He speaks over her. ‘Did you stay here all vacation?’
‘Yes. Actually, I’m trying to write an exam paper, so—’
‘I thought of you,’ he says, and the words silence her like a gag. ‘I went into town a few times,’ he goes on, oblivious. ‘That’s when I bought your sweets. But most of the holiday I was staying with my mother, up north. It was horribly dull. So I spent a lot of time working. That paper you lent me, the one comparing Philidor to Schoenberg – I wrestled with it for ages. Trying to understand why I didn’t understand it.’ He gives her an amused grimace. ‘My faculty for critical thinking is pretty rusty. Then I realised why it didn’t make sense.’
‘Oh yes?’
‘Yes. Because it’s nonsense.’
‘You thought so?’ she says, tilting her head to one side. ‘That’s … interesting.’
‘You know it’s nonsense,’ he says. ‘You gave it to me deliberately. Admit it.’
She hesitates. But it’s too late. He laughs, and after a second she allows herself to join in. ‘I suppose it was a kind of test,’ she says.
And then he says, ‘You’re so like your brother.’
She stands very still. The air seems to crystallise around her, forming a layer of glass on her skin: the smallest movement might break it. Distantly – miraculously – her own voice says, ‘Yes?’
‘He’d do something like that. Try to trip me up. Dare me to call his bluff. It was his way of getting me to tell the truth …’ He swallows. ‘He taught me a lot.’
‘I’m not like him.’
‘Not in some ways, of course.’ He pauses, and she can almost see him counting the ways in which she’s different: female, older, uptight, plain, inferior. Alive. ‘But in others … He was a genius, you know. Really. The way he could play the grand jeu, the way he taught me to play it. I didn’t always understand – I was too young then, we both were – but … My word, he was talented. And … sly. Clever. He understood about games, I think. The way the whole of your life can be a game.’
‘I doubt that.’
‘All I’m saying …’ He falters to a stop. Clearly he expected her to be flattered by the comparison. It hasn’t occurred to him that her brother never made it into the third year at Montverre, and she is Magister Ludi. Then he raises his eyes and looks at her, and a trickle of fire runs down her backbone. Something has changed, in his face. He says, on an outrush of breath, ‘I did something terrible.’
She doesn’t answer.
‘It’s my fault he’s dead. Did you know that?’
She shakes her head; although what exactly she’s denying she isn’t sure. It is Martin’s fault. Almost as much as it’s hers.
He says, ‘If I could go back … I miss him. I—’
He stops, as if she’s interrupted him. But she hasn’t.
He goes on slowly, picking his words as if they’re footholds on a precipitous path. ‘I dream about him, all the time. But the last time I dreamt about him, I think I was also dreaming … about you.’
She tries to clear her throat. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘It was a good dream. You being here … my having met you … it feels …’ He bites his lip. All the irony, the charm, the urbane glint in his eyes has gone: now he’s simply telling the truth. She wants to reach out, take hold of him and rest her forehead against his; and she wants to slap his face so hard he never opens his mouth again. Can’t he see? ‘It’s as if—’
‘He’s dead,’ she says. ‘You can’t bring him back.’
‘I know that. Of course. I didn’t mean—’
‘I’m not him. You understand? I’m not Aimé.’
He nods. His jaw is set, and there are red blotches deepening around his hairline, as though she’s told him off. For God’s sake, it’s only the truth. But if it’s the truth, why does it hurt to have said it aloud? There’s a fierce ache stitching her throat and heart and gut together, tightening. And why is he looking at her like that, as if he can see how she feels?
‘Please,’ she says, ‘please don’t,’ and then she falls silent, thinking of the page she read in Martin’s diary a moment ago. Is she standing like a duellist who’s opened his arms, inviting a blow? Perhaps. Well, too bad if she is: if he steps inside her guard she’ll scratch out his eyes.
He holds her gaze for a long time. The clock chimes. A long way away a door slams, and two young voices come down the passage in a counterpoint of laughter, rising to a crescendo and fading again until another door shuts on them.
‘I must get back to—’
‘Well, I should let you work,’ he says at the same time, and they both wince and share an unconvincing smile, as though they’ve nearly collided at a blind corner. But it’s Martin who carries on, assuming he has right of way. His manner is easy again, assured; the politician is back. ‘Let me warn you, though, that I’m going to pester you this term. I have an idea for a new game, and I’m too out of practice to compose it without help.’
‘I’m not sure that I can.’
‘You offered. You did offer.’
‘Yes, but – this term, Vernal Term is tricky.’
‘I won’t be any trouble. I promise.’ He shrugs boyishly, and she can’t be bothered to point out that he’s just said he’s going to pester her. She is perfectly capable of avoiding him later. She blocks out the treacherous whisper in her head that says she might not entirely want to.
‘In the meantime,’ she says, and gestures at her desk.
‘Yes, of course.’ He bows his head in ironic obedience. ‘Oh – one more thing.’ All this time – like an amateur magician concealing a card – he’s kept one arm at his side, the hand hidden by the cloth of his trousers. Now he holds it out with a nearly casual flourish, offering her another little package. It’s smaller than the marrons glacés, but wrapped in the same blue-and-gold paper. ‘I took the liberty of …’
‘What’s that?’
‘I wondered if – I saw it, and I thought – well, after all, you don’t get to town much, and—’ He stops. Again, her reaction has fallen short of what he wanted. ‘It doesn’t matter. It’s nothing. It’s stupid.’ Now he sounds confused, accusatory. She thinks he’s going to retract his arm and storm out, without a backward glance. Instead he puts the second package on the desk, next to the other. As he steps backwards he trips against the chair and nearly falls over. Then, before she can say anything, he’s gone.
She shuts the door after him and stays there, her head close to the doorway, until his footsteps have died away. But when she finally straightens, breathing more freely, the two gaudy parcels on top of her books catch her eye, stubbornly refusing to disappear. Like a reproach? A threat? Or something else … She picks up the smaller one, weighs it in her hand, considers throwing it out of the window into the snow bank. But she’s bluffing, of course. This is what Martin does to her: she’s reduced to performing, even when she’s alone. She can’t get rid of his gaze. What is it he wants from her? What does she want from him? Nothing. Nothing.