A/N: To my dear Cosmogenes, I just wanted to say su moi ton megiston philon
ei- s'agapo! (if there are any ancient Greeks out there, please don't be
too harsh on my grammar, but I believe that means 'you are the greatest
friend to me- I love you!') Your emails and reviews always brighten my day,
so yay for you!
Lauren: You're so funny! Why do I always worry when I manage to find someone who seems to share my sense of humour...? Coz there's another crayzee out there somewhere, that's why! Hahaha, love your stories.
Jess: Judging from the reviews I think we did a very successful job of that weakest link chapter- team work, eh? But no, I didn't get in there before Deana (damn that girl!) oh well, there are worse things in life... bad hair days... Anne Robinson...
Recap: We join our hero after a fairly eventful night out, and some rather astounding news! What piteous misadventures will he get up to now?
******************************************************************
Chapter 10
******************************************************************
Jonathan woke to a bright light streaming in through his bedroom window- not daylight, but the headlamps of a motorcar hurtling down the hill towards the villa. He recognised that magnificent purring engine and the reckless screech of tires as the brand new Bentley pulled up in the front drive. Dickie had arrived to pick him up.
Jonathan swung his legs out of bed and shuffled towards the sliver of light indicating the doorway to the hall. His head was fuzzy and his eyelids heavy, but he seemed to have out-manoeuvred the hangover by being sober when he had eventually collapsed into bed. That and drinking a couple of pints of water beforehand, which he now desperately had to relieve himself of.
He blinked blearily as he opened the door and was assaulted by the brightness of the landing. Eyes half open he staggered towards the bathroom, barefoot in just his silk PJs, and groped for the scrolled brass handle. It took him a couple of seconds of bashing his shoulder against the hard wooden panel to realise it was locked.
"Evy?" he called in a sleepy voice, still half conscious. There was no answer. The uncomfortable fullness of his bladder was starting to wake him up properly now, and if he didn't empty it immediately he thought it might just burst. He knocked gently.
"Evy, I need to inspect the plumbing..." he said euphemistically, knowing his sister's distaste for vulgarity in such matters. Still no answer, and he was getting desperate now, crossing his legs and biting his lip. "Evy, is that you in there?" This time he thought he could hear a faint noise; if she was pretending not to be in there to save her blushes, she was just going to have to deal with it.
"Look I'm not kidding, I'm going to piss myself!" Tact out the window he banged on the door again, harder this time. "I don't care what it smells like!"
"Jonathan, what on earth are you making all that racquet for?" Evy chided in her matronly tone, stalking up the stairs behind him. Jonathan's head whipped round in confusion, wondering how the only other person in the house could be on his side of the door. Then a look of recollection suddenly dawned on his face. He turned back and began hammering the quaking door with both fists.
"STEPHEN!! Have you fallen asleep on the toilet or something?" he yelled, all consideration and patience now completely dispensed with. His question was greeted with a groan. "Look, I have to take a pi-" Jonathan took one look at Evy's thunderous expression and decided to moderate his colourful language. "I need to relieve myself."
"Bugger off..." came the faint reply.
"Oh charming!" Evy huffed, before flicking her long dark hair and storming back down the staircase.
"Now just look what you've done- you've upset Evelyn!" Jonathan sniggered with fleeting amusement. Then his immediate priority made him wince again. "I don't care what state you're in, if you don't open this door right now I'm going to tell her that you fancy her rotten!" After listening intently for a few seconds, still he could hear no movement. "STEPHEN!!"
"Alright, don't shout... I'm getting up," Stephen rasped hoarsely. The sound of the toilet flushing and a quick burst of water from the tap was proceeded by the minute clicking of the lock. Then Stephen's puffy red face poked around the side of the door.
"At last!" Jonathan sighed in relief as he barged his way past and began to undo the buttons of his pyjamas, not even the remotest hint of modesty. Closing his eyes and smiling at the blessed release, Jonathan urinated while Stephen sagged against the door post, staring blankly out into the hallway.
