Disguised

‘Shall I go and speak with her?’ asked Xavier. ‘I could tell her how I came here.’

‘I’m not sure that would be a very good idea-’ began Kim, but Joe interrupted her.

‘Hang on a minute, love. Why not? We haven’t done anything wrong and Josie’s seen him already, you said.’

‘Seen rather more of him than any of us expected,’ murmured Kim.

‘What’s done is done. Let’s think about this. What are we going to do about you, given we’re not planning to return you or use Solution A.’

Relief was etched on Xavier’s face. ‘I’m very glad to have that confirmed.’  He sat back on the chair, arranging his hands tidily in his lap. ‘Is there some way I could have a function in this house?’

’Stay here, you mean?’ Joe scratched his head thoughtfully. ‘Doing what?’

‘If you show me moving pictures, as Jean-Claude did on his telefonino, I can learn quickly.’

Why does he do that, Kim wondered. Call a mobile by its Italian name? 

‘What have you learned so far?’ Joe couldn’t disguise his interest in Xavier’s life before his arrival at their house.

‘Language, obviously. I have French and Italian vocabularies at my disposal, largely because of Jean-Claude’s conversations. Also, I can dress and undress myself and I know how to behave in a bathroom. Jean-Claude said that was an important thing to remember, when I went about in the world.’

‘But he didn’t mention about keeping your clothes on?’

‘Lots of the people in the pictures I saw did not have clothes on all the time. It seemed normal.’

Once again, Kim shuddered at the thought of what he must have been watching.

‘What else did you learn?’ She needed to move the conversation on.

‘There were lots of films about training dogs. I have a wide range of techniques  at my disposal to do that. And embroidery stitches. And facts about the Roman Empire. Did you know the Circus Maximus could accommodate around a quarter or a fifth of the city's population as spectators during the imperial era, according to estimates by Pliny the Elder.’

‘Not sure how useful that last thing would be’, said Joe. ‘But there’s some potential in the others. You must have been watching Facebook.’