Had only two weeks passed since Marjorie would find Rupert in the staff room spending time between lectures in easy chatter with colleagues? Now, after his brother’s death, he more often slipped quietly into his office and, she imagined, shut the door behind him in relief.
Marjorie knew this was where to find him. She knocked and entered his study at his invitation. He was sitting marking papers by the window. In the ten years that Rupert had inhabited this office, very little had changed. He was an orderly man, sometimes to a fault. As a teacher though, he was renowned for his knowledge and his patience. Marjorie fancied that she could tell more about her staff on visiting their offices than she could by visiting their homes, which for some, like Rupert, was just a room in the College. F
