One thing they shared in common was a fascination with their surroundings. Vince was captivated by the city, had been ever since his father had walked him along Shaftesbury Avenue at the age of four. He had passed his childhood lost in the delights of the printed page, his fingers remaining firmly in his ears to block the sound of his parents fighting. By doing so, he had amassed an alarming amount of detail about his habitat. Reading Pepys and Boswell had provided him with reasons for wanting to become a journalist.
'So you know all about London, then?' asked Sebastian, turning over a volume of photographs entitled The Changing Metropolis.
'That's impossible,' Vince called back. 'I defy anybody to do more than scratch the surface. The city is older than Christ. Dig, and all you ever find is the layer below. It's like peeling an onion. But I had a summer job as a tour guide for London Transport once, and picked up a lot of stuff. For example, do you know what's so special about the lamps at the corners of Trafalgar Square?'
'I've absolutely no idea,' Sebastian laughed.
'They're the original oil lamps from Nelson's flagship, the Victory,' Vince said, walking into the room. 'Do you know why Dick Whittington had a cat?'
'I have a feeling you're about to tell me.'
'It was a metaphorical feline. A "cat" was a medieval nickname for a coal-barge, and Whittington made his fortune in coal. Shit -' There was an explosion of steam in the kitchen. 'I think we're gonna be eating out.'
Sebastian was also something of an expert on the subject, and during the interview unveiled his discoveries before Vince like a series of moves in an obscure memory game. He talked about the past, but never the future. He seemed closed off in so many ways that Vince could never tell what he was thinking – but he was always thinking.
'I've got one for you,' he said suddenly. 'Officially there's no such place as Westminster Abbey, did you know that? It's actually the Collegiate Church in Westminster.'
'All right,' Vince countered, 'why isn't there a single statue of Dickens in London?'
'Easy. He was a modest man, and forbade it. For many years there was a statue of a fat boy near Smithfields, marking the spot where the Great Fire finished. What did it represent?'
'I know this, I know this. It's supposed to be the sin of Gluttony, because the fire started in Pudding Lane and ended at Pie Corner. One more, come on, hit me with your best shot.'
Sebastian thought for a moment. 'All right. Why was St George's Church in Southwark built with three white clock faces and one black?'
Vince knew he was beaten. 'I don't know,' he conceded.
'The people of Bermondsey refused to contribute towards the church. The black clock face pointed in their direction. Impossible to read in the dark.'
'Is that true?'
'Absolutely,' Sebastian said and grinned.
They met again on September the 16th, two weeks after their initial meeting.
'Have you ever encountered real royalty?' asked Vince as they sat in the lounge bar of the Queen's Head & Artichoke with the microphone of his cassette recorder propped between them.
'Oh yes, on several different occasions.'
'Go on, then, who've you met?'
'Well, Her Majesty.'
'What, Liz?'
Sebastian winced. 'Please, Vincent, have some respect. I was presented to Queen Elizabeth the Second when I was thirteen.'
'Wow, what was she like?'
'Regal.'
Vince closed his notebook. 'Did you ever notice that whenever the Queen is asked something she doesn't have a favourable opinion of, she replies in a single word answer? You know, "How does ma'am find this painting?" "Disagreeable." "And the sunset?" "Lurid." "And the prime minister?" "Bovine." That sort of thing. You're like that a lot of the time. It must be a class signifier. Us proles have a hard time shutting up.'
'Really.'
'You see what I mean? But I figure if I keep asking you little things about yourself I can slowly build up a composite picture, like an Identikit. Tell me what you dream about.'
Sebastian smiled mischievously. 'Fire.'
'What do you like to do most?'
'Challenge.'
'What are your plans for the future?'
'Promethean.'
'How much is your family worth?'
'Oodles.'
'What quality do you value above all else?'
'Leadership.'
'How do you get on with your father?'
'Pass.'
It was obvious that Sebastian would rather have his teeth pulled than discuss anything about his private life. It was a barrier Vince knew he would have to break down if they were to make any real connection with each other. He enjoyed his subject's company immensely. The man never stopped explaining the rules; how to behave in a fancy restaurant, why good clothes cost so much, how to order wine, when and how much to tip, what to look for in a good cigar, how the old London streets were laid out, how to play Pelmanism, how to win at poker, chess and a host of strange games whose complex subtleties escaped him. But he adroitly sidestepped intimacies, and the one subject he never offered advice on was women. He seemed only tangentially interested in them. Perhaps he had been badly hurt in the past. Didn't wealthy families sometimes arrange that side of things for their offspring?
Sebastian's town apartment overlooked the Snowdon Aviary in Regent's Park and was stuffed with elegant impersonal furniture, more of a showflat than a home. The only room with any character was the games room, a large spare bedroom filled with board games and puzzles of every description. His 'country pile', he assured Vince, was an altogether more prepossessing sight, a vast Georgian estate in Hertfordshire. He occasionally rang someone called St John Warner, and someone else called Caton-James, and apparently spent evenings playing board games with his friends, but never invited Vince to meet any of them. There was little evidence of the network of powerful connections one imagined every honourable young gentleman to maintain and exploit.
Minor caveats aside, their meetings continued to yield fascinating rewards. One cliché appeared to be true; the isolation of Sebastian's upbringing as he passed from nanny to boarding school contrasted sharply with the warmth and chaos of Vince's childhood home. He was particularly determined not to discuss his relationship with his father, or to set out his hopes and fears for times to come.
Vince taped the interviews, carefully labelling each cassette and indexing it for later reference. Sebastian paid for lunches and dinners, lent cash and cabfares he clearly did not expect to be repaid, and generally behaved like a decent friend. It was a lifestyle to which Vince felt he could easily become accustomed.
Still, an unspoken barrier remained firmly in place between them, preventing any true closeness from developing.
CHAPTER EIGHT
'CONSTITUTIONALLY England no longer exists. It is not mentioned in the title of its sovereign. The English people have no special rights, not even a separate set of official statistics. England retains its separate identity in just two areas: religion – the Church Of England – and sport – cricket, rugby and soccer. England occupies more than half of the United Kingdom's land mass and contains over four fifths of the population. It is one of the most densely populated countries in the world. And yet Scotland and Wales have both been more successful in securing their own institutions. For example, the BBC has special Scottish and Welsh broadcasting councils, but England has none. So how do we define Englishness? By history, by art, by character? What is the spirit of England, and how can we embody it, empower it?'
Vince didn't like the sound of the last part. He had been digging out old speeches in an effort to uncover something more substantial on Sebastian. He knew virtually nothing about his subject's immediate past and had hoped to unearth details about the Wells family background, but this was not entirely what he had expected to find. Turning to the front of the article, he checked the author's name again. Sebastian Wells, right there in black and white. There was even a moody little photograph that looked as if it had been taken at university.