‘Old man,’ he said.
‘Well?’
‘D’you know a bird called Telfourd Yule?’
‘His name – writer of sorts.’
‘He’s just come back from Arabia and the Soudan; he brought a yarn with him.’ Without raising his eyes, he was conscious that Wilfrid was sitting upright.
‘It concerns you; and it’s queer and damaging. He thinks you ought to know.’
‘Well?’
Michael uttered an involuntary sigh.
‘Shortly: The Bedouin are saying that your conversion to Islam was at the pistol’s point. He was told the yarn in Arabia, and again in the Libyan desert, with the name of the Sheikh, and the place in Darfur, and the Englishman’s name.’ And, still without looking up, he knew that Wilfrid’s eyes were fixed on him, and that there was sweat on his forehead.
‘Well?’
‘He wanted you to know, so he told my dad at the Club this afternoon, and Bart told me. I said I’d see you about it. Forgive me.’
Then, in the silence, Michael raised his eyes. What a strange, beautiful, tortured, compelling face!
‘Nothing to forgive; it’s true.’
‘My dear old man!’ The words burst from Michael, but no others would follow.
Desert got up, went to a drawer and took out a manuscript.
‘Here, read this!’
During the twenty minutes Michael took to read the poem, there was not a sound, except from the sheets being turned. Michael put them down at last.
‘Magnificent!’
‘Yes, but you’d never have done it.’
‘I haven’t an idea what I should have done.’
‘Oh, yes, you have. You’d never have let sophistication and God knows what stifle your first instinct, as I did. My first instinct was to say: “Shoot and be damned,” and I wish to God I’d kept to it, then I shouldn’t be here. The queer thing is, if he’d threatened torture I’d have stood out. Yet I’d much rather be killed than tortured.’
‘Torture’s caddish.’
‘Fanatics aren’t cads. I’d have sent him to hell, but he really hated shooting me; he begged me – stood there with the pistol and begged me not to make him. His brother’s a friend of mine. Fanaticism’s a rum thing! He stood there ready to loose off, begging me. Damned human. I can see his eyes. He was under a vow. I never saw a man so relieved.’
‘There’s nothing of that in the poem,’ said Michael.
‘Being sorry for your executioner is hardly an excuse. I’m not proud of it, especially when it saved my life. Besides, I don’t know if that was the reason. Religion, if you haven’t got it, is a fake. To walk out into everlasting dark for the sake of a fake! If I must die I want a reality to die for.’
‘You don’t think,’ said Michael miserably, ‘that you’d be justified in denying the thing?’
‘I’ll deny nothing. If it’s come out, I’ll stand by it.’
‘Does Dinny know?’
‘Yes. She’s read the poem. I didn’t mean to tell her, but I did. She behaved as people don’t. Marvellous!’
‘Yes. I’m not sure that you oughtn’t to deny it for her sake.’
‘No, but I ought to give her up.’
‘She would have something to say about that. If Dinny’s in love, it’s over head and ears, Wilfrid.’
‘Same here!’
Overcome by the bleakness of the situation, Michael got up and helped himself to more brandy.
‘Exactly!’ said Desert, following him with his eyes. ‘Imagine if the Press gets hold of it!’ and he laughed.
‘I gather,’ said Michael, with a spurt of cheerfulness, ‘that it was only in the desert both times that Yule heard the story.’
‘What’s in the desert today is in the bazaars tomorrow. It’s no use, I shall have to face the music.
Michael put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Count on me, anyway. I suppose the bold way is the only way. But I feel all you’re up against.’
‘Yellow. Labelled: “Yellow” – might give any show away. And they’ll be right.’
‘Rot!’ said Michael.
Wilfrid went on without heeding: ‘And yet my whole soul revolts against dying for a gesture that I don’t believe in. Legends and superstitions – I hate the lot. I’d sooner die to give them a death-blow than to keep them alive. If a man tried to force me to torture an animal, to hang another man, to violate a woman, of course I’d die rather than do it. But why the hell should I die to gratify those whom I despise for believing outworn creeds that have been responsible for more misery in the world than any other mortal thing? Why? Eh?’