"That fragrance is not designed to attract women, it's designed to appeal to men! But I'm not keen on the scent of women, either. Maybe that's what marks us out as gay."
Chapter Twenty-seven
The Candlemas term
Early in the Candlemas term, Luke decided that he should be looking at possible future jobs. As our futures were closely bound to one another, we had to keep our career planning in step. He went to see Marcello Fabioni and asked him how he should go about getting a job in Italy. Luke loved Marcello and Caterina. They had been like second grandparents to him, and Caterina was his godmother. Marcello said "I know just the type of job that you need. Something that involves music, people and your linguistic skills, and something typically Italian that you would scarcely get in this country: opera house management. There are practically no training courses in that area, certainly not in England, it's something that you learn on the job. I have contacts in opera houses all over Italy: I'll see what I can do. When would you be able to start?"
"Not before January next year," Luke said. He had to allow time for me to get my Master's degree completed.
"OK," said Marcello, "that's a good timescale for looking now. Everything in the international musical world is set up years in advance. I'll see what I can do!"
Our life continued that term in its usual fashion. Sometimes I had to spend long hours in the lab. Although we were not encouraged as juniors to stay in the lab beyond 5-30 pm, the work I was engaged in sometimes demanded a few hours in the evening, supervised for safety purposes by one of Dr Mills's postdocs, of whom he had a team of three, and four Ph.D. students. I knew that he would have liked me to stay on and join his team, but he knew my commitment to Luke meant my departure for Italy. If I had to spend the odd evening in the lab, Luke would come and eat with me at the Whale and Wheelbarrow, a pub in Laboratory Road, quite close to the chemistry lab. Occasionally too, he would come and have lunch with me in the chemistry canteen. I was making good progress with my project, already my name was on a paper in press as co-author. There's nothing like being a published author to stimulate hard work and creativity!
Prior to partial retirement from artistic work, Luke's father David was doing a tour of the United Kingdom, which involved recitals in Reading, Bristol, Plymouth, Cardiff, Swansea, Birmingham, Camford, Oxbridge, and eight other places. He was due to perform in Camford on Wednesday of the fifth week of the Candlemas term. We obtained three tickets, for Luke, Margaret and myself. The Camford recital consisted of two parts, the first half various Schubert songs, the second half arias by Mozart and Händel. I got very excited about this and in conversation with Jon, discovered that David would be three days in Camford, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, before leaving for Birmingham. As Thursday was the undergraduate Guest Night in hall, I invited him to dine with me on Guest Table. Students using Guest Table could only invite one guest, so poor old Luke would have to eat with Alex and Steve in Poof's Corner! I further arranged for the members of the Chapel Choir and one guest each to join David and myself after the meal for coffee and Prosecco in the college function room, at my expense. Luke nearly collapsed when he heard what I had done. "You're really splashing out with your new-found wealth!" he exclaimed.
"It's worth every penny to honour your wonderful Dad," I replied. "What's the cost of a few bottles of fizzy wine to enable people to meet a great artist? We might even be able to get him to sing for us!"
The recital was a great success. The Town Hall was full with 700 people. The Schubert songs were from various of his song cycles, the Händel arias were familiar ones for the tenor voice, including of course 'Every valley shall be exalted' from 'Messiah'. The Mozart ones included some of my favourites,'Un' aur' amorosa,' 'Dalla sua pace,' 'Ah, se fosse intorno al trono,' 'Wenn der Freude Tränen fliesßen' and one I had not heard before, 'Dies Bildnis is bezaubend schön' from 'Die Zauberflöte.' At the end, I nearly went mad, clapping and stamping and shouting, with many others in the audience demonstrating similar enthusiasm. As encore, David sang, not my expected 'Pretty, pretty youth,' but César Franck's 'Panis angelicus.' After the hall had finally emptied, we took Luke's Dad and Brian his accompanist back to Fountain Street for a drink. Dad and Brian were going to spend the night there, and then Brian would go back to Fitchey for a couple of nights before they resumed the concert tour.
