At school it was quite normal. One never spoke about it much but it was done, that was all. Once, a sixth former whose fag he’d been took a shine to him, and there had been a boy – Farthing, his name was, like the money. Farthing was a vicar’s son so from a poor, old family like his. Ironic that. Barely a farthing between them. Once, they had sought solace with each other. And there had been some comfort in it – just to know that someone was the same as you. He still thought about the smooth line of Farthing’s back, an image of sad consolation. Even now he couldn’t be angry at Farthing, despite what he had done, the bald fact of his absolute betrayal, the shame. He couldn’t blame him because he understood the shame.

The sad business with Farthing should have prepared him for Jack. There was a moment, early on in their friendship, when he had wondered whether Jack was like him. The American had sought him out in the pub, beckoned him over. He’d looked at him slyly, willing him – or so Peter thought – to do something. There was a promiscuity about him, a look in his eyes that seemed to be always on the edge of something precarious. But Peter hadn’t dared then and he kept on not daring until it was too late. He knew something had happened in Norwich but he didn’t know what he had said or done except that Jack wasn’t the same with him any more. He feared, more than anything, that he’d made some terrible pass at Jack, and the thought of that was worse because from the way that Jack was behaving now he knew that it hadn’t been reciprocated. And now she, his clever little sister, who had always beaten him at everything, including Arthur, had done it again.

They still met in the Shipwright’s sometimes but Jack didn’t come on the shoots or to the golf course any more. Peter saw Verity go off every Sunday afternoon and he wondered if Jack had always meant to do this – to get her through him.