The Betrayals(36)

Carfax was standing on the threshold of his cell, looking in. Then, belatedly, I made sense of what Felix had said: something about my having missed the fun.

Carfax looked round. Then he spread his arms and stood aside, inviting me to look.

I have no idea where Felix had got so many matches. He must have got someone to send him parcels full of them. They were scattered everywhere, like a mad game of spillikins: on the bed, the desk, the windowsill, in the washbasin, all over the floor. I caught a faint whiff of sulphur. I think I made a noise that wasn’t quite a laugh.

‘Well done,’ Carfax said, in a tight voice.

‘I didn’t—’

‘Very impressive. Very – amusing.’

‘It wasn’t me! I was with you in the library.’

‘Oh, I know,’ he said, ‘I’m your alibi as well as your victim.’ He smiled at me, without warmth. ‘Why did you follow me? To see me open the door?’

‘It wasn’t,’ I said, and then, before I could stop myself, ‘it must have been Felix. I saw him a moment ago, coming down. Didn’t you see him, too?’

‘Yes. But …’ He tilted his head to one side, his eyes hard. ‘So the familiar demon has got free of the sorcerer, has it?’

‘That’s—’ I broke off. Bloody Felix. ‘It’s not my business what he does.’

Carfax pushed at the matches on the floor with his toe, clearing a tiny patch of floorboard. Then he leant against the side of the door, his shoulders sagging. In a different voice, he said, ‘You know, Martin … I looked forward to coming to Montverre. I dreamt about it, for years. All those people studying the grand jeu, praying, making music and maths … I thought it would be like a kind of retreat. Hard, because the grand jeu is hard, but not – not like this.’

I didn’t say anything. I didn’t know what to say. The bloody matches weren’t my fault.

‘The grand jeu is worship, isn’t it? One way for humans to approach the divine. Trying to embody truth and beauty. A testament to the grace of God in the minds of men.’

‘Is that a quote from Philidor?’

It was as if he hadn’t heard. ‘Shouldn’t the grand jeu make us better people?’

I said, ‘That’s an essay question—’

‘No!’ he said. ‘No, it isn’t. It’s a real question, and the answer is yes.’ He shook his head, with a kind of grimace. ‘So why are you all such bastards?’

‘Carfax … It’s only a joke, there’s no need to be so—’

He swung round to stare into my face, his eyes narrowed. ‘Do you know why your games are shit, Martin?’

‘What?’ It took me a second to take in what he’d said. ‘They’re not shit. I came second in the year.’

‘Yes, yes, I know. Second in the year. That’s not because your games are any good, it’s because there’s nothing wrong with them. Nothing to mark down. They’re completely empty. There’s nothing in them at all, no emotion, no truth.’

‘You’ve been talking to Magister Holt,’ I said. ‘I don’t know why I’m surprised, everyone knows you’re his pet.’

‘He agrees, does he? Well, he’s right. You’re a bad player. And you know why? Because you’re nothing but a bully. The only authentic feeling you ever show is contempt. When I wrote that parody of your games, last year—’ He stumbled a little, as if he hadn’t meant to admit it, but I didn’t have time to react. ‘When they all laughed. It was because they recognised you. You. It wasn’t your juxtapositions or your minor fifths or your pretentious three-level noteplay that they were laughing at. It’s what those things cover up. You rely on gimmicks because never, not once, have you put anything of yourself into a game. We can all see it. You’re a thug and a coward and you’ll always fail at the grand jeu, because you fail as a human being.’

I forced myself to hold his gaze until he blinked and looked away.

‘They don’t hate me,’ I said, and I was pleased at how steady my voice was. ‘The rest of the class. They laughed at me once. So what? None of them think I’m a failure. They think I’m clever and amusing. They hate you.’

‘Yes, I know,’ he said. There was a pause, and he added, with a dry edge, ‘And not just occasionally.’ Then suddenly I wasn’t exactly angry any more.

He turned and went into his cell, kicking a path through the matches. He shook them off his blankets on to the floor, sat down at the foot of his bed and bowed his head.

I cleared my throat. ‘Do you think the Danse Macabre is shit?’

Another long pause. I could feel my heart beating in my jawbone, and between my teeth. ‘No,’ he said at last. ‘No, that’s different.’

‘Because of you? You’re my saviour, are you?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t know why.’

‘And of course,’ I said, ‘your games are a model of self-revelation.’

His shoulders jerked with a single, ironic cough of laughter, as if I’d made a bad joke. After a moment he reached out and brushed the matches off the nightstand. They pattered on to the floor. There was one left on his pillow and he rolled it between his finger and thumb. Then, very deliberately, he leant over and struck it against the wall.