Open Post (but especially for Eros)

[jarndyceheir]

After his meeting with Arabella, Richard was left troubled and confused. Troubled because of her reactions about the gentleman to whom Tom was currently apprenticed. Confused because... well, frankly, he hadn't been admitting to himself that he'd been attracted to Mrs. Strange until he abruptly found himself no longer so. And though the loss of

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[dukes_daughter]

If Richard wants to talk to someone who is, perhaps, almost as confused about their gender as he is, have Ganymede, who will stroll past looking as cheerful as he ever does.

[jarndyceheir]

Richard almost doesn't notice him, but at the last minute looks up with almost a start. "Oh! Ganymede. How are you keeping, sir? Forgive me, I almost missed you."

[dukes_daughter]

"Nay, sir, 'tis not your business to mind me! I fare fairly, sir. Methinks you do not the same?"

[jarndyceheir]

"Just a bit preoccupied. And it is, I hope, always my business to greet my friends." He smiles. "What have you been occupying yourself with, good sir?"

[dukes_daughter]

He smiles in return. "O, with many things, most of no importance. And what of you?"

[jarndyceheir]

"Nothing incredibly exciting. I taught another gentleman how to climb trees, but he did not take to it as well as I did."

[dukes_daughter]

He laughs. "'tis a dangerous venture to fail!"

[jarndyceheir]

"He climbed well enough. He just cared not for the height, once he attained it." Richard is trying not to be amused by this.

[dukes_daughter]

"Ah! A fair fear, yet fair foolish to then wish to climb."

[jarndyceheir]

"I cannot say truly why he consented at the first, other than perhaps disorientation." He tries to hide a grin. "I did meet him very soon after he arrived."

[dukes_daughter]

He laughs again. "A foul trick!"

[jarndyceheir]

"My knavery is too late discovered, I see."

[dukes_daughter]

"Nay, sir, I did always guess it."

[jarndyceheir]

"Too clever by half, my friend," he says, laughing. "And here I've been told I was giving a fair imitation of a dour old spinster."

[dukes_daughter]

"Ay, perchance, but your youth did give't away," he says, nodding slowly and wisely, for all that he is, by all appearances, quite a bit younger than Richard.

[jarndyceheir]

"Aye, grandfather time," he says with a smile, softly hitting the other man's arm, "your sagacity has found me out after all."