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On and on it went, the whole evening long.

Pin’s conversation drying up by midnight I sort of listen/non-listen to her husband's. Each man on the third after-dinner port, and I’m down to the last two inches of my cigar. Occasionally look toward the dining room door, dropping a hint. It isn’t taken. But eventually our host makes to call time. But then doesn’t. Lord, how much more can I take. My head aches, the three hour drive down in the wet dark, on top of a day rushed with valuations in Dublin has me totally done in. While I’m blessed with high energy the rare feeling that I’m not twenty seven anymore creeps in. Finally, an hour later, he talks himself out. And rises. The head-to-toe Loro Piana looking as good as when he sat down. The man might be a boring bully, but he’s an exceedingly expensively dressed boring bully. Top marks in the sartorial stakes.

We enter the hall once again to that wonderful tree, and climb the stairs. Every bauble, every twinkle, perfection. On the landing I shake the man’s hand, and give Pins a squeeze. The party divides, they to the right, us to the left - the guest’s wing. He raises his arm to show direction, “You’re just down the way”. He turns, says “Goodnight”. We walk the wide panelled corridor to our rooms, the walls dotted identikit to The Merrion, rich man’s comfort art. Midway along, an open bedroom door draws us in. We look, two single beds. In the one room. A house with at least twelve bedrooms you’d think he’d give us two of them. But no, a twin room. Weird bastard.

Lovely bedroom though, give it that. Two antique chinoiserie decorated single beds, inset bedhead panels patterned with gilded Chinese figures and waterfalls. French hand-painted wallpaper decorates the walls, again Chinese inspired - gardens with waterfalls, and little Chinamen running about with pails. Burgundy pure wool carpet, and heavy swag silk-lined curtains draw the window. Two luggage racks, one at either end of each bed, both of which covered by an embroidered silk feather-filled eiderdown. Grand landscape watercolours hang on the walls. All very composed, all very chic, and all nearly too ‘good taste’. The bathroom, has to have a marble bath. It does. Given this house is less than twenty years old, the new fortune that went into it is extraordinary. Not too many of these about the place. But it’s late, I’m tired. Quick scrub of the teeth and roll into my chinoiserie decorated bed, feeling consoled by the high thread count. Ahhhh, how lovely.

Not quite asleep, I hear my friend preparing for bed. More methodical than me, he potters about as I try to drift off. During the night too, I occasionally hear my friend turning in his bed, mumbling, over and over in his sleep. Unsettled, angry? No idea. My mind doesn’t work that way. Couldn’t see the problem. Alright, the fellow was perhaps a chaser and a Lord of the Room type, so what. His problem, not ours. Sleep. I guess my friend hadn’t accumulated what he’d gained in the world by being entirely mentally passive either. But still, if he wanted to lose sleep over it, lose sleep away. It's shut eye for me. In between the mumblings I sleep like the baby Lord Jesus in that expensively outfitted bed.

That is, until about three am. Not making this up. 100% true. Hear what sounds to me like a waterfall. My eyes blink in the darkness. Has a tank has burst, or a pipe become unhinged from the wall? Has the wallpaper of Chinamen and waterfalls come alive, or is it a dream lingering in my consciousness. Eyes open wider, adjusting. Can make out a silhouette. There, my friend, standing up on his bed, a mariner on his boat, facing away from me. But what’s the sound? This isn’t making sense. I say his name. No response. He’s stood absolutely upright on the bed. Stock still, facing the silk curtains across the room. He sways to left, then right, sort of looping motion, as if on the prow of a ship. I’m dreaming. He’s dreaming. Odd that our two dreams are intermingled, I’m hearing the sounds of the ocean and he’s on the sea. Can this happen?

But then, then, to my incomprehension and horror I understand. He’s urinating, doing his own thing, not a care in the world. A sorry arc all across to the curtains opposite, onto the carpet, the edge of the bed, the end of the bed, even onto the hand-painted wallpaper, like one of those lawn water spigot things. Aghast, I shout his name. He goes on, phsoooosssh, phsoooossh, phsoooossh. Is he in a trance, or just not hearing, ignoring me? Goes on still more, a horse in the field. New ground for me, simply can’t fathom it. Eventually the flow lessens, ceases. Finished, he hitches up his pyjamas, lays back down, pulls the covers over himself, and back to the land of nod.

