I knew then that he might kill us both. That he himself did not know why.

'Right now, Mark.'

He took his foot off the accelerator pedal. The speedometer needle wound backwards: 90, 80, 70. As we got to 70, we finally passed a lay-by and the Volvo pulled off the road. As we drove past, I saw the mother turn round to comfort her children. Both were tearful. The boy had been sick.

We drove the remaining ten miles at a slower pace. Mark became thoughtful as we went and, after fifteen minutes or so had passed, he said, 'You know, James, I've noticed that when you drive, you always leave a big space between you and the car in front. And as you drive, you let the space get bigger and bigger. If they slow down, you slow down more. If they speed up, you don't speed up quite so much. Why do you think that is?'

'It's called road safety, Mark. You should try it.'

'No,' he said, 'I don't think that's it.'

'OK, Mark, you tell me. Why?'

He pursed his lips.

'I think,' he said, 'I think it's because you like to let people get away from you. You know. You don't like being chased, you like to be the one who pursues. But you can't pursue too hard, or they'll realize you're interested. So you're always tagging along behind people, slowly letting them get away.'

My voice became very level, very tight. I said, 'I have never heard anything so incredibly, pathetically stupid. Do you honestly think that you can derive some cod-psychological truths about me from the way that I drive? And after the performance you have just given, which fucking one of us do you really think has the problem, Mark? How can you think you have any right to lecture me about my personality?'

He looked at me, smiling. 'It's true though, isn't it? I expect that's what Father Hugh wanted to tell you too.' He looked back at the road, spun the wheel in his hands and turned the Dino into the pub car park.

11.

Second year, May, fifth week of term When did I begin to be afraid to answer the telephone? Here in San Ceterino we have an answerphone set so that the phones barely ring before Mark's recorded voice requests, drily, that a message be left. When Mark isn't at home I hover by the machine, listening to the call, my hands by my sides, gauging my own response to the idea of speaking to them. Often it's a friend of Mark's from the village, less often a member of his family or one of their financial representatives, least often my parents or Anne telling me a piece of family news in their small, bitter voices. I listen to the recording being made; I stand waiting until the person hangs up. I allow the messages to accumulate, then I delete them. Mark is different: he either picks up the phone impulsively, surprised if the person on the other end isn't entirely delightful, or fails to listen to the messages at all. But then, it's not Mark who's had to receive the calls about him and the things he has done over the years. It's not Mark who's had to decide what to do about them.

There is this to be said for Mark: he never, despite all his wealth and connections, showed the slightest interest in joining the ranks to which that wealth and those connections would have given him instant access. He never cared to attend drinks with the Master of his college, although he was invited with great frequency. He never took sherry with Bill Clinton at Rhodes House, though he received an embossed invitation, hand-delivered. He certainly never belonged to one of those exclusive all-male dining societies which still blight the face of Oxford, although he did once list for us in alphabetical order all the members of the Bullingdon Club he'd ever shagged or snogged. And when Franny angrily informed us that some male members of the Jewish Society, in a depressing attempt to introduce the same misogynist practices as the rest of Oxford to that institution, had formed an all-male dining society, Mark's only comment was, 'My darling, I guarantee you that each and every one of them will meet a bad end. I shall personally see to it if you like.'

It was in that light that he was critical of Father Hugh. The monk was a visitor to the house two or three times in the summer of our second year, always on the pretext that he had 'happened past' and never staying for too long. He never gave the slightest indication that he and I had spoken privately except that, when he made his goodbyes his handshake with me might have lingered a little longer, and his invitation, 'I do hope to see you at the hall,' might have been made to me with a more fixed gaze.

'He's a horrible snob,' said Mark to us after one of these visits. 'He's only interested in bringing on the boys from the good families. He loves nothing better than getting invited to the House of Lords. As if I spoke to any of those people.'

Father Hugh did not attempt to contact me again that term. It was left to me to contact him and I did not, at first, think I would have any reason to do so.

The notorious 'fifth week blues' had struck; the day was cold, grey and melancholy. Jess was working and Emmanuella was still in bed she often stayed in bed all day if the weather was cold, huddled up in a fur coat, reading and sipping hot chocolate.

I was in the kitchen, the warmest part of the house, flicking through the paper and putting off minute by minute the moment when I would have to return to my work, when the telephone rang. I answered it.

