Topkapi Read Free Page A

copies and let some of the chaps at school read it. Then I charged them fourpence a time to be allowed to copy it out for themselves. I was making quite a lot of money, when some fourth-form boy left a copy in the pocket of his cricket blazer and his mother found it. Her husband sent it with a letter of complaint to The Bristle . He began questioning the boys one by one to find out who had started it, and, of course, he eventually got back to me. I said I had been given it by a boy who had left the term before - The Bristle couldn’t touch him - but I don’t think he believed me. He sat tapping his desk with his pencil and saying “filthy smut” over and over again. He looked very red in the face, almost as if he were embarrassed. I remember wondering if he could be a bit “queer.” Finally, he said that as it was my last term he would not expel me, but that I was not to associate with any of the younger boys for the rest of my time there. He did not cane me or write to the Benevolent Association, which was a relief. But it was a bad experience all the same and I was quite upset. In fact, I think that was the reason I failed my matriculation.
    At Coram’s they made a fetish out of passing your matric. Apparently, you couldn’t get a respectable job in a bank or an insurance company without it. I did not want a job in a bank or an insurance company - Mr. Hafiz had died and Mum wanted me to go back and learn the restaurant business - but it was a disappointment all the same. I think that if The Bristle had been more broad minded and understanding, not made me feel as if I had committed some sort of crime, things would have been different. I was a sensitive boy and I felt that Coram’s had somehow let me down. That was the reason I never applied to join the Old Coramians Club.
    Now, of course, I can look back on the whole thing and smile about it. The point I am making is that persons in authority - headmasters, police officials - can do a great deal of damage simply by failing to understand the other fellow’s point of view.
    How could I have possibly known what kind of man this Harper was?
    As I explained, I had simply driven out to the Athens airport looking for business. I spotted this man going through customs and saw that he was carrying his ticket in an American Express folder. I gave one of the porters two drachmas to get me the man’s name from his customs declaration. Then I had one of the uniformed airline girls give him my card and the message: “Car waiting outside for Mr. Harper.”
    It is a trick I have used lots of times and it has almost always worked. Not many Americans or British speak demotic Greek; and by the time they have been through the airport customs, especially in the hot weather, and been jostled by the porters and elbowed right and left, they are only too ready to go with someone who can understand what they’re talking about and take care of the tipping. That day it was really very hot and humid.
    As he came through the exit from the customs I went up to him.
    “This way, Mr. Harper.”
    He stopped and looked me over. I gave him a helpful smile, which he did not return.
    “Wait a minute,” he said curtly. “I didn’t order any car".
    I looked puzzled. “The American Express sent me, sir. They said you wanted an English speaking driver.”
    He stared at me again, then shrugged. “Well, okay. I’m going to the Hotel Grande-Bretagne.”
    “Certainly, sir. Is this all your luggage?”
    Soon after we turned off the coast road by Glyphada he began to ask questions. Was I British? I sidestepped that one as usual. Was the car my own? They always want to know that. It is my own car, as it happens, and I have two speeches about it. The car itself is a 1954 Plymouth. With an American I brag about how many thousands of miles it has done without any trouble. For the Britishers I have a stiff-upper-lip line about part-exchanging it, as soon as I can save enough extra cash, for an Austin