Free The Centre of the Green by John Bowen

passengers appeared to queue for tea in cardboard cups. Charles ate an Individual Fruit Pie, and prepared for sleep. He would evade inquiries, and keep his secret.
    A few hours later he arrived by the early bus from Newton Abbot to find Julian asleep in his bed. At no time during the rest of the day were there any inquiries for him to evade.
    *
    “Charles?”
    “Yes, Father.”
    “This business—what do you think, eh?”
    I am not involved
, Charles thought.
It’s nothing to do with me.
He was still experiencing a sort of elation from his discovery, as if it were a weapon against despair. When the depressive fit began again, it would turn out, he knew, to be only a cardboard shield, but for the moment he felt free, unattached, not needing to pretend even to himself. “I don’t know what to think, Father,” he said. They were picking beans for supper, working down two sides of the same row. “Is this too small?”
    “No, no. Pick the lot. They grow again fast enough. I don’t know, Charles. Don’t know what I ought to do. I’m not used to dealing with you boys. I feel out of touch.”
    “I expect mother will think of something.”
    “Got the girl into trouble. Can’t just run out like that.”
    “Mother was talking to him this morning.”
    “Yes. Of course, your mother’s always … I’ve never interfered at all. It only upsets her.”
    “I shouldn’t think there’s anything we
can
do, Father. It’s up to Julian really.”
    “Yes, I suppose it is. Don’t like feeling useless though.”
    *
    “We don’t want to bother your father about this.”
    “But he is bothered, Mother.”
    “Well, he doesn’t need to be. It’s nothing to do with him, and there’s nothing he can do.”
    Charles made no comment. His mother put the basket of beans on the kitchen table near an empty colander, and began to slice them. Her knife was sharp, and took the seams off neatly. “We must all be sensible,” she said. “It’s not the first time this kind of thing has happened.”
    “To Julian?”
    “Don’t be stupid, Charles. Of course it’s the first time it’s happened to Julian. But plenty of other people have——”
    “Got girls into trouble. Yes, it’s always happening to regular soldiers. Father was telling me.”
    Mrs. Baker tightened her lips, and continued to slice the beans for supper.
    Charles said, “Mother, isn’t this girl under age? Julian could go to prison.”
    “Age? What’s age got to do with it? A girl like that!”
    “I don’t care what sort of girl she is. It wouldn’t matter if she’d locked Julian in the pantry and pulled his clothes off with her own hands. As long as she’s under age, he’s still responsible. That’s the law.”
    “How old——?”
    “Eighteen, I think. Or is it sixteen? I suppose we’d better find out. It’s serious, Mother.”
    “What’s serious?” said Julian, bringing an empty teacup into the kitchen. “Am I too late for breakfast?”
    Charles looked at him without replying, and Julian said, “Oh!” Then he said, “Let me help you with thosebeans, Mother.” Mrs. Baker, her voice carefully under control, said, “Charles thinks you can go to prison”.
    “Why?”
    “Under age,” Charles said.
    “I never thought of that. She’s seventeen.”
    “Then you’re either all right by a year, or all wrong by a year. You might have taken the trouble to check up.”
    “Charles, how can you, when your brother——” Mrs. Baker put down her knife, and turned away from the table. “When he needs us so.”
    Charles, still seeing himself and all of them at one remove, examined Charles’ heart, and found nothing there but mischief. “Doesn’t he need Father too?” he said.
    “Christ!” Julian said. “Could they really send me to prison?” Even as he spoke the words, even as he began to feel the now familiar symptoms of fear and fog and nausea, another part of him was thinking that if only it weren’t for the publicity and embarrassment of