Out of Bounds

by Mike Seabrook

  Stephen hared after it, head thrown back and hair streaming, and took a perfect deep catch dropping over his head. “Well held”, called Graham. They converged once again. “What can’t you help feeling?” asked Stephen, seizing the ancient, tape-swaddled bat from him.

  “I was going to say, I can’t help feeling that this is all wrong”, said Graham. “I’m a schoolmaster, put in a position of trust over you — in loco parentis…”

  “Like I told my mother this afternoon, I’m a big boy now”, interrupted Stephen. “I’m old enough to know what I want, aren’t I?”

  “You’re old enough physically. Maybe — probably — you’re old enough emotionally”, conceded Graham. “What you certainly aren’t is old enough by law, and even more certainly you aren’t according to conventional morality in this country.”

  “Fuck morality”, said Stephen cheerfully. “And this country. Are other countries more relaxed about this sort of thing?”

  “I don’t really know”, said Graham. “I know most countries have lower ages of consent. Whether they’d be any more likely to condone a relationship between a schoolmaster and one of his own pupils I don’t know at all, but I very much doubt it. Put one up for me.”

  Stephen hit the ball as hard as he could, and Graham ran for the catch. When they met again he continued. “I can’t help thinking our luck can’t last. I mean, we were all right on tour, sharing a room — it was only natural for us to share, because you knew me far better than anyone else. They’d have been surprised if we hadn’t shared. But if we carry it on now, well, we’re going to get caught one of these days, if we’re not very careful indeed.”

  “Well we will be”, grunted Stephen, whacking another high one into the air.

  They carried on with their catching practice, and some new arrivals came out to join them. “Slip cradle?” Graham suggested. “Good idea”, chorused several newcomers. Graham handed over their old bat and ball to some of the others, and he, Stephen and four others dragged the heavy, fifty-year-old cradle out and settled down to hard close-catching practice until the light began to fail. Then they went back inside to join the drinkers in the now crowded bar.

  At ten-thirty, following a plan they had worked out while they were out on the field alone, Stephen said “cheerio” to the group of youngsters he was drinking with and left. Graham carried on drinking for a further half-hour, leaning negligently on the bar and entertaining Bill and some of the other seniors with anecdotes picked up in the masters’ common room. He left when the bar closed at eleven, and strengthened his alibi by volunteering when Bill asked if anyone could give him a lift home. He declined Bill’s offer of a nightcap when they got there, and it was barely half-past eleven when he parked his car outside his flat. As he walked from the street to his front door a shadow detached itself from a clump of bushes on the front lawn. Casting a hurried glance round, Graham hustled Stephen into the flat, followed him in and was very glad to get the door closed behind them.

  They spent a blissful night together, with a leisurely morning to follow before they set off for the day’s game, and with a precedent nicely set, Stephen felt confident enough to make a regular practice of staying away from home on Friday nights. At the same time they worked a series of variations on their routine for blinding their tracks at the cricket club. Some Fridays Stephen would not turn up for drinks at all, once or twice Graham stayed at home, and on one occasion they both stayed away, and revelled in the luxury of a whole stolen evening as well as the night. Once or twice, with his parents getting used to the idea that he was becoming independent and growing rapidly away from them, Stephen stayed out on the Saturday night as well.

  Stephen’s eighteenth birthday fell on the last Saturday of the school summer holidays. He gave himself the very satisfactory birthday present of four cheap wickets; but afterwards he was put out when Graham insisted that he should go home and spend the evening with his parents, who took him out to an expensive restaurant and bored him witless with their notions of conversation. However, when the drinks with which the cricketers had plied him after the game had worn off a little he was glad he had given way to Graham’s gentle insistence, and he had the grace to admit as much when he went to Graham’s flat the next evening.

