Chapter Five
Alec came home that evening in a better temper.
He'd spent a miserable night in that cold, damp, un-aired bed downstairs, and then the look on Maurice's face that morning standing at the window had been awful to see. Alec couldn't help himself, looking up. He'd known Maurice would be there, as sure as the sun rose in the east. Alec knew he was being possessive and unreasonable, knew Maurice was devoted to him alone in a way that was almost frighteningly intense at times, and that he didn't care a fig for that girl and never would. It wasn't fair to treat him so badly, it was almost cruel.
He determined to patch things up between them. Tonight.
That evening he came up through the basement flat as usual and found Maurice in the kitchen making them some dinner as Mrs Moxley didn't work on weekends, thank God.
Maurice pointed with a wooden spoon to a bottle of red wine on the kitchen table. His eyes were uncertain but his voice sounded normal enough when he spoke. "You look beat. Have some of that, it's very good. There's also pudding left over."
Alec sat down and poured himself a big glass. "Cheers."
It appeared that they had each independently come to the same decision, had both decided to pretend that nothing untoward had happened.
Least said soonest mended, as Mum always said.
At first everything went very well. Alec made a big effort to act all as usual, nicer than usual, and poor Maurice managed to unwind by degrees too. By halfway through dinner he was smiling and talking quite easily again.
An hour and a good deal more wines later they made it up to the bedroom, together this time. Alec had removed Maurice's shirt and was busy fumbling with his belt buckle when Maurice dropped the bombshell.
"What'll we do tomorrow?" Alec had asked between kisses. Sunday was their one day together and it started with a long lie-in of course, but then it was nice to go out together, experience something of the place seeing as they had to live here.
"Alec, I'm sorry, I can't. I - I promised Miss Stanton I'd go horse-riding with her."
"You did what?" He let go of Maurice and stepped back.
"I didn't mean to, you see, it was at dinner last night. I happened to mention I ride and next thing I knew she and her father had practically arranged it. I couldn't think of a way to get out of it."
"Didn't want to, you mean."
"Don't be so bloody stupid. It'll only be for a few hours - I promise."
"And what about the Sunday after that - and the next? What'll it be then? A stroll around the zoological gardens? A nice concert? The the-ay-tre?" Stretching out this last word contemptuously, in the way he imagined the toffs said it. All Alec's resolve to be reasonable was gone again, flown away as if it had never existed.
"There won't be another. Next time I'll be forearmed. A sick aunt in the country, rediscovering my religion, I don't know. I'll make a list."
"Sunday's our day, Maurice."
"I said I'm sorry."
They didn't sleep apart that night but they might as well have.
Maurice left at ten the next morning and Alec jumped straight on the omnibus as soon as the cab had disappeared from sight. It was Milly's half-day and with any luck he'd catch her before she went out. She'd been dropping hints about going for "a stroll" somewhere nice together and all of a sudden it seemed a very good idea to take her up on it.
Two can play at this game. If he thinks I'm sitting around like some lovesick girl waiting for him to come home again he's got anther thing coming.
Alec, despite his good intentions of yesterday, possessed a fiery vengeful streak a mile wide - and it had just been ignited.
He didn't think about Milly's feelings, he didn't think about anything really, just sat and smoked cigarette after cigarette on the bus out to old Chisholm's.
"Vanilla, please."
The ice cream seller handed it to Milly with a smile-for-the-courting-couple while Alec paid. His mistake was natural enough. Milly certainly had a happy and expectant air about her, looked quite girlish in her white best dress with flowers on, and her hat and parasol.
But she is practically a girl, Alec, despite having been wed. She's what, twenty-five? And you're leading her on. Again.
He scowled. Fortunately Milly wasn't looking at his face just then, but pointing up at some bright children's kites flying high overhead.
You've got to stop this - now.
But how could he? They'd only just got to Shrewsbury Gardens and there was a whole catalogue of things Milly wanted to see. He hadn't realised the place was so huge. The lake. The meadows with spring flowers just starting their show. The tearooms. The open-air concert at the bandstands.
