The Ballad of Smallhope and Pennyroyal

by Jodi Taylor

Genres: Historical Fantasy; Time Travel; Historical Fiction; Sci-fi Action & Adventure; Humorous sci-fi

Synopsis

From the globally bestselling author of the Chronicles of St Mary's and Time Police series - the origin story of bounty hunters extraordinaire: Smallhope and Pennyroyal.

Meet Lady Amelia Smallhope, for whom there is no problem that can't be solved by a drink and a think.

And Pennyroyal, for whom there is no problem. Ever.

Everyone's favourite bounty hunters. Sorry - recovery agents.

No bad guy they can't handle. No expense account too flexible. No adventure too outrageous.

Join them as they settle scores, break every rule in the book and take the world by storm.

Fasten your seatbelts. The timeline doesn't know what's hit it.

Release date: September 12, 2024

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 352

Sample

STARLINGS

The Present

 

I was with Papa when the news came. He was hanging out of his study window at the time, shooting at the bloody peacock, and I was loading for him when our butler, Cleverly, came in. He stood in silence for a while and then coughed politely.

‘I fancy, my lord, you’ll find that particular gun shoots a trifle low and to the left.’

Neither Papa nor I even considered asking him how he could possibly know that. Several years ago, Papa had insisted that all our staff learn to shoot. This was in the not unlikely event of us having to fight off an invasion by the massed ranks of evil blood-­sucking ghouls – or HMRC as George refers to them. George is my older brother. He walked a different path to the rest of us Smallhopes. As we were about to find out.

Papa emptied both barrels in the general direction of the cedar tree in which the peacock spent each morning, shrieking its eldritch shriek, hangovers for the worsening of. The bird in question lifted its beautiful tail and shat mightily.

 

Papa swore mightily. ‘What is it, Cleverly?’

‘A letter from Lord Hardcourt, my lord.’

Lord Hardcourt is brother George. It’s confusing, I know, so let’s get the details out of the way now. For those less familiar with the peerage of the United Kingdom, Smallhope is our family name. Goodrich is the title. Papa is the Earl of Goodrich – Lord Goodrich. George, as his eldest son – his only son – is entitled to use his second title – Viscount Hardcourt. And I’m Lady Amelia Smallhope. There’s no Lady Goodrich – my mother died, along with my older sister Charlotte, when I was about four – a train crash just outside Droitwich – after which Papa spent a while muttering about roping in some elderly and indigent female relative to supervise my upbringing. That did not go well. I suspect we weren’t respectable enough even for the most elderly and indigent female relative he could find. Think Henry VIII looking for a seventh wife and every princess in Europe suddenly discovering she was washing her hair that night. Or taking the veil. Keeping her head, anyway.

Faced with his failure to procure someone appropriate, Papa took charge of me himself. The result is that I can ride, shoot, drink, curse and, thanks to Smallhope lungs, make myself heard from one end of the county to the other.

Possibly slightly more importantly, he was raising me to handle the estate. I suspected that at some point he’d taken a long hard look at George, decided he didn’t quite have the qualities of guile, deceit and duplicity required to deal with sponging relatives, the local council, our MP, the Lord Lieutenant, HMRC, DEFRA, the parish council, his solicitor, his accountant, his tailor, his wine merchant, and – pretty well everyone, really. Poor George wasn’t that good at holding his drink either, so Papa delegated everything to me.

 

Papa and I got along just fine. He would swear – I would swear back – he would remember his role as a responsible parent and correct my grammar and syntax – and my spelling as well if it was a new word or phrase. Papa and I were very alike.

George was very happy to drift along in his own pretty pink world. In fact, he and I had already sworn a childhood pact. When he became Lord Goodrich, he’d spend his time reading and writing and I would run the estate for him.

I can’t remember how old we were at the time. Before George went off to uni, anyway. We were sitting behind the compost heaps – it had been a favourite hiding place of ours. I have no doubt everyone knew we were there but no one ever said anything. We’d made a small fire and were endeavouring to toast marshmallows. It wasn’t going well and George had already burned himself quite painfully. I’d had to move pretty quickly to prevent him from setting himself on fire.

I gave him my marshmallow to take his mind off it.

‘Thanks.’

He munched for a moment and then said, ‘What are you going to do when you grow up, Millie?’

I shrugged. ‘Get married, I suppose.’

‘Don’t you know?’

‘Not really.’

‘You’ll go away, though?’

‘Well, yes. You do when

you’re a girl. You have to go and live with your husband.’

I poked the fire in a manner that indicated my contempt for such stupidity.

 

‘Don’t you want to be married?’

‘Not particularly. A bit of a mug’s game. Especially for the wife. What about you? You’ll be the earl.’

‘I don’t think I want to.’

‘What – be married or be the earl?’

‘Both. Wish you could do it for me.’

We stared at the fire for a while.

‘You have to marry, George. Heirs and successors and all that.’

‘Yeah.’ He sighed. ‘It’s just . . .’

‘What?’

George isn’t big on eye contact but for once he looked directly at me. ‘It’s the weight, Millie. The responsibility. Land, property, people’s livelihoods, living at Starlings – I’ll get it all wrong, bankrupt the estate, everyone will shout at me . . .’

‘George, you know I’ll never let that happen.’

‘Well, yes, I suppose I do.’ He took a breath. ‘Um . . . Millie, I’ve had an idea.’

‘Mm?’ I was loading more marshmallows. ‘What?’

‘You do it for me.’

I laughed. ‘I can’t be the earl. You need a penis for that.’

We’d just done penises in biology and I was rather proud that I’d managed to work one into the conversation.

‘No, I mean run things. You run the estate.’ He paused. ‘Talk to people. Make them do what you want.’

George doesn’t do other people very well.

‘You can’t make people do things, George,’ I said. Quite wrongly as it turned out, given my career choices. ‘You just have to ask them nicely and, most of the time, they will.’

He ignored this. ‘If you stayed here then I won’t have to.’ He peered anxiously through the smoke. ‘What do you think?’

 

I considered this. ‘What would you do instead?’

‘Whatever I like. Get a little flat in London. Read. Paint. It would be quiet.’

George liked quiet.

I shook my head. ‘Papa won’t . . .’

Again, he looked at me directly. ‘Oh, he will, Millie. He already is. It’s you he takes with him on estate visits. It’s you he buys cider for in the King Teddy. And Jo serves you, which she wouldn’t do for me.’

‘George, you don’t like cider.’

He gazed at me sadly. ‘That’s not the point. The point is that he takes you everywhere with him. You’re his favourite.’

