I grinned. "I'll tell her. She'll be thrilled." She really would, actually.

Roger stroked his gun barrel, staring into space. “Slip of a thing," he mused reflectively. “Tell her not to mumble, eh?"

"I'll pass it on."

We fell to silence. I started sketching him out with my charcoal, my hand moving quickly over the canvas, and time passed peacefully. After a bit, we both heard tires on gravel at exactly the same moment — Belinda, back from her parish council meeting. Roger jumped to his feet and replaced the gun in the cabinet. As he sat down, he whipped a silk cravat from his pocket and put it round his neck.

"Bit smarter," he told me with an enormous wink as he crossed his legs. “She'll like that. Can always lose it later."

The front door slammed. Footsteps could be heard moving down the hall to the kitchen. Then they approached, back down the passageway. Roger pursed his lips to suppress a smile, eyes wide and innocent. moments later, the door opened and Belinda appeared. She was wearing another floral number, pink and white this time with a huge tulip pattern, and her gray-blonde hair was freshly waved and swept back in a great swoop from her forehead. She blinked.

"What are you doing in here?"

"It's my fault, Belinda. The light was terrible in Roger's study and he looked so stiff and awkward in his suit. I thought this might be more natural." The truth, I find, works best in a tight spot.

"What about the living room?"

To heck with the truth, I lunged for the lie. "We tried that, but the light was wrong. And also I thought it would be terribly inconvenient. After all, you use it, and no one comes in here."

"Except Roger. How absurd." She frowned. "I can't imagine how it will look in the hall with all the other portraits. They're far more traditional. Most odd, I should imagine."

Roger seemed to be shrinking down in his chair and holding his breath. I carried on mapping him out with the charcoal. No one spoke. I think she imagined we'd get up and move.

"Oh well, you know best," she snapped eventually, clearly piqued. "But take that ridiculous scarf off from round your neck. You look like a pirate."

Roger dutifully removed it and she swept frostily from the room. She was truly cross and Belinda didn't do cross, she was far too controlled. She did disappointed. Or un-comprehending, even, at the strange ways of others. As her footsteps receded, Roger regarded me with awe.

"You were magnificent!" he breathed.

I sketched on, my hand a bit sweaty. We heard Belinda moving about the kitchen. Slamming about, let's face it, very noisily. Drawers were opened and shut. Cupboards banged. She obviously very much intended us to hear. Then a different noise. A regular, rhythmic, scything noise. One of steel on steel. Roger gasped.