Chapter Four
Good and Bad at Games
Smith wobbled out on to the pitch, pullovers wrapped around his waist. He took up his place on the little rise beside the cricket pitch. On a distant hillside, a shaft of undiluted sunlight was illuminating the ground.
Smith wished he were there. Only this cricket practice, and then he could go home, change, settle down to dinner and conversation with Joan.
It had been nice to see Bernice. She was like her father in some way, he wasn't really sure which. Jonathan had been in the Navy, broke his nose in Pompey Barracks. Bit of a clumsy so and so. Which was odd, for a sailor. Smith pondered on his image of sailors. He'd known of two, and both seemed very unlike everything he knew about the profession. Everything he'd learnt.
He glanced down at the woollens wrapped about his waist. He remembered the feel of them. He'd worn one that his mother had made for him, playing in the street with the other children. His should associate them with proud poverty and ambition.
But still, somewhere in a dream, he felt different things about this material. Something about it spoke of sacrifice.
What a strange existence this was, when all that was inside him seemed to contradict the world. Bigger on the inside than the outside, and bursting at the seams.
'Sir? Sir?' Anand was calling. 'We're ready to play, sir.' Smith started and looked up. 'Yes. Ready. Have you picked teams?' He glanced around and saw that a complete field had been assembled on the pitch, and that Hutchinson and Merryweather had taken up position, doubtless without much debate, with their bats at each wicket. Alton turned his head from wicket-keeping and raised an eyebrow at Smith questioningly. A line of boys were sitting beside him with varied degrees of interest, ready to get padded up and go on. 'I see that you have. Well, go on.'
Anand nodded and turned to begin his run-up. Smith glanced over his shoulder and saw Tim, way out on the boundary, gazing at the infield hopefully. Smith chastised himself. One little mental wander, and the Hulton team captain was sent off to the middle of nowhere. He glanced back at Hutchinson, the watery sunlight dappling the boy's shirt as he thumped his crease, anticipating Anand's first ball.
And tried to ignore the fact that the boy looked up to smirk at him.
Bernice ran from the cart into her cottage and bolted the door behind her. Hodges had spent the whole journey asking her half-embarrassed, half-salacious questions, and seemed to be on the verge of either calling the police or following her inside when she'd hopped from his cart.
She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror as she ran into her bedroom, and winced. No time to wash the mud off. She flicked open the locks of her cases, and pulled on some jeans, a T-shirt and some more useful boots than these lace-up monstrosities with heels. Finally, her work jacket with all the pockets. They'd expect her to head straight for the Pod, of course, but if she could do that without them tracking her, then all she had to do was to rugby-tackle Smith and put the thing against his forehead.
She crept quickly downstairs, mentally saying goodbye to the place. Her easel still stood in the garden outside, the painting half-finished.
Everything spoilt, as always.
Aphasia staggered down the hospital corridor, holding her stomach. Her tiny hand clutched for the railing on the wall, and she pushed herself along with it, leaving traces of brown liquid at every touch. That didn't make much difference to the overall colour scheme. The walls were covered with a thin organic paste, green and brown, which was also dripping from the ceiling as a cycle of mist and condensation.
This place smelt. This whole world smelt. They'd taken her away in a vehicle, when she'd been injured, and they'd tried to make her lie down and put a mask over her face. She'd tried to tell them that she just needed to go and heal herself, but they didn't listen, they just said stupid things to her.
The gas hadn't knocked her out, and when they noticed that, they'd taken off the mask and started talking excitedly to each other. They wheeled her into this place on a trolley.
So she'd opened the pouch in her wrist, and pulled out the bulb, and then they'd started to scream.
Through the haze of her vision, the little girl saw that, ahead of her, a nurse had fallen, pulling over a trolley of instruments as she did. The body lay across the junction of two corridors and was still fairly intact. Aphasia redoubled her efforts to walk and stumbled to her knees beside the body.
The wrist pouch wouldn't close. She'd die if she didn't do something soon and that'd let down all her fathers and her dear son, Hoff.
