Captive Magics

31 - Literary lunch

"Well that went well," she commented as they returned to the hansom. Leander did not reply, instead dropping to a slump in his seat and blinking into the middle-distance. In the white-noise hum of his brain the thought vaguely registered that anyone who married Lissy would probably have to have dinner with her parents at least twice a year. "I never expected it would go so well...are you alright?"

"You lived with them?" he asked suddenly.

"...Well, yes?"

"You lived with that every day for all your...I mean, thank you for introducing me...delightful people..."

"They're unbearable." The hansom pulled away, clattering out of Latimer Avenue and onto roads which seemed lighter, less airless, free...it seemed a nicer place when they arrived.

"I don't understand how you turned out so well if you grew up with that." He pulled off his glasses and massaged his eyes. "Have they always...?"

"Oh yes. You know, Leander, I never expected you to win them over quite so thoroughly. It was astonishing, you seemed to know just what to say. Actually, I thought you'd do the sensible thing and sit quietly whilst they carried on."

"I couldn't just sit there while they tore strips off you!" he said hotly. "It was like being in the army again. Battle lines drawn like your own comrades were the enemy, and everyone confidently talking...just nonsense. Nonsense in the mess hall. Never sense from anyone..."

"Is that all you did in the army? Spoke nonsense?" She giggled and looked out the window with a smile. Leander eyed her profile, marvelling at how quickly her mood had brightened after leaving her parents.

"It's possibly the only thing I learned in the army."

"Well I'm glad you did: you made tea with my parents quite bearable."

"Quite bearable," he echoed in horror. Lissy turned her head to smile at him.

Madame Bird, by contrast, was an effortless social call, though as soon as they stepped into her solarium, her interrogation began.

"You had better be treating him well or I shall be most put out!" she called with reedy indignance as they approached. An oak tree had grown up against the dome since their last visit, or perhaps it was just windier. A long branch noisily tap-tapped the glass in persistent rhythm, whisked back and forth by each gust.

"I've been delightful to him."

"Has she been treating you well, boy?"

"No, she took me to see her parents," Leander replied, paring his attention from the distraction of the tree. Lissy spluttered out a laugh. Madame Bird frowned, opening her mouth. "She has treated me very well," he added quickly.

"Good. Move in front of me. Stand there a moment."

For a minute he stood in front of her chair as she frowned blindly at him. What she was hoping to see he couldn't tell. While he shifted awkwardly from foot to foot, fixed beneath the gaze of his tiny, blind observer, the tree tap, tap, tapped...

There was a bang as the far door opened, and Leander jumped. A silver-haired man wearing the dark flannel suit of a butler entered, his ageing stoop projecting him some way over the floating table-top he had brought in with him. He passed Leander at close quarters, joints creaking audibly, and came to a pause in a circle of three armchairs. The table hung dead still in the air as he straightened cutlery, the humpbacked lid of a silver tureen, snowdrift napkins, then left through another door.