"Johnny, I feel bloody awful."
"You look pretty awful at that." Jonathan shot back as he finished and readjusted himself. "Is that the contents of your stomach I can smell?"
"Yeah, sorry... I don't know what's happened to me- you know I can usually take my booze." He mumbled, rubbing his eyes with a pained expression. He really did look the worse for wear, but Jonathan was sure that a good swig of his patented hangover cure would fix it- Glen Fiddych, oak matured single malt.
"Well you better snap out of it quick old bean- Dickie Warmsley has just turned up to take us to the game." Sure enough, Evy had just answered the door, admitting the sound of a terribly charming, aristocratic voice that could only belong to the young English Baron.
"I don't think so... you go without me, Jonathan." Stephen grimaced as another wave of nausea washed over him.
"What? Come on partner, we're a team, aren't we?" Jonathan asked, reaching for his toothbrush. He didn't much relish the prospect of a night at Dickie's house, among all those pompous old bores he counted as friends, without Stephen there to liven things up. Dickie was a good sort- and absolutely rolling in it, which was always one of Jonathan's favourite qualities in a friend- but for the most part daft as a brush and dull as dishwater. "'oo've 'ot 'oo puhtect 'ee fom all uh 'ose 'oring old farts," Jonathan said around a mouthful of toothpaste.
"Who's gonna protect you from yourself though, Johnny?"
Jonathan spat into the sink.
"Exactly!"
***
Ten minutes later Jonathan was stepping spryly into the lounge, hair neatly brushed and parted, shirt clean and ironed, shoes brightly polished. There was a dashing grin plastered across his hastily shaven face, and a cheeky glimmer in his eye.
"So, where is he then?" he asked his sister, having expected to find Dickie seated in the room with a glass of scotch. Instead he saw Evy sitting all alone, reading.
"Who?" Evy said, raising her neatly pencilled eyebrows with feigned ignorance. She turned the page of her book and began to read from the top with exaggerated interest.
"Who? What do you mean 'who'? Dickie! Who else?!" Jonathan said, gesticulating with a great flourish of arms and wide eyed impatience. Evelyn looked up thoughtfully.
"I do so dislike that name," she mused with a serious brow, "it sounds somehow...imbecilic. Why doesn't everyone call him Richard as they are supposed to?"
"I don't know, EVELYN, perhaps because it's a god-awful stuffy old name!"
Evy shot him a caustic expression, picking up on his insult to her name and implied accusation of hypocrisy, but mostly because she did not appreciate his blasphemy.
"I told him you wouldn't be able to make it tonight. He went home again." She said primly.
"You did what?!" Jonathan cried in disbelief. Marching towards the coffee table, scuffing the corner of the eighteenth century Persian rug in the process, he snatched up her book and peered down at her irately. "Dickie specifically drove here to pick me up so that he could show me his new car! It was rather rude to send him packing like that..." Evelyn was unperturbed.
"I thought you were indisposed, so I sent him away." She restated calmly, not even looking up from where her book had once rested in her lap. Sensing the beginning of another protest, she sharply raised her head and fixed him with a glare. "No more gambling Jonathan!"
"It's not gambling so much as a couple of friendly games of cards, made slightly more interesting by a small redistribution of property." Jonathan said glibly, suddenly on the defensive, having switched from injured to guilty party with remarkable speed.
"That so called 'small redistribution of property' is why you came home without Daddy's pocket watch that time!" Evy charged him, her voice raised to an accusatory pitch. Her cream complexion was starting to gather that glow that always attended a heated mood, and Jonathan could feel another bout of sermonising about the evils of vice. He rolled his eyes and gave her a wry smile.
"I got it back though, didn't I?"
"No, actually I got it back, if you recall."
"Yes, you never did tell me precisely how you managed that..." Jonathan pressed her with an intrigued look. Evy tilted her chin haughtily and fluttered her lashes in a bored, dismissive look.
