"I shouldn't think so, my dear," he said as smoothly as he could manage through gritted teeth, deliberately counting the endless volumes of what he had always assumed was A Magical History of Normandy, but only because the title was largely in cognates. It took up far too much shelf space for something he couldn't actually read. "It doesn't seem to have gone over very well the first time, does it? - Whatever it was." He added the last as a casual afterthought, another wild attempt at getting the needle in just so. There was nothing more comforting than finding someone to share the blame with, whether they had earned it or not.