‘That’s not true,’ I said quickly, knowing it was.

‘I don’t mind. Really. Don’t tell me he hasn’t already thought of it himself. And probably everyone else has as well. Can’t you hear them saying it? What a pity Amelia

wasn’t the boy and George the girl. That sort of thing.’

He was exaggerating, but only slightly. George and Papa didn’t always get on. Looking back, neither were to blame. Papa wasn’t unkind but he was impatient. And if George had just shouted back – as I did – then everything would probably have been fine. It wasn’t that they disliked each other – it was just that each was incomprehensible to the other.

There was the time George crashed the estate Land Rover with me on board. We weren’t hurt but there was a staddle stone on the grass verge by the stables that would never be the same again and the Rover hadn’t fared that well, either. I pushed him out of the driving seat and pretended it was me who’d done it – which was easy because I’d been driving around the park since I was nine. Papa had roared at me for nearly twenty minutes, something that would probably have killed George.

 

‘There’s nothing wrong with you, George,’ I said fiercely, handing him another marshmallow.

‘Not if I was just George Smallhope, but I’m not, am I? One day . . .’ he gestured around, ‘all this will be mine.’

‘So your plan is to put your feet up and let me do all the work.’

He grinned. ‘Something like that. What do you say?’

I grinned back. ‘Yeah – OK.’

We shook hands on it. That was our plan. Both of us would get what we wanted and everything would be perfect.

And so it was, right up until the day that Cleverly turned up with the letter. From George. Or Lord Hardcourt, as those of you paying attention will remember.

Cleverly proffered the tray on which reposed the letter. The peacock, realising the day’s entertainment was over, pushed off – probably to find the rest of his harem and sire yet another generation of anarchic avians. We usually had a good baker’s dozen of the buggers stamping round the grounds, beating up the dogs, terrorising visitors, and continually outwitting poor Papa.

He handed me his gun. ‘Put it on my desk, Millie. I’ll clean it later.’

Cleverly had brought a letter opener but Papa had already shredded the envelope and was unfolding the single sheet.

‘Good God!’

I wasn’t paying much attention. The letter didn’t have HMRC stamped all over it in blood-­red letters so I’d assumed it wasn’t anything serious. I was wrong.

 

‘Well, bugger me sideways, Millie. George is engaged to be married.’

‘Is he?’ I said, astonished. ‘Who to?’

Papa frowned at me.

‘I mean, to whom?’

‘A party calling herself Caroline Dyer.’ He looked up. ‘Never heard of her. You?’

I shook my head. Faint misgivings began to stir. George didn’t write letters. Poetry – yes. Excruciatingly bad poetry, actually. Sometimes he would read us a sonnet or two.

‘Dashed good,’ Papa

would say to these recitations, reaching for the decanter. Like George, he was easily taken in by rhyming words. I did once write to HMRC, explaining this father–son penchant and requesting that they couch all future demands in rhyming couplets because it would make everyone’s life so much easier and, believe it or not, I did get a response from their probably optimistically named Customer Care department. In a letter signed by a V. Tepes, they stated they would have been delighted to oblige, but owing to recent government cutbacks, they’d had to let the entire poetry department go.

But back to George. And his letter. The one announcing his engagement to the unknown Caroline Dyer.

‘And he’s bringing her to dinner on the ninth.’

‘What?’

I consulted the calendar on Papa’s desk and discovered it to be for the year before last. He’d kept it because the picture of the horse reminded him of one he’d once backed quite heavily at Plumpton and said horse had romped home two days after the race meeting had closed.

 

Eventually, after Cleverly had done something technical with his mobile, we discovered that the ninth was tomorrow.

This just wasn’t how things were done. When meeting members of one’s future family, there’s a strict procedure to be followed. Beginning with a telephone call giving at least a week’s notice. Enough time for us to get the Royal Worcester out. Such a meeting should take the form of a pleasant afternoon tea to introduce everyone and check the prospective candidate’s breeding history, bloodlines and financial status. This would then be followed a few months later by a wedding in the local church, St Kyneburgha’s, a month’s honeymoon in Italy, and then back here sharpish for the start of the shooting season on 12th August. The Glorious Twelfth.

Before anyone becomes inflamed over the Glorious Twelfth’s slaughtered birds, here at Starlings – the name of the house, I’ll explain later – the odds are very much on their – the slaughtered birds’ – side. I suspect game birds actually migrate to our estate knowing they’ll be perfectly safe here. The body count rarely exceeds double figures. In fact, about three years ago, the whole event would have been a no-­score draw if Higgins, our elderly and incapable gamekeeper, hadn’t come across a dead bird – killed by a fox, probably – and actually threw the corpse into the air right in front of Papa and his old friend, General Sir Royston Tindler, both of whom were, at the time, refreshing themselves from their respective hip flasks, presumably to offset the trauma of publicly demonstrating that neither of them was capable of hitting a barn door from a distance of ten feet.

Both gentlemen grabbed for their guns. Both fired. Both missed. The dead bird, obeying the laws of gravity, crashed to the ground. Rosie, Papa’s elderly spaniel and mother of Doofus – my dog – woke up, waddled across to the corpse, gave it a good sniff and refused to touch it. Papa stuffed it into his game bag anyway and took the credit. He actually brought it back to the kitchens for Mrs Tiggy to cook.

 

‘No need to hang it,’ he said to her, handing over the dilapidated corpse.

I suspect she threw it in

the bin and defrosted a chicken. Everyone said it was delicious. Smiles and congratulations all round.

I’ve forgotten where I was. Oh yes. The day the letter arrived. The day after which nothing was ever the same again.

According to George’s non-­rhyming missive, a female named Caroline Dyer had inexplicably professed herself willing to become his wife. There followed a paragraph or two where George compared her to several random celestial bodies and a rosy-­fingered dawn – to their detriment, obviously – and wound up by announcing he was bringing her for a meet the family visit.

I sighed. ‘Cleverly, can you apologise to Mrs Tiggy for the short notice and ask her for something special for dinner tomorrow, please. I’ll leave it to her.’

‘As you wish, my lady.’

He oozed his way out of the door.

I was rummaging through Debrett’s – nothing. Burke’s Peerage – nothing. Google?

‘Aha.’ I passed Papa my tablet. ‘That’s her – the one on the left.’

We both peered at the image for quite a while. I remember thinking at the time that it must be a very bad photo. No one could possibly be that vacuous-­looking, that skinny, or have that unfortunate a taste in hats. She was wearing spiked heels at some outdoor event and they’d sunk into the soft ground, thus causing her to list to the right a little. Quite a lot, actually.

