In the dining-room the stuffed owl looked out of its bell-jar at the company with an expression of surprise and some dismay. By now Patch, I mean Madge, was in a state of panic. I carried plates for her, and serving-dishes, and plonked them down on the table with extravagant waiterly flourishes. I confess, I was enjoying myself. I was light-headed, brimming with manic glee, like a child in a dressing-up game. I seemed to move as if under a magic spell, I do not know how it worked, but for a while, for an hour or two, posing as Charlie's factotum, I was released from myself and the terrors that had been pursuing me relentlessly for days. I even invented a history for myself as I went along, I mean I – how shall I express it – I fell into a certain manner that was not my own and that yet seemed, even to me, no less authentic, or plausible, at least, than my real self. (My real self!) I became Frederick the Indispensable, Mr French's famous man, without whom that crusty, moneyed old bachelor would not be able to survive. He had rescued me from uncongenial circumstances when I was a young man – tending the bar, say, in some sleazy downtown pub – and now I was devoted to him, and loyal to the point of ferocity. I bullied him too, of course, and could be a terror when he had people in. (Jealousy? Acquaintances did sometimes speculate among themselves, but no, they decided, Charlie was not that way inclined: remember that horsy woman down the country, the lost love of his life?) Really, we were like father and son, except that no son would be so steadfast, and no father so forgiving of my little ways. At times it was hard to tell which was master and which the man. Tonight, for instance, when the main course was finished, I sat myself down among the guests and poured a glass of wine as if it were the most natural thing in the world. A silence fell, and Charlie frowned, and rolled a breadcrumb about on the tablecloth, pretending he was thinking about something else, and Max stared balefully out the window at the harbour lights while his henchmen around him fidgeted and glanced at each other nervously, and at last I took up my glass, and rose and said, Well! I suppose us ladies better withdraw, and fairly flounced out of the room. In the hall, of course, I leaned against the wall and laughed. All the same, my hands were shaking. Stage fright, I suppose. What an actor the world has lost in me!
Now what shall I do?
I went upstairs to the drawing-room. No, I went into the kitchen. Madge: wig, false teeth, white apron, I have done all that. Out again. In the hall I found Foxy. She had wandered out of the dining-room. Under the stairs was a dark place, there we met. I could see her face in the gloom, her eyes watching me, so solemn and fearful. Why are you sad? I said, and for a moment she did not know what to do with her hands, then she put them behind her back, and flexed one knee and briefly swayed her shoulders and her hips, like a schoolgirl playing the coquette. Who says I'm sad? she said. I'm not sad. And I thought she was going to cry. Did she see it in me, the terror and the shame, had she seen it from the first? For she had sought me out, I knew that. I reached behind her and opened a door, and we stepped suddenly on to bare floorboards in an empty room. There was a smell, dry and oniony, that was the smell of a certain attic room at Coolgrange. A parallelogram of moonlight was propped against one wall like a broken mirror. I am still holding these damned plates. I put them on the floor at our feet, and while I was still bending she touched my shoulder and said something which I did not catch. She laughed softly, in surprise, it seemed, as if the sound of her own voice were unexpected. Nothing, she said, nothing. She shook in my arms. She was all teeth, breath, clutching fingers. She held my head between her hands as if she would crush it. She had kicked off her shoes, they clattered where they fell. She raised one foot behind her and pressed it against the door, pressed, and pressed. Her thighs were cold. She wept, her tears fell on my hands. I bit her throat. We were like – I don't know. We were like two messengers, meeting in the dark to exchange our terrible news. O God, she said, O God. She put her forehead against my shoulder. Our hands were smeared with each other. The room came back, the moonlight, the oniony smell. No thought, except: her white face, her hair. Forgive me, I said. I don't know why I laughed. Anyway, it wasn't really a laugh.
How peaceful the days are now, here at the dead end of the year. Sitting in the fastness of this grey room I sometimes imagine I am utterly alone, that there is no one around me for miles and miles. It is like being in the deep hold of a great grey ship. The air is heavy and still, it presses in my ears, on my eyes, on the base of my skull. A trial date has been fixed at last. I know this should concentrate my mind, give me a purpose and so on, make me excited, or afraid, but it does not. Something has happened to my sense of time, I think in aeons now. The days, the weeks of this banal little courtroom drama will register as no more than a pinprick. I have become a lifer.
Again today Maolseachlainn brought up the topic of how I should plead. I let him maunder on for a while, then I got fed up and told him I would dispense with his services if he did not come straight out and say whatever it was he had on his mind. This was disingenuous of me, for I had realised, of course, since his last visit, that he was hinting at the possibility of an arrangement – I understand, from the conversations I have had in here, that there is hardly a sentence handed down that has not been prearranged among counsel. I was curious to know what the court could want from me. Now, as I watched poor old Mac squirm and sweat, I thought I had it: Charlie, of course, they were trying to salvage something of Charlie's reputation. (How could I have imagined they would care a fig for Charlie, or his reputation?) I would do all I could for him, that went without saying, though it seemed to me a bit late now. All right, Mac, I said, holding up a hand, I'll plead guilty – and what then? He gave me one of his over-the-spectacles looks. Then it'll be an open-and-shut case, won't it? he said. This, I realised after a moment, was intended as a witticism. He grinned dolefully. What he meant was that the trial would open, I would deny the charges as stated, plead guilty to manslaughter or something, the judge would pass sentence, with a bit lopped off in return for my co-operation, and then, presto, it would all be over, the hearing would end, the case would be closed. He could guarantee nothing, he said, but he had a duty to his client to try to secure the best judgement that was possible within the law. He is very charming when he waxes pompous like this. What's the point, I said, what's the trick? He shrugged. The trick is that no evidence will be heard. Simple as that. For a moment we were silent. And will that work, I said, will that save him? He frowned in puzzlement, and at once I saw I had been wrong, that Charlie and his embarrassment were not the subject here. I laughed. I've said it before, sometimes I think I am hopelessly innocent. Maolseachlainn glanced over his shoulder – he did, he really did – and leaned across the table conspiratorially. No one is worrying about Charlie French, he said, no one is worrying about him.