The dinner table was too long for three people. If it had been up to Robert, he’d have had the servants lay a small table in the living room and kept things informal and low key. But here they were, in the dining room, eating off the best silver, surrounded by the family portraits that had so impressed him at one time but, which on reacquaintance, were gloomy and forbidding.

“How’s business, Robert?” Lord Ticksted was poking at his food and eating nothing.

“Oh, you know. Fine.”

“Robert is doing incredibly well,” said Genevieve. “He’s quadrupled the size of the company since he inherited it. Isn’t that right, darling?”

“I don’t like to brag.”

“Well, I shall brag for you. He’s quite a genius, Daddy.”

Robert felt himself blush. Genevieve had a high color in her cheeks tonight, and he wondered how much wine she’d had. Lord Ticksted, on the other hand, was gray and wan. He looked as though his mind and his heart were far away. And so thin…his skin hung in loose pockets around his chin and neck. They were eating dinner with a ghost.

“How do you find Paris?” Lord Ticksted addressed himself solely to Robert.

“Well…It’s not really home, but—”

“We love it.” There was a note of defiance in Genevieve’s voice. “One can live vividly there. We’re surrounded by worldly people. Writers and artists. People who have something real to say for themselves.”

“Not that there aren’t some very interesting people here too.” Robert was thoroughly embarrassed.

“There’s a different code of ethics there,” Genevieve continued. “Not like this small-minded backwater.”

“Genevieve!” Robert could hardly believe his ears. “Sir…”

But the old man appeared unaffected by the outburst and quietly sipped his wine. “I’m glad to know that Genevieve is in such good hands, Robert. Her mother—God rest her soul—never ceased worrying about the girl. Not until her dying day. But I can see that she is well looked after.”

Genevieve stood up too quickly, knocking her wine over. “Nobody looks after me. I do not need to be looked after. Robert lets me live my life the way I want to. You, on the other hand—well, you know very well what you did to me. You and Mummy. I can never forgive you—neither of you! God, this whole place is rotten to the core.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” said Robert, after the door had slammed behind her. “I guess she’s upset about her mother. She’s not at all herself.”

“Quite so, dear boy.” Lord Ticksted pushed his plate away. “Quite so. And she’s always had a delicate disposition, little Genevieve. She was dreadfully ill as a girl, you know. We had to take her out of school in the end, and have her educated at home.”

“Yes…” He clenched his toes inside his shoes. “What actually was wrong with her?”