The Line of Beauty (40 page)

"Um . . .
oh,"
said Nick, sure of himself but confused as to her reasoning; it was a study of the poetry of John Berryman. "I don't think
. . ."

"Do you see that, darling?"

Maurice brought his gleaming lenses to bear on it. "What? Oh yes," he said. He went towards Wani, who was quickly refolding
the
FT.

"You're very welcome to read it," Nick said, with a frank little laugh, "but it's actually mine—it was sent on to me this
morning. I'm reviewing it for the
THES."

"Oh I see, no, no," said Sally, with a coldly tactful smile. "No, Maurice
owns
Pegasus—I just noticed they publish it."

"I didn't know that."

"I've bought it," said Sir Maurice. "I've bought the whole group. It's in the paper." And he sat down and glared at the vase
of thistles and dried honesty in the grate.

"I'm just going up to see if my sis is OK," said Toby, as though all this had decided him.

Nick didn't feel he could go out after him. He sat down again, opposite Sally, but not quite in relation with her, like guests
in a hotel lounge. He said, "I'm afraid this news has rather spoilt the evening."

"Yes," said Sally, "it's most unfortunate."

"Awful losing an old friend," said Nick.

"Mm," said Sally, with a twitch, as if to say her meaning had been twisted. "So you knew him too, did you, the man?"

"Pat—yes, a bit," said Nick. "He was a great charmer." He smiled and the word seemed to linger and insist, like a piece of
code.

Sally said, "As I say, we never saw him." She took up a copy of
Country
Life,
and sat staring at the estate agents' advertisements. Her expression was tough, as if she was arguing the prices down; but
also self-conscious, so that it seemed just possible she wanted to talk about what had happened. She looked up, and said with
a great twitch, "I mean, they must have seen it coming."

"Oh . . ." said Nick, "I see. I don't know. Perhaps. One always hopes that it won't be the case. And even if you know it's
going to happen, it doesn't make it any less awful when it does." It had become unclear to him whether she knew that he was
gay; he'd always assumed it was the cause for her coldness, her way of not paying attention to him, but now he'd started to
suspect she was blind to it. He felt the large subject massing, with its logic and momentum. There would be the social strain
of coming out to such people in such a place, and the wider matter of AIDS concerning them all, more or less. He said, "I
think I heard you say your mother had a long final illness."

"That was utterly different," Sir Maurice put in curtly.

"It was a blessed relief," said Sally, "when she finally went."

"She hadn't brought it on herself," said Sir Maurice.

"No, that's true," Sally sighed. "I mean, they're going to have to learn, aren't they, the . . . homosexuals."

"It's a hard way to have to learn," said Nick, "but yes, we are learning to be safe."

Sally Tipper stared at him. "Right . . . " she said.

Sir Maurice seemed not to notice this, but in her there was a little spectacle of ingestion. Nick tried to put it in her language,
but couldn't think what the term would be. "You know, there are very simple things that need to be done. For instance, people
have got to use protection . . . you know, when they're . . . when they're humping."

"I see," said Sally, with another shake of the head. He wasn't sure she followed. Were such cheerful genteelisms any use?
She had an air of being ready to take things on, and simultaneously an air of puzzled and frightened offence. "That's what
he'd been doing, had he, I suppose, your friend the actor? Humping?"

"Almost undoubtedly," said Nick. Sir Maurice made a rough, dyspeptic sound, as if chewing a mint. "But as we all know," Nick
went on flatteringly, and with a sort of weary zeal now the moment had come, "there are other things one can do. I mean there's
oral sex, which may be dangerous, but is certainly less so."

Sally received this stoically. "Kissing, you mean."

Sir Maurice looked at him sharply and said, "I'm afraid what you're saying fills me with a physical revulsion," and seemed
to be laughing in his distaste. "I just don't see why anyone's remotely surprised. The whole thing had got completely out
of hand. They had it coming to them."

Sally, enlightened for a minute by her unusual talk with Nick, said wildly, "Oh, Maurice is medieval on this one, he's like
Queen Victoria!" It was a little shot at freedom, her silliness of tone almost invited correction.

