Sacrament (29 page)

The summer had been wet, the rainfall so heavy at the beginning of August that it had stripped and flattened
much of the crop, threshing it before its time. Now, a week from September, the fields were still waterlogged,
and the hay that had survived the deluge was rotting where it stood.

'It's all right for the likes of you,' Ken Middleton, who owned the largest acreage of harvestable land in the
valley, had remarked to Hugo in the pub tonight. 'You don't have to think about these things like us workin'
men.'

'Thinkers are working men, Kenneth,' Hugo had countered. 'We just don't sweat doing it.'

'It's not just the rain,' Matthew Sauls had chimed in. 'It's every bloody thing.' Sauls was Middleton's drinking
comrade; a dour pairing at the best of times. 'Even me of Da says things is just coming apart.'

Hugo had been harangued by Matthew's of Da Geoffrey on this very subject earlier in the year when, much
against his better judgment, he'd agreed to accompany Adele to the Summer Fayre, where she'd entered her
onion pickle in the annual competition. Geoffrey's wife had also entered, and while the two women chatted
(with the natural reserve of competitors), Hugo had been left to endure Old Man Sauls. Without the least
provocation, the man had launched into a monologue on the subject of murder, the recent killing of a child by
another child in Newcastle the particular upon which he hung his grim talk. It's a different world, these days he
said over and over. What had once been unthinkable was now commonplace. It's a different world.

'You know what your of Da's problem is, Matthew?' Hugo said.

'He's as crazy as a coot,' Middleton put in.

'Well, that's undoubtedly true,' Hugo replied. 'But that's not what I had in mind.' He emptied his brandy glass
and set it down on the bar. 'He's old. And old men like to think everything's coming to an end. It makes it a little
easier to let go.'

Matthew didn't reply. He simply stared into his beer. But Middleton said:

'Talking from experience, are you?'

Hugo smiled. 'I think I've got a few more years in me yet,' he said.

'Well, gentlemen. That was my last for the night. See you, tomorrow, maybe.'

It was a lie, of course; he didn't need a few more years to understand of Da's point-of-view. He felt it taking
shape in himself. There was a certain grim satisfaction to be had in bad news. What man in his right mind,
knowing he was not long for the world, would wish it to burgeon and brighten in his absence? Perhaps he would
have read the entrails differently if he'd had grandchildren; found reason for optimism in the midst of murder
and deluge. But Nathaniel, who would surely have given him fine grandsons and granddaughters, was thirty
years dead, and Will an invert. Why should he hope the best for a world that would have nobody he loved in it
once he'd gone?

There was pleasure to be taken in playing the prophet of doom, no doubt of that. As he walked home tonight (he
always walked even in the dead of winter; he liked his brandy too much to trust himself behind the wheel) there
was a spring in his step that would not have been there had the night's debate been more optimistic. Swinging
his stick, which he carried more for effect than support, he strode out of the light of the village into the lampless
mile of road that took him to his gate. He felt no anxiety, walking in the dark. There were no thugs here; no
thieves out to prey on an inebriated gentleman walking alone. It was very seldom he met anyone at all.

Tonight was an exception, however. About a third of a mile outside the bounds of the village he caught sight of
two people, a man and a woman, strolling towards him. Though there was no moon, the starlight was bright,
and from twenty yards' distance he was able to tell that he didn't know them. Were they tourists perhaps, out
enjoying the night air? Fugitives from the city, for whom the spectacle of dark hills and starscape was
enrapturing?

The closer he got to them however, the stronger the impulse became to turn around and head back the way he'd
come. He told himself to stop being a silly old fool. All he had to do was wish them a pleasant good evening as
they walked past and that would be an end to it. He picked up his pace a little, and was about to speak when the
man - a striking fellow in the silvery light - said:

'Hugo? Is it you?'

'Yes, it's me,' Hugo said. 'Do I

'We went to the house,' the woman said, 'looking for you, but you weren't there-'

'So we came looking for you,' the man went on.

'Do we know one another?' Hugo asked.

