Out of Bounds

by Mike Seabrook

  Graham, for his part, had long ago got over his intense spasm of jealousy; though he was happily ignorant of the raid on Tyldesley and Richard’s instigating part in it, he was fully aware of Stephen’s immense debt to the other boy. He had a shrewd idea, too, of how much he himself owed Richard, for keeping Stephen sane and balanced — for keeping him there for him; even more, they both felt an awed sense of the quite extraordinary selflessness with which Richard had given of himself and his support, as solid and dependable as the earth itself. There was an ocean of gratitude to be discharged there, and another of guilt that would have to be coped with later on.

  Of the second difficulty they knew nothing as yet. The blackmailer, too, had his plans.

  * * *

  Graham drove Stephen almost to the school next morning, dropping him round the corner. “Better not take you right in”, he said, giving him a peck on the lips as he reached across him to open the passenger door. “That would be tantamount to a two-fingered salute. There’s no point in provoking antipathy for the sake of it. Now, I’m here for an hour or so, but I shan’t be here at lunchtime, or in the afternoon. Why don’t you spend some time with Richard, love? I don’t reckon to be back till about seven tonight, so I’ll see you…where? How about the cricket club? I’m going to be missing cricket a great deal, and so are you, I imagine.”

  “Okay”, said Stephen, who was indestructibly cheerful. “What are you up to today — if it’s any of my business? Only being nosey.”

  “My business is your business now, I guess”, said Graham. “And today’s little bit of business concerns you anyway. I’m going to see Andrew Tyldesley.”

  Stephen’s eyes widened. “Really? Wow. Why?”

  “Time to balance the accounts. I’ve got nothing more to lose now — nothing he can touch, anyway. I’ve got a hankering to punch his eyes out.”

  Stephen grinned. He wondered whether to tell Graham that someone had got there before him, but decided it would be judicious to let that wait. “Don’t get arrested for assault and battery”, he said, and the youthful concern in his voice and face made Graham’s heart throb painfully for a moment. “I won’t”, he said softly. “He’s never going to want to say too much to the law about me. Where I’m concerned he’ll always have a big illuminated sign saying ‘SEVEN YEARS’ prominently in his mind, because of what I might say to the police myself, if I was so minded. But thanks for worrying about me. Now we’d best get on, or it’ll be this afternoon.” He waved a hand as he drove off.

  Stephen was especially gentle and affectionate with Richard that day. He took him off to a semi-disused book store-room, full of the dry smell of out-of-date textbooks, and told him the full story. Richard was his usual bright and irrepressible self, but Stephen noticed that there were odd moments when he seemed not to hear what was said. He racked his brains for ways to soften the blow, and failed to come up with a single idea. All he could do was to radiate tenderness and make a point of enjoying and appreciating Richard’s company to the last degree possible. When Richard was completely up to date they slipped off early and walked to Richard’s house, stopping on the way for a pint at the pub where they had met Terry. When he left him at the door of his house, where Stephen had more or less lived for a long and happy interlude, Richard smiled, a little sadly but with no jealousy visible at all, and said goodbye to him with all his usual brilliance. As a performance it was first class; but Stephen remembered the trace of sadness in the smile, and it wrung his heart. He walked ten yards, then turned back, calling to Richard.

  “What’s up?” asked Richard, brightening visibly. “Do you want me to clear all my things out?” Stephen asked him, deeply troubled. He wandered distractedly off the pavement and into Richard’s front garden. “Oh, God, I feel so bloody guilty about you”, he cried, and turning to Richard he threw his arms round him and clasped him as if he never wanted to let him go.

  They stood there, in full view of the road, holding each other fiercely, desperately, in each other’s arms, for some minutes on end. Stephen kissed him on his cheek and ruffled his thick golden hair with his fingers, and Richard responded as he always did to Stephen’s touch of any kind. “Let me come in for a bit”, said Stephen when a third motorist gave them a fanfare on the horn from the road. There was no way of telling whether the musical signals represented encouragement or not, but they sounded more like derision.