She reached for the nurse's decaying face, and started to feed.
'Sir!'
Smith, despite his intentions, was deep in Mansfield Park when he heard the shout. He waved a hand distractedly -
- and found a cricket ball in it.
The schoolboys applauded and whistled. Smith tossed the ball back to the bowler and bowed exaggeratedly.
'That could have taken your head off, sir!' said Phipps, awed.
'Oh, probably not. Still, someone must be looking after me ...' Smith would have turned his attention back to his book, but the boys became agitated again, a great whispering and the occasional whistle disturbing those sitting beside him.
He looked up to see his niece, dressed in very tight trousers, running frantically across the ground towards him. The batsmen paused as she ran between the wickets, their gaze following her, awestruck.
As soon as Bernice reached the little rise where Smith was sitting, she was offered a flurry of jackets and pullovers to cover herself with, as well as a panama hat from the laconic Alton. She waved them all aside, grabbed Smith's hand and hauled him to his feet.
'Come on,' she said. 'I've got something to show you.' The boys coughed and muttered things, and a few grins sprang up.
'I haven't time...' Smith looked around in confusion. 'This is Bernice, my niece. Bernice, these are my boys.'
'There's no time for that. You must come with me, it's a matter of life and death.'
'It is?' Smith squared his jaw. 'Very well. Lead on.' He pointed stoically and marched off, then glanced back. 'Shall I bring some of the boys?'
'No,' Benny told him. 'Just bring yourself.'
'Finish the game,' Smith called back to his class as she led him away by the arm, quite a bit faster than he was able to walk. 'Then go in for prep if I'm not back.'
Hutchinson stared after them, shaking his head at the little man. 'Have a nice time, Smith,' he snarled. 'The Head's going to love this.'
'Bernice, where are you taking me?' Smith protested, shaking off her arm. They were marching through the orchard that bordered the school, a vast, overgrown river of fruit trees that was part of the Marcham Estate. They had already ventured too far off the footpath for Smith's liking. This was almost certainly trespassing.
'To...' Bernice stopped and turned slowly, pointing at strange red marks on three trees. She settled on the middle one. 'This particular tree. Sit down under it. We're about to recreate a moment in history.'
Smith sat, cross-legged, under the tree, looking rather embarrassed. 'Which one?'
'Newton and the apple.' Benny put her foot up on a low branch and started to climb up the tree.
Smith looked quickly away. 'Those trousers are rather immodest.'
Benny frowned as she climbed. 'I'm not used to you noticing things like that. Ah, here we are.' The crown of the tree was swollen, as if a growth of some kind was inside. Following the instructions in the Doctor's note, Benny had put the red sphere there and watched as the tree's wood had grown to encompass it in seconds. Apparently, Time Lord biodata had that effect on living things, making them a bit like Time Lords. A Time Lord-ish tree wouldn't be as disturbing as a Time Lord-ish person, or even sheep. Benny wondered if the tree's bark rings were forming question marks or something. Indeed, in the brief time that she'd handled the Pod, Benny herself had felt an odd sense of presence to the thing. For the same reasons, the sphere couldn't be kept in the TARDIS. It would mess up the telepathic circuits.
She pulled the TARDIS key from her pocket, and, dangling it over the tree, slapped the swollen wood three times with her hand.
The wood flowed back like liquid, to reveal -
- an empty, ball-shaped cavity.
Benny swore six times. 'And is that really ladylike language?' asked Smith.
'Shut up,' Benny snapped. 'Whether you know it or not, we're both in a great deal of trouble.'
Sitting at a little distance from the other boys, Tim sneaked a look at the red sphere in his pocket.
He'd found it when he was walking on his own in the orchard. He'd felt drawn to a particular tree, and sat down in its shadow. Before long, he'd fallen asleep.
When he awoke, the red sphere was sitting on his chest.
It looked like it had fallen from the tree. The thing was hard and shiny, a shine that couldn't be scratched. It looked very like a cricket ball, actually, except there was no seam, no indication of how such a thing might have been made.