"Men were ever more inclined to reason in the face of subtle female persuasion." She replied coolly, revealing nothing.
"Is that a fancy way of saying you blackmailed him?"
"I would never stoop so low as your methods, Jonathan!" her head whipped back to look at her brother in shock and disgust, but there was a naughty twinkle buried beneath all that scorn. "It was more a case of bribery, really." Jonathan's smile widened until his whole face was lit up with a look of delightful discovery.
"You seduced him then! You cunning little minx!" he winked saucily and nudged her crossed leg with his knee, disrupting her comfortable position on the sofa.
"Ooooh! Can't you find someone else to bother?" she complained in a disgruntled voice, recomposing herself and snatching back the book that was still dangling from Jonathan's hand.
"I was just going to go off and do exactly that! But as you seem to have sent my ride away, I'm obliged to ask you for taxi fare," he said, holding out his hand with an expectant look.
"What about your 'winnings' from last night? You can't have spent five hundred pounds already!"
"Well, I uh...um..." Jonathan scrabbled around for an explanation that wouldn't incriminate himself. "There was this, er, pickpocket, yes! Terrible contagion in this city, they are, have the shirt right off your back, and-"
"Jonathan?"
"You see we had to walk through the Old Town to get to-"
"Jonathan!"
"And there was this poor, destitute old man lying-"
"JONATHAN!!"
"Yes! Yes! I spent it all on women!" he shouted, finally admitting what Evy had suspected to begin with. "Are you happy now?!" With a defeated sigh he crossed his arms sulkily and plonked himself down beside her on the sofa.
"Jonathan, I am very far removed from being 'happy', and would you like to take one wild guess why not?" she asked him pointedly.
"I don't know- does it have something to do with 'women's things'?" he said with a cringing expression that meant he was talking about that thing men do not like to talk about- especially with their sisters.
"No it jolly well doesn't!" she retorted indignantly, swatting the side of his leg with the back of her hand. "You're always getting into unpleasant situations because of your associations with women- particularly married ones- and I always end up with a red face while you waltz off into the sunset with the next one! Take that woman this morning for instance-"
"Now just you wait there a minute, Madame judge, jury and executioner! That accusation is completely unfounded and, might I add, will be proven so as soon as I manage to catch up with whoever put her up to it." He argued with a judicial expression. "You just make sure you have your facts straight in future before you go around accusing people of-"
"Alright I apologise! If you tell me she is nothing to do with you, I believe you. But there have been plenty of others, you can't deny there have," Evy said incontrovertibly. She levelled her disapproving gaze at him over the top of her glasses, and Jonathan suddenly felt fourteen years old again, being told off by his headmaster for sneaking into the girl's dormitory. Just as he had done then, he looked at his hands with a guilty grin. "Sometimes I think the only way to keep you out of trouble is lock you up- or get your neutered." Evy said casually, then gave an evil smile at Jonathan's mock terrified expression.
Nuzzling her shoulder with his cheek, he looked up at her with puppy dog eyes that said 'take pity on me, I really will behave myself', while Evy averted her gaze and tried stolidly to read her book.
"Come on Evy, let me out to play...." he whined, pouting like a child confined to school on a sunny day. "Just a bit of pin money, please?" Evy looked unmoved, so Jonathan laid a tentative finger on her cheek. "Pretty please, Evil Weevil?"
"Jonathan, I have told you before I do not like it when you call me that!" she huffed, unable to stifle a grin despite herself. "But if it will get you out from under my feet, how much do you want?" levelling a finger at his nose, she added "within reason!"
"Oh, not much really, I should think, uh, a hundred should do it..."
"One hundred pounds?!" Evy scoffed, amused by the idea that Jonathan could have expected her to just casually throw away such a sum. "That's a pretty high price for a night's peace!"
"Oh come on, I've got to have some sort of stake to play with! I'll get laughed out of the house if I turn up with less than that!"
"And what about Stephen? Can't he lend you some money?"
