by Alan Keslian
‘He was a car thief, is that what you’re telling me?’
‘Before you met him. Years ago.’
I was so badly shaken for a while I could not speak. Eventually I said, ‘You say he recognised someone at the hotel?’
‘One of your guests had a son who was in the same jail.’
‘So a client at my hotel was a heterosexual ex-convict, is that what you’re saying?’
‘Some gay men do have children. It was his son who was in jail. I had to tell you because of the worry that you might learn of it in some other way. He might have said something to you about having seen Tom before. We couldn’t risk you hearing about all this from a stranger.’
‘Why didn’t Tom have the guts to tell me himself?’
‘This hasn’t been easy for him. When he went up to Manchester that time it was because he felt guilty, but he couldn’t bring himself to confess to you, he thought you would end the relationship if you knew. Of course he could not really run away from the problem. He couldn’t stay up there forever and forget about you. He came back and your feelings had not changed, you still wanted each other. He’s been terrified that you would find out. I’m sorry. We were wrong to keep it from you, badly wrong, but we never intended you any harm.’
‘What do you expect me to do? You know what happened to my parents. You only get one set of them, and when they’re gone they’re gone. You bastards.’
‘Tom has never killed anyone. He had nothing to do with what happened to your parents. You’ve every right to be upset but don’t to be too harsh.’
‘Does he know that you’re telling me now? That you’re sitting there admitting everything has been a deception right from the start?’
‘There was no intention to deceive, never. The situation is hard for us as well, for Tom particularly. We spoke on the ’phone before I came out tonight. He was so miserable; he was talking about disappearing for good, whatever that may mean. This has been an awful shock for you. Give it some time.’
‘You’re always telling me to give things time. What difference will time make? Will it make Tom any less of a bastard?’ Andrew’s face was very flushed, and concern about his health helped me hold my feelings back. ‘Let’s not say any more. You go and get ready for your holiday, and I’ll go back to the hotel. We’ll just finish it there and talk about business in a week’s time by ’phone as we planned.’
‘The three of us, you, he and I, we’ve come so far together. We’ve meant such a lot to each other. We’re all prone to error, anyone can fall… ’
‘Please stop, or I’m going to say things I’ll regret. The situation is bad enough without you making it worse with excuses. Leave it there, please. If you don’t mind, Andrew, I’d like to go back to the hotel.’
He called for the bill. An hour seemed to pass before we were able to leave the table. We found a taxi, but did not speak to each other until it drew up outside Goodmans Hotel. ‘I could cancel the holiday, if you think that would be best. The flight tomorrow is booked but I could miss it; I’ve been selfish, the timing, the way this has come out, I’ve made a complete mess of it.’
‘No. Go ahead with your trip. Depriving you of your break won’t change anything, will it? You’ve made all the arrangements, you’d lose your money if you cancel now. Let’s not discuss this any more tonight, let’s do what we planned.’
‘A final word. Tom looked to me for advice; he did what I told him was best. If anyone is to blame it’s me.’
‘I’m going, Andrew. I don’t want to hear this. We’ll stick to what we planned. That’s as much as I can do. Leave it there, please.’
I climbed out of the cab, shut the door and walked up to the hotel without looking back. Darren sat at the kitchen table making notes from one of his text books and eating a bacon sandwich. He must have read in my face that something was wrong; he put his sandwich down and stood up. How was I to tell him that Tom, one of the people he had relied on and trusted, was in reality someone from whom he should have been protected?
‘I’m back. Any problems?’
‘No. The people you were expecting have all turned up. I took two telephone bookings; one is a regular so I said be sure to let us know if you change your plans, the other was someone new who will confirm by letter. How about you? Are you okay?’
‘Yes – why shouldn’t I be?’ I looked at him, standing in front of me, shifting his weight from one leg to the other, his face full of concern. ‘You know, don’t you?’
‘Only since yesterday. Andrew made me promise not to say anything. It wasn’t my place to anyway, was it?’
‘No, it wasn’t. Looks like I’ll be relying on you more than ever.’
‘Can I make you a coffee or anything?’
‘I think I’ll go straight downstairs. You’ll be going up to bed soon, I take it?’
‘Yeah.’
I went down to my flat, poured myself a large vodka and put on the television, switching from channel to channel, unable to find anything to engage my attention. After ten minutes I turned it off and tried to read a magazine, but couldn’t concentrate. Thoughts about how Tom and Andrew must have conspired to keep the truth from me kept going around and around in my mind; I could picture them whispering together, deciding on what lies to tell me if I asked awkward questions.
At times Tom had boasted about working for well-to-do clients who went out leaving him on his own in their houses and flats; if they had known the truth about him they would not have let him through the door. If Tom alone were at fault that would be bad enough, but Andrew, who had been the major influence on me in setting up the hotel, who had encouraged me to give up my career for a new more open and honest life as a gay businessman, had been party to the deception.
At least he had done me a favour by persuading me to let Darren stay on in the attic and work for me part-time. All his other actions now seemed suspect. Had he been manipulating me all along to suit his own purposes? Even the meal we had eaten earlier that evening was in a way part of the conspiracy, timed immediately before his departure so it would be difficult for me to withdraw my promise to look after his business interests. How could I ever believe anything he said to me again?