'It's been a long time,' the man said. He looked perhaps thirty-two or thirty-three, but there was something about his poise that made Hugo think this was a trick of the light.

'You weren't a student of mine, were you?'

'No,' the man said. 'Not remotely.'

'Well then I really can't recall,' Hugo said, faintly uncomfortable now.

'We know your son,' the woman said. 'We know Will.'

'Ah,' said Hugo. 'Well then good luck to you,' he said dryly. 'Have a good night, won't you?' And with that he
started on his way.

'Where is he?' the woman enquired as Hugo passed by.

'I don't know,' Hugo replied, not glancing back at her. 'He could be anywhere. He flits around, you know. If
you're friends of his, you'll know what a flitter he is.'

'Wait!' the man said, leaving his lady-friend's side to follow Hugo. There was nothing aggressive about his
manner, but Hugo took a firmer grip of his stick, just in case he needed to wield it. 'If you could just give me a
little help here-'

'Help?' Hugo turned to face the man, preferring to stand his ground and send the fellow on his way than have
him following.

'To find will,, the man said, his manner all conviviality.

It was an abomination, Hugo thought, the buttonholing manner people had these days. An American import, no
doubt. Thirty seconds of conversation and you were bosom-buddies. Altogether loathsome. 'If you want to get a
message to him,' Hugo said, 'may I suggest his publishers?'

'You're his father

'That's my burden,' Hugo snapped. 'But if you're admirers of his-'

'We are,' the woman said.

-then I must warn you he's a terrible disappointment in the flesh.'

'We know what he's like,' the man said. 'We all know what he's like, Hugo. You and I particularly.'

The inference of kinship here was too much for Hugo. He brandished his stick in front of his face. 'We have
absolutely nothing to say to one another,' he said. 'Now leave me alone.' He started to back away from the man,
half expecting him to give chase. But he simply stood with his hands in his pockets, watching Hugo retreat.

'What are you afraid of?' he said.

'Absolutely nothing,' Hugo replied.

'That I don't believe,' the man said. 'You're a philosopher. You know better than that.'

'I am not a philosopher,' Hugo said, resisting the flattery. 'I am a third-rate teacher of third-rate pupils who have
no interest whatsoever in anything I impart to them. That is my lot in life and to the extent that I might have
done worse, I'm proud of it. My wife lives in Paris with a man half my age, my best beloved son has been dead
and buried thirty years and the other is a self-promoting queer with an opinion of himself out of all proportion to his achievements. There! Are you satisfied? Does that put it plainly enough for you? In short, MAY I GO?'

'Oh,' said the woman softly. 'I'm so sorry.'

'What for?'

'You lost a child,' she said. 'We've lost several, Jacob and I. You never get over it.

'... Jacob?' Hugo murmured, and in that instant knew to whom he was speaking. A wave of feeling passed
over him that he could not quite identify.

'Yes, it's us,' the man said softly, sensing that they'd been recognized.

Relief, Hugo thought. That's what I'm feeling, I'm feeling relief. The waiting's over. The mystery is here; or at
least a means of access to it.

'This is Rosa, of course,' Steep said. Rosa made a comical little curtsey. 'Now ... shall we all be friends,
Hugo?'

'I ... don't ... know.'

'Oh, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking about Delbert Donnelly. She was responsible for that and I'm not going to mislead you on the matter. She can be cruel sometimes, dangerous even, when she's roused. But we've paid the penalty for that. We've had thirty years in the wilderness, not knowing where we were going to lay our heads from one night to the next.'

'So why did you choose to come back here?' Hugo said.

'We have our reasons,' Jacob said.

'Tell him,' Rosa prompted. 'We came back for Will.'

'I can't-'

'Yes, we know,' Jacob said, 'you don't speak to him and you don't care to.'

'That's right.'

'Well ... let's hope he cares more for you than you do for him.'

'What's that supposed to mean?'

'Let's hope he comes running when he hears you're in trouble.'

