hamstrung by abjcdsss

hamstrung A NOVEL

Charles Stewart

-It's funny how some things just get to you. Even after all these years. Like telling the boy's parents.Inspector Branch looked up at me. Blue eyes. Hard blue eyes that had seen too much. -It doesn't get any easier.-No. We just get used to the fact that it doesn't get any easier.-Well, there's a start.Inspector Branch looked back at the desk, loss of eye-contact like a torch being switched off. -Here.He handed me a sheaf of photographs. A boy, about fifteen, lying on a mortuary-slab, very naked, very dead. I flicked through them, quickly. The face, full and in profile. The torso. The belly. The buttocks. The genitals. The bruising and scorations. The hard blue eyes were on me again. -Bastard. And all of you do-gooding liberals will plead for a bastard who could do that.-Yes. I know.-You know nothing! At least your bloody paper has the balls to campaign for the reintroduction of Capital Punishment.-That is the policy of our bosses.-Bloody right too.- The blue eyes flared. -When we get the bastard, if I have any say in the business, there won't be enough left for the hangman.I handed the photos back. -You know we can't use these.-I bloody know. The sensitivity of your readers, and of your fucking editors, couldn't take it. But I can at least rub your nose in it.-My nose has been suitably rubbed.The blue eyes went suddenly dead. -Ever seen a fifteen-year-old dying?I shook my head. He looked down at the photos, turned his eyes on me again. -He was in a state of deep coma when we found him. We thought he'd fallen from the road above. But at the hospital, when they undressed him...He left off; but there was nothing to say. -I was there, the whole time, watching them trying to save him. For two fucking hours they tried.I was there too; watching those hard blue eyes.

-He died so easily. Effortlessly. There wasn't any great struggle. He just ceased. One minute his chest was rising and falling, then the next it wasn't.He looked down at the photos. -Bastard.There still was nothing to say, so I said nothing. Suddenly the eyes were businesslike again. -He died from internal injuries. Internal bleeding. That could almost be consistent with a fall. Even the scratching and bruising. Except...-Except?-The body had been washed. Lovingly, the doctor said. Every scratch, every bruise, thoroughly cleaned. Then he'd been dressed, in fresh clothes, and, apparently, dumped.-In the Euston underpass.-Right. It was 1.07am when he was found. Not much traffic. The car must have stopped for an instant, pushed him out, and driven on.-No possibility of a fall?-A fall! Christ Almighty! You're the newspaper man. The investigative journalist. A lad falls from the road above, or from a moving car, against the side of the Euston underpass. Nice firm concrete. Nice hard road. No blood. No mess. Clothes all clean.-Suicide?-Sui-bloody-cide! Of course. Why didn't we think of that. The lad beats his own insides to a pulp, cleans up all the bruises and scratches, puts on fresh clothes, and waits for us to find him.-All right.- I held up both hands in mock surrender. -Just talking off the top of my head.Inspector Branch grunted, leafing through the photos. -Look here. Look at these marks.Two deep cuts, gaping, at the back of the boy's knees. -I suppose the boy did that to himself for good measure.-Hamstrung?-They wanted to be bloody sure he wasn't going to get away before...-Before?-Before they did whatever they bloody wanted to with him.-Poor little Gyges.His blue eyes were switched on again. -Huh! Gyges!-Et succiso poplite Gygen.Suddenly the blue eyes smiled, my words draining the pus from his quiet fury. -Christ Almighty! Everything, with you, comes back to your bloody classics.-Virgil. The Aeneid. Book 9, verse 762. And the first foot of 763. Principio Phalerum et succiso poplite Gygen excipit. First Phalaris and then Gyges he catches and hamstrings.-And how do you know our victim isn't Phalaris?-I don't. I don't even know that it isn't Palmus, who gets hamstrung a little later. I just have a hunch.Inspector Branch smiled.

-I suppose you wouldn't have a hunch about our serial killer?-Turnus. Of course. At least in the first two cases.-Any likelihood of our apprehending him?-Not much. He's been dead over three thousand years.The smile broadened. -Some of them get away, even with us.-He didn't get away. No one ever gets away. That's one thing that the classics teach you. Three books later he gets his comeuppance. Vitaque cum gemitu fugit indignata sub umbras.-I want to get this bastard before he escapes anywhere, even to the other world. I want him to pay.-Your Latin isn't as rusty as you pretend.-Fuck you. Fuck you and your Latin. That boy suffered unimaginable indignity and torment before he died. He was fifteen years old. Next week he was going to sit for his exams. He came up to London for the weekend, by train, to relax, just for a bit of a break from his studies. He had his return ticket in his pocket- His eyes burned like a blue flame. -He was an only child. If you had had to interview his parents yesterday, perhaps a suitable Latin tag would not have come so readily to your mind.-Latin tags, as you call them, have nothing to do with it. They just help to make us realise that nothing ever happens for the first time.-Right. But it happened for the first time to that boy's bloody parents. And for the last time too.-And now you want me to see them? To rub my nose a little further into your solitary pain?He almost relaxed. -How could I keep anything so precious all to myself. And not want to share it with you.-Thanks.-Here.He handed me another photo. A boy looked out at me, a frank open smile, soft hair flowing nearly to his shoulders, looking almost like a young girl but for the prominent Adam's apple showing just above an open-necked white shirt. -That's him?-Yes. And this.He handed me back one of the mortuary photos. The same boy, unmistakably, but with features hardened by death, so that all sexual ambiguity was gone in its harsh masculine embrace. -Poor little bugger. Death made a man of him faster than all his years had done.Inspector Branch snorted. -Death made of him what it makes of us all. Cold meat.I looked back at the living boy; the frank open smile seemed to have become an ambiguous glance containing occult knowledge I could never penetrate. I handed the photos back. -No. The live one's for you. That's why I called you here. The father gave it me. He came up to London today to identify the body and brought it with him.- He smiled. -He's one of your readers.

Wants to offer a large reward, through your paper, to anyone who gives information leading to the arrest of person or persons unknown for the murder of his beloved son.I took the photo back and looked at it again. -We can certainly publish this one. And have all our readers up in arms and clamouring for the reintroduction of the death penalty. As we seem to be able to do at boringly regular intervals.-Bloody good thing. The sooner this country, and all our bloody European brothers, follow the example of some of our less enlightened redneck American cousins, the better it will be. The only way to get the crime rate down is harsher penalties.-Do you really think that the pervert who did this would have been put off by anything?-I don't know and I don't bloody care. I just bloody want him to pay.-You don't think he's paying already?-Christ Almighty! I suppose it's the boy's fault for being so fucking good-looking!-Nullus ephebum deformem saeva castravit in arce tyrannus.Inspector Branch snorted again. -The little fucker couldn't help it if he was the type your poor abused underprivileged piece of shit chooses for a victim.-Poor abused underprivileged pieces of shit, as you call them, should be apprehended and put away so that they can never do again what they did to this boy. But they should not be treated by a civilised society with as much, or more brutality than they have themselves shown.Inspector Branch smiled. -Your ancient world was not all that opposed to a little capital punishment. Made quite a show of it.-My ancient world, as you so kindly call it, was as nasty and brutish as our own. It was just a little more honest and a little less humane.-How then can you bring yourself to work, even for an hour, for that bloody rag of yours? How do they keep you on?It was my turn to smile. -Every great propaganda machine needs at least one fifth-columnist like me, pissing out of the tent as it were, just as every corrupt police-force needs at least one sea-green incorruptible like you.He saw my point, and couldn't greatly pretend he didn't see it. Still, he could pretend just a little. -The policeman is corrupt. The police-force is not.-And there are some jolly decent chaps on my paper too.He smiled, a smile tired, without mirth. -But you're the jolly decent one I sent for.I looked at the photo again. -Right. It'll be in the morning edition. And the offer of the reward.-No. Run the story and the photo. Don't mention the reward.- Inspector Branch looked at me hard. -I want you to interview the parents first. Get the readers worked up. Fuel their righteous indignation. Take a photographer with you. The boy's room. The parent's grief. Rub your readers' noses in it too. Every day for a week. Then spring the rewardI smiled grimly.

-You're the one who ought to be the journalist. I'd be happier beavering away here quietly at the police station, pouring over the evidence, studying the forensic reports. Your sledgehammer methods would appeal to the profanum vulgus who read our tabloid.We were both smiling now, but smiling as if on the receiving end of a greeting from Medusa. -I don't want to appeal to anyone. I just want to nail the bastard.- Suddenly even the smile was gone. -This case has really got to me, Rick. Deep down, where it hurts.- The blue eyes were glassy. -Picked Tom up last Saturday, after the football. All the lads in the changing-room, larking about in the showers. All their fine young bodies.- The muscles were working in his jaw. -I don't like to think about what happened to that boy. But I've got to. It's my job.-And mine to whip up the outrage?-Yours to whip up the outrage. Right?-Right.We both were silent. -The father's in London now?-No. He went straight back to Colwyn Bay. Didn't want to leave his wife alone for too long. Just identified the body and left.- The muscles were working hard. -What must it be like, identifying the body of a fifteen-year-old murdered son?-Hard.-Hard? Bloody hell on earth.-Yes.-You wouldn't bloody know a thing.-I can imagine.-Yes.- His blue eyes were fixed on my own. -I couldn't bloody look him in the eye. Me! Not bloody able to look someone in the eye.-And you want me to look them both in the eye, in their home, with a photographer, tomorrow?-They bloody want it. They want their grief spread all over the front page of your bloody tabloid. It's something to occupy their minds. Something positive they can do. Just to keep going.-Colwyn Bay?-The boy left home on Friday afternoon. They think he was going to hitch a ride to Chester. He probably got into London sometime Friday evening. He had his last day, in London, on Saturday. And we found him, at seven minutes past one on Sunday morning, in the Euston underpass, with his weekend return to Chester still in his pocket.-Quite a bit of time to account for. Anything yet?-No. The calls will start coming in after that photo's published. All the nutcases who saw him, or thought that they saw him. But, with a bit of luck, we might get a lead. Whoever gave him that lift. Unless...?-Unless?-No. Too bloody cliché. Besides, he'd have been murdered and his body dumped somewhere between Colwyn Bay and Chester. And he wouldn't have had a return to Chester in his pocket.-Someone he met on the train?-Who bloody knows. If so, he must have spent Friday night and all bloody Saturday with them.-Someone he met in London then?-

-Perhaps.-Euston bypass. Not all that far from Russell Square.-Sure. But we can't arrest every bloody fag who hangs around Russell Square at night because a boy has been murdered and dumped at Euston.-Right.Silence. -And the autopsy?-Have to wait for the results. Couldn't start cutting up the poor little bugger till his father had said good-bye.Again silence. -Here.Inspector Branch handed me a piece of paper. A name. An address in Colwyn Bay. A phone number. -They know you're going to call. I'll leave it to you to make the arrangements.-Tomorrow?-I'll leave it to you. The sooner the better though.The boy looked up at me, smilingly, from the photo in my hand. At the door I turned back. Inspector Branch was staring down intently at some papers on his desk. -â&#x20AC;&#x2039;At non ter aevo functus amabilem ploravit omnes Antilochus senex annos, nec impubem parentes Troilon aut Phrygiae sorores flevere semper.The blue eyes looked up at me. -Nestor still had Echephron and Stratios and Perseus and Thrasymedes and Aretos and Peisistratos to comfort his old age. And this boy has no sisters to weep over him.-TouchĂŠ.- I said and went out.

-Hello.A woman's voice, remote, impersonal, and weak as a supermarket German wine. -Hello. Mrs Betts?A long pause. Then: -Yes.-Sorry to disturb you at a time like this. But Inspector Branch said you would be expecting my call.Another long pause. -Yes.-I'm Roderick Lustrum. From â&#x20AC;&#x2039;The Herald. â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Is your husband there?-I'm sorry, Mr Lustrum, but he's not back from London yet.The voice was more Shropshire than Welsh, with only the occasional sound revealing a long North Wales residency. -Shall I ring you, a little later, or would you rather phone me when he gets back?-You can talk to me, Mr Lustrum.-I only needed to ask about a convenient time when we could call.-Convenient?-I didn't want to put either you or your husband out.-You won't put us out, Mr Lustrum.-You're sure you wouldn't rather check with your husband, before making a time?-There isn't any need. What does our time matter now.The pause was now mine. -Would tomorrow be too early?-Whenever you say, Mr Lustrum.-There'll just be the two of us. Myself and a photographer. We'll be driving from London. Would some time in the early afternoon suite you?-Any time you say, Mr Lustrum.-About two-thirty?-Whenever you get here.-You don't want me to ring back, later, when your husband is home?-Mr Lustrum, what else could we want to do. What else could we ever possibly want to do.I was glad that the vision-phone had not come in. -We'll try to be there on time.-Don't worry, Mr Lustrum. The traffic can be very bad around Chester. Whenever you get here.There was another pause.

-Mrs Betts?-Yes.-I'm so very sorry.The silence was thick and palpable, like a living presence between us. -Mrs Betts?But even this silence had to end. -Thank you, Mr Lustrum. I'm only sorry you won't ever have the chance to meet our boy.-I'm sorry too, Mrs Betts.-You'd have liked him. Everyone did.-Yes. I'm sure.When the silences in a telephone conversation get longer than the talk, somebody has to call a halt, like a performance where there are more actors on stage than there are members of the audience. So I came down to the footlights, as it were, to precipitate a termination. -We'll try to be there as near two-thirty as possible, Mrs Betts. I'm sorry that the circumstances of our visit are not happier.-You have our full address? From Inspector Branch?-Yes.-You know Colwyn Bay?-No.-The turn off is a bit tricky. If my husband was here he could explain it so much better. It's the second street along Lansdowne Road...-I'm sure we'll find it, Mrs Betts.Silence descended again. -Good-bye then, until tomorrow.-Good-bye, Mr Lustrum.Never had a telephone so gratefully cradled its receiver. I sat at my desk, drained, like a man who has struggled with a hard and protracted stool. Almost at once the phone rang. Reluctantly I answered it. -Ricky. I've been trying for ages to get through.-Anne. Darling. It's a treat to hear your voice.-What's the matter? You sound awful.-I feel awful.-You're not sick?-No. Just coping with a difficult call.-Not too depressing, I hope.-Rather like staring into the eyes of a late Rembrandt self-portrait for ten minutes.-Poor Ricky! Never mind. I'll cheer you up.-Where are you calling from? I thought you were in Court all day.-Was. Am. But even us poor jurors get a lunch break. I'm standing outside Middlesex County Hall. With my mobile phone. The sun is shining and even poor old Big Ben looks cheerful enough. And yet you sound so down.-

-Never mind. I'll get over it. How's the case going?-Dragging on.-You're the one who sounds like they need cheering up.-No. It's great. I'm really enjoying it. Mr Justice Inman is a darling. Straight out of Gilbert and Sullivan.-He is rather as one imagines a judge ought to be.-I've fallen in love with him. I hope you're not too jealous, Ricky.-Not at all. I've been in love with him myself for years. He was the judge on the first trial I ever had to report. It was love at first sight.-Ricky! You mean we're going to have to share him?-'Fraid so, Anne. But first come first served.I could see Anne, with her mobile phone, standing in the sun, laughing. -Ricky. I got those seats.-Seats?-Yes. At The Playhouse. For Tonight.-Tonight!-You don't have to sound so pleased.-I forgot. It seems I have to drive to Wales first thing tomorrow morning.-Poor darling. Never mind. It's a very short play. They said it would be over by nine-twenty.-We can't change for another night?-Ricky! The entire run is sold out! I specially went down there to queue, for a whole hour, at nine o'clock this morning, for day seats. We've got two, right in the centre of the front row. I nearly killed myself getting all the way to Parliament Square in time for jury service. They didn't sell the tickets until ten!-Magnificent!-You don't have to go if you don't want to. I can easily find someone else. I'm sure Mr Justice Inman would love to see it.-I'm sure he would. But do you for a minute believe I'd trust the two of you alone together?I could picture her smile broadening. -I don't see why not. In a crowded theatre.-I'd rather go with you myself. To be on the safe side.Suddenly I wanted to be with her, tonight, now, forget all about Wales and tomorrow. -Safe! Do you think I'd be safe with you?-Safer? Safish?She laughed. -Even Vestire gli ignudi? When I telephoned about the seats, I had to listen to a recorded message. It warned me in no uncertain terms that Pirandello's play was erotic and disturbing!-You're erotic and disturbing. And I'm erotic and disturbed.-Not too disturbed to be erotic.-Too erotic to be disturbed.Her laugh rang out again.

-I leave you to yourself then. I wouldn't want to interfere with your solitary vice. I don't think any man ever gets over his first love affair. Us poor girls don't stand a chance.-You poor girls, as you call yourselves, eat us alive.-I know. But I've only had Mr Justice Inman for breakfast and I'll be hungry again by tonight. In fact, I'm feeling a bit peckish right now.-Well, there's a little fellow right here just longing to be gobbled up, if you can make it round to the office tout de suite. Mange-tout!-Pas possible! Got to get back. You wouldn't want me charged with contempt of court and then have to come all the way down here to bail me out before the play.-Right. He can wait. Where shall we meet? -What about your trip to Wales tomorrow? You don't want to be worn out for the long drive!-Fuck Wales and fuck tomorrow. Where do we meet?-

-To Adam Leslie Betts.Anne sat across the table from me, her glass, two-thirds filled with red wine, having just touched mine, still held aloft, a question in her eyes. -Adam Leslie who?-Betts. Adam Leslie Betts.-And just who is Adam Leslie Betts? Not another rival for your affections, I trust. I can put up with â&#x20AC;&#x2039;you â&#x20AC;&#x2039;being your first love. I think I could just about put up with another woman. But a man!-Adam Leslie Betts is the reason I have to go to Wales first thing tomorrow morning. The reason I didn't particularly fancy the theatre tonight.-As long as it's only on business, I'll try not to be too jealous.-Adam Leslie Betts was murdered at the weekend. I'm taking Mike with me tomorrow to Colwyn Bay. To get a good story. From his parents. I'd just arranged it with his mother when you phoned me this afternoon. Aiden Branch called me over. Showed me a wonderful selection of nude studies. A fifteen-year-old on a mortuary slab. Would really have turned-on a pederast necrophiliac. But you needn't be too jealous of me.-Ricky. I'm sorry. I didn't know.Suddenly Anne's eyes had filled with tears. I put my left hand on hers where it lay on the table. -No. I'm sorry. Sorry for my bloody stupid remarks. How could you know? Now I've upset you.-No. It's not that. It's you. The look on your face, in your eyes, when you spoke just now. All night, really. At the theatre. At interval. It was almost like a relative had died. I didn't like to ask. I wanted you to tell me. In your own time.-I shouldn't have waited so bloody long. I didn't like to mention it, earlier. Didn't want to spoil the play for you.Her dim smile was radiant. -Pirandello had already done that.-Yes. I know.We were silent a moment, then she raised her glass again, touched mine, and bravely repeated my toast. -To Adam Leslie Betts.We both drank to the dead boy. She put down her glass. -Poor Ricky. You're really much too much of a softee ever to be a hard-boiled newspaperman. You mustn't take every story so much to heart. Like a doctor. If they allowed each patient...-

-I know, I know. Professional detachment and all that. It should work only... It's something fails us. First we feel. Then we fall. You didn't speak to the mother over the phone today. And have the prospect of interviewing her and her husband tomorrow hanging over you the whole evening.-Sorry, Rick. Advice is cheap. But nothing you can do can help them.-Nothing anyone can do.We were silent. I poured more wine into our glasses. -I'm sorry about the restaurant. But it was handy. And quick.Anne looked around, at the thirties decor, at the framed posters advertising flying-boat travel and The French Line's newest ship on the Atlantic crossing. She smiled. -It's fine. I like pizzas. Even if nostalgia isn't what it used to be.-It never was.We were silent again. -You probably read the whole story in the morning papers.In Anne's eyes light suddenly dawned. -Of course. That poor little guy they found in the Euston underpass.-That poor little guy was Adam Leslie Betts.-I didn't read the details. That sort of thing always depresses me so much.We could still both manage a laugh. The arrival of our pizza, and the waitress cutting and serving the slices, turned the conversation, quite naturally and it seemed by mutual consent, to other things. -Right. How do you feel about the law now? Having served on a British Jury?Anne stopped, a wedge of pizza almost at her lips. -Great. Just great. Best system in the world.The pizza passed the barrier of her teeth and was gone. She chewed, smiling. -I bet the poor bugger you found guilty has other views on the subject.She swallowed, took a sip of wine. -The poor bugger, as you call him, expected no other. The verdict was unanimous. We were vindicated too. Afterwards they read out a long list of convictions for petty fraud over the past twenty years. Three previous gaol sentences.-That doesn't stop him from being a poor bugger.She chewed, smiling. -No. But it reconciles him a little, I would imagine.-Do you think any criminal is ever reconciled to being caught?-Perhaps not. But to the sentence, yes.I served her another slice of pizza from the dish. -I'm glad you got good old Inman. The old style! Not one of these younger men who look like they're in fancy dress.-He's great. Really terrific. Glad when the jurors were dismissed. Didn't want another case. Bound to be an anticlimax. After him. Although it's back to work again tomorrow.-

She spoke, as it were, between swallows. -I know. It's like when you see a great actor playing a role, you don't want to see anyone else in the same part.-Right. I don't ever want to see anybody as Captain Hook, after McKellen.I laughed. -Right.We ate for a time in silence. -Not like tonight.She smiled. -No. Not like tonight.-Thanks, though, for getting the seats. Glad we went. Always wondered what we'd have missed, otherwise.I seemed to be following her example, as if what we both had to say couldn't wait until the chewing stopped. -I know. All that praise. And her having just won the Academy Award for The English Patient.I put down my knife and fork, stopped chewing, looked at her hard: -I'm not missing you yet!She looked hard at me, tossed her blond hair over her shoulder, smiled knowingly: -You will! You will!We both burst out laughing. -God. The rubbishy things they give awards to today.She was a little defensive. -I thought Binoche was good in that. Only good thing in the film.-Yes. But on stage. Tonight. Acting in English. A French girl playing an Italian. And in English. It was brave, I admit. But to act on stage a language has to become second nature. Not like a film. In a film you can get away with anything. Look at poor Isabelle Huppert playing Mary Stuart at the National awhile back. A French girl playing a Scottish queen in a German play dreadfully translated into English. Admittedly Mary would have spoken with a French accent. But art is not life! She got all the intonations wrong. As did our Juliette, to a lesser extent, tonight.Still she was defensive. -I know. But for all that she was the one thing worth watching in the entire show. Fancy having so much fame, and money, that she can turn down all her film offers to play what she wants at a small theatre in London for about the same salary as I get every week.-Agreed. She has real presence. And beauty. But look what she had to contend with. A second-rate company of actors. An indifferent translation. A poor director. And a play in which Pirandello asks his heroine not only to attempt suicide in the first act but to succeed with it in the third. If a thing happens once it may be tragic, but if it happens a second time it can easily descend into farce. And with one interval, after the second act, instead of two as Pirandello intended, whatever symmetry the play may have had was altogether lost.Anne put both elbows on the table, smiling. -Ricky, I sometimes think that the only things you ever really get worked up about are ascetic matters.-

-You're a fine one to talk, with your degrees in Art History and Theatre from Dublin University.-I know. I know. But I can take it or leave it alone. With you it seems to be a matter of life and death.-It is. The life and death of civilisation.-Bravo. That's the Ricky I love.-I'm glad to hear it. I began to have my doubts at the theatre tonight when that old codger tried his luck with you.-Old codger?-At interval. While we were having our Pernod.-Him. He was queuing up with me this morning for tickets. We were standing there in the street for an hour together. Naturally we got to talking.-Quite a bit, apparently. He knew about your jury service. And your Art degree.-Ricky. I do believe you're jealous.-Jealous? Of that old duffer?-He wasn't that old. I found him quite attractive. Some of us girls like older men you know. And he was most interesting. Knew a lot about art and music and the theatre. He'd seen Callas and Fonteyn. And Olivier and Richardson and Gielgud. And Klemperer.-I'm not surprised. At his age.She clapped her hands together, laughing. -Ricky! You â&#x20AC;&#x2039;are â&#x20AC;&#x2039;jealous!-Jealous? No. I appreciate his taste.-You know that young Japanese couple who were sitting a few seats away from us? In the front row?-Yes.-The ones I waved to?-Yes.-Well, he knew a lot about Japanese culture too. Hokusai and Utamaro. And the films of Mizoguchi. And Noh drama. They were very impressed.-So, it seems, were you.-Yes, I was. It was so funny. He appeared to know more about Japanese art than they did. And they are over here in London for a year. The husband is visiting professor at Goldsmiths' College. His wife has just written a paper, in Japanese, about The Turn of the Screw and child abuse. And he is planning a monograph on the influence of body-building in James Joyce's Ulysses.She laughed like a child. -The influence of body-building in James Joyce's Ulysses?-Yes. I know. That's what I thought. But when I asked him, all he could say was that Sandow is mentioned three times. Then he blushed, if one can say that a Japanese ever really does blush, mumbled something about Molly Bloom's method of birth-control, and said that he couldn't explain it in English.I laughed too. -Just as well, perhaps.-They're off to Dublin, on the 15th of June, for two days, so they can be there for Bloomsday.-

-I wonder what the Japanese will make of Dublin, of Bloomsday, of the Irish?-And what the Irish will make of them?-What the Irish make of everything!We both were laughing now. I leaned across the table until my face was close to hers, chanting softly in my best Yeats' style: -Never shall a young man, Thrown into despair By those great honey-coloured Ramparts at your ear, Love you for yourself alone And not your yellow hair.She, however, was straight Molly Bloom: -But I can get a hair-dye And set such colour there, Brown, or black, or carrot, That young men in despair May love me for myself alone And not my yellow hair.But I would not be diverted: -I heard an old religious man But yesternight declare That he had found a text to prove That only God, my dear, Could love you for yourself alone And not your yellow hair.She beckoned me closer so that she could whisper it in my ear. -And if Willie Yeats had written that for me, I'd have reached under the table and given his testicles a good squeeze, monkey-glands or no monkey-glands.I laughed. -He'd have enjoyed that.-Naturally. That's why I'd have done it.-It's your father's fault, you know. Just because your surname is Gregory, he didn't have to call you Anne.-That's why he called me Anne.-And yet you're not related to the great Augusta?-Not that we know of. Although there's probably a connection somewhere way back.It was my turn to whisper in her ear. -As Sam Beckett would have it, both descended from the same noble ball.She beckoned me close again, put her lips to my ear. -I've a good mind to reach under the table and give your testicles a good squeeze.She imparted a small hard bite to my earlobe before retreating, smiling, to her side of the table. I sat back in my chair, stretching out my feet until they touched hers.

-That's the trouble with these pizza joints. No tablecloths. What we need is a good long tablecloth.Her toe played with my anklebone. -It's your father's fault, Ricky. Having Lustrum for a surname. Where you're concerned it seems appropriate almost to the point of banality.I was all innocent outrage. -My darling Anne, a lustrum, as you well know, is a purificatory sacrifice in which a swine, a sheep and a bull are offered as victims every five years. Hence a lustrum, five years.She smiled sweetly. -My darling Roderick, as you well know, a lustrum can also mean a morass or bog, and, by transference, a house of ill-repute or just plain old debauchery. You, of all people, know your Cicero well enough for that.I returned her smile. -You don't see me more as a purificatory sacrifice?-A swine, a sheep or a bull, perhaps.- She thought a moment. -Yes, I think I can just about see you as a bull. But a pure sacrifice, never.-It's your own fault, you know. You shouldn't take me to these disturbing and erotic plays. You were warned, over the phone, by that recorded message.-I know. I should have asked for our money back under the Trade Descriptions Act.-It seems to have had the desired effect on me.She threw back her head, laughing. -Everything has the desired effect on you. A cold shower would have the desired effect on you.The waitress, clearing our plates, brought the conspiracy of silence crashing about our ears. When she had gone, we had nothing more to say. I leaned across the table and took both her hands. -Anne. I want to go home with you tonight. I need you. Tonight.-Ricky. You've got tomorrow to face.-I need it so I can face tomorrow.-You know what will happen. What you're like. What we're both like. If you don't get some sleep you'll never be able to drive to Wales in the morning. And I have to be back at work again tomorrow too.-Please, Anne. Please!-All right. You win. You can take me home. In a taxi. But you can't come in.Already, in the darkness at the back of the cab, I could feel her hands fumbling, feel the weight of her head in my lap, feel the wetness of her mouth, my own sore need, her expert guidance. I lifted my glass, drained the dregs of the wine. -To Adam Leslie Betts.- I said.

-Hello. Mrs Betts?The door of the house before which we had been standing, Mike and I, for more than a minute, looking at the small coloured enamel plaque depicting some, to me, unidentifiable wildflower, set about eye-level at its centre, had suddenly opened onto a darkened hall and the small figure of a woman. -Mr Lustrum, is it?-Yes.We shook hands gravely. -And this is Mike Sorrel, our photographer. Mike came forward and shook hands also. -Good-afternoon, Mr Sorrel. Glad to meet you.-Hi-ya, Mrs Betts. Nice to meet you too.There was a short, awkward silence. -Won't you come in, gentlemen. My husband is waiting to receive you.We followed her down the short, unlit passage and turned into the front room where the brightness of the afternoon was held equally at bay in a unanimous twilight of drawn blinds. A figure rose out of the gloom from a chair, tall, shambling, stooped. -John. This is Roderick Lustrum. From â&#x20AC;&#x2039;The Herald.â&#x20AC;&#x2039;-Mr Betts.The hand was big, powerful, but the handshake seemed drained of all strength. -Glad to meet you, Mr Lustrum.-And this is Mr...- Mrs Betts paused. Mike stepped forward and introduced himself. -Hi-ya. Mike Sorrel. Nice to meet you, Mr Betts.Silence. There seemed nothing to be said, so I spoke. -I know how distasteful it must be for you, to have your grief intruded upon, as it is for us to have to intrude upon that grief. But Aidan Branch told me of your request.-Aidan Branch? Inspector Branch. Oh yes.- Mr Betts seemed almost confused. -I'm sorry, gentlemen. Forgive me. Won't you take a seat.Mike, leaving his photographic equipment beside him on the floor, joined me on the couch. -A whisky, gentlemen? Or Helen has prepared some afternoon tea for you? Perhaps a whisky first, after your long journey?I held up both hands.

-No. Really, Mr Betts. We're quite all right as we are.-What about you, Mr Sorrel?I felt Mike's hesitation beside me. -Which of you is driving?I indicated myself. -Well, I'm sure Mr Sorrel would like a whisky. And you too, Mr Lustrum. You're allowed one whisky, even with these stricter limits.Suddenly I needed that whisky. -All right, Mr Betts. But not too much for me.He went across to a small cabinet, brought out four chunky glasses and an unopened bottle. -Helen?-Yes, dear. But only a drop. To drink to our son.Mr Betts stopped, the bottle in his hand, looking at his wife, then broke the seal on the neck of the bottle with a twist. -Mr Lustrum. Mr Sorrel.- Mrs Betts brought the poured drinks over to Mike and me, then went back to her husband who was proffering her glass. Mike and I stood up. -To Adam.- Mrs Betts said. The four glasses touched. We drank. I was glad of the darkness of the room. Beyond Mrs Betts shoulder, on the mantelpiece, Adam Leslie Betts smiled at us from a silver frame. -Sit down again, Mr Lustrum, Mr Sorrel.- Mr Betts was insistent. -Make yourselves at home.Mike and I, side by side, sank back into the couch. Mrs Betts smiled. -Now you really must have some afternoon tea.-No. Honestly, Mrs Betts. Please.- It was my turn to insist. -We stopped for something to eat on the way down.Her face showed real disappointment. -Oh, Mr Lustrum. I made Welsh cakes specially this morning.- She smiled dimly. -I'm not Welsh, but you pick up a thing or two when you live in a place for eighteen years. Just listen to my accent!Mike stepped in to cover my embarrassment. -Sure, Mrs Betts. I don't know about Rick here, but I'd love some. I haven't had a Welsh cake since I was a kid on holiday at the Gower.Something, some shadow, almost like the effect of a physical pain, seemed to pass over Mrs Betts' face. Then it was gone and other memories replaced it. -The Gower. It's so beautiful down there. At this time of year especially. Are you Welsh then, Mr Sorrel?-No. Not a Welsh bone in my body. A cockney through and through. Used to go there with my parents.-

-It's a lovely spot for a holiday.There was an awkward silence. Mrs Betts turned to me. -Well, Mr Lustrum, I'll leave it to Mr Sorrel to expound to you the virtues of the Welsh cake while I get the tea. See if he can persuade you to change your mind.She hurried out of the room. Mr Betts remained standing where he was for a few moments, his head cocked, as though listening. Then he hurried across to where we sat and stood looming over us in the dim light, bending close. -Mr Lustrum. Please. Don't let Helen know what they did to our son's body. Please. I want her to remember him as he was. Alive.He seemed to be gasping for air. -But Mr Betts. The papers...-I know. I know. But I've tried to keep the worst of it from her. The details. She knows, of course. But she hasn't seen. What I've seen.-Of course, Mr Betts.-Did you see his body, Mr Lustrum?-No. Only the police photos.His eyes were wild with incommunicable pain. -How could anyone do that to such a beautiful boy? How could they bring themselves to do that to his body?-I don't know, Mr Betts. I just don't know.I thought of Branch and wished I could look away. Mr Betts, though, had turned his mad gaze on Mike. -Mr Sorrel? Can you understand? How they could do things like that to my son's body?Mike shook his head dumbly. -He'd been hamstrung, you know. So he couldn't walk. They must have done that to him first. He would have cried out. And later, when... You would have thought someone might have heard him.ut haec trementi, I thought, questus ore constitit insignibus raptis puer, impube corpus, quale posset impia mollire Thracum pectora. But Mr Betts' grief had turned again to me, made more terrible by its persistent undertone. -Mr Lustrum. You saw the photos. Why did they have to do that to his body? They didn't need to...Stiffening, he suddenly turned, hurried back to his chair and sat down. Then he said, in a voice totally other: -Wait till you see my wife's Welsh cakes, Mr Lustrum. I'm sure you'll change your mind.Mrs Betts entered, carrying, I am sure, her best silver tea-set. neque hoc parentes, I thought, heu mihi superstites. Mr Betts was on his feet again, helping her with the tray. Mrs Betts poured.

-How do you like your tea, Mr Lustrum. Milk and sugar?-No milk. No sugar. Just black.-My!Mr Betts brought my cup over. Mrs Betts was pouring again. -And you, Mr Sorrel. The same?-Milk and two sugars for me, thanks. Couldn't drink it like old Rick here.Mike glanced over at me. -And what about those Welsh cakes? Have you persuaded Mr Lustrum to try one?I held up both hands, this time in surrender. -You win. With three against one, I don't stand a chance.Mrs Betts laughed, brought a large green plate upon which a dozen or so flat misshapen scones of various sizes were piled high. I chose the smallest I could find. Mike was more forthcoming. -Mind if I take two, Mrs Betts. For old time's sake. Save troubling you again.Mrs Betts was pleased. -Of course. As many as you want. I like seeing a man with a good appetite. Adam always has at least three or four.Mr Betts, still standing by the tea-table, groaned. I stared down into the blackness of my cup. quid damna foves et pectore iniquo vulnus amas? Mrs Betts returned unsteadily to the table, put down the plate, turned back to us. -I'm so sorry, gentlemen. I just can't get used to Adam in the past tense. I keep thinking he's going to come in the door at any minute.-Please. Helen.- Mr Betts voice was muffled. Mrs Betts sat down. -It's all right, dear. The counsellors who called when you were in London said that that was to be expected. For a long time yet. They said it was good to talk about him as much as we liked.Mr Betts sank down into his chair. I looked up. His silent imploring eyes were fixed upon me. Mike, though, broke the silence. -These are great, Mrs Betts. Best I ever tasted. Brings me right back to the Gower when I was a boy. Just like Proust's madeleines.-Adam loved the Gower. Used to go there on holiday with a friend.Mrs Betts stopped, her face clouded for an instant, then she shook it off and turned to me. -And you, Mr Lustrum? What do you think of our famous Welsh cakes? They're new to you.My mouth seemed full of dry sawdust which, no matter how much I chewed, would not go down. -They're just fine, Mrs Betts. Delicious.There was a long silence. Suddenly Mr Betts leaned forward in his chair, elbows on his knees.

-Did you have a job finding us, Mr Lustrum? My wife told me you didn't know Colwyn Bay. If you turned right along Lansdowne Road, you should have got here without too much difficulty.-We did, Mr Betts. Without a hitch.There was another, longer silence, broken only by the clinking of saucer and cup. Again Mike stepped in. -It was a lovely day, coming down here. Traffic light. Even around Chester. I was navigator, Rick did the driving.Mrs Betts settled her teacup in the saucer. -Yes. It is a lovely day. It seems ungrateful to be sitting here in this darkened room. But since Adam's death the sunlight seems to be so bright. It hurts my eyes. I hope you don't mind.I felt Mike shake his head beside me as I shook mine. -Helen!There seemed to be almost a note of warning in Mr Betts' voice. -It's all right, John. Mr Lustrum and Mr Sorrel came all the way from London to talk about Adam. We have to make the effort, in spite of our pain.She got up, walked to the mantelpiece, brought the silver-framed photo over to Mike and me, left it with us and returned to her chair. Adam Leslie Betts smiled up at us. visu Parthenopaeus erat; simplexque horrore decoro crinis, et obsessae nondum primoque micantes flore genae: Mike's voice, when he spoke, was different from any I had yet heard him use. -He looks like a wonderful boy, Mrs Betts. You both must be very proud of him.Her smile penetrated the gloom. -He was, Mr Sorrel. And we are.Mike seemed to be taking over the interview, while the investigative journalist â&#x20AC;&#x2039;was quietly subsiding into the couch beside him. -Tell us about him, Mrs Betts. What he was like.I was glad that Mike was receiving the full impact of her gaze. Then I became aware that I was being granted the privilege of Mr Betts' silent attention. -Adam was such a good boy, Mr Sorrel. I only wish that you and Mr Lustrum could have met him.She paused for a moment, as if trying to think where to begin. -He was, I suppose, the child of our old age. We married late, John and I, after John had retired early, and we decided to settle here, in Colwyn Bay. We never thought to have a family then. Adam just happened. I know it's a terrible thing to say, but after he was born I just couldn't get used to being a mother. He seemed like a stranger in the house, not someone I had carried in my own body for nine months. They tell me that's very common with a first child and a woman of my age. But after only a few weeks I wouldn't have given him away for the world.-

Mrs Betts chatted on, as if to herself, her voice like a droning bass-note in the dimly lit room. But a fugue had set itself up in my head, a sort of counterpoint to her theme, a fugue of Babel, distancing me, with its classical cadences, from the vivid agony of her present. -Such a fine boy. Talking about him, here to you now, should make me sad. But it only makes me grateful. And happy to think I can share him with somebody else.Illum ipsum iuvenem, dignissimum qui te laetam semper nominatus cogitatusque faciat, -He never caused us a moment's worry, even as a child. He was so good. And popular at school. With his teachers and â&#x20AC;&#x2039;his contemporaries. That's unusual, you know. Normally it's either one or the other. But he was a joy to rear.Si confessa fueris percepisse magnas voluptates, oportet te non de eo quod detractum est queri, sed de eo gratias agere quod contigit. Provenerunt enim satis magni fructus laborum tuorum ex ipsa educatione, -I used to say to John sometimes that he was almost too good. He didn't seem to have any faults at all.Quicquid ad summum pervenit, ab exitu prope est. -Perhaps that's why he died so young. Because such goodness is not for this world.Incipe virtutibus illum, non annis aestimare; satis diu vixit. -I know it seems terrible, even to think it, when he never caused us any anxiety; but you can't help worrying, when they're late coming back from school, or when they're away from home. Now we don't have to worry about him any more. He'll never grow up, or leave home. He'll always be with us.Harum contemplatione virtutum filium gere quasi sinu! Nunc ille tibi magis vacat, nunc nihil habet, quo avocetur; numquam tibi sollicitudini, numquam maerori erit. She seemed to be saying her own Stations of the Cross, trudging painfully from one scene to another of her son's brief existence; but each time we stopped and knelt, as it were, instead of the usual pious prayers I heard the distant voice of the stately old Stoic. -Yet how can I not but regret that we never saw him grow up, never saw what he would have been like as a man.Decessit filius tuus; id est, decucurrit ad hunc finem, ad quem quae feliciora partu tuo putas properant. -You can't help wondering how he might have developed; what he would have made of his life.Quereris, Marcia, non tam diu filium tuum vixisse quam potuisset? -He hadn't even decided upon a career. When he was younger he was mad about sport. He wanted to be a footballer, of course. Or a doctor. Then it was the Air Force. And only recently he got interested in reading and literature. He was so good at so many things.Non est itaque quod sic te oneris: "Potuit diutius vivere". -It's hard to be reconciled to the fact that he is dead.Quis negat grave esse? Sed humanum est. -And to the way he died. The manner of his death.She had begun to cry, not violently, but quietly, the tears running down her cheeks without her brushing them away.

-When John came back here yesterday, after seeing our Adam for the last time, I couldn't look into his eyes.I found myself, like Branch, having the same problem. -He wouldn't let me go up to London with him. And the police said it wasn't advisable. So John went by himself. When he came back he just nodded and took me in his arms. And we stood here in the darkened room for I don't know how long a time.non convertis te ad convictus filii tui occursusque iucundos, non ad pueriles dulcesque blanditias, non ad incrementa studiorum; ultimam illam faciem rerum premis; illi, tamquam si parum ipsa per se horrida sit, quidquid potes congeris. -It was the way he died, Mr Sorrel. Alone. In London. While we were sitting here at home watching television. We don't even know why they did it.The tears were coming fast now. -Do you think he suffered much, Mr Lustrum? I could never stand to see him suffer, even as a child. His pain was my pain.ut non minus ipsa orbitate auctor eius digna res lacrimis esset. Mr Betts had stood up and crossed over to his wife. She stood too, falling naturally into his arms, burying her face in his shoulder, sobbing as if she was alone with him and their pain. He spoke to her gently. -Helen, Helen. Adam's gone. He's dead. I've seen him dead. We can't bring him back. Not with all our tears.Si fletibus fata vincuntur, conferamus, -Why did they have to kill him, John? He was so young. So innocent. His whole life was before him. He was all that we had in the world. If they'd known that, they would never have killed him. They'd have had some pity. On us. On him.Quid opus est partes deflere? Tota flebilis vita est; He led her out gently, leaving Mike and me alone in the darkened room. Itaque si felicissimum est non nasci, proximum est, puto, brevi aetate defunctos cito in integrum restitui. Neither of us spoke. Fuck you, Branch, I thought, fuck you, you old bugger. And Seneca and Cicero and Statius and Crantor. Fuck you all, for all your consolation. You were right, Branch, you bugger. About them. About me. -Christ.- Mike said softly. Adam Leslie Betts smiled up at us from his silver frame.

The dead eye of a trout stared up at me from my plate. I dug the fork in and lifted the pinkish flesh to my mouth. Mike had invested in a large steak. We ate in silence for a time. -Good steak?- I inquired. -Great.-No more worries about Mad Cow Disease?Mike grinned, munching. -I decided I've got so many soft spots in my brain already nobody'll notice the difference if I develop a few more.He washed it down with a gulp of red wine. I stared down at my trout, pondering if even in that I had bitten off more than I could chew. But a whole bottle of white burgundy on an empty stomach would have been too much, even for me. Mike looked over. -Cheer up, Rick. Think of tomorrow.I stared down into my wineglass. Christ, I thought. -Christ.- I said. -Christ.Mike munched. -Don't take it so hard. Tragedies happen every day. In our business we've just got to accept them.-That's what I fucking told Branch yesterday afternoon. Before I met the Betts.-There's no use ripping your guts out. Won't help them. Nothing will. Only time.-Time!- The white burgundy was sharp as metal in my mouth. -What can time do for them?-Everything.- Mike chewed as he spoke. -They married late. Never planned a family. Had their son for fifteen years. Once the horror of all this has passed they'll be reconciled to their loss. His memory will be enough for them. Do them for the rest of their lives.-But it's all so bloody awful.Mike grinned. -Of course it is. It's life.I was glad the burgundy wasn't better; a really fine old Montrachet would have broken my heart. -Fuck life.- I said. Both our bottles were emptying at an alarming rate. I looked at the naked piece of fish on the end of my fork. -Fuck William Burroughs too.- I said. Mike laughed.

-He'd only enjoy that.-Fuck him and all the ass-licking cock-sucking perverts who ever abused and molested and killed young lads for their own sexual gratification. You can kill those Shropshire boys, you know.Mike took another swig of red wine. -You sure in hell can.We ate for a time in silence. -You sure in hell can.- I reiterated. -Apt. And original.Mike lifted his glass to me in a mock salute. -dictoque vale "vale" inquit et Echo.-Forget the Latin, Roddy.- Mike drained the glass. I glared at him. -I'll forget the Latin if you forget the Roddy.-Right. It's a bargain.We both returned to our meals. Mike started laughing. I put down my fork. -Right. What is it now.-You Rick. Christ, a sheep in wolf's clothing could get your goat tonight.-Right. You're right. Even a two-bit cunt of a press photographer who fancies he's Don McCullin.We glared at each other. Suddenly we both were laughing. -Sorry Rick, but if you could see your face.-No. No. I'm sorry. But if you could see yours.I reached my hand across the table. -Here. Let's shake on it.We shook hands firmly, my elbow sending my glass into a perilous spin. I grabbed at it with both hands. Mike laughed. -Careful of that stuff. THAT STUFF IS PRECIOUS.-You're damn bloody right it is.I drained my glass, refilled it with the last of the bottle. Mike poured the dregs of the red into his glass too. We both lifted our glasses, clashed them together in a formal salute: -Adam Leslie Betts!- Our unison was perfect. We drained the glasses together, carefully returned them, not quite together, to the linen cloth. Suddenly I started to cry. -Christ, Rick. This thing's really got to you.-I know. I know.-It's the drink, of course. I sensed you getting maudlin, even before dinner, after the fourth Martini. But as you didn't have to drive, I thought: Why not?-

-The drink, nothing! It takes more than four dry Martinis...-Doubles!-All right! Doubles! And a bottle of white burgundy, to get me drunk. It's just that non fueram genitor, sed cernite fletus liventesque genas et credite planctibus orbi: orbus ego.Mike was glassy eyed. -I warned you about the Latin, Roddy.-And I warned you about the Roddy.But across the table from me Mike was crying also. -I'm sorry, Mike. Sorry about everything. Sorry that I started you off too.Big drops were falling from Mike's eyes onto the tablecloth. -It's not your fault, Rick. It's just. At that house this afternoon. It brought so much back to me. When I was seventeen. My older brother. A motorcycle accident. My mother. Sitting all day long in a darkened room. For two years afterwards! And I still dream about him every single night. Even after all this time. Oh Christ, Roddy, I loved him more than I love my own life.My hand fumbled across the table, took his. -Mike. Mike. Oh Mike. I didn't know.Holding hands, we shared each other's grief. When the waitress came with coffee, we both were laughing. -Christ, Rick. I always knew you were an original. How many other hard-bitten heterosexual reporters have ever sat opposite their photographic counterpart crying over a dead fifteen-year-old boy neither of them had ever met. I tell you, Rick, you're a one-off.-We're a one-off.- I corrected him. -We're a one-off.- He had to agree. -You know, Mike, you're a good fellow. You've got to let me buy you a Cognac before we toddle off to bed.Mike smiled. -Only if you let me buy you one in return.-Agreed.-Agreed.We shook hands on it. Later, in the lounge, we decided on a cigar to accompany our third. -You're a good man, Mike. You know that?The fire at Mike's mouth glowed through a haze of smoke. -You're a good man. Much better than I'll ever be.-Nah!- I waved my cigar airily. -You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din!We drank in the silence. -Mike. I want to be completely honest with you. I'm glad that they didn't have any Paradis. Or even X.O. A good unpretentious V.S.O.P. is all I could have faced tonight. I'm just not up to confronting the sadness of all the ages. Not now. Not here.Mike puffed and glowed. -Me neither.We each communed for a time with the other's cigar-end.