Memories of Tom’s actions and words crowded into my mind. The long history of our relationship was rewritten as incident after incident had to be re-evaluated in the light of what I now knew. So that was why he reacted so awkwardly when he first saw the Mercedes. What was that expression he had used? Crated for the Costa, that was it! He had slipped unintentionally into the language of a car thief. His disappearance up to Manchester, for which he gave the touching explanation that he wanted to give me a chance to find someone ‘who would be more like my sort of people’, was in fact an attempt to break things off with me before I found out about him.
My thoughts grew wilder and wilder. In the restaurant I had already drunk far more than usual, but in desperation I poured myself another large vodka and drank it while undressing and getting into bed. The alcohol did not send me to sleep but muddled my thoughts even more. A miscellany of loosely connected memories paraded through my mind: a conversation I once happened to overhear in a second-hand market in which a trader said that half of the stuff on the stalls was probably stolen; Tom’s flat and his odd collection of second-hand furniture – what luxury it must have seemed after a prison cell; a horrible story Andrew had once told me about someone he used to work with forging orders from a pharmacy for controlled drugs, who was caught and had hanged himself at the police station. Endless unconnected thoughts and impressions tumbled through my consciousness, a kind of mental landslip crashing through my brain.
After an hour I still could not sleep or even lie still. I opened my eyes, watched the luminous dial of the clock for ten minutes and got up again. I felt thirsty and made myself a cup of tea. Taking it over to the window I pulled back the curtain to look out into the street. It was deserted. What did I expect to see out there in the middle of the night? Tom breaking into o
ne of the parked cars?
Then I remembered once before gazing out into the darkness of an empty road. After my parents died, from the bedroom window of my uncle’s house, night after night I had stared out into the shadows, wishing that some mysterious means of escape from my unhappiness lay hidden in the darkness, or that a miraculous saviour might somehow materialize in the eerie glow of the street lights.
Then, as now, my inability to sleep would not excuse me from the demands that the next day would bring. I went back to bed, and some time after five o’clock the need for slumber finally quietened my turbulent thoughts.
Chapter 12
Andrew’s revelation about Tom’s past demolished the illusion that I had escaped from the ruthless culture of City opportunism into a new sunlit world of honesty and fraternity with other gay men. All the warmth and colour my new life appeared to contain had existed in my imagination; the reality was as cold and grey as concrete. Rather than being a place of openness and honesty, concealed motives and deception were as pervasive at Goodmans Hotel as they had been in the ‘straight’ world I had left behind. Those life-changing decisions to accept redundancy and buy the lease on Goodmans Villa were not, as they had seemed, informed judgements made from sound knowledge and understanding, but reckless gambles based on false information.
However foolish the change might have been, it could not be reversed. The hotel had to be run, as did Andrew’s businesses. Hard work would provide me with a diversion from self-pity and constant suspicious thoughts about everyone and everything around me.
Even to speak to Tom on the ’phone was unbearable, and when he rang the day after that dreadful meal with Andrew, in a calm deep voice I said ‘I have nothing at all to say to you,’ and when he began to plead I repeated the words and hung up.
Andrew’s first call from New Zealand came over a week later. With a determined effort to avoid making accusations, I asked politely about his journey and we discussed his plans for the week. My good opinion of him had been shaken, but his personal qualities and achievements in life had to be balanced against the way he had misled me about Tom. His failing health and the need to ensure his staff would continue to have jobs to go to were good reasons for moderating my antagonism towards him. If only for their sake, I would fulfil my promise to check that his businesses were run properly.
Darren made allowances for my low spirits. He did not take offence at my constant grumpiness. I suspect he had warned Cheung about my state of mind, because although I was as curt with him as I was with everyone, he always greeted me with a smile and tried to make conversation, asking after my health or whether the hotel was busy. They avoided displays of affection for each other in front of me, perhaps afraid of reminding me of my own freshly acquired solo status, but passing the lounge one day I saw Cheung affectionately pat Darren’s backside as he reached up for a book from a high shelf. Well, enjoy the fascination with one another before it fades, I thought cynically.
My general disillusion was such that even the hotel guests appeared in a different more suspect light. What secret anxieties and guilty yearnings lay hidden behind their masks of cheerful greeting and warm words? This jaundiced outlook lasted for a week or more, but some inner mental process gradually drew me back towards equilibrium; something in my make-up seemed to refuse to allow me to be permanently miserable.
The arrival of an attractive couple from South Wales, one dark and one fair, helped along my progress towards a less negative frame of mind. As soon as I saw them I could tell they were having an affair. The way they stood side by side, their arms almost but not quite touching and the way they glanced lovingly at each other made it evident that they doted on one another. My first reaction was to think they were making fools of themselves by openly showing their infatuation, and to wonder how long it would take for the unpleasant side of their natures to spoil their illusions about each other, but for three days their obvious affection did not waver. My envy of their happiness grew stronger and stronger, until my sourness towards them seemed unreasonable even to me, since they had done nothing to deserve my sneering thoughts. Then I felt ashamed of my attitude; my feelings of misery and frustration were, after all, not of their making.
