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"Well," said Bracy, surveying the rooms he had taken off Jermyn Street. "It shall do, don't you think, Gedge?"
"Yes, sir," said that young man, looking about him in some dismay at the dark furniture that had come with the rooms, and touching the nearest chair with some trepidation. "Are all these rooms for us, then, sir?" he went on, his tone suggesting some suspicion, perhaps, that they should be joined by lodgers in the near future.
"Yes, of course," said Bracy carelessly. He flung himself into a chair, saying, "Sit, Bill, sit. You make me quite tired to see you as upright as if you are on parade!" He smiled as Gedge lowered himself gingerly to sit upon the very edge of the chair nearest the door, acting for all the world as if he expected the heavy wood to smash beneath him into kindling. "Why, Bill," smiled Bracy, "You should be more comfortable - this is your home."
"I ain't had a home like this before," muttered Gedge. "I'm afraid I'll break something and the landlord will throw us out on the street."
"If we break something we shall simply replace it," said Bracy. "Come now, my lad, no need to look so glum! Come here -" he said, holding out a hand encouragingly. Gedge stood with some signs of relief that his slight frame no longer put, as he seemed to think, the chair upon which he sat into danger of collapse. He took the few steps needed to put him by Bracy, and enfolded the outstretched hand in his own, turning it and bringing it gently up to touch his lips against the palm.
"That little room," said Gedge, his voice a little muffled but clear enough for the mischief to be heard, "That's where I'll be sleeping, is it, sir?"
"Why, yes," said Bracy warmly. "Just as soon as we may move the bed from the main bedroom in there."
"How will you ever fit something so big into such a tight small space?" asked Gedge gaily.
"It might be hard at first, but with perseverance I think you'll find such manoeuvres become easier," said Bracy cheerfully. He laughed, pulling Gedge towards him. "You shall not mind, I hope, keeping me company? Perhaps we should leave the bed where it is for a little while?"
"I'll keep you company wherever you like, sir," said Gedge stoutly. He grinned as Bracy pulled him the last inch or two further off-balance that was needed to make him fall forwards on top of him. "I'll keep you company right here," murmured Gedge as Bracy's arms went about him.
"Let's make these rooms our own, shall we?" said Bracy, and was rewarded with Gedge making every demonstration of his willingness in such an endeavour.
* * *
The rooms were not, Gedge decided, quite as foreboding as he had thought at first. While he still considered it wasteful in the extreme that two men should have so much space assigned to them merely in which to exist, he could find it within himself to laugh at such a thought. "Why, Bill," he said to himself, "Do you think a gentleman lives like a soldier? Just because you're used to tight quarters in the army, it don't mean Mr Bracy wants to lower hisself to your level." He frowned then at this thought, for it seemed to him that if he were indeed merely Bracy's servant, rather than his friend, he would see nothing wrong with one man needing several rooms in which to live and would consider it rather merely in the natural order of their lives. "Why, I do think he ought to live like I'm used to, rather than me living as he wants," he thought in surprise. "That ain't fair on him! And it ain't like me, least I hope it's not, to be having thoughts above myself like that!" Dissatisfied with himself, he turned his attention to the neatening of the sheet corners on the bed, then hurried out to see that the fires were drawing well in all the rooms.
"Will you have toast, Bill?" asked Bracy, applying himself to the task of spearing slices of day-old bread upon a toasting fork, and holding it out to the flames. A kettle of water sat on the iron trivet on the grate, the water heating for their breakfast cups of tea.
"That fire'll do better in a little," said Gedge, looking fiercely upon the grate to indicate the flames had best heed his words if they knew what was good for them. "Yes, thank you. I'm awful hungry this morning!"
Bracy smiled at him apologetically. "I wish it were easier for us in the provision of food," he said as Gedge shrugged in a casual manner to indicate it did not bother him overmuch, for, in an effort to preserve as much privacy as they might, Bracy had refused the offer the landlord had made of the services of the housekeeper for his own rooms beneath theirs. Gedge had agreed to this without hesitation, fearing that the woman might bear tales back down to her employer after bearing food up to their rooms. That it had made meals more than a little difficult, however, Gedge could not deny, for the rooms were not equipped with their own kitchen or pantry and it was necessary, therefore, to bring food in on a daily basis. "I received an invitation to dinner tonight," said Bracy in an even more apologetic tone. "Philip Bellingham - a schoolfriend - has invited me to his club -" he paused, looking into the fire. "I could say no," he went on.
