Read A Hallowed Place Online

Authors: Caro Fraser

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A Hallowed Place (24 page)

BOOK: A Hallowed Place
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Still, he made an effort and said, ‘David just told me something that’ll cheer you up - unless you’ve already heard.’

The pause before Leo registered this and responded was slightly too long. ‘What’s that?’

‘We won’t be moving to New Square after all. Some other set has taken up the lease.’

A little life came into Leo’s face. He drank some of his tea. ‘Really? Christ, it’s about time I heard some good news.’ That was something, at any rate. His life might be falling apart, but at least it could happen in the peace and security of the one home he had ever known. The brief flash of animation died away in his heart. He turned away and fastened his gaze on the plane trees lining the end of King’s Bench Walk, and let his thoughts drift painfully back to Joshua, heedless of the conversation around him.

Five minutes later the arrival of Michael Gibbon broke Leo’s maudlin train of thought. ‘Leo,’ he said in surprise, setting down his tea, ‘I thought you had a summons before the Master at three?’

Leo glanced at his watch. It was five past. He rose hastily, the pages of his paper spilling to the floor. ‘Bloody Felicity,’ he muttered. ‘She didn’t say anything. Thanks,’ he added to Michael, and went out abruptly.

‘I don’t know why he blames Felicity,’ remarked Michael as he sat down. ‘He mentioned it to me himself earlier this morning.’

‘Leo’s seemed a bit off lately, if you ask me,’ said David. ‘Not his usual self. Perhaps it’s this divorce business. I hear he’s having trouble over custody of his son.’

‘Yes, it’s all rather sad,’ agreed Michael. ‘Not that I ever thought of Leo as the marrying kind, but she seemed a very nice girl. What was her name?’

‘Rachel,’ said Anthony.

‘Rachel, that’s right.’ Michael sipped his tea, then said,
‘Tell me, David, what’s the news on that unseaworthiness case of yours? I think I may have a very similar point coming up …’

Anthony let his thoughts wander as Michael and David conversed. Whatever Leo’s problems were, Anthony didn’t think they were to do with Rachel and Oliver. Though he might be wrong. He reflected briefly on Rachel, remembering, almost with bemusement, how much in love with her he had once been. That pale, slender beauty, her hesitancy, the haunted expression in her dark eyes. A complete contrast to Camilla. She was warm and immediate, hiding nothing. Anthony thought of her with affection and, as he did so, experienced again that sensation of slight fear. It happened every time he thought about her and it wasn’t very pleasant. Perhaps it was just guilt. Okay, he shouldn’t have done what he did, but Sarah wasn’t going to say anything. When he saw Camilla tonight, he could put the whole damned thing behind him and forget about it.

‘Mr Davies - a word, if I may.’ Mr Justice Gardner’s voice was courteous, but distinctly cold. Leo stayed where he was, while the other parties to the hearing filed out of the judge’s chambers. The door closed.

‘Mr Davies, you are well aware of the necessity for punctuality in these matters. The lists are very full and we must avoid time-wasting at all costs. I must say, I was most surprised to find you late for the summons this afternoon. It is, if you will permit me to say so, out of character.’ He paused, then added, ‘As was the distinctly offhand manner in which you offered your apologies at the start of the
hearing. I expect a higher standard from members of the Bar, particularly from Her Majesty’s counsel.’

‘Please accept my apologies once again, my Lord,’ said Leo stiffly. ‘Particularly if I failed to express them with sufficient conviction earlier.’

Mr Justice Gardner stiffened slightly, but he decided to ignore any implicit insolence in Leo’s reply. Like most of the members of the High Court bench, he had a high regard for Leo and it vexed him that he should have to have any occasion to reprimand him. There was something incongruous about it. But he had undoubtedly arrived fifteen minutes late without any sufficient explanation, the curtest of apologies, and everyone had been inconvenienced. It could hardly go unremarked. ‘Very well. I trust you won’t let it happen in future.’

Accepting this as his dismissal, Leo left the room. Some part of him knew that he should care more about this dent to his pride, but it seemed these days as though all his senses were muffled by the weight of unhappiness which lay about him. Only three days since Joshua had gone and it seemed like an eternity of hell. He could think about nothing else, cursing himself for letting him go, reliving over and over those brief minutes, in which he had let Joshua walk out of his life for ever, without even telling him that he loved him.

