The Betrayals(51)

‘I – wait,’ she says. ‘Léo—’

It’s the first time she’s used his first name. It makes him respond too soon, too eagerly. ‘Yes?’

‘I want you to know that I – I wish – if things had been different, maybe I would have …’ she says again, and tails off. Something is moving in her face. Ice on the edge of thawing. Fragility that seemed solid, a moment ago. ‘Never mind.’ She makes a quick, abortive gesture, as if she’s going to offer her hand and then thinks better of it. ‘Goodbye.’

Léo stares at her. She’s worked so hard to make him believe that she despises him, but for a moment … He wonders what she would do if he took her hand without giving her the chance to back away. He says, ‘Goodbye, then. I’ll see you next term.’

‘Next term?’ There’s a second of silence. Then the colour in her cheeks deepens and spreads. ‘You’re coming back? I thought you meant …’

‘Yes, I’m coming back.’ Emile’s last letter hinted that he might be able to leave Montverre at the end of the Vernal Term, if he was lucky. But even if Emile has kept Léo’s reputation alive, there’s nothing for him in the Ministry for Culture. He’ll have to start again from the bottom, or find something else – local government, perhaps, or a job in the scrapyard business. He’s not sure any more that he’s looking forward to it.

‘Oh. I see.’ She rubs her face with the inside of her wrist, as if she can wipe away the wash of pink. Belatedly he understands, and wants to laugh. That’s why she was almost kind: because she thought she was rid of him for ever. Now she’s regretting it.

The flush in her cheeks and forehead is like red light falling on her, like an untimely sunrise or sunset. Her eyes flicker to him and away. Something twists inside him, wringing tighter and tighter. He knows where he is, and when – of course, he’s sane, he’s sober – but he’s twenty again, a scholar again, in the music room with Carfax, laughing at his own joke. The way Carfax raised his head, the smile that was like a crack in his armour, the bloom of colour under his skin – exactly the same, subtle and unmissable, like a hoar frost melting … A second ago, he wanted to reach out to her from sheer mischief: now it’s something else, something much more dangerous. He blinks, trying to see the differences between her face and Carfax’s, trying to break the spell. The softness along her jawline, creases by her eyes, escaping wisps of long hair brushing the side of her neck. But it’s like an optical illusion: no matter how hard he tries – how certain he is that the picture is a vase, not two faces – he can’t make himself see her clearly. Carfax is there, on her face, like a mask. His stomach clenches.

‘What is it?’ she says. Her voice does what her face couldn’t, wrenching him back to the present. ‘Are you all right?’

‘Quite. Thank you.’

She glances at her desk. ‘I’m afraid I must get back to work.’

‘Yes. Yes, I should go and pack my things.’ He shuffles towards the door again, but something prevents him going immediately. ‘How is the Midsummer Game coming along, by the way?’

She glances at him, sits down and starts to unscrew the lid of her fountain pen. ‘Happy New Year, Mr Martin.’

‘Happy New Year.’

‘Oh – and take this, please.’ She nods at the brandy. ‘It’s generous of you, but I don’t want it.’

Their eyes meet, a level, intimate stare. It’s not about the brandy – somehow he has no doubt that she’d drink it, if it came from someone else – but about scoring a point. And she thinks he’s the one who plays games? For an instant his irritation flares; then some other emotion takes hold of him. Slowly he reaches for it. ‘All right,’ he says, ‘if you insist. But on one condition.’

‘What’s that?’

‘That you let me bring you something else instead.’ He goes on speaking as she’s about to answer. ‘Whatever you want. You must want something. Please. It would give me pleasure.’ He doesn’t know himself how much of his pleading is real, and how much is a stratagem.

‘What makes you think I care about your pleasure, Mr Martin?’

‘You found games you thought I’d like.’

His heart is drumming in his fingers, around the neck of the bottle. It’s as if the pulse is in the glass. He’s pushed her; now she’ll order him out, and refuse to speak to him again.

Suddenly she grins. ‘A box of marrons glacés, then.’

‘Is that all?’

Her grin subsides into something more ironic, more guarded, and she doesn’t answer. She bends over her notebook and waves him away; but she’s still smiling as he bows himself out of the door, like a music-hall butler.

He stands in the corridor, and he realises that he’s grinning too. It takes him a second to identify what he’s feeling: and then – with a jolt of disbelief – he realises that he was flirting with her. With Magister Dryden … As though she’s a woman like any other, who can be bought with bonbons and jewels and pastel-coloured Russian cigarettes. As though she’s Chryse?s, who can only be undressed if she’s been dressed first at Léo’s expense, in something chic and silky and beautifully cut. An incongruous picture flashes through his mind’s eye: Magister Dryden in Schiaparelli pink, or a Mainbocher suit. It makes him laugh, but the picture has a rough edge to it that leaves a splinter under his skin. Under Magister Dryden’s white gown, she is a woman. A woman to whom he’s promised to bring a box of sweets. He’d’ve thought – if she asked for anything – it would have been books.