He considered this for a moment. And then of all the many ends of the many sticks in front of him he grabbed tightly to the wrong one. “So it’s a specific deer, then? Are you adopting a deer?”

“No, Rhys. I’m not adopting a deer. Where would I keep a deer?”

“This is tragic.” Alex actually had a slightly teary look. “The poor little deer. With no eyes. Was it pollution? If you can’t keep it at your house, Luc, I’m sure we’ve got room on the estate, though the other deer might bully it.”

Just when I thought this had got as out of control as it could possibly get, Rhys Jones Bowen addressed his increasingly vast audience. “Hello, Rhystocrats. Got an exciting new conservation challenge for you. My friend Luc is adopting a deer with no eyes who’s going to live on Alex’s estate. And we need to find a name for him. Or”—he glanced back at me—“or is it a her or some kind of nonbinary deer?”

I flailed like I was Oliver dancing. “It’s not a nonbinary deer. It’s a completely hypothetical deer.”

“So far,” Rhys told me, “the names that are winning are Deerdrie, Deery McDeerface, and Steve.”

“I might go with Steve?” I suggested, hoping vainly that a quick surrender would end my suffering.

Rhys was still checking his feed. “Oh, somebody here has suggested you call it No-Eye Deer, which I think is very inappropriate. I mean you can’t make the poor thing’s disability its whole identity.”

I was just about to flee back to my office when Professor Fairclough descended from the upper floors. “I heard a commotion,” she said. “Has there been a disturbance?”

“I think this place is a disturbance,” I replied.

“Ah, Professor”—Alex looked up excitedly—“you’ll know. What would you call a deer with no eyes?”

“Capreolus caecus, clearly.” She shrugged. “Assuming it was a trait endemic to the species. If it was suffering from an unknown disease, I’d call it Subject One.”

“You can’t call Luc’s poor little deer Subject One,” protested Alex.

Oh God. Why did I keep doing this to myself? “There. Is. No. Deer.”

Everyone stared at me in aggrieved confusion.

“Then”—Alex looked genuinely wounded—“why did you ask me what to call it?”

“You know something?” I threw my hands in the air. “I have no idea.”

Before the situation could degenerate any further, I escaped into my office. Of course I say escaped, but the moment I sat down, I saw that I had an unread email from Barbara Clench.

Dear Luc,