The best thing he could do was act as a respectable escort, nothing more, like a brother or something, and hope her expectations calmed down somewhat. It wasn't as if he'd actually promised her anything; just shown up at the door and asked her if she fancied a day at the gardens because he felt like taking some air himself. He had nothing to feel guilty about. Absolutely nothing.
Alec and Milly were walking along by the water when he saw them.
Riding along the lakeside bridle path, on two fine-looking piebald horses, whether hired or owed by Miss Stanton's father, who knew. It hadn't occurred to Alec that it would be here that they went for their ride. Maurice was chatting away quite animatedly, but it was the look on Edith Stanton's face that sent a fresh rush of jealous rage through Alec. She was looking at Maurice in a way she had no right to, looking at him as if Maurice was free for her taking. Her eyes were bright, her cheeks flushed, her fine chestnut hair beneath a jaunty feathered cap glimmered in the sun. She wore jodhpurs, quite racy and modern for a woman, and the horses walked along so close that her knee brushed against Maurice's. Up and down, up and down, her leg against his, along with the motion of their mounts.
Alec stood, staring at them quite openly. Miss Stanton, face turned raptly toward Maurice's, didn't notice. Maurice, looking around, did - and his eyes widened in shock when he saw Alec and Milly there, his mouth actually dropped open. It would have been funny if Alec hadn't been so angry.
Milly tugged at his arm. "Alec, come on. Never seen a horse before? Let's go and get some tea and cake. I fancy -"
Before she could finish her sentence he'd pulled her to him and kissed her soundly on the mouth, his eyes never for a moment leaving Maurice's.
It was evening by the time he'd seen Milly back to Chisholm's and got back home again.
There was, unsurprisingly, no dinner made this time. The kitchen was cold, dark and quiet as he passed through it on his way up to the house. Dread filled him. He knew he'd done a great wrong. Not just to Maurice but to Milly too. After the kiss she'd linked elbows with him as they promenaded about, squeezed his arm. She didn't even notice his silence, filled the void with her own happy talk. He should have extracted his arm from hers, made some excuse for his behaviour, but he couldn't think of a thing. What he had done was serious. They weren't kids any more, larking around like down at Penge. Milly had interpreted that kiss as a promise, a statement of his intentions that he'd never quite been willing to give back then.
And then there was Maurice. It was one of Alec's faults, he knew it, that if ever he felt he'd been slighted his first instinct was to hit back - hard, unthinkingly. He'd done this to Maurice twice now. Once over his not coming to the Boathouse as Alec had ordered, and again today. It would be his undoing one of these days.
He felt sick.
He found Maurice in the parlour. His friend sat looking into the fire, drink in hand. Alec wondered how many he'd already had.
"What're you playing, at Alec?" His voice low, and frighteningly controlled.
Maurice had heard him, though he'd entered the room almost soundlessly, a skill upon which he usually prided himself.
"What am I playing at? That's rich coming from you," Alec shot back, instantly fired-up again, realising he'd more than half-expected Maurice's opening gambit to be conciliatory - he was ever the peacemaker. Always had been, before.
Maurice turned around, stood up. His eyes were as dark as Alec had ever seen them, almost the same colour as the brandy in his hand.
"What were you doing with that girl? It was Milly, wasn't it?"
"Stepping out, same as you."
He swore he could hear Maurice's teeth grinding together. "Miss Stanton and I are not stepping out, as you well know."
"Looked like it to me. I'm sure you've thought it over, Maurice, and all things considered it's probably a good step up in the world. Marry her and you'll get another promotion. Might even inherit dear papa's business once he's gone. Who wouldn't jump at the chance. Why'd you want to go on tupping a lowly gamekeeper when you've got that to look forward to. And if you're getting your bit of skirt, I don't see why I shouldn't either."
Alec was raving by now and if he'd but stopped a moment to take a good look at Maurice's face, maybe he would have stopped. But he didn't, and when Maurice shot forward and slammed him up against the wall he was unprepared. Alec swore at him and pushed back but Maurice had the advantage of height and weight, not to mention surprise and a moment later, when it became clear that Maurice wasn't actually about to hit him but was instead tearing at his trousers, yanking them down to his knees, a hot, intense desire flared up in Alec. Mixed in equal parts with the anger, just as it was in Maurice.