"Go to yer friend's club," said Gedge, plucking the fork from Bracy's fingers before the toast could become quite blackened. "Don't you worry about me." He thought no more of the conversation until that evening when, after a supper of bread and cheese, he found himself walking aimlessly from room to room, as if he were searching for the missing Bracy.
"Don't you act so queer," he told himself sternly. "Is the man not to be allowed out of yer sight, then? Oh!" he ejaculated, "How I wish we was back in India!"
He sat disconsolately by the fire, thinking of the happy weeks he had spent after Bracy had procured his discharge, tending to Bracy's every wish as they waited for the ship back to England. "No one cared what we did or who we was," he thought, "And a man could get food in his own lodgings without worrying what was being said behind his back!" He jabbed the poker savagely into the coals, wondering if Bracy had really enjoyed that time as much as he said. Perhaps he had pined for an English cook rather than the elderly man employed as much for his lack of skill or interest in speaking English as for Bracy's publicly stated purpose of showing kindness to a man who had been previously in the employ of the army. Perhaps, thought Gedge, such suspected homesickness was why Bracy had wanted to return to England, rather than staying, as indeed Gedge would have preferred, had he had but the firmness within him at the time to ask for his own desires to be met.
"It's different when you've got something worth comin' back to," he told himself. "It's not like Mr Bracy was comin' back ter memories of scrapin' by and worryin' all the time." He raked his fingers through his sandy hair, disarranging it from the neatness in which he was accustomed to keep it. "Blast!" he thought in a vulgar way, "I should get this cut back to army standards! Ah, calm yerself, Bill. He'll be back by and by, and yer not to let him see you've been such an idiot while he was gone." With further such admonishments he made himself sit quietly, and repair at last alone to bed, where he fell asleep, curled up at the edge, as if to give space to an awaited friend.
* * *
"I'll take them, sir," said Gedge, neatly intercepting Bracy's attempt to lift the cooked ox tongue and ham the butcher had parcelled up. Cold meats were not the most exciting of foods to Bracy in wintertime, Gedge knew, but he himself was looking forward to a simple luncheon. "There's still plenty of milk for the tea, oh, I'll be glad of a cup when we get in!" he thought, relieved that he had slipped out from under Bracy's arm to run downstairs at dawn when he heard the milkman's horse. The day before he had slept too soundly and the little remaining in the jug had been emptied long before supper. Such laziness in himself annoyed Gedge, though he knew Bracy did not hold it against him. Now, however, he felt quite gay as he followed his friend from shop to shop, buying such foods as were easily stored and prepared by young men who knew little of the culinary arts. Nothing had been planned for the rest of the short December day, though Bracy had drawn his attention to the times stated in the newspaper for the burlesque opera The Merry War, being performed in the Alhambra. "It'd please him if I said I'd go," thought Gedge, remembering how Bracy had been most particular to stress that persons of all classes attended. He kept a cheerful expression on his face as he wondered if Bracy would sit in a box while he sat in the stalls. "No point thinking about it," he told himself sternly.
"Bracy, I say!" said a dark-haired young man, stopping just ahead of Bracy. "What a pleasure to see you again so soon!"
"Bellingham!" cried Bracy gaily. "You are looking well, I must say! This is -" He half-turned towards Gedge and stopped, a look of some confusion on his open face, an expression quickly replaced by worry. "This is a fine day for December, is it not?" he said awkwardly.
"Most unseasonal," agreed Bellingham. "I say, old chap, it's getting near lunchtime - won't you come to the club with me?"
"Oh," said Bracy. "I had just bought these meats and bread -" he gestured vaguely towards Gedge.
"That's no food for a man at this time of year! Come on, Bracy, it'll do you good to see people now you're back in civilisation!"
"I so recently accepted your invitation to dinner," said Bracy helplessly, "I shouldn't like to make a burden of myself -"
"Nonsense! Come along, I insist! Oh, for heaven's sake, Bracy -" said Bellingham with a laugh, "Let your man take the shopping back to your rooms and come along!"
As Bracy looked his way in annoyance at Bellingham's insistence Gedge stepped a little closer. "Was there anything else you wanted me to get, Mr Bracy?" he said, forestalling anything Bracy might utter.
"No," Bracy said, then stronger, "No, Gedge. That's all. Wait!" he said as Gedge nodded and turned. "Take a cab, that's too much to carry through the streets. Here -" he said, putting coins in Gedge's hand.