He always kept it with him now, because it made him feel a little better. It was like he had a secret, something that made him special. The sphere seemed to tell him things, sometimes, in that a thought came into his mind that he couldn't possibly have thought. The thoughts were always brave and noble.
Perhaps he was a prince, secretly in charge of some foreign land, and this was one of the crown jewels of that place. Just seeing it caused him to remember his true destiny.
'Captain Bug! Are you listening to me, Captain Bug?' Hutchinson was standing over him. 'Our wonderful form master has taken the new balls away with him. Give us that.' He snatched the red sphere from Tim.
Tim stared after the boy as he walked off, idly tossing the sphere in one hand. He took up position distantly then ran in fast to bowl at the small boy who'd taken up his stance in front of the wicket.
Tim jumped to his feet. 'No!' he shouted, and ran forward.
Hutchinson bowled. Disturbed by the shout, the batsman skewed the ball high in the air, right above Tim.
The young boy stared up at it, silhouetted against the bright sky. He began to shiver terribly.
The ball was whistling as it came down, and the sky had turned dark and ruddy. He heard Hutchinson shouting something.
He raised his hands in a gesture of prayer. The explosion engulfed them, their whites turning to cinder and their faces jerking back in frozen expressions of pain and sudden surrender.
And then Tim was just standing there, holding the ball.
The other boys weren't screaming, they were laughing. The batsman was staring at him incredulously.
'Is it possible to get one of your own side out?' laughed Hutchinson. 'Just the sort of leadership we need, Captain Bug!'
In the distance, bells began to ring. The boys picked up their kit bags, and started to file towards the school for prep.
But Tim stayed, looking at the sphere, for a long time.
'But there was something there you needed to see! You have to believe me!' Benny walked quickly after Smith back towards the school. 'Your real name is the Doctor, you're not from this planet. Try and remember!'
Smith glared at her with a mixture of anger and disturbed pity. 'If I'm not from this planet, why do I look and sound like a Scottish schoolteacher?'
'I... I don't know why; you've looked and sounded like a number of Englishmen too.'
'Now I know you're making this up.' 'Look, I can show you a box that's bigger on the inside than the outside.'
Smith closed his eyes, as if struck by a sudden thought, but he just as quickly opened them again and kept walking, not looking at Benny. 'Thank you, no, I've got a dinner appointment. I mustn't be late.'
'Listen, there are people out there who might want to hurt you.'
'Ah.' Smith turned suddenly and pointed at her, an uneasy half-frown on his face. 'You're trying to distract me. Don't. I'm confused enough. All these...' He waggled the hand irritatedly, searching for the right word. 'All these... fantasies. They're bad for you. They get between you and the real world. This is all there is, Bernice. The school and the boys and dinner. We can't leave it, we can't change it. We just have to live with it. So do that. University seems to have been a bad idea for you. I'll talk to Jonathan about it. And put some clothes on. Good night.'
Benny stopped, and watched Smith march into the school buildings.
When he was out of earshot, she swore eight times.
She returned to the cottage carefully, making her way from hedge to hedge as if this quiet little town was a war zone. She hadn't been followed going to get the Pod, so the man with the sword probably wasn't tracking her now. A fire engine roared past down the street, a fireman on the side ringing its bell urgently as the wooden ladder on its roof rocked from side to side. Bernice noticed that a column of brown smoke was rising from the other side of town. That looked ominous.
Perhaps the lads at the pub hadn't detained her attacker for very long. That was a worrying thought, unarmed humans circa 1914 taking on somebody armed with sophisticated weaponry like that. Between them, the man and the little girl could cut a swathe through this lot. And there was no Doctor to stop them.
So what was she going to do? There was always the TARDIS. If she could kidnap Smith somehow and get him inside, she might actually be able to persuade him of the truth. She hadn't tried to go into the details of what had happened yet. They sounded pretty ridiculous even to her, but maybe they'd touch a nerve.