'I hope that's not a threat,' Hugo said, 'because if it is-'

He didn't see the blow coming. There was no flicker in Steep's eye, no indication, however slight, that his civil
chat was now over. One moment he was smiling, all courtesy, the next he struck Hugo such a blow it threw the
man five yards.

'Don't do that,' said Rosa.

'Shut up,' Jacob said, and going to where Hugo lay sprawled, picked up the stick that the old man had
brandished two minutes before. While Hugo moaned at his feet, he examined the stick, moving his hands up
and down its length to get its heft. Then he raised it above his head and brought it down on Hugo's body, once,
twice, three times. The first blow won a yell of agony. The second a moan. The third, silence.

'You haven't killed him, have you?' Rosa said, coming to Jacob's side.

'No, of course I haven't killed him,' Jacob replied, tossing the stick down beside its owner. 'I want him to hang
on for a while.' He went down on his haunches beside the wounded man. With a solicitousness that would have
shamed a doctor, he reached down and lay the back of his fingers against Hugo's cheek. 'Are you with me, my
friend?' he said. He rubbed his fingers back and forth a little. 'Hugo? Can you hear me?' Hugo moaned pitifully.
'I'll take that as a yes, shall I?' Jacob said. Again, the man moaned. 'So here's the plan,' Jacob said. 'We will be
leaving very soon, and if we don't call somebody to come and find you, there's a better than average chance that
you'll be dead before dawn. Do you understand what I'm telling you? Nod if you understand.' Hugo made a
barely perceptible nod. 'Good enough. So. It rests with you. Do you want to die here under the stars? Nobody's
going to be coming by here tonight, I suspect, so you'll have the place to yourself.' Hugo tried to speak. 'I didn't
understand that, I'm sorry. What did you say?' Hugo made a tiny sob. 'Oh now ... you're crying. Rosa, he's
crying.'

'He doesn't want to be left alone,' Rosa said. 'That's a big thing with you men,' she complained. 'You're like
kiddies half the time.'

Jacob returned his attention to Hugo. 'Did you hear that?' he said. 'She thinks we're kids. She doesn't know the
half of it, does she? She doesn't know what we go through. But I'm assuming she's right. You don't want to be
left alone. You want us to find a telephone and have somebody come and find you. Is that right?' Hugo nodded.
'That I will do, my friend,' he said. 'But here's your side of the bargain. I don't want you saying a word to Will.
Do you understand me? If he comes to see you and you tell him anything about us, what you're feeling right
now - the pain, the panic, the loneliness - will be as nothing beside what we will do to you. Do you hear me? As
nothing. Nod if you understand.' Hugo nodded. 'That's good. You needn't agonize about this. He's ... what did
you call him? ... a self-promoting queer? You're not his number one fan, obviously. Whereas I ... I am
devoted to him, in my way. Isn't that strange? I haven't seen him in thirty years, of course, so I may not feel the
same...' his voice trailed away. He sighed, and stood up.

'Lie very still,' Rosa advised him. 'If you've broken your ribs, you don't want to puncture a lung.' Then, to
Jacob, 'Are you coming?'

'Yes.' He looked straight down at Hugo's face. 'Enjoy the stars,' he said.

i

The morning after the love-feast Will woke on the living-room floor, having apparently slid from off the sofa
where he'd made a nest of the clothes he'd stripped off the night before. He felt like shit. His entire body ached,
even his teeth and tongue. His eyes burned in their sockets. He got to his feet, somewhat unsteadily, and made
for the bathroom. There he doused his face in cold water, and then looked at himself in the mirror. The calm and
clarity that had been such a revelation the previous afternoon were gone. The face he was looking at was just a
rag-bag of weary particulars: pallid skin and red-rimmed eyes and furlined mouth. What the hell had he been up
to? He vaguely remembered there being some dispute with Drew, but he had no idea what it had been about,
much less how it had been resolved, if indeed it had. Clearly he'd been out on the town, and to judge by the state
of his body it had been quite a party. He had scratches on his back and chest; bite-marks on his shoulders. And
there was more damning evidence still between his legs: a dick and balls so red-raw they might have been
massaged with sandpaper.

