Dr Beeching May Have Had A Point

The Writers' Block #35. Theme: Sixteen Candles

‘Perhaps - just perhaps - Dr Beeching was a visionary of far greater magnitude than we ever gave him credit.’

Professor Harding loved to do that. It was his style. Drop a statement into the pool of expectation at the beginning of a lecture and see where the ripples go and how far they dig into the young minds in front of him. Today, though, there was the added intrigue of the candles. Throwing caution to the wind, which meant ignoring the health and safety manual, the Professor had a line of candles, already lit as the students arrived. Just before he spoke, on the stroke of the hour, he licked his thumb and forefinger and snubbed out the first one. He studied the wisp of smoke as though its importance was key. He checked his watch, too, aware that a candle must be extinguished every six minutes.

Most eyes were on him, obviously wondering what the proclamation and the candles implied. The few exceptions were staring straight down. In previous years, that would mean the person was focussed on a blank page as his words were studiously copied down. These days, the youngsters were probably making eye contact with their phones.

Harding sighed a little and allowed his head to rise, beyond the smoke, to the ceiling of the small amphitheatre, letting his gaze fumble along the lighting rig, the back wall and finally allowing it to rest somewhere in the middle of the near-distance. He liked to do this as well. By slightly unfocussing, he could, with his excellent periphery vision, take in the whole theatre before him like a hunter inspecting the plain for prey.

He stroked his greying beard and saw movement to his left. That would be the blond Estonian chap. Always eager to ask a question and would undoubtedly enquire if this talk was about how we got here today.

The air-conditioning broke the silence with a very distant click and exhalation. Comforting, somehow, as though the building were alive and allowing them this meeting.

A hand raised.

‘Yes, Otto? Only thirty seconds in and we have your first question.’

‘Is this going to be about our journey here today?’

A mixture of sighs and stifled giggles bounced around the space. Otto looked ashamed, so Harding decided to assist him this morning. It was, although no one knew it, his final talk, so why not? ‘In a way, Otto, yes.’

He had their attention again. The annoying kid was was right, for once. It had to happen one day, statistically. So even the tweeters looked up.

‘Some say the British way of life changed when, in 1526, Henry VIII, the younger sibling who should not have become King, fell in love with a woman not his wife. But, then, our Queen wouldn't be monarch if her uncle hadn't put love ahead of duty. So what's all the fuss? Some say this country is trillions of pounds in debt. And the dirty word 'deficit' is used to confuse us by politicians distracting us from bad news. But debt and deficit are different things and we are so deep in debt - an amount impossible to imagine, let alone pay. We are not the only country in the red - so why worry about it? Some say World War One only began because of the efficiency of the German railway system, without which mobilisation of troops and supplies would have been stunted. But then, people being people, treaties being treaties, given time, we would have gone to war over something. Is not fascism just another form of religion - or vice versa?

‘Monarchs, debt, trains.

‘Three incongruous issues that implicitly affect our world. All of our money has her head, our nationality is hers, our identity, too. That very money is key, but there is a world shortage. Why else would we be in debt (apart, apparently, for Norway)? This country fell into debt when the king borrowed to fight a war two hundred and fifty years ago. From whom? What would happen if we defaulted? Would 'they' demand something or somewhere as payment? Let's propose Norfolk and Suffolk or Cornwall and Devon. Yet the debt concerns industry. Industry employs us. They are the reasons we catch the trains each day. Without them we need not commute at all, yet without the commute would trains cease to be? On the 27th March 1963 the British way of life changed again. Dr Beeching's report slashed our rail network.

‘Leaders (be they elected, self-appointed or anointed), money (whether there is an abundance or a lack of it) and trains (timetabled, delayed or transporting goods).

‘Without them we may just survive: no mad leaders, no debt, nothing running late due to a signal fault at Harrow. And, maybe, without trains, money and despots, there would be no war. Ah, a cessation in fighting. Peace across the world because the trains do not run. Perhaps - just perhaps - Dr Beeching was a visionary of far greater magnitude than we ever gave him credit.’

There was a stunned silence in the room, yet the repetition was their cue. Arms were raised, questions bowled at him, but Harding was in the crease and was feeling good. He parried, left wides alone but smacked the odd one over the boundary. The brighter responses were simply knocked back to the bowler with a doff of the lecturer’s imagined cap.

All the while, every six minutes, he darkened a candle.

The ninety minutes rushed by in a blurr. Harding was having a ball. The students were involved and, when he’d finished, he was unsure whether it was the emotion making his eyes weep or the smoke from the dead and dying candles.

He thanked everyone and made a show of blowing out the final candle before they filed out.

Otto didn’t leave, though. He approached the desk against the stream of students like a salmon through rocks. ‘Please don’t go.’

Harding was shocked. ‘How did you know I was going?’

‘All the references you made to the future. When you have gone. The world goes on. The candles. Pretty weak as allegories go.’

‘Was I that obvious? Amidst all that drivel I was spouting about trains?’

‘Oh, it was mostly drivel, Professor.’ Otto placed a large, friendly hand on Harding’s arm. ‘It was an insightful critique about perceived and actual change. It was the same five hundred years ago as it is now, only with funny clothes and outside toilets.’

Harding nodded. He felt weak. Looking up and realising they were alone he allowed himself a groan. ‘I’m unwell, Otto. I was -’

‘Going to leave today and never come back. I thought as much. So, I repeat, please don’t go.’

Harding looked into the bright and energetic face. Like a puppy. How can you refuse a puppy? But it had all seemed so clear before today and this unexpected student beseeching him to stay had an unforeseen effect on him.

It was not that his body’s ache had gone. Not that. The medications were causing him genuine pain and discomfort. It was the unexpected surge in energy that he felt. Maybe enough to cancel out his negative view of the immediate future. ‘Alright, I will come back again, as much as this body allows me.’

Otto smiled.

‘Provided I can use your “funny clothes and no outside toilets” line.’

They laughed and Otto carried Professor Harding’s bags out of the theatre.