  Richard, delighted at having Stephen unexpectedly to himself for a time, hurried him in up the stairs to the bedroom that Stephen knew so well. He had only been away for a single night, yet it felt like the return of the prodigal son, to both of them.

  “What am I going to do about you?” asked Stephen. “Tell me, Richard. Come up with an idea. Can’t you have one of your brainwaves? You told me once, you’re fucking clever. Well, I know you are. You never let me down when I needed some extra brainpower. Not once. Well, use it for yourself, can’t you?” Richard hugged him and rolled with him on the familiar double bed, ending up lying on top of him with his distinctive light brown eyes looking down into Stephen’s deep ash-grey ones. “I also told you once, Stevie, that I knew one day Mr somebody else, as I used to call him, would come back for you, because he’d be insane if he didn’t. I said, if you remember, that I knew that my little lease would be up then, and that I’d have to reconcile myself to losing you. So okay, it’s happened. Well, we had a lot of very good times, and I’ve enjoyed loving you. I dare say I’ll always love you — you were the first, and I think you’re very special. I think I was very lucky to find someone like you to be my first. But it had to end, and I’m glad it’s ended calmly, and well for you, with you happy.”

  “Does it have to end, though?” groaned Stephen, the newfound effervescent mood of the last thirty-six hours went to shreds in seconds, and a vast, racking emptiness of guilt moved inexorably in to take its place.

  “Of course it’s got to end, sweetheart”, said Richard gently. “And if you ever dare to pity me, I’ll go and put a contract out on you with Terry Garrard. We’ll still have a piece of each other, a piece that belongs to the other for ever. But this part of it” — he gestured round the bedroom — “and this part” — he put a hand between Stephen’s legs and rubbed him gently—“will have to come to an end, of course. Not quite yet. I think I’ll still have you to myself for a little while yet. But not for much longer.” Stephen groaned loudly in pain.

  “Don’t be silly, Stevie, sweetheart. I took you on those terms, and I took you with my eyes open. I knew — at least, I felt pretty sure — that one day I’d have to lose you, so I can’t complain when my own prediction comes true. And if you come to that, I’m not complaining, am I? It’s you doing all this moaning. Now stop worrying. Just do one thing for me, that’s all I want.”

  “Anything I can do, it’s yours”, said Stephen, aching with love and guilt. “You know that.”

  “Yes, I do”, said Richard with a spark of his buoyant cockiness. “Just give me all the time you can spare before you finally go away with him.” This was altogether more than Stephen could bear. He rolled onto his face, pulling Richard with him, and sobbed great, retching howls of anguish into Richard’s duvet.

  * * *

  Richard knew his way around Stephen, and used every way he knew to comfort him and help him down from his pinnacle of grief. He managed to get him calmed down and on his way to the cricket club on time for his appointment with Graham. He got there, in fact, a quarter of an hour early, and sat with a pint of lager, waiting in mingled impatience, anxiety and a residue of the troubled, tormented feelings of guilt and sorrow left over from earlier.

  Graham saw the smudges left over from his earlier grief as soon as he walked into the pavilion, and felt thankful that the place was still almost empty, with just a group of four elderly members playing bridge in a corner. He waggled his fingers at Stephen, glanced at his glass, and brought him a new pint from the bar. “How was it?” he asked gently as he dropped into the chair beside Stephen’s.
/>
  “What happened?” asked Stephen at the same moment, and managed a shaky grin.

  “You first”, said Graham.

  “I told him everything”, said Stephen. “I don’t know what we’re going to do about him, Graham. It nearly broke my heart, telling him I was soon going to just walk out on him. And I kept on thinking of little details, things we’d never even considered — like, I thought of how I’d have to tell his parents, for instance. They’ve been wonderful to me, you know. They’ve treated me just like a member of the family. They’ve let me live there, they’ve never once asked awkward questions, they’ve fed me, made me a part of the family. They must’ve spent a lot of money keeping me like that, apart from anything else — and the one time I tried to say something about it—you know, offer them a bit of money, his… his father laughed at me, and wouldn’t let me get a word in.

  “And then we went up to his room, and I looked round, and it was only then that I realized how many of my things there are there. It was like looking round my own room for the last time, Graham.” His lip was trembling, and he was very close to tears. Graham wisely stayed silent, waiting for it all to work its way out of his system.