'Question one:' he said, looking down at his groin, 'what the fuck have we been doing? And question two: who
the hell do we need to apologize to?'

When he ventured into the bedroom, of course, he was confronted with chaos. The air was rank with rotting
food, and stale vomit, the floor a rubbish heap. He stood in the doorway, surveying the carpet of remnants,
while tantalizing flashes of how the celebration here had come to an end entered his head. He'd crawled on all
fours through this muck, hadn't he? puking like an over-fed Roman in the Vomitorium. And out in the hallway,
where there was blood and broken glass, he'd cut his foot while he was hauling himself to the top of the stairs

What had happened after that? His mind refused to confess. Rather than rack it for answers, he left the
fragments of recollection along with the rubbish, where they lay, and closing the bedroom door, he went to
shower. There was a pattern here, he thought, of sleeping, and waking to visions, and showering, and waking
again, as though the cycle of diurnal duties had been turned to the purpose of Lord Fox. A canny trick, this: to use the safest rituals of his domestic life to make him shed his assumptions. Washing himself proved a delicate business - the soap and water found broken skin he hadn't noticed - but he emerged feeling a little better. He was in the process of drying himself when somebody rapped hard on the front door. He wrapped a towel around his middle and
headed for the stairs, stepping gingerly past the glass as he went. The rapping came again, and with it
Adrianna's voice:

'Hey, Will? Will? Are you in there?'

'I'm here,' he said, opening the door to her.

'Your phone's not working,' she said. 'I've been calling for the last hour. Can I come in?' She peered at him as
she entered. 'Boy did you ever have a late night.' He led the way into the kitchen.

'What did you do to your back?' she said, following him. 'No, never mind, don't tell me.'

'You want some coffee, or-?'

'I'll do it. You should just call England.'

'What for?'

'Something's happened to your Dad. He's not dead, but there's something wrong. They wouldn't tell me what.'

'Who wouldn't tell you?'

'Your agents in New York. Apparently somebody was trying to find you, and whoever it was called them, and
they tried you, but they couldn't get you, so they tried me, only I couldn't get you-' She kept up the story while
Will went into the living-room, where he found the phone unplugged. Drew's handiwork, no doubt, so they'd
not be disturbed during their night of decadence. Will plugged it back in again.

'Do you know who made the call?'

'Somebody called Adele.'

'Adele?'

'Speaking.'

'This is Will.'

'Oh my God. Oh my God. Will. I've been trying to contact you-'
'Yes, I

'He's in a terrible state. Just terrible.'

'What happened to him?'

'We don't really know. I mean, somebody tried to kill him, we know that much.'

'In Manchester?'

'No, no, here. Half a mile from the house.'

'Jesus.'

'He was just beaten unmercifully. He's concussed. He's got three broken ribs and a broken arm.'

'Do the police know who did it?'

'No, but I think he knows, and he's not telling. It's peculiar. And it frightens me, it really does, in case whoever
it is ...' she started to dissolve into tears '... whoever it is ... comes back ... I didn't know who else to turn to .
. . so ... I know you and he haven't talked in a long while, but ... I think you should see him...' It was plain
enough what she was saying, even if she wasn't putting it in so many words. She was afraid he wasn't going to
survive.

'I'll come,' he said.

'You will?'

'Of course.'

'Oh that's wonderful.' She sounded genuinely happy at the prospect. 'I know it sounds selfish, but it'd take such a
weight off my shoulders.'

'It doesn't sound selfish at all,' Will said. 'I'll make arrangements right now and I'll call you the moment I get
into London.'

`Shall I tell him?'

'That I'm coming? No, I don't think you should. He may not want to see me for one thing: better just let it be a
surprise.'

