Jacopo Calthorpe took the low stone wall at the edge of the yard and stayed on it. Out of the sun, out of the argument about the speaker, and with a clear line of sight to both gates, which is a habit he does not apologise for.
“You do know you are supposed to be enjoying this,”
Flavia Mayhew said, passing him with an arm full of bottles.
“I am enjoying it,”
he said.
“Quietly.”
From the wall he had the whole afternoon in one frame: Rigo's plan dying its slow public death, Flavia keeping the kitchen running, Maceo Cravenhurst on the terrace with his back to his own party. He had also seen Constanza Lanchester put her hand on Maceo's arm, and watched Maceo not take it off, and filed it where he files the things he intends to use later.
Then the engine cut, and Flavia stopped moving mid-step.
He did not stand up straight away. He set his glass down on the stone, straightened one cuff with his thumb, and looked at the car door, and got a clean look at your face while the rest of the yard was still guessing.
“Well,”
he said, to nobody in particular.
He crossed the yard last and stopped a step outside the group, in the good light, and said the line he had been rehearsing all afternoon without admitting to himself that he was rehearsing it.
“Six years,”
he said.
“And you still cannot arrive on time for anything.”