 

‘Well,’ said Papa, handing it back. ‘At least we’ll know her when we see her.’

I don’t think he meant it as a compliment.

I should make it clear that, at this stage – before we’d actually met her, of course – neither Papa nor I had anything against this Caroline person. If she made George happy, etc., etc. And since he spent most of his time in London being a poet . . . or an artist . . . or a writer . . . or a composer . . . whatever that month’s chosen profession was – it was unlikely we’d be seeing much of either of them. Life in fashionable London would be far more exciting than life at Starlings. And then, in the course of time, Caroline would be throwing out a couple of sprogs to ensure the succession and that would keep them occupied for a few years, so really this would be quite a minor event in our lives.

I suppose we could have  been more wrong, but it’s hard to see how.

 

CHAPTER 2

It would probably be useful, at this point, to include a little information about us, the Smallhopes: where we live, a bit of family history, and so forth.

I know it’s fashionable for people to claim their ancestors came over with the Conqueror and, for all I know, ours did – among the mercenaries, murderers escaping justice and general hoi polloi Duke William recruited because he was desperate for manpower. Basically if you could hold a sword, you were in. It didn’t even matter if you held the wrong end.

Anyway, our ancestors bimbled their way through the years, emerging in a minor sort of way in the 14th century, which wasn’t a century known for its happy times. Not only was there war, rebellion, plague, civil unrest, shit weather and all the rest of it, but the 14th century also produced Black Ralph Smallhope, who was, by all accounts, a bit of a bastard even by that century’s low standards. No one’s quite sure whether his nickname was due to his ferocious temper, his hair colour, or his armour. Contemporary accounts are scarce and unclear.

The family had settled here at Starlings by then. Chez nous at that time was a hastily assembled stone keep with a couple of wooden huts tacked on as required. There were no comforts of any kind – which was how Black Ralph liked it, apparently.

 

Anyway, even among Smallhope men, he was a bit of a shit. Black Ralph was married to Perfectly Normal Agnes – who, incidentally, is credited with bringing red hair into the family, where it’s been ever since – and they had three sons. I don’t know about any daughters – they didn’t count.

According to the legend, Agnes was pious and kind to the poor and everyone loved her. Except Ralph, one of those men who – due to an unacknowledged but massive inferiority complex and an unwillingness to confront their own inadequacies – are always convinced that their wife is having an affair with every man she meets. Often a self-­fulfilling prophecy.

I’m not sure whether chastity belts were a thing then – or ever – but they weren’t good enough for Ralph, who went one better and locked Agnes in a cage in 1346, grabbed his sons, and followed Edward III to France. Presumably he forgot all about his wife, because he didn’t return for some years.

Fortunately for Agnes, she was able to escape the cage and seduce his younger brother – or possibly she did it the other way around – and the two of them were carrying on very happily at Starlings when Black Ralph finally showed up again. Minus two sons who hadn’t made it. The third son brought home a wife and a son but died a year later, supposedly of dysentery, but George and I were always convinced it was the pox.

Anyway, Agnes and her brother-­in-­law celebrated Ralph’s return by hurling him down the castle well. Well, a castle well. Buggering up your own water supply is never the best idea and Agnes wasn’t a stupid woman by any means. Although it’s probably safe to assume that post-­cage Agnes wasn’t anywhere near as pious and kind as pre-­cage Agnes.

 

Her first priority was to eliminate any and all witnesses to this dastardly deed – namely, the younger brother – by making love to him, there and then, as Ralph splashed impotently some twenty feet below ground level. Their cries of ecstasy intermingled with those of her soon-­to-­be-­dead husband as he roared dark curses and tried to climb out, only to lose his grip on the slippery stones, fall back into the no-­longer-­fit-­to-­drink water and injure himself quite badly. He was still struggling to keep his head above water when his brother, literally, landed on top of him – still unlaced and dangling – as Agnes, taking advantage of his post-­coital lack of concentration, upended him into the well too, and then leaned over the coping to gloat at the pair of them.

No one knew how long it took them both to die, or even if the story was actually true, until Grandpapa Eustace – whom I vaguely remember as a huge, shouty man – had some work done in the second wine cellar and a quantity of human bones were found at the bottom of an old dry well. Not wanting to be bothered with police investigations and coroner’s courts and other irrelevancies, he threw them back and ordered the concrete to be poured immediately.

Black Ralph’s wife – Perfectly Normal Agnes – showed no signs of remorse whatsoever, never married again and, possibly because of that, lived well into her eighties. She ruled her descendants with a rod of iron and became a great matriarch.

As children, George and I spent long hours down in the cellar, listening for the piteous cries of

long-­dead ghosts clamouring for revenge, until Papa very sensibly pointed out that we wouldn’t be able to hear them under all that concrete, would we, so we went off to play on my Xbox.

 

And before I forget, Starlings is named for the sky full of starlings who, for centuries, have flocked around the rooftops during winter sunsets, sweeping, swooping and swirling in complex patterns of magnificent splendour – a murmuration – and, incidentally, crapping over everything in sight. Which just about sums up the Smallhopes, really.

Of Ralph’s original castle, only parts of the keep remain, incorporated into one end of the West Wing. The house has since been enlarged, pulled down, rebuilt, burned down, added to, modernised, Gothicised – and the result is a rambling structure which manages to cover an enormous amount of ground but isn’t actually that large. It has no particular architectural merit but we do have adequate plumbing and heating, thanks to an Edwardian Smallhope who married an American heiress. He had the sense to marry her before introducing her to her new home. She apparently took one look at the place and very nearly bolted, and only by the installation of mass bathrooms, toilets and central heating could she be lured in through the front door. I always imagine them laying a trail of toilets across the floor to tempt her in.

Obviously the benefits of marrying money were plain for even a Smallhope man to grasp, and from that moment on, all subsequent male Smallhopes would marry well but not neces­sarily wisely. It’s not generally mentioned, but in the early years of their marriage, Grandmama Alexandra actually stabbed Grandpapa Eustace. Sadly, the reason why has been lost to time, but as you can imagine, there was a hell of a row and he always swore he never dared turn his back on her afterwards.

Papa and Mama were at least polite to each other. He lived in the central part of the building and she in the East Wing. Presumably they met on common ground and were polite to each other at least three times to have produced George, Charlotte and me.

 

Anyway, after that brief guided tour of the Smallhopes . . .

Caroline was appalling.

And that’s the kindest thing I’m ever going to say about her.

