The woman with the bent glasses had come back for a better pair.
Frankie recognised her before Duncan did, because he'd been looking into a drawer when she entered.
“I'm not sitting on these,” the woman announced.
Duncan turned.
“An excellent plan.”
“I thought you'd approve.”
Her name was Marion Tew. Frankie learned it when the receptionist brought over a little tray with three frames on it.
Marion put the first pair on and looked in the mirror.
“No.”
“Why?” Duncan asked.
“I look like someone who'd tell you to use a coaster.”
“You might.”
“I do. But I don't want to be paid for it.”
Frankie laughed.
Marion saw her in the mirror.
“Are you waiting?”
“Yes.”
“Don't let me take his afternoon.”
“He'll tell us both,” Frankie said.
Duncan gave her a brief look.
He asked Marion what she'd liked about the old pair. She said they stayed on her face and made her feel less visible, though he wasn't to take that as a demand to make the new ones worse.
He handed her the second pair.
She tried them, then smiled.
Frankie watched the little shift in his attention. He hadn't told Marion she looked young or clever or beautiful. He'd waited until she'd seen herself and decided how much of the decision belonged to him.
“That?” he asked.
“Possibly.”
“Try the other as well.”
She did, rejected them, returned to the second.
“All right.”
He didn't celebrate winning.
He adjusted them slightly and asked about how they felt.
Frankie looked away. She felt, absurdly, as though she was watching something private.
Marion took them off.
“You do evenings at Calder, don't you?”
Duncan paused.
“Some.”
“I saw June yesterday. She said there's a theatrical supper. Old hotel thing.”
“A relaunch.”
“Can anyone go?”
“June will know what's available.”
“You'll be there?”
“Probably.”
“Then I might. I'd like to see you without asking for a receipt.”
He smiled.
“I might still give you one.”
Marion laughed.
She paid for the work she'd chosen, spoke to the receptionist and left.
Duncan watched the door shut.
Then he turned to Frankie.
“What do you need?”
“A chair. A minute.”
“Which first?”
She sat.
They went into the small room at the back when he'd finished with the receptionist. There was a kettle, two mugs and a photograph of the shop from before she'd met him.
He put the kettle on.
“Felix?”
“Yes.”
“Does he want to come?”
“He's interested.”
“Then Gideon should be delighted.”
“He wants more than interested.”
“I know.”
Frankie looked at the photograph.
“I could make the invitation feel personal.”
Duncan didn't reply.
“Not that kind of personal.”
“What kind?”
“A place beside people who'd like him. Me. Vivian. Someone he thinks he's chosen to know.”
“Would you like him?”
“I do.”
“Then you're in danger of being accurate.”
She smiled without meaning to.
Duncan took the mugs down.
“What will you tell him about Gideon?”
“That he's involved.”
“You have.”
“Yes.”
“And the rest?”
“Not yet.”
He poured water.
She'd come for help making Felix want the room. She could feel herself asking for permission instead, and hated how easily he could become the person whose refusal made the job moral on her behalf.
“I don't need you to approve it.”
“Good.”
“But you could help.”
“With what?”
“Let him meet you.”
“As Lorne?”
“Yes.”
“And make the company look worth joining.”
She looked at him.
“Would you?”
He set the mug before her. “No. I might meet him, but not to make him think this is an act of affection.”
“I didn't say affection.”
“I thought you wanted me to ask you home. After the money, I kept wondering when you'd started arranging for me to ask.”
She looked down at the tea.
He sat opposite her.
“Sorry,” he said.
“No.”
“I didn't need to say that.”
“You can.”
He took a breath.
For a moment they were only two people in the back of a shop, with customers moving beyond the wall and the kettle cooling. She'd wanted this kind of ordinary time with him once. Or she had enjoyed it while wanting something else more.
Duncan lifted the photograph, which had tilted against the window.
“Marion will come as Marion.”
“Yes.”
“And she'd be glad to see me.”
“I heard.”
“She won't have joined anything. She'll have a supper, perhaps enjoy the evening, perhaps complain the room's cold.”
“You're describing a hotel.”
“Yes.”
Frankie watched him set the photograph down.
“We could make that.”
“We have been making that.”
“With the Table.”
“Sometimes.”
“And without the rest.”
He looked at her.
“You could tell people what they're coming to.”
“Nina's actors know.”
“Not everybody who matters.”
Frankie let the silence remain.
She could invite actual people to an actual evening. Vivian knew guests. Nina knew performers and producers. The hotel already had customers. A room full of people with their own reasons for coming would be less obedient than hired patrons pretending a false history had chosen them.
Gideon would need to believe they were obedient.
It wasn't a solution yet. It was somewhere else to look.
Duncan drank his tea.
“Does that help?”
“I don't know.”
“Fair.”
“Marion. She knows you.”
“Yes.”
“Would that be a problem?”
He put down the mug. “She'll call me Duncan. You'd better leave room for that.”
Frankie looked towards the front of the shop, where Marion had spent so long choosing her frames.
The receptionist knocked.
Duncan stood.
“I have somebody waiting.”
Frankie got up too.
At the front he introduced her to the receptionist by her real name.
Not Claire. Not Celia.
The woman smiled and said she thought she'd seen a photograph of an event Frankie had done.
“Possibly.”
“Looked lovely.”
“Thank you.”
Duncan opened the door for her.
On the pavement Frankie looked back at the shop window. He'd returned to a customer who wanted him to explain something she'd paid to see more clearly.
Marion's new glasses lay in their little tray.
She had chosen them herself.