  Waiting for him there were three presents. There was an early, beautiful leather-bound edition of the works of Mill, which he had read immediately after the County Club and Ground game when he had first got to know Graham, and an expensive hardback of Le Mystère Frontenac, which his form had been reading in class earlier that same day. Graham sat watching him fondly as he excitedly tore the wrappings off them, like a small boy. “I thought we ought to have something to remember that day by”, he said, very pleased indeed when Stephen remembered and remarked on the significance of the books. “There’s one other little thing I got you”, he said, and went out of the room, returning with a heavily wrapped item which could only be one thing. Stephen took it and looked up at Graham with an expression he could not read for the moment. “Go on, have a look”, he said. Stephen stripped it of its paper, disclosing a beautiful Gunn and Moore cricket bat. Stephen gazed down at it, and did not raise his head for a very long interval, stroking the silky-textured, creamy blade like a woman with her child. When he finally did look up his eyes were glistening. “Oh, Graham”, he whispered. He stood up, laying the beautiful bat carefully on the sofa, and came into Graham’s arms. There was no more to be said.

  And so for the remainder of the school summer holidays and for the first couple of weeks of the Michaelmas term, they were able to spend enough time together to keep their hunger for each other reasonably well in check; and they took such intricate pains to preserve secrecy, paying infinite attention to the smallest details of alibis, reconnoitring obsessively before meeting and keeping constantly alert to behave with master-and-pupil formality in school hours, that they began to feel very settled with each other. Their relationship gradually acquired a more subtle and rounded shape, as their simple physical desire began to put on flesh and fill out. They learned more about each other, and with the knowledge came deepening affection and regard. A sexual affair gradually became a love affair. Graham had a front-door key cut and presented it to Stephen, and he started spending more and more of his evenings at the flat, and occasionally stayed the night.

  Then, out of nowhere, disaster struck, and it seemed as if they were doomed.

  * * *

  Graham had to attend the same staff meeting as Jack Page on the Friday of the mass sentencing of the colours XV, so he hung around at school, getting odd bits of paperwork out of the way.

  Stephen went home. He stayed long enough to appease his conscience, which was beginning, just occasionally, to prick him over the negligible amount of time he spent there; this proved long enough also for the atmosphere to begin to get on his nerves, so he decided to go and have the customary Friday-night drink at the club. He took part in a desultory practice knockabout with some of the other youngsters, but the evenings were beginning to draw in, and they quickly decided to pack up and go inside. Stephen was left alone out on the field, because he had been the last with the bat, and had to hunt for a ball he had hit into some undergrowth beside the pavilion. He was poking about for it, swearing luridly to himself after being stung by some great coarse nettles, when he heard voices.

  He straightened up to see where they were coming from, and realized after a moment that he was hearing people talking inside the pavilion. His ears pricked up immediately as he heard Graham’s name mentioned. He edged closer and saw that he was directly behind the home dressing room. Taking great care to make no sound, he pressed himself against the wall of the building, straining his ears to catch what was said, and immediately identified the voices as belonging to Bill, the club captain, and Alan Hood, his deputy.

  “I’m only telling you because I don’t know what to do about it myself”, he heard Alan saying. “I wouldn’t even have paid it this much attention if I hadn’t got it from wher
e I did.”

  “But for Christ’s sake, Al”, came Bill’s deep boom in exasperated tones, “you’ve said yourself it’s none of our business. Jesus, I overheard you squashing that twat Colin flat not long ago when he was coming out with some of his imbecile gossip. Leave well alone is my motto.”

  “Yes, yes, mine too, if you come to that”, said Alan. “Except for the kid. What about Steve? I don’t know if there’s anything in it, any more than you or anybody else. But they did share a room on the tour, and… well, you said yourself there was a pretty dramatic change in the kid over that week. Oughtn’t we to do something? Have a word with his parents, maybe? Or…”

  “Christ, no!” said Bill sharply. “That’s the last thing we do, talk to the poor kid’s parents. I’ve heard some of the other kids talking about them. They’re some sort of religious freaks apparently. He doesn’t get on with them. I’m not stirring up that kind of mare’s nest, thanks very much, and nor will you if you’ve got any sense. I tell you, it’s none of our business. Christ, suppose — just suppose — he is sleeping with Graham. Well, so bloody what? We’ve all known about Graham for years — well, pretty well known, haven’t we? Suspected, and been pretty sure. All right. Well, Steve’s eighteen, isn’t he? He’s old enough to ride a motor bike and join the fucking army, he’s old enough to give Graham one, if you ask me. If the poor kid’s queer, that’s his look-out. That strikes me as bad luck enough, without us poking our bloody oar in and getting him in the scheissen with his people.