  “And then I thought of him, still using the room”, Stephen went on in a kind of suppressed wail that moved Graham greatly. Stephen’s bare recital of his imaginings conjured up a vivid image of Richard’s feelings of forsakenness, and the fine hairs on Graham’s forearms and the nape of his neck prickled. “I thought of him, still going up to it every day, every night, and me not being there, and him knowing I was with you…” He stopped, and for the moment he couldn’t speak.

  Graham sat staring gloomily into space, knowing what he had to do, only wondering if he had the strength to do it. After all that had happened in so comparatively brief a span of time, after the lurching switchback ride of his own emotions, his hopes and fears from extreme to extreme, when it looked as if he might have secured a degree of fulfilment, even the prospect of serenity, it seemed an especially bitter fate to have to utter himself the words of release and then stand back to watch as it all dissolved and died, like the last of the light bleeding out of the sky.

  He pulled himself together and stood up, picking up his glass. “Come with me, Stevie”, he said, speaking very gently. Stephen looked mutely at him, but obeyed after a second or two. Graham led him outside, and set off round the ground.

  They walked halfway round the ground before Graham spoke. Then he halted and took a long swig from his pint. When he turned to Stephen his face was full of sadness and pain, and Stephen suddenly realized what was coming. “N…” he began, but Graham moved quickly to his side, put an arm round his shoulders, and tenderly, almost lovingly, clamped a hand over his mouth. Stephen’s eyes moved to look at him. “Better let me have my say”, said Graham, knowing he was doing the only thing that was right, and somehow finding himself strong enough to do it.

  “I’m offering you your release, Stevie”, he said, and removed his hand. It was the supreme act of love and devotion since Stephen had known him, and Stephen knew it. He was a highly imaginative boy, and knew well how much the offer had cost Graham, and he felt his own love for the man ascending new heights as the magnitude of what he was offering assumed its full proportions in his mind. “Don’t answer yet, please, Stevie”, said Graham softly. “Finish walking round and think about it. I’m going back for a drink. I’ll need one for when you get back. When you know your answer come back in the clubhouse and tell me. I shall know, I think, from your face, but you’d better tell me, just to be sure. Go on.” He put a hand on Stephen’s shoulder and pushed him gently in the direction they had been taking. He himself set off back the way they had come, striding fast back to the pavilion.

  There he went to the bar, drained his lager, and bought another pint, and one for Stephen for when he returned. He also bought a treble brandy, and carried all three drinks over to the table they had been seated at, leaving the steward looking after him and wondering what the special occasion was.

  As he had expected, he knew the verdict the moment Stephen appeared in the doorway, and he felt a terrible shadow of fear that had settled over him flap briefly and vanish, like a smothering tarpaulin being lifted off him and flung far away out of sight by a howling, cleansing gale.

  Stephen approached the table and Graham as if he was picking his way bare-footed across a beach of sharp flints, and slid into the same seat as before. He looked steadily at Graham. “I can’t leave you”, he said very quietly. “But, oh, God, why can you never love two people? Why isn’t there room?” The pain in his voice was magnified by the quiet, even tone in which he said it.

  “There’s a poem by Ted Hughes”, said Graham slowly. “I can’t remember much of it, just two lines: ‘Crying, You will never know/ What a cruel bastard God is’.” He drew in a long, deep breath and let it out. He held the brandy up to the light and swirled it in the glass, watching the light behind it sparking coppery glints in the liquid, then put the glass to his lips and drank it in a single, steady draught. Then he picked up his untouched pint of lager, raised it to Stephen, gesturing with a motion of his head to Stephen to take his. “To us”, he said. “I think it deserves a bit of a commemoration.” He drank the beer down in a series of long, slow swallows, without taking the glass from his lips. Stephen watched, then copied him.

  “What are you two celebrating?” asked Bill McKechnie, who had walked in the door in time to see the whole performance, and come straight over to see what was afoot.

  “I’ve just passed an exam”, said Stephen.