Did this really just happen? It did.

Mind runs through other catastrophes in my life, there have been many, the experiences of which I hope might assist me here. Nope. Nothing. What now? Total blank. Grotesque. Within minutes the room’s radiator warms up the harshly ammonia scented air, sickened, like an ICU ward. I get up, side-step the wet carpet his side and open the window. Then back into bed. My eyes stay wide open, blinking, thinking, figuring. Total car crash turn of events, hard to compute, comprehend. But I try. Well. I’m in his friend’s house, I’m a stranger, it really is his problem, his bed. Maybe it’s a boarding school thing, maybe that’s it. Mind ticks and tocks the permutations. Best leave them to it. Try to sleep. Simply can’t. Now it’s me who turns, tosses, unsettled. All the while Benjamin Button sleeps serene. A peculiar reversal.

The early morning comes slow. The night a dream. Yes! A dream, a dream! Thank God. Imagine that. Thankfully people versed in Latin, poetry, the classics, obviously such accomplished, privately educated people with tone perfect manners don’t ….. don’t….. But they do, they do. They do. They have. He has. It’s happened. It’s real. The smell says so. Horribly, inexplicably, that smell, it’s there. It’s happened. The fall out, the cause and effect, it’s there. We’re, he’s, going to have to live the price today. Whatever it is, today has dawned, and the price will have to be paid. No way can it be avoided. Anyhow, where could I start to help him? It’s too much; yellow stain splattered eiderdown, drenched carpet, blurred smudged lifting wallpaper, marked curtains. Too much, too much. Incomprehensible, hard to take in. Simply can’t be dodged.

Button still sleeps as I dress to go downstairs and meet the day.

Little early for breakfast, I sit once again in the drawing room, peruse the Country Lifes and New Yorkers. At about eight thirty in saunters Kato, “Ah Sir, sweep well?”
“ Never better”
“Breakfast prepared now”
“Very good”, and in I go. 
Now there’s breakfast, and there’s breakfast. This fellow had it all. From the juice to the egg, the burcher muesli to the wild woodland mushroom. All presented perfectly in polished silver, crystal and Wedgewood. Exceptional. Two copies of the London edition of The Financial Times rest folded on the sideboard. Taking one I sit. I’ll miss it when it’s gone, but while I’m here, tuck in.

Thirty minutes later in saunters my friend, not a care in the world. And with Dom by his side. For a fellow who’s just thrashed another man’s property with urine he looks remarkably at ease. Study him. No way he could not know what he’s done. But remarkably, he appears rested, calm, glowing with resolution. Someone doesn’t know something, this I do know. For sure. Maybe it’s a gallows thing, totally accepting of his guilt, the worry’s been released. An interesting phenomena to observe.
Loads up his plate, then turns to me, “Have an idea Damien, why don’t we two go for a little jaunt today, over to Glenstal, see the Abbey, call by the monks. Yes? Perhaps join them for lunch and back later for dinner?” He looks over to Dom for casual approval, “Would that be alright Dom?”

Have to give it to my friend, absolutely no sign of stress or worry. One cool cucumber, or obliviously unaware - if that was possible, which I really don’t think it is. Now nose deep into his Financial Times, Suave doesn’t even look up, just replies, “Yes, yes, suppose so”.
We eat. My friend tucking in with still no evident signs of stress, certainly hasn’t affected his appetite. Remarkable. Maybe I’m missing something, maybe it is after all an old school tradition, a contest, something out of my range. After even more eating, how Suave isn’t thirty stone I’ll never know, I get up to retrieve the car keys, left them in the bedroom. My friend looks up mid-munch, at me. Then munches on. Was that concern? Walk up the stairs and feel each pure wool carpeted step underfoot, shoe sort of floats over it, displacing the deep weave. Money. 
Walk through our bedroom door. 
And there it was. 
The betrayal.

