Tom inspected the bedrooms. There were four, all good rooms. All the beds were made up with clean sheets. Excluding Greg and Ju’s room, Tom liked best the one with the view over the garden, though the front ones were nice too, whence the minaret chimney of the Tweed Mill was visible between the planes. He decided to let Emma choose. Biggins occupied a ‘healthy eminence’, and standing at the back window Tom could see most of the principal monuments of Ennistone: the Institute, the gilded cupola of the Hall, the blunt grey tower of St Olaf’s, the striated spire of St Paul’s (Father Bernard’s ‘shop’), the thin spire of the Catholic ‘tin church’ in Burkestown, the bulky Methodist church in Druidsdale, the Friends’ Meeting House, Bowcocks department store, the gasworks, the Glove Factory (a castellated nineteenth-century brick building) and the new controversial Polytechnic building beyond the Common.
Tom inspected the bathroom. The bathroom at his London digs (near Kings Cross) was a squalid penitential room, not clean and probably not cleanable, shared by a number of male lodgers. The Greg and Ju bathroom was a bower of luxury (Judy had a thing about baths) with the king-size bath set low in the tiled floor, and a matching basin and bidet all made of curiously fat and sensuously rounded red porcelain. The tiles were black. The taps and towel-rails were made of (presumably imitation) gold. Fat fluffy black towels trimmed with red hung from the rails. Upon a gleaming black shelf was a row of jars and bottles containing (Tom had no doubt and he soon checked) celestial unguents. A tiled curtained archway concealed a shower, another such archway the loo. Tom decided that he must have a bath at once. He began to run the water, pouring in the oil and wine of the unguent shelf. A heavenly smell arose.
While this was making he went into Greg and Ju’s bedroom and opened the sliding door of the huge wall cupboard which ran the length of the room. A glittering array of garments met his eye. Both Greg and Judy were vain about their appearance; they were a handsome pair and loved clothes. Tom feasted his gaze upon Greg’s numerous well-tailored suits (he never wore jeans), sleek evening dress, fancy shirts, some with lace. A thousand silk ties. Ju’s clothes were nice, too, and smelt nice. She wore very feminine stuff with flounces, tucks, ruffs, gathers, nonsense, which she wore long and pulled in with little belts, to her slim waist. In winter she wore fine light tweed dresses over brilliantly coloured blouses with smart scarves even silkier than Greg’s ties. Her summer dresses were made of that sort of feather-weight polyester which is what cotton is like when it goes to heaven. Tom fingered some of these dresses and sighed. He reflected that these yummy clothes must represent Greg and Judy’s second team. The first team was even now gladdening the eyes of Americans in Florida.
As the clothes slid silently and easily along the rail upon their sleek hangers, Tom’s hand fastened on something which looked as if it was made of feathers and felt as if it was made of gauze. He drew it out: a very pale blue négligé with multiple cufflets and collarettes. He thrust his hands into the sleeves and pulled it on and gazed at himself in the long swinging mahogany-framed mirror which must so often have reflected that beautiful and fortunate pair. With his tumbling curly locks and his smooth fresh complexion Tom looked, well, quite extraordinary. He looked at himself for a moment with surprise and admiration, then decided to go and show himself to Emma. He skipped daintily down the stairs and flounced into the study.
‘Aren’t I lovely?’
Emma was still reading. He read: ‘Luther was merely advancing still further upon the path which had been trodden before his time by Wycliffe and John Huss. His theology was a continuation of the dissident theology of the Middle Ages; his ancestors were the great heretics of the fourteenth century; he was absolutely untouched by the spirit of the Renaissance. His doctrine of justification by faith was related to the doctrines of the mystics, and although, like the humanists, though for very different reasons, he condemned celibacy and the ascetic life, he was in absolute opposition to them in his complete sacrifice of free will and reason to faith. However, the humanists did not fail to applaud his sensational debut.’ He looked up. He was not pleased to see Tom in drag. Emma himself suffered from secret transvestite fantasies; Tom’s caprice struck him as the idle profanation of a mystery. He said coldly, ‘You ought to telephone your mother.’
‘Not now,’ said Tom.
‘Yes, now.’
‘Oh, all right.’
The telephone was in the hall.
As Tom dialled the number his heart sank. It also beat faster. He hated the telephone. He particularly hated talking to Alex on it. He felt guilty at not being at Belmont, at not having told her, at a hundred matters arising from his imperfect conduct.
‘Yes?’ said Alex at the other end. She always said ‘Yes?’ in that disconcerting way.
‘Hello, it’s me, Tom.’
‘Where are you, when are you coming?’
‘Look, I’m sorry, I should have told you.’
‘What?’
‘I should have said, I met Gregory Osmore in London — ’
‘Who?’
‘Gregory Osmore, and he absolutely begged me to look after his house — ’
‘To what?’
‘To look after his house.’
Emma rose and closed the study door. He did not think it proper to overhear Tom’s conversation with his mother. He regretted that he had already heard Tom tell a lie. He had been present at the party where Tom met Gregory Osmore, and the boot had rather been on the other foot. It was Tom who had (discreetly) insisted to Greg that the house-sitting idea was such a good one. Emma did not approve of lying, and it caused him pain that his friend occasionally indulged in suppressio veri and suggeslio falsi.
‘You know Greg and Judy have gone to Florida?’ said Tom.
‘Where?’
‘To Florida.’
‘Have they?’
‘Yes, and they asked me if I would occupy their house while they were away, to keep it safe, you know. So I won’t be - I won’t be able to stay with you - but I’ll come round and — ’
‘You aren’t going to stay at Belmont?’
‘No.’
‘Where are you now?’
Tom thought of saying ‘in London’, but he did, after all, possess some sense of truth. He said, ‘I’m at their place, at Travancore Avenue.’
‘Are you alone?’
‘Am I —?’
‘Are you alone there?’
‘No, I’ve got a friend with me, a chap.’
‘A man?’
‘Yes.’
‘When are you coming to see me?’
‘Oh, soon - tomorrow, I ~ I’ve got to fetch some stuff— ’
‘Telephone first, would you?’
‘Yes, sure.’
They were both silent. Alex hated the telephone too. Neither of them was good at ending a conversation.
‘Good-bye then,’ said Alex, and put the ‘phone down.
Tom replaced the receiver. He felt curiously uneasy, as if disappointed. He had hoped that Alex would not make a fuss about his not staying with her. Well, she had seemed not to mind too much. Of course on the telephone one couldn’t tell. He hated fuss. Yet he wanted her to mind.
He opened the study door.
‘All right?’ said Emma.
‘All right. I say, let’s go out, let’s go shopping.’
‘Shopping? Why?’
‘To buy something for lunch.’
‘I don’t want any lunch.’
‘Well, I do, I’m starving.’
‘You go, I’m reading.’
‘I wish I could read like you.’
‘You can read.’
‘Not like you. Put you down anywhere and you start reading. And you remember what you read, it goes into a slot in your mind. My mind has no slots. Let’s have a drink. I found a cupboard absolutely crammed with bottles.’