'James?' It was Mark. 'James,' he said, 'you have to come. I've been arrested.'

'What?' I said. 'I mean, why? What have you done? What's happened?' And I thought the worst, it must be the very worst, after all he had done. When he did not answer, I said, 'Is someone hurt, Mark? Have you ... is someone hurt?'

He breathed in and breathed out and said airily, 'Oh, James. You do make a performance out of a drama. It's just cottaging. Come down and bring me a change of clothes. I've been here all night. Hurry up please, they only gave me 20p.'

I can't say why I did what I did next. Only perhaps that I was afraid, or felt that something was promised. I pulled Isabella's card from my wallet. I turned it over. On the back, Father Hugh had written his private Oxford number. After a little consideration, I dialled.

'Benet's?' said the voice on the other end.

'Oh,' I said, 'I was hoping to speak to Father Hugh.'

The porter sighed and I heard the sound of papers turning.

'He's out,' the porter said at last.

'Can I leave a message?'

Another sigh.

'Could you tell him that James rang? James Stieff? It's about Mark. He's at the police station because ...' I stopped. What was I going to say to this porter? I couldn't tell him the whole business, ridiculous. 'Actually,' I said, 'never mind. Don't worry about it. I'll speak to him another time. Sorry to trouble you.'

A final lingering sigh.

'That's it then?' said the porter.

'Yes,' I said, 'thanks.'

It was by no means as bad as it could have been. By the time Jess, Emmanuella and I arrived at the police station most of the formalities had already been dealt with. Mark had been questioned but not charged. Police bail was to be arranged.

We met him in a waiting room. He looked dishevelled and exhausted. I handed him the carrier bag of clothes I'd taken from his bedroom. He nodded and attempted a half-smile. This was not the bravado I'd heard in his voice when he called. This Mark, saddened if not chastened, was surprising to me.

I was even more startled when Emmanuella asked, in a cool voice, 'Did you use condoms?'

Mark nodded. Jess and I exchanged a quick look. We had expected more naivety from her, and more judgement.

Emmanuella looked at him, then pulled out a cigarette and offered him one too. 'Still,' she said, 'you must be tested for ... SIDA how do you say that?'

'AIDS,' said Mark. 'And I don't have it. I was tested a couple of months ago.'

I stared at the floor. It seemed impossible, but there was graffiti there someone had drawn a penis pointing towards the table in indelible black marker. I found that I profoundly did not want to be contemplating Mark's sex life. It wasn't that I was disgusted by it, although I had never found the idea in any way alluring, but I found this image sordid. Anonymous encounters and prison cells and AIDS tests. I thought of the comfort and companionship of my life with Jess, of our cosy bed with its clean white sheets and patchwork counterpane. I felt a shred of sympathy for Father Hugh's opinion. Where were all Mark's lovers now?

He seemed to think something along the same lines, for he took up Jess's hand suddenly and rested his cheek on it.

'Thank you for coming for me,' he said. 'I knew you would. You always would, wouldn't you?'

Jess put her arm around his shoulders.

He looked up at us from his seat. 'Let's go home.'

Later that evening the rest of us had a conversation the kind of conversation we seemed to have a great deal in our final eighteen months at Oxford and subsequently around the question of what could be done about Mark.

Simon, his legs up on the elephant-foot stool, was unconcerned.

'It's just normal, isn't it?' he said. 'That's just the way Mark is, and it's not as if he's done anything dangerous, is it?'

I had not mentioned his driving to any of them but Jess.

'If you ask me,' said Franny, 'it's the normal response of any bloke who went to a public school. They all come out mad. Either totally repressed or totally unable to control themselves.'

'Hmmm,' said Jess, 'but he wasn't at public school for long, was he? It's more down to his mother, I think. Hyper-critical, hyper-indulgent. No wonder he's confused.'

I wondered about all of this. There seemed to be more to Mark's personality to me than could be easily explained away by reference to his upbringing. Some urge towards self-destruction that was more primal than that. I thought of the figure on the crucifix, and of the ease of Mark's circumstances, and of a phrase I had seen written in one of Mark's essays: 'A pain-free life is unbearable.'

I wanted to explain this but all I could come up with was, 'I don't think he can change. Not by himself.'