Mike broke the silence. -You know what I do feel up to, Roderick old chum. Looking around for a bit of local talent. Old Giovanni Tommaso here is as stiff as an untossed caber.-Christ, this is Llandudno, Mike, not Llareggub. Find a lipsticked nipple here, probably be on a cow.-Don't care, Roddy, pardon! Roderick old man. Don't care one little bit.- He dropped one hand to his lap. -Nogood Boyo needs an outing.Mike's cigar-tip glowed. -Tickle the ladies' fancy, eh? End of your old cigar?-Right you are, Rickyroddy, right you are.-No bloody Roddy, Micky!-No bloody Micky, Roddy!-inlitterati num minus nervi rigent, minusve languet fascinum?Mike held up both hands in mock surrender. -All right. No Latin, no Micky, no Roddy. Just plain Mr Lustrum.-Right, Mr Sorrel.We both laughed. Both our cigars glowed. -Well how about it, Rick? A little night cruising?-Right.But when we got out into the night air, suddenly the cigar-smoke seemed to curdle with the Cognac and fish and white wine and a great sour mouthful came up from my stomach. I stood against a wall at the back of the hotel, head down, retching; but the sick wouldn't come. When I looked up, Mike was standing beside me, in copious free-flow against the bricks. -Christ, Mike. I didn't know the piss could get through when it was that stiff!Mike looked down with clinical interest. -Neither did I. But it seems to be finding a way.He finished, with only a marginal detumescence. -Still raring to go!- Mike grinned as he put it away. -How about it, Rick?I felt like hell. -I feel like hell!- I said. Mike's hands were on my shoulders. -Come on. It'll do you good.His face was too close to get into focus. -Can't, Mike. Can't face it. You go without me. Just wanna go to bed.-Right, old boy. Give her one for you too. Try not to wake you up when I come in.Mike threaded his way through the darkness and was gone. I managed to negotiate the lift and get to our room on the fifth floor. But the sick feeling was worse. I stripped off my clothes, made it to the bathroom; still the stuff wouldn't come up. It lay like lead on my stomach. Even the crafty middle finger didn't do the trick. I threw myself down on the outside of the bed, as I was, flat on my back. Christ, I was sick! Cold sweat stood out all over my

body, formed into rivulets, trickled down onto the coverlet. I closed my eyes. But the room wouldn't stop going around. I must have lain there for half-an-hour, trying not to move, not to think. Still I felt rotten as hell. When I looked at my watch, I saw it was nearly one-fifteen. Christ, I thought, I must have slept. I tried to sit up on the edge of the bed, but my head spun at its own pace, solemnly. Anne, I thought. I don't give a damn if you are asleep. I don't give a fuck. But her phone rang unanswered. I dialled again. After the fourth attempt I gave up. I lay back down on the outside of the bed, feeling a little better. Fuck her, I thought, Fuck her, Fuck her. sed paelice laeva uteris et Veneri servit amica manus, -â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Fuck her.- I said aloud. -Fuck her.Lascivam tota possedi nocte puellam, cuius nequitias vincere nemo potest. fessus mille modis illud puerile poposci: ante preces totum primaque verba dedit. My left hand shaped itself to receive the thrusts. improbius quiddam ridensque rubensque rogavi: pollicita est nulla luxuriosa mora. -Fuck her! Fuck her!-

I stopped the car in Lansdowne Road, turned to Mike in the front seat beside me. Mike, too, was not quite in peak condition. I opened the glove-box, took out a flask. -I know they'll offer us whisky, in their altruistic self-abnegating way, when we get there. But I need one to go on with, now, before we face them; to help me face them.Mike accepted the flask, took a heavy swig, handed it back to me. -Thanks, Rick. You're a good man.I drained the flask, sat there, in no hurry to start the car again. -How was the night-life of Llandudno?Mike laughed. -Like the night-life of Rhyl, or Prestatyn, or any other North-fucking-Welsh seaside town. Only quieter.-Sunny Prestatyn!-Yeah, Sunny Prestatyn!-And did your tuberous cock and balls find some local beauty to sit astride them?Mike laughed again. -Christ, have you ever known me to go out cruising and not end up in some snug harbour or other?-Could have landed in dry-dock?-Not the most unctuous haven I've known, but it served the purpose.-Any port in a storm?-Any port in a storm.We were silent a moment. -You were really smashed last night, Rick. When I came back you were dead to the world. Lying there on the outside of the bed, boy-naked as a peeled shrimp, clutching your best-friend for grim death. Hadn't even made it under the covers. Never stirred the whole time I was getting ready for bed.- He grinned. -Couldn't just leave you like that. Looking so frail and vulnerable. Didn't want to disturb you though. Just took a spare sheet from the wardrobe and threw it on top of you. Passed out like a light myself as soon as I hit the pillow.-Thanks, Mike. Found the sheet over me when I woke. Couldn't even remember if I'd done it myself.-Done it yourself? Sure in hell had! Your belly looked like a rock-pool at low tide; smelled like a boy-scout's pyjamas.I laughed. -Don't have many secrets from you, do I Mike?-

-Why the hell should you. Or I you. Journalists uncover other peoples' secrets, don't have any of their own.-Right, Mike. No secrets between us, ever!-Right.We were silent again. -First confession: I'm going to ask to be taken off this assignment, as soon as we get back to London.Mike only stared. -Thought of ringing Harry last night, after we left them. When the old man asked us if we could come back again tomorrow. Then I thought: Why the hell not. One more interview won't kill me.-Christ, Rick. You're really taking this thing to heart.-What about you? Last night?-Last night?-At dinner. Your brother.Mike laughed. -That was last night.-You didn't have a brother?-Sure I had a brother. Davey. Best brother a lad could wish for. Killed when I was seventeen years old. Loved him more than anyone else in the world. But he's been dead for ten years.-You said you dreamed about him every night.-I did. I do. I look forward to our times together. But you can't mourn forever. He died the way he wanted to die. On his beloved motorcycle. I get on with my life now. Let him get on with his death.-But last night...-I was drunk last night. We were both drunk last night.I couldn't greatly disagree with him. Mike was concerned. -You look like hell today, Rick.I laughed. -You don't look too hot yourself.-I know. But this thing's praying on your mind. Yesterday I seemed to be doing all the interviewing. You just sat there beside me like a stunned nun. You're the writer, Rick! I'm just your sidekick. Remember me? Mike Sorrel. Two-bit cunt of a press photographer.I blushed. -I'm sorry, Mike.-Nah, you're right. I'm not fit to lick Don McCullin's arse-hole.-I never said that.-No. I said it. I know what I am.-I was drunk last night. We were both drunk last night. Remember?Mike grinned. -Sure. I remember. Drunk and tired and fed up. Let's forget last night. Agreed?-Agreed!-

We shook on it. -Maybe it won't be so bad today.Mike's naiveté made me laugh. -Maybe it'll be worse.-Worse! Christ, Rick, we've had Adam Leslie Betts fried, boiled, scrambled and poached. They can only serve him up to us on toast now. Or with black pudding. However they present him, it can't be any worse.I still couldn't greatly disagree. -That's a comfort: Jove send me more such afternoons as this!We were silent. -I'm serious, Mike. About opting out. When we get back to London I'm going to ask Harry to put someone else on this job.-Don't blame you, Rick. Not one little bit.-Two days ago, when I was in Branch's office, I thought he was taking it a bit hard. But I couldn't have foreseen the Betts then.Mike grinned. -How could anyone foresee the Betts?-They're so bloody nice. Like their dead son. There doesn't seem to be a crack in their facade.Mike looked at me reprovingly. -Watch it, Rick. The sin against the Holy Spirit. Remember! They are nice. Really nice. That's the terrible part about it.-I know Mike. That's why I'm opting out. If I do go on, and everything is just as it seems, I'm frightened how I might end up thinking about God. And if everything is not as it seems, I'm frightened how I might end up thinking about myself. Either way I can't win.-No one wins, Rick. The most we can hope for is to come out even.-And what if I end up in the red?-You end up in the red. That's a risk we all take when we invest even a modicum of ourselves in what we are doing.-That's fine, Mike, so long as the selves we are gambling with are big enough to sustain the losses. But what if we find even a modicum leaves us totally bankrupt?Mike smiled wryly. -Then we blow our brains out, I suppose.-That's what I like about you, Mike. You're so bloody reassuring.Mike laughed. -Or soap the rope well, like Strovogin.-Damn psychologist!- I said, and put the car into gear.

Again we stood, Mike and I, in the small leafy suburban street, before the same house-door with its small coloured enamel wildflower plaque, as if re-dreaming a dream from which we were both trying to wake. -O dulci iucunda puero, iucunda parenti, salve, teque bona Iuppiter auctet ope, ianua,- I whispered out of the corner of my mouth. Mike gave me a dirty look, but said nothing. The sound of footsteps made us both face the door solemnly. Mr Betts opened the door, breaking for us the unnerving nightmarish quality of exact repetition. -Hello, boys. Nice to see you both again.He shook hands with us vigorously, too vigorously. -Nice to see you, Mr Betts.Tweedledum and Tweedledee answered almost in unison. -Come in, boys, come in. You don't mind my calling you boys?We both shook our heads silently. -Good. Good. Helen is waiting for you in the lounge room.He ushered us both down the hall. Mrs Betts rose from her chair to meet us as we came in. -Mr Lustrum. Mr Sorrel. So kind of you to come back. I'm sorry about yesterday. Sending you both away like that. Things just seemed to get on top of me. I'm much better today.We shook hands. I noticed the Welsh cakes were already on the table. -Sit down, boys. Sit down.- Mr Betts positively boomed. -Just leave all your equipment on the floor beside the couch. It'll be fine there.Mike and I obeyed. -Now you'll want a whisky first, right?We both nodded. Mr Betts in his exuberance was almost more unsettling than he had been yesterday. Mr Betts poured. Mrs Betts brought the drinks over to us. Mike made a pre-emptive strike, standing, raising his glass. -To Adam.-To Adam.- Mrs Betts was vivacious, almost girlish. We touched glasses and drank.

Only then did I realise that the room was brilliantly lit, the curtains wide, the sun pouring in. Mrs Betts saw me looking around. -We thought you'd need plenty of light today, Mr Lustrum. For Mr Sorrel's photographs.-Thanks, Mrs Betts.-Sit down again, boys. Make yourselves comfortable. No standing on ceremony in this house.Mr Betts seemed almost to be convincing himself. -And no more of this Mr Betts and Mrs Betts. From now on it's Helen and John. And I'm sure you won't mind if we call you Roderick and Michael.Roderick and Michael didn't mind. When we were all seated, Mrs Betts leaned forward in her chair. -I must apologise again, gentlemen, for putting you both to so much trouble. I hope it wasn't too difficult, arranging to stay in Wales an extra day.-Not at all.- I seemed to have found my voice. -A phone call to London and it was all settled. Luckily Mike and I had nothing we urgently needed to get back for.-But all the fuss and bother of finding an hotel. And the expense.Mike laughed. -The Herald pays all the bills. We just lie back and enjoy it.-I told them last night, Helen, that they'd be better off driving to Llandudno or Rhyl. To find an hotel. There isn't much in Colwyn Bay for a Londoner- Mr Betts looked over at me. -I hope you found something to your satisfaction, Roderick.-Sure. Just fine. A very comfortable night and a very nice dinner.Mr Betts was pleased. -Llandudno or Rhyl?-Llandudno.Mrs Betts smiled at this. -Oh. I'm so glad. Llandudno is much nicer than Rhyl. Much quieter. Not so commercialised. Charles Dodgson used to go there, you know. Loved walking on the beach with little Alice Liddell.-Did he?- Mike looked blank. -Lewis Carroll? And Alice?Mike grinned. -Oh yes. I remember.-I suppose you didn't have much time to look around.-Hardly any at all, Mrs Betts.Mr Betts interrupted him. -Helen. Remember Michael?Mike's grin broadened. -Sure John. Helen.Mrs Betts was almost girlish again. -Thank you, Michael. But you and Roderick look a bit drawn today. I hope you slept well.Mike and I dared not look at one another. -Not too bad, Helen.- I could almost sense the rising colour in Mike's voice. -You know. An hotel room. A strange bed. All this unaccustomed sea air. Takes a while to settle in.-

I nearly choked on my drink, but managed to control myself. Mrs Betts turned to me. -What about you, Roderick? Did you sleep well?-Some. Not all that much. Mike was a bit restless. Twin beds. Only room the hotel had left. A late cancellation.Mrs Betts made a tutting sound. -What a shame. Two grown men having to share.-Not a bit of it.- Mike seemed to be enjoying himself. -Wasn't the first time. We're old chums. I keep an eye on Rick. Make sure he doesn't get into trouble. Tuck him in at night.I felt Mike's eyes on me, felt my own colour begin to rise. I decided to play him at his own game. -Don't you believe a word of it, Mrs... Sorry, â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Helen. Mike's the one who has to be watched. Wouldn't settle down last night until he'd gone out and got something to help him sleep.Mike, though, wasn't going to let me have it all my own way. -It's true, Helen. Rick here's the lucky one. Seems to have his own in-built sleep mechanism. Despite what he says. Anytime, anywhere. Like the cord on a bathroom switch. He just pulls it and he's out like a light.Mrs Betts turned to me. -What a gift, Roderick. To be able to sleep, just like that.I wasn't going to let Mike get on top. -Mike exaggerates. It isn't always that easy. Sometimes I have to resort to all sorts of tricks.-Like counting sheep?- Mike chimed in. I knew that if my eyes met Mike's we were lost. -Adam was the same. Until about a year ago. Then suddenly he started to read until all hours of the night.I sensed, rather than heard, Mr Betts groan. Mike and I looked at each other. Our fragile house of cards fluttered silently to the ground. We stared down at its ruin. Mr Betts made a half-hearted effort to build a new one. -I suppose you boys won't get much of a chance to look around Colwyn Bay, either, before you go?-No.- I spoke. -We have to head straight back to London.Mrs Betts attempted to rally. -What a shame. Not to go up to the Zoo. While you're here. There's such a beautiful view from there. And the animals. We've got a wonderful collection of birds of prey. One of the best in the world.Mike saw the futility of all pretence. -That must have been great for Adam when he was growing up. Wish I'd had something like that when I was a lad.Mrs Betts was radiant. -Yes, it was, Michael. He loved it. Was up there all the time.-

Then there was silence. I didn't know about Mike. Or Helen. Or John. But I for one had had enough. Hic finis rapto. quin tu iam vulnera sedas et tollis mersum lucta caput? I stood up. -I'm sorry. We have to drive back to London this afternoon. We really should get started.-I'm sorry, Mr Lustrum. Roderick.- She smiled, although there was hurt in her eyes. -I will talk on and on. So thoughtless of me. We've been such a nuisance to you both already.Mike was standing beside me, giving me a hard look. -Not at all. That's what we're here for. To hear you talk about Adam to your heart's content.I turned away to hide the tears that had suddenly come to my eyes. On the mantelpiece Adam Leslie Betts smiled reprovingly at me from his silver frame. ignosce, puer: tu me caligine maesta obruis. Face still averted from them I turned to Mike, not risking speech, letting my eyes say it all. Mike picked up his equipment from the floor. -Come on, Helen, John. I'd like a photo of you both, at the mantelpiece, standing, one each side, looking at his photo.I stood at the window, staring out at the car parked in the drive, while Mike busied himself with the Betts. By the time he had composed his picture, I had composed mine. I turned back to the room to speak. -Right. How about one at the front door. I'd like to get that little wildflower enamel plaque in somehow. It adds a nice homely touch.Mike, snapping away, was every inch the professional. Then Mrs Betts had an idea. -Why don't you boys come up to his room. It's just as he left it. I'd like you to see it, before we change anything. You could take a few photos. I'm sure your readers would be interested.Mr Betts wouldn't come. -I think I'll stay down here, Helen. Not as young as I was. The stairs, you know, boys. Helen can show you around.We followed her up the narrow staircase with its cream-painted wooden banisters, along the dim upstairs hall, and stopped before a low door. -This is Adam's room.- She laughed, remembering. -These last two years he's had to duck to get in. He seems to have just sprung up. We've been thinking we'd have to find him a new room, now that he's getting so big.Mike and I exchanged glances. Mrs Betts, however, scarcely hesitating, opened the door and ushered us both in. -Watch your heads, boys.We straightened up in the room. A small room, brightly white, one wall slanting in with the angle of the roof of the house, a small window high in the wall, a plain pine bed in one corner, a desk, a wardrobe, a bedside table, things

scattered about, a pair of socks hanging over a chair, a pair of black jeans lying on the floor, a typical room, the room of a fifteen-year-old boy. Mrs Betts stood behind us. -Pardon the mess, but you know what boys are like.- She laughed. -It's not all that long since you were boys yourself.Mike and I said nothing. -The police had a look around. But they didn't take anything away. I suppose they didn't see any point. Inspector Branch was very kind. He said he had a boy just the same age as our Adam. Everybody has been so kind and helpful. I don't know how we'd have managed if everyone hadn't been so kind.Mike went over to the window, looked out. -I bet Adam loved having a view of the sea from his window. You feel you can almost see the Isle of Man. If it wasn't for the houses in between.Mrs Betts had joined him. -It's not a wonderful prospect. But at least it â&#x20AC;&#x2039;is â&#x20AC;&#x2039;the sea.I, too, went across. Beyond the leafy suburban streets and the tiled roofs of the houses, a stretch of blue sparkling sea caught the sun. I turned back to the room. Everything was just right: The picture of Tom Cruise, grinning, pinned to the wall with four thumbtacks beside the Renaissance Old Master; the volumes of Poe and Borges and Swift side by side with the cheap comic-books; the Mozart and Beethoven CDs interleaved with the Spice Girls and Ricky Martin; the whole room spoke of that extraordinary blend of innocence and sophistication which can never be repeated, effortlessly, once one is out of one's early teens. Mrs Betts, leaving the window, had observed my scrutiny. -You know what they're like at that age, Mr Lustrum.- She paused, laughed. -I mean Roderick. Poe is the latest craze. Last year it was Stephen King.I picked up a CD. -He bought that after seeing Elvira Madigan one night on television. It's such a lovely piece of music, don't you think?Tom Cruise smiled winningly at me. -He loved Tom Cruise. Top Gun was his favourite film. He saw it one Saturday, two or three years ago, although it was far from new even then, and insisted John and I come along to see it too. It wasn't really our type of film. But we seemed to enjoy it because he enjoyed it so much. It's funny how you can really enjoy something, something you'd never even bother to look at in the normal course of events, because someone you love is enjoying it beside you, willing you to enjoy it as much as they do. You don't even have to pretend. You honestly do enjoy it.I took out a volume of Poe. -Not that though!- She laughed. -I never could share his enthusiasm for Poe. Much too grisly.I leafed through it. -The same old Collins' Classic edition I had when I was his age.She laughed again.

-There you are. You boys are all the same. I don't know what you see in such things.I laughed too. -I don't now, either. But at fifteen I suppose such horrors are far enough away...My voice trailed off. I cursed myself inwardly for allowing it to trail off, for my lack of presence of mind. But it was too late to go back. I blundered on blindly. -And Borges too! I never got on to Borges that young.Mrs Betts saw my distress, smoothed it over in her own determination not to lose the high ground she had managed to achieve after yesterday's drop. -I'm afraid Mr Borges is still too deep for me.We both laughed, aware of the danger averted. Mike had picked up a picture from the bedside table. -Look at this, Rick. This would be great for the paper.Two boys, bare chested, wearing only swimsuits, their arms around each other's shoulders, standing, apparently on the beach, with a curious rock-formation behind them, the blue water sparkling in the distance, both laughing, totally naturally, as if at some shared joke, posing for the snapshot yet caught off guard, as it were, by the skill or luck of the photographer's eye. One of them quite clearly was Adam Leslie Betts. Mike turned to Mrs Betts. -The Gower, if I'm not mistaken?Mrs Betts' laughter evaporated, a sudden cloud masking the sun. -Yes. The Gower.Mike hadn't, or wasn't, going to notice. -I'd recognise it anywhere. Something about the rocks. And the light.-Yes. It is beautiful.I decided to risk a tentative step. -Who's the other boy?Mrs Betts was unsmiling but brave. -He was Adam's best friend. They went to school together. About three years ago the family moved to the Gower. To be near Port Talbot. The father works there now. Adam was heartbroken. He used to get down whenever he could to spend a few days. Or Daniel would come up here and share Adam's room.Mike was admiring it. -It's a great photo. So natural. Look fine in print. Do you mind if we use it?-No. Of course not.tractas et incedis per ignes, I thought, suppositos cineri doloso. But I went ahead just the same. -What about Daniel? Do you think his parents would allow us to interview him? If it wouldn't upset him too much?Mrs Betts face was white. -I'm sorry, but that's quite impossible, Mr Lustrum.Suddenly the Roderick was gone.

Mike and I exchanged glances. I felt the fires moving beneath my feet, under my skin. Mrs Betts' voice, though, was tempered steel. -Last summer Daniel was drowned.-

Mike and I hardly exchanged a word until we were back on the motorway and heading for London. -Christ.- I said softly. -Christ.- Mike answered. Then we fell again into a long silence. Mike at last broke it. -That poor fucking couple. My heart goes out to them. But what can we do?-What can anyone do? orbique parentes coniungunt gemitus!Again the silence overwhelmed us. The motorway lights were coming on, threading a long string of amber beads into the distance. Mike spoke again. -A quarter of a million bloody pounds!-Yes.- I said. -That's a lot of money. By any standards.-Well, almost by any standards.-By our standards.- Mike laughed. -Yes- I said. -By ours. But why?-Why?-Why are they so intent on offering it?-You heard the old boy talking?-Yes. I know.- I pondered. -But I tend to try to read between the lines.-Read between the lines hell! What lines are there to read between? Their poor little Adam gets murdered on a trip to London. They don't want the same thing to happen to some other boy who comes down for the weekend. They've got loads of money, with nothing to spend it on now. Why not offer a whopping big reward? They hope that no other parents will ever have to suffer the same agonies they have been suffering over the past few days. What could be more natural. And unselfish.-I don't know. But don't you find them a little too good to be true?-Why the fucking hell should I? They're not good or true. Just bloody heartbroken. Neither of them seems to be raging for revenge. They just don't want other couples to go through what they've been going through. And they've got nothing else to do with their money.-You're probably right.Mike waved his finger at me.

-Remember, Rick! The sin against the Holy Spirit! Always give everyone the benefit of the doubt. They're nice. I'm nice. You're nice.-I'm a bastard.Mike laughed. -So am I. But we're nice bastards.Again we lapsed into silence. I glanced over at Mike, who was intent upon examining the photo of the two boys. -What do you make of Adam and Daniel?-Make?- He looked over at me. -I don't make anything of them. I'm just seeing what we can make of this photo.-You don't find it odd?-What odd?-The two of them, dying within a year of each other? And both in such tragic circumstances?-How odd?-I don't know. Something's being gnawing away at the back of my mind ever since we first went into his room. But I can't seem to get it into focus.Mike laughed. -Don't try too hard. Whatever it is will have its work cut out finding something worthwhile to gnaw upon.I laughed too. -Thus speaks the Eternal Photographer. Anything fuzzy or a little out of focus is instantly rejected.-Whereas the great Eternal Investigative Journalist knows that behind every suburban facade at least a dozen family skeletons are waiting at the closet door for him to release them.-And for his photographer to snap them as they come clattering out.-Well, we both have an open invitation from Helen and John. Whenever we're in Colwyn Bay. They've got a spare room now, you know. Perchance, in the dead vast and middle of the night, Adam Lesley will walk again. A word to the wise from him and we'd know where we are.-Perchance Daniel too, dripping with seaweed, like Coward in The Scoundrel.We both were laughing, like two medical students faced with their first cadaver at an anatomy lesson, having to laugh to mask their fear and outrage. -You know, Rick, I think Helen has her eye on you. Noticed her sidelong glances. Perhaps a surrogate son to replace Adam Leslie. Or perhaps something more. Poor old John isn't as young as he used to be. Perchance the ghost would turn out to be only too real.I glanced over at Mike. From the photo in his lap, out of the half-darkness, Adam Leslie Betts' smile seemed to reproach us. Our laughter had already turned to ashes in my mouth, as I felt it had for Mike also. -Christ Almighty!- I said. -We've been newspapermen too long.-Or not long enough.We were silent again. The motorway lights were growing brighter as the darkness increased. -Mike?- I eventually spoke. -Do you think that they saw my tears?-

-What the fuck if they did? You should be proud of those tears. Those tears would have meant more to them than all our bloody words.-Yes. No doubt. But thanks, all the same, for covering for me.-OK, Rick. Any time.Suddenly the motorway lights were blurring. sed cur heu, Adam Lesley, cur manat rara meas lacrima per genas? -Right, Rick. Pull over at the next lay-by. I'll drive the rest of the way into London.-No. I'm fine, Mike.-If I didn't know you better, I'd say you were heading for some sort of breakdown.-No. I'll be right when we get back to London. These two days in Wales seemed to have unmanned me. I always go to pieces north of the Watford Gap.nonne gemam te, care puer? -OK, Rick. Have it your own way. But I always planned to die covering some puny war, not in a motorway pile-up.o nimium felix, nimium crudelis et expers imperii, Fortuna, tui, qui dicere legem fletibus aut fines audet censere dolendi! We didn't speak again until we had reached the outskirts of London. Again Mike broke the silence. -Rick? You know what we were talking about earlier? About ending up in the red?-Yes.-You're putting too damn much of yourself into this. You know that.-Yes. I know.-You're still going to ask Harry to release you?-Yes. I guess so.-You â&#x20AC;&#x2039;guess â&#x20AC;&#x2039;so?-Yes then. I am.-You don't sound too sure?-I am sure. Yes.There was another long silence before Mike spoke again. -Because we're not all Verkhovenskies, you know. Some of us, the best of us, the better parts of us at least, are more like Strovogin. And I don't want to see you dangling at the end of a rope. Right, Rick? I love you too much for that.-

Anne was standing in the sunshine, her back towards me, looking westward along Piccadilly, her hair a nimbus of gold, the failed surgeon's sexless Love-god poised on the ball of one foot behind her, aiming his ineffectual arrow. I came up from behind, gruffening my voice. -Sorry, Miss. I'll have to ask you to move along. No soliciting in the Circus, I'm afraid.Anne swung around, laughing, threw herself into my arms. -Ricky. I didn't know I could miss you so much in only two days.I put on my best Ralph Fiennes voice: -Can you still taste me in your mouth? Smell me on your skin?She played it straight: -That's what kept me going. Otherwise I'd have been dead when you got back.I held her at arm's length: -You haven't changed a bit. Apart from those few spots of decay which your make-up so cleverly hides.We both laughed. I pointed up to Eros. -â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Sed tamen, nymphae, cavete, quod Cupido pulcher est:She smiled up at me. -You're not looking so bad yourself, Rick, apart from the bloodshot eyes and the dark rings under them.-What do you expect, after two days of debauchery in the fleshpots of Colwyn Bay?-I've heard it called the Casaba of the West, but I always thought the reports were exaggerated.-Believe every word of it.- I solemnly intoned. She kissed me on the cheek. -Never mind. Solveig's been waiting for you.-Has she?- I mockingly knitted my brows. -Of course, darling.I tried out my prosecuting attorney: -Cast your memory back, Miss Gregory. Where were you at one-fifteen a.m. yesterday morning?She held her hand to her mouth in stage-horror: -All right. You want the truth? You shall have it. I could try a lie. I could say I was spending the night with my sister. I could say I was baby-sitting. But you'd only worm it out of me in the end. Damn you! Damn you!-Now, now, Miss Dietrich, your disguise doesn't fool me one little bit. Out with it!-All right. What do you want to know?-My client, Mr Lustrum, tried to ring you at one-fifteen a.m. yesterday morning from Colwyn Bay. You did not answer the phone. Where were you?-You know that old guy? At The Playhouse?-

I looked blank. -What old guy?-The one who spoke to us? At interval?Memory dawned. -Oh yes.-Well, luckily I had his phone number. And the Japanese couple's. When I knew that Rick, Mr Lustrum, was going to be away overnight, I called them up. You know I can't do without it, even for one night! When the phone rang the Japanese couple were showing us the latest Tokyo techniques for four people. By the time I got myself untangled the phone had stopped ringing.-Mr Lustrum tried to ring you four times.-You haven't seen the latest Tokyo techniques.We both laughed, feeling the joke had gone on long enough. -Poor Ricky. You must have been so lonely. To ring me at that time of night.-I was drunk. In North Wales. And alone. Mike had gone out looking for local talent. I just wanted to talk to you.I was beginning to feel sorry for myself. She stroked my cheek tenderly. -Poor, poor Ricky. I'm sorry I wasn't there. If I had been, I'd have seen to it you wouldn't have felt so lonely, even over the telephone.I laughed. -Easy, Anne. I don't want a stiff one right through lunch!She smiled up at me, all innocence. -Why not? At least Marco-Pierre has long white tablecloths.-All right then. What are we waiting for!After the brightness of the day the interior of the Criterion seemed dark and cool. The head waiter came up, shook hands. -Nice to see you again, Mr Lustrum. It's been quite a while.-Too long. Nice to be back.-I think we've got your old table. Right up at the back.We made our route-march through the plush Victorian splendours. -Something to drink first?I looked over at Anne. She smiled assent. -Two champagne cocktails.-Classique?-Classique.After the waiter had gone Anne queried me. -Celebration?-Yes.-What, if I may ask?-Sure. Getting back to London.She laughed. -Rick. You're incorrigible.-

-Yes. And grateful to have left Colwyn Bay.-Was it very bad?-Yes. Very bad.Anne was full of sympathy. -Poor Ricky. Do you want to talk about it?-Don't mind. Now I'm safe with Solveig again.She took my hand where it lay on the table. -I've been thinking about you and Mike. There's been so much in the papers and on television. He was such a nice looking boy. And his poor mother.-She made old Maurya look like Pollyanna.Anne laughed. -You know I played old Maurya when I was at college. Steel wool wig and all.- She crossed her hands over her chest, lapsed into dialect: -They're all gone now, and there isn't anything more the sea can do to me... I'll have no call now to be up crying and praying when the wind breaks from the south, and you can hear the surf is in the east, and the surf is in the west, making a great stir with the two noises, and them hitting one on the other.- She looked over at me, stopped. -I'm sorry, Rick. That look in your eyes again.-It's OK. It's just that poor little Adam Lesley's best friend got drowned last summer at The Gower.-Oh Rick. How awful. I didn't know.I attempted to throw off that look in my eyes. -How could you.- I smiled at her. -That's what makes me love you so much; what I love so much about you : Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!The champagne cocktails arrived. -Are you ready to order now, sir?I queried Anne with my eyes. -You order for me, Rick.I glanced down the menu. -We'll have the velouté. The one with the whole egg in it. And...- I looked over at Anne. -You're not a follower of Artemis, I hope?Anne shook her head. -Aphrodite's more my scene.-Right. And the guinea-fowl.-I'll send the sommelier right over, sir.We clicked our champagne glasses. -To Adam Leslie Betts.- Anne got in before me. -And his parents. And his poor little drowned friend.-Daniel.- I said. -Daniel.-And to us.-To us.We drank.

The sommelier was at my shoulder. -Sir?-What would you recommend with the guinea-fowl?-With the guinea-fowl? There's rather a rich sauce. Perhaps a full-bodied red. We have some excellent New World reds. A South African or a Chilean?I held up both hands. -No. Not a New World wine, I think. The rejuvenating approach of the barbarians. Something from the Old World. From France.-They are very good.-Yes. No doubt. But not today.He looked down the list. -A Côtes du Ventoux, perhaps? 1995?I saw the name Paul Jaboulet AÎné. -Right. That will be fine.When he had gone I looked over at Anne. -These dear old French wines dont les plaques de fard ont plus de charme sur moi que l'incarnat de la jeunesse.-Couldn't agree more.She put her elbows on the table, graceful as a femme du monde. -When did you get back?-Late last night.-Been to the office yet this morning?-Called in on the way here. There was a fax from Branch asking me to go over and see him later this afternoon.- I hesitated. -But I don't know.-Don't know?-I'm thinking of asking Harry to take me off the assignment.Anne beamed. -Great. I like my old Ricky just the way he was. Not this new supercharged melancholy death-haunted model.-I'll drink to that.- I said. We drained our champagne cocktails. After the meal, while we were drinking coffee, I decided to return to the subject. -I haven't quite made up my mind yet.Anne was puzzled. -Made up your mind?-About keeping on with this story.Her face dropped. -You mean I'm going to have to get used to the new Ricky?-Harry doesn't like chopping and changing once he's got a man on a job. It might not do my career one little bit of good.Anne grimaced. -Fuck your career. You're more important than your career.-

-Mike thinks the same as you do. He thinks I'm heading for a breakdown.-There you are. Trust Mike. He knows what's best for you.-He thinks it's getting on top of me.-He's right. It is.I hesitated, before bringing it out. -I know you're both right. But I'm hooked.-Hooked?-Yes. And wriggling on the end of the line.-But why, Ricky?-I don't know. This thing's got deep under my skin. It hurts, but I'm afraid that if I try to pull it out, something important might come away with it.-But if you don't pull it out, not to mix a metaphor, might you not end up gasping on the sand?-That is a risk.-We'll, is it worth it?-I don't know.- I paused. -I don't like starting out on a thing, getting so far with it, and then giving it up. Even if I don't know where I'll come out. If Dante hadn't faced his Inferno, who knows...She interrupted me. -And you expect me to be your Beatrice?I smiled at her. -Exactly.-And Mike Virgil no doubt?-I hadn't thought of that.She leaned forward on both elbows. -You don't think you ask an awful lot of your friends?My grin broadened. -Of course. That's what friends are for.She mused. -I can see myself as Solveig, perhaps. But Beatrice?-Aren't they much the same?-I hadn't thought of that.-There you are. See the new vistas opening out for both of us already. And I've hardly scratched the surface yet.She looked into my eyes. -Rick, can't we ever be serious about anything?-I'm serious. I can't speak for you.-But why, Ricky? Why this particular story?-I don't know. I can't explain it. Something happened when I went into his room yesterday morning.-What happened?-I don't know. I told you I couldn't explain it.-Try.-

-The books he had: Poe. Borges. The CDs. The socks hanging over the back of the chair. Even the old pair of black jeans lying on the floor. Everything seemed to be waiting there for me to come into the room and find it.-You don't think that you have an overactive imagination?-Of course I do. That's what imaginations are for.-It sounds to me very much like the room of any fifteen-year-old boy.-It was. Exactly. Typical. Except for the photo of Tom Cruise it could have been my own room when I was that age.-Only you, no doubt, would have had a pinup of Samantha Fox.I feigned puzzlement. -Samantha who? Oh yes. Andy Warhol was right about one thing, at any rate.-Well? What was so special about the room?-Nothing. Absolutely nothing. That what makes it so interesting.Anne smiled indulgently. -Ricky, I sometimes think you missed your true vocation in life. You should have been a metaphysician.-Or an absurdist playwright.Anne laughed. -I suppose they're much the same thing.I stared into her eyes, mimicking her voice: -Rick, can't we ever be serious about anything?But she was good enough for me: -Easy, Anne. I don't want a stiff one right through lunch!I surrendered. -Touché. No more flippant remarks. From now on everything will be in deadly earnest.We looked into each other's eyes, burst out laughing. -What a way to talk about poor old Papa Hemingway.-I wasn't.- I said. -I was talking about poor old Mama Wilde.-Enough!- Anne drew back from our decline into total nonsense. -If we can't say anything sensible, better not say anything at all.We sat there silently, trying not to smile. -All right.- I at last broke the Trappist peace. -Shall I call for the bill?-I think I'd like another coffee first, please. This class of restaurant always serves coffee in such tiny cups.During our second coffee, I went back like a dog to my sick. -When I got home last night, I tried to find my old Poe.Anne nearly choked on her coffee. -Serious, remember?- I admonished her. -I'm sorry. I just thought about how Baudelaire's friends used always to tell him he was spending too much time on the Poe.I ignored this. -I tried to find my old copy of the works of Edgar Allen Poe. Right?-

-Right.- She was all serious attention. -Couldn't. Think I must have given it away. Remember, four or five years back, when I did the flat out, I got rid of a whole lot of books that were cluttering the place up. Things I thought I'd never want to read again.-Yes. I remember. That funny old book-dealer came in and offered you a lump sum for them. I told you then that you'd probably regret it afterwards. Knowing your intense and intimate relationship with books.-The flat just wasn't big enough.-I know.- She paused. -But why do you want to read Poe again?I surprised myself by blushing. -I don't know. I think I was trying to think myself back to how I thought at fifteen. Trying to remember how Poe affected me at that age. But it's so hard. The skin you wore that long ago just isn't a comfortable fit. You've grown out of it, like a suit of clothes. It's not you any more. Or it's a very different you. In literature most authors who attempt it sentimentalise it, one way or the other. It's usually a dismal failure.-Wouldn't Borges do?-Do?-Instead of Poe? You've probably kept your Borges.-Yes.- I laughed. -Swift too. He had Swift too. That's not the point. I could pick up a copy of Poe anywhere. It's feeling under your fingers the same pages you leafed through when you were fifteen. It's being fifteen again.Anne laughed. -I wouldn't try too hard, Rick. You were probably a horrible snotty-nosed little fellow with your shirttails hanging out and your face erupting in angry red pustules from the havoc testosterone was playing with your system.-Plus ça change.- I agreed. -Only the angry red pustules have been changed to protect the innocent.-I'd have still loved you, Rick. Even with the pustules. Even if you dipped my plaits in the inkwell.-Careful, Anne. You seem to be regressing even faster than I am.- I went into Viennese, fingertips touching: -Tell me, Miss Gregory, did you start hating your mother when she first refused you the breast? Or does it go back even earlier?-I don't know, Doctor. Perhaps it was when I discovered the things she was doing with my father.-Serious, remember?- I reminded her again. -Right. Serious Rick.- She paused. -But what has all this got to do with you staying on the story?-Nothing.- I laughed. -We do seem to have come rather a long way, don't we?-Rather.We were silent while a waitress cleared away our cups. -By the way, old Betts is offering a quarter of a million reward.Anne sat forward.

-A quarter of a million! I didn't see that in the papers or hear about it on television.-No. Branch's idea. We're building the story for a few days, getting the public well and truly worked up, then the heartbroken father is going to offer the reward, through our paper. He's a Herald reader, you know.-Wow. A quarter of a million. Fancy having that much money and living at Colwyn Bay.-I thought you didn't know Colwyn Bay?-I don't. But from what you've said I didn't suppose Michelin had awarded it three stars.-No.- I laughed. -But they seem to like it. The Betts, I mean. And they don't have anything else to spend their money on now.-The poor dears. Were they nice?-Yes. Very nice.-And very heartbroken?-Yes. Very, very heartbroken.We both were silent. -Ricky.- Suddenly Anne was animated. -Think what we could do with a quarter of a million?I thought. -Yes.- I said. -Stay at the Crillon instead of the Que Voltaire. A week in Venice, any time we wanted. The Gritti. Quadri's.-Yes.- I said. -It'd almost be like winning the lottery.-Yes.- I said. -The public doesn't even know about it yet. So we've got a head start.-We?-You and I. You.-Me?-Yes. You. If anyone could get a lead, you could. With your connections. You know more about crime in London than most of us will learn in a lifetime.I laughed. -Hang on a minute, Anne. This is a case of murder. Violent, perverted murder. We're dealing with a dangerous maniac. It's not a party-game. I don't have to spell out to you how I might end up.Anne laughed. -You can look after yourself, Ricky. All my sympathy would be with the violent perverted murderer who came across you.-Just a minute. I thought you preferred your old Ricky the way he was. That you didn't like the new model.-It's only for a bit.- She smiled sweetly at me. -I can take your supercharged melancholy for a bit. As long as I'm sure the old Ricky I know and love is waiting for me when it's all over.-Not ten minutes ago you were agreeing with Mike. That this thing was getting the better of me.-I know. But how often have I got the better of you. You always seem to come out on top in the end.-

-But what if the me that comes out on top isn't the old Ricky; is as different from the old Ricky as this new supercharged model appears to you to be?-That's a risk I'll have to take.-You'll have to take?-We'll both have to take.Suddenly she reached across the table and held both my hands. -You know how much I love you, Ricky?-Yes.- I said. -I know.-You know I'd rather die than let anyone hurt even a hair on your head?-Yes.- I said. -Well, if Nick and Nora Charles can do it, why can't we?-We seem to be able to equal them at drinking.- I laughed. -Why not at solving crimes?-Bravo!- She clapped her hands. -There's the old Ricky back already. What have we to lose? A cloud passed over my mind. -I don't know. Perhaps something we can't even conceive of.She took my hands again. -Ricky. Not ten minutes ago you were telling me that you intended to go on with this business. I was trying to dissuade you. Now the money question has come up, you want to withdraw. You really are a terrible old puritan! You wanted to continue, purely for your own satisfaction, just so long as you weren't getting anything out of it yourself.-Isn't that always the best way?-Sure. In a perfect world. But in this world, why not profit if it doesn't hurt anyone else?-Hurt?-You can't hurt him now. It would please his parents. It would probably delight old Branch. And it would make me very very happy.-I don't even know if an employee of the paper could claim the reward.-Fuck the paper. Get a new job.-But how can I find out, alone, what the entire metropolitan police force can't find out?-You probably can't. But you might.I looked at her hard. -I never thought of you as a Lady Macbeth or a Kate Croy figure.Suddenly she flared. -Kate Bottoms! Lady Macbum! I'm a tigress, fighting for her mate and for the cubs which, if he prospers, she hopes one day to bear him.Suddenly she was in tears. I squeezed both her hands, hard. -I love you very much.- I said.

-Come.I entered. Branch was sitting at his desk. When he saw me he stood up, came over, shook hands with that solid rocklike grip of his, not crushing the bones yet never for a moment yielding to any relaxation or show of softness. His smile, the hard blue of his eyes, were both somewhat mellower than at our last meeting. -How did it go?-Go?-The Welsh trip? The Betts?-You fucking know how it went, Branch, you bastard. You'd been through it all before me.He clasped my shoulders, smiled grimly. -Sorry, Rick. But what could I do? You're a good man. And strong. I fucking knew you could take it. Better you than some other bastard who'd have gone to pieces at the first hurdle.-If you'd seen me stumble at Beecher's and splash into the Water Jump, I wonder if you would have felt your faith so fully justified?Branch snorted. -Yes. But I knew I could rely on you to use the whip unsparingly and to dig your spurs just as unsparingly into those sleek thoroughbred flanks of yours.-Thanks. Now I'm winded and fucked out.Branch smiled. -Sure. But you finished the course.-Finished? Only the first time round.-Yes. But you passed the pain-threshold with flying colours.-I'm afraid they're still a little at half-mast.-We'll soon have them flapping in the sun!Branch let me go, went back behind his desk, gestured to me to sit down. -You got my fax?-Sure. What do you think I'm doing here. Coming around for a glimpse of your blue eyes?Branch smiled. -What else?I wasn't smiling. -You know I cursed you, Branch? Down there at Colwyn Bay? Cursed you in that gloomy little front parlour? Cursed you from the bottom of my heart?Branch put his arms on the desk, leaned towards me. -You're a newspaperman. I put a story in your way.-Sure. Thanks. But meeting the Betts has put a considerable dent in my hard-won Stoic fortitude.Branch grinned.

-Well, it's done some good then.-You bloody knew it would. That's why you sent me down there. All right. You win. You were right. All my fucking Latin authors weren't one little bit of help.His grin broadened. -Not even Seneca?-Fuck Seneca. And Lucan. nequaquam parem animi constantiam praestitit.He actually laughed. -Christ, Rick. If I could only put a dent in your quoting your fucking Latin authors, then I would really have won.-The dent in my self-esteem isn't enough for you?-Your self-esteem needed a dent. But I don't think the damage goes that deep. I don't see you incriminating Acilia to save your own skin. But if you do ever feel like opening a vein, come round to me and I'll supply the warm bath.I laughed then too. -You old bugger! You hypocrite! You could quote me under the table!.-I leave Latin to the scholars. And to you. But once a Stonyhurst boy, always a Stonyhurst boy.-Once a Stonyhurst boy, always a Stonyhurst boy.We both were silent. I resurfaced first. -Well?-Well?-What did you want to see me about?-Yes.Branch was Inspector Branch again. -It beats me.He looked down at a folder on his desk. -What beats you?-The report. The pathologist's report.-What beats you?His blue eyes turned on me all their force. -It's only the first report. And you know how these things are written. But it seems they're convinced that the boy hadn't been interfered with, sexually.I could, as it were, but gape. Branch laughed. -I know. That's how I felt when I read it.-Not sexually interfered with? They're certain?-They're reasonably certain. His blood was as pure as a mountain stream. No sign of the HIV virus. Or of any other virus, for that matter. Not a trace of semen, either in the rectum or the throat or in any other likely orifice. Or unlikely one. The anus showed no signs of dilation or of forcible entry. There was a bowel movement in the lower intestine so solid it could have stopped a whole army of cinaedus. And there was enough cheese under his foreskin to have supplied half the pizza houses in London with mozzarella for a week.-

-I thought you said the body had been washed?-It had. But that's what they found when the foreskin was retracted. I defy even the most skilful fellator to suck him off and not get a mouthful of that.-Or even to masturbate him?-Right. It seems our Master Betts wouldn't have got a first for personal hygiene.-He hadn't wanked himself, then?-Not for the last couple of weeks. Or even bloody washed under it, for that matter.-I suppose at that age he was afraid of his own sexuality. Of sexual arousal.Branch laughed. -Arousal, hell! At that age you and bloody I were sexually aroused twenty-five hours a day, wanking nearly every time we pissed.-Every other time?-Right! So our Adam Leslie was either enormously self-controlled, enormously undersexed, or just enormously barmy.-Or religious?-Or enormously religious.We were silent again. -So what becomes of our motive?I ventured the query. -Christ knows. As I said, it beats me. Any ideas?-A boy of that age, good-looking, violently murdered, with no sexual motive, it doesn't make sense-No. It doesn't make sense.-And all that physical abuse?-Yes. There were one hundred and twenty-three bruises, cuts, scratches and marks on the body, ranging from a small graze on the left cheek to those two gashes at the back of the knees. Almost like it had been done in a frenzy. Yet, apart from minor abrasions, nothing on the genitals at all. Or the anus. Not the work of a sexual killer, I would say. Or if so, a very new kind of sexual killer.-And the cause of death?-Internal bleeding. Ruptured liver and spleen. Heart failure. Take your choice.-Christ, the poor little bugger.Inspector Branch corrected me. -Not buggered. But poor and little.-Yes. Poor and little.- I said. Silence again. -It might be some comfort to his parents.- I said. -Yes. If an even deeper mystery can ever be a comfort.-No Hannibal Lecter killing for flesh, or Buffalo Bill killing for skin, like in the movies?Branch laughed. -No. Not like in the movies.-Or exsecta uti medulla et aridum iecur amoris esset poculum, like in the Epodes?-

-No, not like in your damned Horace either.-So where do you go from here?-Christ knows. Some of my best men were already getting into their gay gear and setting out for Old Compton Street and Russell Square to do a little infiltrating. But now I'm not so sure.-But there must have been some sexual motive, even if we don't see it.Branch, if not quite so angry, was even more puzzled. -Your guess is as good as mine.-No other leads?-Nothing. Not a word. From any quarter.- He looked at me hard. -I hope your piece will rectify that somewhat.-Harry liked your idea. About springing the reward. We're holding that part of the story back until the weekend.-Good. That's when the crank calls will start coming in with a vengeance.-With a vengeance?-We've had a few. An anonymous man who told us, in loving detail, just what he'd done to the boy before he killed him. And a far from anonymous medium who said the boy had told her, from the other side, that his killers were three of the most prominent, and most prominently gay, members of our acting fraternity.-Christ, it certainly brings them out of the woodwork.-This kind of case always does.-But nothing useful?-Fuck all.We were silent. I held out my hand. Branch passed the report over to me. I looked through it quickly, the clinical terms and impersonal language inadequately masking the indignity poor Adam Leslie had had to suffer, even after death. -Christ.- I laid it back on the desk. -I suppose the sweepings will have to endure a lot more of this before they're finally released for burial?-Some. All the reports have to be in first. They won't leave a stone unturned.-We can use all of this?-As much as you damn well like. As much as the delicate sensibilities of your readers can take.-Fuck the readers! They can do without knowing every detail of his bowel motions and personal hygiene. I was thinking of the Betts.-Use what you like. You're the fucking journalist.-Yes. I'm the fucking journalist.-Well, fuck off and do your thing.At the door I turned back. -Aidan?Branch looked up at me, his blue eyes flashing friendship. -I've got a couple of spare seats for tomorrow's play at the Oval. Would you and Tom like to come along?Branch grinned.

-Christ, thanks Rick. Not a fucking hope in hell for me, I'm afraid. Sure Tom would be delighted, if he's got nothing on. You know what they're like at that age, during the holidays. Padding around the house like a caged lion. Give me a ring at home tonight, late, and I'll let you know if he's free. That is if the offer still stands, without me to chaperone you two.I laughed. -I'll keep an eye on him. And he can keep an eye on me; keep me out of mischief.-He'll have his work cut out!- Branch winked. -When was the last time you saw Tom?I thought. -Christmas.-Right. He's shot up since then. Almost as tall as you are.- He must have seen something in my face. -Rick, what is it?iam tamen et validi gressus mensuraque maior cultibus et visae puero decrescere vestes, -Nothing.- I said. -That's just the way Mrs Betts talked to me yesterday morning. About Adam Leslie.-Christ.- Branch snorted. -And the weather's so fine. Shame that â&#x20AC;&#x2039;he â&#x20AC;&#x2039;couldn't have used that spare ticket. Come along with Tom and me.-

The sky was vivid blue. Overhead a Good Year tourist balloon moved lazily but steadily across a cloudless expanse. -Good hit!- A voice, a slow handclap, expressed the general lack of enthusiasm of the spectators as a tardy four was hit from the last ball of what had been a dreary, slow and too careful over. Ends were changed. Beside me sat Tom, all bony elbows and knees; like a ten-week-old puppy, the cute stage passed, dogdom still ahead, now only awkwardness and angles. I leaned across to him. -Not the most exciting cricket I've seen.He shrugged, smiled wryly. -It's great just to be here.-Sorry your Dad couldn't make it.-Yeah. He's always so busy. Thanks for thinking of us, though. He asked me to thank you.Another slow over was getting underway. -He works too hard, you know. He should give himself a bit of a break.Tom threw his head back and laughed. -That's what he said about you.- His impersonation of his father was excellent, if exaggerated: -You tell Rick he's working too hard. He should give himself a break. Relax a bit.-Pretty good. Only I'm sure your father's advice wouldn't have been couched in such polite terms.Tom laughed again. -Expletives deleted.-Expletives deleted, of course.The bowler was having a long and fruitless argument with the umpire about a leg which they both knew was patently not before the wicket. Tom leaned across to my ear. -Perhaps Dad decided he shouldn't come. Thought the excitement might be too much for him.I grinned at him. -Wicked boy!He grinned back at me, a grin full of adolescent high-spirits and innocent malice. -Well, it is exciting, Rick! Wondering if the players or the spectators are going to doze off first.-I know football's your game. Aidan told me you were playing last Saturday.-Well, at least something's happening all the time.-Cricket has its finer points.Tom grinned again.

