Morningstar Manor

Ricky was happy. He had a large pot of Karma Chai, was slouching on a sofa with a little computer balanced on his knee, working away at some list, happy as a clam. He was listening to some music with one ear -- one wire leading into his mane, one earbud dangling loose, at least -- and would be quite gregarious to anybody who'd come and talk into his spare ear.

Andras was much less happy; he was wondering what to say to Fin the next time he saw him, and brooding into his latte. He felt he was digging himself into a corner as it was, but now he was discovering that that corner was actually the fucking midden. 'Doubleplusungood' was a mild way of putting it. He picked up the magazine he had and tried to read, but it didn't help, because it was the one published by that bloke Declan with whom he'd had a one night stand some weeks back. He sighed.

Sibyl was actively unhappy; she was sitting at a table by the window, looked out, and pondered. As yet, everybody had kept mum about the theft at the museum, and people came in droves to gawk happily at the glass replica; but the atmosphere at work was such that she fled in terror every evening as early as she could possibly justify, and instead sat in her room in Del's flat, listening to audio books and working on the needlepoint from the broken chair, which was all but finished now. But if and when it all came out, the porta-potty was definitely going to hit the helicopter rotor blades, and when the first large donations were withdrawn, who would they fire first? Whom they hired last, of course! It wasn't that Sibyl couldn't have four other jobs starting tomorrow anywhere, but she actually liked the Manor and wanted to stay at least until she had found all the fascinating things that were there to be found. She didn't want to leave yet!