Out of Bounds

by Mike Seabrook

  “Very wise”, commented the old man.

  “Quite. But there have been other times since, when I’ve felt almost sure he was going to unburden himself. But each time something’s happened to destroy the moment, to destroy the intimacy. Some ass blundering in wanting to talk about the game or something, or buying us drinks, or what-have-you. There’s something there, something that’s making him deeply unhappy, especially at home. Something he can’t, or at any rate doesn’t want to talk about to his parents — not that he can talk to them about anything that matters, but this is something pretty fundamental. I’m sure of that much. And, well, you know better than I do, Reggie…oh, it’s just something about him… you can tell, can’t you? I can tell.”

  He sat back, relaxing from the forward crouch into which he had unconsciously stooped in the intensity of his concentration. “That’s as far as I could say”, he finished. “I think he’s gay, though I doubt if he knows it himself for certain. I think he probably suspects, and would like to find out, from someone he trusts. And I think I’m the person he trusts most right now. We’ve become very close, you know, Reggie”, he said, a little wanly, and yet with a depth of happiness lying clearly visible to the older man, close beneath the rather sad, pinched smile, like the outline of a fish just beneath the surface of deep water.

  “He knows nothing about you?” asked Westwood.

  “Not as far as I know”, Graham nodded. “And as far as I know there’s no-one to tell him, either at the school or at the cricket club.” He hesitated. “There are a few who suspect, I think. That’s about as far as I can say for sure. I’ve heard one or two things at the cricket club. Just small things, you know…odd times when I’ve walked into the dressing room or the bar, and it’s suddenly gone quiet — you know how it is. And once in a while you hear the odd ribald remark, or more likely catch the tail-end of one, and maybe some mention of queers or poofs — well, again, you know the sort of thing. So I suppose it’s just possible that he may have heard something there. Come to that I suppose he may have heard something at the school. You know what schools are like, or anywhere where it’s all males — anyone who’s still unmarried at thirty, and so forth…”

  “But all in all you don’t think he’s got any clear idea of what you are?”

  “All I can say for certain is that I don’t think so. I’ve got no reason to think so. What I want to know is what I should do if he does ask me for advice. I mean, Reggie, suppose that is the problem he’s got at home, or rather, suppose that’s his problem, and the one of all his problems that he can least talk about at home. If he goes to anyone I’m certain it’ll be to me. What do I tell him? Do I advise him and say ‘I happen to be something of an expert on this, because…’? Or do I tell him and then say, ‘oh, and by the way, I’m in love with you, so while we’re at it you can check it out—you’ve had the theory, now bend over and prepare for the practical’?”

  Westwood laughed at the extravagance, but quickly sobered. “You must advise him as you would advise any boy who came for guidance in such a difficult area”, he said with certainty. “And that’s all. Leave it at that. You know all this already, of course. I know you well enough to know I don’t need to be telling you all this. You don’t need me to point out what an unmitigated catastrophe it would be if you embarked on an affair with one of your pupils. You can supply the headlines in the News of the World for yourself. Quite apart from which, you’re in a fiduciary position, and it would be utterly improper for you to do any such thing. That’s something else you don’t need telling.

  Graham sighed. “No, Reggie”, he said, “I don’t.”

  “Then have a last tot of this magnificent popish poison, and then go and have a peaceful night’s rest. I keep a room made up for you.”

  Graham offered him a smile full of gratitude and affection, and hefted the half a hundredweight decanter off the floor for a last time. “Good God, we’ve drunk half a bottle”, he said, eyeing the level of the amber liquid, refracted through thousands of prismatic cuts in the glass. He swirled it, and the vessel flashed and sparkled amber, orange from the glow of the fire on the old mahogany furniture and the dim lights flowing from concealed sconces in the walls, and a rich indigo blue that seemed to emanate from some mysterious depth within the lead-weighted crystal itself.

  “I think about him all the time, you know, Reggie”, he said inconsequentially as he handed his old friend his refilled glass. “I dream about him, too. I was daydreaming about him all the way up to town on the train, and all the time I was propping the bar up in Andrew’s ridiculous pub. That’s why I got alarmed when he started getting perilously close to the truth — I suddenly had this notion that he was looking into my mind. Silly, I know, but it made me shiver for a moment — you know, somebody walking over your grave?”