I know that makes me sound arrogant and snobbish but I’m not. Papa insisted I was educated at the local school – Rushford St Winifred’s. My best friend was our head groom’s daughter, Emily. I did well at school. I was captain of the junior hockey team; I was down to play Katherina in next year’s production of The Taming of the Shrew, I was year head and a junior prefect with the distinct possibility of becoming head girl one day. And then, if my A levels were good enough, off to uni to study land management.

There were party invitations and sleepovers and all the usual teenage stuff. I went to other girls’ houses and they came to mine. We’d have hot dogs and burgers, make popcorn and stream movies. Apart from Papa stamping around in the

background shouting about the peacocks, those bastards at HMRC and the imbecilic government, everything was perfectly normal. I did rather worry about what they’d make of Papa but all my friends thought he was lovely. No one was in the slightest bit afraid of him. Rowena said he was sexy and Lindsey thought he was cute. I suppose my house was just like their houses – it’s just that mine had twenty-­seven bedrooms and four staircases. Although, as I explained to them, we didn’t use all of them. I’ve no idea what they would have made of George but he was wafting around York University at the time so the subject never really came up.

 

Papa, too, knew no barriers when it came to friends and acquaintances. He was almost certainly on nodding terms with every poacher and ne’er-­do-­well in the district. He was known and welcome in every pub for a radius of twenty miles. And no race meeting was complete without the Earl of Goodrich lamenting his phenomenal bad luck.

And then there was the mysterious Mrs Rugeley who lived in Kew. Papa would take George and me with him to visit her whenever he went up to London, where he decamped regularly to argue with large numbers of people. He would drop us off with her and we’d spend a couple of days there. She had a tall narrow house with a tiny back garden, most of which was occupied by an enormous fuchsia. We would make little cakes and jam tarts and she would read to us from the classics – Thomas the Tank Engine and The Chronicles of Narnia and Terry Pratchett. George would sit alongside her where he could see the pictures and I’d sit on her lap with my head resting on her comfy bolster bosom. I think she’d been an actress at one time because she could do all the different voices and make the stories sparkle. Sometimes she and George would dress up and sing songs from their favourite musicals and I would laugh and clap and then we’d have fish and chips. I was thirteen or fourteen before I realised what her and Papa’s true relationship was. I probably should have resented her and accused her of trying to take Mama’s place, but I honestly don’t remember my mother, and Mrs Rugeley – Auntie Dee – was so warm and kind and soft and funny. I loved her dearly. I thought George did, too. I miss her even today.

I know you’ll think I digress a lot, but I mention Auntie Dee because, with Mama dead, she and Papa were the nearest example I had of a couple in a relationship. The only example, actually. So, I’m not sure what I expected from Caroline and George, but everything started badly and went downhill faster than our local MP’s fall from grace when he was discovered with one hand in the till and the other down the front of someone else’s shorts.

 

Back to Caroline. I stood in Papa’s study and watched them arrive in a very smart new car. George’s engagement gift to Caroline, apparently. It was yellow – which should have told me something, I suppose. Caroline was driving, pulling up outside the side door – we don’t use the front. In fact, I wasn’t sure the doors even opened any longer. Papa said it was to baffle the revenue when they finally came for us. Apparently the plan was that we’d nip out the back while they wrestled with the front. I had my doubts about that strategy.

Anyway, she pulled up with a flourish of flying gravel, very nearly taking out the pugnacious 

peacock who just happened to be passing at the time. As was Mrs Tiggy, Milburn the head gardener, and two or three other people who had no business being there but had been unable to resist the temptation. Mrs Tiggy was actually clutching a sprig of mint as if that would offer up some kind of explanation for her out-­of-­kitchen experience.

First out was George, looking a bit green around the gills. He doesn’t travel well. He certainly hadn’t travelled well today. Quickly, perhaps, but not well. He leaned against the car door, getting his breath back, and I transferred my attention to the eagerly awaited Caroline.

I’ve never seen anyone that thin. I honestly couldn’t understand why her legs hadn’t snapped in half. She wasn’t tall – certainly shorter than me. Which might be why she was wearing those massive heels again. Wispy hair blew around her face and she was wearing a short tight yellow dress. She looked like a pencil.

 

I watched them enter the house and suddenly realised I should be down there to say hello. By the time I came flying down the stairs, Doofus at my heels, Papa was shaking Caroline’s hand and welcoming her to Starlings.

They say the onlooker sees most of the game. I was waiting at the foot of the stairs, so it’s possible that I was the only one to see the quick appraising look she cast around the hall and its contents. She’d be lucky – the Gainsboroughs were upstairs in the Long Gallery.

‘And here,’ said Papa, looking around, ‘is Amelia.’

Caroline reeled backwards. ‘Oh no – I’m sorry – I can’t bear dogs.’

It was unclear to which of us she was referring.

‘And they don’t like you either,’ I said cheerfully, as Doofus stood his ground and barked at her.

Even at that stage, if she’d made an effort, we could all have laughed it off. And if she had problems with Doofus, just wait until she met Papa’s Rosie, elderly, grumpy and riddled with secondary lifeforms. But George said, ‘Millie, do you mind?’ So I shut Doofus up in the library. When I came back, they’d taken themselves off to our private sitting room. Cleverly was under instructions to give us twenty minutes and then wheel in the tea trolley.

Caroline was standing in front of the fireplace talking to Papa as I entered, so I was able to take my time observing her. Seeing her now, close up, she had shoulder-­length bottle-­blonde hair and watery blue eyes. Everything about her seemed pale and washed out. Especially her voice, which was deliberately low-­pitched. She had the irritating habit of dropping it still further at the end of every sentence, possibly entering the realms of the subsonic where only elephants could hear her. Not that it mattered – Papa’s selectively deaf and George had presumably heard it all before, leaving me, not particularly interested, to perch on the edge of the sofa, trying to look fascinated and absorbed.

 

I honestly did try to give her the benefit of the doubt, taking advantage of her listing the charities over which she presided to wonder if perhaps she was nervous. Or overwhelmed. Or just trying too hard to make a good impression.

There was no need. Our

 small family sitting room is just that – small. And very friendly, with slightly shabby furniture, family watercolours – which aren’t very good but they were done by the family – and a lovely Empire ormolu mantel clock that hadn’t worked in living memory. I had no idea what was wrong with it – for all I know someone had forgotten to wind it up one day in 1947 and it had been like that ever since. The whole room smelled slightly of dog, occasionally of horse, and if it was autumn and we hadn’t yet switched on the central heating – damp.

