“No, Beauchamp. You have walked in on me in a state of nature in my own drawing room. After such an introduction, youcannot seriously propose that we now require a clause governing whether one may cross the corridor in a state of dress suitable for the pre-watershed broadcast ofCountdown. The ship has sailed, Beauchamp. It has sunk, and it has been salvaged by the Portuguese coastguard.”
Beauchamp’s jaw had tightened. His expression sat between that of a man deciding whether to laugh or resign.
“Sir, the clause was intended to — ”
“I know what it was intended to do, Major. It was intended to preserve your dignity, which is sweet, and mine, which is, I regret to inform you, not currently in a condition to be preserved by bureaucracy.” Vidal patted the broad chest under his hand once, firmly, and stepped back. “No. We will not be operating on this basis. You will come and have breakfast with me. I am going to put on the coffee, and I am going to fry the last of the good bread in the oil, and you are going to sit across from me at the table, while we talk about your document. Properly. Like civilised men who have seen each other at their worst and have nothing left to hide.”
He scooped Mercè up off the floor, tucked her under one arm, and turned in the doorway.
“Fifteen minutes, Beauchamp. And for the love of all the saints, put on something other than that robe. I am begging you as a friend.”
Chapter Twelve
Beauchampdressed for comfort, certain that whatever waited for him in the kitchen was going to require full range of mobility. He settled on a pair of dark jeans, a plain navy jumper, and the canvas trainers he’d owned since a posting in Cyprus. It was his second scheduled day off in a fortnight, and he’d meant to spend it horizontal in front of the snooker. Instead, he was about to spend his day off being companionably dismantled by a man in a silk robe.
He came down the corridor to find the kitchen already in a state of advanced chaos.
Vidal had pulled every item of conceivable interest out of the fridge and arrayed it across the counter. A block of manchego sat on the chopping board beside the last of the sourdough, a glass dish of olives, a jar of cornichons, and a bundle of radishes. Vidal himself had exchanged his silk robe for loose linen trousers and a cream shirt open at the collar. He was cracking eggs into a ceramic bowl while singing softly in Catalan.
“Beauchamp! There you are. Look at you, in your weekend attire. We’re going on a picnic.”
Beauchamp took one careful step into the kitchen and said nothing.
Vidal cracked another egg with a sharp flick of the wrist and tossed the shell into a bowl on the counter. “Don’t give me that face. It’ll be a small thing. The garden’s ours, Beauchamp, and the sun has finally consented to visit this miserable island.”
“We can’t go out, sir. That was the entire point of yesterday’s—”
“We’re not going out. We’re going downstairs. The garden is the ground floor of this very building, which, if my understanding of your document is correct, falls entirely within the perimeter you’ve spent the last twenty-four hours sealing like a tomb. Yes? A picnic in the garden. A picnic of really quite modest ambition by any continental standard, but it’s the one your protocols will allow me.”
Beauchamp was handed a wooden spoon before he could protest.
“Scramble, please. On low heat, with plenty of butter. I’ve started them in the bowl, you’ll take them across the line. I must attend to the bread.”
Vidal was already at the hob, tipping olive oil into the pan without measuring. Beauchamp poured the eggs in beside him on the second ring, dropping a knob of butter into the pan as he began to stir.
“Beauchamp.”
“Sir.”
“You haven’t used enough butter, and you’re stirring too conservatively. They’re eggs. They’ll forgive you a little boldness.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And notsir, please, not this morning. I’m wearing linen and you’re wearing denim and we’re about to eat breakfast on a lawn.Siris for the moments when I’m being foolish and you’re saving me from myself. This morning you may call me Vidal.”
“I’ll stick with sir, if it’s all the same.”
“Oh, Beauchamp. You’re going to make me work for every inch.” Vidal pressed a slab of sourdough into the oil in the second pan, and the kitchen filled at once with the delicious smell of frying bread. “That’s fine. I’ve the stamina for it. Now, the cheese. Cut it into rough pieces, none of this thin elegant slicing you English like to do. I want chunks that a man can actually get a taste from.”
He cut the cheese into hefty chunks. The eggs on Beauchamp’s hob had begun to gather themselves into soft yellow folds, and he pulled them off the heat before they could toughen. Vidal leaned across him, pinched a little between finger and thumb, put it in his mouth, and made a satisfied hum that Beauchamp was embarrassed to find pleased him.
“The eggs into the blue bowl, please. Cover it with the plate beside it, they must stay warm. Now.” Vidal turned from the counter with both hands on his hips and surveyed the spread. “Olives, cheese, bread, eggs, cornichons, radishes, the butter, the pot of honey from the top shelf. Beauchamp, pass me the honey. What have I forgotten?”
“A picnic blanket, sir.”
Vidal stopped with the honey pot halfway to the counter. “Ah. We don’t have one.”
“No, sir.”