  “There’s no harm in thinking about him, or dreaming about him”, murmured Westwood, smiling fondly at him in the near-darkness of the great high-ceilinged room. “Though I’d suggest that it’s likely to bring you more pain in the form of frustration than joy from the sight of his face. And as long as it doesn’t interfere with important things: your work, your relationship with the boy himself — he’s become dependent on you in a sense, Graham, as I’m sure you’re aware. So you’ve got a responsibility to him. Don’t let lust come between you and that responsibility.”

  “It’s not lust, Reggie, my dear”, Graham said sadly, “it’s love.”

  Westwood stroked his chin before answering. “Yes”, he said eventually. “I suppose, you being you, it probably is. Infinitely worse. Just keep it platonic, that’s all.”

  * * *

  “Christ, Colin”, groaned the captain of the Elderton Park First XI. He briefly covered his eyes as his no. 6 batsman flashed airily at a fast leg-cutter well outside the off stump. “How many times have we told him to leave those alone?” he muttered, exchanging a grim glance with his vice-captain in the next deckchair.

  “Shall the leopard change his Ethiopian?” murmured the vice-captain as the bowler tramped back to his mark. “There he goes again”, he added. The next ball was identical, and so was the stroke. This time he got a thin top edge, and they could hear the close fielders’ strangled yelps of anguish as it flew an inch above second slip’s convulsive salmon-leap and shot to the boundary. “Four more, anyway”, said the vice-captain. He craned his neck to see the face of the scorebox. “One-eighty-nine”, he announced. “Fifty-seven wanted. We should do it, Bill. We’ve got thirteen overs after this one.”

  “We’ve also got a tail long enough for the Guinness Book of Records”, his captain reminded him. “I still don’t know which way to play it. What do you think, Alan? Do I shut the shop, or do we still go for it?”

  “See how many Colin can put together”, suggested Alan. “Oh”, he added in dismay. No. 6 tried the same flashy stroke yet again to another fast ball drifting away outside the off stump. This time his luck was out, and so was no. 6, caught by the wicketkeeper, who, seeing that it would not carry to first slip, had hurled himself to his right and taken the ball one-handed, at full stretch, three inches above the ground. “Great catch”, said the captain, clapping despite himself. “Good luck, Simon”, he called as no. 7 got out of his deckchair and set off for the crease, pulling on his gloves. “He’ll bloody need it”, he added, aside to Alan, but he considerately waited until the batsman was out of earshot before he said it.

  “Made up your mind yet?” asked Alan.

  “I’m making it right now”, muttered Bill, craning to look at the score, which had not changed. “Yeah, I’m going to give it one more wicket. What’s that new kid’s name? The one Graham Curtis brought from his school?”

  “Steve, isn’t it? Yes, Steve Hill”, supplied Alan.

  “Yeah, that’s right. He’s been getting a lot of runs for the Threes, so they tell me. Only been with us about three weeks, and I heard he got his first fifty last week. Sydney or the Bush”, he said after musing for a few moments. “Hey, Ste
ve”, he called, looking about and spotting Stephen leaning in at the hatch at the scorebox. Stephen looked up and hurried over.

  “Get padded up, will you, Steve, please. I’m putting you in earlier than I’d expected. Next wicket down, okay?”

  “Yes, fine. Great. Thank you very much”, said Stephen, beaming as he hurried into the dressing room. “Well, he’s keen”, said Alan, looking for a bright side.

  It was fortunate that he got his pads on quickly. No. 7, having got nicely off the mark by thrashing the dealer in leg-cutters handsomely through backward point for four, then squirted the last ball of the over through the slips for a streaky single. He now had to face a straight-up-and-down man, who, however, had been rested and was extremely fast. He slashed the first ball of the over uppishly, but wide of gulley’s clutch, for four more. The second ball was short of a length and pitched on middle stump. It reared ferociously, moved a fraction of an inch to the off, and flew with hardly a deviation off the shoulder of no. 7’s bat into the wicket-keeper’s welcoming hands. He trailed disconsolately back to the pavilion, shaking his head sadly at the captain and vice-captain. “Sorry, Bill”, he said. “Too good for me, that last one.”