The group nodded and became quiet.

'Do you not think,' said Emmanuella after a while, 'that we must save him? For his own good, rescue him?'

'That'd be fine,' said Simon amicably, 'if it were, you know, not completely impossible.'

Emmanuella was silent.

'I don't know, Manny,' said Franny, popping a grape into her mouth from the fruit bowl on the table, 'isn't salvation something only your God can offer?'

I had come to know Father Hugh's notes by their envelopes, by the curlicued hand and the slight cigar whiff of them. And the next morning, when one arrived at Annulet House, I knew that something had gone wrong with my calculations.

James, Written in haste. I received a garbled message yesterday afternoon from you regarding our young friend. Called at the house this evening, no answer. I am concerned, as I am sure you can imagine. Please call me at once; I am in contact with Rome.

Yours sincerely, Fr Hugh This note threw me into a panic. It was 9 a.m. and Mark might be awake or asleep, there was no way of knowing. The reference to Rome was ominous. Had Father Hugh consulted with Isabella or with the Vatican? Was Mark's mother on her way here at this very moment? I telephoned at once.

'James.' Father Hugh's voice was calm and even. 'I'm so glad you've called. Tell me precisely what's happened, please.'

'Um,' I said, 'it was nothing, Father Hugh, nothing really. It's been sorted out now. I didn't mean to leave you a message. I thought I'd told the porter not to.'

'I'm glad to hear it's been sorted out, James, but what actually happened?'

'Oh, it was nothing, not really.'

'George mentioned a police station, James.'

I wondered suddenly what Father Hugh could do if he suspected I was lying to him. Could he call my college? Report me to the university?

'I ... made a mistake.'

'A mistake?'

'Yes, I, it was just a joke, just one of Mark's jokes.'

Father Hugh was silent for a moment.

'George said you sounded quite alarmed,' he said.

'Oh, I ... Well, yes, I was taken in by it myself.'

'What sort of a joke,' said Father Hugh, 'was he making?'

'Umm ...' I said, 'nothing. He didn't say anything. I made a mistake.'

'James,' said Father Hugh, 'I think I understand. You should come and see me in my office, where we can talk privately. Without any chance of being overheard. Come this afternoon, James.'

And I thought again of my college and of Father Hugh's influential friends and of the fact that Mark might come down at any moment.

'Yes, Father Hugh,' I said.

Mark was up early that morning. He was subdued and restive, moving from room to room, making himself cups of coffee and leaving them to get cold. I told him, in as few words as possible, about my blunder with Father Hugh. When I'd finished he took a deep breath in and let it out slowly.

'It doesn't matter,' he said, lighting a cigarette with trembling hands. 'Tell him. What does it matter?'

'Seriously?'

He drew deeply on his cigarette. His fingernails were tobacco-stained.

'What's the worst they can do? Only take the house away and send me to some horrible clinic somewhere.'

'Really?' It was so hard to know which of the things he said were real and which imagined.

He smoked his cigarette down to the quick and began another.

'Listen, James,' he said, 'I'm only telling you this because my family seem to want to get their claws into you. They think you're my friend. I don't know why. Probably because you took the blame for the music box. It doesn't matter.' He sighed. 'You remember I told you that I had a breakdown? It was after my parents split up, when my mother was dragging me round Europe with the idea of giving me an education. It wasn't anything serious. I took too many drugs and got into a few fights. But you know how religious people are. My mother sent me to live with a bunch of monks.' He smiled. 'As if she thought there was no such thing as a gay monk. Anyway, it's all over now. I've been better for years. But I'm trying not to give them an excuse to tell the trustees to stop my money, OK? That could make it difficult.'

'Right,' I said.

'That's all though. Just temporarily difficult.'

'Yes,' I said.

He lit another cigarette.

Father Hugh was waiting again with sherry and beaming smiles.

'James,' he said, 'how marvellous of you to come. Now we can have a proper chat.'

'Yes,' I said, accepting the sherry and seating myself on the sofa.

'I was glad that you telephoned, James. I entirely understand that one can't always be as direct as one might wish about such things. Especially not in a shared house, shared spaces. But now, tell me what happened.'

'Nothing happened, Father Hugh.'

Father Hugh's smile cracked a little.

'Nothing? Come, come. There's no need to prevaricate now.'