soon be kicking up dust and preparing to clog up the roads.
Talking of roads, by half past eight Simon had Lloyd and Philip loaded up and was ready to be on them.
"Good luck!" he said before delivering his usual quick peck.
I already had Barry up and breakfasted and ready to load into my car. By a quarter to nine we had reached Denzil's house. In response to my knock Mr Thorpe opened the door.
"Come in," he said, not in his usual brusque way. "He's nearly ready." Then, to Barry, "Do you want to go up and let him know you're here?"
Barry said nothing but headed upstairs. There was no hesitation or fear.
Mr. Thorpe turned to me.
"I think he want to 'ave a word with the boy on his own," he said. That surprised me. There had obviously been some communication between Denzil and his dad during the night, and that communication had been two-way - and in words. There was some reason to hope.
After a few minutes Barry came back down followed by Denzil. Denzil's face was tear-stained, but Barry took his hand and squeezed it. Denzil forced a smile. I pretended not to notice any of this.
"Come on you two, we've got work to do," I said briskly. "Will about five be alright?" I added to Mr. Thorpe.
"Oh arrr, whenever it's convenient," replied that worthy.
With both boys in the back I directed the Discovery to Newton St Faith.
Denzil had never seen our house, so I let Barry introduce him to the place and show him where everything was, while I made myself a cup of tea, and poured orange squash for the boys.
"Right then," I said when everybody was provided with a drink. Sit yourself down where you can see this chart. " On the floor, I spread a royal genealogy of the middle ages from Richard I to Queen Anne.
"Now we're going to talk about how wars are fought. You probably know that we have an army, a navy and an air force, and the King is the commander-in-chief of all three of them. If the country goes to war all the King's men are there to fight for him. It wasn't always like that."
We spent an hour understanding how armies were created in mediaeval times and how royal succession was and is determined before introducing the Wars of the Roses. History is boring, if you let it be. I made sure that I didn't let it (a feat more easily pulled off with two boys than it usually is with thirty).
"Now we're going to go outside and play tag for fifteen minutes before we do some arithmetic. A couple of rules. One is that we step over the railway, not on it, because we don't want to disturb the ballast, and we don't bump into things like signals. Try to stay away from them. You're safe if you're on the patio, but you can't stay there. Come on."
I was obviously a glutton for punishment since I couldn't move as quickly as a couple of ten year-olds, but it couldn't be played with just two, and sitting studying books for two hours without a break couldn't work.
I was exhausted when I summoned them back in and poured another round of drinks. We supped as we added, subtracted, multiplied and divided. I spent the next hour setting simple scenarios leading to calculations and then demonstrating how the calculations could be used to solve the problems.
"It's three miles back to Denzil's house from here. How fast would I have to go if I wanted to get there in ten minutes?" (eighteen miles per hour, but the boys needed to work out how to calculate that).
At the end of the hour,
"Barry, can you nip into the kitchen and get me a hammerfer from the cutlery drawer?"
"What's a hammerfer?" the boy wanted to know.
"Hitting nails with," I replied to much rolling of eyes.
"Right boys. I'm going to make us some lunch now, because afterwards Denzil has an appointment at the police station."
"Are you taking him?"
"Yes, Barry, we're both taking him because you can't stay here on your own."
Having put away the beans on toast, we piled into the Discovery and headed for Sprowston.
""Afternoon Mr. Ito," said Sgt Robbins. " I wasn't expecting to see you and young Barry there."
" No Sergeant, but Denzil couldn't come on his own. His dad couldn't bring him because he wasn't with his dad. He's home-schooling with Barry and I."
"Well I look on that as good news Sir, and I'll make a note of it on Denzil's file. Is Barry OK with that?"
"Denzil said sorry to me," Barry reported.
"Which reflects credit on both of you. I'll make a note of that too. Denzil - PC Hopkins will be with you in a minute."
Denzil's face fell.
"Can I sit in with Denzil for his interview Sergeant?"
"Well, his father always do, so I reckon it'll be alright. Will Barry be alright out here?"