  “In any case”, he went on after a brief pause for thought, “how do you know this bloody man—what was his name — Page is right? We all know schoolteachers are the bitchiest bastards on earth. How do we know this isn’t just some staffroom feud, or that the bloody bloke’s put two and two together and made five and a half of it? No, Al, for Christ’s sake do yourself a favour and mind your own business. Do me a favour, and the club too, for that matter. And most of all, do Graham and the boy a favour. It’s none of your business, or mine, or anybody else’s, and that’s the end of it. Just don’t breathe a word of this to any of the others. Not anybody, Al, please. I’ll have a word with fucking Colin, and make sure he keeps his trap shut. I’ve got enough on Colin to guarantee he doesn’t tattle. So you just keep your face closed, and forget all about it.”

  “Suits me down to the ground”, said Alan, sounding, Stephen thought, rather relieved. “That’s what I told Colin when he first told me — he was crowing as if he’d got a scoop for the papers, silly-born prick that he is. If you think it’s something we can forget about, and if you can make sure Colin keeps his lip buttoned, that’s fine. Unless you think we ought to talk to Graham, maybe.”

  “Oh, yeah?” jeered Bill. “And what do we tell him? That one of his colleagues thinks he’s bent, and can’t keep it to himself? And that he’s suspected of knocking off one of his own schoolboys? Oh, fuckin yeah, I can see me taking Graham aside and telling him that little lot. No, Al, I keep telling you, it’s none of our business. Steve’s old enough to look after himself and make his own decisions — if he’s up to anything with Graham, which he might not be, for all we know. And Graham’s more than old enough. He’s a good friend of ours, too. So let’s just forget it, as I’m sick of hearing myself say.”

  “Okay”, said Alan peaceably. “Just what I hoped you’d say.”

  “Right, then”, said Bill. “Now for Christ’s sake let’s get out of this and have a dri…” His voice faded, and Stephen heard a door slam. He leaned against the wall of the pavilion, trembling from head to foot. He dragged the sleeve of his shirt across his forehead to mop the cascading sweat off it. His legs felt as if they had suddenly dissolved, and he tottered a few paces away into the bushy undergrowth and sat down. His shirt was sticking clammily to him, and he noticed that he could smell his sweat, a rank, foul smell, reminiscent of unwashed groins, utterly unlike the clean, neutral-smelling sweat of exertion.

  He sat for some minutes, allowing the night breeze to cool him down a little, and shortly felt a little better. He thought fast, trying to decide how to play the new circumstances. To begin with, he knew he was in a few moments going to have to walk back into the pavilion and act as if he had heard nothing. His next step would have to be to get away and tell Graham. Beyond that his mind refused to produce any ideas. He physically shook himself, angrily, striving to clear his head, and found to his immense relief that his limbs were steadier and he was sweating less. After a minute or two more he found that he could stand and walk steadily. He bit his lip, steeled himself, and walked round to the front door of the pavilion.

  * * *

  Quite how he got through the ordeal of the next few minutes he could not have said afterwards. He knew only that he came through it better than he could have imagined possible. He walked in, rubbing nettle stings on his legs, and for the first time in his life drank a pint of lager down in a single draught. Then he rejoined the gang of younger members and chattered and laughed about nothing much for a fair time, until he judged that he could leave without provoking any comment. Then, amid a chorus of goodbyes, he slipped off. The only clear memory he took away with him of that awful half-hour was catching Bill’s eye and waving to him and Alan and calling “See you tomorrow” as he was going through the doors into the soft summer darkness outside. Less than half an hour later he was letting himself into Graham’s flat. He could smell the rank odour of that peculiar kind of sweat once more.