The conversation ended there. Will gave Adrianna a quick summary of what had happened, and then asked her
to see what she could do about arranging a flight: any airline, any time. Leaving her to make the arrangements
from the downstairs office, he went up to pack. This meant facing the filth in the bedroom, of course, which
wasn't particularly pleasant, but he wrapped up the mess as best he could in the sheets on which the feast had
been laid, dumped them all in plastic bags, and left them out on the landing to take downstairs. Then he opened
the window, so as to let in some fresh air, and hauling his suitcases out of the closet set about filling them.

Adrianna secured him a flight out of San Francisco that evening. An overnight flight that would deliver him into
Heathrow Airport around noon the following day.

'If you don't mind,' Adrianna said, 'I'd like to come in while you're away and look through all those pictures you
took down-'

'The consumptives?'

'Yeah. I know you think I'm crazy, but there's a book in those pictures. Or at least an exhibition.'

'Help yourself. I don't want to look at another photograph right now. They're all yours.'

'Isn't that a little extreme?'

'That's how I'm feeling right now. Extreme.'

'Any particular reason?'

It was too big a subject to explain even if he'd had the words, which he doubted he did. 'Maybe we'll talk about
it when I get back,' he said.

'Will you stay long?'

Will shrugged. 'I don't know. If he's going to die then I'll stay until he does. Isn't that what I'm supposed to do?'

'That's a strange question.'

'Yeah. Well, it's a strange relationship. We haven't talked for ten years, remember.'

'But you talk about him.'

'No, I don't.'

'Trust me, Will, you talk about him. Offhand remarks, usually, but I've built up a good picture of him.'

'You know, that's a damn good idea. I should get a picture of him. Something that'll catch him, for posterity.'

'The man who fathered Will Rabjohns.'

'Oh no,' Will said, heading up to pack his camera, 'that wasn't Hugo. And when Adrianna asked him who the
hell it was if it wasn't Hugo he refused, of course, to answer.

ii

He went to see both Drew and Patrick before he left for the airport. He had called Drew several times, but
nobody picked up, so he caught a cab to the apartment on Cumberland. Through the bars of the security gate he
could see Drew's bicycle in the passageway, almost certain proof that its owner was in residence, but Will's
repeated ringing of the doorbell brought no reply. He'd come prepared for this eventuality, with a scrawled note
which he jammed between the gate and the brick; three or four lines simply informing Drew that he had to go to
England on short notice, and that he hoped to be in contact again soon. Then he went back to his cab and had it
take him up Castro to Patrick's apartment. This time the doorbell was answered, not by Patrick but Rafael. He
was sneezing violently, his eyes bloodshot.

'Allergies?' Will said.

'No,' Rafael replied. 'Pat just came from the hospital. Not good news.'

'Is that Will?' Patrick called from the living-room.

'Go on in,' Rafael said softly, and disappeared into the kitchen, still sneezing.

Patrick was sitting in the window - where else? - though the vista of the city was largely obscured by a glacial
bank of fog. 'Pull up a chair,'

he told Will, and Will did so. 'The view's fucked, but what the hell?'

'Rafael said you were at the hospital.'

'I introduced you to my doctor at the party, didn't I? Frank Webster? Tubby little guy; wears too much cologne?
I went to see him this morning, and he just told me flat out he'd done all he could. I'm getting weaker and there's
nothing more he can do for me.' There was a new barrage of sneezes from the kitchen. 'Oh jeez, poor Rafael. As
soon as he gets upset he starts sneezing. He'll be like that for hours. I went to his mother's funeral with him and
the whole family - he's got three brothers, three sisters - they're all sneezing. I didn't hear a word the priest said.'
This was sounding more and more like one of Patrick's tales, but what the hell, it was bringing a smile to his
face. 'Remember that beautiful French guy Lewis used to date? Marius? You had a fling with him.'

'No I didn't.'

'Then you were the only one. Anyway, he sneezed after he'd come. He sneezed and sneezed and sneezed. He
fell downstairs at Lewis's place, sneezing. I swear.'

'Terrible.'

'You don't believe me.'

'Not a word.'

Pat glanced at Will, smirking. 'So,' he said, 'to what do I owe the pleasure?'

'You were telling me about Webster.'

