Adrian looked across at Pigs Trotter who was rocking forwards and tightly gripping his handkerchief as if it were the safety-bar of a roller-coaster.
'It's a misquotation from
Trotter nodded.
'Um . . . anyone . . . anyone I'd know? You don't have to say if you don't want to.' Adrian was maddened by the huskiness in his throat.
Trotter nodded again.
'It. . . must be pretty tough.'
'I don't mind telling you who it is,' said Trotter.
I'll kill him if it's Cartwright, Adrian thought to himself. I'll kill the fat bastard.
'Who is it then?' he asked, as lightly as he could.
Trotter stared at him.
'You of course,' he said and burst into tears.
They walked slowly back towards the House. Adrian wanted desperately to run away and leave Pigs Trotter to welter in the salt bath of his fatuous misery, but he couldn't.
He didn't know how to react. He didn't know the form. He supposed that he owed Trotter something. The object of love should feel honoured or flattered, responsible in some way. Instead he felt insulted, degraded and revolted. More than that, he felt put upon.
Pigs can fly. This one could, anyway.
It isn't the same, he kept saying to himself. It isn't the same as me and Cartwright. It can't be. Jesus, if I were to declare my love to Cartwright and he felt a tenth as pissed off as I do now ...
'It's all right, you know,' said Pigs Trotter, 'I know you don't feel the same way about me.'
'Well,' said Adrian, 'the thing is, you know, I mean it's a phase, isn't it?'
How could he say that? How could he
'It doesn't make it any better though,' said Trotter.
'Right,' said Adrian.
'Don't worry. I won't bother you. I won't tag onto you and Tom any more. I'm sure it'll be all right.'
Well there you are. If he could be so sure that it would be 'all right' then how could it be love? Adrian knew that it would never be 'all right' with him and Cartwright.
Trotter's wasn't the Real Thing, it was just Pepsi.
They were nearing the House. Pigs Trotter dried his eyes on the sleeve of his blazer.
'I'm very sorry,' said Adrian, 'I wish . . .'
'That's okay, Healey,' said Trotter. 'But I ought to tell you that I have read
'What do you mean?'
'Well, in the book, everyone wanted to know who the Scarlet Pimpernel was and so Percy Blakeney made up that rhyme: the one you just did a version of: 'They seek him here, they seek him there, Those Frenchies seek him everywhere . . .''
'Yes?' What on earth was he on about?
'The thing is,' said Trotter, 'that it was Percy Blakeney himself who was the Scarlet Pimpernel all the time, wasn't it? The one who made up the rhyme. That's all.'
IV
Adrian managed to get into Chapel early next morning, so that he could sit behind Cartwright and ponder the beauty of the back of his head, the set of his shoulders and the perfection of his buttocks as they tightened when he leant forward to pray.
It was a strange thing about beauty, the way that it trans- formed everything in and around a person. Cartwright's blazer was outstandingly the most beautiful blazer in Chapel, but it came from Gorringe's like everyone else's. The backs of his ears, peeping through the soft golden tangle of his hair, were skin and capillary and fleshy tissue like any ears, but nobody else's ears set fire to Adrian's blood and flooded his stomach with hot lead.
The hymn was 'Jerusalem the Golden'. Adrian as usual fitted his own words.
'O Cartwright you are golden, With milk and honey blest. Beneath thy contemplation Sink heart and voice opprest. I know well, O I know well, What lovely joys are there, What radiancy of glory, What light beyond compare.'
Tom, next to him, heard and gave a nudge. Adrian obediently returned to the text, but lapsed again into his own version for the final verse.
'O sweet and blessed Cartwright, Shall I ever see thy face? O sweet and blessed Cartwright, Shall I ever win thy grace? Exult O golden Cartwright! The Lord shall play my part: Mine only, mine for ever, Thou shalt be, arid thou