He walked slowly back to chambers, and when he reached Caper Court he paused to lean against the stone wall of the archway, suddenly aware of the loveliness of the day. But even its beauty, the light on the soft stone walls, the colour of the trees in their last leaf, wearied and sickened him. He felt tired, both in his body and spirit.
He was sleeping badly and drinking too much. Each day he promised himself that he wouldn’t drink that evening, but each evening it was the same. What else was there? He didn’t have the heart to get in touch with friends, or try to get out. Whatever dismal kind of life he had been leading before Joshua, it was nothing compared with this wretchedness.

Well, he would have to make an effort. He was badly out of condition. He would start by having a game of squash this evening, possibly with Anthony, if he wasn’t busy. They hadn’t spoken much for several weeks. Leo had been too bound up in Joshua to make room for anyone else. That was what love did to you.

Going into chambers he met Jeremy Vine coming out of the clerks’ room in his shirtsleeves.

‘I suppose you heard about the New Square place falling through, did you?’ said Jeremy. He was cross, and when Jeremy was cross, he spoke even more loudly and moved even more aggressively than usual.

‘I did, as a matter of fact,’ said Leo. ‘What a pity.’

‘Hm. Don’t pretend you’re not pleased.’

‘I can’t say I really relished the thought of Lincoln’s Inn, Jeremy. What have you got lined up for us next? Grey’s Inn? I hear the rents are nice and low.’

‘Don’t tempt me,’ said Jeremy. ‘I might just think about it.’ He gave Leo a searching look. ‘Am I right in thinking you’re growing your hair long, Leo? Must be something to do with middle-aged insecurity. Doesn’t suit you.’ Smirking, he turned and bounded heavily upstairs.

‘Mr Davies?’ Felicity called over to him.

‘Yes?’

‘I’ve got a call for you. Miss Draper.’

Leo glanced across to the waiting room and saw that it was empty. ‘I’ll take it down here,’ he said.

Leo closed the door of the waiting room and picked up the phone. ‘Alison?’

‘Hello, Leo. Just to let you know that the court welfare officers have confirmed the Friday appointment. Is that still convenient? They’ll come round about half two - it should only take an hour or so.’

‘Fine,’ said Leo. Well, he thought as he put down the phone, now that Joshua was gone there was nothing to indicate to the welfare officers that he did not lead the most blameless of lives. Joshua’s room remained just as it had been on the night he had walked out, a token of Leo’s faint hope that he might still come back, but the few possessions he had left behind could easily be tidied away.

Leo sighed, then went upstairs to Anthony’s room, knocked, and put his head round the door. ‘Wondered if you were free for a game of squash this evening?’

‘Can’t, I’m afraid. I’m seeing Camilla.’ Anthony was genuinely sorry to have to say no. He was worried about Leo and would have welcomed the chance to have a talk with him. ‘Maybe tomorrow night?’

‘I don’t know. I’ll have to see. Maybe.’ Leo closed the door and went to his room. With an effort of will, he sank himself into some work. He sat there, combing through books, writing up notes for an opinion, while dusk and eventually evening fell over Caper Court. At last he looked up from the pool of light on his desk, gazing into the
shadows at the far side of the room, and realised that he had been working for several hours in a kind of oblivion, free from pain or emotion. The building was silent. Everyone had long since gone. Leo stood up and stretched, feeling the anaesthetic of drudgery wear off, and the familiar misery settle once more on his mind and heart. He walked to the window and looked out over Caper Court. All the windows in the buildings were in darkness, except for his own, and a faint light which glowed behind Desmond Broadhurst’s curtains. Poor old boy. He was due another visit. But Leo had not the heart for company. He had nothing to say to the world. Perhaps it was a good thing that Anthony was seeing Camilla this evening.

He could get on with his life without having to share Leo’s troubles. It seemed as though the closeness which had once existed between them had vanished like so much mist. Another ache crept into Leo’s heart at this thought.

Glancing at his watch, Leo saw that it was past nine. He collected his papers, put on his jacket, switched off the light and left the building. He was so tired that he drove home almost mindlessly, hardly hearing the music which he had put on, not even thinking, consciously, of Joshua.

He parked his car and walked round from the mews, slowing his footsteps as the windows of his flat came into view. He glanced up, letting his heart tighten in wild and faint anticipation. Not really anticipation at all. Just a kind of hopeless fantasy. One in which the long windows stood not in uncurtained darkness, but were lit from within, the curtains drawn. In this fantasy it was only five days ago, and he still had time and the chance to make everything right
with Joshua. The fantasy died before it had even begun.

