“I thought he’d be in the barn longer,” Marjorie whispered behind her hand to Adrian. “Doesn’t he train the ferrets on Tuesday evenings?”
Graham sent her a pointed look, then ducked back behind his open newspaper.
“All right.” Jacob crossed his arms rather than head to the sideboard for a plate of food. “What’s happening?”
“Nothing,” Philippa said, far too quickly. “Nothing Wynchestery is happening to any Wynchesters. Don’t worry about it.”
“If it’s nothing,” Jacob said, “then why would I worry about it?”
“You shouldn’t,” said Kuni. “It has nothing to do with y—”
Thunk.
All heads swiveled toward the noise.
“Er…” Marjorie’s face bloomed with color. “Jacob, I think I hear an… antelope. Across the street. Outside. You should go check on it.”
He gritted his teeth and stalked around the table toward her chair.
Tommy covered her face with her hand. “Anantelope?”
“I panicked,” Marjorie muttered. “At least I didn’t say dolphin.”
A book lay on its side in the crevice between her chair and Adrian’s.
A familiar-looking book.
One that had just been published that morning.
“What’s this?” Jacob asked as he scooped it up.
A silly question, given that he was the only person present who knew the real answer.
“You don’t like to hear anyone speakJ-A-L-L-O-W’s name,” Philippa blurted out. “So we try to hold our discussions of his work in private—”
“You lot have a secretreading circleyou’ve been hiding from me?” he said in shock.
“We can’t tell you about it if we can’t say the words,” Kuni pointed out. “A completely silent reading circle has no reason to gather at all.”
“Wine,” said Philippa.
“Biscuits,” said Marjorie.
“I’d attend a wine-and-biscuits circle,” Adrian agreed.
“Add pies and I’m there,” said Tommy.
Graham stayed hidden behind his newspaper.
Jacob handed the book of poetry back to his sister. “Each of you bought your own copy?”
“We all wanted to be the first to read it,” Philippa admitted. “You might not think much of Sir Gareth, but he’s one of my favorite poets.”
Irrationally, Jacob’s instinctive reaction was irritation to discover he wasn’t the very favorite.
Followed at once by the conviction that if Philippa—who was not a professional poet—had found faults in his work, then it was surely riddled with errors and incompetencies that his actual artistic peerswould rightfully sneer at. Indicating Jacob’s pathetic attempts at verse should never have been published at all.
“I deserve all the awards” and “Readers should throw rotten tomatoes in my face” mightsoundlike opposites, but no writer of Jacob’s acquaintance had any problem fully believing both things at any given moment.
