They lay on the bank together, side by side. The sun beat down on their faces; Maurice had a large hat tipped down over his face while Clive turned his head to gaze at the gurgling river beside them to shield his eyes, the crunch of the grass beneath his head echoing in his ear as he did so. In his mind this was one of the loveliest spots in England, all the more glorious to him for no one else having discovered it.
"We should come here more often," he said idly, picking some blades of grass and rolling them between his forefinger and thumb.
Maurice did not reply for a moment and Clive wondered if the heat of the day and the peace of their hideaway had lulled him to sleep; but then Maurice said, "I would, but I can never seem to find you when I want to go." His voice was slurred a little with the indistinct tones of one who had been dozing and Clive smiled slightly. Dear Maurice! There was no one like him in England and yet his sort was the kind that the old country depended on.
"Then why don't you come here anyway?" he inquired, lifting his eyebrows. He raised himself up onto an elbow, the better to challenge his friend.
"I don't like it half so well as when I'm with you; too much quiet makes me uncomfortable. I'd rather be with Chapman and the others in their rooms than here alone; I prefer people to solitude." Clive smiled at the subtle compliment beneath Maurice's words and sat up properly.
"You're an odd fish, Maurice," he told him, his lips quirking into a teasing grin. He was expecting a certain reaction and he got it; Maurice sat up, lunging for him. His nimble fingers caught Clive around the waist; Clive let out a most unmanly squawk and he twisted away, narrowly avoiding rolling into the water.
"Pax! Pax!" he called, laughing up at his friend. Maurice grinned down at him, grabbing Clive's arm to pull him back up the bank. They collapsed in a heap, breathing hard and Clive allowed himself to relax against Maurice.
They remained like this for several moments and Clive closed his eyes. The soft motion of Maurice's chest beneath his cheek, rising and falling, rising and falling, gave him the pleasant impression of being gently lulled to sleep by a tender hand. Which was not so far from the truth, he thought, and smiled again. Dear Maurice, he added mentally, with no consideration of the unoriginality of the sentiment. He fancied that he could hear Maurice's heartbeat, thudding rather more quickly than he would have expected from their tussle in the grass.
As he sighed into Maurice's shirt, he felt Maurice's hand come up and begin caressing his shoulder; an agreeable massage of his tense muscles. Maurice's hand moved lower, touching his waist and then his hip. It shifted again, but even as it did so, Clive sat up.
"I say, Maurice. Do you think we could tickle a trout?"
Maurice blinked, obviously not expecting the question, but he recovered himself with remarkable speed. "I shouldn't think so; this isn't the river for it."
"Ah, well, it was just a thought." They lay down again, but Clive had moved further away and Maurice seemed restless.
"Clive," he said, rolling over to gaze down at him. "Clive, what shall we do when you leave?"
"I shan't leave," Clive replied easily, twisting his hands together and placing them behind his head. "I can wear my mother down; we shall have another year here together."
"Of course," Maurice acquiesced, shaking his head as if to clear it of all his doubts and worries. He did not move, however, but stayed as he was, staring at Clive as if he couldn't look at him enough. Finally he reached down to touch his fingertips to Clive's cheek and stroked the line of Clive's jaw with almost hypnotic slowness. As he leant down, Clive felt a chill pass through him and he caught Maurice's hand and sat up once more.
"I think we'd better be starting back," he said firmly. Maurice looked at him with wide, startled eyes and Clive recoiled from the dumb hurt in them, as if Maurice were merely an animal in pain. He suffered a sudden wave of irritation.
Honestly, couldn't Maurice be more sensible about this?