Then Maurice's mouth slammed so hard against his that he felt his lower lip go numb.
For a while there was no sound in the room but ragged breathing, hoarse moans and the slap of flesh against flesh as they reasserted their ownership of each other in the most basic way known to man. Followed shortly after by loud cries of pleasure that they could neither control nor stifle, as climax ripped through them both.
Afterward, they lay in a tangled heap on the floor, not looking at each other, while their racing hearts and panting breath slowed back to normal.
Maurice felt he teetered on the very edge of a precipice, could already feel the sick, dizzy sensation of tipping slowly over. He was sure he'd lost Alec forever. It was as if he'd been possessed. Like that struggle with Clive over the key in the smoking room, all those years ago. Except a thousand times worse.
The silence stretched out until he could bear it no longer. Steeling himself, he ventured to speak.
"Did I hurt you?"
My God, even the same words coming from my mouth. My life, always in circles, in cycles, swinging around the sun like Grandpapa said.
"Of course not." Alec's voice was slow and heavy, as if he was drugged. A pause. "Maybe a bit."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be. I enjoyed it, in case you didn't notice."
Alec turned his head and met Maurice's eyes. The bright brown eyes of the man he loved more than his own life. What he saw there - still saw there, after all that had been said and done that day, made him want to weep with blessed relief.
The primitive frenzy of their coupling seemed to have performed some rite, exorcised some demon between them. Alec felt as if they had been washed clean, their union as fresh, new and innocent as it had been back in the Russet Room.
He stood, reached down for Maurice's hand and drew him up. Led him upstairs, laid him down upon the bed and made love to him more gently and sweetly than he ever had before.
"We have to get out of here."
Alec nodded, then a fit of coughing took him and Maurice rubbed his back until it passed.
"You'll see a doctor before we leave." It wasn't a question.
"Yes Maurice," Alec replied meekly. He wasn't about to raise a fuss about anything right now. "Where will we go?"
Maurice pulled him close. "I don't know. But we'll think of something, we always do."
There was no choice but to go. They both knew it. Their town experiment was over. The vortex of people was pulling them apart, sucking them back into their separate spheres, into the roles society deemed proper for them, and it seemed that they were powerless to stop it. This town did the work even the Great War had failed to achieve; it had come within a hair's breadth of parting them forever. Alec shivered at the thought. He'd been faithful to Maurice all through those terrible years of fighting though the temptation had sometimes been...fierce, to take a bit of comfort where it was offered. And he was certain Maurice had stayed true to him also, though they'd never asked one another outright. And now he'd just about thrown it all away over some silly girl. It was this town. It was doing something to him, something wrong. He hated it.
"Let's leave straight away."
"Not before we both give proper notice. I'm not skipping out without a reference again. It'll only be a month, Alec. We'll be all right."
"Maurice. I've done a terrible thing to Milly and I don't know how I'm going to get out of it."
Maurice shifted uneasily at mention of her. "You'll have to make something up. What I mean is, you'll have to lie. All these lies - Alec, they're like poison. I've never had to tell so many in my life."
"Who've you bin lying to?"
"The Stantons, mainly. Trying to make out I was normal." He laughed humourlessly.
"You convinced them you was normal, all right."
"How do you mean?"
"Maurice. You never see things, do you. That Stanton girl's in love with you and has a mind to marry. I can see that and I've never even spoken a word to her."
There was a silence as Maurice's mind processed this new fact. The glow of his cigarette flared brighter as he dragged deeply on it.
"I really am a fool. You're right, I'm always so slow at seeing. I'm sorry I made you so unhappy."
Alec, all anger long gone, poked him in the ribs, tried to cheer him up. "Well, I always did have to take drastic action to get yer attention, didn't I? Climb in through your bedroom window and practically ravish you, threaten to blackmail you or move to the Argentine, and now, worst of all, kissing a girl in Shrewsbury Park."
"You got my attention good and proper this time, Alec dear."
Alec ran his fingers gently, absently, along the shrapnel scar on Maurice's shoulder.
"I think I did, yes."