'It can wait. You've got a purposeful look on your face. What's happening?'

'I have to go to England. I'm catching a flight out tonight.'

'This is sudden.'

'My father's got a problem. Somebody decided to beat the shit out of him.'

'You were here on the night in question,' Patrick said. 'I'll swear to it.'

'I mean badly, Pat.'

'How badly?'

'I don't know. I'll find out when I get there. So that's my story. Now back to Webster.'

Patrick sighed. 'I had a heart to heart with him today. He's been great. We're always in line if somebody comes
along with some new medication. But ...' he shrugged '... I guess we've run out.' He looked at Will again. 'It's
a mess, Will. Getting sick. We've all seen so much of it, and we all know how it goes. Well, it's not going to
happen to me.' This sounded like Patrick at his defiant best, but there was no resilience in his voice; only defeat.
'I had a dream, a couple of nights ago. I was in a forest, a dark forest and I was naked. Nothing sexual about it.
Just naked. And I knew all these things were creeping up on me. Some were coming for my eyes. Some were
coming for my skin. They were all going to get a piece of me. When I woke up, I thought: I'm not going to let that happen. I'm not going to sit there and be picked at, piece by piece.'

'Have you talked to Bethlynn about any of this?'

'Not about the conversation with Frank. I've got a session with her tomorrow afternoon.' He leaned his head
back on the head rest, and closed his eyes. 'We've talked about you a lot, you'll be pleased to know. And she
was always pretty acute about you, before she met you. Now she'll be useless. Like the rest of us, flailing
around trying to work out what makes you tick.'

'It's no great mystery,' Will said.

'One of these days,' Patrick said lazily, 'I'm going to have a blinding revelation about you, and everything'll
suddenly make sense. Why we stayed together. Why we came apart.' He opened one eye and squinted at Will.
'Were you at The Penitent last night, by the way?'

Will wasn't sure. 'Maybe,' he said. 'Why?'

'A friend of Jack's said he saw you coming out, looking like you'd just done some serious mischief. Of course, I
protected your honour. But it was you, wasn't it?'

'I don't remember, to be honest.'

'My God, that's something I don't hear very often these days. Everybody's too clean and sober. You don't
remember? You're a throwback, Will. Homo Castro, 1975.' Will laughed. 'A primitive simian with an oversized
libido and a permanently glazed expression.'

'There were some wild nights.'

'There certainly were,' Patrick said with gentle relish. 'But I don't want to do it again, do you?'

'Honestly?'

'Honestly. I did it, and it was great. But it's over. At least for me. I'm making a connection with something else
now.'

'And how does that feel?'

Patrick had again closed his eyes. His voice grew quiet. 'It's wonderful,' he said. 'I feel God here sometimes.
Right here with me.' He fell silent; the kind of silence that presages something of significance. Will said
nothing. Just waited for the something to come. At last, Patrick said: 'I've got a plan, Will.'

'For what?'

'For when I get very sick.' Again, the silence; and Will waiting. 'I want you here, Will,' Patrick said. 'I want to
die looking at you, and you looking at me.'

'Then that's what'll happen.'

'But it might not,' Patrick said. His voice was calm and even, but tears had swelled between his closed lids and
ran down his cheeks. 'You might be in the middle of the Serengeti. Who knows? You might still be in England.'

'I won't-'

'Ssh,' Patrick said. 'Let me just get all of this said. I don't want somebody telling you what did or didn't happen
and you not knowing whether to believe them or not. So I want you to know: I'm planning to die the way I've
lived. Comfortably. Sensibly. Jack's with me on it. So's Rafael, of course. And, like I said, I want you here, too.'
He stopped, wiped the tears off his cheeks with the heels of his hands, and then continued in the same contained
manner. 'But if you're not, and there's some problem; if Rafael or Jack get into trouble somehow ... we're trying
to cover all the legal issues to make sure it doesn't happen but there's still a chance ... I want to be sure you'll
get it sorted out. You're good with that kind of stuff, Will. Nobody pushes you around.'