The Dean’s Christmas lunch ran its customary and convivial course, treading the usual path between slightly pompous traditionalism which gave way to subdued raucousness by the time the brandy circulated.
Nell appeared to enjoy herself. Michael was grateful to her for having taken the trouble to look so striking: she had on the copper-coloured jacket she had worn for her London trip, with an amber pendant and earrings. Her hair was brushed to a shining cap and she listened to everything with the eager absorption that Michael always found so attractive. It looked as if the Dean found it attractive, too; at least twice during the pre-lunch drinks he leaned forward to pat her shoulder. The third time he did it, Nell caught Michael’s eye and gave him a half-wink.
Owen’s solemn recital of the fifteenth-century form of grace was received with the respect proper to the occasion, although Michael afterwards heard several of Owen’s more acerbic colleagues muttering that wouldn’t you know Professor Bracegirdle would come up with something so bloody obscure nobody could check its provenance.
It was nearly four o’clock when the meal ended. Nell arranged to meet Michael next day for lunch at one of their favourite trattorias, then went off to collect Beth from the school friend’s house where she had been staying. Michael felt slightly at a loss, until he was swept along by Owen and several members of the History faculty who were bound for what they said was a wine-tasting event, but Owen said would be an excuse to get potted. Nonsense, of course Michael must accompany them, they said, cheerfully. They were going on to a Greek restaurant afterwards to blot up the vino.
Owen’s view turned out to be right, and what with the wine-tasting and the moussaka that followed, it was after midnight when Michael got back to his rooms. He was let in by the porter, who had been lying in wait to recount Wilberforce’s latest piece of devilry.
Wilberforce, it appeared, had gone to sleep unnoticed on the bed of a nervous first year. Nobody knew how he had got in, because nobody ever knew how Wilberforce got in anywhere. But it seemed that when he tried to get off the bed he had found himself so entangled in the bedclothes he had reared up under the sheets with an angry yowl. The student, who was writing an essay on the Victorian Gothicists and had gone to bed just after eleven with a copy of The Castle of Otranto, had been so deeply immersed in the world of phantoms and apparitions, he had thought a ghost had come to gibber at him, and had dashed on to the landing in a panic and yelled for help, resulting in several of his neighbours mounting a grand ghost hunt. No, said the porter crossly, he had no idea whether anyone actually believed there was a ghost; what he did know was that there had been cavortings across the quad after midnight, and six people were due to see the Dean next day, never mind it nearly being Christmas, college rules was college rules, Dr Flint.
Michael, called to account next morning, did his best to apologize, and was tetchily told by the Dean, who was fighting a hangover, that if he could not control his turbulent cat, Wilberforce might have to be banned from College for good.
‘I’ll lace his milk with bromide,’ promised Michael, and retired to his room, where he spent three hours detailing the fictional Wilberforce’s exploration of a haunted house, to which the gleeful and inventive mice had lured him, dressing up as white-sheeted ghosts to stalk him through the cobweb-draped rooms. This seemed to take care of the requested three thousand words, and he emailed the document to his editor so it could be dealt with before the world closed down for Christmas. After this he went off to his lunch with Nell, which was followed by a shopping expedition to equip Beth for her forthcoming trip to America where she was going to spend two weeks with Michael’s god-daughter in Maryland.
As Christmas drew nearer, Nell seemed to have what Michael thought of as her inward look. He usually put this down to something having triggered an unexpected memory of her dead husband. He never pried, but he sometimes wondered if she would ever get over his death. It was nearly three years since Brad West had been killed in a motorway pile-up, but three years was not so very long, and Christmas could be difficult and sad for bereaved people.
The day before Christmas Eve, Michael received an email from his editor to say that much as she had enjoyed Wilberforce’s outing with the ghosts, she thought it was a bit too scary for seven year olds, and please could Michael think up a different adventure because they still had that three-thousand-word space to fill by the second week of January.
‘You’ll think of something,’ said Nell, when Michael reported this. ‘You always do. Or Wilberforce will provide copy. Did I tell you I’m meeting Nina Doyle after Christmas? She thought I might like to meet Benedict – I mean properly meet him. Which I would, of course.’
‘How is he?’ Michael’s mind switched from Wilberforce to the chess set.
‘Bored with being kept in hospital, according to Nina. They haven’t found what’s wrong yet; they just keep doing dozens of tests. I hope he doesn’t have to stay in hospital over Christmas. It won’t be very festive for him.’
‘It won’t be very festive for us if I don’t manage to bash out three thousand words on that pestilential Wilberforce.’
TEN
Benedict’s Christmas was very far from festive. He had been allowed out of hospital, but he must not, said the doctors firmly, be on his own, until they had got to the root of this. Was there someone he could stay with?