"Thank you, sir," Gedge said, smart as if he were talking to an officer, and walked off before Bracy could say anything else.
* * *
Gedge had long finished his sandwiches and his cups of tea, and had everything neatly put away, when the door opened and Bracy came in, wild-eyed.
"Bill!" cried Bracy, "Oh, Bill, I'm sorry!"
"You're back sooner'n I expected," said Gedge. "Not a big lunch, was it?"
"I made my excuses as soon as I might," said Bracy. "I'm sorry, Bill -"
"For what? A man's got to see his friends, don't he?"
Bracy took a breath. "You don't."
Gedge crooked a smile at him, wondering what he would say of his life as a soldier, let alone his life as it now was to the boys he'd grown up with, or how he could explain his position to them. "It's a bit of a trek over to the East End on a work day, sir."
"You're not my servant!" Bracy said, louder, as it seemed, than he had intended, for he paused cautiously for a moment thereafter. "You're not," he said.
"But I got to seem to be," said Gedge. He smiled more openly. "Come on, sir, we talked about this."
"Earlier," said Bracy, seizing his shoulders, "I was going to introduce you to Bellingham. I wanted to, Bill, but I - couldn't."
"Of course you couldn't," Gedge said. "I'm not insulted. He'd have thought the sun in India went to yer head, if you'd introduced me!" Silly though the thought was, he felt a little sliver of warmth at the idea that Bracy had wanted to do such a thing.
"It suddenly occurred to me," said Bracy, still holding his shoulders, "That here in London I shall meet many people I know. They will want me to dine with them, they will want me to ask them to dinner in return, they shall invite me to balls and to their houses in the country and will in time want to tell me of the impeccable characters of their sisters and spinster cousins. They shall do their best to ensure I am not left alone and dull by myself and shall take me away from spending time with you. I thought that we could live here, that we could have a good life as we wanted, but I was mistaken about London."
"Oh," thought Gedge. "He sees it now, the sorts of things he didn't before give thought to giving up. If only we'd stayed in India!" He drew a deep breath, thinking he should be kind, that Bracy might remember him gently. "That's the kind of life you were born to have," he said softly. "There's no one could blame you if -" He gasped, his breath cut off as Bracy embraced him strongly.
"Don't you dare!" said Bracy. "Don't, Bill. There's no choice to make, or at least it's one I've already made."
Gedge closed his eyes, and uttered a wordless sound of relief before putting his arms about his friend, and kissing his face. "All right, then," he said. "What are we going to do, Edmund?"
"We're going to need to leave London," Bracy said. "We can find a house far enough out in the country to make it inconvenient for people to bother us, and we can just live as we want. The people near by may think we're a queer sort, but they'd think that of anyone who came from the city - you know how people are in the countryside!"
"Well, I don't," Gedge said, laughing. "I c'n find out, though." He stroked Bracy's hair back, smiling into his face. "I'll still have to live as yer servant, you know that, don't you?"
"I want you to live as my friend," Bracy said urgently. "I want to have a life where I can introduce you as my friend."
"That'd be nice," said Gedge, "But it ain't anything we're going to get soon. So we've got to be sensible, you hear me? And if that means living quiet as yer servant in the country, then that's what I'm happy with."
"You're sure?" Bracy said happily, "If you wanted to stay in London for part of the year we could manage."
"I'm sure if you are," said Gedge. "If you're set on livin' in England, the place don't matter to me. I left a more interesting place than London to be with you. You find me somewhere I can do just that."
"Thank you," breathed Bracy. "Thank you." He kissed Gedge soundly, over and over. "I'll do my best to make sure it's not boring," he said. "Anything you want to do, we'll do it. What would you like?"
"I think tonight we should go to the Alhambra," said Gedge, smiling at the pleasure in Bracy's face. "And be sensible there - if persons of various stations are mixing, that's fine, but I'd look a right monkey in a box seat!" He clutched Bracy tight, and grinned wickedly at the thought that he'd been chosen over a gentleman's life in town, even here where Bracy could see what he was really losing. "Right now, I want to go to bed and I want to stay there till we're almost late for your theatre. That all right with you, Edmund?"
As Bracy laughingly pulled him towards the bedroom, Gedge felt at last - now he knew they should leave them as soon as ever they might - that the rooms had finally become his home.