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the hermetic scribe. It seemed this was not happening.
    ‘He’s being impossible about the Reveal,’ he sighed now, handing her a plastic flute of Buck’s Fizz before lying back on his elbows and tipping his face up to the sun.
    Conrad was rightly proud of his golden literary find, and he remained crucial to its success, providing the only link between the super-famous boy hero, his enigmatic creator and the real world. But like the man with the goose that laid the golden egg, he constantly wanted to cut through the feathers and see what lay beneath.
    Tai Chi is non contact,
Gordon had replied to Legs.
There is no point continuing this conversation as it is no longer constructive. P.s. Tell Conrad I remain resolute.
    ‘He remains resolute,’ she told him.
    ‘He’s infuriating!’
    Legs admired the thrust of Conrad’s square chin, and the Grecian profile. She’d always thought he looked more a rugby player than a literary connoisseur, which was possibly why he rampaged through the publishing world like a prop forward tackling the scrum. He adored the cut and thrust of deal-making, but delicate negotiations frustrated him, and Gordon Lapis was an author who required a great deal of sensitive handling, more now than ever. The author had recently and very reluctantly agreed that it might be time to reveal his identity at long last, not least because the tabloids that had been threatening to do it for many years now appeared closer than ever, and the media man-hunt was reaching feverish proportions. Conrad saw the release of the next Ptolemy Finch book as the perfect cue for an unveiling.
    But Gordon’s Reveal was not proving easy to plan. At first, he had changed his mind endlessly about the time and place, the stage management and the pomp and circumstance involved. An exclusive deal with a national newspaper had been mooted then dismissed, followed by failed discussions with Oprah’s production team, Hay Book Festival and Alan Yentob. Most recently, he’d settled on a venue that was laughably unrealistic.
    ‘He’s absolutely fixed on the Farcombe Festival idea,’ Conrad sighed.
    On hearing the familiar word, Legs swallowed a blade of dismay and dread. The most elitist arts festival in the UK, notorious for its snobbish selection process, Farcombe would no more want Gordon on their programme than an end-of-pier Punch and Judy act. For all Conrad’s Booker nominees and literary grandees, he rarely ever had a client that matched up to the Farcombe entry mark. It was widely rumoured that they’d once turned down a request from the Poet Laureate to appear at the small, cherry-picked annual September festival because the role was deemed too mainstream.
    ‘But they’ve already said no, haven’t they?’
    ‘Emphatically,’ he sighed. ‘However, Gordon won’t let it drop. I even spoke with the new festival director personally last night, some old bag called Hawkes.’
    ‘Yolande,’ Legs groaned in recognition. Yolande Hawkes had been known as Bird of Prey when working in the Square Mile because she made grown men fall to their knees and beg for mercy. She had now turned from hedge funds to high culture with the belief that a brutal pruning of all but the purest art forms was required.
    ‘Any luck?’ she ventured, although she already knew the answer.
    ‘Turned down flat.’ He looked predictably offended. ‘She refuses a face-to-face meeting. She won’t even put it to the committee; saying the list is closed.’
    ‘It is mixed arts,’ Legs pointed out fairly. ‘They can only have what, eight or nine writers appearing each year, most of those poets. It’s predominantly music and visual art.’
    ‘No doubt Gordon’s deliberately suggested it as a venue because he’s convinced we’ll never get him a slot,’ Conrad said, draining his glass and straightening up to fix her with that intense, green-eyed stare that always had such a seductive effect on her, her bra practically undid itself. ‘But we have