"I'm not ashamed of what I think," said Sir Maurice.

"Of course you're not, darling," said Sally.

"No, well nor am I, as a matter of fact," said Nick.

"What do you think, Wani," said Sally, "as a younger person, you know, on the other side of the picture?"

Wani had been watching Nick with mischievous patience. "I suppose Nick must be right, you know . . . everyone's going to have
to be more careful. There's really no excuse for getting the thing now." He smiled wisely. "I think it's so sad with little
children having it—babies born with it, even."

"That is awfully sad," said Sally.

"I'm probably just old-fashioned on these things, but actually I was brought up to believe in no sex before marriage."

"My own view entirely," said Sir Maurice, as fiercely as if he was contradicting him.

Nick, tingling with ironies and astonishment, said merely, "But if we're never going to get married . . ."

"Sort of sex-mad, isn't it, the world we live in," said Sally, as if that was their general conclusion.

"I know . . . " said Wani.

(v)

Next morning there was a briefbit of shouting between Gerald and Catherine, down by the pool. Nick couldn't quite hear what
it was about. He was surprised by it, so soon after Pat's death, when Gerald might have bothered to tread carefully; but it
seemed also to make a kind of sense, as an awkward aftershock of that event. Nothing more was said about it in the day.

When Nick went upstairs in the afternoon Catherine came too, a little behind him, so that it wasn't clear if she was following
him; he glanced back in the long passageway and saw her plotting expression. He left his door open, and a few moments later
she came wandering in. "Hello, darling," said Nick.

"Mm, hello again, darling," said Catherine, looking quickly at him, and then peering mysteriously around the room.

"Are you OK?"

"Oh, yes . . . fine. I'm fine."

Nick smiled tenderly, but she seemed almost irritated by the question, and he thought perhaps she'd got over Pat, with her
odd emotional economy, of feelings fiercely inhabited and then discarded. She was wearing tight white shorts and a grey tank
top of Jasper's, in which her small breasts moved alertly. No one had come to his room before, and it felt intimate, and pleasantly
tense, like a first date. She sat on the bed and tested the springs.

"Poor old Nick, you always get the worst room."

"I love my room," said Nick, gazing to left and right.

"This used to be my room. It's where they put the children. God, I remember those creepy pictures."

"They are a bit spooky, aren't they." They were the little German paintings on glass:
Autumn,
where a woman with an aigrette filled a girl's apron with easily reached fruit, and
Winter,
where men in red coats shot and skated and a bird sang on a bare branch. It was hard to put your finger on it, but they had
a sort of sinister geniality.

"Still, you're nice and near your friend."

"I can hear old Ouradi snoring, yes," said Nick, rather heartily, and sat down at the table.

"Actually I don't mind old Ouradi," said Catherine.

"He's all right, isn't he."

"I always thought he was just a spoilt little ponce, but there's a wee bit more to him than that. He can even be quite funny."

"I know . . ." said Nick, who thought of himself as much funnier than Wani.

"I mean he's bloody moody. Sometimes he's just not there, he's like a shop dummy going
charming . . . duchess
. . . et cetera; and sometimes he's the life and soul."

"I know what you mean," said Nick, with a wary laugh at her mimicry. "You get used to that."

Catherine leaned back on her arms and swung her legs. "I'm quite glad I'm not his fiancee, I must say."

"I think she's probably used to that too."

"She's certainly had time to get used to it . . ."

Nick looked down, realigned the books on his table, his notebooks, Henry James's memoirs covering the
Spartacus
gay guide to the world. He assumed Catherine had come here with a purpose. She glanced round, and then got up and closed
the door, in the abstracted way of someone already working on the next thing.

"I must say I'm beginning to wonder about old Wani," she said.

"How do you mean . . . ?"

"He's rather brilliant, actually."

"Oh . . . ?"

"He's completely pulled the wool over your blue eyes."

Nick smiled dimly, with anxiety and a vague sense of a compliment. "Quite probably," he said.

Catherine sat down and said, "My little Jaz has got a theory."

"Oh, yes?" said Nick. "I wouldn't automatically credit a theory of little Jaz's."

