The Threat.

Very attentive, he was an old retainer, with the emphasis on old. He instinctively knew his place. A man in service, her butler.

Especially evident at breakfast time, he’d usually laid the table the night before, ready for milady, whenever she chose to float down the stairs that morning. He brought fruit to enhance her cereal, and when finished, in a world of her own, seemingly unaware of him, he replaced the bowl with toast and freshly prepared coffee.

Then he would stoop to kiss the back of her neck.

“You could be dismissed for that!”

But I haven’t yet!