She broke from cover and dashed up the path to the cottage gate then unlocking the door with one twist of the key. If this was going to be a long-term job, or even if Smith really was going to snap out of it in three weeks, she needed to put a pack together. The bloody forest was beckoning again.
Having checked every room, Bernice quickly assembled the basics: camping stove; tent; bottle of rather fine Aldebaran brandy; and shoved them all into a bag. She'd brought them along for outings, but the comfort of the cottage had kept her here.
She crept downstairs. She wanted to warn Alexander about what was going on, but having warned one person, where could you stop? She suspected that, soon enough, the whole town would know that there were aliens about. 'I say!' a voice called, and Benny spun to see Constance knocking on the window. The woman frowned when she saw the way Benny was dressed. 'I say, do let me in, they're behind me!'
Benny swore ten times as she pulled the bolts out, and hauled Constance inside. 'Who's behind you?' she asked.
'Why, the police. What on earth are you dressed like a man for? I mean, I've dared to wear the odd pantaloon myself, but what have you done to your hair? Those trousers are positively obscene, darling.'
'Never mind my trousers, Constance. I might be being chased myself.'
'Yes, I heard. You poor dear. I think that's why they've called in extra police. They arrived in a motor van. We both were heading here, and I managed to put a bit of a lead on with my bicycle when they got trapped behind some sheep, but - '
'You're saying the police are on their way here?'
'Yes, because you were, you know, interfered with. At the pub. Bernice, if they see you in that get-up, they'll have you locked up in an asylum and let that thug who did it off with a warning!'
'They locked him up?'
'No, they're still after him. There were veterans from three different regiments at that inn. They competed over him, but he still got away. I think it was while he was being dragged to the police station by the Dragoons.'
'Sounds nasty. What about the little girl?'
'He hurt her too, didn't he? She was driven to hospital. Out of the frying pan, I'm afraid...'
'What do you mean?'
'Why, the place seems to be on fire. That's where the fire brigade are going. All go in town today.'
Benny shook her head. 'You don't know the half of it. Do you know where I can find a gun?'
Constance looked at her shoes, abashed. 'A gun? Do you mean to shoot him? I understand the urge, but don't you think - '
'I wasn't molested, Constance, at least not in the way you mean. I need to defend myself, and you know where I can find the means to do that.' Benny put her hands on the young woman's shoulders and stared into her eyes. 'Don't you?'
'Yes,' Constance said, after a moment. 'We don't have any guns; we've never had the need to use them, but we are equipped to damage property on a large scale. But the ordnance isn't to be used for-'
'Near here?'
'Very.'
There came a harsh, official knock on the door. 'Come on,' said Benny. 'You show me the way. We'll go across the fields. I'm getting used to ditches.'
Joan carefully lifted the lid from one of the saucepans on the stove and peeped inside. 'Perfect.' She replaced it, and, humming a ragtime tune to herself, popped to the mirror in the lounge to check her make-up.
Well, it would have to do. She didn't look too much of a ruin for a woman in her forties. Like one of those duchesses that surrounded themselves with an army of handsome young men. She'd like to have had her hair done, but her invitation to John had been on such an impulse that there hadn't been time. That was the thing about her job, no time to get anything else done, what with preparation and marking and all that. No time to really live.
She glanced at the clock on the wall, chided herself and dashed back into the kitchen.
Dr Smith wandered jauntily along the lane, glancing up at the darkening sky from time to time. He was dressed in white tie and tails, with a top hat, gloves and a white gardenia in his buttonhole. He was whistling a tune he couldn't place, and wondering about all manner of things he didn't understand. In his pocket was the second part of his story:
The tribe of Gallifrey thought that the inventor was a god, and started to worship him, but then he told them not to.
'I have brought new ideas for you,' he said. 'I want to help you.'
And so he told them about travelling through time and space, and about the police. He taught them how to build police boxes, and he taught them about law and books and civilization.
It was progressing, but he still didn't know where it was going.
He stopped beside a tree and doffed his hat to it. I wonder, could I have this dance?'