Catherine carried on as if she didn't mind him sounding like her father. "Perhaps not, but. . .Jasper's very observant, you
know, well, you probably don't believe me . . . anyway, he thinks he's a fag."

"Oh!" Nick tutted disappointedly. "Yeah, people are always saying that. It's just because he bathes so often and wears see-through
trousers." The odd thing, Nick thought, was that people said it so rarely.

"Jasper says he follows him round all the time trying to get a look at his knob."

"Mm . . . It sounds to me a bit like vanity, darling. Jasper's always following me round trying to
show
me his knob." Perhaps this was too frank. "You must admit, he can be a bit of a flirt." Nick was surprised by his own presence
of mind, but still he sniggered, and crossed his legs in complex discomfort.

"Wani hasn't said anything at all, then? About Jaz? I suppose he would be extra careful to keep it from you, wouldn't he—in
case you got the wrong idea! Wouldn't do at all!" said Catherine, perhaps not convinced by her own theory.

Nick was blushing, but he looked at her levelly. "I don't know, darling," he said, and bit his lower lip. "Aren't they alone
together down at the pool right now? Who knows what might be happening?"

"At least he's not wearing his thong today," said Catherine.

"No, quite . . ." Nick pushed on defensively with his rough joke. "Though once they get into the pool-house together . . ."

Catherine gave him a bothered stare, and coloured a little herself. She knew of course that Nick knew that Jasper fucked her
in the pool-house, it was a silent brag; but of course she didn't know that Nick had fucked Wani there last night, after the
awful dinner, in a storm of pent-up anger. She said, "Oh, god, don't mention the pool-house."

"What . . . ?"

"Gerald was on to me about it this morning, and behaving broadly like an ape, I must say."

"Oh, darling . . . I saw something was going on": and the image of Gerald standing by the pool, head down, shoulders rounded
in accusing disappointment, was somehow ape-like, it was true.

"Apparently her ladyship found a rubber johnny floating in the lav. She was frightfully upset, as you can imagine. It quite
ruined her early-morning bathe."

"Hoorah!" said Nick, and grinned at her, while his mind raced round a series of right-angled bends.

"I thought he'd flushed it, but Gerald came snooping round, and we only escaped by a
hare's breath."

"I'm surprised she knew what it was."

"It's too pathetic," said Catherine, who of course had missed last night's sex-education class. "We're all adults, for god's
sake."

"I know . . ."

"You can't do it in the house, because the noise carries."

"That
can
be a problem."

"Actually, god, fuck, that's really weird . . . !" Catherine stared at him in excited self-doubt, whilst Nick felt his disguise
grow eerily thinner. He smiled, not knowing if he'd been recognized, or if, by sitting still, he could avoid detection. "Because
I'm sure we didn't use one yesterday."

"You must always use a rubber," said Nick. "There's no point in sometimes using one and sometimes not. You don't know where
he's been."

"Oh, Nick, he's a total innocent. He's never been with anyone else."

"No, well . . ."

Catherine gaped. "So if it wasn't us."

"It might have been there from the day before, I suppose," said Nick, with doomed insouciance, watching Catherine as she went
on an Agatha Christie-like tour of the possible and frankly impossible suspects. He thought that perhaps like Poirot she had
known the answer before she came into the room; but when she stood up, walked to the window, and turned he saw the shock,
the disgust even, of discovery in her face.

"God, I've been stupid," she said.

Nick looked at her, and she looked at him. He felt the painful stupidity of detection himself, and also a kind of pride, lurking
still, waiting for permission to smile. She couldn't deny the scale and class of the deception. He thought he saw her quick
recovery, her feel for anything salacious. He said, "Perhaps he is rather brilliant, yes."

Catherine came and sat down again, as dignified as she could be. "I don't think he's brilliant any more," she said.

Nick said carefully, "You mean he was brilliant when you thought he was tricking me, but not when it turns out he's tricking
you." He felt, without time to work it out, that there could be a brilliance of concealment, over something simple and even
sordid; and there could be a simple, dumb concealment of something glitteringly unexpected. Caught up in it, inured to it,
he didn't know which was more nearly the case with himself and Wani. "Of course, it's all for him," he said.