Well, well, one for the books. Didn’t take a lot of thinking. Would I have done it? Nope. He’s moved his suitcase. It’s now placed at the end of my bed, instead of his. While mine has been moved over to the end of his. Instant solution, old-guy traitor style.

Looked at it for a while, the situation. Thinking, sizing it up - what to do. Or not to do. Didn’t say a word when I came back downstairs, just played it cool. All day, never once mentioned it. And what a surprisingly lovely day it was; we saw the chapel at Glenstal, another mutual friend had redesigned the interior, joined the monks for lunch, then back to the chapel for Christmas carols and mince pies. Mulled wine for afters. A jolly day, really. The whole bedroom debacle, the urinary vandalism, somehow shunted itself to the back of my mind. 

Afterwards, we walked back to the car for the drive home. The heater cranking out the warmth, the big leather seats comforting. The mulled wine, the frost at dusk, all made for a very festive drive back. Weaving the lanes I turn on the radio

Here comes Santa Claus, here comes Santa Claus, right down Santa Claus Lane
He doesn't care if you're rich or poor, he loves you just the same

Future thinking simmers as we draw closer. The price, the price, always a price to be paid. Always a price. There could be a serious shootout waiting for us back at the OK Corral, the thought tempers my festive cheer. No so Benjamin Button, he starts a singalong with the radio

Here comes Santa Claus, here comes Santa Claus, right down Santa Claus Lane
Vixen and Blitzen and all his reindeer, pullin' on the reins

Oh, to be eighty and incontinent.

The lonely thunk of the car doors closing after us, the only sound of greeting this time. We walk to the front door, left open, ajar. Walk into the entrance hall, the Christmas Tree’s height somehow now intimidating. Turning left we go through double doors to the drawing room. Daggers. Absolute daggers. Word had obviously gotten back to the big man someone had pissed all over one side of the room, Kato must have told him, wonder how, “Weally weally sorry Boss but……. (the mind boggles).

Vengeance is in his eyes, looks of disgust heap toward me, the Lee Harvey Oswald of urination. You see, I left the bags exactly as they were. Didn’t touch them, double-crossing behaviour though it was. No matter what way you look at it, a friend is a friend. Was he in distress when he woke up, and panicked. Or was I being coldly framed? Was it accidental, or premeditated. People are complicated, I’ve learned this over my life. What goes on in a person’s head, awake, or asleep, one can never tell. Better part of me thought that if it was an ‘accident’ I was helping out an older friend. One for the team. Even if the game was rigged.

Realising his swap had worked, my friend’s comfort remained. All smiles, he stocks up on the Champagne proffered his way, swirling a plenitude in his glass, a weight lifted. Me, had to reach over for mine, serving the time for his crime. Our host, well-mannered enough not to express himself against me in front of his friend, would wait his moment - only a matter of time before he exacts revenge, there’ll be no catch and release here. Most definitely, now I was only an animal, an animal, a worse than useless thing, to be punished.

Coldness blows from across the coffee table as I sit once more. Uncomfortable, and understandably so, I’m socially isolated from all ensuing conversation. Stiffly I draw on the iced champagne to pass the time. Excruciating. Going to be a long and painful evening Damien. But then, bustling at the doors. We stare as one towards the noise. A jostling, they open, it’s Cassandra, burdened with shopping bags and fur. Bring me my velvet fainting cushion, what a knockout. 
She looks across to me, straight in the eye, says, “Hi Piss Boy!”
Winced my reply, “Hello Harrods”
“Mummy told me, so bold”
One thing you cannot do is rat on a friend, “I have a condition”
“You sure do”

And so began another story (for just a short while).

Postscript.
Occasionally afterwards my old friend would drop a hint, that he’d remember me for that weekend. Told him he could put it where he’d put the kidneyfied claret - friendship isn’t, or rather shouldn’t be, about money. He died a year later, nearly to the day, Christmas week in fact. The after-funeral luncheon was held in my house. 
His friend came. 
I kept a very close eye on him.