He took the tree by its lower branches and stepped carefully back, moving his feet as if the thing were following his lead. No, his ability to foxtrot hadn't deserted him, so Joan's gramophone wouldn't be a tremendous obstacle; though if she wanted to bunny hug or chicken scramble, he'd be at a loss.
She wouldn't though, would she? Not in private, anyway.
But there was something else. He looked left and right along the road. There was nobody about.
Carefully, he puckered his lips and touched them to the bark of the tree. He experimented with wider and narrower kisses, finally letting go with a little scowl and shrug. He didn't remember kissing anybody since Verity. Surely there must have been. There'd been somebody called Barbara, hadn't there? In Rome - an Italian? But he'd never been to Rome. He must have read it in a book, probably one of those Arnold Bennetts that were keeping him awake at night.
All in all, it was a good thing that he wouldn't be doing any kissing tonight either.
He spun on his heel and doubled his speed along the road.
Joan opened the door of her little house to him and took his hat, popping it on the peg in the hallway. 'What a K-nut you look! It's nearly ready,' she told him. 'I hope you like fish?'
'I don't know,' Smith grinned. 'What sort of fish is it?'
'Cod in a white wine sauce, new potatoes and mixed vegetables. I am not exactly Rosa Lewis, but - '
'I'm sure it'll be fine. How was your day?' Smith wandered about the room, examining the pictures and ornaments that decorated the front room. He took off his gloves and put them down on a bureau. As Joan turned back to the kitchen, he raised a small display case that seemed to have fallen over on the mantelpiece, saw that it contained three medals and put it back down again.
'Fine,' Joan called. 'Lab all afternoon, and you know boys and chemicals, they love mixing things up and making clouds of smoke. Talking of which, did you see the fire in town today?'
'No.' Smith settled into an armchair. 'Cricket practice. What was burning?'
'Mr Blum the fishmonger says that it was St Catherine's. We will have to see what the paper says tomorrow.'
'The hospital...' Smith pondered, hefting a gunmetal paperweight in his hands. There was an insignia of some kind stamped in the metal, a few numbers and letters. He quickly put it down as Joan came back into the room.
'It's ready,' she said. 'Come on through.' The meal, as it turned out, was excellent. Afterwards, Joan set up a little table in the front room, and they played a few of their customary hands of whist, at which she was supreme, as always.
Smith threw up his hands and let his cards fall to the table. 'You're too good for me. Is there another game we could play?'
She arched an eyebrow. 'You sound like a young rake.'
'I, erm, ah, well, I was wondering if you played chess?'
Smith fumbled with his collar and succeeded in unfastening a button.
'Not very well, but I do have a set.' Joan exited for a moment then returned, blowing the dust from a fabric-bound board. 'Under the bed, and rather distressed.'
'I'll only distress it more. Which side do you want?'
'Black.' She sat down, pulling her chair around to face his.
They began to set up the pieces. 'That's odd. Most people choose white.'
'I suppose that I like other people to make the first move,' she murmured, not looking up.
'I'm just the opposite.'
'Are you really?'
They played for a few minutes, then Smith seemed to break off thinking about a move. 'My niece came to see me on the cricket pitch today. She's down from Newnham College. She was dressed in trousers.'
'Oh, a suffragette. Silly things. We'll get the vote sooner or later, just as Mill predicted. I don't think there's much point in burning things down.'
'No,' Smith agreed. 'There's always a way to talk yourself out of a situation. She dragged me off into the orchard.'
'You did say niece?'
'Yes. My brother's daughter. She's called Bernice. You ought to meet her. I'm sure you'd like each other.'
'Quite possibly. These bright young things take my breath away, with their motor cars and their vortexes.'
'Sorry, their what?'
'Oh, you know, Wyndham Lewis and all that. It is as if all the rules about art have been torn up. All very exciting, but they do make me feel quite old.'
'Oh, Bernice isn't that young. Thirty-two. I think.' '
Your brother must be much older than you.'
'Yes. He's a sailor. Got his nose caught in... She wanted me to see a tree.'
'Why?'
