Yet to call him up because I was in a mess and needed his help would be humiliating. Later, after I had recovered, we would be able to talk on equal terms. Would he want to talk to me? He might have come to think of himself as the injured party in our relationship. He had had nothing to do with my parents' death; he had never done me any harm. All I had against him was that he should have told me about his conviction, that was all. He had served a prison sentence for what he had done; what gave me the right to punish him a second time?
If we were to get together again, surely being honest with each other was the way, not for me to start out by concealing my vulnerability and weakness from him. The sooner he knew what had happened to me, the better my chance of getting him back. At last I did what I should have done that evening when Andrew had revealed their secret in the restaurant: I called Tom on his mobile 'phone. When the ringing tone stopped I heard his voice for the first time in months.
'Hello Tom, it's me.'
'How are you doing?'
'Something terrible's happened.'
'I heard. You've been mugged. Darren's just been on the 'phone. Is there someone there to look after you? I'm sorry, Mark, this is all my fault.'
'Of course it's not your fault. Darren rang you?'
'There wasn't any harm in it, Mark. He's rung me a couple of times to keep me in touch with things, that's all. He wasn't being disloyal to you or nothing. Thank god you've rung anyway. Shall I catch the train? Only take me a few hours to get back to London.'
'No, you don't have to do that, your work down there...'
'Doesn't matter. I'll tell them it's an emergency. If you'd like me to come.'
'Yes, I really would like you to come, but you don't have to rush, don't cause yourself problems. I look ghastly. Horrific.'
'You shouldn't talk about yourself like that. I'll go down to the station and call you from there. Won't be long mate.'
Bringing him back was as easy as that. An hour later I struggled upstairs and sat in the office reading the newspaper, waiting for him to arrive. A dozen times I heard the front door open and looked up full of hope, only to be disappointed by the sound of one of the guests making his way upstairs. At last there was a loud knock and his voice called down the hall: 'Darren, Mark, anyone about?'