"No, uh, Stephen isn't coming I'm afraid- not feeling too good, you see-"
"Well it serves him right! I have no sympathy for self inflicted maladies." Suddenly an unpleasant thought made her wrinkle her nose, and she looked at her brother beseechingly. "Oh Jonathan, you're not going to leave him alone here with me, are you?"
"Don't worry, dearest baby sister, your chastity is safe!" he said with a smirk. "I gave him 'the talk' earlier. Besides, he'll probably be in bed all night anyway- sick as a dog, that man."
"Oh, very comforting." She replied sarcastically. "I don't see why you have to go at all- its not like there isn't some card game or other every blessed day of the week!"
"Look Evelyn, we could go on like this all night, but you know you're going to give it to me eventually, so why don't we just dispense with the preamble?" Jonathan said confidently, jumping up and hopping about, impatient to be on his way. Evy sighed, conceding that he was, of course, absolutely right- she could never refuse him anything, however strongly she disapproved of it. Reluctantly getting up, she went to a replica bust of Nefertiti on the bookshelf lining the other side of the room, and removed a small key from underneath it. Then she picked up an old, gilt edged edition of the King James Bible and opened it to reveal a hollow recess within its pages. Retrieving the small cash box concealed there, she unlocked it and took out a quantity of folded notes, before locking at all back up and returning everything to its hiding place.
"Here, take this," she said, grudgingly handing the money over into Jonathan's grubby mits. "Behave yourself if you can, try to find your way home sometime this side of Christmas, and no cheating!" she said, punctuating each instruction with a jab of her finger.
"Will do old mum. Toodlepip!" And with that Jonathan pecked her on the cheek and disappeared out into the hallway. Seconds later Evy heard the bang of the front door, and knew she was alone.
Or ostensibly alone. Somewhere upstairs she knew slept the soon to be ex- lance corporal of His Majesty's Army, Stephen Wilkins.
**************************************************************************
A/N: Sorry about all that waffle, but the sole reason for the existence of this chapter is to satisfy the cravings of one avid Evy admirer! It serves very little function in the plot whatsoever, and I will therefore call it a 'character' chapter. Apologies to anyone who was bored rigid!
Lauren: You're so funny! Why do I always worry when I manage to find someone who seems to share my sense of humour...? Coz there's another crayzee out there somewhere, that's why! Hahaha, love your stories.
Jess: Judging from the reviews I think we did a very successful job of that weakest link chapter- team work, eh? But no, I didn't get in there before Deana (damn that girl!) oh well, there are worse things in life... bad hair days... Anne Robinson...
Recap: We join our hero after a fairly eventful night out, and some rather astounding news! What piteous misadventures will he get up to now?
******************************************************************
Chapter 10
******************************************************************
Jonathan woke to a bright light streaming in through his bedroom window- not daylight, but the headlamps of a motorcar hurtling down the hill towards the villa. He recognised that magnificent purring engine and the reckless screech of tires as the brand new Bentley pulled up in the front drive. Dickie had arrived to pick him up.
Jonathan swung his legs out of bed and shuffled towards the sliver of light indicating the doorway to the hall. His head was fuzzy and his eyelids heavy, but he seemed to have out-manoeuvred the hangover by being sober when he had eventually collapsed into bed. That and drinking a couple of pints of water beforehand, which he now desperately had to relieve himself of.
He blinked blearily as he opened the door and was assaulted by the brightness of the landing. Eyes half open he staggered towards the bathroom, barefoot in just his silk PJs, and groped for the scrolled brass handle. It took him a couple of seconds of bashing his shoulder against the hard wooden panel to realise it was locked.
"Evy?" he called in a sleepy voice, still half conscious. There was no answer. The uncomfortable fullness of his bladder was starting to wake him up properly now, and if he didn't empty it immediately he thought it might just burst. He knocked gently.