-To appeal to finer minds, like yours and Dads?He suddenly reddened, as if perhaps overstepping the mark. -When you get to our age, my boy!- I feigned bluff outrage. -Sorry, Rick. Only kidding.-Kidding nothing! You young whippersnappers! Think you know everything!I was enjoying watching him squirming, his blush deepening. -I'm really sorry, Rick.- He was all pathetic apology. I burst out laughing. -If you could see yourself, Tom. I was only kidding. You should know me well enough for that.The smile returned, broadening as the blush had done. -You're too good an actor, Rick. When Dad gets shirty with me, he's really shirty.-Your Dad's got a lot on his mind.Tom was serious suddenly. -I know. This Betts case has really got under his skin.-Under mine too.He looked at me, quizzing. A catch off a duff stroke brought the audience to its feet, our conversation to a close. We returned to the subject during lunch, sitting together on the benches, Tom with his shirt off now, munching a hot-dog washed down with an iced tin of coke, me with a sandwich and an equally chilled half-bottle of indifferent Chardonnay, not at its best from a plastic cup. -Gosh, Rick. I always thought you hard-boiled newspapermen and detectives were beyond all that.-Beyond all what?-Getting so involved with a case.-How much has your father told you about this Betts business?-Not much. He tries not to bring his work home with him. But I read the papers.- He grinned at me. -I read you!-But he hasn't talked about it?-He doesn't have to.Tom's eyes, like his father's, told it all. -Did you know he was there when the boy died? That he saw him dying?Tom's eyes widened. -Gosh. He never told me.-You, of all people, must know why it hits him so hard.Tom's eyes suddenly went dead. -Yes. I know.We were silent. -You know, Tom, how much your father loves you?-Yes. I know.- Suddenly there was anguish in his face. -I think he loves me too much, Rick. He expects too much of me.-That's Aidan, Tom. He expects too much of me. He expects too much of everyone.-

-But I'm his son, Rick. He expects too much of me twenty-four hours a day.- He paused. -It's hard to live up to his standards.I laughed. -I know. I'm having the same difficulty myself.-We're both in the same boat, then.- His grin said it all. -With Aidan to crack the whip if we shirk, even for a moment, from the rowing.Tom's face showed all the frankness of fifteen. -He's never hit me, Rick. Never once in all my life. But when he calls me in, when I've done something I shouldn't have, something about the way he looks, his eyes, makes me ashamed and sick and I know I could have done better, should have done better.I laughed. -I know just how you feel.But Tom couldn't see the joke. -I so want to please him, Rick. To be the man he wants me to be. But I don't seem cut out for it.-You're fifteen, Tom. Just be the lad you are. The man you're going to be will come along in his own good time. Too soon, believe me.Tom's all but disgusted grimace revealed to me the patronage of my tone. I laughed. -Sorry, Tom. I'm beginning to sound like an old duffer. It's not all that long ago I was fifteen myself.Tom looked up at me. -What was Dad like? At fifteen?I laughed again. -Very much like he is now, I would imagine. I never knew him till much later. He was seventeen. I was twelve. I looked up to him, like to an older brother. Still do, if the truth were told. He sort of took me under his wing. Took my part in a quarrel. Couldn't stand bullying, even then.-Were you bullied?-Some. A bit studious. A bit of a swat. Deserved it, no doubt. You know what boys are like.He grinned. -But Dad was more of a sportsman?-Captain of the first eleven. Captain of everything else.Tom giggled, as if at some private joke. -But you're still his best friend.-Once a Stonyhurst boy, always a Stonyhurst boy.Tom frowned. -Yet he never sent me there.-The Jesuit training takes us all differently.-He never goes near a church.-Not many of us do.-Yet he believes in God, I think.-Most of us do. Although some of us like to pretend sometimes that we don't.Tom looked at me hard.

-Do you, Rick?I pretended I didn't understand. -Do I what?-Believe in God?-God?Tom laughed. -Yes Rick. God. Do you believe in Him?-I'm one of the ones who like to pretend sometimes.Suddenly Tom was serious. -I don't know if I do or not.I laughed. -Well, that's a start.But Tom wasn't laughing. -That boy who was murdered. All those things that were done to him. How could a good God allow that to happen?Tom's blue eyes mirrored his father's anguish and outrage. -There's evil in the world, Tom. We all know that.-I've been thinking about him, Rick. I can't help thinking about him. He was just my age. I can't talk about it to Dad. I don't know if I can talk about it to you. Or to anyone.-Try. If you want to.Tom hesitated. -I won't say anything to your Dad. If that's what's worrying you.-No. It's not that. It's just that I don't know if I can find the words.-Try.-Last night. In bed. I couldn't sleep. I kept thinking about what happened to that boy. It was like his body was my body. All he must have gone through! I felt my ribs under the flesh and it was like I was a skeleton. â&#x20AC;&#x2039;His â&#x20AC;&#x2039;skeleton. I seemed to be just a heap of meat. No soul. Nothing. Just a pile of meat fit for the butcher's shop. Or the mortuary slab.The anguish of fifteen hit me between the eyes. -Tom!-Rick. It was suddenly there. Inside me. My own mortality. And God didn't seem to come into it.I was at a loss. -Tom. You're fifteen. You've got a whole lifetime ahead of you.It was cheap comfort and Tom knew it. -Rick. What's it matter? What does anything matter? If we're just waiting like sheep? If The Good Shepherd turns out to be The Indifferent Slaughterhouse Man? Why go on? Why not end it, here, now?A youth fed on earnest discussions, on anguished questionings, on endless Dostoevskyian arguments, seemed to tug at the strings of memory. Yet the man I now was, the man I had become, couldn't, didn't want to, wasn't prepared to respond to the needs of fifteen. I had already shown too much of myself to Mike. I wasn't going to do the same to this youth sitting beside me.

I decided to embark on a cricketing simile, the banality of which struck me even as I spoke. -Tom. Some of us will make our century. We hit sixes and fours and flash down the wicket. Others stand and field. Others bowl. The most we can hope for is a good innings. But we must play the game.Tom was good enough for me. -I'd rather be out for a duck!He almost spat it into my face. I laid my hand on his shoulder. -Tom. I know how you feel. I remember feeling the same way myself. But we have to go on.The frankness of Tom's gaze made me realise just how much of my own childhood I had lost. -Why?Tom's flesh was warm under my hand in the hot sun. But suddenly it seemed to be the dead Adam Leslie Betts I was holding. I withdrew my hand quickly. Tom looked down at the place where my hand had been, at the tanned skin, almost as though my touch had been the touch of death. -Why, Rick? Why do we have to go on?I decided on the direct approach. -Because your father loves you so much.Something switched off in Tom's eyes; the flashlight inherited from his father. They went suddenly dead. -Yes. I know.We were both silent. I risked my hand on his shoulder again. But this time he did not even seem aware. Fuck it, I thought. Was Mr James Duffy right: Is love between man and man impossible because there must not be sexual intercourse, and friendship between man and woman impossible because there must be? -Tom?He said nothing. -Tom?He looked at me again, looking outward at me again. -Have you talked about this to anyone else?-Only a friend of mine from school.-A good friend?-Yes.-A very good friend?-Yes.-Thanks, Tom. Thanks then for talking to me.He grinned at me, then blushed, suddenly uncomfortable, his shoulder squirming under the weight of my hand so that I had to let him go. -I shouldn't have troubled you with all my nonsense.-It's not nonsense. And never hesitate to trouble me. Any time. Right?-Right.-

-Swear? Never to do anything, anything foolish, before you talk it over with me first?-Swear?-By the God neither of us are quite sure we believe in.Tom threw back his head and laughed, the laugh of the boy who had sat beside me earlier in the morning. -As long as you can laugh like that, you're all right.-I am all right, Rick.-Swear, though.Tom laughed again. -OK Rick. I swear. If the oath of a prospective atheist can mean anything.-It means something to me. And to you. That's what really counts.Tom grinned wickedly. -Rick. I don't believe you've ever really got away from the Jesuits any more than Dad has.-I know. But I like to pretend I have sometimes.Tom's eyes suddenly went dead again. -I wish I had something like that. Something I could pretend I didn't believe in.-You have, Tom. Your father.The light switched on. He laughed. -Yeah. The God of the Old Testament with a vengeance.I laughed too. -Capital Punishment and all.-Dad would bring back the rack and thumbscrews if he thought he could get away with it.-Whereas I'm just one of your woolly liberals who sees both sides of every question.Tom squinted up at me in the sunlight. -What was it like, Rick? Interviewing his parents?-Hell on wheels.-I read your piece in The Herald.-That was only the half of it.-It was worse?-Much, much worse.-You don't want to talk about it?I wondered how dead my own eyes must have gone. -No. Not particularly.-Sorry, Rick.I looked at him hard. -It's just that, had you looked into their eyes, you never would have thought, even for a moment, much else said, those foolish childish things you were saying to me earlier.Suddenly he bristled. -That was all talk. Adolescent prattle. Forget it. You know what kids are like at my age.-Yes. I know.I tried to put my hand on his shoulder again, but he squirmed away. -Hey, lay off Rick. Leave me alone. I'm fine.-

He had closed up, withdrawn the soft vulnerable part of himself into its shell, was all hard surfaces. Later, as the long day's play drew laboriously to a close with Tom sullen now beside me, I thought: Yes. I can understand how a totally evil man might well kill such a boy. Not for sex. Not for kicks. But in order to destroy that spiky innocence which until then he had believed in himself irretrievably lost.

Anne was late. The afternoon was hot and dusty. Berkeley Square rustled green around me. I sat on the bench and waited. The ancient plane tree opposite spread its gnarled arms in silent supplication. The mobile phone shrilled in my pocket. -Sorry darling. I'm going to be late.-You â&#x20AC;&#x2039;are â&#x20AC;&#x2039;late.-I know. I kept thinking that I'd get away. But it looks like I'll be another hour at least.Christ, I thought. -I'm sorry Rick. You know how these things come up.I looked down at my lap. -Yes.- I said. -I know.-You're not too angry with me?-How could I ever be angry with you.-You'll wait for me there?-The hell I will!-Where shall we meet then?I thought. -How about the Connaught Lounge?I heard the hesitation in her voice. -Right, Rick.- There was an ominous silence. -You won't drink too much before I get there?I laughed. -Do I ever drink too much?-Rick!-All right. I promise. One drink.She laughed. -You don't have to join the Temperance League!-One drink. That will keep me going. And the thought of you.-You old smoothie!We both laughed. -Got to go, Rick. See you then.The phone went dead in my hand. Christ, I thought. I got up, crossed to the old plane tree, laid one hand on the bark. -So long, old boy. See you again.In Mount Street the Connaught beckoned to me with its bright flowery facade.

But on the corner I looked left. There was Mount Street Gardens, the gates open, the familiar outlines of Farm Street Church beyond. I wandered across, through the gates, passing the flower-beds bright in the sun, the benches donated by various grateful Americans who had so loved these gardens. Above the church door Mary, the Mother of God, the Immaculate Conception, stood amid stone clouds supported by straining carved cherubs, one bearing an extraordinary resemblance to Napoleon Bonaparte. Inside was cool and quiet. There was the familiar figure of Loyola, all stony blackness, one hand raised in a silent blessing which seemed to imply total obedience in response. I patted his stone foot. -Hi, Ignatius. Long time no see.Ignatius smiled down at me. I sat in the front row. Suddenly I was kneeling, great waves of unexpected emotion sweeping through me, almost making me gasp. Sunlight shone through the stained-glass windows, dappling Mary and the Christ Child with shadows of the blown leaves outside. I am still that same little boy, I thought, kneeling in chapel at Stonyhurst, longing to confess yet afraid to confess, ashamed of the things I had been doing with my own body, with my own soul, asking God for a sign, any sign, to show that He still loved me, that He had not confined me to outer darkness, even that He was just there. A pigeon, alighting from its perch on a ledge outside, flew past the stained-glass, the shadow of its wings for an instant seeming to trace the outline of the Holy Dove as it hovered over Our Lady's head. All right, I thought. You win. Big deal. What else is new? I stood, made my way along the side aisle, past the row of confessionals, till I found one, the door ajar, above it the name Fr. F. Lawrence, S.J. I stepped inside, closed the door behind me, knelt. Beyond the grate a dim face moved. -Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.I was amazed how it all came back to me, the words, the feelings of shame, the sense of embarrassment, the guilt. I heard his voice mumbling familiar things, almost in spite of myself heard myself saying the Act of Contrition I did not even know I remembered. -And when did you last confess, my son?Christ, I thought. You're a man, Rick. Be a man. Not a snivelling little boy. -About twelve years ago, Father.There was a long silence. -Quite a time. And why has it been so long?-One thing and another, Father.There was another long silence.

-And what sins have you committed since then?I thought for a moment; examined my conscience, as it were. -Put me down for everything in the book, except murder.A great burst of laughter sounded from the other side of the grate. -That's what I really like to hear. A good honest sinner.I laughed too, suddenly at ease. -I don't know about the good. But I hope I'm honest. And I'm certainly a sinner.-We all are, my son.-Do you want me to start at the beginning, and itemise them all?He laughed again. -That might take us all day. And God knows them already, and what is in your heart, and if you are sorry.-But I'm not sorry, about some things, things the Church considers sinful.-Such as?I listed, as decently as possible, some of the things Anne and I got up to. And some of the things I got up to alone, when she was not around. He was silent a moment. When he did speak there seemed to be a smile in his voice. -Habit is very strong. Few of us have the grace to escape from it. Particularly sexual habit. But God knows that better than we do. And He understands. Sex is just a mechanism. Rather like a lavatory cistern. Sometimes the chain has to be pulled. To release the pressure of the water. I never cease to be amazed how people always seem to confess sexual sins first. As if they were the ones God, and the priest, was going to come down hardest upon. But tell me, is it one girl?-Yes.-And do you love her?-Yes. Very much.He was silent again. -I do not judge you. Only God knows what is in your heart. In God's eyes you may very well be man and wife. When the time is right, when you are both ready, perhaps He will give you the grace to come here, to receive a blessing, to channel your love in a way that is more pleasing in His sight, perhaps even to have a family.-Amen to that.I was surprised by the fervour of my own response. -But that isn't why you came here today?-No, Father.We were both silent. -Well?-Father. You know the murder case. Adam Leslie Betts. The boy who was found last weekend in the Euston underpass.I sensed shock in the silence. -You said everything â&#x20AC;&#x2039;except â&#x20AC;&#x2039;murder!I laughed.

-Oh no, Father. I'm sorry. Not that, thank God. I'm a journalist. I've been writing up the story in The Herald.He laughed too. -What a mistake! For a moment I thought you considered murder a venial sin also. But go ahead. I've been reading some of your reports. Very fine too. Much too fine for The Herald.-Thank you, Father.-Not at all. The interview with the parents reduced me to tears. I'm not ashamed to admit it.-You can imagine what it did to me. Having to interview them.He was silent a moment. -Yes. I can imagine.-Father, a week ago, before I was given this assignment, I wouldn't have believed what it could do to me, is doing to me, has done to me; that I would be kneeling here this afternoon talking to you.-If you'll pardon a cliché, God moves in a mysterious way.-But what if we don't like the way in which He moves?He laughed. -We often don't. That's not the point.-What is the point?-Our response.-But what if our response is...?-Yes, my son?I hesitated. -What if our response is, Fuck you, God?He was silent a moment. -Well, at least it's a response. He'd rather have that than be ignored.-Can't I say anything to make you angry?-Is that what you want to do? Make me angry?-No. Yes. I don't know.-Do you want to try to tell me all about it?-Yes. No. I don't know.There was a long silence. -Yes, Father. I'd like to try.I outlined the events of the past week, filling in a few details here and there which I thought relevant, leaving out nothing that might show me in a bad light. When I had finished he was silent a moment. -And this lad you took to the Oval yesterday?-Tom. He's the son of the Inspector on the case.-Inspector Branch?I laughed. -You are keeping up with the story.-Yes, I am, aren't I.-I'm his godfather. Aidan and I were at Stonyhurst together.He clapped his hands in delight.

-You're both old Stonyhurst boys!-Very bad ones, Father.-No doubt. No doubt. But it gives you a background. Something to fall back on.-As my presence here today shows?-Exactly. Exactly. But what about the son? What about Tom?I hesitated. -I don't think his father wanted him to have the benefits of a Jesuit education.He clicked his tongue. -Oh dear. I thought so. I'm worried about poor Tom.-So am I, Father.-How seriously did you take all his talk?-I don't know. It's hard to tell at that age.-An age when suicide peaks!-Yes. I know.-Do you think you should talk to his father?-I don't know. I just don't know.We were silent again. -I'm worried about myself too, Father.He laughed. -Yes. No doubt. But your self-awareness saves you.-I've never thought of myself as a prospective pederast before.-Why not? We're all pederasts and murderers and apostates at heart. There's no sin in feelings. It's only when we put them into action.-But I've never had homosexual feelings before.-Never, my son? Not even at school?I thought. -Perhaps. With Aidan. He was five years older than me. A fine sportsman. But that was just hero-worship.-And this is his son?-Yes.-Like him?-Yes.-Why not hero-worship then?-But when I put my hand on his naked shoulder. Something happened.- I could not but hesitate. -Our glands don't lie, do they, Father?-Tosh. Our glands have no conscience.I laughed. -No. But I did it three times. Until he had to squirm away from me in disgust.He laughed. -He probably noticed much less than you imagine.-And later, I felt I could understand how someone might murder such a boy.He clicked his tongue again.

-I told you that we're all pederasts and murderers at heart.-Yet I don't believe that at heart I'm even remotely attracted, sexually, to Tom.-No?-No.- I hesitated. -It was when I first put my hand on his shoulder.- I hesitated again. -It seemed to be the shoulder of the dead boy.-Ah.-I know, Father. It is horrible.-Horrible?-To be in love with a boy who's been dead for a week. A boy I've never even met.-Horrible? Why? I've been in love all my life with a man who's been dead nearly two thousand years; a man I've never met.I laughed. -Yes, Father. But that's different.-Different? Perhaps. I don't know.We were silent. -Father. I don't know how to put this into words. It's so hard to express.-Try, my son.I waited a moment. -That first night in Wales, after visiting the Betts; I know I was drunk, but I wanked in my bed like a little boy.-You were drunk. And physically and emotionally exhausted. God understands these things.I went on. -And the next day, when I went into his room, it seemed to be my own room I was going into, when I was a boy.-Your own room?-Yes. The books that were there. Poe and Swift and Borges. And the records. Everything.-Boys are much alike at fifteen. I know. I was once the headmaster of a boys' school.-He even had the same edition of Poe I had when I was his age.I paused. He said nothing. A dim head moved beyond the grate. -Father. I don't think I'm in love with Adam Leslie Betts, dead or alive. Or with Tom. I think I'm in love with myself; with the boy I was when I was fifteen.-Ah.- He released his breath almost in a whisper. -sic amet ipse licet, sic non potiatur amato!I laughed. -credule, quid frustra simulacra fugacia captas?He was delighted. -You know the old boy too!I went on. -ista repercussae, quam cernis, imaginis umbra est: nil habet ista sui;He interrupted me. -But what about your Anne? What about poor Echo?-Echo!-

-quae tamen ut vidit, quamvis irata memorque, indoluit, quotiensque puer miserabilis "eheu" dixerat, haec resonis iterabat vocibus "eheu"; cumque suos manibus percusserat ille lacertos, haec quoque reddebat sonitum plangoris eundemI laughed again. -You're better, or worse, than I am.-I try not to let my Latin get too rusty, even though it is out of fashion in the Church today.-“I pray - for fashion's word is out And prayer comes round again...”He completed the quadrant for me: -“That I may seem, though I die old, A foolish, passionate man.”We were silent again. -But what about your poor Echo?-dumque dolet, summa vestem deduxit ab ora nudaque marmoreis percussit pectora palmis.I hesitated a moment to make my point: -Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.-Yes. But where does that leave her?I knew exactly where it left her. -I told her. That I wanted to withdraw from the assignment. But she was the one who insisted I go on. When she heard about the reward.-Ah, yes. The reward.-So she has no one to blame but herself.-But you want to go on. Reward or no reward.I hesitated again. -Yes. I want to go on.-Despite the dangers?I laughed. -Perhaps because of them.-No matter where you might come out?-Yes. I've warned Anne. She's willing to take the risk.-And does she really know what the risk is?-I don't know.-And you don't care?-I don't care.-Did you tell her about being twice reduced to tears? At the house and driving back to London?-I don't know. I don't believe I did.-Well?-I told her what Mike said. About putting too much of myself into it. Ending up in the red.He clicked his tongue.

-I'm not at all sure this Mike of yours is an altogether good influence.Suddenly I bristled. -Mike is my best friend.-Yes. No doubt. But best friends are not always our best influences.-Mike would do anything for me, Father.-Nulla est igitur excusatio peccati, si amici causa peccaveris;I smiled, in spite of myself. -Touché, Father. But Mike is a good man. One of the best I know.-I shall take your word.I decided to get off Mike. -And now that the autopsy seems to show that the boy wasn't sexually interfered with, we appear to have come up against a brick wall.He seemed distracted. -Ah yes. The boy.-So where do I go from here?He thought a moment. -You said the parents asked you to visit them at any time? Even to stay in the boy's room?-Yes.-Why not go down there. Take the opportunity to return the picture they lent you, in person.-I don't know if I can face them again.-Despite the dangers, remember? Perhaps because of them?I laughed. -But if the boy was killed in London? What can I find out by returning to North Wales?He laughed to himself, almost like a little boy. -But you're not interested in the reward. Or even in the killer. Or killers. What interests you is in that house, perhaps in that very room.I couldn't help entering into his enthusiasm. -You think I might find something there?-Why not try. And what about this Daniel? The boy who was drowned last year? Have you thought about following that up? Finding out a little more about him?-Mrs Betts shut up like a clam when he was mentioned.He clapped his hands. -There you are. That's where you should start. Why not go down by yourself this time? Without Mike?-Mike's a great guy, Father!-Yes, yes. But think how much more you may find out, by yourself. You don't need more photographs.-No.He laughed to himself again. -I wish I was going there with you. I'm beginning to feel a little like a latter day Father Brown.I had to laugh with him. -I wish you were too. No doubt you'd pick up all the little clues I'll only pass by.-

Suddenly he was serious. -Be careful, my son. Be very careful. And whatever you find out, remember: Always give yourself, and everybody else, the benefit of the doubt.Now I laughed â&#x20AC;&#x2039;at â&#x20AC;&#x2039;him. -That's almost exactly what Mike said to me as we were driving back to London.He too could laugh at himself. -Perhaps I was mistaken about that young man.-I think you were. He's always warning me about the sin against the Holy Spirit.-Quite right, too. Tell him to call in some time for a chat. I'd like to meet him.I laughed at the thought of Mike kneeling in the confessional at Farm Street. -I don't think there's much chance of that, Father. If I were ever to get him near a church, it would be at Stratford East. He's a real Eastender. Brought up by the Franciscans.He clapped his hands in delight. -That explains everything!-Almost.-So many Catholics. And none of you go anywhere near a church?-No, Father.-Ah, well. God is working through us all, inside and outside the Church.-Yes. Little did I think, driving back to London last Wednesday, when Mike warned me about not getting too involved and said he didn't want to see me dangling at the end of a rope, like Nicholas Stavrogin, that by Saturday I would be making my confession, as it were, in Father Tikhon's cell.-Ah, Dostoevsky!-Yes.He hesitated a moment. -I see I was mistaken about your Mike. I can only plead, in mitigating circumstances, the long time historical misunderstanding which has always seemed to exist between his Order and ours.I laughed. -The conflicting interests of obedience and humility?-Well, the Franciscans do things their way, and the Jesuits do things God's.We both laughed at this. I looked at my watch. -I think I'll have to be going, Father.-You're meeting Anne?-Yes. She'll be at the Connaught Lounge.-Ah. Very grand.-I was waiting for her, in Berkeley Square, when she phoned to put me off for an hour. I was on my way to the Connaught when I suddenly changed my mind and came in here.-Ah, God's mysterious ways again.-Yes. And her surname is Gregory.He clicked his tongue. -Gregory! And is her hair honey-coloured?-Pure honey.-

-I've never found that text, you know.-Neither have I.-Try to love her for herself alone.-Yes.-You can, you know.-Yes. I know.-sed tamen haeret amor crescitque dolore repulsae? Remember? Poor Echo?-Yes. I remember.We were silent. -You will come in and say hello, any time you feel like a chat?-Yes.-I'm looking forward to see how the story develops.-Yes. So am I. Whatever I find out, you'll be the first to hear.-Thank you, my son.After another long pause he brought it out. -I'm still very worried, about that boy at the Oval, Tom.-Yes. So am I, Father. But what can we do?-We can pray.-

It was hot. The air-conditioning at the office was â&#x20AC;&#x2039;under repair. â&#x20AC;&#x2039;The windows were thrown wide. Distant traffic noises. In front of me, on the desk, an oscillating fan oscillated. I sat there, undecided. Anne had flown back to Dublin, for a day or two, to see her sister's new baby. Without her London seemed dismal and empty. What was there to keep me? I dialled. -Hello.A familiar voice. -Hello. Mrs Betts.-Roderick! How nice to hear from you.-Nice to hear you too, Mrs Betts.-Helen?-Helen.Silence. -Thank you so much for the story, Roderick. And the photos. We've had so many cards and letters. So much sympathy from total strangers. People are so kind.-Yes. Some people are.Silence again. -Helen?-Yes, Roderick.-I have to be in Wales, for a day or two, covering another story, and I wondered if I might call in again and see you, return the photo in person.-Roderick. That would be so nice. John and I would be delighted to see you again. Will Michael be with you?I hesitated. -No. Not this time. No photographer required. He'd jump at the opportunity to come, if he could wangle it. But work is work, I'm afraid.-Yes. Of course. You will give him our love.-And he sends his too.Silence again silence. -What time will you be here?-Tomorrow afternoon. Late. If that's all right with you.-Yes. Of course.-

-Only if you promise, no special preparations, Helen.-Special preparations?-No Welsh cakes.-Oh, Roderick. That's not special preparations.-Besides, Mike's the big Welsh cake eater. I've got to watch my waistline.-Roderick! You're as slim as a boy.-Helen!-You could very nearly get into Adam's clothes.A moment's silence. Then I laughed. -Adam and I are old friends now. But I haven't started borrowing his clothes yet.Another silence. -Roderick?-Yes.-I hope you won't mind me saying this. I know what you men are like.Silence. -Go ahead.-I saw your tears. Last Wednesday. I saw you trying to hide them.-I'm sorry.-No, Roderick. Please. Don't be sorry. I just wanted you to know that those tears meant more to me than almost anything else has done. To think that a stranger, a man, who had never even known him, could shed tears for our darling Adam.Silence. Then I laughed again. -You should see me now, Helen.-Oh, Roderick. You're such a good man. Such a good, kind man.Good, I thought, â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Kind, I thought, feeling the tears streaming down my cheeks, the released lubrication moving inexorably along the urethra. -I'm a man. And you know what men are. We don't like to show our feelings.-I know. Adam was the same. And John. But I'm a woman. And I appreciate those tears. And your trying to hide them. Bless you for it.Things had gone far enough. -All right, Helen. I'm not coming. Unless you promise.-Promise?-No Welsh cakes.She laughed. -All right, Roderick. I promise. No Welsh cakes.I laughed too. -See you then, Helen. Tomorrow afternoon?She was almost coy. -No need for directions this time!-No. No need for directions.Silence. -So long, Helen.-

-Good-bye, Roderick. We'll both be looking forward to it.I hung up. Later, at the urinals, I found that the lubricant had got past the barrier of my foreskin, had stuck it firmly to the front of my underpants. Christ, I thought, it'll be soaking through onto my trousers next. The urine flow took most of the stickiness away. Mike came in behind me. -Hi-ya, Rick, you old wanker!He stood beside me, producing his usual copious stream. I glanced down. -All that lager has to go somewhere.Mike grinned. -Can you think of a better place?At the sinks I glanced up, washing my hands. Mike was looking at me in the mirror. -Spoken to Harry yet?-Spoken to Harry?-About another assignment?I looked down, cleaned under my fingernails. -I've decided to stick with this one.When I looked up at the mirror again Mike was staring at me hard. -Are you sure, Rick?-Sure.-After last week?-Sure. I'm fine now. The effect of all those Welsh cakes and Laverbread seems to have worn off.Mike was doubtful. -You don't look your old self to me.I grinned. -Anne wants me to go on with it too.-Anne?I laughed then. -Yes. She's after the reward.Mike was all incredulous mirth. -Christ Almighty! The mercenary little Irish bitch!I scowled. -Watch it, Mike. You're speaking of the woman I love.Mike grinned. -I love her too. Often thought of setting up a ménage à trois. But she can't stand my red hair.-Never mind, Mike. I love you both.Mike's easy good-nature was there in everything he did. -I suppose you know what you're about. And Anne certainly should. No doubt the love of a good woman will save you.I laughed.

-Save me from the love of a good woman!We both laughed. -Anyway, I suppose the worst of it is over now. I wouldn't care to repeat our time in Wales with the Betts.I said nothing, continued to wash my hands. We dried our hands on the towel, came out of the men's room, stood irresolutely in the corridor. -What have you got on your plate, Rick?-Nothing much. Thought I might get away for a day or two. Drive down to the seaside somewhere. Escape from London and all this heat.Mike beamed. -Great idea. Forget all about this business. Anne going with you?-No. She's off to Dublin. Visiting her sister's newborn baby girl. Well, eight months old. First chance she's had to see her.Mike's accent was more cockney than Irish. -Another beautiful colleen to be breaking the hearts of us poor wretched men!I laughed. -Most assuredly.-Wish I could come with you, Rick. Love to get out of London myself. But duty calls.-No, Mike. I want to get away alone. I'm even glad Anne won't be there. With your bad influence it'd be drinking and whoring every night.-Whereas without me it'll just be every other night.-Right.-Where you heading for?I hesitated a moment. -Haven't quite made up my mind yet. Somewhere with a nice cool sea breeze.-Great. No mermaid-worrying, mind you!-No. No mermaid-worrying.Mike shook my hand. -Forget all about this thing. Forget about yourself. Just be. Here. Now.- He paused. -My old Franciscan teacher used to say: Don't ask God to show you what's inside yourself. You may not like what you find.I laughed. -My old Jesuit teacher used to say: Know yourself. Then you can face anything.Mike laughed. -Sounds just like a Jesuit.-And there speaks a true Franciscan.Back in my office, on the desk, the fan seemed to be admonishing me, shaking its head from side to side. Right, Mike. No secrets between us, ever! it seemed to say. -I didn't lie to Mike.No, it seemed to answer, but you were economical with the truth. -The hell with you! Go oscillate yourself!-

I switched it off. The movement slowly died. It stared at me now in blank reproach. Shall I at least set my lands in order? I picked up the phone. Dialled. -Hello.-Hi. That you, Rick. Sorry, but Dad's not at home.-Tom. How are you?-Fine, Rick. Just fine. Thanks again for The Oval. Had a great afternoon.I laughed. -You were the only one.-No. Play was a bit slow, but it was great just being there with you.-Thanks, Tom. I'm sorry things got a bit heavy.-Heavy?-All our talk.Tom laughed. -I did go on a bit, didn't I.-No. I was pleased you confided in me. I took it as a great compliment.-Aw, Rick. If I can't talk to you, who can I talk to? You're like an older brother.-Thanks, Tom.Perhaps Father Lawrence was right, I thought. Perhaps he noticed much less than I imagined. -Rick.- He hesitated. -I hope I didn't worry you too much. With all that rubbish of mine.I waited for him to go on. -It wasn't really me talking. It's the stuff I've been reading lately. Poe. And Dostoevsky.My stomach muscles contracted, but I turned the groan they wanted to make into a reasonably successful laugh. -I was just the same at your age.-Dad doesn't really approve, but he never tries to stop me from reading anything. Nietzsche's next.This time the laugh was real. -We can discuss him then next time we meet.-Rick! Next time I'm taking you out. I've got something all lined up. Don't want to say what in case it doesn't come off. Just the two of us again.-Right, Tom. Won't ask. You surprise me. Give me a couple of day's notice and I'll make sure I'm free.-Great. Sorry about Dad. Any message?-No. Nothing. Just rang to see how you all were.-Right. Fine. Bye, Rick.-Bye, Tom.The phone went dead in my hand. Thank Christ, I thought, thank Christ, thank Christ. I sat behind my desk in the silence of the afternoon, strangely excited, moved, in my mind's eye seeing already the blueness of the sea, hearing already the cry of gulls, the pounding of distant waves.

I don't have to try, I thought. I still am fifteen. puer ut festis Quinquatribus olim. Already the outskirts of London were well behind me, the motorway stretching out its long ribbon of road ahead, already, with signboards flashing by, I seemed to be approaching the Watford Gap. "Iacta alea est."

I stood again in the leafy suburban street, without the door, as it were, alone this time, the enamel wildflower plaque like some funerary offering, welcoming me with its ambivalent brightness. The first time tragic, I thought, the second time farce, what then this third time? I rang the bell; the sound died away, reverberating, as if from within the walls of an empty tomb. I laughed. Too much Poe at an impressionable age. And laugh - but smile no more. I knew from the footsteps that Mrs Betts would open the door. -Roderick.She threw herself into my arms, as it were, kissing me on both cheeks. -Helen. It's so nice to see you. I didn't think my return visit would be so soon.She held me at arm's length. -Roderick. You look so much better than the last time I saw you. I was quite worried about you then.I laughed. -I hadn't slept much.-Well, you're your old self again today.She seemed to be drinking me in with her eyes. -And how's John?-He just stepped out for a few minutes, to get a local paper. But come in, come in.She led me along the hall, into the front room, the curtains wide again, everything bathed in sunlight. -Sit down, Roderick. Make yourself at home.Strangely I did just that, relaxing, feeling none of the unease of the two previous occasions. She stood looking down at me. -I know what you'd like now, Roderick. A whisky. After your long drive.I laughed. -I wouldn't be so much the ungrateful guest as to refuse such an hospitable offer.She laughed too, going over to the sideboard. She returned with the bottle and a glass. -You say when, Roderick.I said when. -Would you like some soda, or tonic? Or just plain water?-

-I think I'll take it neat.She smiled. -I'll join you in just a little one. I can't have a guest drinking alone.She came back, sat in a small chair opposite. I raised my glass. -To Adam Leslie. And to John.She raised hers. -And to Michael.-Absent friends.-Absent friends.We drank. -And how is Michael?-Fine.-What a shame he couldn't come down with you.-Yes.-I bet he was envious, when he heard.-Yes. But work is work.-I know. You newspapermen must be on the go all the time.I laughed. -Most of the time.We drank again in silence. -I brought back your photo.I reached across to her. She took the photo, looked down at it, smiling. -It came out so well, in the paper.- She looked up at me. -Adam has so many friends. People he never knew, who never knew him. All those strangers who love him now just as we do. They all mourn for him as if he was their own son.Omnibus idem oculi, par est concordia flendi: -It must be a comfort.She looked at me hard. -It is, Roderick. No one will ever know how much.She looked down again at the photo. The silences today seemed natural, with no need of forced conversation. We finished our drinks. -John should be back at any moment. We'll wait for him for afternoon tea.-No Welsh cakes, I hope, Helen.She laughed. -I should hope not. After what you said on the phone.- She hesitated. -I just ran up a small Bakewell Tart. Something a little nearer home.- She laughed. -England, I mean.I feigned annoyance. -Helen! You're incorrigible!-

-Well, Roderick, John and I do have to eat something with our afternoon tea, even if you weren't here with us.-But would you have made a Bakewell Tart if I hadn't been coming? Honestly?She almost blushed. -Honestly Roderick, no.I smiled. -I forgive you this time, Helen. Bakewell Tart is one of my favourites.She beamed all over. -I'm so glad. It was Adam's favourite too.I laughed. -Your Adam goes up in my estimation every minute. Obviously a man of exquisite taste.She quizzed me comically. -In some things, yes. But not in everything. As you saw for yourself in his room last week.-Perhaps. But I myself have had similar lapses. Many of them much the same as Adam's.-There you are. I said you boys were all the same-Boys! You call me a boy!She smiled indulgently. -You're not much more than a boy, Roderick.-That appraisal of the state of my maturity would have been fully vindicated if you could have seen me at lunch in Chester today.-You stopped for lunch? You should have driven on here, to us. We could have given you lunch.-Thanks, Helen. But I got a bit peckish by Chester. And tired. Thought lunch might help to freshen me up.-Poor Roderick. It â&#x20AC;&#x2039;is â&#x20AC;&#x2039;a long drive.-Guess what I had? After lunch? For pudding?She thought a moment. -Spotted Dick? With custard?-Spotted Dick! With custard!She almost clapped her hands in delight. -There you are again. That was another of Adam's favourites.-I'm beginning to think Adam and I were twin souls.She looked at me, suddenly serious. -If Adam had lived, Roderick, I could have asked for nothing better than for him to have grown into the man you are today.Tears came to her eyes, but she blinked them resolutely away. -And did you have the opportunity to see much of Chester?I, too, couldn't fall below her brave example. -Not really. It's not my first time there, but I never get the chance to look properly around.-Adam loved the Roman ruins. Especially the little shrine to Minerva.Something brought the hair up on the back of my neck. -Shrine to Minerva?-

-There's not much of it left, I'm afraid. Just the vague figure discernible. Carved on an outcrop of stone where the old Roman quarries used to be. Just across the Old Dee Bridge. It's unique, I believe; the only Roman shrine still on the site where it was carved. Adam used to go there whenever he was in Chester.Nor yet where Deva spreads her wisard stream. -I'll take a look, on my way back to London.-And the shops on Eastgate Street. They're unique too. There's a second row built above the first, with a gallery running right around, reached by climbing funny little narrow steps from the street. They're really quite mediaeval.I laughed. -I've seen them. That's where I had lunch.She laughed with me. -And here am I telling you all about it! I must be beginning to sound rather like a tourist guide.-You are, Helen, you are! And you're not even from this part of the country.-No. But after eighteen years.-Which part do you come from?Helen was almost coy. -You guess, Roderick.I thought a moment. -Shropshire?-Right. The accent gives me away. Even after all these years in Wales.-Which part of Shropshire?-John is from Kidderminster. And I was born just outside Ludlow.Before the starry threshold of Joves Court. -Then Adam really was A Shropshire Lad.Helen's face was sad. -Yes. I suppose he was. Although you wouldn't have thought it to hear him speak. His accent was pure North Wales. He was born here. All his friends were Welsh.-Daniel?I saw the pain in her eyes. -Yes. Daniel.But I was determined to go on. -You have some other photos?-Other photos?-Not for publication. Old albums. Anything. I'd like to see them. Just for my own benefit.She jumped at the opportunity. -Of course, Roderick. I should have thought of it myself. But one doesn't like to bring out all the old photos. It's such a bore for...-Strangers?She smiled dimly. -I haven't thought of you as a stranger, Roderick, from the moment you first walked into this house.-

-Thank you.She got up, went over to the sideboard again, opened a door, rummaged, returned with a couple of battered albums. -Come over here and sit by me on the couch. I can explain all the details. I joined her and, side by side, turning the pages slowly, feeling her thigh warm against mine, Adam's blood still circulating close to my own, we passed the stages of his youth and youth, entering the MaelstrĂśm. (The evening with the photograph album). -That was Adam at six months. Such a happy baby. He always hated when I brought these ones out. Especially in front of strangers. His face would be scarlet. But where's the harm. At that age.A naked boy, lying on a towel, laughing; supine, prone, shot after shot. The face, full and in profile. The torso. The belly. The buttocks. The genitals. The rolls of baby fat at the backs of the knees. hunc a poplite sectum, -Have you ever seen such a perfect baby.totumque in vulnere corpus. -And here, when he was three, just before he started going to kindergarten, always talking, always asking questions, always so affectionate.quis matutinos abrumpet somnos impositus stratis abitusque morabitur artis nexibus atque ipso revocabit ad oscula poste? -And here he is blowing out the candles on his tenth birthday cake.O ubi venturae spes non longinque iuventae? -And here, at twelve, with the school football team.â&#x20AC;&#x2039;vitae modo cardine adultae nectere temptabat iuvenum pulcherrimus ille cum tribus Eleis unam trieterida lustris. No, I thought. Enough indulgent tears. Enough Statius. Enough Silver Latin. Gold. The Gold of Flaccus. desine mollium tandem querellarum, I laughed. -I appreciate how Adam felt. I used to get so embarrassed when my mother brought out all the old childhood photos.-There we are yet again. Boys are all the same.She turned another page. There were Adam and Daniel, smiling up at me. Helen was silent. A dozen or so pictures spread across two album pages, all apparently taken on the same occasion; the same beach, the same rock formation, the same light, the same two boys in most of them, caught in various stages of their horseplay: Daniel half-buried in the sand, with Adam about to pour a bucket of water over him; Daniel bound hand and foot with old ropes, staring up in mock-horror at

Adam, chest expanded, who stands above him brandishing a makeshift spear; Adam sitting on Daniel's shoulders, with Daniel tottering under the weight; Adam climbing up the rocks while Daniel waits for him above; Daniel on all fours, Adam mounted on his back, a harness of rope held in both hands which Daniel grips between his teeth; together, like isolated frames from a lost motion picture, giving an almost cinematographic account of a carefree afternoon romp at the seaside. None, however, matched, in spontaneity and naturalness the photo I had just returned. Two of the photographs contained a third person: a small dark-haired youth, looking a little older than the two boys, also wearing swimming-trunks, smiling, in the one with his arm round Daniel, in the other, Adam. Elementary, my dear Watson. The photographer. I laughed. -They look like they're having fun.Helen was subdued. -Yes. They had some wonderful times together.-It almost makes me feel like a boy again, watching the two of them play.-You â&#x20AC;&#x2039;are â&#x20AC;&#x2039;a boy, Roderick. To me, at any rate.-Thanks, Helen, but if I tried to get up to half they are getting up to I'd be in bed for a week.Helen was all mock-sympathy. -Poor old Roderick!-Who's the other boy?-Peris. Peris Roberts. He's a couple of years older than Adam and Daniel, but together they formed a sort of gang. A kind of secret society, I believe. Blood Brotherhood. You know what they're like at that age.-Yes. I know.-They were inseparable. That's why it was such a wrench when Daniel moved down to the Gower.-The other boy still lives here?-Peris? Yes. He's working in a summer job right now. Just up the road at the Zoo.-Poor Peris. It must be hard for him too.-Yes. I dare say.-You haven't seen him since...I hesitated, but Helen went bravely on. -No, Roderick. Not since Adam's death.She smiled grimly. -I don't blame him. For not calling. No, not one little bit. I know how he must be grieving. He will come though. Sooner or later. We must give him time. Just now I'm sure he feels he can't face us. He's a very nice boy, but a bit arrogant and aloof. You know what they're like at that age. He wouldn't want us to see him crying. And he would cry if he came. I know that too.She lapsed into silence. tractas et incedis per ignes suppositos cineri doloso. Nevertheless I went on.

-It must have brought him and Adam even closer together. When Daniel was drowned.I saw the pain in Helen's face and almost regretted my relentless probing. -No. Strangely enough it seemed to come between them. They were still the best of friends, but Peris didn't call as much as he used to. And when he did come there wasn't the same old ease.She paused, as if needing the right way to explain. -It's not surprising, really. The three of them did everything together. And suddenly they were two. Daniel's absence was more real than his presence ever had been. They both seemed constrained, embarrassed even. Almost as if they felt guilty. That they were alive and he was dead.She paused again, but this time I didn't have to encourage her. -And then they had both changed. Peris was even more distant, and Adam seemed to withdraw into himself. Adam had always been the outgoing one, Daniel the more retiring. Bookish almost. But now Adam would read till late into the night, couldn't sleep. And when Peris did call I'd often find the two of them sitting alone in Adam's room, reading, or talking quietly, or just looking out of the window.She hesitated, remembering. -Yet when Daniel was alive you could hear the three of them up there together halfway around the block.She paused again, almost smiling, as if lost in a happy dream. -I had hoped that they would come out of it. But the months passed and nothing seemed to change. If anything they got worse. Peris called less often, and Adam would come home from school and go straight up to his room. He lost all his interest in sport, in swimming. All he seemed to want to do was study.She laughed. -At least his school marks improved. His reports had always said: Could do better, if he was not so interested in sport.She paused. -I was so worried, Roderick. Sometimes Adam didn't even want to come down to meals. But I always insisted upon that. I almost considered taking him to see a doctor. A psychiatrist, I mean. But I thought I'd give him a little longer. I put it off.She looked at me hard. -Never put things off, Roderick. Never put anything off.-No.- I said. -And now it's too late. And I don't have to worry about Adam ever again.-No.- I said. -Adam is with Daniel now.She looked into my soul, her face almost radiant. -Oh, I do hope so, Roderick. I do hope so.Just then the sound of a key in the lock announced the return of the absent husband.

