I nearly flew at her. I was proposing to tell her I had always been soft, and she was the only one who hadn't noticed it; and I'd half a mind to add that I didn't give a brass farthing whether she slept with Larry or a two-toed sloth; and that the only reason Larry had taken the remotest interest in her was in order to get at me. Fortunately she came in ahead of me with another barb of her own:
"Who sent you, Tim?"
"No one. I'm flying solo."
"How did you come here?"
"Walked. Alone."
"I just have this picture of Jake Merriman waiting for you in a car down the road, you see."
"He isn't. If he knew I was here, he'd set the dogs on me. I'm practically on the run myself." The doorbell was ringing. "Diana. If you know anything about him—if he's been in touch—phoned, written, dropped by—if you know how to get hold of him—please tell me. I'm desperate."
"It's Sebastian," she said, and went to the hall.
I heard voices, and the sound of young feet going down the basement stairs. I realised in a fit of anachronistic indignation that she must have commandeered my old study and put her consulting room in it. She returned to her chair and sat on the arm exactly as before. I thought she was going to tell me to leave, for her face was firmly set. Then I realised she had reached one of her decisions and was about to communicate it.
"He's found what he was looking for. That's all I know.”
“So what's he looking for?"
"He didn't say. And if he had said, I probably wouldn't tell you. Don't interrogate me, Tim; I won't have it. You dragged me into the Office for seven years, and that was bad enough. I don't subscribe to the ethic, and I don't accept the imperatives."
"I'm not interrogating you, Diana. I am asking you a question: What is he looking for?"
"His perfect note. That was his dream always, he said. To play one perfect note. He was always graphic; that's his nature. He telephoned. He'd found it. The note."
"When?"
"A month ago. I had the impression he was leaving for somewhere and saying his goodbyes."
"Did he say where?"
"No."
"Did he
"No."
"Was it abroad? Was it Russia? Was it somewhere exciting? New?"
"He gave absolutely no clue. He was emotional.”
“You mean drunk?"
"I mean emotional, Tim. Just because you brought out the worst in Larry doesn't mean you have rights of ownership to him. He was emotional, it was late at night, and Edgar was here. 'Diana, I love you, I've found it. I've found the perfect note.' Everything was in place for him. He was together. He wished me to know that. I congratulated him."
"Did he tell you her name?"
"No, Tim, he wasn't talking about a woman. Larry's too mature to suppose we're the answer to everything. He was talking about self-discovery and being who he is. It's time you learned to live without him."
I had not expected to shout at her, and I had gone to some lengths till now to avoid doing so. But since she had appointed herself the high priestess of self-expression, there seemed no reason to restrain myself. "I'd adore to live without him, Diana! I'd give my entire bloody fortune to be rid of Larry and his works for the rest of my natural life. Unfortunately, we are inextricably involved with each other, and I have to find him for my own salvation and probably for his."
She had turned her smile to the floor, which I suspected was what she did when patients ranted at her. Her voice took on an extra sweetness.
"And how's Emma?" she enquired. "As young and beautiful as ever?"
"Thank you, she is well. Why do you ask? Did he talk about her too?"
"No. But you didn't either. I wondered why not."
* * *
I was climbing. In Hampstead if you are climbing you are exploring, and if you are descending you are going back to hell. Thinner air, thicker fog, pieces of brick mansion and Georgian façade. I entered a pub and drank a large Scotch and then another, then several more, remembering the night I returned to Honeybrook with the black light glowing in my head. If there were people in the pub I didn't see them. I walked again, feeling no different.
I entered an alley. To one side, a high brick wall. To the other, iron railings like spears. And at the further end a white wood church, its spire severed at the neck by fog.
I began cursing.
I cursed the goad of Englishness that had held me back and spurred me forward all my life.
I cursed Diana for stealing my childhood, and despising me while she did it.
I remembered all my agonising lurches for connection, the mismatches, and the return, time and again, to burning alone.
And after I had cursed the England that had made me, I cursed the Office for being its secret seminary, and Emma for luring me from my comfortable captivity.
And then I cursed Larry for shining a lamp into the cavernous emptiness of what he called my dull rectangular mind and dragging me beyond the limits of my precious self-mastery.
Above all I cursed myself.