Caroline had obviously made an effort with her appearance. Fortunately she didn’t have pillow lips, but they were firmly outlined in brown pencil. Perhaps she couldn’t find them, otherwise. They were very thin and, as we were to discover, became even thinner when she was annoyed or displeased. She wasn’t silicon-­enhanced or in danger of blinding herself with her own fingernails, but to me she seemed a manufactured character. A collection of fashionable features. A persona to show the world. And her laugh was so silvery and tinkling that I feared for the glassware.

 

I underestimated her right from the very beginning.

Cleverly entered with the tea things.

‘Ah, excellent,’ said Papa, who loved his afternoon tea. ‘Millie, would you . . . ?’

Too late. Caroline had already seized the teapot. ‘I’m sure you won’t mind,’ she said, not looking at me. ‘After all, as the future Lady Hardcourt . . .’

I don’t know whether she stopped talking at that point or her voice dropped into elephant frequency. There’s a safari park about twenty miles away. Perhaps they heard. The next minute she was sloshing tea around like a priest swinging one of those incense thingies and telling us about the dear Duchess of Somewhere or other – even the elephants would have had their work cut out for them at that point, big ears or not. Actually, I think I’ve read somewhere they absorb sound through their feet. Anyway, apparently the dear duchess always asked her to pour because of her special . . . more inaudible words. Ask the elephants.

She got the tea all wrong. You’d think George would have briefed her, wouldn’t you. Papa was handed something milk-­laden and anaemic. George got something sugared and I didn’t get one at all.

Papa and I exchanged a long look. His eyelid flickered so I let her live. Wish I hadn’t bothered now.

It was at this point that I made a cardinal error. In later years I would know better than to withdraw from hostilities voluntarily. Never, ever leave your enemy in sole charge of the battleground.

Mindful that I could be ignored much more comfortably in my own rooms, that Doctor Who was on later, and that Mrs Tiggy would supply me with a more than adequate care package, I waited until Caroline was in full flow and caught Papa’s eye. He grinned at me and nodded his head towards the door. I waited until she was talking about . . . something . . . and made my escape.

 

I liberated Doofus, who had made himself a forbidden nest on the library sofa, and went to ask Mrs Tiggy if I could have a sandwich or two. She packed me up a small feast and Cleverly brought me up one of Mrs Tiggy’s special chocolate mousses and half a glass of wine. I think they saw the way the wind was

blowing much more quickly than I did.

That was my first mistake. And Papa’s. We sent the wrong signals. That I was a pushover. That Papa would do anything for a quiet life. That George wouldn’t make a fuss. I learned from that. First impressions are important. Start as you mean to go on.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

 

Caroline stayed at Starlings for several days, passing the time by clinging to George’s arm as he showed her around, and gushing darlings in his general direction whenever he looked at her. I’ve always been hugely suspicious of people who pepper their conversations with darling, and let’s not even start on babe.

I, Papa and the dogs took refuge in his study.

He was cleaning his second favourite shotgun, I was doing my Spanish homework, and Caroline was being the elephant in the room.

Eventually I said, ‘What do you think of her?’

No need to specify who her was.

Papa said nothing for a while and then laid down his gun. A sure sign of an important pronouncement.

‘Well, she wouldn’t do for me, but George seems to like her, which is the important thing. And frankly, Millie, I never thought he’d marry at all. I was convinced he’d hide behind you for most of his life. Let you get on with everything – which would have been fine as far as it went – but the bottom line is that he needs to produce an heir. And a spare, just to be on the safe side. Glad to see he’s accepted that.’ He picked up his gun again. ‘There aren’t many of us Smallhopes left, these days.’

 

‘But . . .’

‘I know, but she is George’s choice.’ He stopped again and then said with some difficulty, ‘George and I are very different people, Millie. Perhaps if your mother had lived, then she could have . . . well. It was hard for me, losing them both like that. At the time, you were my main concern but, with hindsight, it’s George who’s been most affected by her death. I didn’t mean to be . . . unkind, but I’m afraid I’ve been unsympathetic to some of his . . . his choices. I think I owe it to him to . . . to be supportive over this one.’

I said nothing. It was true that George and I had had very different childhoods, but Papa’s words were making me uneasy in a way I couldn’t describe. For the first time I could remember, a shadow lay across my life here at Starlings. And across George. And Papa.

If they’d been on better terms, could Papa, at some point, have taken George aside. Could they have talked about how George saw his future? About leaving his life in London and returning to Starlings to live here? About Caroline and their life together? It never happened. I suspect that, just for once, Papa had bottled it.

Something of my anxiety must have shown in my face because he said, ‘Nothing for you to worry about, Millie. I’ve no intention of kicking off my clogs in the near future – but just in case . . . there’s a bit in my will . . . George will take care of you. Probably unnecessary – he relies on you a lot – but it’s there

anyway.’ He stopped and repeated to himself, ‘Just in case.’

 

 

The wedding took place. I wasn’t a bridesmaid. Apparently Caroline was well endowed with sisters – all of whom looked exactly like her. Other than the clones, there were no other Dyer relations at the celebrations. There was a brother, apparently, who was unable to attend because he was abroad or something, and their parents were dead. Probably consumed by their own offspring.

The ceremony was a bit of an ordeal for everyone except Caroline. Beginning with decorating the church. St K’s is a small country church and I think everyone had been expecting pretty posies made of summer flowers. Poor Reverend Caldicott could hardly believe his eyes. I don’t think he’d ever seen so many purple and orange flowers in all his life.

‘Do you think she knows it’s not Westminster Abbey?’ said Papa, blinking, as we entered together. He was looking very distinguished in morning dress. Apparently Caroline had designated an official colour scheme – purple and orange – with which everyone had to comply. Papa got away with an orange tie but I’d been condemned to wear something stupid in purple, which clashed horribly with my red hair.

There must have been at least twenty-­five miles of orange and purple ribbons adorning each pew. Papa caught his foot in the bunting as we sidled into our seats and brought down the whole pew’s worth. We stifled our giggles, stuffed it under our seat and didn’t dare look at each other.

 

So busy were we burying the evidence of our depravity that we nearly missed the grand parade of bride and bridesmaids up the aisle. How could one person possibly have so many sisters? All of them virtually identical in their matching dresses.

‘Like the Village of the Damned,’ confided Papa in what he probably thought was a whisper.

The ceremony proceeded. Sadly, no one came up with a good reason why these two should not be joined together in holy deadlock. I didn’t actually see the bride’s triumphant march back down the aisle – Papa and I were too busy trying not to break anything on the way out.

