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‘How could this be more private?’ Toby demanded, voice rising. ‘Just us, all friends together, aren’t we? Suchveryclose friends.’
‘Yes,’ Nicky said. ‘We are all friends, and I suggest you and I take some fresh air in order to keep it that way.’
‘Why?’ Toby demanded. ‘Because I’m at fault? Because I’m drunk?I’mnot the one who let us all down, like some slobbering sot?—’
‘Toby!’ Jem protested. ‘Stop it. Please. You don’t mean this, and I’m sure you’ll regret it in the morning. Look, why don’t we call it a day? It’s awfully close to Finals to be drinking.’
‘An excellent idea, Jeremy,’ Nicky said. ‘Let us disperse.’
‘God, listen to you,’ Toby said. ‘Mr and MrsRook, cawing in harmony before they fly back to the nest. All that hopeless pining paid off in the end, eh, Jem?’
Jem’s throat clamped shut, so hard he couldn’t breathe. He heard a couple of inhalations, but he didn’t look round. He didn’t want to look at his friends for fear of what he might see on their faces and what they might see in his. He knew he was scarlet; he felt dizzy and slightly cold.
‘Toby,’ Hugo said carefully. ‘That, uh?—’
‘Oh, come on,’ Toby snarled. ‘Nicky’s taken little Jemmy to bed; has that surprised anyone except Jem? I hope you didn’t violate his provincial virtue too painfully.’
‘Fuck you,’ Nicky said, the words clipped and shocking. Prue gasped aloud, and Hugo began a furious protest to which nobody attended.
‘Thanks awfully, I’d rather not,’ Toby said over him, tone vicious. ‘Which is why you had to turn to Tiny Tim here. I wish you’d done it earlier and spared me the endless histrionics. Congratulations, Jem, you finally got his attention. You won’t keep it long, of course, whatever promises he may have made. Which is lucky for you. He’s not precisely discreet, and you two wouldn’t want to be caught, I suppose.’
There was a second’s endless, awful silence, then Nicky spoke, with appalling calm. ‘The histrionics here seem rather one-sided to me. You are making quite the mountain out of averyinsignificant molehill, Tobes.’
Jem couldn’t help the tiny gasp that escaped his painfully tense throat. Nicky went on steadily. ‘You entirely overestimate how much importance I might place on really quite trivial pastimes. No offence, Jem,’ he added. Jem thought he might have looked round; he couldn’t see, with his gaze locked on the table and tears swimming in his eyes that he refused—absolutely refused—to let fall. ‘I am, I think, permitted alittleself-indulgence, with examinations on the way. We all need a diversion occasionally.’
This was the precise, surgical horror of a nightmare. Jem wanted to leap up and flee from the shame and exposure and agony of loss, but he couldn’t do that, and he couldn’t bear to heave himself up and hobble out, with his face red and wet, with the people who had been his friends staring at him. He didn’t know if it would be worse if they offered comfort or if they didn’t.
‘You are a damned cold-blooded swine, Rook,’ Hugo said savagely. ‘A disgrace. How you presume to call yourself a gentleman—My God.’
Prue made an inarticulate noise. Nicky began a response and Aaron said, ‘Enough,’ his deep voice thundering out over them all. ‘Stop this at once. Apologise, Nicky. Now.’
‘You pack of hypocrites,’ Toby said. ‘Why shouldn’t Nicky dip his wick as he pleases when everyone else does? I simply think people should know their place in these matters and understand their positions. Don’t you?’
He sounded like that was addressed to someone; Jem couldn’t look up. Prue shoved her chair back from the table. ‘You’rehorrible. Foul. You’re all hateful and cruel, using people like toys, you’re all—all?—’
‘On the contrary,’ Toby said over her. ‘Some of us have decency. Some of us consider what our actions might do to others. Some of us don’t want to disgrace our names, our families—Are you not going to say anything, you bitch?’ he roared, making Jem jump. ‘Nothing?’
‘I’d rather talk in private.’ That was Ella’s voice, very calm.
‘Well, I don’t want to talk in private!’ Toby shouted. ‘Are you going to do it all in private? Marry in private? Breed a nursery of half-caste brats in private?’
‘Go to the devil,’ Ella said, voice no longer composed. ‘Damn you, Toby. How dare you?’
‘How dareI? With you sneaking and whoring behind my back?’
‘You may not speak to her like that,’ Aaron said at some volume. ‘Mind your tongue.’
‘I’ll speak to my sister how I choose!’ Toby shouted. ‘She’smine!’
‘I am not,’ Ella said. ‘I am not yours to withhold or bestow. I never have been. Aaron and I will be getting married, and you have no say in that at all.’
‘A Feynsham,’ Toby said through his teeth. ‘A Feynsham, of our blood, our family, degrading herself?—’
‘Watch—your—mouth,’ Aaron said, and his tone was far from his normal measured speech. He took a deep breath, stretching his clenched fingers out. ‘Let us calm down. We intended to speak to you, Toby?—’
‘Liar. You didn’t even tell me! I had to find out from Prue!’
Prue gasped. Ella shot her a truly vicious look. ‘We were waiting for a time when you might be able to think of someone other than yourself. We hoped you might care what made your friend and your sister happy.’
