If he smoked he’d be blowing smoke rings at the ceiling. But he didn’t smoke. When his father’s physician had advised the old man to give up cigars—long before the war—the entire household had had to give up any form of smoking. The old man would not have it any other way. Rod was not in the habit of defying his father. He left that to his sisters—who surreptitiously did what they liked, let libido rule reason, and deceived rather than defied—and his little brother, Fred, who openly argued with the old man. But if you don’t smoke … what do you do after sex? What do you say? Twenty-seven years of monogamy had not left him at all certain of the protocol.
“Thank you,” whilst sincere, did not seem appropriate.
“Did the earth move for you?” sounded like he was fishing for a compliment, and was more than likely to elicit a reply from Cid along the lines of, “Not all of it, but parts of Africa and the Middle East might have rumbled.”
“You’re miles away again,” she said to him now.
“Was I?”
“Daydreaming. Family characteristic. The Troy male’s modus operandi. Your father, you … young Fred. Come back to planet Earth. Tell me what we should do with ourselves. The day has arrived with not a plan in place. We could have given dinner for thirty. We could have had a dirty weekend in Paris for two …”
“Well, I certainly wouldn’t want a dirty weekend in Paris for thirty!”
“Shut up. Your sisters would love that. Shut up and listen. We will do something. Not today perhaps, but something while the House is in recess. Once Parliament is sitting again, I’ll never get you away. So think on, my boy. Apply your mind to this and come up with a plan by teatime today. Or else.”
“Or else what?”
“Or else no more Applied Biology.”