  “Hard luck, Simon”, commiserated the captain. “See from here what a peach it was. Okay, young Steve”, he said as Stephen passed in front of him on his way to the exit from the enclosure. “Take it steady, now. Let Graham do the scoring. You just stay there. Occupy the crease, and the runs’ll come. How many do we want, Alan?”

  “Forty-eight.”

  “Good luck, then”, they chorused, and Stephen was alone.

  Graham met him halfway to the wicket. He was looking serious and preoccupied. “I take it they told you to take it steady?” he said. Stephen nodded. “They’re worried about the long tail.”

  “Well, take my advice, and just play your natural game”, said Graham. “Temper it, be careful, certainly don’t take any risks — the bowling’s far too good to take risks with. The man you’re going to face is pretty quick, but he’s straight up and down most of the time. The one he got poor Simon with was a freak. He won’t bowl another one like it if he lives to be a hundred. Just play straight, and take any singles there are going.” Stephen nodded, and they went to their ends.

  Stephen took guard, twiddled his bat as he stared round the field, then settled into his stance and waited for the first delivery, hoping the slight trembling he could distinctly feel under the white shirt was not visible to any of the field.

  The bowler retreated an improbable distance towards the sight-screen, turned and raced in. Stephen patted the toe of his bat in the crease, and could hardly believe his good fortune when the first ball turned out to be an amiable long-hop a clear eighteen inches outside his off stump. It lolloped along and sat up like a rather dim but amiable old dog, asking, begging and praying to be hit. His captain’s and Graham’s admonitions were still in his ears; but batsman’s instinct was too imperious to be denied. He stepped carefully onto the back foot, and fairly flogged the soppy, lolloping ball on the up, through extra cover for what felt like the finest four of his life.

  “SHO-O-O-T!” came a stentorian roar from the crowd gathered in the enclosure in front of the pavilion. He cantered a few paces down the pitch, feeling the after-shocks of that glorious contact tingling through his body, and knowing in every sinew that there was no need to run for it. He pulled up as he saw it rocket over the rope, and met Graham halfway.

  Graham’s eyes were shining. “That was as good a shot as I’ve seen all season”, he exclaimed, dropping an arm round Stephen’s shoulders. For an instant Stephen felt a kind of electric current pass through him, similar to the physical tingle induced by the perfect contact of the ball in the middle of his bat. Then it was gone, leaving him with some vague feeling of déjà vu, some faint after-image of memory which he couldn’t place but knew was recent. It had come and gone before Graham’s next word.

  “Great shot, Stephen, as I say, but take it steady. Nothing rash. We’ve got tons of time. You all right?” Stephen nodded, feeling as happy as he could remember ever feeling. “I’m fine”, he said, and as he said it he felt a bolt of elation shoot through him. “Let’s blow these buggers out of the water”, he said.

  Graham grinned at him, and they went back to their ends.

  Six overs later, the game was finished. Stephen had not been able to hit another boundary, but he had gone for his strokes and made a highly creditable fifteen, and Graham had polished off the remainder, finishing with a capable, carefully compiled sixty-two. Stephen’s main contribution, as Graham was telling him as they walked into the enclosure to receive the rapturous acclamation of the others, was the psychological effect of his first scoring stroke. “You’ll never forget that shot, Stephen” he said, and Stephen felt inclined to agree. It was only as they walked up the steps and into the dressing room that he became conscious of the fact that Graham’s arm had been round his shoulders all the way from the crease. He turned his head to look at Graham, and his eyes were glittering strangely.

  * * *

  Stephen showered with quick and economical movements and with his back turned to the others, erecting an invisible but almost tangible wall of privacy in a corner of the large shower bath. He wrapped a towel round his waist and flitted back to his peg, where he dressed with the same slightly fussy quickness. He accepted the congratulations of the others modestly, with a shy smile, but wasn’t very communicative, and the moment he was dressed he slipped out into the bar. No-one noticed the sudden dissipation of his elated mood except Graham; but he noticed it with the anguished poignance of a lover, and had an appalled suspicion that he could ascribe a reason. He had to swallow hard before leaving the security of the dressing room. Then he squared his shoulders, almost in the manner of a soldier preparing to walk into the room in which he is to be court-martialled, and stepped through into the bar.

