‘No, not all,’ he agreed. ‘The last bit was good.’
‘Did you mind,’ she said, dropping her voice to a whisper, ‘Richard being so bossy? He didn’t mean to put you out.’
‘He didn’t. Honestly. It’s fine.’
A creak from the stairs broke their brief communion.
‘Richard,’ piped Lucy, returning to the bottle. ‘Will you have some wine?’
‘Mm, don’t mind if I do.’
As he reached the foot of the stairs, Lucy saw that he had not been getting changed. He had, however, been unpacking some items from his bags.
These items were placed on the rug beside Lucy’s footstool.
‘Oh,’ she said, her voice faltering as she handed the wine to her master. ‘I really am in trouble, then?’
She retreated back to the footstool and cast her eye over the rug with heavily pantomimed dismay. A broad-backed hairbrush, a two-tailed strap, a riding whip.
Richard took his seat in the other armchair and sipped at his wine.
‘So, Rob,’ he said. ‘Do you mind if I call you Rob, by the way? It’s how Lucy always refers to you, but if you prefer—’
‘No, Rob’s fine. I sometimes have Lucy call me ‘Dr Sherburn’ but I’ll let you off.’
‘Doctor?’
‘Rob has a PhD,’ said Lucy eagerly, but Richard nudged his leather-shod toe between her bottom cheeks and shushed her.
‘We’ll hear from you, young lady, when you’re spoken to,’ he said.
Rob smiled tightly into the fire before looking back at Richard.
‘What she said. No medical training. Just an abnormally huge and useless knowledge of post-war social policy.’
‘Yes, she said you were an academic. At the LSE, was it?’
Rob nodded.
‘I’m a lowly post-doc with a couple of seminar groups at the moment, but I’m having something published later this year and hoping it’ll whisk me into the starry heights of, I dunno, a lectureship.’
‘That’s where you see your future?’
‘I’ll be honest, Richard, I don’t see my future at all. I don’t have a plan. I never have. Bloody hell.’ He shook his head, vigorously, and took another slug of wine. ‘I’m sure you don’t want to hear my life story. Or my loaf story, as I should perhaps call it.’
Richard smiled. ‘On the contrary,’ he said politely, but Lucy didn’t think his heart was in it. Why would it be? Richard was a go-getting corporate bastard who had never tolerated a rival in his life. Why would he start now? Her nerves flared up again, tormenting butterflies with sharp antennae.
‘We’re not here to bore Lucy with this kind of thing,’ Rob proclaimed. ‘And I think you must agree with me, Richard, given what you’ve brought down with you. I’m guessing a quiet post-prandial game of Scrabble isn’t on the agenda.’
‘You’re not wrong. Or, well, I don’t think you are. If you’d prefer to play Scrabble, of course, that’s an option.’
‘Oh. No, it’s fine.’
‘What I mean to say, and I’m coming across clumsily, for which I apologise, is that I don’t have an agenda. I just have some preferences. If they aren’t yours, then we can rethink the plan. In short …’
‘You’re both in charge,’ translated Lucy. ‘You both get to tell me what to do, but you don’t get to tell each other what to do. The scene has to be negotiated between you.’
Both Richard and Rob stared at Lucy.