The Laying on of Hands: Stories by Alan Bennett

regular revolutions. The Maya had perished, so why not Clive? But what Carl had said made sense. Of course it was Aids. No one could screw as much as he had done and go unpunished. So the sentence that had been all too briefly remitted was now reimposed and hopes momentarily raised were dashed once more. But to have been given a vision of peace of mind and then to see it snatched away made the burden even harder to bear.
    One couple held each other’s hands in mute misery. Which had slept with Clive—or both? What did it matter? Never had they been so close.
    Still, the couples who had shared Clive’s favours were better placed than husbands or wives who had known him singly. ‘What does it signify anyway,’ said a fierce-eyebrowed judge, who knew Clive only as someone who occasionally unfroze his shoulder. ‘He’s dead, that’s the essence of it.’ His wife, who was keeping very quiet, shifted in her seat slightly as she was suffering from thrush, or that was what she hoped.
    Symptoms were back generally. A pitiless quiz-show host found herself with a dry mouth. The suffragan bishop knew he had a rash. A stand-up comedian had a cold sore that didn’t seem to clear up and which was masked by make-up. Now it had suddenly begun to itch. He had a powder compact but dared not consult it. Those who were famous, though, knew better than to turn a hair. Their anxiety must be kept private and unshown for they were always under scrutiny. They must wait to share their worries discreetly with friends or, if with the general public, at a decent price from the newspapers concerned.
    Husbands who thought their wives didn’t know, put a face on it (though their wives did know very often). Wives who thought their husbands didn’t know (which they generally didn’t) masked their distraction in a show of concern for others, one, for instance, patting the shoulder of a man in front who, without looking, took the hand and held it to his cheek.
    The congregation had been given a glimpse of peace; the itch had gone, the cough had stilled, the linen was unsoiled; the pores had closed, the pus dried up and the stream ran clear and cool. But that was what it had been, a glimpse only. Now there was to be no healing. There was only faith.
    How to put this into prayer. Father Jolliffe clasped his hands and tried once more. ‘Shall we pray?’
    They settled and waited as he sought for the words.
    ‘May I speak?’
    Baulked for a second unbelievable time on the brink of intercession, Father Jolliffe nearly said ‘No’ (which is what the Archdeacon would have said, who has long since written down: ‘Hopeless. Lacks grip.’ And now inserts ‘totally’).
    Father Jolliffe searches the congregation to see who it is who has spoken and sees, standing at the back, a tall, distinguished-looking man. ‘I am a doctor,’ he says.
    This is unsurprising because it is just what he looks like. He is dry, kindly-faced and yet another one who doesn’t speak up. ‘I am a doctor,’ he repeats. ‘Mr Dunlop’s doctor, in fact. While his medical history must, of course, be confidential’—‘Must be what?’ somebody says. ‘Controversial,’ says someone else—‘I think I am not breaking any rules when I say that Mr Dunlop was a most … ah … responsible patient and came to me over a period of years for regular blood tests.’
    ‘Regular blood tests,’ goes round the pews.
    ‘These were generally a propos HIV, the last one only a week before his departure for South America. It was negative. What this fever was that he died of I’m in no position to say, but contrary to the assertions made by the gentleman who spoke earlier’—he meant Carl—‘it seems to me most unlikely, in fact virtually impossible, that it was HIV-related. Still,’ he smiled sadly, ‘the fact remains that Clive is dead and I can only offer my condolences to his grieving friends and to his aunt. Whatever it was her nephew died of, her grief must be