  Graham was sitting on his sofa putting in a stint of knocking in Stephen’s new bat with a mallet with half a cricket ball for a head when Stephen silently opened the door and crept in. He looked up in surprise to see who his visitor was at such a late hour. “Why, Stephen”, he exclaimed “what are you…” He saw the expression on Stephen’s face, and immediately put down the odd-looking tool and rose swiftly to his feet. “What’s the matter?” he asked quickly, taking charge like any schoolmaster faced with a pupil in extreme distress.

  Stephen, just about at the end of his tether, was so relieved to be able to transfer the insoluble problem into capable adult hands that he simply rushed across the room and flew into Graham’s arms, almost bowling him over, bursting into tears of mingled rage, helplessness and fright.

  Graham sat him firmly down on the sofa. “Stay there”, he said, and went out of the room. He came back a moment later with a glass. “Here, drink this”, he commanded. Stephen, glad to let someone else be in command, drank it, choking and spluttering. However, it rallied him. “What — groogh — what is it?” he asked.

  “Only a small brandy”, said Graham, sitting beside him and smoothing his ruffled hair gently. “Now calm yourself down and tell me what’s brought you charging in here at this time of night looking like the wreck of the Hesperus. Something’s upset you, or shaken you badly, I can see that. What’s happened?”

  Stephen told him, fighting to keep calm and tell exactly what he had heard without omitting any detail.

  Graham listened without saying a word. He had determined not to show any reaction, so as not to upset Stephen any further, but his face was set grimly and his eyes were gleaming by the time Stephen finished his account.

  He sat for a long time, pondering what he had heard. “This is nothing too serious, love”, he said eventually, not certain whether what he said was true, but feeling the need to say something to reassure the boy, who half sat, half lay, cradled in his arms, quivering slightly from strain, anxiety and an assortment of unformulated fears. Stephen sat up, snuffling slightly, and looked searchingly into his eyes. “Are…are you sure, Graham?” he asked, a little tremulously. “Will we be able to put it right?”

  “Yes”, Graham said after a further pause for thought. “I don’t know how Jack Page reckons he knows about me. I can’t see how he can possibly know anything. Second, if he does know anything about me, he certainly can’t know anything about us. And third, if he knows about me, and if he does even suspect anything about us—which, as I say, I don’t see that he can — h
e’s no damn right to say anything about it. I don’t know how he knows Colin Preston, although I’ve got a fair idea, but in any case it’s outrageous of him to say anything like this about me, let alone about you. To mention you in such a context, on the basis of mere suspicion, or empty-headed gossip, is the most deplorable, disgraceful piece of unprofessional conduct I’ve ever heard of. He could be dismissed for such a thing.

  “In any case”, he went on, becoming red with indignation as another aspect of the matter struck him, “quite apart from the ethics of the thing, pure common sense ought to have told him he shouldn’t mention something like this to Colin Preston, of all people. If there was ever a competition for the world’s most blithering, blathering, dunderheaded idiot who did all his thinking below the belt, Colin would win the gold, silver and bronze medals all on his own. Jesus Christ! Whoever said nature won’t tolerate a vacuum would only’ve had to have a look inside his skull to see what balls he was talking. Colin bloody Preston. Jesus!”

  “What will you do?” asked Stephen, calming down greatly as he saw how smoothly and capably Graham had received what he thought must have come as a devastating shock. “And how do you think he might have told Colin? You said you had a good idea.”

  “Oh, that’s easy enough. I reckon they belong to the same rugby club. Jack doesn’t get enough rugby at school — he only runs three teams, plays for two and referees several matches a week — so he plays for the town side whenever he can find the time, and goes along after matches to sing their half-witted songs with them. As for what I’m going to do, I don’t know exactly, not yet. I’ll sleep on it.”