Bother. Stuck.

[reynardo]

There's only so much alcohol my male protagonist can give the young lady. So many chapters you can devote to food. And now I have a dilemma.


London 1932.

Enid is a young lady who has brought herself up from being an orphan with little education, she's gone to secretarial school, now has a good position working for a barrister specialising in property law. She's 25.

Robert is an ex-army captain who is in love with her. Aged 42, he's currently got some money - not Peter Wimsey levels but certainly enough to marry her and support her. He adores that she's independent, and the last thing he wants to do is lie or hide things from her.

Trouble is, he likes men as well as women. And he doesn't want to hide it from her. He wants to marry her, but he wants to have the freedom to occasionally (discreetly) see one of his "other interests" from time to time.

She's spotted the bookshelf of dubious books (The Well of Loneliness, The Green Carnation, etc) so I'm slowly giving them a chance to discuss that some people do things "differently". But in 1932, this was still dangerous territory.

How does he tell her about his preferences, and how does he negotiate that freedom without freaking her out completely? The only thing I can think of is her being glad there wouldn't be another woman in his life, and no illegitimate children, but that just seems rather contrived.

Ideas?

Comments

[frou-frou.livejournal.com]

I suspect that for people like your characters, in 1932, that he would probably just go ahead and marry her and tackle that problem after the wedding, when her attitude will be that of making the best of the situation: he probably wouldn't want to risk a chat before the big day in case she doesn't react well.

I'm sure you've considered that though, so perhaps he might speak of his special friend (assuming he has one) and let her know that he will be spending occasional nights there, and perhaps trips to the country. She would draw her own conclusions if he were sleeping elsewhere.

If he wasn't currently seeing anyone he would probably not mention it until the situation arose.

[rivertempest.livejournal.com]

Could they (or would they) engage in a threesome? If so, I'm trying to think if there were special "clubs" back then (I'm sure there were) that one could go to, to have a somewhat voyeuristic fantasy. He could offer to take her, to ask her to keep her mind open, that they could leave if she ever felt uncomfortable. They could observe several different groupings while he sits with her (possibly touching her while she watches and guaging her reactions).

I assume since you want them together that she'll be amenable to something she sees.

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

Oh goodness. Um ... it's not that sort of story, really. Although now I know what I'll be dreaming :-}

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

And there you have the crux of the problem - that he probably wouldn't.

Oh well, looks like more writing :-}

[fluidsparkles.livejournal.com]

why cant he just be open and direct and see if she takes it well pr not,in which case horrid loss but better before than during. Perhaps a conversation about honesty..

[shiv5468.livejournal.com]

I'm slightly more blinky about the idea she's working for one barrister and not chambers. However id could drop mentions of the bloomsbury set or Noel coward into the mix. I don't know when design for living was on the stage.

Also he's really going to have to be careful because this is pre wolfenden.

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

Ahh - the barrister is in chambers just near Grey's Inn but he's rich enough and does enough Property Law that he can afford to have a single secretary - or is that totally wrong? I have a tame helper in England giving me information on this, but he's been a bit quiet lately.

The description of the barrister is: Sir Martin Poulter, knighted in 1908 for services to the Crown (ostensibly for giving advice on a civil matter but really for helping keep the King's name out of a messy divorce case) and currently a top expert in Property Law, especially where it comes to untangling liens and ownership of complicated inheritances.

A little of it is based on how the office for Sir Wilfred Robarts in "Witness for the Prosecution" is set up, so of course I can only claim my own lack of research for the errors :-}

[shiv5468.livejournal.com]

Gray's inn. And what do you mean by ownership of inheritances? Devolution? That's wills and estates. Trusts? Chancery. And liens are remedies sort of. They're a form of possessory security interest and not limited to land.

And mostly it's not a question of affording a secretary but not producing that much typing. ONe barrister with a high end practice won't do that many cases.

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

(Goddamit Lucius is being very distracting ...)

That being the case, I'll stick with him having a legal secretary/PA who basically keeps things under control. He's probably writing his memoirs as well and she keeps his timetable under control. And he has quite a few people consulting him with cases that never actually get to court - which is his speciality. I might give him a junior barrister that Enid's also assisting, and she gets lent to the chambers downstairs as well when they're busy. Hmmm - I needed someone she knows but not well to warn her about Robert - you may have solved my issue.

As to the different areas of the law - aaargh. Wills and estates, methinks. I was thinking liens particularly when related to land - we were thinking of buying a property here in Aus that we declined because council have a lien on the first 3m of the front garden for when the road needs widening. Or at least that's how it was explained to me.

The case Robert's solicitor is consulting on is about a property Robert was given the use of by his grandmother, as she had left it to him in her will and she wasn't using it in the meantime. So he lived in it, then let a cousin stay there when he went overseas. Gran died, the cousin who has a similar name is trying to state that *they* were supposed to stay there as long as they want, and Robert wants them out as he wants to move back.

Like most NaNo novels, this is a zero-th draft, and I can change all of this out later :-} Let me see if I can sneak Lucius in somewhere...

[shiv5468.livejournal.com]

Foreign liens are different. And wrong clearly.

I don't think you understand how a chancery barrister works.

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

That figures. Can you give me the 5p version? Like I said, easy to re-write at this stage.

[shiv5468.livejournal.com]

Barristers are arranged in chambers, but work for themselves. There is a rule that says you can't just set up in business on your own until you've achieved a certain level of experience, and it's not usual to do so. It's a bit of a sign that you can't get taken on / work with other people, and that you're not that good. You work in chambers with other people so you can feed each other work and talk to each other about cases, and build a reputation as a chambers for being good at a particular area of law.

A junior barrister might work on a case for a more senior barrister but he's still self-employed, and he will work on his own cases and cases for others as well.

Chambers might have one or two secretaries, I suppose for a whole group, but typically a barrister would be turning out one or two pieces of typed work a day. Most of the time is spent reading, researching, taking manuscript notes. Only advice notes, pleadings, and wills / trusts would be written.

And I think the answer to your legal question would be that the interloper would have to leave because if the grandmother wanted to give a right of occupation that would have to be in writing and the rule that says that is very, very old indeed.

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

Cool, I can work with this, thank you heaps. OK, so Sir Martin is the Head of the Chambers (which gives him the chance to be a little bit paternalistic towards Enid, hog her time to type his memoirs, and steal her biscuits). I can easily throw in a couple of senior and junior barristers in the background.

And I was hoping for the case that the solicitor has brought it to the barrister for advice because they don't want it going to the court - all they're after is some straightforward advice so they can go to these interlopers with exactly the right paperwork and say "Out." 'cause originally when Robert said the cousins could stay, everything was done verbally or in informal letters, which is why the cousins are being pains. So the right of occupation is the document that Robert needs to lay his hands on. Excellent.

Thank you so much for this.