On the last morning of their stay they had not come down by the time breakfast was over, presumably tired by sight-seeing during the days and late nights in the clubs. The cleaner reported that he had left their room untouched as the door was locked and they did not respond to his knock.
At two o’clock they had not emerged and I went up to check. The door was still locked and there was no answer to my gentle tapping. I used my pass key to let myself in. In the semi-darkness, covered by a sheet, they lay together in the twin bed nearest the window, their limbs wrapped around each other. One of them was breathing slowly and heavily. Only their heads and one foot protruded from the sheet, a corner being wrapped around the ankle.
Neither of them stirred. I could not resist gazing down on their unconscious figures, working out to whom the exposed foot belonged from the way they lay beneath the contorted sheet. How fortunate they were, sleeping contentedly in each other’s arms. If they could lie so happily together, so clearly a couple even in sleep, what was wrong with me?
A growing sense of guilt about spying on them broke the spell cast by their sleeping forms. What was I doing there, sneaking around in their room while they lay clasped together in sleep? What if one of them woke, discovered me and thought I was there to steal from them? I crept out, shutting the door with hardly a sound, and stole away the mental image of them lying together under the crumpled white sheet.
They came down a couple of hours later and looked in at the little office to pay their bill, completely unaware of my intrusion. We shook hands and with genuine warmth I wished them a good journey home and hoped they would come back to the hotel the next time they visited London. If Goodmans Hotel provided a comfortable and welcoming place for men like them, surely it was an enterprise I could feel pleased about.
Relentless sexual frustration was a daily reminder of my return to single status. After the long period of regular love-making with Tom my appetite was strong. Irrepressible urges began twisting my thoughts, imbuing everyday social and business contacts with lewd sexual connotations. My mind constantly saw in others the persistent lust that was swamping me, and almost any vaguely attractive man in almost any circumstances became, to my imagination, a potential debauchee.
For a time I thought that an outlet for my desires might be found among the hotel guests, but any kind of sexual involvement with them threatened to cause awkward complications. How could the commercial part of the arrangement be kept separate from the sex? Might a man refuse to pay for his room after having slept with me, hoping that embarrassment and fear of being accused of selling sex would prevent me pursuing the debt or calling the police?
Even if nobody tried to get out of paying for his stay, word would surely spread. In gay bars when Goodmans Hotel was mentioned people might say, ‘Oh yeah, stayed there, had the manager.’ What if Darren realised what was going on and followed my example? My intention was to run a clean comfortable hotel, not a brothel.
One Friday night, when Darren was at the club with Cheung, I ventured out to a bar in the West End to look for a pick-up, leaving a note with the number of my mobile ’phone pinned to the office door in case of emergency. There were three or four men drinking on their own among the crowd, and after conversation developed with one of them I brought him back to the hotel. Reluctant to let him know anything about myself, rather than going down to the basement flat I pretended to be one of the guests and took him up to a vacant second floor room.
As we were unaccustomed to each other physically the sex was rather clumsy, but becoming intimate with a stranger again after so long was exciting, and the pretence of being a hotel guest added an element of adventure to what might otherwise have been a fairly uninspiring one night stand.
Had he wanted a telephone number, my mobile ’ph
one would have allowed me to keep any subsequent meetings from Darren, but we parted without either of us expressing any interest in meeting again. I wondered what he thought of our night together, whether he was simply content with having sex with me once, or if he had found I was not at all what he wanted and gone away disappointed.
That one night apart there never seemed to be time for me to go out looking for pick-ups. The only aids easily available to assuage my desires were magazine pictures of naked men and my own hands. The satisfaction was meagre compared to holding a lover in my arms. Sometimes alone in bed at night I imagined the hotel rooms above me writhing with acts of love, while I lay alone in the basement like a wretched doorkeeper, not permitted to share in the pleasures of the house above.
Of all the gay men around me, the one who might have been my choice for starting a new relationship was the manager of the garden centre. He was seven or eight years older than I, and not ‘with’ anyone as far as I knew. Darren had been over to his small terraced house to see the long narrow garden almost completely taken up by a series of ponds where he grew aquatic and marsh plants. He was fit, even-tempered, intelligent, and had the great advantage of not looking at all like Tom.
Andrew sometimes described him as an excellent employee, praise which contained the implied criticism that, however well he did his job, he was unwilling to commit himself beyond his contracted hours or show the broader interest that might have made him a potential business partner. To a lover this characteristic might have been welcome – workaholics do not have much time to devote to relationships.
Unfortunately my ignorance of gardening irritated him and he had never been very friendly towards me. Whenever he and Darren talked they would litter their conversation with multi-syllabic horticultural terms and discuss esoteric subjects such as biological methods of pest control. My attempts to contribute to discussions of this kind only made me seem stupid. Once he forced me to admit that never in my life had I planted seeds, waited for them to germinate, and watched the plants go on to develop flowers or bear fruit.