  “Oh, yeah, course, it’s your A’s, isn’t it?” said Bill. “Congratulations, mate. Lemme get you a refill.” He tramped over to the bar, good-natured as ever, pleased at hearing a member of his team’s good news, and wondering why the two of them were suddenly seized by a fit of wild, slightly hysterical laughter. He never did know what it was that he had said.

  They sat and chatted with Bill for some time, until a few others drifted in and took him away, and Stephen was at last able to ask about Graham’s call on Tyldesley. “What happened?” he said.

  “Nothing happened at all”, said Graham, frowning. “It’s a bit of a mystery. I went to all his old haunts, and nobody had seen him, or had any idea where he was. Apparently he hasn’t been seen or heard of for weeks. So I went to his home. He’s got a lovely place, down near the Albert Hall — he’s as rich as Croesus, you know—and that was even odder. I rang the bell, and a young woman answered. Arabic, I think. So, of course, I asked if he was there, and she’d never heard of him, didn’t know who I was talking about. Then her husband appeared, and he said they’d rented the place for a couple of months, through an agency, while he was in England on business.

  “Well, you can imagine, I was pretty curious, so I asked if I could take the name of the agency, and they invited me in. I couldn’t believe it. That place used to be like a cross between Aladdin’s cave and a miniature art gallery. He had all sorts of stuff there — I don’t know much about art, but I do know he had at least one original Rembrandt — some goddess or other — and a Rubens, and various others, plus all manner of Ming and Meissen porcelain, and I don’t know what else. Well, it was all gone. The place was furnished, after a fashion, but it was all new, modem, functional stuff, with as much personality or individuality as an office — admittedly, the managing director of an oil company’s office — which is probably what this Arab was. He’d have to be something like that to be able to afford the rent round there.

  “Anyway, this couple gave me the address of the agency, and I rang them from a pub. And it seems that Tyldesley’s put the place in their hands for a year, and they’re in sole charge of it. He’s just vanished — disappeared. Blowed if I can understand it. I mean, why would anyone with a beautiful place like that leave it at the mercy of an agency and the tenants? Doesn’t make much sense, does it?”

  It made plenty of sense to Stephen, but he decided it was the wrong time and place to s
ay so. A little spasm of pleasure ran through him, though, to hear the far-reaching effect Richard’s idea had had. It was instantly cancelled out, however, by the reminder of Richard that it brought in its train, and his face crumpled a little. Graham saw, and divined the cause, without suspecting any of the train of thought that had led there. “Shall we go home?” he suggested quietly.

  “Yes, please, let’s”, said Stephen.

  “I’ll get Bill a drink before we go, though”, said Graham. “It was a very kind intention. He can’t be blamed for mistaking the kind of exam you meant.” They both laughed, and Graham went off, chuckling, to find out what Bill was drinking. Then they went home to Graham’s flat, cooked spaghetti, watched some cricket on the television, and went with very mixed emotions to bed.

  * * *

  “I’ve got to go to London again today, dear”, said Graham over breakfast the next morning. “I’ve got to get my green card — car insurance for driving abroad”, he elaborated, seeing Stephen’s raised eyebrows, “and there are one or two other bits of business I must get done before I go off to France. I want to go and visit poor old Reggie, too. He’s been very ill, and I’ve only been to see him once. He’ll be wondering what he’s done to offend me. I’ll most likely sleep at his place tonight — he’s gone home from hospital now, I know.

  “Don’t look so worried, you ass”, he said, smiling at the anxious expression that had instantly come over Stephen’s countenance. “The poor old chap’s over seventy, and still very frail after hospital. Also we haven’t been lovers for years, so there’s no need to get jealous, young man. There’s nothing to be jealous of. In fact, I hope you’ll be meeting Reggie very soon. If we can find a decent place in a nice part of France, fairly quickly, I’d like to invite him over to convalesce, with us to look after him, once we’re settled down. You’ll like him, of that I’m certain. Anyway, all that’s in the future. The long and the short of it is that I reckon I’m going to be in London for the rest of this week. Pity, actually. I’d hoped to go into school every day this week and say my farewells in small batches. But it can’t be helped, and I’ve said goodbye to everyone who matters.