Afternoon tea was a protracted affair, the late afternoon sun slanting in through the window, the finger sandwiches I knew Helen had taken so much trouble with, the freshly made Bakewell Tart, the silver tea service, the bone china cups. John sat across from me in what I now was beginning to make out was his chair, his desultory conversation occasionally lapsing into silence, his eyes suddenly emptying of all life, staring out of the window as if lost in some dream of the past or vision of a future he could scarcely bear to contemplate. Helen pottered about, fussing over us like children, constantly replenishing our teacups and offering us food, which neither of us, I felt, really wanted or had the heart to refuse. -And how is our friend Michael?John's voice suddenly boomed out, too loud, breaking one of the long silences into which he had fallen. -Mike's just fine.-Fine boy, Michael. Fine boy.-Yes. He sends you his regards.-Good. Good. Give him ours too when you get back to London.-Yes. I will.The conversation again lapsed. I gritted my teeth. Without Mike's loquacity to fall back on, I had determined to keep up my side at least of whatever talk we might have and to follow wherever it might lead, regardless. But now the silences that descended on us with what should have been alarming regularity seemed to be becoming, not merely bearable but almost de rigeur, as if to allow room, breathing space, as it were, for the breathless ghost who seemed to hover always just out of sight in the interstices of the vain words we were building in an effort to keep him out. The last line of a play I had all but forgotten, a play I had read, perhaps at Anne's instigation, I did not even remember that, a play in which an only child has died suddenly, after a successful operation, came drifting into my mind. We can still be a family. -We can still be a family.- I said. John, disturbed from his reverie, refocused his eyes from the empty window. Helen, who was at the sideboard decanting some more tea, turned around. -What was that, Roderick?-

Christ, I thought, help me. -I thought you said something about a family?-Yes. I did.Christ, I thought, Christ, Christ. Helen and John were both waiting. -Do either of you know German?John shook his head. -'Fraid not, Roderick.Helen was all sad apology. -We're both very ignorant about such things.Thank Christ, I thought. -An old German proverb came into my mind. I didn't even know I was going to say it. It just seemed to come out.-And what was that?Helen showed genuine interest, although John's limited attention was already wandering. -Weiblich still bein Familie.â&#x20AC;&#x2039;- I lied, racking my memory for a few random German words, disregarding grammar and sense and syntax, thinking only of sound. -I'm not even sure I remember it correctly. I was watching you, Helen, standing over at the sideboard, quietly getting things done, and I thought of my own mother, and the thing was out before I knew it.Helen smiled. -Is your mother German, Roderick?I laughed. -No. Not at all. Nor my father. I don't know why it should have come to me.-And what does it mean?I hastily mistranslated my own invention. -The Female Principle is the still centre of family life; a woman at the heart of every family.Helen smiled again. -How nice. Wasn't that kind of Roderick, John?She was determined to keep him in the conversation. -Kind? Yes kind. Most kind, Roderick.But he was again elsewhere. Helen returned to the tea. Thank Christ, I thought. That was a close shave. Have to be on my guard. Lulled into a false sense of security. Watch yourself, Roderick. Keep your wits about you. As the father owl said to the mother owl. Christ, I thought. That's the sort of joke I'd have liked when I was fifteen. Helen was beside me with the teapot. -Another cup, Roderick?-Just a half, thanks very much.She poured. -I keep forgetting you don't take milk or sugar. I don't know how you can drink it like that. I'm sure it must be very bad for you. All that tannin.-

I laughed. -I've given up worrying about what's bad for me.-Naughty boy!She hit my hand playfully. -And you, dear?John had to be dragged back again. -Yes? What?She clicked her tongue. -Would you like some more tea, dear?-No thanks, Helen. This will do me.She went back with the teapot, returned carrying the green dish on which four slices of Bakewell Tart still remained. -Now you big men are going to have to finish this Bakewell Tart.-Not for me, Helen.John was adamant. -You'll have some more, Roderick. I know it's your favourite. And it will only go to waste.About to decline, the look of pathetic eagerness on her face made a refusal impossible. -Thanks. Just a small piece.I ate in silence. Helen, her duty all ended, settled opposite me. -I can't tell you, Roderick, how nice it is to have you with us again.I grinned. -I can't tellâ&#x20AC;&#x2039; you â&#x20AC;&#x2039;what a pleasure it is to be here.-How are things in London? Inspector Branch?-Aidan? He's fine. Just fine. Getting along with the investigation.I sensed, rather than felt, Mr Betts unease. Helen continued. -He's such a nice man. You all are. I always supposed newspapermen and police inspectors were cold and ruthless and hard-bitten. But you've all been so kind. It just goes to show you shouldn't believe everything you see on television and film.I laughed. -Aidan can be pretty tough when he has to be. Even I have my ruthless side.She smiled. -I'm sure you have, Roderick. You'd have to, in your line of work.I knew without looking that Mr Betts' eyes were on me. -I saw Aidan's son last week. Tom. Took him to The Oval for a day of cricket.-Good day's play?Mr Betts had suddenly re-joined the conversation. I turned to him. -Not bad. I've known better.-Cricket can be slow. But it's a damn fine game. The best.-Yes. The best.-

-You can keep your football.Mrs Betts laughed. -You men and your sport. You're all the same.I could only agree. -We must be pretty hard to take.-I'd rather hear about Tom. What's he like?-Great boy. Same blue eyes as his father. Very like his father at that age.-You've known Inspector Branch a long time?-We were at school together.She was delighted. -How lovely. It's so nice when people keep up their childhood friendships.-I'm Tom's godfather.Her pleasure increased. -How wonderful for you both. I can see how proud you are of him. Just from the way you talk.-He's a real chip off the old block.She hesitated a moment. -You don't have any of your own?I laughed. -I've managed to avoid being caught yet.-You have a girl? One you're serious about?I paused, not sure if I wanted to discuss Anne at this particular moment. But Helen's interest was so genuine and touching. What the hell, I thought. -Yes. Anne. And very serious.Helen beamed. -I'm so glad. I bet she's a lovely girl.-Yes. She is. Very lovely.I rummaged in the pocket of my coat, which was lying over the arm of the chair, withdrew my wallet, found the picture of Anne I always carried with me. Helen was on her feet, putting on her glasses; took the photo over to where John was sitting, to the brighter sunshine. Que les soleils sont beaux dans les chaudes soirĂŠes! -Oh, look John! Isn't she lovely!John had his glasses out also. -Beautiful girl!Ta tĂŞte, ton geste, ton air Sont beaux comme un beau paysage; -Such lovely yellow hair!- Helen looked over at me. Love you for yourself alone And not your yellow hair. Suddenly I was embarrassed, ill at ease; didn't want this couple of whose existence I had been unaware ten days ago probing into my private life, into something that had nothing to do with them. I'm here on business, I thought. I'm here to unearth their secrets, not they mine.

Helen was still smiling over, looking down at the photo and then back at me. -You must make such a handsome couple.Christ yes, I thought. She's got a couple of handsome tits, I've got a couple of handsome balls. You should see her sucking me off sometime. We make a really handsome couple then. I looked down at my watch, suddenly impatient to be off. Off where though, I thought, as suddenly mollified. Helen missed nothing. -Poor Roderick. It is getting late. You must be tired.-No, no, I'm fine.-After driving all the way from London! Do you have much further to go tonight?-Tonight?-Your other business in Wales?I had forgotten all about my other business in Wales. -No. No. Bangor.- I extemporised as I went along. -I thought I'd spend the night at Llandudno, like Mike and I did last time, then drive on to Bangor in the morning.Helen was quite put out. -Roderick! You wicked boy! Why didn't you tell me? You know what I told you and Michael. There's always a place for you here. I could have had the room ready.-I didn't want to put you out.-Put me out nothing! I can't have you staying at an hotel five miles away when there's a perfectly good room right here.-No. Really Helen.-Really Helen nothing! John! Tell him he must stay!John stood up. -We would really like you to stay, Roderick.I hesitated. Helen clapped her hands. -Right. It's all settled then. You wait down here and chat to John. Or watch television together. I'll go up and prepare the room.- She paused, her enthusiasm suddenly dampened. -It will be about half-an-hour, I'm afraid. Things are just as they were. I haven't touched anything. Since you were here. Since he was here. There's quite a bit of tidying up to do. You saw that for yourself.- She paused again. -If I'd known you were coming, staying that is, I could have had it all done. I know I should have done it already. But I just didn't have the heart.She stood near the window in the fading sunlight, John beside her. Without a word he took her hand. Nothing happened for a long time. I stood up, suddenly decisive. -No. It's quite impossible. I can't have you changing the room, just for me.Helen was insistent. -But it's no trouble at all, Roderick.-No. I won't hear of it. I will stay, but only if you promise me one thing.-Yes, Roderick?-

-To leave everything as it is.-As it is?-Yes. Not to touch a thing.Helen was perfectly outraged. -Roderick! I can't have you sleeping amid all that mess.I reached for my coat. -All right. I must go.Helen was at a loss. -But Roderick.I looked at her straight. -That mess, as you call it, was Adam's life. The socks over the back of the chair, the jeans on the floor, they are him, all that is left of him, all of him that I can ever know. He lived among all that mess. To do the same, even for a single night, is the closest to him that I will ever be able to get now.Her eyes suddenly filled with tears. She fell into my arms, burying her face in my chest, sobbing like a little girl. -Oh, Roderick, Roderick. You love Adam too. You love him just as we do.John, the pain of his son's wounded body there in his eyes, reached out his right hand and took my own, held it tightly, as if trying to share in the comfort all three of us knew to be impossible. So we remained in the fading summer sunlight, each of us mourning, in our own way, the absence which could never be filled. But even grief does not last forever. Helen was the first to recover herself. -Look at me. A fine hostess. I must go up and get some fresh sheets.But I stopped her. -As it is? Remember, Helen? I would consider it an honour, a privilege, to lay my limbs where Adam's limbs have lain, to rest my head on the pillow where his head has rested.Helen understood. -Yes. Of course. How stupid of me.- She smiled. -You know the way. I'll just show you where the bathroom is situated.John, who still had my hand, held me back as I was about to follow her. -Roderick. Thank you for coming here today. And for staying. You'll never know what it means to Helen. And to me.-You'll never know what it means to me.- I said.

La nuit s'ĂŠpaississait ainsi qu'une cloison, I stood at the window, looking across the roofs to where the last light faded on a patch of sea. After London the quiet of Colwyn Bay seemed absolute, a quiet broken only by the occasional cry of a gull. Tom Cruise grinned at me from the wall. I had excused myself from dinner, pleading fatigue after a long day, lack of appetite after a large lunch, and Helen's afternoon tea as the perfect finishing touch I could not hope to better. Nevertheless she had only consented to my absence when I had promised her that, should I feel hungry during the night, I would come downstairs for the ham sandwich and glass of milk she insisted on leaving for me in the fridge; one of Adam's favourites, she had told me. I was not hungry, it was true. But my real reasons I had studiously avoided: a disinclination for small talk over dinner; an unwillingness to embellish further upon the lies I had already been forced to perpetrate; a fear that I would somehow give away, by my very smugness, as it were, the almost clockwork precision with which Helen and John had fallen in with the plans I had so wildly yet successfully conceived; most of all an eagerness to be alone, to be by myself in the quiet room, to meet Adam Leslie Betts on his home ground. My suitcase stood on the floor near the bed, the suitcase I had felt obliged to fetch from the boot of my car and to carry supervacuously upstairs, unopened, not to be opened. I had not switched on the light. I lay on my back on the crumpled sheets, fully dressed, not even bothering to take off my shoes, listening to the distant sounds of the house as it prepared for bed. I fancied I could hear Helen as she finished the washing up, the cupboards closing one by one, even the click of the television set as it was switched off for the night. Then the two sets of footsteps, the sounds of which I had already learned to distinguish, as they ascended the stairs, heavy, as it seemed to me, with the weight of sorrow. The switching on of the bathroom light, the lavatory being flushed, the switching off again, all this I heard, or seemed to hear. Helen's steps, as she paused outside my room, listening, hoping perhaps that I was still awake, then the diminishing tread as they joined those of her husband in a dead patrol. The bedroom door closing, the wardrobe being opened and then shut, the creak of the bedsprings as they accepted their familiar weight. Silence.

Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I laughed at my own adolescent imagination. I do not think that I slept. But suddenly I could not get my breath. A distant voice, urgent, insistent, seemed to be calling me by name. I lay there, gasping, suffocating, desperately trying to breathe. Then I opened my eyes. The room was flooded with moonlight. And Adam Leslie Betts was there, standing above the bed, wan, smiling, looking down at me. Adam Leslie Betts, naked, beaten, abused, the moonlight shining through his frail body, stars embedded in chest and head and arms as if picking out some new constellation. I shut my eyes tight, shook my head, opened them again. Still he was there, a little fainter, fading perhaps, solemn in his vulnerability, strong in his catasterisation. Adam, I seemed to whisper, without moving my lips. Rick, he seemed to answer without moving his, Thank you for coming, I knew that you would. I shut my eyes again. When I opened them a third time he was still there, but so faint as to be barely visible, a mere wrath against the night sky beyond the open window into which he gradually disappeared. I sat bolt upright on the edge of the bed, my heart thumping wildly, blindly staring out at the blank space where, free from sodium-glare, the bright stars blazed in the Colwyn Bay night. Calmness gradually returned. I looked down at my watch, clearly visible in the moonlight which still managed to proclaim its objective autonomy. Christ, I thought, past twelve. I must have slept. In the dead vast and middle of the night. Mike, Mike, I thought. Perchance 'twill walk again. You were right. I am putting too damn much of myself into this. Outside a gull cried shrilly, its white form caught for a moment in the moonlight. I listened to the silence, intent. Past midnight. Never knew such silence. The earth might be uninhabited. Christ, Rick. You know a quote for everything, the value of nothing. This time the laughter died on my lips. Right, I thought. To work. Unlike Adam Leslie Betts, my time was limited. I stood up, went over to the window. The moon, low in the heavens, made a silver pathway on the distant sea. The heaventree of stars hung with... Christ, Christ, Christ, I thought. I drew the curtains, blotting out the distracting heavens, flooding the room with a near total night. I felt my way back to where the light switch was situated, nearly tripping over my forgotten suitcase on the way. The room was plunged into light. I blinked. Everything was as I remembered it. Adam Leslie and Daniel, replaced by Helen on the bedside table before she had left me alone in the room, their arms around each other's shoulders, were still both laughing as if at some shared joke.

All right, I thought, Adam, Dan. We're supposed to make fools of ourselves. Fools for God. Perhaps this is what you were really laughing about. His black trousers still lay lifeless on the floor. Crumpled as chance. Almost as if he had just stepped out of them. Destined for the laundry. To be cleaned and pressed. Sent perhaps to some charity shop. As though he had never worn them. Walked in them. Pissed in them. Erected in them. Lived in them. As though he had never lived. I picked them up. Obviously unwashed, they gave off a faint dusty acrid odour of stale sweat and urine. Filthy as the unwashed balls that occupied the crotch, I thought. That is if Aidan's estimation of your personal hygiene is correct, Adam Leslie. The balls whose shape still shapes the cloth in smooth round contours of dormant lust. So be it, I thought. I undressed hurriedly, almost excitedly, stripping down to my Yves Saint-Laurent boxer-shorts. Adam Leslie and Dan laughed over at me. All right! All right! I peeled off the boxer-shorts, stood naked. Slowly I pulled on the black jeans, feeling the denim rough against my thighs, dressing to the left as I habitually did, as Adam Leslie quite plainly had done also. Long time no jeans, I thought. But the zip would not do up. I laughed. Ma taille s'épaissit aussi. Not as slim as a boy, Helen. Although I can very nearly get into Adam's clothes. What a comic scene Alan Ayckbourn would make of this, I thought. And true too, in its way. Without ever quite getting into his character's clothes. Much less into their skin. Adam and Dan were still laughing. The pair of socks were dangling over the back of the chair. I tried to sit down to pull them on. But the tightness of the crotch prevented me. Nos fesses ne sont pas les leurs. I suddenly saw myself, as it were, as they must be seeing me, half-squatting down over the chair: the far-from-adolescent hairy chest; the incipient paunch hanging out over the gaping flies; the bollocks crushed into the too tight jeans. Farce continuelle! Mon innocence me ferait pleurer. La vie est la farce à mener par tous. Quickly, angrily, I dragged off the black jeans, stepped out of them, feeling almost stupidly naked, leaving them crumpled on the floor where I had found them. And still they laughed. Well, what next, Adam, Dan? I crossed to the bed, pulled back the sheets. A pair of old-fashioned striped flannelette pyjamas had been left roughly folded on the crumpled undersheet, very like the pyjamas I had worn when I was a boy. Plus ça change, I thought.

And fortunately boys still seem to like their pyjamas a couple of sizes too large for them. I slipped the pants on, tying the white woven drawstring loosely at the waist, feeling like a boy again myself. My membrum virile, obedient till then, rose up peremptorily from the loose flies. Pourquoi la puberté tardive a le malheur Du gland tenace et trop consulté? I looked down at it. Sorry, old boy. Not tonight. -Ailleurs qu'en ton cher corps et qu'en ton coeur si doux?No. The body is most dear but is easily led astray. And the heart is notoriously corrupt. -et tirons-nous la queue!No. Not tonight. -pertundo tunicamque palliumque.Resorting to Latin, you little devil! -non si demisso se ipse voret capite.Come off it! -Tam tremulum crisat, tam blandum prurit, ut ipsum masturbatorem fecerit Hippolytum.Go on! Do your damnedest! -Sit nobis aetate puer, non pumice levis, propter quem placeat nulla puella mihi.Pull the other one. It's al rough and long y-herd. -incurvabat Hylen posito Tyrynthius arcu:Sir! You go too far! -et tumidum cornu durius inguen erat.Right, Curius Mentula! You chose the weapons! -quin istic pudibunda iaces,- I said aloud, -pars pessima nostri?Disgruntled but obedient, it sunk out of sight between the soft flannel folds. Sorry, old chap. No offence meant. There is a time for the evening under starlight, a time for the evening under lamplight, even a time for the evening dans le Bois d'Oneux. But not tonight. Adam and Dan, who had been watching the display, seemed gleefully to approve. Slowly I buttoned on the pyjama top, feeling each large white button slide into its buttonhole, leaving the top button undone. As no doubt Adam Leslie had done. Adam and Dan seemed to approve of this too. Excited again, but in a different way, I hurriedly prepared for the long night ahead of me, plumping up the pillow to support my back, switching on the bedside lamp, switching off the main one, filling the small room with unaccustomed shadows. Unaccustomed for me, I smiled. Wait! A pair of checked felt slippers, the heels trodden down, peeped out from under the bed. Why not?

Why not indeed? Adam and Dan seemed to say. Slipping them on, taking up a small anodised torch which seemed to have been left there for the purpose, I made my way quietly downstairs, each obliging door opening soundlessly as I went, each promiscuous obstacle announcing itself to my probing beam. The ham sandwich and glass of milk left for me by Helen in the fridge were ice-cold to the touch. As was the portion of homemade sticky toffee pudding she had covered with a piece of protective cling. Good old Mum! I seemed to observe myself as I half-formulated the thought. Even a tray. I loaded it, carrying it carefully upstairs, pausing outside Helen and John's door for a moment to reassure myself that they were both asleep, continuing on down the darkened corridor towards the thin pencil of light which beckoned to me from my own room. Inside, my midnight feast arrayed about me, my volume of Poe ready on the bedside table, I was every inch the boy my sister, waking early in the summer dawn on the seaside holidays of our childhood, still so vividly seems to remember, sitting cross-legged on the bed in his striped pyjamas, reading an Edgar Wallace thriller while all around him the household slept. Tolle lege, tolle lege.

I opened the book. A whole legion of Roman soldiers marched in formation over my grave. Or else I was not really very surprised at all. On the title page of Tales, Poems, Essays, midway between Laurence Meynell's name and the familiar fountain of the Collins logo, facing the small portrait of Poe which stared knowingly out at me, and which would, when the book was closed, be pressed closely to his breast, was the following intimate inscription: Rick ac melior mihi frater Aidan No, no, no, I thought, thinking at the same time, Yes, of course, I knew it all along, how could it have been otherwise. The same old Collins Classic edition I had had at his age, the one I had got rid of because it was cluttering up my flat, the one that the funny old book-dealer, a Welsh book-dealer I now remembered, had taken off my hands with a lot of others because I had thought that I would never want to read them again, a book I had even forgotten had once been given to me, and inscribed, as a birthday present on my fourteenth birthday by my best and closest school chum, even though he was five years older and seemed to me almost like a god, was not only the same edition but the same copy, the copy that I had poured over till late into the night, that I had thought then more precious than pearls or gold. Coincidences happen, I told myself. It was quite simple really. My old copy of Poe, hanging about in some second-hand bookshop or market-stall since I had sold it, had eventually been picked up by, or bought as a gift for, Adam Leslie Betts. So what! But any rational explanation I could

come up with seemed to extend the boundaries of credibility more than the plain simple irrational one. And besides, I was not in the mood for rational explanations. All right. So be it. Adam Leslie, do your stuff. I am in your hands. I looked at Aidan's finely wrought script. Hasn't changed all that much. A little more careless perhaps. To be expected. All those long police reports. Aidan! How I loved you as a boy. You a man already. Your blue eyes flashing fire at any injustice. All injustice. That hasn't changed either. Always expecting everybody to have the same high standards as yourself. That has if anything got worse. Poor Tom! You were hard to live with then. What must you be like now. Aidan! How could I have forgotten so much. How could I have so forgotten you, all that you had meant to me then, as to have sold this book, forgotten even that you had once given it to me. I began to renew my acquaintanceship with Edgar Allen, turning the pages slowly, reminding myself of all that he had meant to me too. Poor, sad Edgar. Then, at the very beginning of the book, on the first page of the life, by H. de. R., whoever H. de. R. might be, I found, underscored faintly but distinctly in a fine-ruled pencil-line, the following sentence: He was good at all kinds of sports and performed some prodigious feats at swimming. Half of the next sentence had been underlined also: However other traits in his character were beginning to make their appearance, for example, a tendency towards introspection and brooding, a desire for solitude, and yet the end of the sentence, and a groping for self-expression which found partial outlet in verse-writing., had had a line carefully ruled through it. I read on, remembering, as I read, all the melancholy facts of the biography. The titles of the thirty-six tales, in the Table of Contents, brought back to me, with an almost alarming vividness, the strange disturbed nature of Poe's genius, and the hold it had exerted upon my own youthful imagination. Many of the titles alone, dropping like Japanese paper flowers into the medium of my stored memory, expanded and grew to their full gorgeous artifice without reference to the tales at all, almost as if I had read them yesterday. I went deeper into the book, reading a sentence here, a passage there, sometimes a whole page. I marvelled that the human brain could acquire and so effortlessly retain so much haphazard information. And then, on the last page of the first tale, William Wilson, I noticed that the last sentence had been underscored with the same faint fine-ruled pencil-line, the sentence itself already printed in italics: In me didst thou exist - and, in my death, see by this image, which is thine own, how utterly thou hast murdered thyself. The additions were not my own, I was sure of that. But whose? Adam Leslie's? Or some intermediary owner? I had never in my life underlined a passage in a book; considered it almost a blasphemy. Nevertheless I was glad that some other, perhaps less scrupulous soul was, as it were, doing my blaspheming for me. But wait! I had, I suddenly remembered, not underlined but I had marked out a passage with an oblique stroke at beginning and end, a passage which, at a particularly disturbed period of my adolescence, had spoken so directly to my own, I had until then thought, particular and private obsessions that I had very nearly wept for joy to discover that another soul before me had shared in, and even celebrated, my despair. Quickly, excitedly, I turned back to the contents, found the number, leafed through to page 170. Berenice. I turned to the next page. There was the passage I had marked, the seventh paragraph of the tale, the two small, lightly penned oblique strokes with which I had isolated it from the text so many years ago still perpetuating my youthful identification with the author. But there, in the

margin, in a small neat hand using no doubt the same fine-leaded pencil which had been used for the underscoring, the following had been obsessively inscribed:

/ To muse for long unwearied hours with my attention riveted to some frivolous device on the margin, or in the typography of a book; to become absorbed for the better part of a summer's day, in a quaint shadow falling aslant upon the tapestry, or upon the door; to lose myself for an entire night in watching the steady flame of a lamp, or the embers of a fire; to dream away whole days over the perfume of a flower; to repeat monotonously some common word, until the sound, by dint of frequent repetition, ceased to convey any idea whatever to the mind; to lose all sense of motion or physical existence, by means of absolute bodily quiescence long and obstinately persevered in; - such were a few of the most common and least pernicious vagaries induced by a condition of the mental faculties, not, indeed, altogether unparalleled, but certainly bidding defiance to anything like analysis or explanation. /

yes

Rick

yes

Rick

yes

And later on, the same pencil had underscored the single phrase: The meditations were never pleasurable; the never, printed in italics already, overwritten two or three times, as if to lend it, however faintly, a special emphasis. Adam seemed to be speaking to me again, not in some vision of the night but in the shared moments of a tenacious puberty inherited from Poe, a puberty we both seem to have once inhabited, were still inhabiting, would always perhaps inhabit. It's feeling under your fingers the same pages you leafed through when you were fifteen, I heard myself saying to Anne. It's being fifteen again. Long, long I read, methodically, from the beginning, working my way through all five-hundred and seventy-six pages, noting whenever a passage had been deemed worthy of my particular attention. Apart from those already mentioned: On page 104, at the end of The Gold Bug, 'Why, to be frank, I felt somewhat annoyed by your evident suspicions touching my sanity, and so resolved to punish you quietly, in my own way, by a little bit of sober mystification.' had been underscored, but this time heavily, and with a red pencil. The rest, for the most part underscored lightly, in black, and with the same faint neatly-ruled lines, were, as follows: In The Fall of the House of Usher:

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Its proprietor, Roderick Usher, had been one of my boon companions in boyhood; Although, as boys, we had been even intimate associates, yet I really knew little of my friend; Surely, man had never before so terribly altered, in so brief a period, as had Roderick Usher; I felt creeping upon me, by slow yet certain degrees, the wild influences of his own fantastic yet impressive superstitions; Sleep came not near my couch - while the hours waned and waned away; - and so we will pass away this terrible night together; Oppressed, as I certainly was, upon the occurrence of the second and most extraordinary coincidence; But, as I placed my hand upon his shoulder, there came a strong shudder over his whole person. In The Assignation: Stay for me there! I will not fail To meet thee in that hollow vale. both as an introductory verse and near the close of the tale. Also: The quiet waters had closed placidly over their victim: many a stout swimmer, already in the stream, was seeking in vain upon the surface, the treasure which was to be found, alas! only within the abyss: All efforts proved in vain. Many of the most energetic in the search were relaxing their exertions, and yielding to a gloomy sorrow. And, on page 148, not underlined this time but marked with an oblique stroke at beginning and end, as I had done, but with the same faint pencil: / in turning over a page of the poet and scholar Politian's beautiful tragedy The Orfeo (the first native Italian tragedy) which lay near me upon the ottoman, I discovered a passage underlined in pencil. / Then, the note translating the French quote prefacing MS. Found in a Bottle, at the foot of page 248: He who has but a moment to live has no longer anything to dissemble. And, in The Oblong Box, near the close of the tale, three passages, the first having had one word overscored also, thus: We saw at a glance that the doom of the unfortunate artist was sealed; While we gazed in the extremity of astonishment, he passed, rapidly, several turns of a three-inch rope, first around the box, and then around his body. In another instant both body and box were in the sea - disappearing suddenly, at once and for ever; But of late, it is a rare thing that I sleep soundly at night. There is a countenance which haunts me, turn as I will. Nothing else had been marked in the Tales. But in the Poems, in The Raven, every 'Nevermore' had been neatly underlined. And in the poem, A Dream within a Dream, the following verses also: O God! can I not save One from the pitiless wave? Then, in the Essay, The Poetic Principle, the lines from Thomas Hood's Bridge of Sighs, quoted in full by Poe. Or was there a dearer one Still, and a nearer one Yet, than all other? and: Even God's providence Seeming estranged.

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also: Mad from life's history, Glad of death's mystery, Swift to be hurl'd Anywhere, anywhere Out of the world! In the Essay, The Philosophy of Composition, the following passage: - propounds them half in superstition and half in that species of despair which delights in self-torture - propounds them not altogether because he believes in the prophetic or demoniac character of the bird (which, reason assures him, is merely repeating a lesson learned by rote) but because he experiences a frenzied pleasure in so modelling his questions as to receive from the expected 'Nevermore' the most delicious because the most intolerable of sorrow. And, in the Introduction to the Marginalia: as for the facility it affords me of pencilling suggested thoughts, agreements, and differences of opinion; the marginalia are deliberately pencilled, because the mind of the reader wishes to unburthen itself of a thought; but, while the picturesqueness of the numerous pencil-scratches arrested my attention; I found myself, at length, forming a wish that it had been some other hand than my own which had so bedevilled the books; - there might be something even in my scribblings which, for the mere sake of scribbling, would have interest for others; I concluded, at length, to put extensive faith in the acumen and imagination of the reader. Finally, right at the back of the book, in the Chronological Table on page five-hundred and seventy, the following entries had been underlined: 1836 May 16. Poe marries Virginia who is not quite fourteen years old. 1847 January 30. Death of Virginia. 1848 November. He makes another journey to Providence for the same reason, then proceeds to Boston where he tries to commit suicide. 1849 October 3. He is discovered unconscious in Baltimore and taken to the Washington College Hospital. October 7. Poe dies at five o'clock in the morning. And that was all. Adam Leslie, Adam Leslie! O my prophetic soul! I sat there in the bed, eyes closed, my head thrown back against the pillow, until long after the candle, which should have been beside me on the bedside table, would have gutted and gone out. I tried to pray. But I could not. Great waves of despair seemed to wash over my limbs, as if the very fabric which had once contained his body still transmitted to me, along with the stale sweat and flakes of skin, something of the hopelessness of spirit his soul must have exuded. O! Adam Leslie! Adam Leslie! O! This was what I had come back to Wales to find out, what I had known all along but been afraid to find out, the fires I had felt moving beneath my feet and under my skin when I first stood in this room. At last the picture was in focus. But Adam Leslie himself, being so sharply defined, seemed

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to have plunged everything else, the background and the other figures, into an even more impenetrable obscurity. I opened my eyes, almost convinced I was dreaming the whole thing. But still I sat in the darkened room in the little circle of light, my midnight feast uneaten, the book in my lap, Adam and Dan still smiling at me from their terminal beach. Le mystère s'épaissit. Right. To work again. Still a lot to be done. But the body needs fuel. I ate the ham sandwich and drank the glass of milk with all the boyhood relish I could muster. So this is what food used to taste like when I was fifteen, I thought, almost believing it, telling myself I was not missing the chilled Chardonnay, that the milk, not quite so cold now, was really much better. The sticky toffee pudding could wait. I got up, fetched the other three books which were beckoning to me from the shelf: The Penguin English Library Edition of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket; The Penguin Modern Classics Edition of Labyrinths by Borges; Gulliver's Travels in an old Signet Classic paperback. Thank God, I thought. None of them mine. The other Poe first. Inside the front cover Edgar Allen sneered haughtily at me from the heights of his proud disdainful paranoia. I turned to the back. Thank God again. Only three-hundred and eleven pages. I worked my way through the still so amazingly familiar narrative, noting again all the passages that, as I had expected, were carefully underlined with the same faint pencil-strokes. On page 7 of the Harold Beaver Introduction: How memories were stirred! How his mind was carried back to his boyhood, drifting down the James River and out to sea: to his friend Ebenezer Burling who first taught him to swim. On page 47, the first page of Chapter One of the novel proper: I used frequently to go home with him, and remain all day, and sometimes all night. We occupied the same bed, and he would be sure to keep me awake until almost light. On the next page, 48: As usual, in such cases, I took part of his bed in preference to going home. Then, in Chapter Two, on page 57: My conversations with Augustus grew daily more frequent and more intensely full of interest. And later, on the same page: Augustus thoroughly entered into my state of mind. It is probable, indeed, that our intimate communion had resulted in a partial interchange of character. Then nothing until page 229, the penultimate chapter of the novel: - in the next my whole soul was pervaded with a longing to fall; a desire, a yearning, a passion utterly uncontrollable. And, in Chapter 25, the last, on the last page: but upon touching him, we found his spirit departed. Then, on page 240, the whole of the first paragraph of the Note had been marked with a thick oblique stroke, both before, and, conspicuously, after the penultimate clause of the last sentence; one word only had been underlined; and the last full stop had been pencilled thickly into a question. Thus: / The circumstances connected with the late sudden and distressing death of Mr Pym are already well known to the public through the medium of the daily press. It is feared that the few remaining chapters which were to have completed his narrative, and which were retained by him,

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while the above were in type, for the purpose of revision, have been irrecoverably lost through the accident by which he perished himself. This, however, may prove not to be the case, and the papers, if ultimately found, / will be given to the public? Adam Leslie! You're playing a game with me. Even if it is the Jeu suprême. Adam and Dan just grinned. So did Tom Cruise. On. In the Editorial notes: underlined: on page 243: 'He was then but fifteen years of age...' and on page 245: Dr John J. Moran, resident physician, reported to Poe's aunt, Maria Clemm: 'At the end he began calling for one "Reynolds" which he did through the night until three on Sunday. Then he became feeble and quiet, moved his hand, said, "Lord, help my poor soul!" and expired' - 15 November, 1849. And in the Commentary: underlined: on page 251: I stayed at his school until I was sixteen - 'fourteen' in the original instalment of the Southern Literary Messenger, January 1837. Poe was clearly intent on pushing the ages of his youths from early to late adolescence. on page 255: According to Dr John J. Moran, Poe's own very last words were: "Lord, help my poor soul." Washington College Hospital, Baltimore, 15 November 1849. and on page 265: (f. Herman Melville: 'So that for better or for worse, we two, for the time, were wedded; and should poor Queequeg sink to rise no more, then both usage and honor demanded, that instead of cutting the cord, it should drag me down in his wake. So, then, an elongated Siamese ligature united us. Queequeg was my own inseparable twin brother.' Et ne sic cohaerentes malignior fluctus distraheret, utrumque zona circumvenienti praecinxit, like Encolpius and Giton; or like poor Cornelius Wyatt and his oblong box. Then, finally, on page 267, the single phrase, 'Death by Water', had been heavily underscored and overwritten, in red pencil. I closed the book wearily. My heart grew sick; it was the dampness of the catacombs that made it so. I laughed. I hastened to make an end of my labour. I put down the book, picked up Borges' Labyrinths, but changed my mind. The sticky toffee pudding first. I deserved it. Then, reluctantly, I took up Borges, not feeling like renewing my acquaintanceship with the erudite Argentinean at this hour of the morning. Don't read. Don't get too involved. Look for the pencil-marks. The self you are gambling with may not be big enough to sustain the losses. Besides, you still have Borges at home. And Swift. You can renew your acquaintanceship with them any time you feel like it. To my intense relief, in the table of contents three stories only had had their titles underscored with the same familiar faint pencil-lines: I noted the titles: Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius; Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote; The Immortal. But, in the book itself, nothing! Except, on page 36, in Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius, the last two sentences of the footnote, one of Borges' own: All men, in the

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vertiginous moment of coitus, are the same man. All men who repeat a line from Shakespeare are William Shakespeare. I picked up Swift. Outside, a gull cried shrilly. I got up, went to the window, opened the curtains. It was light already, the patch of sea grey and reflecting the coming dawn. Christ, I thought, I've read all night. And today there is much to be done. I left the curtains wide, returned to my bed. Christ. And to Swift. Nothing. Not a mark. Not a pencil-stroke to blaspheme the to me now almost Mallarméen whiteness of the pages, despite the blackness of the printing-ink which, as I suddenly remembered, still seemed to come off a Signet Classic, even after all these years, and to dirty the fingers as with a newspaper. Right, Adam Leslie. Either you hadn't got round to Swift, or you found nothing in him worthy of your ubiquitous pencil. Or nothing in him apropos to your purpose. Whatever that purpose may be. Adam and Dan just smiled. I had intended to spend the night going through all the drawers, all the cupboards, all the ephemeral trinkets which make up a life, looking for some sign, any sign, that might point to the ultimate fate of its erstwhile owner. But now, what was the point? He had told me everything about himself that he wanted me to know. I was sure that, however hard I might try, nothing more would be given to me here. He had lured me to this house, to this room, he had encouraged me to take off all my things, to circumcise the foreskin of my heart, as it were, now, clothed in the invulnerable armour of death, he stood on the other side of the sluggish river with his beloved Dan, laughing at my vain attempts to make his life my own. Suddenly I was very tired. I switched off the bedside lamp, filling the room with the early dawn light growing. Then I climbed under the sheet, lying down for the first time, relaxing into the space where his body, their bodies, had been. Adam and Dan smiled, their arms round each other's shoulders, their frail torsos little more than pale luminous blurs in the lightening gloom. A profound intimacy, certainly. Adam had told me that. Like brothers, perhaps. Dan the brother Adam had never had. But how far did that intimacy go? Remember, Rick! The sin against the Holy Spirit! Always give yourself, and everybody else, the benefit of the doubt. Poor mortal Dioscuri offering each other only our mortality I lay there, wide awake now, listening to the gulls, watching the room growing brighter about me, wondering how many times, in the past twelve months, Adam had done the same, in anguish of spirit, thinking of his dear dead Dan as I now was thinking of him.

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Eventually I slept, but badly, fitfully, having to remove my pyjama top because of the heat, still tossing, waking, my sleep a confused jumble of disturbing dreams. In noctis spatium miserorum vulnera durant.

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At first it seems I am walking through Somers Town, past St Aloysius Church. The Apostle of the Young. I am just opposite, looking across the road, when two boys on bicycles come out of a side street. Both have their faces averted. I head towards Euston while they circled slowly around me, almost as if in slow-motion, always keeping their faces averted, sometimes dropping behind, at other times pulling ahead and then stopping, as if waiting for me to catch up. I pass them and stop on the next corner, pausing until the traffic has gone by. I look back, curious. They are almost on top of me. One pulls up sharply, a yard or so away. My eyes meet his. Adam Leslie stares at me, hard, not smiling. I half smile at him. He scowls, then says: Don't fucking look at me, mister! Dan comes up behind him on the other bike. They exchange a glance, then burst out laughing. I shrug, they giggle to each other, I walk on. I hear them coming up behind me again, do not look round. Adam passes silently, but Dan, learning towards me, whispers in my ear as he goes by: Pervert! They continued on down the street, half-standing in their seats as they ride. Adam, attempting to get something from his pants pocket, pulls out a handful of small change, which clatters over the footpath. Both boys stop, get off their bicycles to retrieve it, scrambling about in the gutter. I look down at them as I pass, laughing at them in my turn. They scowl up at me. I glance back one more time as I wait for the traffic-lights at Euston Road. Both boys are disappearing into Euston Station, riding high on their bikes, half-standing up like jockeys, again almost in slow-motion. Only then do I notice that the seat of Dan's trousers is brown with shit. And that from the back of Adam's knees blood flows. Then they are gone. I wonder vaguely if Adam is intending to use his return ticket to Chester. Looking across at St Pancras Church, I can not help but feel, inexplicable, that I have narrowly escaped some near disaster. I laugh. Opposite the House of Caryatids, I think, like Yuri and Lara. I head west along Euston Road, passing University College Hospital on my left, coming at last to Tottenham Court Road. I stand looking down on the Euston bypass. Only then do I remember that this is the place where Adam Leslie's body had been found. No gaudy flame of gilded plastic, I think, as there is above the underpass in Paris where Diana died. Gradually I become aware that some sort of filming is in progress. Cameras are beside me, pointing down from the concrete parapet. I also look down. On the narrow island in the middle of the road, between the contraflow of speeding traffic, a young man, quite like Adam Leslie but a couple of years older, wearing white jeans and a white shirt open almost to the waist, is running at full speed, his long hair floating behind him in the wind, towards the darkness of the underpass which disappears underneath our feet. The young man vanishes, a voice cries 'Cut!', and the young man reappears, walking slowly back to his starting place. He repeats this performance again and again, perilously close to the two streams of cars which flash past him on his little island, on either side and in both directions. One of the film crew, a young man standing quite close to me, not unlike Dan but a little older, explains what is going on. He is cheerful and friendly. They're filming a deodorant commercial, he tells me. I express surprise that the police

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will allow them to film at such a busy time of day. He grins, telling me that they haven't; that the police think it is too dangerous, but for the moment are turning a blind eye. If we're too long about it though, he laughs, they'll be down on us like a ton of bricks. I look below me. The poor young man, a little greyer and more exhausted each take but putting on a brave face whenever the cameras turn, is running again between the speeding cars, his chest heaving, glistening with sweat. I can think of easier ways to earn a living, I say. The cheerful young man laughs. I ask him why they are filming here, at this particular spot. All smiles he explains that it is because an unfortunate youth had been found dying here a couple of weeks back and that the commercial is cashing in on that, although changing the age from early to late adolescence to appeal to the teenage market, and giving the story a happy end, by having the young man escape from his prospective murderers, all because he has been shown earlier wearing only his designer jeans and spraying under his armpits, in a wonderful sequence of tanned flesh and proud nipples and rippling pectoral muscles, with a protective shield of the latest designer deodorant. In a final image he is seen, whisked away in a fast sports car by a beautiful girl who has stopped for him in the underpass; slamming the car door in the faces of the outraged assassins, together they speed off, laughing, into a sunset of endless promise. As he speaks I seem to be sitting in the front row of the Renoir Cinema One at the Brunswick Centre, watching the finished commercial on the big screen, watching the beautiful young people in their deodorised world, the handsome young man running effortlessly now, and in slow-motion, towards the deux ex machina of his inevitable assignation. How different to the exhausted, grey-faced, sober reality. And how different in its turn from the unflinching nemesis towards which Adam Leslie Betts had been so inescapably running. Life, Art, the labour of Art, the very nature of Art itself, perhaps, falsifying by its own necessary transformations. I laugh at myself for calling this commercial, even in a dream, Art. Suddenly someone flops down beside me in the next seat, sliding low, spreading long legs out in front of them. I turn to see who it is. Adam Leslie is there, munching popcorn from a carton, his eyes fixed upon the screen. He looks around at me, grins, proffers the carton. I take a handful of popcorn, out of politeness, thank him. But he is lost again in a dream. I eat the popcorn slowly, piece by piece, holding it in my left hand and taking each separate morsel between the thumb and forefinger of the right. There are seven pieces in all. The feature film begins. It is Top Gun. Adam Leslie sinks deeper into his seat. I glance at him. His eyes are glazed in absolute delight. The film drags drearily on. Adam Leslie seems to be living it all. When Tom Cruise and his friend sing "You've lost that lovin' feeling", he giggles beside me like a small boy. When Tom's best friend is killed I hear his sobs, feel his whole body shaking, look to see the tears streaming down his face. When Tom at last inevitably makes love to his girl I know, even before I confirm the fact, that the soft photography and the sentimental music which accompanies their writhing is having the desired effect, that the cloth at his crotch will be taut as a drum. I marvel at the fifteen-year-old capacity for total empathy. And at its ability to swallow whole such a nearly liquid mass of loathsome - of detestable puerility. I woke up convinced of two things. Firstly, that I could never be fifteen again. And secondly, that even if I could, I would not want it.

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It was almost as if I was leaving home. Helen and John came out to the car, Helen kissed me on both cheeks, John shook hands manfully, I promised that the next time I was in North Wales I would call again, knowing in my heart that I would not, even if I should return, Helen assured me that there was always a room in her house, for me or for Michael, and a tidier room, she added laughingly, while I protested that Adam Leslie's room had been fine, just as it was, that I had slept like a log, after my long day, and we chatted there in the sun about inconsequential things, about the weather, about my fictitious assignment in Bangor, for the benefit of which I extemporised much merely corroborative detail, intended to give artistic verisimilitude, as it were, to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative, about anything at all other than the fact, which we all seemed tacitly to acknowledge, that we would probably never see each other again. Sein blick ist schwer Schon vom geheimnis das ich niemals weiss Und leicht umflort Da er vom lenz in unsern winter traf. I had left the room, and everything in it, much as Adam Leslie himself had left it, folding the striped pyjamas roughly and leaving them under the sheet where I had found them, not attempting to tidy an untidiness which was no longer mine. Adam Leslie would be fifteen now forever. One thing only, I had realised, could not be allowed to remain the same. Two things rather. The volumes of Borges and Swift could stay. There was no harm in them now. But the two volumes of Poe! I had carefully rehearsed the casual scene I was so successfully to play with them later, at breakfast; the offhand request for permission to borrow the books, for old time's sake, to remind myself of the author Adam Leslie and I had, at fifteen, both so loved; Helen's insistence that I keep the books, as a memento of her beloved son, feeling sure that he would want me to have them; my instant refusal; her further persuasive efforts to make me take them and to elicit from the dumb misery of her husband a like encouragement; my eventual reluctant capitulation, as a favour to her, and because I would like some tangible reminder of the boy in whose room I had just spent the night

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and whose soul I had already learned to love. But the original owner of one of the books I had determined should remain a secret. That occult knowledge must always be part of the mystery religion of which I was the sole devotee. Now, standing in the sun beside my car, with the two pieces of what Aidan would doubtless have called â&#x20AC;&#x2039;incriminating evidence, the one with its so familiar worn maroon cover, packed carefully into my suitcase and safely in the boot, I was suddenly at a loss for words, knowing anything I might say in an attempt to comfort Helen and John could only bring them further and, perhaps, this time, utter desolation. -You will come back to see us again soon, Roderick?Helen smiled up at me, standing in the suburban street with her almost regal grief. -Yes, old man, you really must come.Her consort could only rise to meet her. -I will. I promise.- I lied. -How could I not, when I've fallen in love with North Wales in general, and with Bae Colwyn in particular.They both laughed at my attempt at a Welsh accent. -Come if you can.I showed a faint smile. -Thanks. If I can.-And now you're off to Bangor?-Yes. I'm off to Bangor.-Try to stop at Conwy. The castle. And the smallest house in Britain.- Helen was doing all the talking now. -But I suppose you won't have the time.-No. I won't have the time.-Never mind. That will provide you with a good excuse for a return visit.We laughed. -You'll go to church?-To church?-At Bangor? The cathedral? You must try to see that while you're there.-Why yes. I think I will.But we all three had eventually to concede that there was nothing more to say. I got into the car, slammed the door shut, put down the offside window. John remained on the footpath, but Helen stepped down into the gutter and reached her hand through the open window. I took her hand and squeezed it, hard. Her responsive squeeze had the iron of grief. -Good-bye, Roderick.-Good-bye.-And thank you. For coming.I drove off, watching their receding figures still waving in the rearview-mirror, pausing at the first cross-street, wanting to go left, knowing that they were still there, turning right, reaching out a hand to give a final wave. Then the angle of the street corner blocked them from my sight.

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I drove on, blindly, aimlessly, turning right again into the main road, realising that I was heading away from Bangor, realising then that I was not even going to Bangor. I stopped the car. It suddenly came over me that I had just lied to Mrs Betts even more than was necessary. To what cathedral, what church, could I go? And yet the desire queerly stirred in him not to have wasted his word. I had stopped, however, by a happy chance, directly opposite St Joseph's Roman Catholic Church, Colwyn Bay. The signboard boldly proclaimed it. Mass was at twelve o'clock. I looked at my watch. Eleven forty-five. -All right, God.- I said. So be it. At the door then, in a few minutes, his idea was really - as it struck him - consecrated: I was not on the edge of a splendid service which glittered and resounded; there was no flocking crowd, no blaze of altar-lights from distant depths and the swell of organ and choir. St Therésè was there, however; and St Antony; and St Joseph of course. A dozen or so mostly elderly people were saying the rosary before mass; the mumbled monotone of their collective response answering the almost inaudible lone voice. Sunlight streamed in through the windows. I sat about halfway back in the church. A few others straggled in just before midday. A man and a woman, in their seventies, sitting in front of me, knelt for a moment before the Angelus sounded. How it all came back. Hail Mary, full of Grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the Fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. AMEN. And the Word was made flesh. And dwelt among us. Hail Mary, full of Grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the Fruit of thy womb, Jesus. I even remembered when to kneel. The mass-bell sounded. A very old priest made his way to the altar. Irish. Joyce-thick spectacles which nevertheless had to be augmented by a strong magnifying-glass for the words which he no doubt had by heart. We stood for the Gospel acclamation. A reading forehead from the Holy Gospel lips according to Saint John breast: After the meal Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon son of John, do you love me more than these others do?' He answered, 'Yes Lord, you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my lambs.' A second time he said to him, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' He replied, 'Yes, Lord, you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Look after my sheep.' Then he said to him a third time, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' Peter was upset that he asked him the third time, 'Do you love me?' and said, 'Lord, you know everything; you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my sheep. I tell you most solemnly, when you were young you put on your own belt and walked where you liked; but when you grow old you will stretch out your hands, and somebody else will put a belt round you and take you where you would rather not go.' In these words he indicated the kind of death by which Peter would give glory to God. After this he said, 'Follow me.' Pause. This is the Gospel of the Lord. Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ. We sat. All over the world. Today. Millions of people are being told to Feed my sheep. In hundreds of languages. The same readings. The same mass. The same old Irish priest. Or one very much like him. Wash away my iniquities. Your iniquities! Pray. Stand. That my sacrifice and yours. My sacrifice! May be acceptable. Acceptable? The Lord be with you. And also with you. Lift up your hearts. We lift them up to the Lord. Not as good as the old Latin. What was it now. Dignum et iustum est. It is right everywhere and always to give him thanks and praise. Everywhere and always. Join in their unending hymn of praise. Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of power and might,

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heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini. Hosanna in excelsis. Kneel. That they may become the body and blood of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, at whose command we celebrate this eucharist. The old hands moving above the altar, over the paten and chalice, the bread and the wine. Bow the head. On the night he was betrayed, he took bread and gave you thanks and praise. L'Ultima Céna. Remember Leonardo's disciple suddenly understanding what is going on. Like Parsifal after he has been kissed by Kundry. The priest does nothing, Roderick. He merely stands in for Our Lord during the consecration. He can be thinking about the winner of the 3.20 at Newmarket. Remember Canon Bartlett. Your old mentor. This is my body. And Father Tracy. We are not required to believe that there is anyone in Hell, only in its existence. No, not even Judas. We don't know what was in his mind at the moment of death. And Augustine. sed tantummodo memoriam sui ad altare tuum fieri desideravit. Remember him at your altar, Lord. Which will be given up for you. Look up. Our Lord held aloft as the apex of an isosceles triangle whose base, being a space, is infinite, extending in its mercy to all humanity. Bow the head again. This is the cup of my blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant. It will be shed for you and for all so that sins may be forgiven. Do this in memory of me. Look up again. Es starrt der Blick dumpf auf das Heilsgefäss: - Das heil'ge Blut erglüht: QED. I bowed my head again. Surely his sins, his many sins, must have been forgiven him, or he would not have shown such great love. It is the man who is forgiven little who shows little love. The priest's voice droned on. Lord, remember those for whom we offer this sacrifice. Forgive him, Father, for he knew not what he did. Welcome into your kingdom our departed brothers and sisters and all who have left this world in your friendship. We hope to enjoy forever the vision of your glory, through Christ our Lord, from whom all good things come. Through him, with him, in him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honour is yours, almighty Father, forever and ever. AMEN. AMEN. The mass had ended. I lingered on in the quiet church, strangely at peace. For what had Father Lawrence sent me down here, what had all my metaphysical sleuthing hoped to discover, other than acceptance of the fact I now seemed to know I had known all along, that all I could do, all I would ever be able to do, for Adam Leslie, for his beloved Daniel, for his desolate parents, for myself, for everyone, as it were, was to pray? This wasn't the Brompton Oratory. It wasn't even Farm Street. It didn't match his own day, but it was much less of a discord than some other things actual and possible. St Joseph's Colwyn Bay, in short, to make me right, would do.