'I don't know. She tried to find something there, but couldn't. She told me it was very important.'
'Oh dear. Do you think that she could be in trouble?'
'Perhaps. I don't know. She seemed to think that I was.'
'Hmm. I could imagine you getting into trouble quite easily, but I think you would be able to get out of it, also.'
'That's not usually the way.'
'I can see you as a prefect or something, running about organizing things. Where did you go to school?'
'Well, that's complicated... An old woman taught me how to read, at my father's hearth. Her name was Sarah McLeod. She died at Culloden.'
'Oh, I'm sorry. A classical place for a McLeod to die, though.'
A sudden image had rushed into Smith's mind, contradictory to anything he could express - an old lady on the end of a bayonet. 'She was old,' he whispered. 'And then I went to a little school in London. I carried the Oxford English Dictionary in my left blazer pocket and a bag of marbles in my right. No wonder I started to lean to the left.'
Joan laughed. 'You seem to have lived several lifetimes. Like Whitman, you contain multitudes.'
'It feels that way, sometimes,' Smith agreed, missing the reference.
'Whitman also said - Oh, hello, Wolsey.' The tabby tom-cat had wandered under the table, put up a questioning paw against Joan's leg and then hopped up on to her lap. 'Are you a cat person, John?'
'Yes,' said Smith, still looking as if he was trying to organize several different thoughts that were buzzing randomly around his head. 'May I?'
Joan paused only a moment. 'Yes, of course, Wolsey loves attention. He arrived after I'd moved in here. He's a wanderer. I'm not sure how long he's planning to stay.'
Smith got up and made his way to Joan's side of the table, the chess game forgotten. He squatted beside her and gently put his fingers on Wolsey's chin. Wolsey had his eyes closed as Joan stroked his stomach, but now he opened them and rubbed the scent glands on the side of his head against Smith's fingers.
Smith trailed the tip of one finger round the back of the cat's ear as it curled itself on the white material of Joan's lap, stretching its back to be stroked. Joan ran her fingers down its back, letting Wolsey feel the tips of her nails, as Smith rubbed it under the chin with his thumb, smiling as the cat stretched its jaw forward in pleasure.
'Look, he likes this,' said Joan, her voice low. She took the base of the cat's tail gently in her hand, and smoothed it all the way down, letting go of the end with a little reflexive twitch. She repeated the action many times, shifting her weight to give Wolsey more room to turn and twist in her lap. The cat was purring loudly and unrestrainedly, opening itself up to the two pairs of hands. While Joan smoothed its tail, Smith was running the tips of his fingers along its stomach.
'My goodness,' Joan breathed. 'You must be good at that. He normally grabs people who do that and tries to bite them.'
'I'm good with cats,' Smith muttered. 'They run right up to me as if they know something I don't.'
'And do they?'
'I don't know.'
'They must feel safe in your hands.'
'They aren't. I don't keep things safe. I used to. Perhaps. I can't keep all the plates spinning. I drop some.'
Their hands collided across the soft expanse of Wolsey's stomach. Smith's hand swept right over Joan's and she kept that hand still, accepting, the tips of her fingers gently playing with the smallest swirls of the animal's fur.
A moment later, Smith's hand swept back again and she looked at the top of his head as the hand passed over hers, delighting enormously that he didn't look up and meet her gaze with something terrible and shattering like a smile.
'Well, that is always the risk, if you're a plate, isn't it?' she whispered, letting her fingers catch his cuff, but keeping her eyes firmly fixed on the fine hairs at the back of his neck. 'If you want to be spun, then you must accept the possibility of being broken.'
Slowly, his head came up to look at her, his gaze flicking uncertainly over her face, as if in search of a sign. His pupils were bigger than she'd ever seen a man's be, and she'd seen several.
'And do you - ' he gruffed, seeming to have such difficulty with the words, but with no difficulty at all in the sudden certain strength of his stare, 'accept that possibility?'
Joan paused for a moment, feeling Wolsey squirm at the sudden lack of their hands. She wetted her lips and willed herself to form the sound. 'Yes.'