I looked at Barry who nodded.
The constable that we had seen two nights ago appeared and said,
"Right Denzil, you know where to go."
We both followed him until the officer said.
"Sir, you'll have to wait out here, It's only..."
"You're not allowed to interview Denzil on your own constable," I said.
"He's right Charlie," said the sergeant. "His dad's not here so it's either Mr. Ito or me. If I were you, I'd take Mr. Ito."
The constable shrugged so we followed him to the interview room and sat down.
"Now," said the constable, "you've only got another three appointments after today so, if you keep your nose clean you'll be in the clear - until you do it again. In my experience your type only end up in here again and next time we'll be looking at a detention centre. Do you know what one of those is?"
"No he doesn't constable, and he doesn't need you to tell him either, since he isn't going to one. You made four unwarranted and incorrect assumptions in that statement and then had the cheek to utter them out loud in front of a ten-year old boy."
"Sir, I'm interviewing this boy. You're only here because...."
"You haven't any choice. There's a reason why you haven't any choice and it isn't because there needs to be someone here to look decorative. Besides, you're not interviewing him You're talking at him. Interviewing would suggest a two way conversation with him doing most of the talking. He doesn't need to hear your poisonous opinions based on your dubious experience."
"I'll be buggered if I'll sit here and be...
"Sit down Charlie," said Sergeant Robbins from the doorway. "I could bust you from the force altogether for using the word I just heard you use in front of a minor."
"Minor?" screamed the PC. "This little thug might be a minor...."
"PC Hopkins," I commented quietly. "You're in a deep hole. I recommend that you stop digging."
"There's a "Fundamentals of Safeguarding" course starts on the 22nd, at Wymondham" said the sergeant, "I've booked you on it. You're not to have primary contact with minors until you complete it to at least level four. I'll do the rest of Denzil's interviews."
The constable fumed and stormed from the room.
"Well I think we have everything we need for today," Sgt Robbins said cheerfully. "I'll see you same time tomorrow Denzil. Oh, and Denzil - if I say I'm looking forward to it - it won't be for the same reason that PC Hopkins might have looked forward to it."
I'm sure I must have been mistaken. I couldn't possibly have seen the sergeant wink at the boy - but why else would Denzil have been wearing a smile that I had never seen in all his years of schooling. He even looked quite handsome when he did that.
We were back in Newton in time to spend an hour in Bible study before the troops got home. As soon as Simon arrived I bundled Denzil into the car and drove him home.
"Are you coming in?"
"You don't need me to Denzil."
"I think my dad'd like you to."
I followed him to the front door. It opened without either of us touching it.
"Come in," said Mr. Thorpe as Denzil thundered upstairs.
"I want to thank you Sir," he said as he closed the door. "After you went last night, it was like I had a different boy. We both cried a bit, and we both said sorry to each other, but I don't think we knew what we were sorry about. It didn't matter anyway. I told Denzil I loved him and he said he loved me, so you were right Sir. I'm taking him to Carrow Road on Saturday. I don't even know if he likes football, but he said he'd like to go with me. Thank you sir."
There were no words for what was going through my mind. I patted his arm and turned to the door. He siezed my arm and turned me back again, then took my right hand. I still didn't trust myself to speak so I shook his hand, smiled and nodded, then left.
"Spagbol for dinner," said Simon, on my return. "Yours is in the saucepan. It's ice cream for afters but we haven't had that yet. We're going to run a few trains first."
"Sounds like a good idea," I commented collecting the plate from on top of the saucepan on which it had been warming. "Do you want to hear another one?"
"Go on then," said Simon.
"How about we invite Mick Thorpe round here for dinner tomorrow night. If it's fine we can fire up the barbecue. We can run a few trains and Denzil can stop and play with our boys. I'm sure they'd both like that."
"Might be nice," said Simon. "What if the weather doesn't play ball?"
"Then it's an indoor barbecue, using the stove, and DVDs instead of trains."
"I think you should go for it," said my partner.