‘Caroline being one of your weaknesses.’
‘In a sense. In a few senses. In every possible sense of the word.’
‘Listen, Aubrey,’ George said. ‘I’m not going to say that you two are right for each other, destined to be together or any of that twaddle. But I will say that you two seem happiest when you’re getting on – adventuring, bantering, planning outrageous deeds. And when you two are on the out and out, you’re both extremely difficult to be with.’
‘She seems happy enough at the moment.’
‘What? Are you serious?’
‘What do you mean?’
George shook his head. ‘I worry about you sometimes, old man, I really do. And not just when you’re about to do something remarkably foolhardy. I actually have confidence in you then.’
‘Implying that you don’t have confidence in me when...’
‘When you deal with people. Some people.’
‘I see. Any sort of people in particular?’
‘Female people. In general. And one in particular.’
‘Hmm. I thought I was improving on that front.’
‘You were. Lately, though, you’ve gone backward.’
‘I can’t tell you how uncomfortable that makes me feel.’
‘Glad to hear it. What you need is some decent adventuring. Sharpens your mind, it seems.’
‘Little chance of that. I’ll be at the Academy all day with Mother.’
‘And Caroline. Don’t forget her.’
‘Yes. An uninterested Caroline.’
George rubbed his temples with both hands. ‘You can be obtuse, can’t you?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that Caroline isn’t uninterested. She’s doing her best to appear so, but she isn’t.’
‘And you can tell, can you?’
‘I think you might be the only one who can’t.’
‘Not that slide, Aubrey,’ Lady Rose called from the stage of the lecture theatre. ‘That’s a guillemot, not an auk.’
‘Sorry.’ Aubrey moved the brass carriage of the diascope, took out the offending slide, banished it for eternity and substituted another. ‘How’s that?’
‘Well, that’s definitely an auk. But an upside-down auk simply won’t do. Come now, concentrate.’
‘I’m trying,’ he mumbled, but it was easier said than done. Caroline was sitting entirely too close. The other side of the lecture theatre would have been too close, to tell the truth, but that was another matter. Caroline squeezed alongside him in the tiny projection booth was enough to make his head swim.
‘Let me, Aubrey,’ Caroline said. ‘You look flushed. Are your ribs playing up?’
‘No, tip-top. Projector’s just throwing off a bit of heat. Diascopic projectors tend to do that.’
‘Ah.’ Caroline adjusted the focus on the lens tube. Then she peered at the image on the screen behind Lady Rose and made a tsk of disgust. She took out a handkerchief and dabbed at the lens until she was happy. ‘As opposed to episcopic projectors, I take it.’
‘Of course, of course.’ Aubrey was sweating. To cover his awkwardness, he waved a hand and nearly knocked over a box of slides that probably represented hundreds of hours of collation. ‘Not to mention the more complex epidiascopic projectors, which are prone to breaking down.’
‘I see,’ Caroline said. ‘You are so wise in the ways of projectors and in the manner that episcopes work by reflected light and diascopes work by passing light through an object.’
‘They do?’ Aubrey blinked. ‘I thought diascopes were just bigger than episcopes. Or the other way around.’ He concentrated on sliding the carriage smoothly. He squinted at the screen. ‘How’s that?’ he called.
Below, Lady Rose scrutinised the image with her hands on her hips, head back. ‘That’s a fine example of a Little Auk. Well done, Caroline.’
Aubrey turned to his projection comrade. ‘Well done, Caroline?’
‘I took the photograph when Lady Rose and I went to the Arctic last year.’
‘Ah. When I was interdicted.’
‘Because of your appallingly manipulative behaviour.’
‘Which I apologised for, renounced and have been doing my best never to repeat.’
‘With some success.’
‘Really? I thought you hadn’t noticed.’
‘I notice.’ Caroline busied herself with the slides. ‘Here’s the next. A pair of nesting auks.’
Aubrey wasn’t about to let this go. ‘Then you’ve noticed that I’ve been abiding by our compact. The one where we agreed to be good friends of a jolly platonic sort.’
‘I remember. Nothing to get in the way of our studies and the like.’
Aubrey sniffed. ‘What’s that smell?’
‘Your sleeve. It’s starting to burn. Move it away from the projector.’
He did. ‘No time for frivolities of a romantic sort, that’s what you said.’
‘Or words to that effect. New slide. A flock of auks.’
Aubrey took the slide offered and jammed it into the carriage. ‘What about other frivolities?’
‘One must always find time for frivolities.’
‘But any frivolities with a whiff of romance are to be avoided.’
‘Sadly, I fear so.’
Sadly? Aubrey took a sharp breath. She met his gaze evenly, with a cryptic smile. He was lost, all over again.
‘Hello?’ Lady Rose’s voice came from the stage. ‘It’s rather too quiet up there.’
‘Sorry, Mother. Just fixing up a few things that have gone wrong.’
A few hours passed while Aubrey and Caroline helped Lady Rose sort through the slides for her lecture. Aubrey marvelled how elastic time was. A short period of time spent in a boring classroom could seem like days while a few hours in confined space with Caroline Hepworth could pass in an instant.
Lady Rose eventually insisted that they leave her, suggesting that they had better things to do. The thoughtful look she gave both of them gave Aubrey pause. He knew she felt protective of Caroline, seeing her as almost a protégée, and he was reasonably secure that she cared for him, exasperated though she was on occasion, but he couldn’t come to a conclusion as to how she viewed the two of them. Her attitude oscillated between alarm and approval, with much of this variation due, Aubrey had to admit, to the way he treated Caroline.
At Caroline’s suggestion, they decided to wander around the Academy. The grand, forbidding building with its medieval corridors and gothic architecture was a stonemason’s dream, but it was far from a quiet and studious environment on this day. Too many savants, professors and scholars in diverse fields were fussing about and trying to ensure their display would be perfect, or their lecture theatre well ventilated, or the quality of their chalk firstrate. Aubrey found it easy to tell the Academy staff from the visitors – the Academy staff had long-suffering expressions, a mixture of professional patience and resignation as they listened to complaints and requests.
‘Reminds me of putting on a show,’ Aubrey said when they passed a porter who was attempting to explain to an extravagantly bearded visitor that there were no tigers to be had in the city, for love nor money.
‘Chaos, puffed-up egos and no idea how it’s ever going to be ready before opening?’
‘Exactly.’
‘I was seeing it as like embarking on one of your lunatic adventures.’
‘Lunatic?’
‘In the kindest sense of the word.’
‘Ah. Go on.’
‘Well, just like your adventures, I imagine this place is full of that heart-in-the-mouth feeling, not knowing how it’s going to turn out, but with the anticipatory thrill of doing something important and exciting.’
Aubrey walked on in silence for a moment. They ignored a pair of squabbling academics who looked as if they were about to come to blows outside a lecture theatre.