He bent his head to her, and like a little boy just discovering this, took her face in his hands. They were warm and still against the skin of her cheek. She felt that, more than she'd felt anything for years. She closed her eyes. The distance between then and now hurt inside her, and she let go of the breath she'd been holding, letting herself breathe deeply and fast, remembering all the things about being married that she'd enjoyed and let herself forget. Her heart was pounding like a dance, but he was studying her, like a painter, from a distance. She opened her eyes again, and saw that he was terribly afraid.
'Yes,' she insisted. 'Yes.'
'Yes,' he said. And brought her mouth on to his. After a moment, a minute, they parted again. And kissed again, exploringly this time, now that that terrible uncertain thing was dead and they were delighting in the knowledge that this was what they both wanted to do.
Finally they stopped, and Joan let her head fall on to his shoulder, and, in a kind of unlikely stumble, they got up and shuffled back to sit together on the sofa. Wolsey fell off in disgust and stalked into the kitchen.
'May I sit on your lap?' Joan asked. 'I feel, oh, I'm blushing, like a young maid, and, I must admit, I'm rather enjoying it. You don't think me forward, do you?'
'Oh yes. ..' Smith giggled. 'Forward. As opposed to reverse. I've got all my gears mixed up.' He helped Joan as she got up, smoothed down her skirt and settled back on to his lap. 'This is so ridiculous,' she said, not being able to catch his eye as he awkwardly put an arm around her waist. 'I've been married, I shouldn't feel all nervous like this.'
'I'm, erm, nervous too,' Smith muttered. 'I don't feel as though I've ever done anything like this before.'
'I'm glad you feel like that, because I'm terribly afraid,' Joan whispered. 'You do mean you're my sweetheart, don't you, John? I'm far too old to be ruined. Not that I have been ruined yet. I mean at all. I mean - '
Smith's face hardened. 'Stand up,' he told her.
'Oh no, John...' Joan's voice sounded utterly lost. 'No, please don't. You won't tell, at least say you won't tell, I'll give you anything - '
'Hush.' Smith sternly walked into the hall and picked his hat from the peg. He positioned it carefully on his head.
Joan ran to the door, and pushed herself between it and him. She'd had time to become angry now. 'How dare you use me this way!' she demanded. 'To think I trusted you! I may be ruined tomorrow, but I'll tell you what I think of you first!'
'And what's that?' Smith grinned.
'That - ' Joan frowned. 'That... what are you grinning at?'
'I'm grinning at time. At circumstances. At my sweetheart.'
'You mean - '
He tipped up the brim of his hat, and, against her slight protest, kissed her again. 'I won't tell anyone, because I don't tell people things I can't believe. You can tell me all about it again tomorrow. And tomorrow. And tomorrow.'
Joan laughed with relief and kissed him again, longer. 'So why are you going?' she asked. 'I mean, you could stay for a little while longer at least.'
'I could - but I wouldn't want you to think anything was ruined. Least of all you.' He put a finger to her nose and opened the door. 'Good night, Joan.'
'Good night, John. Oh -' She stopped him. 'I just realized. Smith and Joan.'
'Well,' said Smith, kissing her knuckle, 'that does sound like a double act.'
And then he was gone, off into the night.
Joan gazed after him until he vanished, him turning and smiling back at her at intervals.
Then she closed the door and leant on it. 'Oh my goodness,' she exclaimed, putting a hand to her breast. 'I think I just started getting younger.'
Smith skipped down the lane, his hands in his pockets, whistling a tune that the Isley Brothers hadn't written yet, a grin that was unwipeable spread across his face.
Up ahead, he glimpsed a street lamp that hadn't ignited, the last one on the comer before the darkness of the countryside swept in.
He looked up at it and raised a hand, intending to tap the pole.
In romantic stories, the gas filament would then ignite. He tapped.
Nothing happened.
Still indomitable, he shrugged, turned and made his way off down the lane.
Behind him, a little corner of light sprang up. He glanced back at it and nodded. 'Yes.'
