Martin puts his spoon down and sits back. ‘Porter said you’ve got a strong solo voice.’ William meets his eye, hoping his scarlet cheeks are fading. ‘He says we’ll have to watch out.’
‘I’m only a probationer. You’re safe for a while.’ William tries to smile. ‘You’re the best soloist, Martin. Everyone knows that.’ William’s fingers are crossed under the table. He knows he is at least as good as Martin, if not better, but strictly speaking, he’s still not a chorister.
‘Good job I am.’ Martin grins and looks more himself. ‘It’s the only thing I can do.’
William decides not to write about his solo in his weekly letter to Evelyn; he wants to save it until he sees her in two weeks’ time. He’ll tell Uncle Robert though. There’s no danger he’ll spoil the surprise; his mum doesn’t even know that they correspond – another of those things his uncle worries might upset her.
17
EXEAT Name: Lavery from 12.30 to 4.45
Date 20th October Signed AG Atkinson
Since receiving his exeat on Wednesday, William has dreamt about Evelyn twice. In the first she was lolling on their settee at home, throwing warm biscuits to him in the next chair, relaxed and smiling as crumbs pattered onto the carpet. In the second, she appeared in his dorm, wearing her mac and a scarf on her head. She looked so pleased to see him, he woke with a start, full of embarrassment, because she was painfully out of place and about to make a big fuss of him.
All he had to do was go into the headmaster’s room and take the exeat from Mr Atkinson’s hand. Glancing round the wood-panelled study, at the vase of yellow roses on the table, he found it hard to believe this was where Martin had been given all those whacks. He couldn’t see a cane anywhere. Coming from such a gentle upbringing, there was a large part of him that couldn’t quite accept caning actually happened, that a piece of willow could be kept with the sole purpose of hitting a boy. But his encounter was polite and straightforward. The only challenge was to stop himself jumping up and down, because the little piece of paper in his hand allowed him a whole afternoon with his mother in four days’ time.
? ? ?
And now it’s Sunday and after the service he’s free to leave. With her! Lined up to process into the chapel, full of those parents who suddenly vanished from their lives six weeks ago, everything feels different. Charles, Edward and Anthony are so busy making each other laugh, they don’t seem to have noticed. But then William thinks maybe being silly together, fluttering and chirruping around, is their way of noticing. He doesn’t think Charles will cry today when he has to say goodbye; it’s as if he has become another boy altogether from the one who walked away from his parents in tears.
William loves the stone and wood smell of the ancient antechapel. Martin breathes in and puffs out heavily as he always does the second before they process. As the organ starts, the purple and white vestments sway and the boys move forward. The ceiling is so high he has to tip his chin as far as it will go to see it. The tiles are hard and beautiful beneath his feet. His favourite saint looks him in the eye, arms outstretched. And when this service is over, the flesh and blood arms of his mother will wrap around him.
There she is. Right next to the choir stalls on the left. Her hair has been set and it’s longer than it used to be. She’s ramrod-straight, holding her order of service level with her chest. She’s spotted him.
When it comes to it, when he’s so close they could nudge elbows, William can’t bring himself to look at her. He feels the brightness of her smile on him, registers the scarlet fabric of a new dress and smells her L’Air du Temps but can only stare straight ahead. Charles, he notices, turns his head the slightest fraction to the right to meet his mother’s eye, and smiles lightly, briefly. Before he has even got to the choir stalls, William is filled with regret and guilt for not having done the same.
‘So, Master Lavery, tell me everything!’
William is relieved that none of the other probationers has chosen the Copper Kettle on King’s Parade for their lunch. He wonders where they have gone. This is the only place he knows about. Martin comes here with his family. On his china plate lies ham, egg and chips; huge, luxurious and shockingly greasy.
There’s a hint of lipstick on his mother’s front tooth, and where once he would have reached over and rubbed it off, he points at his own teeth and rubs. Instantly she lifts her napkin to her mouth.
Having spent the last six weeks adjusting to the shock of her leaving him at the school, simply walking away and not being there, he now finds it just as strange to be sitting opposite her, with the comfort and the responsibility of being the centre of someone’s world again.
‘So?’ She grins. ‘I’m waiting.’
How does he even begin?
‘Martin, who did the solo this morning, is my friend. He’s my age, been here three years. I like Phillip. I like Mr Atkinson – he gave me this.’ He pulls the exeat from his pocket and dangles it over his mother’s meal. ‘I couldn’t have come out with you if he hadn’t given me this.’
‘I’d have clouted him round the head with my handbag if he hadn’t! What about the singing?’ Her eyebrows arch in expectation. William notices they are softly coloured in.
‘The chapel makes us sound amazing.’
‘And?’ It’s the excited look she has when he’s about to open a present from her. A waitress squeezes past their table, holding a tray level with her plump face.
‘Every morning, I have to line up by the bath,’ he says, with a sudden desire to shock her, ‘put my hands on the bottom of it and get cold water poured over my back.’
It works. Her brow collapses. ‘What on earth do they do that for?’
‘Make men of us.’ He wants to sound nonchalant.
‘When you say cold, do you mean cold, or just not very warm?’ The worry on her face for some reason pleases him.
‘Ice cold,’ he says.