But Prior wouldn’t let go. ‘All the same there must be times when one patient actually does need to talk about another. I mean, it must be obvious the conversation about the Cameronians could only have taken place in bed?’
‘The thought had occurred.’
‘Well, suppose I need to talk about it? Suppose I’m racked with guilt?’
‘Are you?’
‘The point is —’ Abruptly, Prior gave up. ‘No. I don’t seem to feel sexual guilt, you know. At all, really. About anything.’
Not true, Rivers thought. Prior had felt enormous guilt about the nocturnal emissions that accompanied his nightmares. Guilt about an involuntary action.
‘I used to,’ Prior said.
‘When was that?’
‘When I was twelve. Where we lived there was a young man who used to be wheeled around on a trolley. I don’t know what was wrong with him, tuberculosis of the spine, something like that, something terrible. And the trolley creaked, so you could always hear it coming. And he was pointed out to us as an illustration of what happened if you indulged in self-abuse.’
‘Who told you that?’
‘Scoutmaster. Mr Hailes. He actually said what came out was spinal fluid. And of course you’ve only got a limited supply of that, and mine was going down pretty fast. I used to lie awake and try not to do it, and I’d get more and more frightened. Unfortunately, there was only one thing that took my mind off the fear. So I did it again. And all the time this creaking trolley was getting nearer and nearer. And we’d been told the first signs of collapse were pallor and shadows under the eyes. And I used to get out of bed in the morning and look in the mirror, and what do you know? Pallor. Shadows under the eyes.’ He laughed. ‘It’s funny now, but at one time I actually thought about suicide.’
‘What got you out of it?’
Prior smiled. ‘Not what. Who. Paddy MacDowell.’
‘The man who organized the Sheffield strike?’
The smile broadened. ‘Yes, at a later stage. He was otherwise engaged at the time. “Bashing his bishop.” That’s what we used to call it. Mac’s bishop got bashed oftener than anybody else’s. He used to more or less pull it out and do it in public — and he was taller and stronger than any of us. So that planted the first seed of doubt. And then Hailes said the way to purity was to keep a glass of cold water by your bed, and then when temptation struck, you could plunge “the Inflamed Organ” — he always called it that — into the water. Well, I relayed this to Mac. Mac was common, he didn’t go to Scouts — and he said, “But if it’s stiff how do you get it into the glass without spilling the water?” And I suddenly had this picture of poor bloody Hailes standing there with his limp “organ” in a glass of water and I just knew he was talking rubbish. Poor little sod, he must’ve forgotten what an erection looked like. Anyway, after that I gave up on guilt. I think I got through a lifetime’s supply in six months.’
‘Was it a close friendship? With MacDowell?’
‘You mean, did we —’
‘No. I—’
‘Yes, it was close. We were that age, I suppose.’
Prior was looking much more relaxed. ‘Do you want to go on?’ Rivers asked.
A slight hesitation. ‘No, but I think I’d better.’ For a while he didn’t speak, then, measuring the words with movements of his steepled fingertips, he said, ‘Dreams are attempts to resolve conflict. Right? Well, I can’t see any conflict in this one.’
‘You stabbed somebody in the eye.’
‘Rivers. It was a door.’
‘The eye was alive.’
‘Yes.’
‘So why do you say there was no conflict?’
‘Because I was so identified with William or Beattie or… I don’t know. William, probably, because I was naked. And I was attacking what seemed to me the most awful feature of their situation, which is the eye. The constant surveillance. So I don’t see that there’s any conflict. I mean it might be very inconvenient in real life but in the dream there was no doubt whose side I was on. Theirs.’
Rivers waited. When it was clear Prior could offer nothing more he said, ‘You say the worst feature of their situation is the eye?’
‘Yes.’
‘The constantly being spied on?’
‘Yes.’
Rivers asked gently, ‘In that meeting with Mrs Roper, who was the spy?’
‘I —’ Prior’s mouth twisted. ‘I was.’
Another pause. Rivers prompted. ‘So?’
‘So,’ Prior said in a disgusted singsong, jabbing with his index finger, ‘“eye” was stabbing myself in the “I”. And God knows one wouldn’t want a reputation for puns like that!’
A pause. Rivers asked, ‘What do you think about that? Does it seem…’
‘It’s possible, I suppose. I hate what I do. And I suppose I probably felt I was in a false position. Well, obviously I did, I’d have to be mad not to.’
‘I want you to do something for me,’ Rivers said. ‘I want you to write down any dreams you have that are as… as bad as this one. Just record them. Don’t try to interpret. And send them to me. I’ll be seeing you again on—’
‘No, I’m sorry, I can’t. It’ll have to be the following week. If that’s all right? I’m going to see Hettie Roper.’
‘Back to Salford? Where will you be staying?’
‘At home.’ He pulled a face. ‘Yes, I know. How can I stay anywhere else?’
Rivers nodded. He was remembering a visit of Prior’s parents to Craiglockhart. In one afternoon they’d undone every slight sign of progress and precipitated an asthmatic attack. ‘Does your father know what you’re doing? I mean, does he know what the job involves?’
‘My God, I hope not.’ Prior shifted restlessly. ‘This is a dirty little war, Rivers. I can honestly say I’d rather be in France.’
‘Yes. I’m sure you would.’
Prior gave him a sharp look. ‘You’re worried, aren’t you? Why? Because I’m going home?’
‘No, not particularly.’
‘Oh, I see. Yes. It was a suicide dream.’ His expression changed. ‘You needn’t worry. If anybody comes a cropper over this one, it will not be me.’
He looked quite different, suddenly: keen, alert, cold, observant, detached, manipulative, ruthless. Rivers realized he was seeing, probably for the first time, Prior’s public face. At Craiglockhart he’d been aggressive and manipulative, but always from a position of comparative helplessness. At times he’d reminded Rivers of a toddler clinging to his father’s sleeve in order to be able to deliver a harder kick on his shins. Now, briefly, he glimpsed the Prior other people saw: the Lodes, the Ropers, the Spragges, and it came as a shock. Prior was formidable.
SIX
Against a yellow backcloth a woman draped in brilliant green veils writhed and twisted. She looked like an exotic lizard or a poisonous snake. That, apparently, had been Wilde’s intention. Robert Ross had been telling them about it before the performance, recalling a day in Paris, Wilde darting across the boulevards to look in shop windows, asking, ‘What about that?’ or ‘Or perhaps she should be naked except for the jewels?’ Yellow and green was his colour scheme, though Wilde could not have foreseen what, for Charles Manning, was its most disturbing feature: that the yellow was the exact shade of munition girls’ skins. Others wouldn’t notice that, of course. It only struck him because one of his duties at the Ministry was to serve as the military member on a committee set up to inspect the health and safety standards of munitions factories. One saw row after row of such girls, yellow-skinned, strands of ginger hair escaping from under their green caps, faces half hidden by respirators.