Pat Barker - Toby's Room

An hour later they were standing on opposite sides of the bed as Kent breathed his last. When he was certain it was over, Brooke reached across, closed Kent’s eyelids and pulled the blanket up over his face. Automatically, he reached for the file and noted the time of death.

‘You can lay him out in the morning, there’s no rush.’

As Brooke handed him the file their eyes met. Now, Neville thought, he’s got to say something now. But Brooke’s face remained expressionless and almost immediately he turned away. That was it, then. There was to be no discussion, no explanation — and, after all, what explanation could there be? Just this proud, stony silence: Brooke saying, in effect, I’m stronger than you. You’ll never hear me plead .

Neville spent what was left of the night in the sickroom. Kent’s corpse was more acceptable company than Brooke.

Towards morning, he went into the yard and held out his hand to see if it was still raining. A pinprick now and then; no more. He looked down at his palm as if he were seeing it for the first time, and then slowly, involuntarily, curled his fingers, turning his open hand into a fist.

Paul had been in the Domino Room for perhaps twenty minutes before Elinor arrived. At first he didn’t recognize her. She was flushed, her hair and shoulders covered with a fine mist of rain. When he bent to kiss her she smelled, mysteriously, of woodsmoke. Apparently she’d spent the whole day at Kew, going there and back by river. A wonderful day, she said. Her speech was quick and passionate, her pupils still dilated from the darkness outside. She was like a wild creature glimpsed in the headlights of a motor car; he was startled into a fresh awareness of her.

‘Wasn’t it very cold?’

‘Freezing. It was wonderful, though, and such a change from the hospital. Do you know, even outside the huts you never really feel you’re outside?’

She didn’t seem to belong to this room with its dark red plush seats and wreaths of cigar smoke, and that pleased him because with each visit his dislike of the place grew.

‘Why are you smiling?’ she asked.

‘I was thinking about Kit. Do you remember how he used to call the Café Royal “vile”?’

‘Yes, and he practically lived here.’

‘I’m going to see him this weekend,’ Paul said. ‘He’s invited me down to Suffolk.’ She was looking away from him so he couldn’t read her response. ‘Did you know they were letting him out?’

‘Yes, Tonks told me. It’s only a couple of weeks till the next operation — they’re hoping to fit it in before Christmas. I’m pleased he’s having a break — it’ll do him good.’

Paul wondered how much he should say. ‘He says he wants to talk to me.’

‘About Toby?’

‘I suppose so. Can’t think what else it would be.’

‘Well, you know …’ She brushed her hair out of her eyes, still not meeting his gaze. ‘I’ve got to leave that to you.’

‘I won’t press him, you know, if …’

‘No. I understand that.’

They sat in silence for a moment, looking around the room. It was a while since they’d been seen here together and at several of the tables he could see people rather obviously commenting on their presence. What his father would have called a clatfart shop. God, he hated it.

‘What are your plans?’ he asked.

‘I’m going to look for a flat. Catherine says she’ll go round with me.’

‘How is she?’

‘Getting ready to go back to Scotland. At least that’s the current plan. But … She’s going to have dinner with Kit and his parents before he goes back into hospital. So. We shall see.’

‘She said his mother was pressing her to go to see him.’

‘I don’t know how much pressure would be needed.’

‘I just hope she doesn’t get carried away by … Well, by pity. There’s a real danger here, you know, of people thinking that Kit’s like … That he’s the way he is because of his injuries. Whereas you and I both know Kit was a very difficult man before any of this happened. I think if you want to be a real friend you’ll remind her of that.’

Elinor was smiling. ‘There wouldn’t be anything personal at stake for you, I suppose?’

‘No, of course not.’

They lapsed into silence again, but he could feel the tension gathering in her.

‘Whatever it is,’ she said, turning to him and looking straight into his eyes. ‘You will tell me, won’t you?’

‘Yes, of course,’ he said, realizing, even as he spoke, what a rash promise that was.

With a final petulant hiss of steam, the train stopped. Paul hauled his bags off the luggage rack, opened the door and dropped them on to the platform. A porter appeared, but no other passengers. The train must have been empty.

Neville was standing directly under the lamp. His nose and mouth were hidden by a thick scarf that he’d wound round and round the lower part of his face. Only the eyes showed, the corners creased by some change of expression, a smile, presumably, though of course a snarl has the same effect. Paul held out his hand, registering the shock of Neville’s hot skin against his own cool palm, and then Neville pulled him into an awkward, backslapping embrace.

The porter coughed. Before Paul could take action Neville had slipped a coin into his hand.

‘Good journey?’

‘Not bad. Certainly wasn’t crowded.’

‘Never is, that one.’

He picked up one of Paul’s bags.

‘No —’

‘ Face , Tarrant. Nothing wrong with the arm.’

They walked side by side down the hill. They should have known each other well enough by now to chat easily in this situation, but despite the embrace there was still the awkwardness of strangers between them. It had always been like this: they greeted each other like long-lost brothers and a minute or so later remembered they didn’t actually like each other very much. Paul had never had such a strange, unquantifiable relationship with anybody else. Even now, after years of admittedly intermittent contact, he’d have hesitated to call Neville a friend; and yet nobody mattered more. There was nobody whom he so persistently measured himself against.

Neville was quickly out of breath, puffing and gasping through whatever apparatus was hidden by the scarf. Ahead of them, in the darkness, the sea turned and turned, the crash and grating sigh of its retreat more imagined than heard. They came out between narrow rows of houses to find it waiting for them in the darkness. Huddled dark shapes of fishing boats were drawn up on the shingle. The roofs of the huts sparkled with frost: the last few nights had been freezing.

‘Do you mind if we walk on the beach?’ Paul said.

‘No, go ahead. It’s all shingle, mind, won’t be easy on that leg.’

Paul’s breath plumed on the air as he slipped and slithered down the slope and half ran the last few yards to the sea. Neville followed slowly, a bulky, top-heavy shape, breathing stertorously through his mouth. At the bottom of the slope, there was a strip of firm, hard sand, but you couldn’t get to it because of the tangle of barbed wire that ran along the water’s edge. A gap in the wire left a space for fishing boats to come and go and presumably for the lifeboat to be launched. That, too, was hauled high on to the shingle, poised like a fish hawk about to dive. Neville joined him and for a time they were silent, looking out to sea through coils of rusting wire, thinking their own thoughts.

It had started to rain and the rain quickly turned to sleet, slanting silver rods disappearing into shining grey-brown pebbles. They turned by mutual consent and walked up the shingle slope, still not having spoken. Paul glanced sideways at Neville, who was struggling up the bank, hunched over, hands thrust deep into his pockets, the moonlight glinting on the whites of his eyes. Paul noticed that the scarf had a curious bulge on one side.