Without seeming to notice what was happening, Lucy was steered out the door by Avis, who paused, only momentarily, to tut-tut at the old men over her head.
Fee settled back in his chair and stared into the fire as Corrie leaned in to poke at the coals.
'Will she stay?' Corrie asked, when the fire was spitting and crackling again.
'She will,' said Fee, smiling to himself, 'and be all the better for it. She and the little one.'
Corrie raised his eyebrows. How Fee knew these things, no-one could figure, but know them he did. 'I'm thinking of the very last of the Princess with a glass of something sweet and sticky,' he finally said, after pondering the predicament Lucy possibly didn't yet know she was in.