The flat was silent. Leo put on a few lights and poured himself a drink, careful to make it a small one. Then he went into the kitchen and stared listlessly at the contents of the fridge. He made himself a ham sandwich and took it, with his drink, into his study. There he switched on his computer, and took off his jacket and loosened his tie as he waited for the computer to boot into life. Without sitting down, still chewing his sandwich, he went into his email. Five new messages, more than usual. He clicked on the first one and watched as it filled the screen. He read the first words listlessly, without really comprehending them. Then the content of what he was reading dawned on him. He swallowed, put down his sandwich and read it again from the beginning. It was invective, as obscene and puerile as might possibly be imagined. It went on, an outpouring of filth, for several sentences. Shock made his flesh tingle, his heart begin to hammer. Jesus. He had never received anything like this in his life before. It brought with it a sense of violation that was almost physical.

Without pausing to consider, he leant down and clicked on the ‘delete’ button. When the screen asked him if he was really sure he wanted to delete this item, it came across to Leo as a kind of sneering innuendo, as though the machine itself were looking slyly up at him. Angrily he clicked ‘yes’ and the words vanished from the screen. He felt an instant sense of relief, although the shock of what he had read had not left him. Messages two, three, four and five still waited. He hesitated for several long seconds before clicking on the second. Its contents were similar to the first, but worse.
Mechanically he deleted it and went to the third, fully expecting the screen to fill with obscenities and abuse once more. It was a message from a friend, a female lawyer in New York, telling him that she was coming to London on business at the end of November and to keep the
twenty-seventh
free. It was cheery and brisk, and ended snappily with the word ‘Bye!’, but because of the vile force of the last two emails, it read at first to Leo like a coded message, in which obscenity and insult surely lay buried. He had to read it several times before it gradually took on the form of an innocuous, friendly transmission.

He sat down now, picked up his glass and swallowed its contents. He felt better after a few seconds, as the whisky did its work. He was reluctant to click on to the last two messages. He sat for a long while, thinking it all over. He had no idea who could have done such a thing. Who would want to? What enemies did he have? His mind moved reluctantly, inevitably, to Joshua. No. If Joshua had thought of him since he left, it had been negligently,
unregretfully
. He didn’t care enough. Leo half smiled as he remembered trying to show Joshua, largely unsuccessfully, how to perform basic tasks on the computer. The memory had a sweet pain attached. To do this kind of thing was beyond Joshua in every sense.

In an instant Leo regretted deleting the earlier messages. If the two remaining ones were mere mundane correspondence, then he had lost the possibility of identifying the sender. He had been too shocked to look for clues, to references which might point to an individual. After a few moments Leo put out his hand, hesitated, then went into the fourth of the
messages. More filth, this time of a threatening, sickeningly sexual kind. Trying with difficulty to ignore the content, Leo read it through three times, but could find nothing to tie it in to anyone he knew. Perhaps it was just random. One heard of such things. Unsolicited material turned up on screens every day, all over the world. But Leo wasn’t on the Internet. This had come from someone who knew his email address. Knew his name. He clicked on to the fifth message and what he read there made his gorge rise. As soon as he saw Oliver’s name, and read what was written, he got up, went to the bathroom, and was briefly and violently sick. With trembling hands he went to the basin and splashed water over his face, then dried it. He stood for a while, hands on the side of the basin, waiting for the trembling to go away, the taste to leave his mouth. He tried to erase what he had read from his mind, but that was the worst of words. Once they were in there, they could not easily be dislodged. Whoever had written these messages knew that. They had found a way into his mind. From now on, he would be unable to switch on his computer and look at his email, for fear of finding more messages like those of this evening.

After a while he went through to his study and, not looking at the screen, managed to delete the message and close down the system. Then he went through to the drawing room and poured himself another drink, this time a large one, which he swiftly followed with another. The whisky had the desired effect of dulling his senses, putting everything which he had just experienced at a kind of remove. And inevitably, it brought back thoughts of
Joshua. Leo got up and went through to Joshua’s room. He had done this every evening since Joshua had left. He gazed around. The cleaning lady had made the bed and tidily arranged what was left of Joshua’s belongings. The easel still stood in the corner by the window. Leo went over to the bed and pulled back the cover, picked up a pillow and held it to his face, breathing in what was left of the scent of his lover. Then with a groan he chucked it down and went back through to the drawing room. Tears stung the backs of his eyes. You maudlin, bloody drunk, he told himself. No more whisky. Then again …

BOOK: A Hallowed Place
8.94Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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