"Evy, I need to inspect the plumbing..." he said euphemistically, knowing his sister's distaste for vulgarity in such matters. Still no answer, and he was getting desperate now, crossing his legs and biting his lip. "Evy, is that you in there?" This time he thought he could hear a faint noise; if she was pretending not to be in there to save her blushes, she was just going to have to deal with it.
"Look I'm not kidding, I'm going to piss myself!" Tact out the window he banged on the door again, harder this time. "I don't care what it smells like!"
"Jonathan, what on earth are you making all that racquet for?" Evy chided in her matronly tone, stalking up the stairs behind him. Jonathan's head whipped round in confusion, wondering how the only other person in the house could be on his side of the door. Then a look of recollection suddenly dawned on his face. He turned back and began hammering the quaking door with both fists.
"STEPHEN!! Have you fallen asleep on the toilet or something?" he yelled, all consideration and patience now completely dispensed with. His question was greeted with a groan. "Look, I have to take a pi-" Jonathan took one look at Evy's thunderous expression and decided to moderate his colourful language. "I need to relieve myself."
"Bugger off..." came the faint reply.
"Oh charming!" Evy huffed, before flicking her long dark hair and storming back down the staircase.
"Now just look what you've done- you've upset Evelyn!" Jonathan sniggered with fleeting amusement. Then his immediate priority made him wince again. "I don't care what state you're in, if you don't open this door right now I'm going to tell her that you fancy her rotten!" After listening intently for a few seconds, still he could hear no movement. "STEPHEN!!"
"Alright, don't shout... I'm getting up," Stephen rasped hoarsely. The sound of the toilet flushing and a quick burst of water from the tap was proceeded by the minute clicking of the lock. Then Stephen's puffy red face poked around the side of the door.
"At last!" Jonathan sighed in relief as he barged his way past and began to undo the buttons of his pyjamas, not even the remotest hint of modesty. Closing his eyes and smiling at the blessed release, Jonathan urinated while Stephen sagged against the door post, staring blankly out into the hallway.
"Johnny, I feel bloody awful."
"You look pretty awful at that." Jonathan shot back as he finished and readjusted himself. "Is that the contents of your stomach I can smell?"
"Yeah, sorry... I don't know what's happened to me- you know I can usually take my booze." He mumbled, rubbing his eyes with a pained expression. He really did look the worse for wear, but Jonathan was sure that a good swig of his patented hangover cure would fix it- Glen Fiddych, oak matured single malt.
"Well you better snap out of it quick old bean- Dickie Warmsley has just turned up to take us to the game." Sure enough, Evy had just answered the door, admitting the sound of a terribly charming, aristocratic voice that could only belong to the young English Baron.
"I don't think so... you go without me, Jonathan." Stephen grimaced as another wave of nausea washed over him.
"What? Come on partner, we're a team, aren't we?" Jonathan asked, reaching for his toothbrush. He didn't much relish the prospect of a night at Dickie's house, among all those pompous old bores he counted as friends, without Stephen there to liven things up. Dickie was a good sort- and absolutely rolling in it, which was always one of Jonathan's favourite qualities in a friend- but for the most part daft as a brush and dull as dishwater. "'oo've 'ot 'oo puhtect 'ee fom all uh 'ose 'oring old farts," Jonathan said around a mouthful of toothpaste.
"Who's gonna protect you from yourself though, Johnny?"
Jonathan spat into the sink.
"Exactly!"
***
Ten minutes later Jonathan was stepping spryly into the lounge, hair neatly brushed and parted, shirt clean and ironed, shoes brightly polished. There was a dashing grin plastered across his hastily shaven face, and a cheeky glimmer in his eye.
"So, where is he then?" he asked his sister, having expected to find Dickie seated in the room with a glass of scotch. Instead he saw Evy sitting all alone, reading.
"Who?" Evy said, raising her neatly pencilled eyebrows with feigned ignorance. She turned the page of her book and began to read from the top with exaggerated interest.
"Who? What do you mean 'who'? Dickie! Who else?!" Jonathan said, gesticulating with a great flourish of arms and wide eyed impatience. Evelyn looked up thoughtfully.
