Billy fell deliberately and heavily on top of me, grinning fiercely with his own private pleasure, stabbing his elbows sharply into my chest and pressing me down hard on to the rigid anchorages. It hurt, and he meant it to. I kicked and rolled over, trying to get him underneath for a taste of it, but he was off like a cat at the crucial point and already aiming his boot as I stood up. I took that on the thigh and lunged accurately in return at his head. He just shook it briefly and went on punching, hard, quick, and with no respect for convention[110]; but the pleasure left his face when he continued to get everything back with interest[111].
Thankful at least that he had produced no flick knife or bicycle chain I battled on, knowing in a cold detached part of my brain that I would gain nothing even if I won. Billys resentment would be greater, not less, for being slogged by what he despised.
I did win in the end, if anyone did, but only because he had a belly full of beer and I hadnt. We were both very near to a standstill. I hit him finally very hard just below the navel, my fist sinking in deep, and he fell against the aft box[112] retching and clutching himself and sliding down on to his knees. I caught hold of one of his wrists and twisted his arm up across his back.
Now you listen, Billy, I said loudly in his ear, panting to get enough breath, I dont see any point in fighting you, but I will if you make me. You can forget Im an earls son, Billy, and take me as I am, and this is what I am. I jerked his arm. Hard, Billy, not soft. As tough as necessary. Remember it.
He didnt answer, perhaps because he was showing signs of being sick. I yanked him to his feet, pushed him across to the lavatory compartment in the tail, opened the door for him, and shoved him through. As the only lock was on the inside I couldnt make sure he stayed there, but from the sounds which presently issued from the open door, he was in no state to leave.
My own body ached from head to foot from his punches and kicks and from brisk contact with many sharp and knobbed edges, not least those spaced regularly on the floor. I sat down weakly on a straw bale and rubbed at a few places which didnt do much good, and was suddenly struck by something very odd indeed.
My face was completely unmarked.
I had bashed my head against one of the metal bars on the rear box and there was a tender swelling a little above my right ear. But Billy, I remembered distinctly, had not once even aimed at my face; not at any point higher than my throat.
For someone in the grip of obsessive fury, surely that was extraordinary, I thought. The usual impulse in such a case was to smash his face in. Billy had actually taken pains not to[113]. I didnt understand why. I thought about it all the way to Cambridge.
It was dark when we landed and the cabin lights were on. The cheerful customs man made his way through the plane, raised his eyebrows, and asked where my two mates were.
Billy is in there, I nodded towards the lavatory, and John stayed in France. He said he was coming back tomorrow.
O.K. He checked through the horses papers perfunctorily. All clear, he said, and as an afterthought: Buy anything?
I shook my head, and he grinned, helped me open the double doors, and whistled away down the ramp as soon as it was in position.
Billy had locked himself into the lavatory and refused to come out, so I had to get one of the box drivers who had arrived to collect the cargo to help me unload the horses. Unloading was always quicker and easier than loading, but I had begun to stiffen up all over with bruises[114], and I was glad when it was done. The helpful box driver led out the last horse, an undistinguished brown mare, and before turning back to tidy up I watched them step and slither down the ramp. That mare, I thought idly, was very like the one we had taken across in the morning, though the rug she wore might be misleading. But it couldnt of course be the same. No one would ship a horse out in the morning and back in the afternoon.
I turned away and began slowly to stack the box sides and the bars, wished painfully that Billy hadnt been quite so rough, and forgot about it.
The following day I went down to the wharf building and hooked Simon out for a liquid lunch[115]. We shambled down the road to the usual hideous pub and he buried his face in a pint like a camel at an oasis.
Thats better, he said, sighing, when a scant inch remained. How did yesterdays trip go?
All right.
His eyes considered me thoughtfully. Did you have a fall on Saturday?
No. A winner. Why?
Youre moving a bit carefully, thats all.
I grinned suddenly. You should see the other fellow.
His face melted in comprehension and he laughed. I imagine I have, he said. Billy has a sunset of a black eye[116].
Youve seen him? I was surprised.
Simon nodded. He was in the office this morning, talking to Yardman.
Getting his version in first[117], I suppose.
What happened? he asked interestedly.
Billy picked a fight. I shrugged. He resents my existence. Its ridiculous. No one can help what his father is. You cant choose your birth.
You feel strongly about it, Simon observed, ordering another pint. I shook my head to his invitation.
So would you, if you had to live with it. I mostly get treated as a villain or a nit or a desirable match, and not much else. I was exaggerating, but not unduly.
That last doesnt sound too bad, he grinned.
You havent had half the debs mums in London trying to net you for their daughters, I said gloomily, with your own mother egging them on.
It sounds a wow.[118] He had no sympathy for such a fate.
It isnt me they want, I pointed out. Its only my name. Which is no fun at all. And on the other end from the wedding ring I get bashed around for exactly the same reason.
Very few can feel as strongly as Billy.
I looked at him. There were the French in seventeen eighty-nine[119], remember? And the Russians in nineteen-seventeen[120]. They all felt as strongly as Billy.
The English like their aristocrats.
Dont you believe it. They dont mind them from the social point of view because titles make the scandal sheets juicier. But they make damn sure they have no effective power. They say we are a joke, an anachronism, out of date, and weak and silly. They pretend we are these things so that we are kept harmless, so that no one will take us seriously. Think of the modern attitude to the House of Lords, for example. And you you still think it funny that I want this sort of job, but you wouldnt think so if my father was a a farmer, or a pub-keeper, or a schoolmaster. But Im me, here and now, a man of now, not of some dim glorious past. I am not an anachronism. Im Henry Grey, conceived and born like everyone else, into this present world. Well, I insist on living in it. I am not going to be shoved off into an unreal playboy existence where my only function is to sire the next in line, which is what my parents want.
You could renounce your title, when you get it, Simon pointed out calmly. He spotted a pin on the bar counter and absent-mindedly tucked it into his lapel. It was such a habit with him that he sported a whole row of them, like a dressmaker.