The reception at Starlings was even worse. George and ­Caroline – Caroline, anyway – had invited hundreds of guests. Well, probably not hundreds, but that’s how it seemed. We had our family and friends too. Some of George’s friends from university came. And local people, of course. Most of the family were of Papa’s generation – cousins, second cousins, aunts and uncles – who all withdrew to Papa’s study afterwards to get some serious drinking done. It was only as I gazed around the troughing masses in the ballroom that I realised how much we Smallhopes had dwindled over the years.

‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’

I turned. There was Aunt Indira. I’m not sure what our relationship was – she was Papa’s now dead uncle’s wife’s sister’s son’s wife. I think. There may be another brother or wife in there somewhere.

‘What are you thinking?’

‘I’m thinking there

 aren’t many of you left. If Caroline doesn’t start throwing out some heirs pretty soon, then we could be looking at an extinction event.’ She considered me. ‘What about you? Any plans to get married?’

 

‘Not likely. The thought of ending up with the male equivalent of Caroline is enough to render anyone celibate. For life.’

She laughed and then frowned. ‘Seriously, Millie – I would start looking at alternative living arrangements if I were you.’

‘George and I are to run the estate together,’ I said.

She sighed. ‘Oh, my dear.’

‘What?’

‘Amelia, you’re taller, better looking, younger, more intelligent and more popular. She won’t have you around here for long. How old are you?’

‘Why?’

‘Well, fortunately, your papa’s got years of life left in him yet, but I’d definitely put together an exit strategy if I were you.’

I stared at her. Aunt Indira was nobody’s fool. She ran her own business, was involved in several more, sat on several committees and was one of the governors of a very posh boys’ school up in the Lake District. Any advice from her should be heeded.

‘I’ll think about it,’ I said.

‘That would be wise. I strongly suspect the day after Randolph’s funeral will begin with you being shown the door.’

‘I think I can handle Caroline.’

‘Oh my dear, she wouldn’t do it – she’d get George to do it.’

She smiled, patted my arm and drifted away. I withdrew to a corner to consider the implications. Indira was absolutely right. Caroline would want rid of me as soon as possible. George wouldn’t want to push me out, but he probably would if she told him to. Both of us would be completely isolated from each other. George would remain at Starlings but I’d be out. It wasn’t a disaster – I’d never intended to spend all my life here – but I’d always imagined a new life where and when I chose – not being evicted by some . . .

 

I looked over to where Caroline was laughing with a gaggle of sisters. George stood nearby, staring into space.

As if she felt my thoughts, she looked up and caught my eye. I didn’t need to be psychic to know what she was thinking. I was no longer mistress of Starlings. I was the unmarried sister. Too young to be pushed out immediately, but the day would come.

I had two choices. Not whether to go or not – at some point, voluntarily or otherwise, I would be leaving Starlings. No, my choice was whether to go quietly or embrace the inevitable and enjoy myself on the way out.

We regarded each other across the room.

Yes – this really was not going to end well.

 

CHAPTER 3

 

Papa died. Quite suddenly. In his sleep. Cleverly found him when he took in Papa’s morning tea.

There was a funeral. I wanted to invite Mrs Rugeley. They’d been together for years. Left to himself, George would certainly have said yes. They’d been very close once upon a time, but Caro­line said no, of course not, George. What were you thinking?

Caroline stood between George and me at the church. The turnout was massive and the place was packed. Standing room only at the back. The day was cool and autumnal. Out among the gravestones, I listened to Reverend Caldicott read the last of the service as I watched the yellow and red leaves slip from the trees and flutter to the ground.

‘Earth to earth, ashes to ashes . . .’

The words went round and round my head. Earth to earth, ashes to ashes. Earth to earth, ashes to ashes. I stared at the massed banks of flowers. I stared into the hole in the ground. I stared up at the blue sky. I stared at everything that wasn’t Papa’s coffin because if I did . . .

Caroline poked me. ‘Pay attention.’

And then, from somewhere behind the trees lining the churchyard – one long, last mournful cry cut through the still afternoon. A lament for an old frenemy. A final farewell. Every Smallhope lifted their head.

 

That was the day the peacocks disappeared from Starlings. No one knew where they went. There were rumours of feral birds living in the woods for years afterwards. You heard an echo of their cry on the wind, occasionally. Well, I did. With one eye on Caroline, George always denied it and Caroline said thank God those awful dirty birds had taken themselves away before she’d had to bring in pest control. I missed them.

After the funeral, everyone went back to Starlings for the wake. It was just like George’s wedding, really. I didn’t attend. I sat on my bed, wearing my new black dress, Rosie on one side, Doofus on the other, staring out of the window, trying to make sense of a world that didn’t have Papa in it somewhere.

I didn’t see George – or anyone – for several days. He was busy being the new Lord Goodrich, I suppose. Eventually, though, he came to see me.

He was wearing a new tweed suit that Caroline must have ordered for him. True, Papa always wore tweeds, but his had dog slobber, mud, spilled beer and horse shit all over them. George had even had his hair cut. This was no longer T-­shirt-­and-­jeans George. This was the Earl of Goodrich.

I thought he wanted to talk about our arrangement. He’d be Lord Goodrich and I’d manage the estate for him, as per our discussion behind the compost heaps. I’d learned a fair bit off Papa and Mr Askwith, our manager, and I wanted to discuss my plans to study land management at uni. But no. He wanted to talk about a new school. A smart all-­girls’ boarding school in the Cotswolds. He wanted to tell me about how wonderful it would be. How much I would enjoy it once I was there. How much I would benefit from more conventional surroundings. How badly Papa had brought me up. He didn’t look at me once. Not once. He looked out of the window or down at the floor. He didn’t stroke Doofus or Rosie.

 

I could hear Caroline behind every word. And it wasn’t a discussion. It was all fixed and I would start at the beginning of the next term.

I said, ‘George . . .’

He stood up quickly, said, ‘Well, that’s all settled then,’ and left the room.

Seven days later, half the staff at Starlings were handed their months’ notice. Mrs Tiggy was in tears. She’d been working in our kitchens since she’d left college. There was no Mr Tiggy, by the way – all cooks and housekeepers are given the honorific of Mrs. It took me ages to calm her down. And I had to make sure everyone had somewhere to go because it was very apparent that Caroline wasn’t going to do it.

I only saw my brother once more before I left Starlings too. We met on the stairs. He was coming up; I was going down. I said, ‘George, what have you done?’ And I didn’t mean the boarding school thing.