"I do so dislike that name," she mused with a serious brow, "it sounds somehow...imbecilic. Why doesn't everyone call him Richard as they are supposed to?"
"I don't know, EVELYN, perhaps because it's a god-awful stuffy old name!"
Evy shot him a caustic expression, picking up on his insult to her name and implied accusation of hypocrisy, but mostly because she did not appreciate his blasphemy.
"I told him you wouldn't be able to make it tonight. He went home again." She said primly.
"You did what?!" Jonathan cried in disbelief. Marching towards the coffee table, scuffing the corner of the eighteenth century Persian rug in the process, he snatched up her book and peered down at her irately. "Dickie specifically drove here to pick me up so that he could show me his new car! It was rather rude to send him packing like that..." Evelyn was unperturbed.
"I thought you were indisposed, so I sent him away." She restated calmly, not even looking up from where her book had once rested in her lap. Sensing the beginning of another protest, she sharply raised her head and fixed him with a glare. "No more gambling Jonathan!"
"It's not gambling so much as a couple of friendly games of cards, made slightly more interesting by a small redistribution of property." Jonathan said glibly, suddenly on the defensive, having switched from injured to guilty party with remarkable speed.
"That so called 'small redistribution of property' is why you came home without Daddy's pocket watch that time!" Evy charged him, her voice raised to an accusatory pitch. Her cream complexion was starting to gather that glow that always attended a heated mood, and Jonathan could feel another bout of sermonising about the evils of vice. He rolled his eyes and gave her a wry smile.
"I got it back though, didn't I?"
"No, actually I got it back, if you recall."
"Yes, you never did tell me precisely how you managed that..." Jonathan pressed her with an intrigued look. Evy tilted her chin haughtily and fluttered her lashes in a bored, dismissive look.
"Men were ever more inclined to reason in the face of subtle female persuasion." She replied coolly, revealing nothing.
"Is that a fancy way of saying you blackmailed him?"
"I would never stoop so low as your methods, Jonathan!" her head whipped back to look at her brother in shock and disgust, but there was a naughty twinkle buried beneath all that scorn. "It was more a case of bribery, really." Jonathan's smile widened until his whole face was lit up with a look of delightful discovery.
"You seduced him then! You cunning little minx!" he winked saucily and nudged her crossed leg with his knee, disrupting her comfortable position on the sofa.
"Ooooh! Can't you find someone else to bother?" she complained in a disgruntled voice, recomposing herself and snatching back the book that was still dangling from Jonathan's hand.
"I was just going to go off and do exactly that! But as you seem to have sent my ride away, I'm obliged to ask you for taxi fare," he said, holding out his hand with an expectant look.
"What about your 'winnings' from last night? You can't have spent five hundred pounds already!"
"Well, I uh...um..." Jonathan scrabbled around for an explanation that wouldn't incriminate himself. "There was this, er, pickpocket, yes! Terrible contagion in this city, they are, have the shirt right off your back, and-"
"Jonathan?"
"You see we had to walk through the Old Town to get to-"
"Jonathan!"
"And there was this poor, destitute old man lying-"
"JONATHAN!!"
"Yes! Yes! I spent it all on women!" he shouted, finally admitting what Evy had suspected to begin with. "Are you happy now?!" With a defeated sigh he crossed his arms sulkily and plonked himself down beside her on the sofa.
"Jonathan, I am very far removed from being 'happy', and would you like to take one wild guess why not?" she asked him pointedly.
"I don't know- does it have something to do with 'women's things'?" he said with a cringing expression that meant he was talking about that thing men do not like to talk about- especially with their sisters.
