The borrowed drum

Source: an original fiction extract.

Milo had promised to return the drum by lunchtime. At eleven forty he was still standing outside Mr Sen's music shop with it pressed against his chest. A pale split crossed the skin from rim to centre. He had placed a scarf over it, although the morning was warm. Inside, Mr Sen was taking small packets of strings from a cardboard box. Each packet made a brief silver flash as he laid it on the counter. Milo watched until the arrangement was complete, then watched him begin another row. There seemed no courteous moment to interrupt.

The drum had slipped while Milo was carrying it down the school steps. He had told his friends that the strap broke. In fact, he had been trying to play as he walked, holding the drum with one hand because the other was needed to make a particularly impressive roll. He could still hear the impact: a single note lower than any the drum was meant to produce. His friends had winced and accepted the story about the strap. By the time he reached the shop, the story had become almost comfortable.

Mr Sen looked up when the doorbell rang. 'How did it go?' Milo said that everyone had enjoyed the performance. This was true. He placed the drum on the counter and began to unwind the scarf. Mr Sen did not help him. As the split appeared, Milo started the sentence he had practised, but the word strap caught somewhere behind his teeth. On the shelf beside the counter stood a little photograph of last year's school band. Mr Sen was at the edge, holding a case for someone else. 'I dropped it,' Milo said.

Mr Sen turned the drum slowly. He asked where, and Milo described the steps. He asked how, and Milo explained the roll. The questions were quiet and inconveniently exact. At last Mr Sen said that the skin would have to be replaced. Milo offered the coins in his pocket. Mr Sen counted them without touching them. 'That won't cover it.' Milo stared at the counter. He had imagined either forgiveness or anger. The possibility of an ordinary bill had not occupied much space in his plans.

They agreed that Milo would speak to his mother about the cost and return on Saturday to help sort the shop's old sheet music. The work was not payment for the repair, Mr Sen said; it was a way of making himself useful after causing trouble. Outside, Milo took the scarf from his bag. It smelled faintly of the drum's wooden rim. He began a message to his friends saying that Mr Sen had been fine about it, then deleted the word fine. He wrote that the drum needed a new skin and that he had dropped it while showing off. He did not send it immediately. He read it once more, and then pressed the arrow.

Consider the whole source. A reader said: “Milo admits the truth only because he has been caught, so the ending gives little reason to believe he has become more responsible.” Evaluate how far you agree with this view. Support your judgement with detailed references to the text and the writer’s methods.