It was great fun entertaining my future father-in-law on Guest Table. The college was a bit prejudiced against Italian wines, so the two of us shared a bottle of Chablis. The kitchen always supplied special food for the one-day-a-week guest table, limited to ten undergraduates and their ten guests, and they gave us an excellent meal of roast pheasant.
Afterwards we went to the function room where the chapel choir and their friends were gathered, and we had coffee and Prosecco, and David gave us a fascinating half-hour talk about his singing career and the many amusing experiences he had had on tour. Most of the choir were amazed to hear that he had a Ph.D. in chemistry, obtained before he became a professional singer. The rest of the evening David circulated and chatted with the choir members, and answered questions from one or two, who were considering a career in singing. The evening ended with David singing 'Amazing grace' for us.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Tom's baptism
The weeks went by in the usual round of lab work for me, lectures and tutorials for Luke, and swimming, shagging, cinema trips, walks along Camford's waterway network and trips to the pub for the pair of us. Before long, the last week of term and my baptism and confirmation arrived. We had some debate about my baptism service. We had arranged for it to take place in the afternoon, as the Confirmation by the Bishop of Fitchey and first Communion were to take place in the evening at a public ceremony. The college was not geared up for adult baptisms. The large seventeenth century punchbowl that was used to baptize the children of fellows of the college was quite unsuitable. I felt that a small quantity of water sprinkled on me was not suitable for a serious rite symbolizing our death to sin and rising to new life in Christ. Total immersion was also impractical in a consecrated building. After consultation with our family theological authority (Professor Edward Bairstow), we finally hit on a method that we all found suitable. We would use the antechapel.
On the seventeenth century tiled marble floor we placed a child's paddling pool, filled to a depth of 15 cm with water. The persons present were Francis, who presided, assisted by Prof Bairstow who was Luke's godfather. The witnesses were Luke, his two cofathers, Alex and Steve and the organ scholar. My sponsors were David, Jon and Edward Bairstow. David had scheduled his national recital tour to leave a gap for my big event. It might have looked startling to an outsider that everyone present at my profession of faith except the organ scholar was gay or, in the case of the two clergy, gay-friendly, but it is a strength of the Church of England that it welcomes gay people, even if it is unhappy about ordaining them if they are in a relationship.
We used the modern baptismal rite, I would not be a party to the use of the rite of 1662, which seems to use the word 'carnal' as a synonym for 'sinful.' I came into Chapel wearing a white towelling bathrobe, which I kept on during the promises and the signing with the cross. After the blessing of the water, I took it off. Underneath, I was naked except for a pair of white cycling shorts. I knelt in the water and Francis filled a large seventeenth-century silver ewer with the holy water and poured water three times over my head, shoulders and belly. After the baptismal words had been said, I stood up and put the bathrobe back on and put my wet feet into a pair of disposable slippers for the remainder of the service. Luke dried my hair with a small white towel. As he did so, Francis said to me the liturgical words, "'You have been clothed with Christ. As many as are baptized into Christ have put on Christ.'" Then we sang a hymn, accompanied by the organ scholar and the rite ended with me receiving a lighted candle.
After the baptism, we all adjourned to our room, where I dried myself off, combed my hair and put on dry underpants, a white silk shirt and my Armani suit. We drank coffee and ate cakes. At 4-30, Francis left to meet the Bishop, and I put on my scholar's surplice, as did Luke, and we all returned to Chapel for the Confirmation and first Communion, presided over by the Bishop. During the service, my baptismal candle stood lighted beside my choir stall. There was a reasonable attendance of college members for the service, including most of our friends in the choir. The other two boys who were confirmed were second-year students, and had shared some of my catechumen classes. Edward read the Epistle, and Francis led the intercessions and the prayer for the college's founder and benefactors.
