‘Yes?’
‘We had a bit of bother with one of theGuardianjournalists, you know what they’re like.’ His hand is still on my shoulder, fingers pressing into the fabric of my shirt, then releasing, like a pulse.
‘What about?’
‘Diversity. They were threatening to write a piece about my team, saying we were all straight, white men – the usual crap.’ He puts on a weedy voice: ‘“Where are the Black lesbians? Why don’t you have any disabled transsexuals?”’
‘Transgender,’ I say.
‘Mm, well it’s nonsense obviously.’
‘But,’ I venture, ‘I suppose you are quite …’ I search for a word inoffensive enough for him to accept. ‘… monocultural.’
In the distance, an evening cuckoo sounds, the birdsong echoing across the valley and woodland beneath us. Shortly after buying Tipworth, Ben told me there was an ancient oak tree in the grounds. It was this oak tree, he said, that had provided shelter for the future King Charles II in 1651, retreating from Roundhead soldiers after a Royalist defeat. Charles II had seen a Parliamentarian soldier pass beneath the oak’s pollarded branches while hiding there, Ben said, ‘so the moral of the story is: there’d be no royal family if it weren’t for that Tipworth oak!’ I looked up the tale afterwards, only to find that Charles II had indeed hidden up an oak tree, but the tree was in Shropshire, not Oxfordshire. I was never sure, with Ben, how much he lied and how much he didn’t know.
‘Monocultural,’ Ben repeats, adding a mirthless ‘Ha!’
His face is sharp. A twist in the mouth that is not quite a smile. The fading sun catches the planes of his forehead and nose. He is still so beautiful, that’s the thing. I can’t escape it.
‘Anyway, I hope you don’t mind,’ he says, ‘but I gave them your name as an example of our liberal outlook. To prove that we’re a broad church, as it were.’
‘I’m sorry, I don’t follow.’ It’s not deflection. I truly don’t get it. ‘I’m a white man.’
‘But a gay one,’ Ben says, ever so lightly. ‘Which is great, obviously. Not an issue, why would it be, you’ve always been part of the …’
He’s about to say family but has the decency to stop himself.
A great whistling rush of air in my chest.
‘You told them I …’
I can’t finish the sentence. My legs begin to shake and for a moment, I think I might keel over, right there and then on the ancient stones.
‘We’ve never …’ I start again. Once more, I fail to complete the thought. I want to say, we’ve never spoken about this, Ben, but I think what I actually mean isI’venever spoken about it. Not even to myself, really. This … this … dark well of impulse is the source of my greatest confusion. It is not something I choose to share or discuss with others. Certainly not with Ben, of all people, who tormented me by refusing to see what I was and who exploited that wilful ignorance for years because it suited him. And now, because it suits him to acknowledge my particular persuasion, he betrays me. Again.
‘You’ve outed me?’ I say. ‘In theGuardian?’
‘Oh, mate.’ He pretends to be crestfallen. ‘I didn’t think it was that big a deal. I thought … Jarvis said …’
‘I don’t give a fuck what Jarvis said. What on earth made you think you could do this?’
He shrugs. He actually shrugs. And in that singular movement, I see the smash-and-grab student he was at Cambridge, hurling plates and chairs around pub dining rooms because he knew that, the next day, his family money would pay for the damage. I see the drunken toff who groped the teenage waitress as she bent to clear his place, whobroke things out of habit because he could, because people like him always had, because hurting others didn’t matter when they were less powerful than you.
‘They’re not going to print the article,’ Ben says, guiding me back towards the house. ‘So don’t worry about it. I wouldn’t have said anything if I’d known it would upset you.’
But that isn’t the point, is it? Journalists will talk. I can’t bear the thought of them laughing at me. My mother was always disgusted by my wrongness. Now, here was the inescapable proof laid bare for gossiping hacks to pick over.
I think there is part of him that senses my distress. He stops and faces me, gripping my arms.
‘I’m sorry, LS.’ I meet his gaze. He looks sincere. ‘Truly.’
‘It’s alright,’ I say and I hate myself for saying it.
I let him usher me into the kitchen and I pretend everything is fine. I’m good at that. I push all that just happened into a private part of my soul. I concentrate very hard on the salt and pepper dishes – tiny granite bowls with even tinier wooden spoons. A steaming dish of spaghetti bolognese appears (why hot pasta? In summer? Just looking at it makes me sweat even more) and a green salad consisting mainly of rocket, the most overrated of the brassicas.
‘Thank you, Susan,’ Serena says to the housekeeper. ‘We’re so lucky to have you.’ Serena turns to me. ‘She’s a real treasure. They’re so difficult to find these days, aren’t they?’
‘Are they?’
