«You don't understand,» I said. My head ached and my eyes were intolerant of the light.
«I understand perfectly, as a matter of fact,» said Arnold. «You've just lost this round and you'd better relax. I'd go to bed if I were you.»
«I'll come and look after you,» said Francis.
«No, you won't.»
«Why do you keep shading your eyes and screwing them up like that?» said Rachel.
«What made you miss the train?» said Arnold.
«I think I'll go to bed, yes.»
«Bradley,» said Arnold, «don't be cross with me.»
«I'm not cross with you.»
«It was all an accident, my being there I mean, I called in because I thought you'd be back, Christian rang and then she turned up, and Rachel had had about enough of Priscilla and there was no sign of you. I know it seems hurtful, but really it was just common sense, and it amused Christian so much, and you know how I love a scandal and a little bit of turmoil. You've got to forgive us. We're not all conspiring against you.»
«I know you're not.»
«I only went along today because-«Oh never mind. I'm going home.»
«Let me come with you,» said Francis.
«You'd better come with me,» said Rachel. «I'll give you lunch.»
«That's a good idea. You go along with Rachel. I must go to the library and get on with my novel. I've wasted quite enough time on this little drama. I'm such an incorrigible Peeping Tom. You're sure you're not cross with me, Bradley?»
Rachel and I got into a taxi. Francis ran along beside it trying to say something, but I pulled the window up.
N. ow at last there was peace. Rachel's big calm woman's face beamed upon me, the beneficent full moon, not the black moon dagger-armed and brimming with darkness. The bruise seemed to have faded, or perhaps she had covered it with make-up. Or perhaps it had only ever been a shadow after all.
Feeding my hangover, I had consumed a lunch which consisted of three aspirins, followed by a glass of creamy milk, followed by milk chocolate, followed by shepherd's pie, followed by Turkish delight, followed by milky coffee. I felt physically better and clearer in the head.
We were sitting on the veranda. The Baffins' garden was not big, but in the flush of early summer it seemed endless. A dotting of fruit trees and ferny bushes amid longish red-tufted grass obscured the nearby houses, obscured even the creosoted fence. Only a hint of pink rambler roses between the trunks suggested an enclosure. The garden was a curved space, a warm green shell smelling of earth and leaves. At the foot of the veranda steps there was a pavement covered with the mauve flowers of creeping thyme, beyond this a clipped grassy path starred with white daisies. It stirred some memory of a childhood holiday. Once in an endless meadow, just able to peer through the tawny haze of the grass tops, the child who was myself had watched a young fox catching mice, an elegant newly minted fox, straight from the hand of God, brilliantly ruddy, with black stockings and a white-tipped brush. The fox heard and turned. I saw its intense vivid mask, its liquid amber eyes. Then it was gone. An image of such beauty and such mysterious sense. The child wept and knew himself an artist.
«So Roger's blissfully happy?» said Rachel, to whom I had told all.
«I can't tell Priscilla, can I?»
«Not yet.»
