[There is something disarming about Ferdinand’s plain affirmation of his question. Hubert is much more the type to play the game, dancing along the edges of whatever he chooses to uncover — and his friend, ever bright and straightforward (and lacking in the art of subtlety) does what he can to unknowingly throttle it to pieces.

What to say? Why does he feel like he’s set a trap and is now the one to have fallen into it? His finger slips, losing a pleat of hair, and he has to undo a bit of the braid to compensate. What is it that he’s aiming for?]

Do I? [Hubert loses some of his figurative gentle prodding, getting more to the point, then. His face still feels too warm.] All I can know for sure is that you have been detrimental to my focus since last night.

[He lets that sit there, shining a spotlight on the elephant in the room.]

And that’s dangerous, you know, between two figures of such import within the workings of the Empire itself.