"No it jolly well doesn't!" she retorted indignantly, swatting the side of his leg with the back of her hand. "You're always getting into unpleasant situations because of your associations with women- particularly married ones- and I always end up with a red face while you waltz off into the sunset with the next one! Take that woman this morning for instance-"
"Now just you wait there a minute, Madame judge, jury and executioner! That accusation is completely unfounded and, might I add, will be proven so as soon as I manage to catch up with whoever put her up to it." He argued with a judicial expression. "You just make sure you have your facts straight in future before you go around accusing people of-"
"Alright I apologise! If you tell me she is nothing to do with you, I believe you. But there have been plenty of others, you can't deny there have," Evy said incontrovertibly. She levelled her disapproving gaze at him over the top of her glasses, and Jonathan suddenly felt fourteen years old again, being told off by his headmaster for sneaking into the girl's dormitory. Just as he had done then, he looked at his hands with a guilty grin. "Sometimes I think the only way to keep you out of trouble is lock you up- or get your neutered." Evy said casually, then gave an evil smile at Jonathan's mock terrified expression.
Nuzzling her shoulder with his cheek, he looked up at her with puppy dog eyes that said 'take pity on me, I really will behave myself', while Evy averted her gaze and tried stolidly to read her book.
"Come on Evy, let me out to play...." he whined, pouting like a child confined to school on a sunny day. "Just a bit of pin money, please?" Evy looked unmoved, so Jonathan laid a tentative finger on her cheek. "Pretty please, Evil Weevil?"
"Jonathan, I have told you before I do not like it when you call me that!" she huffed, unable to stifle a grin despite herself. "But if it will get you out from under my feet, how much do you want?" levelling a finger at his nose, she added "within reason!"
"Oh, not much really, I should think, uh, a hundred should do it..."
"One hundred pounds?!" Evy scoffed, amused by the idea that Jonathan could have expected her to just casually throw away such a sum. "That's a pretty high price for a night's peace!"
"Oh come on, I've got to have some sort of stake to play with! I'll get laughed out of the house if I turn up with less than that!"
"And what about Stephen? Can't he lend you some money?"
"No, uh, Stephen isn't coming I'm afraid- not feeling too good, you see-"
"Well it serves him right! I have no sympathy for self inflicted maladies." Suddenly an unpleasant thought made her wrinkle her nose, and she looked at her brother beseechingly. "Oh Jonathan, you're not going to leave him alone here with me, are you?"
"Don't worry, dearest baby sister, your chastity is safe!" he said with a smirk. "I gave him 'the talk' earlier. Besides, he'll probably be in bed all night anyway- sick as a dog, that man."
"Oh, very comforting." She replied sarcastically. "I don't see why you have to go at all- its not like there isn't some card game or other every blessed day of the week!"
"Look Evelyn, we could go on like this all night, but you know you're going to give it to me eventually, so why don't we just dispense with the preamble?" Jonathan said confidently, jumping up and hopping about, impatient to be on his way. Evy sighed, conceding that he was, of course, absolutely right- she could never refuse him anything, however strongly she disapproved of it. Reluctantly getting up, she went to a replica bust of Nefertiti on the bookshelf lining the other side of the room, and removed a small key from underneath it. Then she picked up an old, gilt edged edition of the King James Bible and opened it to reveal a hollow recess within its pages. Retrieving the small cash box concealed there, she unlocked it and took out a quantity of folded notes, before locking at all back up and returning everything to its hiding place.
"Here, take this," she said, grudgingly handing the money over into Jonathan's grubby mits. "Behave yourself if you can, try to find your way home sometime this side of Christmas, and no cheating!" she said, punctuating each instruction with a jab of her finger.
"Will do old mum. Toodlepip!" And with that Jonathan pecked her on the cheek and disappeared out into the hallway. Seconds later Evy heard the bang of the front door, and knew she was alone.
Or ostensibly alone. Somewhere upstairs she knew slept the soon to be ex- lance corporal of His Majesty's Army, Stephen Wilkins.
**************************************************************************
A/N: Sorry about all that waffle, but the sole reason for the existence of this chapter is to satisfy the cravings of one avid Evy admirer! It serves very little function in the plot whatsoever, and I will therefore call it a 'character' chapter. Apologies to anyone who was bored rigid!