And then Caroline came along the landing. I think she had some kind of internal radar. Every time George and I were within ten feet of each other, she would materialise out of nowhere and take him away. She started to enquire whether I’d made all the preparations necessary for me to be out of the building by Monday, half past nine, and I just walked off in mid-­sentence. Thanks to her, my world was crashing, and I didn’t feel I owed her even the most basic of

courtesies. I could see, just by looking at her, that she felt the same about me.

 

I made no effort to prepare for this new school. I made sure I was never around for uniform fitting. Every day I took Pye, my horse, and rode up on the moors or along the coast, slipping in through one of the side doors as it grew dark and blagging some food from the kitchen. Caroline might want me gone but I’d make damn sure that she’d have to do all the heavy lifting herself.

My last morning dawned. Cleverly brought me up a special breakfast and took my overnight case downstairs. I’d refused to don the school uniform and if Caroline wasn’t happy about that, then she could come and tell me so herself.

She didn’t.

The staff all lined up to see me go. Caroline wasn’t there, thank God, so I was able to speak to each of them individually. I knew that I’d never see most of them again and some of them – Mrs Tiggy, for example – had been with me nearly all my life.

My luggage had been sent on ahead. The only thing that would be left of me at Starlings was Doofus.

George was waiting for me at the bottom of the steps. It wouldn’t surprise me if Caroline had stationed him there to make sure I actually left the building.

‘Well . . . Millie . . . I . . .’ He dwindled into silence.

‘You promised to look after Doofus for me.’

‘I shall,’ he said. ‘And Rosie, too. Don’t worry about them. They’ll be fine. And you’ll see them when you come home for the holidays.’

‘Why are you making me do this?’

His eyes shifted over my shoulder. ‘It’s a wonderful opportunity, Millie. You should make the most of it.’

 

I leaned towards him and said softly, ‘I intend to, George. Trust me – you and Caroline will never be able to show your faces in that part of the country ever again.’

‘Now, Millie – don’t be . . .’

I turned away from him and bent to say goodbye to Doofus, who couldn’t understand why he wasn’t coming with me.

The car waited at the door with my hired travelling companion. From some agency, I believe. I don’t know – we never spoke. Caroline obviously wasn’t risking me cutting loose and coming back home again. I was to be accompanied to the school itself, handed over, and then forgotten.

I could just hear Papa’s ‘prisoner and escort – quick march’ as I walked down the steps of Starlings, and that was it. I never returned to St Winifred’s. Never saw most of my friends again. My life turned down a different path.

 

The new school wasn’t awful – don’t get me wrong. If it hadn’t been Caroline’s decision, I’d probably have quite enjoyed it. But her shadow lay over everything.

There was always some reason why it wasn’t convenient for me to return to Starlings, so either Aunt Indira or Auntie Dee took me in for the holidays. I missed Starlings horribly. And Doofus. And Pye. But mostly, I missed Papa. They say there are different stages to grief, and anger is one of them. I think I got stuck

on anger.

This was when I discovered the really deep satisfaction engendered by never doing as I was told. Or, alternatively, doing exactly as I was told. Which, if done properly, can be even worse.

I was asked to paint an angel for the school nativity scene. I created a rather striking Angel of Death, complete with snakes for hair, blood-­filled eyes and wings made from the faces of sinners. I thought it looked fantastic hanging menacingly over the stable but apparently I was in a minority of one. There was a bit of a chat with the educational psychologist over that one.

 

I pointed out that Jesus was born in March. There was another long discussion with the deputy head as to the appropriateness of imparting that piece of information during my reading at the school carol service.

I smoked in the toilets. Well, no, I didn’t, because cigarettes taste vile, but I lit one and left it there, which set off the fire alarms, and we were all evacuated and I didn’t have to do double maths that afternoon.

They introduced a new system called prefects’ detentions – whereby prefects were granted the authority to award detentions for bad behaviour. They announced it at the morning assembly and I’m pleased and proud to say that by lunchtime I’d got two.

I bunked off regularly and was twice brought back by the deputy head herself. She tried so hard with me – opportunities to talk, counselling, the lot – and I just ignored it all. They didn’t chuck me out – kudos to them – but I reached minimum school leaving age – and it was made very clear that I wouldn’t be welcomed back at the beginning of the new year.

I heaved a sigh of relief and began to entertain thoughts of returning home, and then a letter came. From George. It would seem I was to be packed off to a finishing school. There was a page and a half of how much I would benefit from the experience and how much I’d love it. Oh – and had he mentioned it was in Switzerland?

I crumpled the letter and vowed revenge.

 

 

Mademoiselle Leonie’s School for Wayward Daughters of the Aristocracy, or whatever they called themselves, was not what I thought it would be. Well, no – that’s not quite right. It was exactly what I thought it would be. Exactly the sort of place Caroline would choose. Dedicated to taking in rich but slightly unconventional young ladies – or misfits, as the rest of the world would describe us – and turning them into something still rich and dim but slightly more marriageable.

It’s probably fair to say that didn’t quite work out for me.

I was to be there for a term – thirteen weeks – which was twice as long as most students were accepted for, so Caroline was obviously anticipating some difficulties in brainwashing me into becoming something as useless and unpleasant as she was herself. On the other hand, the cost, as George had reminded me several

 times in his letter, was nearly thirty thousand euros for six weeks. So that was sixty thousand euros straight down the drain, I’m happy to say.

The worst part of all – everything was just so bloody pretty.

The school was a lovely old building with pretty fairy-­story-­style turrets. The windows glinted prettily in the sun. The gardens were bright and colourful – and pretty, obviously – and twice a week, the inmates – or students, as I was constantly instructed to call them – were shunted out to pick blooms for our regular sessions of floral art.

The interior was pretty with impeccably furnished rooms. Real art hung from the walls. No one ever raised their voice. Everything was sweetness and light. Even the toilet rolls were covered in crocheted dolls with pink skirts. I think it was felt that while toilet paper did indeed perform a useful function, there was no need to sit and look at it.

 

Pretty. Pretty. Pretty.

I wasn’t sure I was going to survive this. There was no educational syllabus chez Mademoiselle Leonie so it was just as well I’d had a good foundation at St Winifred’s. Although I never got to be head girl. Never got my A levels. Never played Katherina in The Taming of the Shrew. Never led the hockey team to victory in the county tournament. And never went to university, obviously. Don’t feel sorry for me, though, because Mademoiselle Leonie’s was the place where I began my real education. It just wasn’t quite the one anyone had envisaged. Because I haven’t yet mentioned my roommates.