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There was, however, in Colwyn Bay, one other thing actual and possible I still had to do. I turned the car and drove back up the street from which I had just come, avoiding Lansdowne Road, my excuse for still being there all ready should I meet Helen on her way to the shops or John buying his paper, knowing in my heart that they were again both sitting in their darkened front room, as it were, nursing their memories. I followed the narrow winding road up into the hill behind the town, finding with ease the Welsh Mountain Zoo. I paid at the entrance, was given a map of the Zoo and told where to park by a friendly old Welshman. -Do you know Peris Roberts?- I asked casually. -Peris Roberts. Yes. Of course.-Where can I find him?-He should be up at the Safari restaurant.He pointed it out to me on the map. -Thanks.-He hasn't done anything wrong, I hope.- He joked with me, making conversation. -I hope not either.- I joked back. -You haven't brought news about his job?-Job?-Yes. He's been trying to get a post on a cruise ship. Work his way to Australia.-No. No. Nothing like that. Just got a message for him.-Do you know Peris?-No. Not yet.- I paused. -Must be an adventurous young man.He raised his eyes heavenward. -My God, yes! Always rock-climbing. Wales isn't big enough for him. Last year it was France. A place called Grenoble, I think. Now Australia. He thinks the rocks will be bigger there.I laughed. -They will.I decided to risk it. -Did you know Adam Betts?His eyes suddenly went dead. -My God! Don't mention it. That poor boy. I couldn't believe when I read in the papers. That sort of thing only happens to other people.-Yes. I know.He looked at me suspiciously. -Did you know him?I decided to come clean.

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-No. I'm a journalist. From London.He relaxed. -A journalist. London. That's why you're looking for Peris?-Yes.He became almost confidential. -I still can't believe it. Such a wild boy. So lively. Used to come here all the time.-Wild?He looked to heaven again. -My God! You've no idea. The things those boys used to get up to. Adam was the worst. Always playing practical jokes. Pranks. I got quite annoyed with him sometimes. But now. I just can't believe that he won't swagger in here again. And such a terrible way for the poor lad to go.-Yes.- I agreed. A car had pulled up behind me, another behind him. -Ah well. Another customer. I must let you go. You have a word with Peris. He'll tell you all you want to know about Adam Betts.I thanked him, pulled away from the entrance. I parked my car, with the aid of the map traced my path to the Safari restaurant, passing a cage whose population of spider-monkeys set up an outraged chatter, swinging ostentatiously from their ropes in an attempt to divert my attention from the task in hand. I ordered a cup of filter coffee and a slice of toasted tea-cake from a thickset young man, looking around for a familiar face. I took my coffee. -I think I'll sit out on the terrace.The young man was most helpful. -Don't you wait. We'll bring your tea-cake out to you when it's ready.-Thanks.I wandered onto the terrace with my cup of coffee, sat on a wooden seat at a wooden plank table. Below me, in a large enclosure fenced in with double wire, a lion and a lioness were stretched out together in the sun. At a nearby table a little girl was attempting to wake the lions, pelting them with morsels of food which fell woefully short of their target. Her father admonished her. -How would you like something to land on your head when you were trying to sleep? Lions don't eat biscuits anyway.- The little girl looked guiltily down. Her father picked her up. -Now I know a lovely juicy little girl that they'd really love to have for their dinner.- The little girl giggled and buried her face in her indulgent parent's beard. A young man was making his way to my table with the tea-cake. Slim, small, with dark black hair, I instantly recognised the near-naked youth from the photos, even with his white shirt, black trousers, black waistcoat and white apron. I gave him a pound. He looked puzzled. -For the service. After all, this â&#x20AC;&#x2039;is â&#x20AC;&#x2039;a cafeteria.He grinned.

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-Thanks very much.-That's all right, Peris.His grin vanished. -How d'you know my name?I pointed to the plastic rectangle on the left of his waistcoat. He grinned again. -Peris. That's unusual. Never heard it before. Is it Welsh?-Yes. You don't know Wales?-No. I'm from London.-My father used to be an engineer. In the steel industry. He was working in a plant near a lake when I was born. Peris. So he called me after that.-Peris. It's a nice name.-Thanks.He grinned, started away. I called him back. -Peris?He turned, on the defensive. -I knew you even before I saw your name-tag.-Knew me?-Yes. I saw you last night.-Last night?-At the Betts. You were wearing a swimsuit. You had your arm round Adam's shoulder. You had your arm round Daniel's shoulder too.He looked at me hard. -Just who bloody are you?I smiled. -I'm a journalist. Roderick Lustrum by name. I write for The Herald.His face was white. -So you're the one who's been perpetrating all the bloody sentimental rubbish for that rag of yours.I smiled grimly, agreeing. -I'm the one who’s been perpetrating all that bloody sentimental rubbish.I held out my hand to shake his. He ignored it, took the pound from his waistcoat pocket, snapped it down on the planked wooden table, turned, and disappeared back into the cafeteria without saying a word. I drank my coffee and ate my tea-cake, looking down at the sleeping lions. A spiky customer, I thought. Helen underestimated him. Aloof and arrogant? Certainly. A very nice boy? Perhaps. A tight-testicled little prick of the first water without a doubt. Suddenly my anger vanished. The last of the three. So young yet so bereaved. Think of the pain that must feed on his heart. Sorry, Adam Leslie. Sorry, Daniel. Sorry, Peris.

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But how to get through that carapace? How to touch enough of the living flesh to be admitted, not into the inner sanctum but into something even approaching amicable conversation? Play it by ear, Rick. I got up, went back inside. Peris was drying cups with a tea-towel behind the drinks' counter. The cafeteria was almost deserted. I went over. -Peris?He did not look up. -Peris, I'd like a word with you.He looked up. -Sorry, Mr Lustrum, sir. I've got my work to get done.-Peris, I need your help.He glared at me. -Bloody snooping journalist!He returned to his drying-up. -True. But past tense. I'm giving up this story. I'm giving up my job with â&#x20AC;&#x2039;The Herald.â&#x20AC;&#x2039;I realised as I was speaking that I was making public something I had not even articulated to myself. -Good for you! Now leave me alone.-Peris! I don't know how Adam Leslie died. But I do know why.Peris glanced quickly around, making sure we were not being observed, then, almost trembling, spat it in my face: -Good for bloody you! Now fucking leave me alone!Almost at a loss, something came to me. -Peris! I need your help. Urgently. And your advice. On Edgar Allen Poe. And on rock-climbing.His anger seemed to vanish almost as quickly as mine. He looked at me, his head a little on one side, incredulous. I was still an enemy, perhaps, but one that had to be placated at any cost. -All right, Mr Lustrum. You win.-Rick.-Rick?-Call me Rick.-All right, Rick.He said it through gritted teeth. -Where can we talk?He thought. -I'm working here till five. Below the restaurant terrace, just in front of the lion's enclosure, about five past. There's a bench seat. It's usually pretty quiet at that time.I laughed. -Glad this isn't Tony Aspinall's Zoo.Peris laughed too, really laughed.

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-If you were much smaller, Rick, and I was much much bigger, and the fence wasn't quite so high, I admit I'd be sorely tempted.I held out my hand; he took it, shook it uncertainly. -A truce, Peris?He was thoughtful. -A cessation of hostilities at least?He grinned, almost warmly. -Right. We did seem to get off on the wrong foot. I'm willing to give it another try.-For Adam's sake?He frowned, as if a little resentful that I had dared pronounce the sacred name. -Yes.It was all he said. He looked at his watch. -You've got a couple of hours to kill. Why not look around. There's usually a display of birds of prey at three, but I guess the wind's too strong today. There's a lot to see though.- He hesitated. -Why not visit Adam's favourites?-Adam's favourites?-Yes. The Ravens. - Ah! The Ravens.The capitol letter was implicit in both our voices. -There's an enormous old fellow Adam used to talk to. Struts around like he owns the place. I'm sure you'll get on well with him. Any friend of Adam's is a friend of his.-And of yours?Peris paused. -Any friend of Adam's is a friend of mine also.-I hope I'm a friend of Adam's. And of yours.His eyes narrowed. -Are you some kind of bloody pervert?I laughed. -Who knows. You'll have to make up your own mind about that, Peris. Perhaps I am.Perhaps I am, I thought. He laughed then. -Well, you're honest at least.-I think I'll take your advice. Have a look around. If you hear any reports of animal-worrying, at least you'll know who’s to blame.He guffawed. -Right.I held out my hand again. -Till five past five?He looked down at my hand, dried his own on the leg of his trousers, shook mine with boyish earnestness. -Till five past five.-

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He seemed to want to say more, but I turned and left the restaurant without looking back. Peris was right. The wind was too strong. There would be no birds of prey flying. A beautiful young kestrel sat upon the gauntleted arm of its handler, eager-eyed; as did an owl, its talons sunk deep into the leather at the left wrist of a surprisingly young girl. But after a brief consultation the project had to be abandoned. Sea-lions were being fed; penguins plunged gracefully past the glass panels of their underwater world, seeming to belie their awkwardness on land; a panther, black and sleek, prowled and growled; a couple of Arctic foxes sniffed at my proffered finger, their elegant faces and brown eyes looking up at me with indecipherable longing. The paths gently rose and fell, following the green undulations of the hill upon which the Zoo had been built, giving occasionally onto a distant vista of Colwyn Bay and the Irish Sea beyond. I wandered in a desultory manner, my map in my hand. Eventually, in a cage near the end of a deserted path, I found him. At first all I saw was his smaller mate, near the front of the cage, plunging her beak into the entrails of what looked like it had once been a quail. Then, from the back of the cage, seeing me, he, with many a flirt and flutter of his glossy black plumes, flew up and landed on a branch about eye-level, not far from the bars which separated us. I looked at him. He looked at me with his small black eyes. vivit et armiferae cornix invisa Minervae ille quidem saeclis vix moritura novem; -Hello.- I said, half-expecting the appropriate response, which, reason would have assured me, was merely a lesson learned by rote, doubtless caught from some unhappy master. Master Adam? â&#x20AC;&#x2039;optima prima fere manibus rapiuntur avaris; implentur numeris deteriora suis. But the bird just looked at me. No, no, no, I thought, Edgar, you got it all wrong! Not grim, not ungainly, not ghastly or gaunt or ominous. Beautiful. Quite beautiful. The stately bird (stately, yes!) pushed a small portion of a clotted and liverlike substance it carried in its beak down onto the branch quite close to me, as if offering me a share. I politely declined. Then, quite suddenly, grasping the wires of the cage with his strong beak, his claws planted firmly in the branch for leverage, he began shaking the whole cage, rattling it hard, as if desperately wanting to escape, to obliterate the barrier separating us, to join me in the freedom from which he was forever barred. Poor bird. Poor Adam Leslie. How many times have you stood where I stand, watching his frantic attempts to escape, your own heart rattling at the cage of your ribs, longing to be free. Nevermore. Nevermore. Nevermore. Nevermore. Nevermore. Never. I walked away. When I was a dozen paces off the raven stopped his rattling. I looked back. He had returned to his fretful repast. I arrived back at the lions' enclosure a little before five. They were awake now, the male sitting lazily in the sun, blinking, the female prowling, stopping occasionally to bite at the back of his neck. He, ignoring her almost as completely as he was ignoring me, merely twitched his tail, disdaining the flies also. His tawny eyes did not even bother to show boredom.

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I sat in the sun on the bench directly under the terrace where I had sat earlier eating my tea-cake and drinking my coffee, waiting. Peris was on time, his small slim figure unmistakable, even in the blue denim jeans and red blouson into which he had now changed. He sat beside me without a word, pulling the collar of his jacket up around his neck against the wind, thrusting out his short legs and crossing them in front of him, his hands deep in the jacket pockets. Plus ça change, I again thought. Even today, rebels, with or without a cause, still seem to like to dress and behave in the manner of James Dean. I wondered how much of the waiter's uniform, of the rebel's uniform, I could strip away, as it were; how much of the boy on the beach who had played with Adam and Daniel he would be willing to show. I glanced around. His nose and eyes looked straight ahead of him, apparently at the lions, from above the line of his upturned red collar. I decided to speak first. -Thanks. For coming.He looked around at me. -How did you know? About the rock-climbing? About Edgar Allen Poe?-I know quite a lot. About Adam. About Daniel. About you.His eyes flared up, blazing. -You wouldn't bloody know it from the tripe you write in that fucking scandal-sheet of yours.I had already made up my mind not to rise to any bait his anger might contrive to hook for me. -That's why I came to you. For the truth.He positively shook. -You can stick the fucking truth right up your arse, mister!I knew, at the rate we were going, in another minute he would be gone. -I thought you were willing to give it another try?He calmed a little. -I am. It's you. With your snide, superior airs.-I'm sorry, Peris. I can't help being what I am any more than you can help being what you are. I'm a Londoner. A journalist. I'm sorry I offend you.I held up both hands, feeling a little like Chamberlain holding up his white paper flag. Peris appeared to be a little appeased. -All right.We were silent a moment. -I told you earlier. I'm giving up this story. I'm leaving The Herald. I only want to find out more about Adam now for my own benefit.-Your own benefit?I decided to risk it. -Yes. Because I love him. As you do.Peris looked at me hard, apparently found something in my eyes. He grinned. -You do bloody love him, don't you!-

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Might as well be hung for a pound as for a penny. -I spent last night in Adam's room. In his bed. Reading Poe. In his pyjamas.He stared at me, half-laughing, incredulous. -You are a bloody pervert, aren't you!I lifted both hands. -If you say so.He seemed to show genuine interest. -But why?-Why?-Why Adam?-I don't know.He burst out laughing. -Rick, I think I'm getting to like you.I smiled, I hope, wryly. -I wish I could say the same about you.His laughter grew. -You really are a nut-case, Rick.-I guess I am.Suddenly his laughter ceased. -You know nothing! About him! About us! That rubbish you wrote. That wasn't the Adam I knew. The First Man was no plaster saint.My scalp bristled. -The First Man?Peris smiled. -That's what Daniel and I called him.-And Daniel?He hesitated. -Daniel was The Prophet.-And you?He thought for a moment, then brought it out. -I was The Lake.-And when did all this start?He looked at me hard again. -You want to join us?I smiled. -I know that I can never be a founder member, but I'd be honoured by an offer of honorary membership.He smiled too. -And what would you like to be known as?I hesitated a long while before I dared answer. -The Second Adam, perhaps.He looked at me as if he already knew what I was going to say.

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-Right. The Second Adam. But you'll need to know a lot more about the first one before you can even begin to hope to emulate him.-Right.He thought for a moment. -OK. This was his favourite practical joke. The best one he ever played. So he said. He laughed about it with me for hours.-And with The Prophet?He seemed to marvel at my stupidity. -He played it on The Prophet.-Ah!He smiled up at me, nodding. -Now you see! The Prophet was staying over with him for the night. They were sharing The First Man's bed. And his pyjamas. They drew lots. To see which one would get which half. The Prophet lost. He got the top half. The First Man won the pants. During the night, when The Prophet was dead to the world, The First Man pulled back the sheets. The Prophet was lying flat on his face, his bare arse stuck up in the air. You know what The First Man did? You want to know? He had a box of those Belgian chocolates. You know, those soft ones shaped like shells, mottled with white chocolate? He crept out of bed. You want to know what he did? He pushed a couple of them, ever so carefully, between the cheeks of The Prophet's bum, got back into bed, and just lay there. To give the heat time to melt them. Then he threw his leg over The Prophet's leg, as though in his sleep. The Prophet turned over onto his back, but didn't wake. The First Man gave the chocolate a little longer, then he sat up, as if with a start, waking The Prophet. The First Man relished every detail of it later, telling me: The Prophet's realisation; his shame; his blushes; his tears. The First Man even made The Prophet get up, in the middle of the night, and wash the shit from off the sheets. They had to sit up until nearly dawn waiting for them to dry, The First Man threatening to tell his parents, me, everyone, taunting The Prophet with his incontinence. He really rubbed his nose in it.He left off, never taking his eyes off me. I said nothing. Peris grinned. -Well, that was Adam all over!He turned away, spat on the ground, seemed to be looking at the lions. I waited a little before I spoke. -They were only boys.He turned to me again, almost violently. -They should have known better. He should have known better. I certainly should have known better.-It was harmless. Naughty, but harmless.-Naughty?-I bet Daniel had a good laugh about it when he found out.-Found out!He looked at me, incredulous. -You really are an innocent, Rick. You've forgotten what it was like being a boy.-

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That got to me. -You bloody tell me then, Peris.He smiled knowingly. -That's better, Rick. I like you much better now.-Thanks, Peris. I still wish I could say the same about you.He looked at me, almost amused. -Little boys is nasty. Particularly little Welsh boys.His polite North Welsh accent had suddenly dropped into deepest Swansea. -I take your word for it.But he was serious again. -Daniel never found out. That was the whole point. If the one the joke was played on ever found out, the other had to do everything, anything he was told to do, for a whole day.-But what's the point if the victim never knows?-That was the point!He seemed amazed at my naiveté. -I still don't see.He turned on me, eyes narrowed. -If you want to join The Brotherhood you have to stick by the rules. Otherwise no membership. Not even honorary membership.He looked away in disgust. -All right. I accept the rules.He turned back. -You'll never be The Second Adam. You haven't got the balls for it.I decided to ignore his needling. -But surely Daniel must have got the better of Adam sometimes. And of you. And laughed about it with you. Or with Adam.-No one ever got the better of Adam.-And of you?He grinned. -Well, I wouldn't know about that then, would I?I could only grin too. -Peris, I think I am beginning to like you. Just a little bit.His grin broadened. -That's because you know me a little bit. The more you get to know me, the more you'll like me.I laughed. -It could work the other way.Suddenly he was serious. -No. The more you know somebody, the more you like them. Love them even. If you knew them completely you'd love them completely. The way God does.I looked down. -Peris, you make me ashamed.When I looked back at him I felt the tears in my own eyes, seeing them in his.

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We both sat there, watching the lions lazy in the sun, for a long time. Eventually Peris spoke. -I like you Rick. If I knew you better I would no doubt love you. But more importantly I trust you. That's why I want you to know what happened.I said nothing, not even looking at him. He was silent again for a long time. -I'm the only one still alive. The only one who knows. And if something should happen to me. It would die with me.I sensed the smile on his lips. -I'm hoping to go to Australia quite soon. You never can tell. I'd like to tell somebody. Before I go.Still I said nothing. He didn't seem to know where to start. -Adam was The First Man. In everything. Right from the beginning. I was older, but I was so small. Insignificant. Adam could do exactly what he wanted with me. And Daniel! Poor Daniel. â&#x20AC;&#x2039;I could do what I wanted to with him! But he was The Prophet. He was the intellectual. Always with his nose in a book. Even Adam, I think, looked up to him in a way. That's probably why he was always trying to take him down. Make him look small. He didn't have to do that with me. I was small enough already. I was The Lake. Peris the Lake. I didn't signify. I was permitted to hang around to witness their antics. I was the camera. They were the big stars. I was needed to record every humiliation. How Adam would have loved to have had me there with them on that night. Daniel wearing nothing but pyjama-tops. Daniel with the chocolate running down his legs. Daniel's shame. Daniel's tears. Daniel washing himself clean. As it was Adam had to be satisfied to report it all to me. In loving detail.He left off. I said nothing, waiting for him to continue in his own time. -Adam was a bully-boy, Rick. Despite his charm, despite his long hair, despite his good-looks and soft features, he was a bully-boy. I don't blame him. He was an only child. They spoiled him rotten. He only had to ask for something and it was his. He learned to ride roughshod over everyone at his mother's knee. And poor old Mr Betts just went along with everything she said. So what was The First Man to do but think himself The Last Word. And he did, Rick, he did.He left off again. The lioness, who had been prowling, bounded onto a rock in the centre of the enclosure, lay down, and stretched out full length in the warm sun. The lion merely flicked his tail. -On our last time at The Gower, the last time we were together, Daniel had attempted some stupid ineffectual practical joke and Adam had found out about it. He was triumphant, strutting about the beach like a rooster. Naturally Daniel had to do everything he was told. Those were the rules. The rules The First Man had himself devised. All good harmless childish fun. As usual I was the photographer. Daniel was buried in the sand, tied up, trussed like a chicken. He loved every moment of it. So did I. We both loved to see Adam happy and triumphant. It seemed his birthright; the medium in which he most naturally flourished. Daniel was only too willing to have Adam ride on his shoulders, to get down on all fours, a makeshift harness between his teeth, with Adam astride his back, gleefully guiding him this way and that, digging hard heels into unresisting flanks.-

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Again Peris fell into silence. The lions were at rest. I scarcely breathed. The old exile took up the refrain: nunc eques in tergo residens huc laetus et illuc mollia purpureis frenabas ora capistris. -Eventually even Adam grew weary. He flung himself onto the beach, spread-eagle on his back, his eyes closed, drinking in the hot sun. Daniel, of course, waited on him hand and foot; rubbing the sun cream into his chest and legs, bringing him food, drinks, feeding him morsels of those bloody Welsh cakes. The First Man luxuriated. But I think Daniel was even more happy. He loved Adam so much. He would gladly have died for him.Somewhere a bird shrieked. I risked a look at Peris. His eyes were closed, remembering. molliter in tacito litore compositam! -Then I was the one who had to see it. Far out, bobbing about on the water, scarcely distinguishable, what looked like a child's blowup rubber boat. Adam sat up, sheltering his eyes with one hand. It was empty, obviously escaped from a more populated part of the beach. Adam turned to Daniel. "Prophet, fetch me that thing." That was all he said. Daniel pulled a long face. But The First Man was peremptory. "At once!" Daniel staggered to his feet, without a word, and made his way down to the water's edge. Then he plunged in without looking back. Adam and I chatted about inconsequential things, not even bothering to watch him. Daniel was such a strong swimmer. He had taught Adam to swim! It wasn't for a long while that we even began to worry. The boat was still there, but bobbing about in the distance a little further off. We had expected Daniel to have it halfway back by then. We both jumped up. Nothing. Nothing at all. Absolutely nothing.Oed' und leer das Meer. -We searched for him desperately. Both of us. But it was no good. I had to give up first, exhausted. But Adam wouldn't give up. Again and again he plunged in, each time swimming out as far as he could, returning, flinging himself onto the beach, his chest heaving convulsively, then staggering up again. I tried to stop him. But he just glared at me, unable to speak. He had long since lost his swim-trunks, or had discarded them. The First Man, who had been for me always the heights of self-assurance, was a naked frantic distraught boy plunging again and again into the sea, emerging again and again, crawling on all fours up the beach, collapsing, spent, sobbing his energy back for a further effort. Each time he vanished into the waves I thought never to see him emerge again either. He did though, at the last, dragging something with him. I could see it was too late, anybody could have seen it was too late, but The First Man couldn't see. He wouldn't see. Every piece of first-aid he had ever learned he must have put into practice. Some I think he made up on the spot. He lay The Prophet on his belly in an effort to pump out the water. He stuck two fingers down The Prophet's throat, attempting to shift the tongue, to release the vomit. He tried mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. He beat The Prophet's chest with his fist, willing the heart to start up again. But The Prophet was dead. The First Man knelt on the beach, sobbing, begging God to take his own life, to let The Prophet live. Once more I saw The Prophet's chest rising and falling, filled with the breath of The First Man as he turned again to the kiss-of-life. But each time he left off the chest failed to rise. He had to admit defeat, eventually. Even The First Man. He knelt beside The Prophet in the sand, half-sitting, looking down at his face. He wasn't crying. He was too far gone for that. I thought for a moment he was praying again. But he wasn't. Not a regular prayer. He was gasping out a few

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broken words, as if to himself, over and over again. "Chocolate, Dan. Chocolate. Not shit. Chocolate. Chocolate."Peris stopped. I looked around at him. His eyes were still closed, the red collar of his blouson still pulled up round his neck. The little girl I had seen earlier came past along the path with her father and mother. She pointed at the lions, shivered, laughed, clung to her father as they went by. I just waited. inter Baianas raptus puer occidit undas, Eutychos ille, tuum, Castrice, dulce latus. -After The Prophet died things just fell apart. Adam had always taken it for granted that he was The First Man. I had taken it for granted. But I think we both realised then that Daniel had really occupied that post in all but name. He had made all the decisions, he had mapped out all our adventures, and he had been clever enough to make Adam believe that they were his. He had been the power behind the throne, the eminence grise, the Rasputin, if you like. And now he was dead the fate of the Tsar of all the Russias seemed assured. He had manipulated us both into believing that Adam was manipulating him. And now whenever The First Man looked into The Lake all he saw was his own reflection staring sullenly back at him. Every time we were together The Prophet was there. Alive he had been a slave, a servant, the court-jester, a mirror in which The First Man could admire himself; dead he had become, through me, when we were together, merely a reflecting surface which flashed back at us unsparingly an image of fallen man. We saw each other less and less often, even though we live only a couple of streets apart. I started rock-climbing in earnest. But never with Adam. I had new friends. Adam had lost interest in all his sports. The First Man! The athlete of the school! He had become the swat; the scholar; the reader; the intellectual! He had asked Daniel's mother for a couple of Daniel's favourite books. In memory. She had given him Poe and Borges. Poe and Borges! For Adam, who always had had his nose in a comic-book and considered Stephen King to be his serious reading! Whose idea of an art-house movie was Top Gun! Then he started buying CDs of all Daniel's favourite music: Mahler and Mozart and Beethoven. Whenever I did call to see him some classical muck was playing. Or else he would be pouring over some old book. Usually Poe. But he wasn't cut out for it. Not Adam. The First Man was never meant to be anything but himself. Now he had been expelled from Eden. Now he had to work by the sweat of his brow. But he wasn't cut out for it. I would look up and see him, not engrossed, not enjoying his reading, but gazing fixedly at something, who knows, a spot on the margin, the number of the page, a mark on the wall of his room, anything. Anything but the reading itself. He never seemed to get any pleasure out of the reading itself. But he would go on. Sometimes he would take up a pencil and ruler and carefully underline some phrase or sentence. I would get up and look over his shoulder. It usually turned out to be some passage about water or drowning. He would look angrily around, slam the book shut, glare up at me. "You know nothing!" he'd say. "How could you. Only Poe understands me. And Rick. Poe can't come, but Rick will come. Rick won't let me down."Peris stopped, looked round at me. -Rick!I looked at him. -Yes?-

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His face relaxed into a grateful smile. -That's why I agreed to talk to you today. To tell you all this. You're the Rick the book was dedicated to. The melior mihi frater.I too smiled. -Yes.Peris looked a little like a small boy who has just been given the gift he had for so long desired. He turned away, averting his face, seemed to be observing an ant crawling near the toe of his left shoe. I said nothing. When he did speak, he spoke with the tongues of men and of angels, and with love. -The First Man did become The Prophet after all.The lioness was still asleep. The lion, not moving, looked at us, blinking tawny eyes in the afternoon sun. O Daniel, servant of the living God, is thy God, whom thou servest continually, able to deliver thee from the lions? The imaginative leaps we were both being forced to make seemed, despite their distances, to require no further explication on either side. Peris eventually went on. -Little is left to tell. The last time I saw Adam was a week before he died. The day before his birthday. He didn't want me to come to his place on the day. I don't think he could face it. Instead we went to a movie. We sat in the front row, shared some popcorn, like we always used to do. At least we didn't have to talk. We could just be there together. We saw The English Patient. I thought that it stunk. I would have left halfway through.I laughed. -Couldn't agree with you more.He looked at me, as if confirming further occult sympathies between us. -Adam seemed to like it though. Right at the end, when the nurse gave the injection to the Patient, and after he had died, the way she smiled; I heard him sobbing next to me, trying not to, his leg shuddering against my own. Afterwards we waited for the lights to come up, sat through all those interminable titles, with half the audience already gone. We didn't discuss the film. We didn't talk much at all. We just stood outside in the street together, reluctant to part. I gave him his birthday present in advance. An old copy of Gulliver's Travels. I knew he wanted to read that next. Poe and Borges had both mentioned it, apparently. That was enough for him. He thanked me, I wished him a Happy Birthday for the next day, and we parted, just like that. He never even mentioned his trip to London the following weekend. He'd long since given up confiding in me. It never occurred to me that I might not see him again. I didn't even watch him walking away.Peris broke off. He seemed to be watching the ants again. He lifted his left heel, brought it down, crushing two or three who had gathered around a fragment of sweet. As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; They kill us for their sport. The lion lazily roared. Eventually I spoke. -And now you're off to Australia, Peris?-

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He looked at me. -Soon, I hope. I want to work my way over. On a cruise ship. Waiting at tables. I've got a friend Down Under already. He writes and tells me the rock-climbing there is terrific. Better even than France.-It means a lot to you? Rock-climbing?He smiled. -Everything. I love it. At the end of a good day you're too exhausted to eat or drink or do anything. Even think. You just want to sleep.-Sounds like hard work.He looked at me strangely. -It's a joy.We were silent again. -Peris. Before you go, if you can face it, try to call at the Betts. I think Helen is a little hurt that you haven't.He looked at me as if somewhat disappointed that my imagination had not been sufficient for this final leap. -Rick! I don't know how Adam died. From what I read in your wonderful paper it was a pretty horrible death. Now you want me to call and express my deepest sympathies. I'm not that much of a hypocrite. What could I say if I did call? "Glad to hear Adam's dead, Mrs Betts. You killed him and I killed him as surely as that degenerate fucker who cut the tendons at the back of his knees. But I'm glad he's dead. And I know he wanted to die. Because now he's away from the whole rotten lot of us." Do you think that would be a comfort?His eyes blazed. -Peris. Peris.I put my hand on his shoulder. He squirmed away from me as Tom had done. -You really are a pervert, Rick. Maybe you killed Adam. Maybe that's why you're down here, investigating. To put people off the scent.-Peris. Peris.I shook my head. He imitated me: -Peris. Peris.He had become the silly spiky rebel again. Suddenly I lost patience. -Perhaps you could teach me a thing or two about perversion. You and your precious Adam and Daniel.Peris suddenly became quiet. He looked at me almost pityingly. -Rick, Rick. You really have forgotten what it was like being fifteen. You've passed the point of no return. I should have realised you were too old, even for temporary membership. The Second Adam! Rick, O Rick, it would never have even occurred to Adam, the first Adam, my Adam, to stick anything other than a Belgian chocolate up Daniel's arse.I looked down at the ground.

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We were both silent for a time. When I did speak I spoke without looking up. -Peris, for the second time this afternoon you put me to shame.We both were silent again. Eventually Peris got up. He stood looking down at me. -Rick. I don't know if I like you. That's not important. But I do love you. That's why I'm glad you're leaving the newspaper. You've been a journalist too long. You deserve something better.I looked up at him. -A rock-climber, perhaps?He laughed. -I don't know if you could ever aspire to those heights.We were both laughing. I stood up. -Rick!Peris was looking up at me. -You'll never know the whole truth. About anything. I don't want to know any more about Adam's death. He's dead. That's enough for me. You'll never even know if everything that I've told you today is true. You are an honorary member still, remember. And there's only the two of us now. So if you are the victim, and my practical joke is successful, you'll never find out. Just as I'll never find out if you, Rick, are really the melior mihi frater. And I don't want to know. Because if either of us ever did find out, the other would have to go round for a whole day doing anything and everything he was told. And that might not be to either of our liking.I looked down at him. -You've passed the point of no return too, Peris.His eyes shone up at me. -I passed the point of no return one day last summer, on a sunny deserted beach.I smiled. -I can't even remember when I passed mine. But I do remember the day when I finally admitted it to myself.He smiled too. We shook hands gravely. -I wish you all the very best in the New World, Peris.-And to you, Rick. Wherever you are, whatever you do.-Look after yourself.-You look after your self.He waved an admonishing finger at me, turned, and walked quickly away, a James Dean in his red blouson. A Daniel come to judgement, yea, a Daniel! I sat down, watched him disappearing up the path. And they brought those men which had accused Daniel, and they cast them into the den of lions. The lions just looked at me.

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And there was, before I returned to London, yet another thing actual and possible I still wanted to do. illa in arcem abivit, aedem visere Minervae. aedem visere Minervae? parva licet videas Captae delubra Minervae, Ubi? Deva. Quamobrem? Tu nihil invita dices faciesve Minerva. Invita Minerva? Quia nihil decet invita, ut aiunt, Minerva, id est adversante et repugnante natura. Quando? Cras. Cras? Hodie. Hodie? Hodie! The Zoo was closing. Colwyn Bay had given up her secrets. Now it was time to leave. I followed the leafy winding lane back down into the town, passed Lansdowne Road for the last time, turned right at the main intersection, was soon heading towards Chester. A hitchhiker stood by the roadside. Jeans. Checked shirt. Backpack. I stopped. -Chester?-Sure. Hop in.He sat in the front beside me, heaved his backpack over onto the back seat. -Thank you, sir.Dark hair, about twenty-five, strong Italian accent. We drove off. I glanced across at him.

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-Which part of Italy are you from?He grinned. -You knew I was Italian?-Your accent.-Si.-Which part?-Milano.-Ah, Milano. Beautiful city.He shrugged. -Not so beautiful as Venezia. Or Roma.-Perhaps not. But more international.-International?-More a big city. Like Paris or London. Not so provincial as Roma or Venezia.-Si, si, not so provincial. A big city.-And it does have L'Ultima Céna.-Ah, L'Ultima Céna!hoc est enim Corpus meum. -And l'ultimo Michelangelo. The unfinished Pietà. At the Castello Sforzesco.-Ah si, molto bello.-Bellissima!We fell into silence. The sun was still quite high in the sky, but the afternoon had taken on a stale, spent air. When I glanced across at him again, the Italian was sleeping like a little child, his head resting against the closed window beside him. There was some light traffic on the outskirts of Chester, but not much. The Italian slept through it all. I pulled up in a parking bay near the railway station, not knowing which part he wanted, reluctant to wake him. But when I switched off the engine he woke. He looked about uncomprehendingly for a moment. Then he recollected himself. -Scusi, Signore. Sono stanco. Grazie.I smiled. -Di niente.I helped him out with his backpack. -I didn't know which part of Chester you wanted. You're not allowed to drive in most of the main streets. I thought the station was a safe bet.He grinned. -Perfetto. Grazie.We stood by the car, shook hands. -My name is Roberto. Thank you very much.He pronounced each word individually and carefully. I grinned too. -Perfetto. Mine is Rick. Riccardo.Roberto was all smiles.

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-Ciao, Riccardo.-Ciao, Roberto.I watched him walk away, feeling strangely alone. I wandered up the road and into the newly refurbished Victorian railway station with its Crystal Palace roof. I stood upon the platform. The line was overgrown with grass and weeds. Directly across from me, on the wall of the platform opposite, a weathered sign, probably as old as the station itself, boldly proclaimed: LONDON 85 MILES

179 MILES

HOLYHEAD

Suddenly I was Adam Leslie Betts, standing on this same railway platform two Fridays ago, having just hitched his last ride from Colwyn Bay to Chester, his London return ticket bought and in his pocket, his subterfuge successful, looking along the twin tracks in the direction of London towards the point where they seem to meet and to become one, tears in his eyes, knowing that he at least would nevermore return. Lord, help my poor soul! I returned to the car, found a parking space just off Foregate Street, mounted the steep steps to the mediaeval walls at the old Eastgate, its decorative ungainly Victorian clock anachronistic in that special way the Victorians had of adding their own particular tone to whatever remains of the past. Signs pointed to the River Dee. I headed in that direction, stopping occasionally to lounge on the parapet and look down at the Roman Gardens with their architectural fragments and at the ruins of the stone amphitheatre where a young man in Roman Legionary attire was instructing a small group of captive tourists. I left the mediaeval walls just before the river, crossed the Old Dee Bridge to the south bank, passed the pub and shops. Eyes right! portusque patescit iam propior, templumque apparet in Arce Minervae. Even in the distance I recognised it at once, carved into an outcrop of rock in what had once been the ancient quarries, a grassy slope now leading up to, surrounding, surmounting it. I approached slowly, respectfully, keeping my eyes on it all the time, hardly noticing the grass beneath my feet. Rather it seemed to approach me, to grow in size as I drew nearer, more like moving toward something in a dream, or in a scene from a film, than like something in real life. Eventually I stood directly in front of it. It was, as a ruin, distinctly disappointing. Not very large. More of an aedicula than an aedem. Almost obliterated by the years. The figure itself worn smooth. The spear in the right hand, the owl on the left shoulder, mere shadows only, reconstructed more in the mind than by any visible evidence. The whole covered by a sheet of protective Perspex. But it was not a ruin that I had come to see. Stable trésor, temple simple à Minerva, Masse de calme, et visible réserve... I closed my eyes.

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Ô mon silence!... Édifice dans l'âme... I stood for a long time with my eyes closed. Then I opened them. A ce point pur je monte et m'accoutume... Some boys were playing ball, quite a long way off. Their distant cries were like the sound of seagulls. nunc ades o coeptis, flave Minerva, meis. Here too Adam Leslie must have stood on that same Friday, visiting Minerva for the last time. Before making his way to the station. And to London. pars stupet innuptae donum exitiale Minervae And lay here on the grass, perhaps, in the sun, his eyes closed, wondering how. sic, nisi vittatis quod eret Cassandra capillis, procubuit templo, casta Minerva, tuo. I sunk down upon the grassy bank, stretching out on my back in the sun, closing my eyes, wondering why. why rick why rick i don't know why you don't know why peris doesn't know why and my parents don't know why but i know you told me why you know nothing i told you but but daniel was dead and i wanted to love him love him wanted to be him were him it was too late he had taken my breath you gave him your breath yes because it was his Beau ciel, vrai ciel, regarde-moi qui change! if you become me rick you too will die Je m'abandonne à ce brilliant espace... watch out for me rick i'm deadly I shut my eyes tighter. Sur mes yeux clos, secrets éblouissants... secrets peris doesn't want to know peris always was a jealous little prick jealous of daniel of our love peris loves you adam loves no one but himself and must i then give you all the benefit of the doubt Une étincelle y pense à mes absents.

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you most of all rick you must give and to yourself give first the benefit of the doubt A sudden breath of wind played on my face. Minerva spira... I sat up, opened my eyes. All was silent. The afternoon sun sunk low. In some far playground the voices of children had ceased. Ce lieu me plaît... I lay back down again, closed my eyes. -Ce lieu me plaît...Suddenly Adam and Daniel and Peris were there, carefree as they had once been, scrambling over the grassy mound, playing about that antique shrine, their voices full of childish expectation, the grass itself receiving the sudden pressure of their vanished feet. Tout va sous terre et rentre dans le jeu! I thought of London, of The Herald and my job, of Aidan and Tom, even of Anne. All of it seemed like so much straw compared with what had been revealed to me. Ici venu, l'avenir est paresse. I did not know what I had come here for but I did know that I had found it, even though I still didn't know what it was. Reluctantly I stood up. It was time to go. Le vent se lève!... il faut tenter de vivre!

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Mike was the first person I told. We met, as we so often did, at the urinals. I was unbuttoning when Mike came in. -Rick! Hi-ya! Great to see you back.He came up beside me, looked down. -Christ, Rick. Those Farhi jeans of yours. Get on with it! You unbutton like an old Edwardian.He was unzipped and out while I was still fumbling. And so the trajectories of our, first sequent, then simultaneous, urinations were similar; but our organs of micturition â&#x20AC;&#x2039;not â&#x20AC;&#x2039;reciprocally rendered invisible by manual circumposition: we knew each other too well for that. I liked pissing with Mike. -How went the holiday?I hesitated. -Fine. Just fine.-Where'd you end up?I decided on the best policy. -Colwyn Bay.For a moment Mike said nothing, as if not able to piss and put two and two together at the same time. Then he did and seemed to make five. -Christ, Rick. I thought you wanted to get away from it all for a few days.-I decided on a hair of the dog.-Hair of the dog? Not a bloody hair-shirt!-You'd be surprised how quickly I got used to wearing it.-But why Rick? Why Colwyn Bay?I was silent. -You didn't bloody visit the Betts again?I laughed. -And they both asked me to give you their regards.He was at a loss. -Why Rick? Why fucking why?He was shaking off the drips, hard. -Careful, Mike. More than five shakes and it's a jerk.-Bloody wanker!He zipped up and went across to the sinks.

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I took my time, calling over to him. -Trust a good old-fashioned girl like Nicole to bring back buttoned flies. She wants us gentlemen to take our time, whether it be pissing or serving a lady.-Bloody wanker!Mike seemed stuck in a grove. I joined him at the sinks. When I looked up I saw in the mirror that he was crying. -Damn bloody wanker!-Mike!-Don't Mike me!He scrubbed his hands furiously. -Mike, Mike, Mike!He glared around at me. -Rick, Rick, Rick!I was at a loss. -But why, Mike?He dried his hands on the towel, equally furiously. Then he turned to me, put both hands on my shoulders, began massaging the back of my neck, hard. -Rick. You know how fucking much I love you?-Sure Mike. I love you too.His eyes were strange. -You know that rubbish we were talking? At Colwyn Bay?I smiled. -What particular rubbish was that? We seem to talk little else.But he wasn't smiling. -About ending up in the red? At the end of a rope?I kept smiling. -That rubbish.He almost shook me, his fingers digging into my vertebrae. -Rick! I see more than you think. I know the signs. I've seen it all before.He had left me well behind. -Signs? Seen what all before?He seemed exasperated at having to spell it out. -Rick! Promise me, swear to me, by Almighty God, that you'll never even contemplate, not for a minute, ever doing any harm to yourself.I kept on smiling, even as the chill nozzle of an enema separated the cheeks of my buttocks, was inserted, forcing its way between the tightening spinnaker muscles, filling my insides with a frozen liquid, turning my bowels to ice. -Mike! You know me better than that!-Rick. You don't know. You don't have an idea. What an awful bloody thing suicide is. What it does to friends. And to family.I tried desperately to keep things light.

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-Mike. This is Rick you're talking to. Roderick Lustrum. I'm not the suicide type.He held me with his glittering eye - and with his two strong hands. -Rick. I know. What it did to me. To all my family. And it still goes on. It never ends. I don't think I could take it again. Not you. Not bloody you.Mike's eyes seemed to contain only sorrow. His fingers on the back of my neck were gentle now, as if caressing a brother. Suddenly I understood. -Mike. Mike. Your brother. The motorcycle accident.-If only he hadn't bloody left a note. If we could have been given some room for doubt. But that wasn't Davey's way. He didn't blame anybody. Only himself. Said it was his failure. That he couldn't go on. A failure! At fucking nineteen!-Mike. Mike. I'm so sorry.He held me at arm's length. -Don't be sorry. Be bloody different.-I am different.But past grief is in an instant present. -He was such a great lad, Rick. So much life in him. And Mum blamed herself. We all blamed ourselves. That's the terrible fucking part about it. We all keep on blaming ourselves. Thinking we might have done something to stop him. Even today. And being good Catholics made it worse. Makes it worse. Still for Mum. She says if Davey's in Hell, she wants to be there with him. She held onto the coffin as it went into the flames, almost as if she intended to follow him right there and then. I was like that too, for the first couple of years. I thought that if God didn't bloody want Davey, I didn't want God either. That He could keep His bloody Heaven. But I was a kid. Now I know that Davey has been forgiven. How could God not forgive Davey! The sin against the Holy Spirit. Always give everybody the benefit of the doubt. Remember? Well, I give Davey the benefit of the doubt now. Just as I do God.Mike still had both his hands on my shoulders, but more now it seemed for support. I offered him the only comfort I could. -Try, Mike, to give me too the benefit of the doubt.He took it as I had intended. -Right, Rick. The benefit of the doubt.He let go of me, smiled. Only when he had released my shoulders did I understand that his hands had carried with them the weight of the world. I too smiled for very relief. -Trust me, Mike. I may only be a Stonyhurst boy but I always remember that Ignatius himself loved and respected Francis enough to want to be a Franciscan. Just as I love and respect Brother Sun and Sister Moon too much ever to pre-empt Little Sister Death.Mike's grin reassured us both. -Great, Rick. I admit I'd feel happier if you'd been born and raised in the Parish of St Francis, Stratford East. The heart of Joan Littlewood country. But you can no more help being a

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snooty-nosed little toff born with a silver spoon up your arse anymore than I can help being the cockney kid destined to pull it out.I laughed at the re-emergence of the old Mike. -When you do, be gentle.-Gentle, hell! But I â&#x20AC;&#x2039;will â&#x20AC;&#x2039;give the silver spoon a bloody good wash before I use it.We seemed to be almost on old terms. But what had been said could not be unsaid. -You want to talk about it, Rick?I tried to fathom Mike's eyes. -No. Not particularly.-Did they find a new way to serve up Adam Leslie Betts to you, along with the Welsh cakes?I laughed. -Not Welsh cakes this time. Bakewell Tart.Mike smacked his lips. -I should have been there.I hesitated before answering his last question. -Much the same. More talk. More photos. None as good as the one we got of Adam and Daniel.Mike too hesitated before going on. -You didn't spend the night?I merely nodded assent. -In that room?-In that room. In his bed. And in his pyjamas.Mike stared. -Christ! Courageous stupid bloody cunt!I grinned. -Compliments will get you everywhere.But as I offered no more, Mike had to go on. -And did the ghost of Adam Leslie walk, perchance?I thought carefully before I spoke. -I don't know. I'm not sure. I read his books, slept in his bed. I'm still not sure. But I think I may at least have laid the ghost.-Laid?-Mike. When you come to the end of your tether there are only three options open to you: pull so hard on the rope that you hang yourself; go back and live among your own droppings in the territory you've already marked out; or break the rope and walk away. I decided on the third.Mike was all wonder. -I've already asked Harry to take me off this assignment.Mike's face shone. -Thank Christ!-I think I agree with your old Franciscan teacher now. I asked God to show me what was inside myself. And I didn't particularly like what I found.Mike laughed.

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-Sounds just like a Jesuit.-And there speaks a true Franciscan.We both laughed, suddenly ourselves again. -And what does the bloody Playgirl of the Western World think about it?-I haven't told her yet. She's still in Dublin. Can't drag herself away from the new baby niece. I spoke to her on the phone today but I didn't have the heart. Besides, she was too busy gushing. You're the first person I have told.-What about Harry?-The first human being.Mike beamed. -Compliments will get you everywhere.-That was no compliment. That was the truth.Peris, I felt, in the present instance, didn't count. Mike grinned at me. -And apart from all that, Mrs Lincoln, how was the play?-Fine. Just fine. I got some sun, some sea air, loafed. Even visited the Welsh Mountain Zoo.-Lucky devil!-There was a particularly ugly red-haired monkey put me in mind of somebody, but I can't for the life of me quite place who.Mike laughed. -Hang on a minute, Rick. A moment ago I was a human being.-Well, almost a human being. And he was a very human looking monkey.-Thanks very much.-And while there I also attended mass at St Joseph's Roman Catholic Church, Colwyn Bay.Mike was incredulous. -You! Attend mass!I supplied the mock outrage. -And why not!-Christ, Rick! And to think I was the bloody one who was worried about you!Mike was laughing, but there were tears again in his eyes. -I thought you should have known me better than that.Suddenly Mike's arms went around me and he was hugging me hard, like a bear, lifting me almost off the ground. -Mike. Mike. Someone might come in.-Fuck them. Fuck them all.Fuck them all, I thought, the psychiatrists and psychologists, the Freudians and the interpreters of dreams. Fuck the old Dubliner too. Love between man and man is not only possible but actual. And the question of sexual intercourse doesn't come into it. It doesn't even raise its head. We left the men's room together, arm in arm, innocent and laddish as a couple of lager louts. At my office door we shook hands and parted. As Mike was walking away I remembered something and called him back.

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-Mike. I almost forgot. I handed in my notice to Harry this morning. I'm no longer an employee of â&#x20AC;&#x2039;The Herald.â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Mike could only gape. -Remember? About being a newspaperman too long?-Sure Rick. But shouldn't you have bloody looked around for something else first. Jobs are scarce. What'll you do?-Play it by ear.-

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Anne was not back. The job was going on, but with little of interest coming my way. Harry saw to that. I was being run down. Social life was nil. I had the occasional drink with Mike after work, the occasional couple of drinks, but that was all. I didn't fancy the theatre, or even the pictures, without Anne. I usually went home early, eating out most nights first. But I found it hard to sleep. Somne, tuis, iuvenis placidissime divum. I read till late, but all my reading now seemed to be rereading: my two newly acquired volumes of Poe; Borges, particularly the stories whose titles Adam had so thoughtfully and neatly underlined; Swift of course. But still I couldn't sleep. si aliquis longa sub nocte puellae brachia nexa tenens ultro te, Somne, repellit? But no. All the young men in love seemed to be snoring their heads off while their girls were merely lying beside them twiddling their thumbs. aut leviter suspenso poplite transi? O Adam Leslie, Adam Leslie: nam succisi poplites membra non sustinent. And even when I did sleep I would wake up around dawn, my membrum virile hard, insistent, nunc opus exposcunt militiamque suam. But Anne was not back. Then would I lie abed, wishing myself more like Horatius Flaccus than Amyntas of Cos, cuius in indomito constantior inguine nervos, quam nova collibus arbor inhaeret. Quid faciam? scelus est, mihi crede, sed ingens, quantum vix animo concipis ipse tuo. I looked down at it, hard. Changed your tune a bit, haven't you, old boy, since Bae Colwyn? mandasset manibus gaudia foeda suis. You chose the weapons last time! nam nihil est quicquam sceleris quo prodeat ultra, Hang on, old chap. That's a bit stiff. 'istud quod digitis, Pontice, perdis, homo est.' All right! Hands off! Iam desine! God! You old Roman pricks are bigger prudes than our hard-line moral theologians. That silenced it for a time. But I knew it would not lie doggo for long. And Anne was not yet back.