  “Have a noggin” he said, schooling his voice to normality as he walked to the bar and stood beside Stephen. “Have two. That cover drive was worth one on its own.”

  Stephen gave him a thin smile, drained his pint glass quickly and allowed Graham to refill it. They chatted idly for a while, breaking off for digressions as other players drifted in from the dressing rooms, joined them while they got drinks and drifted away again. After half an hour Graham took a calculated gamble. He peered closely at Stephen and said in a low voice “Is there anything the matter with you, Stephen? You don’t have the air of the conquering hero.” He was careful to disguise the solicitude behind a light laugh, so that it could be passed off as something less than it was if the boy should resent the enquiry.

  Stephen sketched a quick smile, which seemed genuine enough, but a little strained, and said “It’s nothing, Graham. Don’t mind me. It’s just something I was going to ask…But it doesn’t matter. Later, perhaps…” And he lapsed into a moody silence. Graham had enough sense to let it be for the moment, and after a few minutes more he excused himself and drifted off to join a lively post-mortem of the match. But his heart was heavy as he laughed and chattered with the others, and it was no later than nine when he had had enough.

  He sought out Stephen, finding him in what looked like the identical position in which he had left him half an hour before, and suggested that they might make a move. “Don’t let me hurry you, though”, he said. “You could get a lift off one of the others without any trouble if you’d rather stay on a bit later.”

  “No!” said Stephen, so sharply that a couple of the nearest drinkers looked round, startled. Graham began to wonder if there was something wrong with the boy apart from what he suspected, and dreaded, that there might be. “You sure you’re all right?” he asked, looking hard at Stephen.

  “Yes, yes”, the boy said with an attempt at airy dismissiveness. “Bit light-headed, that’s all. Probably had a drink too many. Look, I must go to the gents, d’you mind, Graham? I shall only be two minutes.”

  “Of course. I’ll get the bags in the
car. See you out there”, he said, heading for the dressing rooms.

  Stephen used the lavatory, and was on his way back past the dressing room doors to leave via the bar when he heard voices from the home dressing room.

  “Cheerio, Graham”, came the voices of a couple of his teammates. Stephen would have hurried on then, so as not to keep Graham waiting. But he was as likely as anyone else to stop to hear what people might say about himself, and when he heard his name mentioned a second or two later, he couldn’t resist the temptation to stand outside the door for a few moments longer.

  “What did you think of the new kid?” he heard the no. 6 batsman, of the airy square-cuts, ask.

  “Good kid”, came the voice of Alan. Stephen felt himself flushing with pleasure in the darkened little alcove between the changing rooms and the lavatories. “Sensible, responsible knock. And that extra-cover drive was the best shot of the match, I thought. Bowled quite well, fielded as well as you’d expect. Kid’s an athlete. I was impressed.”

  “So was I”, came no. 6’s rumbling tones. “You reckon he and Graham are…” He lowered his voice, and Stephen, outside the door, could almost see him unconsciously glancing round as he did so. There was a short laugh from Alan. “Get away with you, Colin. You don’t pay attention to every dressing room rumour, do you?”

  There was more subdued murmuring, “…all the same, it wouldn’t surprise me…bum chums…all know about old Graham…” he heard, and there was another chuckle. This was followed by Alan’s voice, slightly raised. “I don’t know anything of the sort, and neither do you. In any case, as far as I’m concerned it’s none of my business. Or yours. All I know about Graham Curtis is that he got sixty without giving a sniff of a chance, and you got a streaky nine and should’ve been out twice while you were getting them. The boy looks like a good little cricketer, too. He was shot into the Ones at short notice, and he delivered the goods. That’s all I’m bothered about. And if you take my advice you’ll leave dirty-minded tittle-tattle to dirty-minded tittle-tattlers. Now why don’t you stop twirling your jock strap about like a bloody propeller and come and have a drink?”