The Floating Body by Kel Richards Page B

gossip network in a small school can be.’
    ‘Indeed,’ Cowper agreed. ‘That they have found out so much is not surprising. What alarms me is that some of the older boys have been trying to frighten the younger ones by claiming that the only explanation for this impossible event is occult nonsense—lots of stuff about ghosts and ghouls and things that go bump in the night.’
    ‘If the children are being genuinely frightened,’ Jack said firmly, ‘that needs to be stamped out.’
    ‘Quite right, Mr Lewis,’ said Cowper. ‘I intend to deal with it in my talk to the boys at chapel tomorrow morning.’
    ‘And what insights can you give us,’ I asked the Dean, ‘into the mind of the murderer?’
    Richard Cowper shook his head sadly. ‘Who can understand what goes on in any human mind that drives it to such an act of savage violence?’
    ‘Except,’ I suggested, ‘that it must be a badly diseased mind—a human mind that is unnatural, bent out of shape, in some way.’
    Jack chuckled and said, ‘Morris is trying to draw you into a debate he and I are engaged in over the truth concerning human nature.’
    ‘I see,’ muttered the Dean. ‘Well, I’m afraid I have nothing original to add. In fact, I’ve sometimes thought that what is most remarkable about the doctrine of original sin is how unoriginal it is. Throughout human history the basic corruption in human nature keeps showing itself in the same horrible ways over and over again.’
    ‘So it’s two against one, Morris,’ Jack grinned. ‘You’re outnumbered.’
    ‘I take it you don’t agree, Tom,’ Cowper said as he refilled our port glasses and offered the bottle to Warnie.
    ‘Surely,’ I protested, ‘all civilised people agree that human nature is basically, fundamentally,
good
!’
    Jack and Cowper glanced at each other.
    ‘I think,’ said Jack, ‘the Dean and I agree that your confidence in the goodness of human nature does you credit—it shows what a trusting and charitable person you are. But it also, sadly, shows that you just haven’t been paying attention.’
    ‘To what?’
    ‘To the patterns of human history, to the stories in your daily newspaper, to the behaviour of those around you—and even to the inclinations of your own heart.’
    ‘But I keep
seeing
goodness in human beings,’ I thrust back. ‘I see people behaving well and doing the right thing.’
    ‘And the opposite, of course,’ said Cowper gently. ‘Or do you find you never need to discipline your class?’
    ‘Well . . . of course . . .’
    ‘And that’s the whole point, young Morris,’ said Jack, leaping gleefully into the battle. ‘Human nature is this strange mixture. As a Christian, I believe we are made in the image of God; but this image is now sadly marred, deeply corrupted, by the rebellion of our primeval parents against God. Furthermore, their nature we have inherited, and hence we too are by nature corrupt.’
    ‘But there’s still good there,’ I insisted.
    ‘Chesterton put it best,’ Jack responded, ‘when he noted that the good that remains in human nature is like the goods Robinson Crusoe found on his beach—something salvaged from a wreck.’
    ‘Pascal said something similar,’ Cowper volunteered. ‘He said that human nature contains these contradictory elements of nobility and wickedness.’
    ‘Precisely!’ Jack leaped in, seizing the point with delight. ‘Pascal said something along the lines of
Quelle chimère est-ce donc que l’homme? quelle nouveauté, quel chaos, quel sujet de contradictions
.’
    ‘I’m sorry, my French is not . . .’
    ‘ “What a chimera is man!” Jack translated. “What a novelty, what chaos, what a subject of contradiction.” ’
    Dean Cowper was nodding enthusiastically as he added, ‘Pascal’s point is that man’s greatness lies in his capacity to recognise his wretchedness.’
    ‘But I
don’t
recognise it,’ I protested before he could go any further. ‘Human nature