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By Saturday night I had had enough. I had dined, alone, at The Criterion. The waiter asked after Anne. I said she was due back from Dublin early next week. He smiled, said he hoped to see us together again soon. Christ, I thought, so do I. But this was only Saturday night. a pereat, cui sunt prisca supercilia! I felt in my lap, under the starched white table-napkin, an irresistible pressure. pereat, qui crastina curat! Changing your tune yet again, old fellow? Mors aurem vellens 'vivite' ait, 'venio'. Good. The sooner the fucking better. Noctu ambulabat in publico Themistocles quod somnum capere non posset. Right! Where? Soho? acris ubi me natura intendit, sub clara nuda lucerna quaecumque excepit turgentis verbera caudae, clunibus aut agitavit equum lasciva supinum, dimittit neque famosum neque sollicitum ne ditior aut formae melioris meiat eodem. I wandered aimlessly, but Soho on Saturday night, with its loud-voiced young men and heavy-fleshed whores, its vomiting drunks and vulgar garish glamour, was enough to make even him hang his head for very shame. King's Cross? Shepherd's Market? King's Cross! In Russell Square the boys were coming out. The daytime Russell Square was gone: the Russell Square of exhausted tourists fresh from the British Museum, of snatched Yuppie lunches, of large parties of chattering schoolchildren and pigeon-fancying Japanese. The night Russell Square, with its homosexual couples, its be-jeaned figures loitering under the trees, all but invisible save for the glow of a cigarette-end, now bright now dim, which seemed to mark out their territory, had come into its own. Curius Mentulaâ&#x20AC;&#x2039; did not stir. But when I reached St Pancras Church I stopped. Opposite the House of Caryatids... I looked across to Euston Station, half-expecting to see the two boys about to disappear, standing up like jockeys in their bicycle-seats, still bearing upon their bodies the marks of their profane stigmata. But there was nothing. Almost as if in my dream I turned and headed west, away from King's Cross, passing University College Hospital on my left, arriving at last at Tottenham Court Road and the Euston bypass. Somebody was there before me. There was no film-crew; cameras were not turning, pointing down from the concrete parapet. But a girl was standing on the concrete island between the two sets of traffic-lights which divide Euston

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Road at that particular intersection, her arms resting on the edge, looking down at the two almost constant streams of traffic which thundered beneath her. I came up beside her, leaned on the parapet. Underneath us the lights of the cars receded and approached, emerging from out of and disappearing into the underpass below, an impossible duel-flowing river of jewel-like reds and whites. I turned to her. I could see, though her pale face was in profile in the constantly changing lights, that she was crying. -Hi.- I said. She turned to me, smiled, the two streams of mascara running down her cheeks making her look a little like a clown. -Hi.-You all right?-Sure. Just sad.-Sad? A pretty girl like you?She smiled wanly. -Us pretty girls get sad too.She looked back down at the traffic below. -Not thinking of doing anything silly?She turned to me again. -No. No. Nothing like that. Just someone I knew. Died three weeks ago today. Nothing to be done about it.I was silent a moment. -Someone very close?She tried to smile again. -Like a brother.She looked back to the traffic. We stood side by side, leaning on the parapet, staring down. Pourquoi pas? My ready gland, tenace et trop consulté, was all encouragement, emitting a tear of its own. -I'm mourning for someone too. But life has to go on.I hesitated a moment before speaking again. -How about the two of us trying to cheer each other up?She looked at me, really looked at me, up and down, for the first time. -Sure. Why not. You look like you're carrying enough on you to cheer me up for a bit.She smiled. Les yeux, les dents, les paupières mouillées... -You don't take plastic?She laughed. -No. Not yet. Nor IOUs.La larve file où se formaient des pleurs.

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I took out a sizeable folder of notes. -No matter. There should be enough here.Her eyes sparkled. -That's cheered me up already. Mind you, the more you want, the more you have to pay.-That's fine with me.-You wanna go to my place?-Sure. Is it far?-A couple of minutes walk. Just near King's Cross.She glanced down at my crotch. -That is if the guy down there can wait.I laughed. -He's been waiting already for more than a week.She laughed again. -You're not going to tell me you've been saving it up for me?-No. But I have.We both laughed then. I suddenly noticed she was wearing an AIDS ribbon. She saw me looking down at her lapel. -It's all right. I'm clean. In any case I always insist on protection.I was unaccountably embarrassed. -Of course. I'm sure. I was just wondering if you wear it for someone special?She looked at me a moment, as if debating with herself whether to take me into her confidence, then seemed to decide. -For my brother. Yes.-He died?-Yes. Of AIDS.-I'm very sorry.-Thanks. It was a long time ago.I wondered. -But I thought that you said something about three weeks.She laughed. -No, no. Like a brother, I said. My real brother died more than ten years ago. That was someone else.-AIDS too?She smiled strangely. -AIDS related.-Poor...I suddenly realised I didn't know her name. -I don't even know your name.She smiled, as if suddenly grateful. -Serena.-Serena. That's a nice name. Unusual. And it suits you. Great to meet you, Serena. I'm Rick.-

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-Rick?She looked dubious. -Sure. Why not! Roderick! But everyone calls me Rick or Ricky.She burst out laughing. -I thought you were pulling my leg. You know? Rhyming slang? Rick?We laughed again together. She looked down. -It suits you too, Rick.-Thanks for the compliment.-Roderick? No one calls you Rod?-I have a friend who sometimes calls me Roddy.-Roddy suits you too. Like Bishop Roddy.The suggestive banter was beginning to bore me. -Come on now, Serena. Watch it. He knows he's being talked about. I don't want any little accidents with him before I'm good and ready.She smiled knowingly. -You don't look like the kind of guy who'd allow any accidents to happen.I could match her. -I'm not. But with a girl like you, Serena, one never can tell.She almost simpered. -Rick! Butter wouldn't melt in my mouth.I preferred her suggestive to coy. But I liked her tears best of all. -All right, Serena. Let's see what will. You know the way. I'll follow.We lingered, however, as if reluctant to leave the bright lights of the traffic below. I thought of the place in Paris, similar in so many ways, where Princess Diana's fast-lane existence had shuddered to so sudden a stop. No gilded plastic monument here. Not even the pathetic bunches of flowers still left at the north-east corner of St James's Square for Yvonne Fletcher. Poor Adam Leslie's crumpled body lying against the underpass wall seemed all but forgotten already. Must I be the only cenotaph where his undying flame could burn? Serena turned to me, determinedly cheerful. -Come on, Rick. Let's forget the dead. Let's see just how much fun life can still be.It wasn't far. We headed east, passing University College Hospital on our right, passing Euston Station, the House of Caryatids, the new British Library. Serena turned off just before King's Cross, leading me through the labyrinth of narrow, relatively mean streets which seem to proliferate, in most great cities, around big railway terminals. There were still quite a few Saturday night revellers about, but, once off the main road, the scaffolded buildings and half-empty rubbish-skips far outnumbered them. We stopped in front of a plain white door. Number 17. Serena fumbled with her keys. The stairs were lit by a naked bulb which seemed almost ostentatiously to show the peeling pale green paint on the walls. She was on the fourth floor, the top. I didn't mind. She went ahead of me up the narrow stairs, pausing on each landing to light with a touch of her finger the next flight, the automatic time-switches plunging the preceding ones into darkness almost before we had left them. Her still firm, well-muscled buttocks moved slowly from side to side under her tight skirt, its curves and

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hollows promising more, I already knew, than poor Serena, despite her years of professional experience, would be able to deliver. The stairs ended with her flat. She unlocked the door, ushered me in. The room was too conventional, too almost banally what I had expected, to elicit from me more than a cursory glance. She locked the door, turned to me, smiling. -Make yourself comfortable, Rick. Take a seat. I'll get us a whiskey.I took off my coat and tie, sat on the couch, stretched out my legs in front of me. Serena came over, two branded whiskey-glasses in her hands. -Neat, Rick? You look like the kind of guy who takes it neat.I smiled, took the glass. Serena sat down beside me. -Mind if I take a look, Rick?I smiled. -Go ahead.Her right hand swooped down, began unbuckling my belt. -Rick! You've got fly-buttons!-So?-Oh Rick! With most guys now it's just zip-bang-wham. I knew you were different. I knew you were a gentleman.-Thanks.She put her glass down on the coffee-table, stood up, knelt on the floor between my knees. Her hands fluttered at my waist like the wings of a butterfly, settled, began unbuttoning slowly, almost reluctantly, as if I too might be promising more than I could deliver. One hand raised my shirttails. -Rick! You wear Yves Saint-Laurent shorts! You â&#x20AC;&#x2039;are â&#x20AC;&#x2039;a high-flyer.The other hand was already undoing the three small white buttons, separating the interlocked cotton. Dicto citius nervi paruerunt imperio manusque scortillum ingenti motu repleverunt. She might have been a small girl given a large ice-cream cone as a treat. -Oh Rick. It's great. Any girl ever tell you that?I laughed. -Almost everyone.She laughed too. -Just a little taste?-Sure. Why not.Her head came down in my lap. I felt the tip of her tongue, like a lizard's, darting in and out, felt her wet lips easing the taut skin, felt it loosening, relaxing, sliding back, felt her mouth taking in the whole exposed head, sucking it gently, as if not wanting to lose a drop of the precious crystal fluid. I ran my fingers through her golden hair. I was not even particularly surprised to see Adam Leslie Betts smiling at me from the mirror on the wall opposite.

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It was a largish, decorative mirror with a gilded frame, the frame studded, liberally and rather pathetically, with seashells and smaller pieces of broken mirror, whether purchased as such or embellished by a later hand, possibly Serena's, I did not know. But in the left-hand corner of the frame, masking a small rectangular section of the mirror's surface like a calling card, a strip of four photos, taken in an automatic passport photo booth, had been stuck: In the top one Adam Leslie was smiling; in the second his face showed only despair; in the third he had been joined by Serena for a cheek-to-cheek smiling embrace; in the last they were both grimacing, still cheek-to-cheek, Serena almost cross-eyed, Adam Leslie with his mouth puckered up as if waiting for an expected kiss. I shifted my focus, from the photos in the foreground, the water-lilies floating on the surface, as it were, to the image reflected in the mirror's depth: the eyes were intent, glazed, like those of a man attempting to reach, or to delay, a sexual climax. I did not know how long Serena had been working. But my tightening coleos warned me that the mechanism of sex has a more precise and ineluctable point of no return even than adolescence. I lifted her head away from my lap, firmly but gently, freeing myself from the eager suction of her mouth. She looked up at me, disappointment in her eyes. nunc animis opus, Aenea, nunc pectore firmo! -Just a little taste, remember?-Oh Rick!She pleaded. -No, no. Accidents can happen. Look at Bill Clinton and Monica. I'm not paying for anything but The Full Monty.Disgruntled she stood up, went over to a chest of drawers, opened the top one, took something out. I wondered if poor Gulliver, naked in the water, had had as much trouble fighting off the amorous advances of the little lustful Yahoo girl. Or Swift Miss Vanhomrigh's, for that matter. She returned with it out of the pack and already in her hand. -Hang on a bit, Serena. I'm calling the tune.Her mouth hardened. -All right, Rick. But I haven't got all night.I could match her at that game too. -You've got as much of the night as I'm willing to pay for. And I've got quite enough to pay until dawn, if necessary. Now put that thing away.She went back to the chest, replaced it, slammed the drawer shut, turned back to me, her eyes blazing. -Now come back here.She came back, stood glaring down at me. -Now put him away, do up my pants, sit down, and bloody have that drink.She knelt again between my knees, began stuffing my now partial detumescence back into the white shorts. -As he was, Serena, as he was, if you don't mind.-

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But she was rough now, rolling the foreskin up over her finger, pinching it hard between the long sharp nail and her thumb. I hit her across the face. -No more tricks like that, right! And dry those bloody hands before buttoning me up.She did so, but had begun to sob. -Now sit here beside me and have that bloody drink.She sat close to me, her leg pressing against mine, exaggerating the sobs. -Oh, Rick. I thought you were different.Her mascara had begun to run again. -I â&#x20AC;&#x2039;am â&#x20AC;&#x2039;different. If you don't stop that sniffling you'll find out just how different.She stopped, her eyes almost frightened. -That's better. Now you can tell me a little about yourself. Where are you from? That doesn't sound like a London accent to me.-The North West.She had become sullen. -No sulking now. That's worse than the tears. I only want you to be a bit friendly. You know. Not just zip-bang-wham. Remember?She laughed. -I knew you were a gentleman, Rick.She was almost relaxed again. I smiled. -Where in the North West?-Huh?-Whereabouts in the North West are you from?She had begun to snuggle close to me. -Chester.I said nothing. Her hands were on my shoulder. -D'you know it, Rick?-Sure. It's a nice town. I was there only a few days ago. Very Roman. Very mediaeval.-You hardly notice that when you're born there.-No. I guess not.-Were you there on business?-Sure. On business.-I thought you looked like a businessman.She seemed all set for some old-fashioned courting. But I had other things on my mind. -I am. And I do.-Do?-Mean business.She laughed, rather too fulsomely.

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-Fine. We're both business people. We understand each other. That keeps things simple. Now Rick, what would you like to talk about?Her face was too close to mine, out of focus. Her breath smelt of musk. I moved a little away. -You.-Right, Rick. Fire away.-Who's the boy?She was puzzled. -Boy?I gestured with my head towards the mirror, keeping my eyes on her. She looked to where I had indicated, turned back to me, confusion in her eyes. -Your brother?She smiled, suddenly relieved. -Sure Rick. My brother.-Bring it here.She got up, returned with the photos. I took the strip from her. Adam Leslie looked almost insolently out at me. -Great looking kid. Great. Died of AIDS you say. Sad. Sad.-Yes. I know. But it happened such a long...Her voice trailed away. I slapped her face again, not too hard. -Liar! Your brother died more than ten years ago, according to you. You would still have been at school. These photos are recent.She was sobbing again. -No Rick. I meant like a brother. He was â&#x20AC;&#x2039;like â&#x20AC;&#x2039;a brother. I'm sorry. I didn't mean anything.I waited until her sobs had subsided a little, then I brought it out. -That kid's the one whose body was found in the Euston underpass three weeks ago, dying.Her eyes showed real terror. -No, Rick, no. I don't know anything about it. I didn't even know him.-I can see that, from these.I held up the strip. She made a grab for it, but I got it behind my back. -Hang on a bit, Serena. I'm sure the police would be interested in this. There's a big reward, you know.Her eyes were wide. -No, Rick, no. Please. They're mine. Give them back to me. Please, Rick, please.We were both on our feet. She started pummelling at my chest. Fortunately I saw her knee as it rose, managed to shift the targeted area, enough at least to make the full force of the blow, already rendered less effective by the tightness of her skirt, bearable. -You little bitch!I threw her down on the couch. She lay there, sobbing.

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I went over to the phone. -All right, Serena. I'm going to call the police now. Do you want to say anything first?She looked up at me, her eyes wild. I could see she was planning something, but I didn't know what. Suddenly she was on her feet and sprinting for what I took to be the bathroom door. I got my foot in before she could close it. -Let me go, Rick. Please. Please. I don't want to live. Let go. Please let go.I forced the door slowly open. She stood there, sobbing, like a little girl dressed up as a whore. I held out the strip to her. She looked at me, wondering. Then she took it. The next moment she had collapsed on my chest and was sobbing as though her heart would break. I led her back gently to the couch, drew her down beside me, determined to let her cry as much as she wanted. And she did, burrowing her head deeper into my chest, sobbing away her grief as if in the arms of a father. Then was he glad, that he had put away All other things at last, and come to this. Her tears soaked through my shirt and over my breast. Now when the Pharisee which had bidden him saw it, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that toucheth him: for she is a sinner. I let her cry herself out. Then we just sat there. Eventually she lifted her head. -Oh Rick. I've got mascara all over your good shirt.I laughed. -And over my good chest.She laughed too. For a moment I half expected her to unbutton my shirt, to dry my chest with her hair. But the dye would doubtless have only made matters worse. -You're not going to ring the police?I shook my head. -No.-But the reward?-Fuck the reward.She laughed like a little girl. -I know you didn't kill him. â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Couldn't â&#x20AC;&#x2039;kill him.-Oh Rick. I loved him.-I know. Like a brother.-That's why I was there. At the underpass. It happened three weeks ago tonight.-I know.She wondered.

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-You know?-I know a lot. Do you want to tell me the rest?-Oh Rick. I've wanted so much to talk to someone about it, these last three weeks. But there was nobody. I had begun to think there never would be.-You can talk to me.Something in my eyes seemed to tell her that this was true. -Yes. I know.-You met at Chester?She seemed to accept now my prior knowledge. -On the station.-Had you known each other previously?-No. Yes. I don't know.She broke off, confused. I said nothing. -He reminded me so much of my brother.-Ah yes. Your brother.-He was standing on the platform, waiting for the London train. His face was so sad, forlorn. There were tears in his eyes. I thought that he must have lost someone very close. He didn't even seem to notice me. But why should he.I let her talk on. -When the train came we both got on. He sat beside a window, facing front. I sat beside him, though the train wasn't crowded. He didn't seem to notice that either. He wasn't reading, or anything. Just staring out of the window. After a few minutes I decided to speak. I said we had a long journey ahead of us so we might as well introduce ourselves. I told him my name, he told me his. He still didn't seem very interested. Or inclined to talk. I wanted to ask him what the matter was, but I didn't like to intrude upon his grief. Then he noticed my AIDS ribbon, just like you did tonight. That did seem to interest him. His eyes were drawn to it as if it was a magnet. Eventually he got up his courage and asked me about it, like you did. He asked the same thing you did, whether I wore it for someone special who had died. So I told him about my brother.-Ah yes. Your brother.We were both silent. -You want to tell me?-You?-About your brother?She smiled feebly. -Sure Rick. Why not. There isn't much to tell. He was one of the early AIDS victims. Almost when it first started. I was still a little girl. He came down to London when he was sixteen or seventeen and got mixed up with the gay community. And the drugs scene. So what chance did he have. I don't know many of the details. My Mum tried to keep as much of it from me as she could. I think he was probably a rent-boy. I didn't even know what that meant then! He used to come home to Chester to see us sometimes. Mum wouldn't let him into the house. She'd talk to him in the front garden, standing a few feet away. I wasn't even allowed to get that near. I don't blame her. She

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didn't know any better. Everyone thought in those days that if you so much as touched someone with AIDS you were certain to get it too. She was only trying to protect me. But the last time he came he looked so thin and sick and sad. I wanted to run up to him and throw my arms around him and kiss him like we used to do when we were kids. But Mum wouldn't let me. I don't think she even kissed him herself. Certainly not while I was present. She just stood there talking to him, keeping her distance, almost as if he was a stranger. I wasn't even allowed to hear what they were saying. Then he just waved to me, and smiled, and called Good-bye, Sis!, with the tears pouring down his face. And that was the last time I saw him. Mum never even told me when he died. She didn't mention it until it just happened to slip out one day, but that was six months afterwards. So I suppose it was inevitable that when I grew up I'd start to wear an AIDS ribbon, and do just what I have done.The tears were pouring down her own face again, but all the mascara had gone. Moi: j'ai ma revanche Quand je serai grand - matelot! She laughed. -Rick! You're as bad as I am. You're crying too.-Sure. A stone would cry.Her arms were around my neck, comforting me. -No Rick. You're not a stone. You've got a good heart. Did anyone ever tell you that?I laughed. -Almost everyone.She smiled. -I knew I was right about you.But she didn't know the full cause of my tears. I was only just beginning to perceive it myself, darkly. -And what did Adam say?-Adam?She seemed to have lost the thread. -When you told him in the train about your brother?She looked at me. -That's when he confided in me. Told me about himself. About how he had contracted the AIDS virus. That's when I understood why he had appeared so sad.-He had AIDS? I don't recall seeing that in the papers.-The police probably hushed it up. For the sake of the family. They're terribly respectable, you know. Adam told me all about them. They live at Colwyn Bay. If the family don't want it released to the press, that someone is HIV positive, the police always respect their wishes.-Oh. I didn't know that. But then I don't know much about the police or the press.She smiled. -You're just a big innocent baby, Rick, despite that cock of yours.I tried to grin. -And how did Adam get AIDS?-It was a terrible story. He was on holiday at The Gower last year. He'd only just turned fourteen, but he'd suspected for a long time that he was gay. He'd been swimming on a lonely part of the

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beach when a sailor approached him. A real big blond guy, a Swede or a Finn, I think Adam said, but he didn't speak much English. His ship, the NordstjĂ¤rnan, was sailing that evening from Cardiff. Adam could make that much out. He couldn't make out the sailor's name, but he told me the name of that ship had been burnt into his memory in letters of fire. And the sailor could make out something too: Adam's erection under his swimsuit! One thing led to another, Adam said. The sailor really made a meal of him. Adam didn't go into many details, but I could see by his eyes that it still hurt him to talk about it. And all that poor Adam could think of, was unable not to think of, he told me, while the whole awful business was going on, was that his father had done to his mother very nearly the same hideous thing that was being done to him. And do you know what the sailor gave him, Rick, after all that? A box of Belgian chocolates! A miserly box of Belgian chocolates, Rick, after that!Christ, I thought. Fuck you, Emma Zunz. And fuck you too, Jorge Luis Borges. Fuck you and your damned ingenious cerebral plotting. Fuck you all. Fuck every last damned sodding one of you. -It was only that one time, Adam told me. Just the once. But that was enough. Adam had the AIDS virus. It doesn't seem fair, does it, Rick?-No. It doesn't seem fair.-Adam had nowhere to go in London. When we arrived at Euston I asked him to come back here with me. What were a few lost customers! I had the chance at last to get to know my brother; to be the loving sister I thought I had been cheated of forever ten years ago. I even offered to be more than a sister. But he said no. I told him it was quite safe for me, if he wore a condom. But he just grinned and said that I wasn't exactly the Swedish sailor type.-He was right. You're not.-We slept in the same bed together, just like we were brother and sister, just like I used to with my brother when we were small. And we spent all Saturday wandering around London, holding hands, doing any stupid thing, taking those silly photos, just like I was a big sister with her kid brother, showing him the sights. We had a burger and a milkshake about four o'clock. And Adam suggested a film.-The English Patient?She looked at me, wide-eyed. -Rick! How did you know?-I didn't know. I just guessed.-Clever Rick! It wasn't even new. But we passed a cinema where it was showing and neither of us had seen it. Adam said he wanted to because it had won so many Academy Awards. So we went.Fuck you too, Anthony Minghella. Fuck you and your cheap morbid sentimental novelettish mind. -It was a bit long for me, and a bit gruesome. But the end made up for all that.-Ah yes. The end.-You remember the end, Rick?-I remember.-Adam and I were both in tears. We left the cinema, holding hands, hardly able to speak. We had a pizza and a coke together. But we seemed to avoid each other's eyes. It was almost like we were embarrassed. We wandered around the streets for a bit. But you know what London is on a Saturday

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night. And we didn't feel like being part of all that noise and laughter. Adam said he'd like to come back here, if I didn't mind, as he had to get home to Colwyn Bay quite early on Sunday. He had a lot of reading up to do for an exam.quel giorno più non vi leggemmo avante. -But when we got back he just sat here on the sofa and laughed. Then he was crying. I sat beside him, trying to comfort him. But he just kept saying "What's the point!", laughing and crying at the same time. I knew what he meant, but what could I say? Then he looked at me, strangely. I knew what he was thinking, knew he was looking at me the way Ralph Fiennes looked at that French girl, that if there had been some of those little glass phials he'd have pushed them towards me, begging me for my help. I cried too then, just like she did, burying my face in my hands. But what could I do?She broke off, looked up at me, pleadingly. -What did you do?-He was such a beautiful looking boy, Rick. So fit and healthy looking. But I knew that inside he was just like The English Patient. I knew that he'd end up looking the way my brother did the last time I saw him. That perhaps his own mother would reject him too. I couldn't stand the thought of that happening to Adam, Rick. I couldn't let him suffer the way I now know my brother must have suffered.She was crying again, but looking straight at me, not burying her face in her hands. -I offered him some sleeping pills, but he said no. He said if his parents ever found out what he had done, it would kill them. He was an only child, Rick! He hadn't even told them about the AIDS! He said it would have to look like an accident. Then his eyes lit up. Or better still, murder! I laughed. But he was quite serious. He got so enthusiastic about the idea he even carried me along with him. He looked so happy, excited, planning it all, that I didn't have the heart not to help him. I know it was mad, that I should have refused, that it would make me an accomplice, but I kept thinking about my brother. Adam didn't want me to do anything much at all. Just arrange to have his unconscious body dumped in the street somewhere afterwards.Fuck you too, Edgar, I thought. -Just arrange?Serena looked at me, almost pityingly. -You are an innocent baby, Rick. It's not the first time I've had to arrange to get rid of the body of a client whose heart wasn't quite up to all the excitement.-No. I guess not.Serena's eyes pleaded for understanding. -Don't think too badly of me, Rick. I know I should have said no. I know I shouldn't have helped him. But he was such a big baby, like you Rick. He only had to bellow and cry and make enough fuss to get exactly what he wanted, and he knew it. I didn't have the heart to be the first person to refuse him.-No.-He said he knew exactly what to do. He went into the bathroom, got undressed, handed his clothes out to me through the half-open door. He was embarrassed about getting undressed in front of me! His own sister! I said I'd wash and iron his things dry for him. He said not to bother, but I did it all the same. He sat on the edge of the sofa, watching me, wearing only a towel. He looked so

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fragile sitting there, like a fledgling bird dropped out of its nest, his body almost hairless. Then, right at the end, he seemed to have doubts. He looked up at me, pleadingly, almost like he half hoped I'd try to talk him out of it. But I knew he had to go ahead. I had to be the strong one then. What future was there for him, Rick? A long slow decline into disease and death.-Yes.-He said he'd do it in the bath, so there wouldn't be any mess for me to clear up afterwards. I gave him the big hug and kiss I'd been waiting to give for more than ten years. He was so thin he almost wasn't there. Then I pushed him into the bathroom, closed the door, and just waited.The tears were flowing again. -When I went into the bathroom, Rick, it was so awful. I'd heard the thumps and groans but I put on the radio to drown them out. He must have been in a frenzy, Rick, to do those things to himself; to be able to do those things to himself. There was so much blood. I knew I had to be careful, but I just didn't seem to care anymore. I almost wished that I had it too. The scratches and bruises were bad enough, but he'd even used an old razor-blade to slice open the backs of his knees. Why did he want to do that, Rick? Those beautiful strong young knees?I swallowed hard but did not answer. -He was unconscious, his breathing very shallow. His face was a strange colour. He must have ruptured something, something vital. I don't know how or what. I think the big old-fashioned bath taps helped him. He seemed to know what he was doing. Maybe he'd hoped to go into medicine. I don't know. But he'd done a good job.Still I said nothing. -Then I washed him, Rick, as he was, naked, in the bath. It was like God had given me a second chance. To prepare the body of my brother for burial. I didn't give a fuck about the blood. If I got it, I got it. So what. I washed every part of him, each scratch and bruise, even managed to staunch the flow of blood at the back of his knees with a little alum. All except for his cock. Christ, Rick, I've seen so many cocks in my time. All shapes and sizes. And I always try to make a guy feel that his is something really special. Just like I did with you tonight, Rick. You wouldn't think I'd be squeamish about a fifteen-year-old's cock. But I couldn't bring myself to do it. It would have been like pulling back the foreskin of my own brother! So I left him as he was. Just wiped the outside with a cloth. And his balls. His poor, poor balls. And that was that.She left off, her eyes blazing. -Christ, Rick, I wish I could lay my hands on that Swede's.-Yes.She quietened down a little. -There wasn't anything else to do. I dressed him, still in the bath, as well as I could. His knees had started to bleed again, but I couldn't help that. I didn't want him to die there, in my room. I wanted to remember him alive, even like that. That's why I kept those stupid pictures! I called the guy I always call, when there's been an â&#x20AC;&#x2039;accident. He was round in ten minutes. He never asks questions. Wasn't even interested in what kind of â&#x20AC;&#x2039;accident. As long as the price is right. I didn't even know where he'd been dumped, until I saw the papers.-That's why you were there tonight, at the underpass.-That's why I was there tonight. Remembering.-

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She smiled suddenly. -Don't you think there should be a memorial for him, Rick, like for Princess Diana? A golden flame. For our own Prince Adam.I smiled back at her. Stupid, gullible, sentimental little slut, I thought. I could a tale unfold whose lightest word would harrow up thy soul, if I had a mind to it. And a heart. But why? Too many lives have already been spoiled by Master Adam Leslie Betts. -Yes. For our own Prince Adam!She tried to snuggle close again, but I stood up. I got my coat, left her a generous wad on the sideboard. -Rick. You've paid for it now. Don't you think, after all this, that we might feel less alone, afterwards?I pictured her, rolling the condom on for me as she would roll on one of her stockings; pictured myself, afterwards, in the bathroom, â&#x20AC;&#x2039;that â&#x20AC;&#x2039;bathroom, plucking it off, looking down at the spoonful of greyish milky fluid in the bottom, flushing away all my salt-sweet sons into kingdom come. The devil spoke, the devil inside me, the devil who would not give Adam, or Serena, or myself, or anyone else, the benefit of the doubt. -Christ Almighty, Serena. That only happens in cheap, sentimental movies. In real life we'd only feel even more disgusted with ourselves than we do already.I went down the dingy stairs quickly, pausing a moment on each landing to flick on the switch, descending from darkness into light, thinking of Maro: facilis descensus Averno: noctes atque dies patet atri ianua Ditis; sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras, hoc opus, hic labor est.

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hoc opus, hic labor est. Aidan was sitting behind his desk when I came in. We shook hands. The grip was, for him, though firm, almost relaxed. -Hi. You're looking happy today, for you.He grinned. -Tom just got his exam results. They're good.I was glad. -Congratulate him for me.Aidan beamed. -Do it yourself. He'll be in any minute. He's preparing a summer project. How a police station works. From the inside.-Not fair. How many kids have the advantage of a police inspector for a father.The blue eyes shone. -I'm not bloody sure Tom would agree about the advantage.-I'm bloody sure he should.Aidan gestured for me to sit. -Rick. What's all this I hear about your leaving The Herald?I smiled. -I've taken your advice.Aidan was blank. -My advice?-I'd had quite enough of that bloody rag I work for being called, by you, mine.He grinned. -We're going to miss you.-I'm probably going to miss it for a while myself.He leaned forward on the desk. -What about all that pissing out of the tent? Decided to piss in for a change?I tried to match his grin. -I thought it was time to get away from the tent altogether and to start pissing where I damn well pleased.His grin broadened. -Good for you!Yet he seemed uneasy.

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-Be careful, Rick. Where you cover your feet.I laughed. -Right. You keep an eye on me. If you find me pissing in the wrong place, cut off the skirt of my robe privily and wave it in my face. Say I told you so.Aidan wasn't laughing. -Easy, Rick. I was only bloody kidding.I realised, too late, the inappropriateness of my response. -Sorry.- I tried to smile naturally. -Things are a bit fraught. What with leaving The Herald and Anne being away.He grinned. -When are you two going to make it legal?I was careful of my tone. -Legal? The two of us would never dream of breaking your law.He laughed. -So it's my law now!-Sure. Like it used to be my Herald.- I was happy to keep things light. -Besides, she may not want to marry an out-of-work journalist.But Aidan seemed intent on seriousness. -I hear you've been visiting the Betts again.I had to hold onto myself. -Sure. I returned their photograph.-Helen told me you spent the night.-Right. Why bloody shouldn't I.I cursed inwardly my want of control. Aidan leaned further forward. -Rick. Don't be angry. We know each other too well for that. You know, ever since we were kids, how much I've always had your best interests at heart. Once a Stonyhurst boy, remember? And you know, as well as I do, the inadvisability of getting too involved in a case.I felt the blood pounding, even as I tried to smile. -I was there on business.-Sure. I know. But I'm thinking of Helen. You underestimate your own charm. You should have heard her talking about you. She thinks the sun shines out of your arse-hole.Aidan's old familiarity was reassuring. I grinned. -Well. Perhaps it does.-Rick! She loves you, Rick! She seems to have transferred all her affection for her lost son onto you. Don't you see there's no future in it? Only further heartbreak for her?I suddenly saw where Aidan's conversation had been leading and laughed at how readily I had got hold of the wrong end of the stick. -You don't have to worry. When we said good-bye I think she sensed it was the end. She knows I've got my own life to lead. And I'm off the story now. For good. Besides, one set of parents is enough for any man.-

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He seemed relieved. -Great.-I think you were troubling yourself needlessly, anyway. She wasn't interested in me. Not really. All we ever talked about together was Adam Leslie.Aidan laughed. -I know â&#x20AC;&#x2039;exactly â&#x20AC;&#x2039;what you mean.Already poor Helen's grief seemed to be a thing we unbearably could laugh about together. Aidan's blue eyes twinkled. -And now she's found someone else she can discuss her beloved son with. You haven't heard the latest yet. We've got our first lead on the case.My heart grew sick. -Your first lead?He laughed. -Sure. The person has come forward who gave Adam Leslie that lift from Colwyn Bay to Chester. The last person, so far, to have seen him alive.My thoughts seemed an inextricable knot in my brain. -The last person to see him alive?-Apart from me. At the hospital.I was particularly stupid that morning. -Have you made an arrest?Aidan laughed again. -Hardly. She turned out to be a nice little grey-haired retired schoolteacher who was driving into Chester to do some shopping for the weekend. Just the type to murder a young lad like Adam.Alexander had cut through the knot with a single blow. I smiled. -Well. That's a start.-She was most helpful. Offered to go and see the Betts herself. I left her with Helen over afternoon tea, discussing Adam Leslie's last ride. Although it seems he slept through most of it. She dropped him near the Old Dee Bridge at Chester. Helen and her were getting along famously, although poor old John seemed a bit out of things. I made my excuses and left. I just couldn't take any more.-I don't blame you.His eyes shone wickedly. -One more saffron bun and I'd have been sick.I laughed. -No Welsh cakes?-She seems to have moved on to saffron buns.-That's a change. I had Bakewell Tart the last time. I suppose saffron buns were another of Adam Leslie's favourites.Aidan smiled wearily. -Poor little bugger.He sighed.

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-Nothing else?-Else?-No other leads?-Fuck all. The gay boys of Russell Square are as much in the dark about it as we are.-Nothing new, forensically?-Not a bloody thing. It seems the little chap died pure as the driven snow.-So you're back where you started.-Precisely. And unless some Belgian snuff-movie of Adam Leslie's last moments turns up, and a whole new era in celibate sex-murders is ushered in, it looks like we're going to remain that way.-Just another unsolved crime?-Just another unsolved crime.We were silent a moment. A thought occurred to me. -You're hamstrung.Aidan smiled grimly. -Hamstrung. You're damn right. We're all bloody hamstrung.-Poor little Gyges.Suddenly the blue eyes smiled. -Christ Almighty. I thought we'd gone rather a long time without bloody Latin raising its ugly head.I smiled too. -So our Turnus, whoever he happens to be, gets away scot-free?Aidan stopped smiling. -No. That's one thing you were bloody right about. No one ever gets away with anything. Some day vitaque cum gemitu fugit indignata sub umbras.My delight at Aidan's Latin was more than a little tempered by the thought of those umbras amongst whom, I could only pray, Adam Leslie's would not have to bleed, eternally distressed. and, in my death, see by this image, which is thine own, how utterly thou hast murdered thyself. We were silent again. Eventually Aidan spoke. -They're releasing the body later in the week. They've put all the pieces back, stuffed up all the holes, and he's almost as good as new. All trussed and oven-ready for the Colwyn Bay Crematorium. It's one day next week. I promised the Betts that I'd be there. I don't know if you want to come.-I think I'll give that one a miss.Aidan's eyes weren't smiling. -Can't say I blame you.-Tell them I won't be able to get away. Give them my deepest sympathies. And my love. I'll let Mike know. Don't know if he'll be able to face it or not.-Right.-Right. In pace requiescat!Aidan's eyes smiled now. -For the love of God, Montresor!-

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-Yes, I said, for the love of God!Aidan laughed. -Remember? The old Cask of Amontillado? Remember how much you used to love Poe?Exigua est virtus praestare silentia rebus: -Yes. I remember.At contra gravis est culpa tacenda loqui. -You remember the old Collins Classic?I smiled. -The one that you gave me for my fourteenth birthday. Yes. I was looking at it just the other day.Aidan was amazed. -Don't tell me you've still got it!-I misplaced it for a time. But I came across it again only last week.-Christ, Rick. You sentimental old stiff!I laughed. -Stiff! I haven't heard that since Stonyhurst! Remember Father Peoples? The old Australian priest who'd been in the First World War?-Christ yes, Rick. At Gallipoli. Haven't thought of him in years. It's funny how it never leaves you. How it all comes back.I looked at him hard. -ac melior mihi frater!Aidan shut his eyes. For a moment he was eighteen again, all the wrinkles smoothed out, the broadening features refined; the godlike adolescent I had almost worshipped as a boy; the captain of the first eleven about to stride out for his final innings. When he opened them again I half-expected there to be tears. But they only burned the bluer. -You big stiff!He was up, around the desk, and had me in his arms, all in an instant, crushing me to him until it almost hurt, just like his handshake, making my bones crack. -Aidan! Aidan!He held me at arm's length. -You big stiff! You big stiff! The Thebaid! Remember how you loved Statius too? Polynices and Tydeus. Remember the fight we had when we first met? You were a spiky arrogant little prick, even at thirteen. I think it was Father Peoples who separated the two of us that time. We used to call him Adrastus, remember? And old Brother Goodman, who did all his dirty work, Arion?-And you used always to say that you could see me gnawing away at an enemy's brains. And I used to say that I could see you.We were both laughing about things we thought we had forgotten. -Polynices and Tydeus. Adrastus and Arion. They were the bloody days!-And yet you never saw fit to give your son the inestimable advantages of a Jesuit education.Aidan grinned. -You should have seen to that. You're his bloody godfather.Suddenly Aidan was serious again. He looked at his watch.

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-Rick. Tom will be here any second. He's got some outing or other he wants to discuss with you.Aidan seemed unaccountably tongue-tied, almost embarrassed. -Well?-Rick. Promise me you'll never let Tom know I mentioned this to you.I laughed. -I don't know what you're on about. But you know I'd promise you anything, Aidan. As long as it doesn't involve incest or folk-dancing.But he was serious. -Rick. When Tom got back from his day with you at the Oval, he seemed a bit preoccupied, almost morose. I asked him what was the matter.The sickness of earlier left my heart and moved down to my stomach. -And?Suddenly he blurted it out. -Christ Almighty, Rick. I know I can say anything to you. Even this. I know that you'll understand. Tom said he was worried about you, Rick. The way you acted.-Acted?I tried to appear casual. -He said he'd never seen you so depressed before. That you kept talking to him about this Betts business. And about suicide. Christ, Rick. I put this bloody case into your hands. I sent you down to Colwyn Bay. If you ever bloody did anything to yourself I'd never bloody forgive myself.The tears I had half-expected a few moments before were now in his eyes. The sickness was gone. Relief had replaced it. I could laugh now, at my own guilt, at Tom's innocence, at my own innocence, at Aidan's ignorance, at everything that no one else would ever know or understand. I could even laugh at the thought of my own suicide, even as I realised, not without a certain degree of satisfaction, that I had not after all got hold of the wrong end of the stick entirely as to where Aidan's earlier conversation had been leading. -Aidan! You big stiff! You should know me better than that!Then he was in my arms and I was crushing him until it hurt us both. Tom came in. I saw, over Aidan's shoulder, first the surprise and then the laughter in his eyes. -Dad! Rick! Sorry to break in on such an intimate scene.Aidan comically glared. -Can't you ever bloody knock before you come into a room, Tom. Rick and I had only just got our pants up.Tom feigned outrage. -Mum told me to keep an eye on WPC Gildersleeve and Dad. But I thought better of you, Rick.WPC Gildersleeve was a particularly tall, busty blonde policewoman at the station. I shrugged my shoulders, playing it straight. -Sorry, Tom. But you had to find out some time. Your father and I have been on intimate terms ever since our schooldays. I was his fag in more ways than one.Tom's eyes sparkled. -Just wait till Mum hears about this!-

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I was glad to see Tom so flippant and happy. -Bang goes my long-standing Christmas dinner invitation!Tom grinned reassuringly. -Don't worry, Rick. It'll be our secret. And I can always use it in future to blackmail Dad.He winked at Aidan, who was beaming all over. -You two trot off to the cafeteria. Have a cup of coffee on me. My shout. Hush money. Keep you quiet for a while.He pushed a note into Tom's hand. -Thanks, Dad. Maybe I'll find out from Rick a little more about your relationship.Aidan cuffed him gently on the ear. -Mind your own damn business.Aidan winked at me. -Keep him guessing, Rick. Lads today think they ought to know everything. It's about time this one learned that there are some things even he can never understand.I winked ostentatiously back at him. -Right, Aidan. My lips are sealed.In the corridor Tom glowed beside me. -God, Rick. I wish Dad was like that all the time. He can be so great when he wants to be.-He is great, Tom. He just doesn't always show it.Tom gave me a confiding glance. -I think he's pleased I came in here for this project. He tried to put me off when I suggested it, but now I've been in every day this week, he seems almost proud of me.I smiled. -He is proud of you, Tom. And glad you're taking an interest in his work. He'd be an unnatural father if he wasn't.-It is interesting, Rick. Once you get into it.The cafeteria was bleak but not crowded. Everyone there knew Tom, most of them knew me. We ran the gamut of their waves and smiles. Tom insisted on paying. We found a quiet table, unloaded our trays of their Danish pastries and coffee. Tom sat opposite me, elbows on the table, excitedly. -It's great seeing you again, Rick.-It's great seeing you, Tom.-This week has been great fun. I wouldn't have believed it. I've sort of grown into it. The first day everything was so strange. But now.-That's the way with most things.-Dad's let me do everything. I've been out on patrols. Been through all the departments. It all seems so natural when you're here. But before I came it was all horror.-Horror?Tom leaned forward. -You know, Rick. Death and murder. But that's only part of it.I laughed. -A large part.-

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He laughed too. -Sure. But a part.Suddenly he was serious, confidential. -You know the first thing I asked to see when I came in. The file on the Betts case. I could see Dad didn't want to show it to me, but then his eyes hardened, you know the way they do, Rick, and he got it out and put it in my hands. The same way he's never tried to stop me from reading anything I wanted to read. I forced myself to go through it. I didn't want to but I knew I had to. To prove to myself I could do it. I made myself look at all those pictures.Christ Tom, I thought, you're too young, even as I remembered Adam Leslie's fifteen years. But he was going on. -At first it hit me hard. It was like looking at myself dead. Or the Gorgon's head. Something inside me seemed to turn to stone. But then something happened. Something strange.He stopped. -Strange?-Yes. I don't know how to describe this, Rick. Suddenly it seemed right. I know that sounds awful. It seemed right he had died the way he did. Right for him. I know this sounds crazy. Crazy as Kirillov. But it seemed in his death that the silly grinning little boy of all those newspaper photos had suddenly become the man he might otherwise never have been. Death gave him a dignity he had never possessed in life. I don't know if I'm making sense, Rick. Now I say it to you I don't even seem to be making sense to myself.-Go ahead, Tom. You're making sense to me.-He seemed to have died at the time he should have died. The right time for him. Like it was his destiny. And my destiny, which until then I had in some silly way got mixed up with his, seemed quite different. Then all the horror left me. I got interested in the details of the investigation, in all the reports and interviews, in an almost objective way, detached almost. I suppose that's what they mean by becoming a professional.He grinned. -A little knowledge is a dangerous thing?-I guess so, Rick.I smiled. -My grandfather was a doctor. He used to say that the worst professional was better than the best amateur. I think he was talking about theatricals, but he was probably right. About most things.Tom was still grinning. -I guess I was like a medical student at his first dissection. Once that is over, the rest is plain sailing.-Unless you're like Berlioz and escape through a window.Tom laughed. -Is that what he did?-Yes. He was going to be a doctor. But he wasn't cut out for it, if you'll pardon the pun. So he became a musician. A professional in his own field. Although there are some people who are still willing to argue about that.We were both laughing now.

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-So you're really enjoying yourself here?-Yeah. Great.-Think you might follow your father into the profession? The family business, as it were?He shrugged his shoulders, smiled wryly. -Don't know. I'm interested in so many things.-It would please him.-Sure. I know. And I want him to be proud of me. But I don't want to do it just so he'll be proud of me. I've got to do it for the right reasons. I don't want to be too pusillanimous.I grinned. -You have been reading your Dostoevsky. Or is it John Osborne this time?He was puzzled. -John Osborne?I laughed. -Sorry. Wrong generation. Sic Transit Gloria Mundi. In my time he was still quite famous. A playwright. I think Dostoevsky was a safer bet.Tom grinned secretively. -Talking of Dostoevsky?Then he just stopped. -Which we both seem to have been doing. What about Dostoevsky?His smile made the Cheshire Cat look like Crassus. -Have you read The Devils, Rick?Something inside me seemed to have turned to stone also, because I only laughed. -Read it? I wrote it in Switzerland. Between bouts of gambling.Tom was delighted. -I knew that you'd know it!-What about poor old Nietzsche? I thought he was going to be next.Tom blew up his cheeks, puffed them out. -Nietzsche can wait. I'll get around to him. I haven't had time. What with this project and preparing myself for our next outing.The mischief in his smile confirmed the fact that he was intent on mystification. I played along. -Aidan mentioned some outing that you wanted to discuss. But he didn't go into details.But Tom wasn't yet ready. -Are you doing anything Saturday week? All day?I thought a moment. -Can't say that I am. Or any other time, for that matter. I'm leaving The Herald.Tom was momentarily diverted. -Hey, Rick. Dad told me something about that. Why?-Fed up. In a rut. Call it what you will. Maybe I just want to find out what it's like to be on Jobseeker's Allowance.Tom grinned. -From the way things are looking in the country, I'll be finding that out for myself as soon as I leave school.-

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-With your exam results! By the way, your father told me. Congratulations.-Thanks. But exam results don't mean all that much nowadays. Even university degrees.-Well then, you'll just have to start at the bottom as an ordinary PC and work your way up. But you'll still never be the man your father is.He grinned proudly. -No one ever could be.There were tears in his eyes. -Now what's all this all day?-All day?Tom was nonplussed. -The all day I'm to keep free Saturday week. I hope you're not planning anything I won't be able to tell your father about.Tom's grin returned broader than ever. -After catching you two together just now, I think I'd really have to stretch my imagination.I wagged an admonishing finger at him. -When you get to our age Tom, you'll realise that us middle-aged blokes need a bit of physical contact too.Tom playfully gaped. -Blokes? Middle-aged?I laughed. -To answer your two most beautifully phrased questions in turn: One: your father and I were discussing schooldays at Stonyhurst and remembering a certain old Australian priest, hence Blokes. Two: according to Dante middle-age is thirty-five, Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita, and we are both of us quite near enough to that, in whatever direction, to justify the epithet.Tom grimaced. -Rick. You're not middle-aged. You're an old fuddy-duddy.-Tom. Aidan and I both grew up in the generation of the New Man. You know. Caring, changing the baby's nappies, helping with the cooking and the washing-up. We're not the hard-nosed lot that your generation seems intent upon becoming.Tom was wide-eyed. -Dad! Helping around the house!I shrugged. -In theory.Tom pushed his nose flat with the tip of his right forefinger, crossed his eyes. -And here's the hard-nosed lot that your theory makes me a part of.I laughed. -Touché, Tom. You win. As usual.Suddenly WPC Gildersleeve was at his shoulder, bending close, her bust almost in his face. She smiled at me knowingly. -Hi, Rick. Hi, Tom. You're looking particularly handsome today, Tom.Tom's face turned scarlet. I smiled at her, half stood up.

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-Hi, Barbara. Nice to see you. Tom here was just giving me his impression of how the hard-nosed South American woolly monkey attracts his mate.She smirked. -My! It certainly had the desired effect on me. I'm feeling all hot and bothered.I looked across at Tom. -You hear that, Tom. It works.Tom's eyes pleaded over her bust. Barbara was enjoying his embarrassment. -I've always fancied your father, Tom. But until now I've thought of you as a child. I can see I was wrong.She leaned closer, glancing down at his lap. -Hard-â&#x20AC;&#x2039;nosed, â&#x20AC;&#x2039;you said, Rick?Tom was purple. -Apparently one can tell quite a lot about the male of the species from the nose.-Ooh! Just like with us.I laughed. -So they say.She straightened up. -Oh well. No rest for the wicked. I'll leave you two to your man's talk.She patted Tom on the shoulder, crossed to a far table where three PCs were waiting for her. Suddenly Tom was up. -Back in a moment, Rick. Just got to go to the gents.He made his way awkwardly between the tables, his left hand thrust into his trousers' pocket. Christ, I thought. Fuck me, fuck me! Fuck her! Fuck all the adults who've forgotten what it's like to be fifteen! Fuck all the fifteen-year-olds too! My own member raised its head. Defensor culpae dicet mihi "fecimus et nos haec iuvenes." But I had an answer ready for it. indulge veniam pueris: Tom was gone quite a time. When he did return the blush had been replaced by an appropriate pallor. He made his excuses. -Sorry I was so long, Rick. Had the runs. Must have been that Indian curry I ate last night. It just poured out of me like I'd turned on a tap.I laughed, almost a little embarrassed, thinking: Yes. That separates the men from the boys also. They delight in talking about their bodily functions but are embarrassed by sex. We delight in talking about sex but are embarrassed by our bodily functions. Unless we're like Swift. Or Dan. Poor, poor Dan. Or perhaps none of us ever really grow up at all. Perhaps we just exchange one set of bodily functions for another. -Your coffee's cold. Let me get you a fresh cup.Tom shook his head.

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-Nah. It's fine. I don't want it, anyway. It's lousy coffee.I could only agree with him. -You'll have to take that into consideration before you decide on a career in the police force.He laughed. -Listen, Rick. I still haven't got around to telling you about our outing.I laughed. -You're the one who's been beating about the bush.He grinned. -All right. Have you heard of the Maly Theatre Company from St Petersburg?-Of course. They're coming here next week as part of BITE. The Barbican International Theatre Event. I saw them last time they were in London.He was a trifle crestfallen but went bravely on. -Well, they're doing a stage adaptation of Dostoevsky's The Devils, they're calling it The Possessed. It's going to run the whole day. Part One starts at eleven in the morning, there's an hour or so for lunch, Part Two is at three o'clock, there's over two full hours for dinner, and Part Three begins at seven forty-five and finishes about ten. And for the dinner interval the restaurant is serving borsch, then either goose or pickled herrings and potato salad, and sugared baked apples to finish. And vodka if you want. What do you say, Rick?His growing enthusiasm quite carried me along with it. -I say great, Tom. It sounds great.His smile reached the places even the Cheshire Cat's couldn't reach. -Rick! I'm so glad. You're the one person I know who could sit it out.I laughed. -I don't quite know how to take that, Tom.A slight blush returned. -You know what I mean, Rick.-I know what you mean.We were silent a moment. -But it's going to cost you a bomb. You'll have to let me go halves.He held up both hands. -No, Rick. I'm paying for it all or the deal's off. You've treated me so often, I want, just this once, to have the chance to show my appreciation.-Let me pay for the dinner?He thought a moment. -No. All or nothing.-Right. All.He chuckled with delight. -It's not that expensive, Rick. The seats for all three parts are only twenty-four pounds each. They're not the best seats in the house but they are in the front row. The girl said they were cheaper because you couldn't see the sur-titles so well from there. I just laughed in a superior manner and said that that wouldn't worry my friend or me. She didn't know she was dealing with a Dostoevsky buff. She probably thought we were both fluent Russian speakers!-

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He giggled to himself like a small boy. -And dinner is only thirteen ninety-five a head. Three courses and coffee! So I should get out of the whole thing for about eighty quid.-Eighty quid's a great deal. Especially to waste on somebody like me.-Rick. I've got the money. And you're the person I want to spend it on.-Thanks, Tom. That means a lot to me.He looked into my eyes. -You mean a lot to me, Rick.Suddenly a light dawned. Aidan's recent worries came back to me. Of course! But I had already promised him never to let Tom know that I knew. And as incest and folk-dancing were not involved, I was determined to keep my word. Nevertheless I felt it a shame that we could not laugh together over Tom's concern for my recent welfare, my concern for his. His offer, in the light of this, and the earnestness now of his boy's face, only made me love him the more, want to take him in my arms and hug him, right there in the cafeteria. But I felt, that for myself at least, there had already been enough hugging for one day. I determined, however, on the spot, not to let him get away scot-free with his impudent suspicions. I would not tease him all that much; nevertheless I would tease him just a little. -I can see I'm going to need that vodka by the second interval! I pay for my own vodka, right?Tom grinned. -Right.-I don't want to bankrupt you. But all those hours of Russian gloom. I'll want something to cheer me up. Or depress me even further.A flicker of unease showed in Tom's eyes. -You think it might be a bit heavy?I laughed. -You've read the book.-I'm only two-thirds of the way through.I was beginning to enjoy myself. -Ah, well! The mayhem and suicides haven't really begun in earnest.Tom's face was a picture of dismay. -Suicides?-Well. You know what to expect from Dostoevsky. I'm not going to spoil the end for you. But if things get too much for me I can always resort to the cake of soap.-Soap!-I'm not saying another word. You haven't got that far yet. But you can be certain of one thing. I won't be leaving any half-drunk bottles of Château d'Yquem.His dismay had turned to anguish. -Rick! Don't ever say things like that. Not even in jest.Another moment and tears might have sprung to his eyes. I had had my fun. Too much, perhaps. Now his fears, however impudent, had to be allayed. I laughed. -Haven't we had this conversation somewhere before?-Before?-

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-At the Oval. A couple of weeks ago. Only the other way round.The incipient tears had become blushes. -Oh Rick. I was such a fool. I kicked myself afterwards. All that rubbish I was talking.I corrected him. -All that rubbish we were talking.He smiled. -Right. We.-That was my little revenge just now.-Revenge?-I thought: If Tom can cause me considerable worry on a beautiful sunny afternoon at the Oval with his adolescent anguish, why shouldn't I worry him just for a short while with my middle-aged despair?Tom wondered. -Rick! You've been pulling my leg!-For want of anything better, yes.He narrowed his eyes. -Just you wait, Roderick Lustrum. Be careful. You've had your fun. It's my turn next time.The pleasure I felt at the return of Tom's boyish high-spirits was more than a little mitigated by the thought of to what fearful abysses such boyish high-spirits could sometimes descend. Nevertheless, I resolutely gave him the benefit of the doubt. -Right. I'll watch out.-Gosh, Rick. I can't wait to see Stavrogin and Kirillov and Verkhovensky on the stage.Tom's lightening recoveries, like his sudden drops, displaying, as they did, all the recuperative powers of the young, had their darker, obverse side, before which I could only wonder. I laughed. -I see we have a prospective nihilist on our hands.Tom grinned. -Isn't Dostoevsky great, Rick?-Yes. Great.-I thought Poe was great, but Dostoevsky makes him seem like a schoolboy.-Poe was a schoolboy, all of his life. Whereas Dostoevsky was a perpetual adolescent.Tom looked hurt. -Dostoevsky? Adolescent?-Anthony Burgess used to say that only the very young and the very old could really enjoy Dostoevsky. He was such an absolutist. So black and white. Us poor in-betweeners, in our grey relativist middle-age, tend to turn to Henry James and Turgenev.-I haven't read him yet. But I've read Henry James. The Turn of the Screw. It's terrific.-Yes. It is. But I mean all Henry James. Eliot believed one must read all of him; that James and Dostoevsky both created their own worlds of thought and feeling. And he found James no less profound, but so much less violent and more reasonable.Tom grimaced. -But Eliot was such an old fuddy-duddy.-

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-In his later years, perhaps. But read The Waste Land. That wasn't written by a fuddy-duddy.I was beginning to feel like the elder Borges, sitting on a bench on the banks of the Charles River in Cambridge, arguing with his younger self about the relative merits of Dostoevsky and Conrad. Like him I, who had never been a father, felt for this poor boy - more intimate to me even than a son of my flesh - a surge of love. Only The Devils had not faded in my memory. -God, Rick. There's so much I want to read. I'll have to get you to draw me up a reading-list one of these days.I laughed. -The Waste Land is a reading-list. And besides, I haven't read my own one yet.He laughed too. -I bet it's a beauty.-And what about poor old Nietzsche?-He'll just have to wait till Saturday week!-Well, for a stare, I'd strongly advise you to buckle down and learn Latin.Tom pulled a long face. -Translation just isn't possible, you know!-But it's such a bore, Rick.-Only at first. Then I'd suggest Greek. Which is more than I've ever done.We both burst out laughing. -Right. I'll start on Latin and Greek Sunday week, as soon as I've got Dostoevsky under my belt.-I'd wear my bracers, Tom, if I were you. You don't want to have to unbuckle during the show.He giggled. -Especially after all that rich Russian food at interval.We were back on our old, easy, friendly terms. Or almost. Tom leaned forward. -Come on Rick. Tell me. Who commits suicide?-Who?-At the end.I followed his train of thought. -My lips are sealed!-Well, it can't be Shatov.I said nothing. -Certainly not Verkhovensky! Not Stavrogin?I compressed my lips further. -Ah, Rick. Come on. I expect it's Kirillov. He's mad. And with that Verkhovensky around!-Tom. If you have so little self-control, read the end of the book first yourself. I'm not saying another word.He grinned. -I expect I'll find out soon enough.-I expect you will. With a little patience.-I didn't guess about Smerdyakov. In The Brothers.-

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-We won't hold that against you.-Who do you like best? In The Brothers?I laughed. -I don't know. I hadn't thought about it all that much. Dmitri. Alyosha perhaps.He grinned again. -I like him too. But he's so good. Sometimes I feel I'm more like Ivan.I shook my head. -We all feel like Ivan at times, Tom. But I don't see you as Ivan. Kolya. You're Kolya.He beamed. -I love talking to you, Rick. More than anyone else I know.-Thanks.-I still show off to all my friends about our famous National Gallery Tour. We got through the whole History of Western Art in an afternoon.-Yes. But that didn't cost me a penny. Look what this is costing you. I certainly know which side my bread is buttered.Suddenly he was serious. -Rick. I know I shouldn't say this. Never tell anyone that I did. Promise. But I sometimes think I love you more than I do Dad.He blushed. -Tom. Don't ever let me hear you saying that again. Never again. You promise. It's easy for me. Power without responsibility. The prerogative of the journalist and the whore. Your father loves you more than his own life.My severity was not feigned. Tom's blush deepened. -Christ, Rick. I love him too. I'd gladly give my life for him. But that's just biological. You're my godfather. If there is a God, He chose you out for me. I'd gladly give my soul for you.His eyes filled with the easy tears of his own childish magnanimity. He grasped my hand for a moment, then he was up and off, making his way between the tables, the wounds at the back of his knees invisible under his khaki pants. Poor, poor devil, poor dear Tom, I thought. You're hamstrung too. By your genes, by your birth, by your chosen parents, by your environment, by the schooling you have had and the schooling you have not had, by your friends, by your own fond heart, even by your bloody godfather. We're all of us hamstrung. He disappeared through the swinging door. Hnuy illa nyha maiah Yahoo.

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And now Anne was back. We were meeting in Vigo Street, just across from where Garrard's used to be. She had flown in the night before but had not wanted me to pick her up at the airport. She was exhausted, she had said, and looked a mess. She would rather meet me the next day for lunch, a late lunch, after she had had her beauty sleep. That suited me fine. I arrived first. I wondered vaguely what new name we would have to get used to for Gerrard's Corner. Because once a thing is gone, it seems like it has never been there. Anne was late. I stood in the sun, looking in a desultory manner into the windows of Austin Reed, purveyors of suits to the profanum vulgus. But that did not divert me for long. Suddenly everything went dark. Soft, familiar fingers covered my eyes, creeping around my head from behind. I feigned shocked surprise: -O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon, Irrecoverably dark, total Eclipse Without all hope of day!-The blaze of two forty-seven precisely!Anne's voice was honey to my ears. -O late, late, late, amid the blaze of two forty-seven!Anne was good enough for me: -First granting, as I do, it was a weakness In me, but incident to all our sex...I interrupted her: -Out, out Hyaena; these are thy wonted arts, And arts of every woman false like thee.She was good enough again: -In argument with men a woman ever Goes by the worse, whatever be her cause.I swung around to face her. Her hair was a golden nimbus in the sun. -Thank Christ I'm not blind!We embraced for a long time on the crowded corner of Regent Street, oblivious of our surroundings. I held her at arm's length.

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-You're looking great. Great.She smiled. -Motherhood seems to agree with me. Even my sister's.-I can see that.She frowned. -I wish I could say the same about you.I misunderstood deliberately. -You don't think motherhood agrees with me?She clicked her tongue. -That you're looking great. You look awful.-Thanks.-You haven't been working too hard?-Not too hard.She assumed her Ralph Fiennes persona: -You're not missing me yet?But The English Patient didn't seem funny any more. -Fuck Ralph Fiennes!My own vehemence surprised me. She looked hurt. -I'm only kidding, Rick. Like with Milton.I softened, smiled, instantly contrite. -Sorry, Anne. Milton's one thing. But The English Patient is something else.She smiled too, ran her fingers through my hair. -Talking of Milton, you need a haircut. Look at yourself! You should have a woman to look after you.I moved my head under her fingers, like a cat: -God, when he gave me strength, to shew withal How slight the gift was, hung it in my Hair.Comatose, like a cat, I moved my head, eyes half closed. Verweile doch! Du bist so schön! But she left off. -Nevertheless, you do need a haircut. Don't you think Tony, at any rate, might be missing you?I laughed. -God! At least Dalila did her own dirty work. She didn't send Samson off to be shorn by her Sicilian accomplice in Dean Street.She kissed me again. -Rick. I do love you. Even with unkempt hair.-I love you too. Even with the most beautiful hair in the world.Her fingers closed round my throat. -Rick! You're not going to start on my hair again!-Only God, my dear...But she throttled me, laughing, into silence.

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I quizzed her with my eyes. -Right. Where do we go?She feigned innocence. -It's too late for the Cri. Or for any of your grander places. Now I wonder why you suggested we should meet in Vigo Street?I played along. -I can't imagine.We smiled into each other's eyes, spoke in unison. -La Madeleine!The walk took us all of fifteen seconds. -Dear old Sackville Street. I do hope that you gave my love to its Hibernian counterpart.She frowned comically. -O'Connell Street, now, if you'll not be minding it, Rick! We're no longer liking to be part of your big grand Empire!Her usually slight Dublin accent was suddenly strong. -Neither it is you are, Anne! Neither it is you are!I was a match for her. We were both laughing when we entered La Madeleine. The Spanish manager came up and shook hands with us. We were shown to a corner table, at the back, sequestered now, with the rush of the lunch hour over. That suited me fine too. Anne smiled across at me. -I love this place. It's like a little bit of Paris in the heart of London. I always get a surprise when we leave to find myself back in Vigo Street again.-It is a real Brassiere. Everything about it seems to be French. Even the waiters. Although I don't think they'd quite do for Marco-Pierre. Most of them are students learning the language.-Except for the manager.I laughed. -Except for the manager.A young waiter sporting a small beard brought us the menus. He was new to me. -Which part of France are you from?-From Lyon, Monsieur.-Lille! I know it well.-No, no, Monsieur. Lyon. Près de Lyon? Le Rhône?-Ah, oui. Je connais Lyon aussi. C'est une belle ville. Le deuxième cité de France.He smiled proudly. -Ah, oui, oui! And the food!-Delicieuse! Paul Bocuse.-Oui, oui. Paul Bocuse.-And Vienne. I was there last year.-

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-Vienne! That is near where I am from!-La Pyramide!-Ah, La Pyramide!After he had gone Anne burst out laughing. -You don't think it might have been better to stick either to French or to English?-I don't see why. I can help him with his English and he can help me with my French.-You've both got your work cut out.I scowled. She leaned forward. -Remember last year? At Vienne? La Pyramide? The centenary of Ferdinand Point?-We didn't even know it was being celebrated until we got there. And we both had the Centenaire Turbot in Champagne.Anne laughed. -And both drunk too much.-And afterwards, in our room, how you said the ancient Roman pyramid outside our window, which was really more of an obelisk, reminded you of something?-Except that we didn't have a green spotlight to illuminate yours.-Careful, Anne. No long white tablecloths here. Remember.-Right. Not another word. My lips are sealed.-That'll be a change.We both laughed. -What do you fancy? Apart from that, I mean.Anne had gone on, before I could articulate the words she sensed my lips were forming. I laughed again. -A Quiche Lorraine, perhaps?-Right. Perfect. And some Provence Rosé.After we had ordered, we could talk. -How was Dublin?She was rummaging through her purse. -Dublin was Dublin. Fuck Dublin. Wait till you see Abigail.She handed me a photograph. A small girl, wearing an embroidered waistcoat and a Panama hat, both some thirty sizes too large for her, was staring solemnly out at me. -She looks rather like Tweety-Bird.Anne laughed. -She is! Exactly! That's what everyone calls her!I looked again more closely. -Rather strange attire for an eight-month-old?Anne laughed again. -That was Charlie. He's a cousin of the father's. A bit of a dandy. A bit of a card. He visited us one day and dressed Abigail up. In his own fancy waistcoat and Panama hat. She looked a scream.-I can see that.-

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She took the photo back, studied it. -I suppose they suit Charlie better than they do Abigail.-I'd have to meet Charlie before I could give an informed opinion on that.Anne was still lost in the photo. -Although I'm not so sure.-Another beautiful colleen to be breaking the hearts of us poor wretched men!My accent, the vehemence of its tone, took me again by surprise. Anne looked up quickly. I cursed inwardly my own lack of watchfulness. -Rick! That doesn't sound like you.I laughed, covering up. -It's not, actually. It's what Mike said to me when I told him where you were.-I'd expect it of Mike. It sounds like Mike. But not you.-Mike's all right. He's a great guy. The best.My defence of Mike failed to divert her. -Sure. I know. Now what's the matter?I pretended not to understand. -Matter? Nothing's the matter.But she would not be diverted. -Ricky Lustrum! I know you too well not to know when something's the matter. Like at the theatre the other week. Now what is it?An innocent smile tried to bluff it out. -Nothing. Honestly.-All right. Now you tell me all about the nothing, honestly.I attempted a laugh. -There's nothing to tell. Honestly or otherwise.-Rick! I get back from Dublin. You look like death warmed up. You almost bite my head off as soon as I open my mouth. And now you grind your teeth at me and nearly spit my beautiful baby niece back into my face when I show you her photograph.I was glad when the waiter, bringing the bread and wine, interrupted her. After he had gone, I proposed a toast. -To Abigail.-To Abigail.We clicked glasses grimly and drank. Anne put her glass down, glared across at me. -I'm waiting.-Anne. A lot has happened since you've been away.She leaned forward, her elbows on the table. -A lot?-I've resigned from The Herald, for one thing.She clapped her hands together, laughed.

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-Great. You always were too good for The Herald. It was like watching a Prince of the Blood trying to empty trash-cans. You did it, but one could see you were ill at ease. One sensed the effort. What else is new?I was disappointed at her response, or lack of it. -Else? Isn't that enough for you?-You said a lot!-Isn't that a lot?Suddenly she was serious. -Rick. Something's on your mind. You know you can talk about it to me. About anything.est et fideli tuta silentio merces: -Nothing's on my mind.-Rick! I've been worried about you, you know. Before I went away I said some silly things. I hope your leaving The Herald has nothing to do with that.My answer was prompt. -No. Nothing.-All that rubbish about employees of the paper not being able to claim the reward. That wasn't why you left? You haven't found something out?I laughed. -I'd forgotten all about that.Her querulousness verged on suspicion. -Forgotten? After all we said?-I mean I hadn't followed it up. Not after what Branch told me. Not really.-What Branch told you?-I mentioned his fax, I'm sure. When we had lunch at the Cri. I'm sure we talked about it at the Connaught when we had dinner just before your Dublin trip.She smiled sweetly. -All I remember you talking about that night was your precious godson and the Oval.I laughed. -All I remember you talking about was your forthcoming first sight of your precious niece.-Right. Touché, Rick. What then did Branch tell you?-The forensic report. It's been in the papers. Surely you must have seen it.Still she smiled. -I haven't been reading the papers all that much. Besides, your little dead boyfriend hasn't made quite such a splash in the Irish press.I felt myself colouring. -Christ, Anne, that was pretty low!Suddenly there were tears in her eyes. -I'm sorry, Rick.She took my hand.

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-I don't know what got into me. Ever since that night, the night we saw Naked, that boy has in some silly way somehow come between us. I wish the wretched brat had never been killed. I'd have liked to have been given the opportunity to murder him myself.My guard slipped momentarily. -Not if I'd got in first!Anne picked it up. -Rick! What have you found out?I smiled. -Nothing. Nothing.She smiled too. -Nothing? Nothing will come of nothing. What about the forensic report?-The forensic report showed the boy hadn't been sexually interfered with. So bang went all our leads. Even Aidan admitted it. So there was no point in tramping through half the gay bars in Soho looking for our murderer. I had to find another angle.Anne was interested. -So?Now I had to allay that interest. -I went to North Wales again.-And?-Nothing. Nothing really. I saw the parents a second time. Interviewed a school friend. But I didn't find out a thing.Anne smiled. -I should have been there with you. I'd have picked up all the little clues. The kind of thing a man doesn't notice. Like Nora Charles.I laughed. -There was nothing to pick up.But Anne picked up everything. -You said really. Nothing really. What about the really?My answers seemed to come from the air. -Well, I found out our Adam Leslie wasn't quite the lily-white boy my credulous imagination had painted him out to be. It seems, reading between the lines, that he was really rather a nasty bit of works. A bully, among other things.-Well, he was only fifteen.-The child is father of the man.-Sure. And he would most probably have grown up to be an even nastier bit of works. But that's no reason to kill him.-No. But it's a motive.-Rick, if you're going to take that as your criterion, who should 'scape whipping? Or murdering?-I know, Anne. I know. But...Suddenly there were tears in my own eyes. -Rick. What is it?-I thought he was all glittering with the noblest of carriage.-

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Anne smiled. -He's only a bumpkin. A puny, Rick. Like us all.She squeezed my hand hard. -You expect too much of people, Rick. Always have done. There are no lily-white boys any more.My lapse was only momentary. -Sure. I know. But I had been building up a case for him on the side of the angels. Now that the Devil's Advocate has put in his objections, objections that I can't ignore, a certain drop appears to be inevitable. I feel let down.-Poor Rick.- She patted my hand. -We can't all live up to your high standards.I felt the vehemence creeping in again. -I can't live up to my high standards. That's why I feel let down.The arrival of our quiches was a welcome diversion. -Some black pep-per, Madame, Monsieur?The waiter had that much English. I watched the black pepper sifting down onto our plates from the extended grinder. -Merci.He grinned. -Bon appetite!We ate for a time in silence. Anne spoke first, a shred of lettuce disfiguring one corner of her mouth. -So we have a motive. But no culprit.-No. No culprit yet. Or even suspect. Nor any likelihood of one. We seem to have come to a dead end.The shred of lettuce, still clinging to Anne's lip, appeared to have taken on monstrous proportions. It seemed then she could have, if she had so wished, reached across the table, taken me up in the palm of her hand, held me close to her face so that every tiny flaw was magnified a thousand times, placed me astride her gigantic swelling nipple. I looked down at my plate, to the naked lunch waiting at the end of my own fork. Anne laughed. -Oh, well. Easy come, easy go. We shall just have to get used to the penury to which I am rapidly growing accustomed.The shred of lettuce was now stuck to the rim of Anne's wineglass. -What about the Crillon? The Gritti? Quadri's?Anne waved them gaily away. -Fuck them all!I laughed. -Changed your tune a bit, haven't you?-That's a lady's prerogative.She smiled sweetly. -And now I'm out of a job, we'll be lucky to be able to afford this.-I'll shout you the occasional quiche, Rick. For old sake's sake.-

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I put down my knife and fork. -Anne. Even after all these years I'm still never quite sure where I am with you.She had her Giaconda look. -That's part of my eternal fascination.-I almost took you seriously the other week.-Seriously?-At the Cri. All your talk of rewards and high living.She smiled. -That was at the Cri. Amid all that Victorian opulence. That was Flaming June. That was before my trip back to Dublin. This is here. This is now. This is real life. This is La Madeleine. This is quite good enough for me. Too good. I'm quite happy eating at home. On scraps.-You don't mind?-Mind?-About the reward? The quarter million? Or rather about the lack of it?-Mind, Rick? I only mind about you.She leaned forward, suddenly serious. -Rick. This time in Dublin has clarified a lot of things in my own mind. Put things in perspective.-Things?She looked at me hard. -Rick. Promise me not to be offended by what I'm going to say. Not to take it the wrong way.I laughed. -How can I know if I'm going to take it the wrong way until I know what it is?She wasn't smiling. -I know. It's asking a lot. Nevertheless promise.I could only go along with her. -All right. I promise.She spoke low. -Rick. The word which I'm going to use I choose carefully. Very carefully. Being back in Dublin, with my sister and her new baby, being an aunt for the first time, has made me come to question the â&#x20AC;&#x2039;sterility â&#x20AC;&#x2039;of our own relationship.I laughed, blushing, angry at myself for blushing. -Why should I be offended. It's a very good word. An excellent word. A good technical word.She bit her lip. -I knew you'd be offended.-No. Not at all. I did promised you, didn't I? Nevertheless I hardly need to remind you that if we hadn't, by mutual consent, been taking it the wrong way all these years, our relationship doubtless would not have been so sterile.-Rick!Anne almost wailed. -Sorry. But I thought when you Irish saw a spade you liked calling it a spade.Anne tried to lighten things.

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-I am glad to say that I have never seen a spade. It is obvious that our social spheres have been widely different.But I would have none of it. I spoke deliberately. -parce tuis igitur dare mascula nomina rebus teque puta cunnos, uxor, habere duos.Anne coloured too, but rose triumphantly to trump my spade from my own pack. -heu quantos aestus, quantos patiere labores, si fuerit cunnus res peregrina tibi!I clapped my hands. -Bravo! I chose the weapons. You deserve first blood. Although blood hardly seems the word.-Rick! No mutual recriminations? Remember? Neither of us wanted children. God knows how often I longed for you to risk it. But you, with your horror of abortion, your upside-down scruples about contraception instilled into you by the Jesuits, never did. I'm not blaming you. Or myself. We both had to act according to our own lights.I laughed. -Lights! We'd have both done better with a darkened room and a chambermaid. Or, in your case, a footman no doubt.There was hurt in her eyes, but she smiled. -Speak no evil of the soul, Nor think that body is the whole.The accent and intonation were perfect. Suddenly she was crying. -Rick. Rick. I love you so much, Rick. Not just your body. Your soul, Rick, your soul! And seeing Abigail. She's so beautiful! And being an aunt. And wanting to be more. So much more. And loving you so much. Oh Rick!She buried her face in her hands. Something was growing in the pit of my stomach, something heavy and hard, like a malignant tumour. I let her cry. She looked up, the tears dried as suddenly as they had begun. -Rick. I said I was a tigress, fighting for her mate. I haven't changed. But I have changed about one thing. I don't give a fuck whether you prosper or not. Whether you're in work or out of work. Whether we eat at the Savoy Grill or McDonald's. All I care about is you. And the cubs I want to see looking up at me with your eyes.I started to laugh. I knew I was hurting her but I didn't care. -Rick. What is it?-I was just thinking of something you said that afternoon at the Cri.-Something I said?My words were a counterpoint to the laughter. -You said: What have we to lose? And do you remember what I said?-

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Anne's face was grim. -No. You tell me.-I said...But I had to stop for a moment to fight down the laughter. -I said: Perhaps something we can't even conceive of. Remember, Anne? Remember?-Yes. I remember.My laughter dried up as suddenly as her tears had done. -Because, during these last few days, the period of your own tardy conversion to the idea of motherhood, the conviction has been steadily and irresistibly growing in my own soul of, and I choose the word carefully, very carefully, the inadvisability, for me, of fatherhood.-Inadvisability?Anne was stony. I laughed without mirth. -I use the word advisedly. There is something in me, something in my blood, something in the blood of the whole human race perhaps, that I would not wish to pass on to my wretched offspring.-Rick!Anne positively wailed. -I do not care to end as poor Gulliver ended, thinking as he thought:I looked steadily into Anne's eyes as I spoke. -And when I began to consider, that by copulating with one of the Yahoo-species, I had become a parent of more; it struck me with the utmost shame, confusion, and horror.Anne did not say anything for a long while. When she did speak, she spoke in her best Dublin manner, but lowering her tone to emulate a man: -It is Swift, Jonathan Swift, talking to the woman he called Vanessa. She was christened Hester Vanhomrigh.She paused. I smiled at the familiar words. She went on, in her own lovely voice: -I questioned her, Jonathan, because I love. Why have you let me spend hours in your company if you did not want me to love you?She paused again. I took up my cue: -When I rebuilt Rome in your mind it was as though I walked its streets.-Was that all, Jonathan? Was I nothing but a painter's canvas?-My God, do you think it was easy? I was a man of strong passions and I had sworn never to marry.-If you and she are not married, why should we not marry like other men and women? I loved you from the first moment when you came to my mother's house and began to teach me. I thought it would be enough to look at you, to speak to you, to hear you speak. I followed you to Ireland five years ago and I can bear it no longer. It is not enough to look, to speak, to hear. Jonathan, Jonathan, I am a woman, the women Brutus and Cato loved were not different.-I have something in my blood that no child must inherit. I have constant attacks of dizziness; I pretend they come from a surfeit of fruit when I was a child. I had them in London.... There was a

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great doctor there, Dr. Arbuthnot; I told him of those attacks of dizziness, I told him of worse things. It was he who explained. There is a line of Dryden's....-O, I know - 'Great wits are sure to madness near allied.' If you had children, Jonathan, my blood would make them healthy. I will take your hand, I will lay it upon my heart - upon the Vanhomrigh blood that has been healthy for generations.Anne took my hand, did just that. Then she went on: -That is the first time you have touched my body, Jonathan.But I had to go on too: -What do I care if it be healthy? What do I care if it could make mine healthy? Am I to add another to the healthy rascaldom and knavery of the world?-Look at me, Jonathan. Your arrogant intellect separates us. Give me both your hands. I will put them upon my breast.Anne followed the â&#x20AC;&#x2039;stage directions â&#x20AC;&#x2039;to the letter. -O, it is white - white as the gambler's dice - white ivory dice. Think of the uncertainty. Perhaps a mad child - perhaps a rascal - perhaps a knave - perhaps not, Jonathan. The dice of the intellect are loaded, but I am the common ivory dice.She hesitated a moment. -It is not my hands that draw you back. My hands are weak, they could not draw you back if you did not love as I love. You said that you have strong passions; that is true, Jonathan - no man in Ireland is so passionate. That is why you need me, that is why you need children, nobody has greater need. You are growing old. An old man without children is very solitary. Even his friends, men as old as he, turn away, they turn towards the young, their children or their children's children. They cannot endure an old man like themselves.She hesitated again. -You are not too old for the dice, Jonathan, but a few years if you turn away will make you an old miserable childless man.-O God, hear the prayer of Jonathan Swift, that afflicted man, and grant that he may leave to posterity nothing but his intellect that came to him from Heaven.-Can you face solitude with that mind, Jonathan?She paused. -Dice, white ivory dice.I raised my voice. -My God, I am left alone with my enemy. Who locked the door, who locked me in with my enemy?We were both silent for a long time. Anne, when she spoke, spoke with a child's voice: -Bad old man! Do not let him come back. Bad old man does not know he is dead.Again for a long time we were silent. Eventually I did speak. -But the bad old man won't go away. Perhaps the bad old man will never go away again.Anne's own voice was a dying echo. -Rick. O Rick.-

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We each returned in silence to our cold quiche. And did not speak again until after the waiter had cleared our plates and brought us big cups of black coffee. -Anne!She looked up. -Anne. One thing I did find out at Colwyn Bay. I think I found out what it was like being fifteen again.-Rick. That look in your eyes.My attempted smile failed dismally. -How could I ever ask a son of ours to go through that.But her eyes blazed. -Of all the defeatist fucking rubbish I've ever heard in my life. Rick! Be a man! You're not a little boy any more.Her look seemed to bore into my soul. -If you'd really found out what it was like being fifteen again, you'd have discovered what resilience the young have at that age. We all go through it. We survive. What makes our son so special that he alone should be spared. It's not all that fearful childhood and youth you and St Augustine look back at so lovingly through the black-tinted spectacles of your blighted old age.I merely quoted: -Never to have lived is best, ancient writers say; Never to have drawn the breath of life, never to have looked into the eye of day; The second best's a gay goodnight and quickly turn away.Anne, as usual, was good enough for me. -That was Willie Yeats paraphrasing a language he didn't even understand which was in any case written by an ancient who didn't know his arse from his elbow.I had to laugh in spite of myself; nevertheless I attempted a trump: -Thy portion esteem I highest, Who wast not ever begot; Thine next, being born who diest And straightway again art not.But she had a higher one. -Well, he knew the language, I'll grant you that. And he did know his arse from his elbow. But it's still the same ancient, who didn't. I know the jury acquitted him, but I think his sons were right. By the time he wrote that I think he was gaga.Again I had to laugh. -That's what I love about you, Anne. Your respect and reverence for the past.But still her eyes blazed. -Fuck the past. I have no respect or reverence for anything but us. And do you know what I really want you to love about me?She glanced quickly around, then went on in a lower tone.

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-What the fucking hell do you think God gave you your mentula for? Not for my shitty podex. Not for my os. Not for your own bloody manus. He made it to fit my cunnus. And that's where it belongs. That's what I want you to love about me, Rick. My cunnus.I could only admire her spirit. And her tactics. Unfortunately I could see all round them. That didn't stop me from loving her the more. -Anne. It's no use. It's too late. We can't go back to what we were before.She flared up. -I don't want to go back. I want to move on.-On? Move on? Where?She looked into my eyes. -Into life.But I was resolutely turned towards die mondenen Pfade der Abgeschiedenen. -Schmerz versteinerte die Schwelle.She looked up to heaven as if the last straw and the camel's back had both broken at once. -God. It's like talking to a bloody United Nations translator. Let's try and stick to English, eh, Rick? Just for a change?Suddenly I had had enough. We seemed to be talking around in circles. I could see no point in prolonging the agony further. Hers. Or mine. I searched amid my ruins, our ruins, for some fragment, something to make an end, knowing now that nothing could ever shore them up. And again it came to me, from the air, as it were. -All right. English. Just for a change.I decided on Olivier and Williamson as my models: -Why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest; but yet I could accuse me of such things that it were better my mother had not borne me. I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious; with more offences at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in. What should such fellows as I do crawling between heaven and earth? We are arrant knaves, all; believe none of us.Her Ophelia would have been comic had it not been so heartbreaking: -O heavenly powers, restore him!I went straight to the point: -I say, we will have no more marriages; those that are married already, all but one, shall live; the rest shall keep as they are. To a nunnery, go.She, too, focused on the end: -O! Woe is me! To have seen what I have seen, see what I see!There didn't seem anything to be said after that. Nevertheless, we were not yet finished. The waiter cleared away our cups. If he had noticed anything, his tact was either too good, or his English too bad, to in any way show it. I paid l'addition, adding twelve-and-a-half per cent. He thanked me. When we were alone again, Anne, who had been silent during the transaction, looked up at me. The expression in her eyes, though I had never seen it before, was what I would have expected. The tone of her voice, though, was quite different: -Lasset das Lied auch des Knaben gedenken.-

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The snide United Nations riposte which had surfaced in my mind I immediately suppressed. Her tone was altogether too tragic for that. -Yes. Poor little Adam Leslie. Let us remember poor little Adam Leslie too.Her words sounded all the stranger spoken, as they were, in a soft sweet undertone: -Fuck poor little Adam Leslie. I wish poor little Adam Leslie had never been born. I was thinking about our son.-Ah, yes. Our son.-Die ungebornen Enkle.-Yes. Die ungebornen Enkle.Then we both just sat there. The waiter returned with two glasses. -Some Cognac. Compliments of the house. For our good customers.The Spanish manager waved over to us from the bar. -Thanks a lot.We sat with the glasses in front of us. Eventually I raised my glass, proposed the toast. -Die ungebornen Enkle!Her forlorn response merely echoed the last two syllables. -... Enkle!We touched glasses almost silently and drunk. Then, almost silently, she was crying. I fumbled for her hand across the table. She grasped mine hard, the tears flowing. -Oh, my grief, I've lost him surely. I've lost the only Playboy of the Western World.I leaned forward, spoke in a low voice. -Isn't there the light of seven heavens in your heart alone, the way you'll be an angel's lamp to me from this out, and I abroad in the darkness.She managed a dim smile. -Fuck you, Ricky Lustrum. I still love you.-I still love you too. But what can we do. I'm not the old Ricky. I don't think I ever was. But I liked to pretend I was sometimes. Now I can't pretend. We both acknowledged the risk. We both lost. You're not the old Anne.-No. I'm not the old Anne. Ah, Torvald - it would take the greatest miracle of all.I could only go along with her. -Tell me the greatest miracle!-You and I both would have to transform ourselves to the point that - Oh, Torvald, I've stopped believing in miracles.-But I'll believe. Tell me! Transform ourselves to the point that - ?-That our living together could be a true marriage.Her smile was radiant. But I had already heard the door slam.

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Mendacious and gross, I couldn't greatly pretend I hadn't heard it. Still, I could pretend just a little. -Solveig waited?But she had heard the querulousness of my tone. -Yes. And Beatrice prayed.Still she smiled. Why not, I thought. Might as well be hung for a late James as for an early Ibsen. -I'll marry you, mind you, in an hour.Her smile broadened. -As we were?-As we were.But she would not play her part. -I know my headshake ought now to be the end. I know I should say: We shall never be again as we were! And it is true. But I won't admit it. Not even to myself. I do know we can never go back, though. As we were.-No.I could only agree with her. She got up. -Give me a call, Rick. We might meet for lunch sometime.Then she was gone, her golden hair flowing in the sunshine of the street outside. A sudden hope leapt in me. -The greatest miracle - ?But the waiter let a saucer fall and break. Perish the day on which I was born!

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quod si tantus amor menti, si tanta cupido est bis Stygios innare lacus, bis nigra videre Tartara, et insano iuvat indulgere labori, accipe quae peragenda prius. I wandered at will amid the flower beds and trees of Mount Street Gardens, aimlessly reading the inscriptions on the backs of the benches, putting off the inevitable plunge from the brightness of the day into the gloom of the cavernous church. si nunc se nobis ille aureus arbore ramus ostendat nemore in tanto! But no twin doves came flying from the heavens to settle on the green grass. Pigeons fed; but they did not lead me on. Perhaps the very pigeon whose shadow, was it only two Saturdays ago?, had for all but an instant coincided with the leaded shape high in the stained-glass. But now the birds seemed contingent and as indifferent as the sky. Eventually I found what I had been looking for. I did not know what it was, forsythia perhaps, botanical Latin has always been a mystery to me, but its boughs branched out and they were clustered with small golden flowers. As a token of my journey it would do. The gardens were quiet. After an almost furtive check to see I was not being observed, I reached out. namque ipse volens facilisque sequetur, si te fata vocant; aliter non viribus ullis vincere nec duro poteris convellere ferro. The small bough I had chosen to pluck came away effortlessly in my hand. I entered the comparative darkness of the church. Ignatius was keeping watch. I patted his foot. He seemed to view my golden bough and the two decrepit volumes I carried with some suspicion. Nevertheless, obediently I received his blessing. But the confessionals were all deserted. For a moment I felt an almost inexplicable sense of disappointment, almost of rebuff, as if God, or Father Lawrence, or the two of them in cahoots, had suddenly slammed a door in my face. Then I laughed, instantly aware of my own self-centeredness. Pull down thy vanity, I say pull down. Did you honestly expect Father Lawrence to be waiting here for your return, in the confessional, like some latter-day Curé d'Ars? Come on, Rick! Take a pull on yourself! Be a man! The only wisdom we can hope to acquire Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.

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Ignatius seemed to smile as I passed him, amused, no doubt, to hear such Franciscan sentiments aired by an old Stonyhurst boy. Outside the sunlight was blinding. I left the gardens by the gate, found the Mount Street entrance to the presbytery, resolutely turning my back on the Connaught and its flowery blandishments. I rang the bell. The door was opened by a small, slightly hunched figure in black. -Good afternoon. I wonder if I might see Father Lawrence?The porter smiled up at me, all friendliness. -Certainly. Certainly. Come in. Come in.He ushered me into the entrance hall. -Whom shall I say is calling?-Roderick Lustrum. He knows me.The porter glanced down at my floral offering, puzzled. Suddenly embarrassed, I attempted to conceal it in the folds of my trousers. But that only made matters worse. There seemed little point in trying to explain. So I said nothing. The porter shrugged, indulgently, as if well used to such eccentricities, and shuffled around to the switchboard behind the reception desk. That in Majorca Alfonso watched the door. He was back in a moment, all smiles again. -Father Lawrence will be with you in a couple of minutes. He was just resting.-I hope I haven't disturbed him. There's no urgency.-No no no. Just follow me. I'll show you where to wait.He led me along a long corridor and stopped before one of a number of identical doors; identical save for the number on each; this one was seven. He opened the door, showed me in. -Father Lawrence will be with you shortly.Still he smiled up at me, his head to one side; immobile, I now realised, either from a frozen shoulder or a slight curvature of the spine. Then he shut the door and I was alone. The room, which was little more than a large cubical, was bare and brightly lit. The furnishing consisted of a wooden table and two wooden chairs. There was a crucifix on the wall. Apart from that, nothing. I sat on one of the chairs and just waited, my books and â&#x20AC;&#x2039;golden bough lying on the table in front of me. Father Lawrence was not long. The door opened and he was there. -Roderick, my boy. How are you?I stood up. He took my proffered right hand in both of his, shook it warmly, I adding my left hand to make a fourth. -Fine, Father, fine.He held me at arm's length, frowned. -You don't look it.-

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I laughed. -Thanks, Father.He laughed too. -Although I'm bound to admit I have no previous knowledge of your appearance with which to compare it. It's nice, though, having a face to fit the voice.I grinned. -It's nice meeting you face to face too, Father. I feel I know you so well already.-The confessional is most intimate, my son. More intimate than many closer relationships. We meet there soul to soul.-Yes.-But tell me all your news. You have no idea how often I've thought of you over the past two weeks. And prayed. And what about Tom. How is Tom?I laughed. -He's fine. I think I worried us both unnecessarily there. We have an appointment Saturday week at the Barbican. Just the two of us. An all day production, from St Petersburg, in Russian, of The Possessed. With Russian food at interval.He clapped his hands together, laughed. -Wonderful. I've a good mind to join you.I laughed too. -I wish you would. You and Tom would get on like a house on fire. He'd be tickled to death to meet a real live Jesuit priest. Whenever his father and I remember our old Stonyhurst days, I can see him green with envy. He thinks you're dead romantic.Father Lawrence looked at me over his glasses. -Well, we are.We both laughed. -Father. Tom seems so fond of me. Too fond, I think. But he doesn't really know me. I love him too. None of that rubbish I was confessing to you last time I was here. But I do love him. Very much.-Quite right. He's your godson. And you're his godfather. You have a lot to live up to, you know.I couldn't hide the dismay in my voice. -I know. And it's hard. But I try.He smiled. -None of us can do more than that.-He's such a great kid, Father.He looked at me quizzically. -I'm sure he is. And why do you suppose such a â&#x20AC;&#x2039;great kid â&#x20AC;&#x2039;is so inordinately fond of such a worthless creature as you?I laughed. -It's a bit late in the day, Father, to start trying to build up my self-esteem.But he was serious.

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-I'm not trying to build up your self-esteem. I only want you to recognise your true worth in the eyes of God.I would not be serious. -I'm sure God's got more important things to do than to worry His head over the likes of me.He clicked his tongue. -The likes of you is all He worries His head over.But I had had enough of me. -Touché, Father. But I promised you I'd let you know how the story developed. That you'd be the first to hear.-Of course, of course. Sit down, my son. Make yourself as comfortable as these somewhat Spartan conditions allow.We sat across the table from each other. Father Lawrence glanced down at my still-life with books and branch. I proffered him the golden bough. -hoc sibi pulchra suum ferri Proserpina munus instituit;He smiled and took it. -And was your descent to Avernus as easy as it is purported to be?I was glad how little I had to explain. -Easy?He nodded. -Ah, yes. The return. hoc opus, hic labor est.-Yes.-It was hard?-Is hard, Father. Impossible.We were both silent. Then he laughed. -So this is your second trip to black Tartarus? Visiting me here today? I don't quite know how to take that.I was not laughing. -No, Father. I haven't left yet.Then he was serious. -No. Perhaps, your telling me about it, will help you finding your way back to the upper air.But I had no facile response; in fact no response at all. -It was bad?I only nodded. -Very bad?-Yes. Very bad.He was suddenly angry, with himself. -I should not have encouraged you. I was carried away by my own enthusiasm. Forgive me.-No, Father. I would have done exactly the same thing, with or without you. There is nothing to forgive.-

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-There is always something to forgive.He was almost sharp. -Very well, Father. I forgive you.He smiled. -Thank you.He looked at his watch. -There is a lot to tell?I laughed. -A great deal. You have time?-I say mass in three hours. Will that be sufficient?We laughed together. -Too long, Father. And not long enough.He nodded gravely. -I understand. Shall we talk under the seal of the confessional?-I think it might be best, Father.-Yes. I think so too. But I think we can dispense with the kneeling. I don't suppose your knees would hold out.We could both laugh at this too. Father Lawrence went through his formula and gestures, I went through mine. Then we were ready. He glanced across the table at my books. -And these then are the flowers you have brought back with you? That you discovered were real upon awaking?He too had to explain no further. -These are proofs positive of the Hell in which I never dreamt I could believe.-And in which you believe far more readily, perhaps, than you would have of Coleridge's Divine counterpart?His eyes glittered. -Yes. No doubt, Father. But there I am.He smiled. -There you are. What then?-Ah, what then?-Yes. Unless you are still dreaming. In which case I must be part of your dream. And I don't like belonging to another person's dream, any more than did Alice. But I must confess I find that kind of metaphysical debate rather tiresome. Perhaps it's my Jesuit training. Contemplation in action. If I am part of your dream, or if you are part of mine, all the contemplation in the world isn't going to get us any nearer to the truth. That sort of thing's much too deep for me. Rather like a lot of those Borges' Ficciones. I sometimes think it a shame that such a fine intellect as his should have spent so much of its time thinking up those silly, niggling little conceits and then seen fit to share them with us so that we could worry our heads over them too. No doubt, if it were looked into, we'd find a Dominican influence there somewhere.I laughed.

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-Two week ago you'd have had an argument on your hands, Father. Now I'm not so sure. In fact I think I'm rather inclined to agree with you.He smiled again. -Right. How about telling me the things that have happened to make you change your mind?Father Lawrence listened to me most attentively as I regurgitated the chewed-over gristle that had been stuck in my gullet for so long now it seemed that I had almost begun to accept its undigested mass as permanent, spewing out the chunks of human flesh, the horrors I had had to keep down, all the reversals, discoveries and calamities. At the appropriate time I handed over the two volumes, their relevant pages marked by me with thin flat ribbons as though Poe were some missal or mass-book, and he pored over them silently. I watched his face for a sign, some flicker of horror or disgust, but it was impassive. Everything came up, the last sour dregs that had been lying like some weight in my dyspeptic stomach, and then I was empty. I sat there, utterly drained, with only a dry retching, as it were, to remind me that at last it was all gone. Father Lawrence said nothing for a time. Then he looked up at me, his eyes, incredibly, dancing. -The ingenious little scallywag! What a story! Real News of the World stuff! What a shame no one will ever know about it. Only the two of us. And God.He smiled. I had not known what to expect. But I had not expected this. -Very well, Father. There seems nothing more to say.The blood was pounding in my temples. I started to get up. But he gestured with both hands for me to remain seated, his face still smiling. -Roderick, Roderick. Sit down. You're such a hot tempered young man. Try to respect my age at least, if nothing else.-Do not let me hear of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly.I spat it out. But he merely went on: -Their fear of possession, of belonging to another, or to others, or to God?-Touché, touché, touché, Father. Now may I please leave?I felt like a schoolboy asking to be excused from class. But suddenly he was severe. -No you may not, Roderick. I have a lot more to say to you. A lot more I want to ask you.I sat there, almost biting my lip, wondering if I would next be asked to write out a hundred lines. -Very well. Ask away.He sensed that the immediate crisis was past. -Do you intend to go to Colwyn Bay for the funeral?-No, Father, I do not.-Why not?I felt the blood pounding. -Because if I did I don't know if I could refrain from paying my last respects by pissing into the bloody coffin.He clicked his tongue. -You're very bitter, Roderick.-

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-Yes. Very bitter.-Why?The question was so simple that for the moment I could not think of a response. -I don't know.He smiled. -Look into your soul, Roderick, and try to think why.I hesitated. -Look what he did to his parents. To all his friends. To that poor slut. To me.-Ah, to you.-Yes, Father, to me.He looked at me over his glasses. -Look what he did to himself.I pounced. -A mortal sin, Father, a mortal sin! I don't know if God can forgive him, I certainly can't.-Fortunately God is more merciful than we are.Suddenly he laughed, breaking into song in a good light baritone voice: -Were I laid on Greeneland's coast...The look in his eyes, the sudden flash of humour, the incongruity of the whole situation, all conspired to help me to take up my cue: -And in my arms embraced my lass...We finished the next two verses in unison: -Warm amidst eternal frost, Too soon the half-year's night would pass...We broke off together, laughing. -They offered a requiem mass for him, you know. At Westminster Cathedral. Everyone was there. Muriel Spark. Alec Guinness. Harold Pinter and Antonia Fraser.I laughed. -I know. I was there too.-You?-I haven't been completely out of touch with Catholic affairs.He looked at me again over his glasses. -The Cardinal was there. But he didn't celebrate the mass. He just â&#x20AC;&#x2039;sat in.â&#x20AC;&#x2039;I looked at him, as it were, over mine: -He was a bad Catholic.He smiled indulgently: -That's the silliest phrase in common use.We were not quite back to where we were before, but the air had been cleared. -I'm sorry, Father. For my discourtesy.-Think nothing of it. I've known worse, over the years, in the confessional.-Yes. I dare say you have.We were silent a moment. Father Lawrence spoke first.

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-That poor distraught boy, almost a man, driven half-mad by grief and guilt, who chose you as the one human being who might be able to understand his plight, to whom he could unburden the secret anguish in his breast, and now you turn away.I did not answer for a time. -I'm sorry, Father. Perhaps that's what I can't forgive.He did not answer for a time either. -I know. It is a heavy cross to bear. But bear it you must. Otherwise he is lost. There is no one else.-There is you?-Ah, but he did not choose me.Suddenly the boy's anguish was my own -But why me? Why did he choose me?Father Lawrence smiled. -Because he loves you more than the brother he never had. Because you are his brother. Because you understand him. Because he knows you won't let him down. Because you love him. Because you are Rick.Die Wunde! - Die Wunde! Sie brennt in meinem Herzen! Each sentence stabbed like a burning shaft. -ac melior mihi frater!It was all I could manage. Father Lawrence went on. -And after he lost Daniel, when he was given that book, your book, how it must have fired his heart when he found the passage that you had marked which so perfectly fitted his own case, described his own struggle, the struggle everyone has when trying to apply themselves to a study which is uncongenial to their nature and temperament. Your own struggle too, Rick, at one time, else you would not have marked the passage. He recognised the bully-boy, the lout you probably were at that age, before you had become the toffee-nosed little swat we all know and love today. He couldn't make it, though, no matter how hard he tried. He sank deeper and deeper into his own, and Poe's, obsessions, until all he could look for in even the most innocuous of texts were morbid reminders of his loss and vague premonitions of his own imminent self-destruction. Rather like the protagonist of The Raven. And then, moving on to Borges, it seems inevitable that he would take those absurd literary concepts in an absurdly literal way. Always a danger for those who attempt something beyond their understanding. Look at poor Origin! Adam Leslie seemed really to believe that, simply by reading the same things that he had read, he could somehow become Daniel. And then that failed him too.-Peris didn't think so.I felt I had to interrupt. Father Lawrence looked at me gravely. -True. And Peris didn't even know the truth about his wonderful death.My jaw muscles gave way as though preparing for rigor mortis to set in. -Wonderful! It was abject!-

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-Yes. It was abject. And wonderful. Remember Pascal's grandeurs et misères de l'homme?-Grandeurs? That poor little bastard's last few minutes of consciousness? That ecstasy of self-loathing, alone, in the bath? The bath of a whore?Father Lawrence put his head on one side. -Yes. It does knock The Agamemnon for six, doesn't it! And God, being the greatest tragic dramatist, made sure that it all happened off-stage, so that no one but He can ever intrude upon those last few moments of consciousness.-Father, aren't you playing around with words?-Not at all. Unless you think that Poe's last cry was playing around with words.-No.I had to admit it. Another few moments passed before Father Lawrence went on. -Rick. I hope you don't mind my calling you Rick? I doubt if I could say this to anyone but you. Few others would even understand what I was talking about. But I think you will. Remember Strether arriving in Paris? His wonderful first impressions? His wonderful romantic illusions? His wonderful innocence? (If you'll pardon me for talking like Miss Barrace!) That was you, after your first trip to Colwyn Bay. Now, after your second trip, you think you have discovered the truth. You have experienced the violence of been very nearly cut, as it were, by Chad and Madame de Vionnet, on the assumption that you wouldn't know it. And, like Strether, you feel lonely and cold. But you have not yet reached the third stage of his education: the realisation that the truth upon which you have stumbled is far more romantic, far more tragic, far more wonderful than the whole of your first impressions and innocent illusions put together ever were. You went to Colwyn Bay expecting a simple tale of passive pain and blighted hope in youth. Instead you are given a tragic hero, flawed, as is necessary in tragedy, yet capable of great peaks of suffering and, at the end, of such abysses of ingenuity that he could extemporise a ficcione that would have done credit to his Borges. And all for what. Not for himself, but for others. For his parents, so that they might live and never feel the guilt of his suicide on their conscience. For Serena, so that she might help him to die thinking she was doing a good deed and not snuffing out a healthy life. And for you.-For me!A bandage was urgently needed to tie up my chin. -Rick. Mike was worried about you. Tom was worried about you. Even Aidan. I was equivocal. I trusted you, yet there was still a nagging doubt in my mind.-Doubt!-I never for a moment believed in Tom's suicidal tendencies. I knew that it was you we were really talking about. Nevertheless I took a chance. I sent you back to Colwyn Bay suspecting you'd unearth something of this sort.-Something of this sort!Father Lawrence smiled. -Rick. Try to close your mouth. You look so much more foolish than you really are. Something of this sort, yes. Not all this wonderful rubbish. But I had a hunch. And I sensed that only by risking it could I bring you back from the brink. Help you to emerge from the Inferno of yourself. And you have, Rick. With flying colours.-

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Sudden rage possessed me. -And what's to fucking stop me from fucking hanging my fucking self with the first fucking rope I find?Father Lawrence only smiled. -Nothing. Nothing at all. Except you won't. Not now. You've seen the aftermath. You know the horror. You wouldn't want to wish that on those who love you, on those you love. And besides, Adam Leslie has done it for you. He has killed, once and forever, the boy you were, the boy you seemed unable to cease being. What is the point in doing it again? A first suicide may be tragic; a second can easily descend into farce. And you have never liked being laughed at, Rick. Never in this world.-No. Never in this world.Father Lawrence smiled on. -Laughter in Paradise, however, is another matter.I had to smile too. -Yes. Quite another matter.Then he was suddenly solemn. -Rick. Adam Leslie died for you, as surely as Christ. I think you understand that now. Quitted the world, in truth, only the more effectually to leave it to you. So that you might live on, prosper, grow. I know your response will not be ungrateful.I too was solemn. -No.We were both silent. He glanced down at the golden bough on the table. -sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras?He made it a question. My answer appeared a non sequitur. -sumptaque pallenti septem de cortice grana presserat ore suo...But he understood. -Ah, yes. Your dream.-I accepted seven pieces of popcorn. And I ate them.He looked at me, not smiling. -Sunt geminae Somni portae; quarum altera fertur cornea, qua veris facilis datur exitus umbris, altera candenti perfecta nitens elephanto, sed falsa ad caelum mittunt insomnia Manes.I laughed. -post mediam noctem visus, cum somnia vera:He had to agree. -nec tu sperna piis venientia somnia portis: cum pia venerunt somnia, pondus habent.-What then?-

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He was almost sharp: -You shall just have to get used to dividing your time between your world and this other world in which you have really only recently come to believe.-Yes. I suppose I must.He smiled. -It is not hard. Once you get used to it. And it is a great comfort. That is why so many people reject it.-But it is so hard to keep it from fading. Already so many things, incredible miraculous things, as you well know, things that only a few days ago seemed as solid to me as this table at which we are sitting, are beginning to seem unreal, contingent, mere coincidence.His smile broadened. -That is our fallen condition. That is our sceptical nature. We do not want to believe. We try to convince ourselves that it is all in our imagination. That is the main purpose of prayer. To keep it fresh.-And if we can't pray?-God does the praying for us.We were both silent for a time. Father Lawrence's next remark was a non sequitur. -I rather like Peris.I laughed. -Yes. So do I.-I hope he climbs his way out of the darkness, as you appear to be doing.I remembered his admonishing finger waving. -Yes. So do I.-So young. And to have experienced so much grief. But God always knows what He is doing.We were both silent again. Suddenly half-a-dozen questions seemed to tumble out at once. -There is so much I don't understand; want to understand; don't even know if Adam understood. The shrine of Minerva he so loved: did he know about Pallas, her playmate, and how heartbroken the goddess was at causing her accidental death; how she fashioned a wooden image in her likeness? I can't see Adam reading Apollodorus. Yet he did just that: Tried to fashion himself in Daniel's likeness. Cyparissus did not wish to live after he had accidentally killed his pet stag. Neither did Adam. But Minerva is thought. And Adam loved the raven, which was rejected by her in favour of the owl; the raven which perched upon the pallid bust of Pallas quothing 'Nevermore'.Father Lawrence, whose smile had been increasing during my tirade, all at once erupted into laughter. -Rick, Rick! You sound like Porphyry trying to interpret the Cave of the Nymphs. Or even better, Augustine trying to interpret Porphyry. That's all much too deep for a simple Jesuit like me. Remember how Bellerophon was given in a dream the golden bridle with which he tamed Pegasus? The gift of Minerva? Yet riding on his back he attempted to reach Olympus. And you know what happened to him! Peris was wise there too. You'll never know the whole truth. Never understand Adam Leslie's real motives. Never in this life. Perhaps, God in his time, or out of time, as

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R.S.Thomas so charmingly puts it, will correct this. Perhaps one day you will be able to ask Adam face to face. You don't want to end up like one of those commentators in Laputa who are afraid to approach Homer because of the way they have misinterpreted him to others down through the ages.I laughed. -Nor do I want to end up like Gulliver:I quoted verbatim, as I had done to Anne, but apparently I was unable to keep the bitterness out of my voice. -And when I began to consider, that by copulating with one of the Yahoo-species, I had become a parent of more; it struck me with the utmost shame, confusion, and horror.Father Lawrence's ears, as it were, pricked up. -You have broken with Anne!His imaginative leap I took in my stride. -Yes. I have broken with Anne.He said nothing for a time. Then he only said: -Poor Echo.-Yes. Poor Echo.He looked at me quizzically. -You cannot even continue loving her, as you have been loving her; for her yellow hair, as it were?-Neither of us want to continue loving, as we have been loving.His eyes glittered. -Quite right!Then he went on, a question in his voice. -You have such a profound attraction to your own image of yourself that you feel you can never give that self to another person completely?I laughed outright. -I have such a profound aversion to that self, and, by extension, to the self that is the whole human race, that, rather than add to it, I would prefer to leave my progeny dangling, as it were, unborn, unbaptised, in the limbo which God has so conveniently provided.He clicked his tongue but would not be drawn. -Do you want to tell me all about it?I told him, as accurately as I could, about my last meeting with Anne. When I had finished he was silent. Then again he only said: -Poor Echo.But I was half sick of echoes. -Poor Narcissus!He looked at me, half smiling. -You're very sorry for yourself, aren't you, Rick?I would not be drawn either. -I'm very sorry for the whole bloody lot of us.He continued smiling, his head on one side.

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-Rick. You're not a crusty misogynistic old bachelor fearing for his sanity. Not yet. You should by now have got past the stage in your reading when you become totally possessed by an author, however great.-It's not a question of possession, Father. Or of greatness. I see the limitations of Swift. I see the limitations of everyone. Especially of myself. But Anne and I have changed. We used to want one thing. Now we each want something else.He smiled on. -Like Paphnuce and Thaïs?-Exactly. Like Paphnuce and Thaïs.But his smile had taken on something of the Church Triumphant. -To be possessed by Swift, Mr Lustrum, may be regarded as a misfortune; to be possessed by Anatole France looks like carelessness.I had to laugh. -Touché, touché, touché, Father.He laughed too. -My dear dear Rick, such neatness, such symmetry, is the province of the second-class mind. Like France; or like Maugham and Williams, who copied him. Or, even more inexcusably, like Forster, who had the temerity to impute his own, very severe limitations to such an infinitely subtle being as Henry James and to see in The Ambassadors the same hourglass shape that we find in Thaïs. Did he not understand that an hourglass is a living symbol of the flux of time itself, where the past is lost in the present and heaps up inexorably to become the future? That that is what makes the sacrament of the present moment so important? James understood this.He broke off for a moment, as if the sand somehow had been running too fast. Then he smiled at me wickedly. -Come to think of it, I seem to have been giving poor old Forster the benefit of the doubt. I don't believe his mind ever even aspired to the second-rate.I laughed, but he went on more seriously. -Rick. God is always turning our lives upside-down, like an hourglass. The sand is always running. But there is no neatness, no perfect symmetry. Even as we achieve it, it is gone, the heap of sand at the bottom has grown. That is life. Anne now wants children. You think you do not.-Think?I had to interrupt him. He smiled. -You do not. But the sand is running. Live. Look at people, ordinary people, in the street. See the father with his little daughter riding high on his shoulders. See the mother's protective care as she wraps a scarf around her son's neck against the cold. Do you really think that they, holding their Yahoo babies in their arms, felt shame, confusion, and horror?-Father. You missed your vocation. You should have designed Christmas Cards.I was sorry, even as I said it, but he took its cheapness in good part, laughing. -Rick, Rick! Your aversion to parenthood almost seems to rival that of David Lynch. But he got it out of his system by making that wonderful film, Eraserhead.I laughed. -You are with it, Father.-

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-With it! Eraserhead must be all of twenty years ago!-True. But it still seems a little avant-garde.He clicked his tongue. -Eternal truths are always a little avant-garde.We were both silent. Father Lawrence looked at me hard. -Well, Rick. What then?I laughed. -I thought for a moment you were going to suggest holy orders, like Father Tikhon.He laughed too. -Good Heavens, no! You'd make a dreadful religious. I wouldn't wish that on you, or you on the Church. And I don't see chastity as one of your strong points.-No. Nor charity.He ignored this. -I repeat. What then? A lifetime of seeking out girls like Serena, with a taste, as it were, for your bodily secretions? Or perhaps, eventually, even the Russell Square boys, who would no doubt offer similar services?Father Lawrence had no qualms about hitting below the belt. But two could play at that. -A return to my schoolboy habits? A good wank in the shower before bed?Father Lawrence winced. -Sorry if my crudity offends you, Father.-No. Not at all. But wank. The monosyllable does sound a trifle common. Anglo-Saxon, no doubt.He appeared to be able to make me laugh at will. -I know that masturbate is Latin, Father, but it always seems to me so cold and clinical.He thought a moment. -How about auto-eroticism. At least it has the ring of the sinful and forbidden about it. Rather like something out of Crash!I laughed out loud. -â&#x20AC;&#x2039;That â&#x20AC;&#x2039;wasn't twenty years ago!He looked at me almost shamefacedly. -True. But one likes to keep up with the times.Again we were silent. -For the third time, Rick. What then? Was the break with Anne very acrimonious, very final?-She said to call her up. That we might meet for lunch.He clapped his hands in delight. -Then there we are!I smiled. -Strether, out of the whole affair, to make him right, got nothing for himself?He smiled too.

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-I don't see you as a Strether figure. Nor Anne, for that matter, as a Maria Gostrey. Or a Madame de Vionnet.I couldn't greatly disagree with him. Still, I could disagree just a little. -No, Father. But I heard the door, distinctly, slam.-Yes. But you're not quite such a dolt as Torvald. And Anne, I suspect, hasn't stopped believing in miracles.All at once I was holding her hand again across the table. -Father. It broke my heart. Hearing her say those last lines of The Playboy, the tears pouring down her cheeks.-Yes. Susan Fleetwood had much the same effect on me, at the National Theatre, it must be all of twenty years ago.-That's a little before my time.-Perhaps. But the effect, on both of us, was timeless.I felt his logic, felt the sand heaping up inside me, yet resolutely, wilfully, turned myself, as it were, on my head. -Words, words, words, Father.He smiled. -Perhaps. But I still hope to see you, with your own disgusting, excreting, beloved little Yahoo baby in your arms, if only to make you eat those words.But the sand was stuck in its own contraflow. -Father! I've seen Deiphobus! I've seen him in Hell, as Aeneas saw him! I've seen what he did to his own body. I've seen the bruising and the wounds and the blood. I've seen him in that whore's bath, on that mortuary slab, a hundred thousand times. And you want me calmly to conceive a son who might end up like that!His eyes sparkled. -Not calmly, I hope, my son.English words failed me. -Quae enim vita fuisset Priamo, si ab adulescentia scisset, quos eventus senectutis esset habiturus?Again he was good enough for me. -Certe igitur ignoratio futurorum malorum utilior est quam scientia. Adam and Daniel and Peris knew nothing of future evils during those wonderful summers they together so gleefully shared. Would you want to take that away from them?-But the whole thing ended in such abject horror; the seeds of it were there already, even then.-Yes. As were the glory and the courage and the grandeur. It seems to me, Rick, your love of ancient tragedy doesn't extend to the tragic in life.-Life is all tragic, all suffering, all sacrifice!He clicked his tongue again. -Yes. No doubt. But fortunately that didn't stop Our Blessed Lady from consenting, calmly, to conceive.-Father! You know you can put me to shame, any time you want! You know I know you're right! But that doesn't stop me from feeling the way I do! Here!-

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I hit my midriff, hard, with a gesture that would have done credit to another Lawrence. Father Lawrence's face was grave, but not tragic. -None of us can help our feelings, my son. There, or in any other parts of the anatomy. I understand your feelings, and respect them, and pray that one day they may change.-Amen to that!But I almost spat it out. He looked at his watch. -Too long, remember? And not long enough? Although we do seem to have got back to where we had started, and to be repeating the same things in a slightly different way.I laughed. -Yes. We do.-I'm saying mass in a short while. I should be very gratified if you would care to attend.-I don't know, Father.-Of course. As you will.He paused for a moment. -I was most pleased to hear about your mass at Colwyn Bay.-Yes, Father. So was I.He smiled. -I was even pleased about poor old Minerva.I laughed. -Ici venu, l'avenir est paresse.He smiled. - il faut tenter de vivre! What now?-I don't know. Is there life after journalism?He laughed. -Perhaps. And perhaps, not too soon, and not too damn much after, you might write about all this? Changing the names, of course. To protect the guilty.I made a helpless gesture. -God knows! Right now, I can't really see it.-No. Of course not.He looked down at the books. -And these? You will destroy them?I hesitated. -I don't know.-They are the only incriminating evidence.-Yes. I know. But I don't have the heart.He smiled, wickedly again. -You know, in the future, if you should yourself die in mysterious circumstances, these books could well be taken as your own coded suicide note?I laughed. -Only by Chief Inspector Tom Branch, if he should have succeeded his father by then. Aidan is not a Poe or Dostoevsky addict.-

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He laughed; but I was serious. -Besides, Father, that would be farce.He too was solemn then. -Yes. That would be farce.Suddenly I burst out. -Bloody hell, Father, I do believe Anne was the only bloody one of you who had any real faith in me at all: Faith in me not committing suicide.He smiled. -That's because she is a woman, Rick, and probably much wiser than the whole lot of the rest of us put together.But my smile was humourless. -Or perhaps, being a woman, she didn't understand what we all understood, being men. That I am a man.He raised his hands in an almost prayerful gesture. -Perhaps she understood it only too well.Again we were both silent. Eventually he spoke. -And do you think you might change your mind, Rick, about attending poor Adam Leslie's funeral?My own gesture verged on the prayerful. -I don't know. I just don't know. I don't know if I can face it.-It will mean a lot to Helen and John. If you can. And to Adam.-Yes, Father. I know.His eyes were bright. -"Rick will come? Rick won't let me down?"-No.-You'll be the only one there, Rick, who knows, who understands, who can really pray for him.-ac melior mihi frater?-Yes, Rick. ac melior mihi frater.His eyes shone as he spoke: -"Romanus orat; transfer hunc haedum mihi; sit dexter agnus, induatur vellere."We were silent. -Whatever you decide on, Rick, come and see me, anytime. You're always welcome.-Thanks, Father.-Come to think of it, I might see you Saturday week. At the Barbican. With Tom. I'm more than a little tempted by The Possessed.I laughed. -Great.-Just one thing more. Before the absolution.-Yes?He turned to a page in Poe, pointed out the passage.

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-Why this sentence from The Gold Bug? And why underscored in red, do you think?I smiled. -I puzzled over that for a long time myself, Father. I think it was Adam Leslie punishing me quietly, in his own way, by a bit of sober mystification. Like The Gold Bug itself.He understood at once. -Succisi poplites! â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Of course! A little grisly?-Adam Leslie had a grisly sense of humour.He laughed. -Adam Leslie's way of telling you that you too were hamstrung?-Exactly.-As we are all of us hamstrung.-Hamstrung? You?He just looked at me. -By the secrecy of the confessional?I wondered. He laughed at my facile conclusion. -Our fallen nature. Isn't that just another way of saying hamstrung.-

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APPENDIX Translation of quotes used in the text. Chapter A Et succiso poplite Gygen. And then he hamstrings Gyges. Virgil: Aeneid: IX; 762. Principio Phalerum et succiso poplite Gygen excipit. First he catches Phaleris, and Gyges, whom he hamstrings. Virgil: Aeneid: IX; 762-3. Vitaque cum gemitu fugit indignata sub umbras. And with a moan life passed indignant to the Shades below. Virgil: Aeneid: XII; 952. Nullus ephebum deformem saeva castravit in arce tyrannus. No misshapen youth wae ever castrated by a cruel tyrant in his castle. Juvenal: Satire: X; 306-7. At non ter aevo functus amabilem ploravit omnes Antilochus senex annos, nec impubem parentes Troilon aut Phrygiae sorores flevere semper. Yet the aged hero who had lived three generations did not forever mourn his loved Antilochus, nor did his Phrygian parents and sisters weep without end for youthful Troilus. Horace: Odes: II: IX; 13-17.

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Chapter D

ut haec trementi questus ore constitit insignibus raptis puer, impube corpus, quale posset impia mollire Thracum pectora. When, after making these complaints with quivering lip, the lad stood still, stripped of boyhoodâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s emblems, a youthful form, such as might soften the impious breasts of Thracians. Horace: Epodes: V; 11-14. neque hoc parentes, heu mihi superstites. and not these parents, alas surviving me. Horace: Epodes: V; 101. quid damna foves et pectore iniquo vulnus amas? Why nurse your loss and perversely love the wound? Statius: Silvae: II: VI; 94-95. visu Parthenopaeus erat; simplexque horrore decoro crinis, et obsessae nondum primoque micantes flore genae. Like unto Parthenopaeus; your hair rough yet unadorned, and your cheeks bright with new down. Statius: Silvae: II: VI; 42-45. Illum ipsum iuvenem, dignissimum qui te laetam semper nominatus cogitatusque faciat. And as to the youth himself, who so richly deserved that the mention of his name and your thought of him shall always bring you joy. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: III; 4. Si confessa fueris percepisse magnas voluptates, oportet te non de eo quod detractum est queri, sed de eo gratias agere quod contigit. Provenerunt enim satis magni fructus laborum tuorum ex ipsa educatione. If you confess that you have experienced great pleasures from him, then it is your duty not to complain about what has been withdrawn, but to give thanks for what you have had. Surely his rearing alone has yielded you ample reward for all your toil. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XII; 1-2.

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Quicquid ad summum pervenit, ab exitu prope est. Whatever has reached perfection, is near its end. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XXIII; 3. Incipe virtutibus illum, non annis aestimare; satis diu vixit. Undertake to estimate him by his virtues, not by his years, and you will see he lived long enough. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XXIV; 1. Harum contemplatione virtutum filium gere quasi sinu! Nunc ille tibi magis vacat, nunc nihil habet, quo avocetur; numquam tibi sollicitudini, numquam maerori erit. In thinking of all these virtues hold again, as it were, your son in your arms! He has now more leisure to devote to you, there is nothing now to call him away from you; never again will he cause you anxiety, never again any grief. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XXIV; 4. Decessit filius tuus; id est, decucurrit ad hunc finem, ad quem quae feliciora partu tuo putas properant. Your son is dead; that is, he has finished his course and reached that goal toward which all those whom you count more fortunate than your child are even now hastening. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XI; 2. Quereris, Marcia, non tam diu filium tuum vixisse quam potuisset? Do you complain, Marcia, that your son did not live as long as he might have lived? Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XXII; 1. Non est itaque quod sic te oneris: "Potuit diutius vivere". And so you must not burden yourself with the thought: â&#x20AC;&#x153;He might have lived longer.â&#x20AC;? Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XXI; 6. Quis negat grave esse? Sed humanum est. Who will deny that it is hard? But it is the common lot. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XVII; 1.

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non convertis te ad convictus filii tui occursusque iucundos, non ad pueriles dulcesque blanditias, non ad incrementa studiorum; ultimam illam faciem rerum premis; illi, tamquam si parum ipsa per se horrida sit, quidquid potes congeris. You do not turn your thoughts to the pleasant intercourse and the meetings you had with your son, nor to his fond and boyish caresses, nor to the progress of his studies; you dwell only on that last appearance of fortune, and just as if it were not horrible enough in itself, you add to it all the horror you can. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: V; 4. ut non minus ipsa orbitate auctor eius digna res lacrimis esset. So that not less than the bereavement itself the source of it was a matter that called for tears. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XIV; 2. Si fletibus fata vincuntur, conferamus. If tears can vanquish fate, let us marshal tears. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: VI; 1. Quid opus est partes deflere? Tota flebilis vita est. What need is there to weep over parts of life? The whole of it calls for tears. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XI; 1. Itaque si felicissimum est non nasci, proximum est, puto, brevi aetate defunctos cito in integrum restitui. If, therefore, the happiest lot is not to be born, the next best, I think, is to have a brief life and by death to be restored quickly to the original state. Seneca: Ad Marciam de Consolatione: XXII; 3.

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Chapter E dictoque vale "vale" inquit et Echo. And when he said “Farewell!” “Farewell!” said Echo too. Ovid: Metamorphoses: III; 501. non fueram genitor, sed cernite fletus liventesque genas et credite planctibus orbi: orbus ego. His sire I was not, but look upon my woe and my livid cheeks, and give credence, O ye bereaved, to my lament: for verily bereaved am I. Statius: Silvae: V: V; 11-13. inlitterati num minus nervi rigent, minusve languet fascinum? Surely these unlearned sinews stiffen no less, that poker doesn’t droops any less, does it? Horace: Epodes: 8; 17-18. sed paelice laeva uteris et Veneri servit amica manus. But use your left hand as a mistress and make it a kindly servant to your lust. Martial: Epigrams: IX; 41; 1-2. Lascivam tota possedi nocte puellam, cuius nequitias vincere nemo potest. fessus mille modis illud puerile poposci: ante preces totum primaque verba dedit. All night long I enjoyed a wanton girl, whose naughtinesses no man can exhaust. Tired by a thousand different modes, I asked for the boy routine; before I had started to beg, she gave it in full. Martial: Epigrams: IX; 67; 1-4. improbius quiddam ridensque rubensque rogavi: pollicita est nulla luxuriosa mora. Laughing and blushing, I asked for something more indecent; the lustful hussy promised without hesitation. Martial: Epigrams: IX; 67; 5-6.

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Chapter G O dulci iucunda viro puero, iucunda parenti, salve, teque bona Iuppiter auctet ope, Ianua. Hail, house-door, dear to a well-beloved husband son and dear to a father, hail, and may Jupiter bless you with kindly help. Catullus: LXVII; 1-3. Hic finis rapto. quin tu iam vulnera sedas et tollis mersum lucta caput? It is the end: he is lost to you. Will you not now assuage your pain and lift your grief-sunken head? Statius: Silvae: II: I; 208-9. ignosce, puer: tu me caligine maesta obruis. Forgive me, lad: it is you who clouds my mind with sorrow. Statius: Silvae: V: V; 52-3. tractas et incedis per ignes suppositos cineri doloso. and are walking, as it were, over fires hidden beneath treacherous ashes. Horace: Odes: II: 1; 7-8.

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Chapter H orbiqueâ&#x20AC;&#x2039; â&#x20AC;&#x2039;parentes coniungunt gemitus! Bereaved parents utter their groans with one voice. Petronius Arbiter: Poemata: 19; 5-6. sed cur heu, Ligurine, cur manat rara meas lacrima per genas? But why, why steals now and then down my cheek a tear? Horace: Odes: IV: I; 33-34. nonne gemam te, care puer? Can I not mourn for you, dear lad? Statius: Silvae: V: V; 79. o nimium felix, nimium crudelis et expers imperii, Fortuna, tui, qui dicere legem fletibus aut fines audet censere dolendi! Ah! too happy he, and heartless, and ignorant, Fortune, of your law, who dares to set conditions to lamentation, or adjudge the bounds of grief. Statius: Silvae: V: V; 59-61.

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Chapter I Sed tamen, nymphae, cavete, quod Cupido pulcher est. Yet take heed, nymphes, for Cupid is wondrous fair. Pervigilium Veneris; 34. dont les plaques de fard ont plus de charme sur moi que l'incarnat de la jeunesse. Whose patches of rouge have more charm for me than the rosy flesh of youth. Stéphane Mallarmé: Plainte d’Automne.

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Chapter J nequaquam parem animi constantiam praestitit. he showed by no means equal firmness of purpose. Suetonius: Vita Lucani. Or â&#x20AC;&#x2039;exsecta uti medulla et aridum iecur amoris esset poculum. and all for this, that his marrow and his liver, cut out and dried, might form a love-charm. Horace: Epodes: V; 37-38. iam tamen et validi gressus mensuraque maior cultibus et visae puero decrescere vestes. Yet already was he firm of stride, and his height outstripped his dress, and the garments seemed to shrink upon the lad. Statius: Silvae: II: I; 126-127.

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Chapter L sic amet ipse licet, sic non potiatur amato! So may he himself love, and not gain the thing he loves! Ovid: Metamorphoses: III; 405 credule, quid frustra simulacra fugacia captas? O fondly foolish boy, who vainly seeks to clasp a fleeting image? Ovid: Metamorphoses: III; 432. ista repercussae, quam cernis, imaginis umbra est: nil habet ista sui. That which you behold is but the shadow of a reflected form and has no substance of its own. Ovid: Metamorphoses: III; 434-5. quae tamen ut vidit, quamvis irata memorque, indoluit, quotiensque puer miserabilis "eheu" dixerat, haec resonis iterabat vocibus "eheu"; cumque suos manibus percusserat ille lacertos, haec quoque reddebat sonitum plangoris eundem But when she saw it, though still angry and unforgetful, she felt pity; and as often as the poor boy says “Alas!” again with answering utterance she cries “Alas!” and as his hands beat his shoulders she gives back the same sounds of woe. Ovid: Metamorphoses: III; 494-498. dumque dolet, summa vestem deduxit ab ora nudaque marmoreis percussit pectora palmis. While he thus grieves, he plucks away his tunic at its upper fold and beats his bare breast with pallid hands. Ovid: Metamorphoses: III; 480-481. Nulla est igitur excusatio peccati, si amici causa peccaveris. Therefore it is no justification whatever of your sin to have sinned in behalf of a friend. Cicero: De Amicitia: XI; 37. sed tamen haeret amor crescitque dolore repulsae. But still, though spurned, his love remains and grows on grief. Ovid: Metamorphoses: III; 395.

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Chapter M puer ut festis Quinquatribus olim. Like a schoolboy in the spring holidays. Horace: Epistles: II: II; 197. "Iacta alea est." “The die is cast.” Suetonius: Divus Julius: XXXII.

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Chapter N Omnibus idem oculi, par est concordia flendi: All eyes are the same, there is an equal harmony of weeping. Ovid?: Consolatio Ad Liviam; 201. hunc a poplite sectum, the other he severs at the knee. Statius: Thebaid: VII; 713. totumque in vulnere corpus. The whole body is one wound. Statius: Thebaid: V; 598. quis matutinos abrumpet somnos impositus stratis abitusque morabitur artis nexibus atque ipso revocabit ad oscula poste? Who will climb on your couch in the morning and whisper you awake, and clasping you tight delay your going, and from the very gate recall you to his kisses? Statius: Silvae: II: I; 62-64. O ubi venturae spes non longinque iuventae? Where now is that not far distant hope of coming manhood? Statius: Silvae: II: I; 52. vâ&#x20AC;&#x2039; itae modo cardine adultae nectere temptabat iuvenum pulcherrimus ille cum tribus Eleis unam trieterida lustris. marked him out on the very threshold of maturity, about to join three years to three lustres, first filling out his form. Statius: Silvae: II: VI; 70-72. desine mollium tandem querellarum. Cease at length your weak lamentations. Horace: Odes: II: IX; 17-18. tractas et incedis per ignes suppositos cineri doloso. and are walking, as it were, over fires hidden beneath treacherous ashes. Horace: Odes: II: I; 7-8.

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Chapter O Que les soleils sont beaux dans les chaudes soirées! How beautiful are the suns of sultry evenings! Charles Baudelaire: Le balcon; 11. Ta tête, ton geste, ton air Sont beaux comme un beau paysage. Your head, your gestures, your air, are beautiful as a beautiful landscape. Charles Baudelaire: À celle qui est trop gaie; 1-2.

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Chapter P La nuit s'épaississait ainsi qu'une cloison. The night was thickening around us like a wall. Charles Baudelaire: Le balcon; 16. Ma taille s'épaissit aussi. My waist is thickening also. Nos fesses ne sont pas les leurs. Our buttocks are not theirs. Arthur Rimbaud: Les Stupra: II; 1. Farce continuelle! Mon innocence me ferait pleurer. La vie est la farce à mener par tous. Continual farce! My innocence would make me weep. Life is the farce which everyone has to perform. Arthur Rimbaud: Une Saison en Enfer: Mauvais Sang. Pourquoi la puberté tardive a le malheur Du gland tenace et trop consulté? Why puberty tardily come, and why the pain of the obstinate and too-much-consulted glans? Arthur Rimbaud: Remembrances du Vieillard Idiot; 34-35. Ailleurs qu'en ton cher corps et qu'en ton coeur si doux? Except in your dear body and in your gentle heart? Charles Baudelaire: Le balcon; 24. -et tirons-nous la queue! -and let us jerk our tails off! Arthur Rimbaud: Remembrances du Vieillard Idiot; 40. pertundo tunicamque palliumque. thrusting through tunic and cloak. Catullus: XXXII; 11. non si demisso se ipse voret capite. Not even if he lowered his head and mouthed himself. Catullus: LXXXVIII; 8.

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Tam tremulum crisat, tam blandum prurit, ut ipsum masturbatorem fecerit Hippolytum. Her waggles are so tremulous, her itch so seductive that she would make a masturbator out of Hippolytus himself. Martial: XIV: Apophoreta; 203; Puella Gaditana. Sit nobis aetate puer, non pumice levis, propter quem placeat nulla puella mihi. Let me have a boy made smooth by youth, not pumice stone, on whose account no girl will please me. Martial: XIV: Apophoreta; 205; Puer. incurvabat Hylen posito Tyrynthius arcu. The Tirynthian used to lay aside his bow and bend Hylas over. Martial: XI; 43; 5. et tumidum cornu durius inguen erat. his swollen penis harder than horn. Ovid: Fasti: II; 346. quin istic pudibunda iaces, pars pessima nostri? Lie down there, you shamefaced creature, worthless part of me. Ovid: Amores: III: VII; 69. Tolle lege, tolle lege. Take it up and read, take it up and read. Augustine: Confessions: VIII; 12.

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Chapter Q ac melior mihi frater. and more than my brother. Statius: Thebaid: IX; 53. Le mystère s'épaissit. The mystery is thickening. Jeu suprême. Supreme Game. Stéphane Mallarmé: Une dentelle s’abolit; 2 Et ne sic cohaerentes malignior fluctus distraheret, utrumque zona circumvenienti praecinxit, et ... And that no envious wave should pull us apart as we clung to each other, he put on his belt - it went round us both - and tied it tight … Petronius Arbiter: Satyricon: 114. In noctis spatium miserorum vulnera durant. The wounds of the unhappy endure into the night-season. Petronius Arbiter?: Poemata: 31; 16.

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Chapter S Sein blick ist schwer Schon vom geheimnis das ich niemals weiss Und leicht umflort Da er vom lenz in unsern winter traf. His glance is already heavy with a secret I shall never know, and slightly clouded as he came from springtime into our winter. Stefan George: Mein kind kam heim; 9-12. sed tantummodo memoriam sui ad altare tuum fieri desideravit. All she wanted was that we should remember her at your altar. Augustine: Confessions: Book IX. Es starrt der Blick dumpf auf das HeilsgefĂ¤ss: Das heil'ge Blut erglĂźht: My dull gaze is fixed on the Sacred Vessel: the Holy Blood flows. Richard Wagner: Parsifal: Act II

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Chapter T vivit et armiferae cornix invisa Minervae ille quidem saeclis vix moritura novem. the raven, too, hated by armour-bearing Minerva, lives on - it, at least, will hardly die after nine generations. Ovid: Amores: II: VI; 35-36. optima prima fere manibus rapiuntur avaris; implentur numeris deteriora suis. Best things are all too oft first swept away by the greedy hands of fate; the worst are suffered to fill out their tale of years. Ovid: Amores: II: VI; 39-40. nunc eques in tergo residens huc laetus et illuc mollia purpureis frenabas ora capistris. Now, sitting like a horseman on his back, now here, now there, would gleefully guide his soft mouth with purple reins. Ovid: Metamorphoses: X; 124-125. molliter in tacito litore compositam! comfortably couched on a beach that tells no tales! Sextus Propertius: Elegies: I: XI; 14. Oed' und leer das Meer. Empty and barren is the sea. Richard Wagner: Tristan und Isolde: III; 24. inter Baianas raptus puer occidit undas, Eutychos ille, tuum, Castrice, dulce latus. A boy has been snatched to his death in Baiaeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s waters, Eutychos, your sweet companion, Castricus. Martial: Epigrams: VI: 68; 3-4.

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Chapter U illa in arcem abivit, aedem visere Minervae. she went away to visit the temple of Minerva. Plautus: Bacchides: 4: 8; 59. parva licet videas Captae delubra Minervae. you may see the small shrine of Minerva Capta. Ovid: Fasti: III; 837. Tu nihil invita dices faciesve Minerva. But you will say nothing and do nothing against Minerva’s will. Horace: De Arte Poetica; 385. Quia nihil decet invita, ut aiunt, Minerva, id est adversante et repugnante natura. When a thing is said to be against Minerva, it is against and repugnant to our own natures. Cicero: De Officiis: I: 31; 10. portusque patescit iam propior, templumque apparet in Arce Minervae. a haven opens as we now draw near, and a temple is seen on Minerva’s Heights. Virgil: Aeneid: III; 530-531. Stable trésor, temple simple à Minerva, Masse de calme, et visible réserve... Firm treasure, simple temple to Minerva, mass of calm and apparent reticence… Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 13-14. Ô mon silence!... Édifice dans l'âme... O my silence!... Building in the soul… Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 17. A ce point pur je monte et m'accoutume... to this pure spot I climb and become accustomed… Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 20. nunc ades o coeptis, flave Minerva, meis. Now favour my undertaking, yellow-haired Minerva. Ovid: Fasti: VI; 652.

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pars stupet innuptae donum exitiale Minervae… Some are amazed at the maiden Minerva’s gift of death… Virgil: Aeneid: II; 31. sic, nisi vittatis quod eret Cassandra capillis, procubuit templo, casta Minerva, tuo. thus was Cassandra - except that fillets bound her hair - when she sank gown at your shrine, O chaste Minerva. Ovid: Amores: I: VII; 17-18. Beau ciel, vrai ciel, regarde-moi qui change! Fair sky, true sky, watch me as I change! Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 31. Je m'abandonne à ce brilliant espace… I give myself up to this shining space... Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 34. Sur mes yeux clos, secrets éblouissants… Dazzling secrets, above my closed eyes… Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 51. Une étincelle y pense à mes absents. There a spark thinks of my departed ones. Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 54. Minerva spira... Minerva breathes… Dante: Paradiso: II; 8. Ce lieu me plaît... this place pleases me… Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 57. Tout va sous terre et rentre dans le jeu! everything goes underground and returns back into play! Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 96.

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Ici venu, l'avenir est paresse. Once come here, the future is idleness. Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 67. Le vent se lève!... il faut tenter de vivre! The wind is rising!... We must attempt to live! Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 139.

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Chapter W Somne, tuis, iuvenis placidissime divum. Sleep, you youthful, gentlest of gods. Statius: Silvae: V: IV: Somnus; 1 and 3. si aliquis longa sub nocte puellae brachia nexa tenens ultro te, Somne, repellit? if some lover through the long hours of night is clasping a girlâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s entwined arms, Sleep, and of his own will drives you from him? Statius: Silvae: V: IV: Somnus; 14-15. aut leviter suspenso poplite transi? Or pass over me with lightly hovering step. Statius: Silvae: V: IV: Somnus; 19. nam succisi poplites membra non sustinent. my knees are hamstrung, and cannot support my body. Petronius Arbiter: Satyricon: 1. nunc opus exposcunt militiamque suam. now clamouring for business and the fray. Ovid: Amores: III: VII; 68. cuius in indomito constantior inguine nervos, quam nova collibus arbor inhaeret. in whose unconquerable groin sticks tight a sinew more firmly than a young tree on the hills. Horace: Epodes: XII; 19-20. scelus est, mihi crede, sed ingens, quantum vix animo concipis ipse tuo. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a crime, believe me, and a heinous one, how great a crime your mind can scarcely grasp. Martial: Epigrams: IX: 41; 3-4. mandasset manibus gaudia foeda suis. consigning their loathsome pleasure to their hands. Martial: Epigrams: IX: 41; 8. nam nihil est quicquam sceleris quo prodeat ultra. for there is no guilt whatever beyond for him to which he can attain. Catullus: LXXXVIII; 7.

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'istud quod digitis, Pontice, perdis, homo est.' “what you waste with your fingers, Ponticus, is a human being.” Martial: Epigrams: IX: 41; 10. Iam desine! Now cease! a pereat, cui sunt prisca supercilia! Ah! away with him that has the sternness of early days! Virgil?: Copa; 34. pereat, qui crastina curat! Away with him who heeds the morrow. Virgil?: Copa; 37. Mors aurem vellens 'vivite' ait, 'venio'. Death, plucking the ear, cries: ‘Live; I come!’ Virgil?: Copa; 38. Noctu ambulabat in publico Themistocles quod somnum capere non posset. Themistocles used to walk about in public at night because he could not get to sleep. Cicero: Tusculanae Disputationes: IV: 19; 44. acris ubi me natura intendit, sub clara nuda lucerna quaecumque excepit turgentis verbera caudae, clunibus aut agitavit equum lasciva supinum, dimittit neque famosum neque sollicitum ne ditior aut formae melioris meiat eodem. When vehement nature drives me on, naked under a clear light I get to work with my hard stick, or she sits astride me as on a horse and does all the work with her lively buttocks while I lie on my back, I do not worry if some greater or better man has used the same place before me. Horace: Satires: II: VII; 47-52. Les yeux, les dents, les paupières mouillées... The eyes, the teeth, the moist eyelids… Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 92. La larve file où se formaient des pleurs. The worms crawl where tears used to form. Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 90.

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Dicto citius nervi paruerunt imperio manusque oniculae scortillum ingenti motu repleverunt. Before you could say a word, my sinews obeyed her command and filled the old woman’s young whore’s hands with a huge upstir. Petronius Arbiter: Satyricon: 131. nunc animis opus, Aenea, nunc pectore firmo! Now, Aeneas, you need your courage, now your stout heart! Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 13-14. Moi: j'ai ma revanche Quand je serai grand - matelot! Me: I’ll have my revenge when I grow up - a sailor! Tristan Corbière: Le Mousse; 13-14. quel giorno più non vi leggemmo avante. That day we got no further with our reading. Dante: Inferno: V; 138. facilis descensus Averno: noctes atque dies patet atri ianua Ditis; sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras, hoc opus, hic labor est. easy is the descent to Avernus: night and day the door of gloomy Dis stands open; but to recall your steps and pass out to the upper air, this is the task, this the labour. Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 126-129.

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Chapter X hoc opus, hic labor est. this is the task, this the labour. Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 129. vitaque cum gemitu fugit indignata sub umbras. and with a moan life passed indignant to the Shades below. Virgil: Aeneid: XII; 952. Exigua est virtus praestare silentia rebus: Keeping silence is but a small virtue: Ovid: Artis Amatoriae: II; 603. At contra gravis est culpa tacenda loqui. but to speak what should not be uttered is a heinous crime. Ovid: Artis Amatoriae: II; 604. ac melior mihi frater! and more than my brother! Statius: Thebaid: IX; 53. Defensor culpae dicet mihi "fecimus et nos haec iuvenes." An apologist will say to me, “We too did the same as boys.” Juvenal: Satire: VIII; 163-164. indulge veniam pueris. Boys may be pardoned. Juvenal: Satire: VIII; 167. Hnuy illa nyha maiah Yahoo. Look after yourself, gentle Yahoo. Swift: Gulliver’s Travels.

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Chapter Y

Verweile doch! Du bist so schĂśn! Remain still! You are so fair! Goethe: Faust; 1700. est et fideli tuta silentio merces: There is a sure reward for trusty silence, too. Horace: Odes: III: II; 25-26. parce tuis igitur dare mascula nomina rebus teque puta cunnos, uxor, habere duos. So kindly donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t give masculine names to your belongings, wife, and think of yourself as having two cunts. Martial: Epigrams: XI: 43; 11-12. heu quantos aestus, quantos patiere labores, si fuerit cunnus res peregrina tibi! Ah what embarrassments, what ordeals you will suffer if a cunt is something foreign to you! Martial: Epigrams: XI: 78; 9-10. die mondenen Pfade der Abgeschiedenen. the moonpaths of the departed. Georg Trakl: Gesang der Abgeschiedenen. Schmerz versteinerte die Schwelle. Grief had petrified the threshold. Georg Trakl: Ein Winterabend. Lasset das Lied auch des Knaben gedenken. Let the song also remember the boy. Georg Trakl: Helian: IV. Die ungebornen Enkel. The unborn grandchildren. Georg Trakl: Grodek.

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Chapter Z

quod si tantus amor menti, si tanta cupido est bis Stygios innare lacus, bis nigra videre Tartara, et insano iuvat indulgere labori, accipe quae peragenda prius. But if such love is in your heart, if such a yearning, twice to swim the Stygian lake, twice to see black Tartarus, and if you are pleased to give rein to the mad endeavour, hear what must first be done. Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 133-136. si nunc se nobis ille aureus arbore ramus ostendat nemore in tanto! O if now that golden bough would show itself to us on the tree in the deep wood! Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 187-188. namque ipse volens facilisque sequetur, si te fata vocant; aliter non viribus ullis vincere nec duro poteris convellere ferro. for of itself will it follow you, freely and with ease, if Fate be calling you; else with no force will you avail to win it or rend it with hard steel. Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 146-148. hoc sibi pulchra suum ferri Proserpina munus instituit. This has beautiful Proserpina ordained to be borne to her as her own gift. Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 142-143. hoc opus, hic labor est. this is the task, this the labour. Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 129. Die Wunde! - Die Wunde! Sie brennt in meinem Herzen! The Wound! The Wound! It burns within my heart! Richard Wagner: Parsifal: Act 2.

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grandeurs et misères de l'homme. the grandeurs and the miseries of man. Pascal: Pensées. sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras? but to recall your steps and pass out to the upper air? Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 128. sumptaque pallenti septem de cortice grana presserat ore suo... and peeling off the yellowish rind, she had eaten seven of the seeds… Ovid: Metamorphoses: V; 537-538. Sunt geminae Somni portae; quarum altera fertur cornea, qua veris facilis datur exitus umbris, altera candenti perfecta nitens elephanto, sed falsa ad caelum mittunt insomnia Manes. Two gates of Sleep there are, whereof the one is said to be of horn, and thereby an easy outlet is given to the true shades; the other gleaming with the sheen of polished ivory, but false are the dreams sent by the Spirits to the world above. Virgil: Aeneid: VI; 593-596. post mediam noctem visus, cum somnia vera: but after midnight, when dreams are true: Horace: Satires: I: X; 33. nec tu sperna piis venientia somnia portis: cum pia venerunt somnia, pondus habent. Spurn not the dreams that come through the Righteous Gate: when righteous dreams come, they have the weight of truth. Sextus Propertius: Elegies: IV: 7; 87-88. Quae enim vita fuisset Priamo, si ab adulescentia scisset, quos eventus senectutis esset habiturus? Consider, for example, what Priam’s life would have been if he had known from youth what dire events his old age held in store for him? Cicero: De Divinatione: II: IX; 22. Certe igitur ignoratio futurorum malorum utilior est quam scientia. Of a surety, then, ignorance of future ills is more profitable than the knowledge of them. Cicero: De Divinatione: II: IX; 23-24.

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Ici venu, l'avenir est paresse. Once come here, the future is idleness. Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 67. il faut tenter de vivre! we must attempt to live! Paul Valéry: Le Cimetière Marin; 139. ac melior mihi frater. and more than my brother. Statius: Thebaid: IX; 53. Romanus orat; transfer hunc haedum mihi; sit dexter agnus, induatur vellere. Romanus prays for him: Bring this goat over to me; let him stand on my right hand as a lamb and be clothed in a fleece. Prudentius: Peristephanon: X; 1139-1140. Succisi poplites! My knees are hamstrung! Petronius Arbiter: Satyricon: I.