There were just over thirty girls at the finishing school, most of whom had already completed their education and were near adults. The oldest were in their early twenties. You’d have thought that with all the money Caroline had forced George to fork out that I’d at least have a room to myself, but no – I was in with three others. Not to say it was all bunk beds and threadbare blankets – each bed did have its own curtained alcove, and there were dressing tables and rugs and shelves for personal belongings. I placed my copy of Anarchy for Fun and Profit in a prominent position, alongside a mostly empty box of condoms and a poster inviting the reader to Press This Button to End the Patriarchy.

I was easily the youngest in our room. Initially I thought they were just silly women whose thoughts revolved solely around men and make-­up. I’m not sure what they made of me. I was still in fuck-­off-­everyone mode. We regarded each other warily and kept our distance.

 

 

The breakthrough came one day when we were supposed to be practising floral art in the music studio. I’d grabbed a handful of things with petals and rammed them into what probably wasn’t a jam jar – not with those fees – then twisted a piece of rusty barbed wire around the container; my bloodstained thumbprint would be an interesting talking point. If Madame Whatever turned up to complain, then I’d label it Rage Against the Pretty.

My roommates were talking about antiques and things – I can’t remember why – and I casually mentioned one of the Gainsboroughs at Starlings. I’d had some wild dreams about lifting it from under Caroline’s nose, then selling it and living off the proceeds, and I was speculating how much I’d get for it.

‘Not a lot,’ said Meilin, shoving a random rose into her arrangement which immediately transformed it into something ethereal and wondrous. She looked me up and down.

‘Less than twenty pence in the pound. But, if you ever pull it off, come to me and I’ll give you mate’s rates. Forty pence in the pound.’

I must have looked surprised because Meilin paused and shrugged. ‘Family business. Mine one day. Although my stupid brother doesn’t know it yet.’

Olga – who had the bed next to me – nodded. She was the daughter of a Russian oligarch. And on her other side, listening carefully, was Lucretzia – niece of someone very important in the world of the not terribly legal. Because this was a school for girls who weren’t quite top-­notch. Girls with behavioural problems. Girls whose parents were a bit . . . you know. In other words – girls who knew exactly how the world worked, and it wasn’t ever going to be in their favour unless they did something about it.

There was a very significant silence. All sorts of doors suddenly opened in my mind. We looked at each other. It was, truly, a universe-­changing moment.

 

I put down my scissors and took off my apron. ‘Ladies, I really do feel we might have quite a lot to offer each other.’

So – while the official syllabus was chock-­full of floral art, deportment, social situations, style and grooming, social media and how to manipulate it, fine wine and how to persuade someone to buy it for you, how to lay a table for fifty dinner guests, basic diplomacy, etiquette and manners – that wasn’t all there was to my time at Mademoiselle Leonie’s School for Wayward Women.

It became known as the after-­hours curriculum. Olga was her father’s heir and already had some standing. She was here to achieve polish and make useful contacts. She initiated us into business management. Sod team-­building and mission statements and all that crap. Olga was all about how to plan, strategise and operate while never emerging from the shadows. How to ensure successful outcomes. How to turn failure into success. How to rearrange circumstances to your advantage. The words risk management took on a whole new meaning in this context. We discussed how to identify and hire people with very specialised skills. And equally importantly – how not to have them exercise those skills on us.

Lucretzia didn’t actually come out and say so, but her father’s health was failing and no one was allowed to know. She talked about how her mother worked through him. How she ran her husband’s gang of ambitious underlings all of whom were just waiting for the opportunity to slit his throat and take over his organisation. And since this state of affairs had lasted for over seven years and counting, it seemed safe to assume that she and her mother knew what they were doing.

 

I learned finance from Meilin. How to raise money. How to keep it off the books. How to move it around without attracting attention. And, in a session especially for me, how to fence stolen property without being ripped off.

‘The actual theft is the easy part,’ she said. ‘The real problem is disposal. Art, for instance, unless stolen to order, is very difficult to get rid of. And half the time

whatever you’ve pinched is so hot you have to shift it as quickly as you can. People like my family will take advantage of that. And watch out for the insurance companies as well. They can be bastards.’

‘But there must be ways and means,’ I said.

‘Oh, always. But you’ll need to recognise when it’s better to move stuff quickly and accept a lower price or when to hold on and reap the long-­term benefits. Both are equally risky.’ She smiled. ‘I plan for my family to offer a complete service all the way through the process. Beginning with actually acquiring the object, its safe disposal, brokering the fees, and ending with laundering said fees. Our clients will pay for it, but it will be a very good service.’

It was all theory, of course, but we drank it in. And then we expanded, moving into successful networking – courtesy of a girl in the next dormitory. Suzanne Somebody was the daughter of a highly placed diplomat. She gave me a list of people in her world I might find useful one day and I did the same for her. The old girls’ network at its best. An ever-­increasing group would get together every night after lights out, sitting on the ends of our beds, tablets at the ready. There were bottles of illegal wine, some giggling, and then we would educate ourselves. A small group of girls not willing to accept their lives being defined by other people.

 

We made friendships that lasted most of our lives. In the years that followed, Meilin was always my financial go-­to person and our association was mutually profitable. Although to this day I still can’t arrange flowers.

 

Naturally there were a great many rules and regulations at Mademoiselle Leonie’s, but since most of them ran along the lines of never wearing blue and green together, never talking across the dinner table, never wearing suede shoes with formal attire – in fact, never wearing suede shoes at all – never bringing lilac into the house, and never lending money to any British politician – ever – I felt under no obligation to comply with any of them.

There was also a ton of stuff about not leaving the chat­eau grounds except with written permission from a member of staff – and even if you surmounted that obstacle, there was another ton of stuff about being back in the building by 8:30 p.m., in bed by 9:30, with lights out at 10:00.

We weren’t held in complete captivity, obviously, so we didn’t have to dig a tunnel under the art room or smuggle ourselves out in the laundry van – although I was perfectly willing to give that a go. We were allowed out for Mademois­elle Leonie-approved cultural events. Which did not, we were firmly given to understand, include the upcoming beer festival. A delightful occasion offering big-­time beer tasting, live music, street theatre, a food festival and shedloads of young men. Something for everyone, in fact.

Alas – not for the inmates of Mademoiselle Leonie’s. We were grounded until these horrors had safely

 passed.

‘I do like a challenge,’ I said thoughtfully to Meilin one afternoon as we regarded the golden perfection of her vol-­au-­vents and the molten puddles of carbon that were mine.

 

‘You’re plotting something,’ she said. ‘I can tell.’

‘I do have a plan,’ I said, struggling to unweld a vol-­au-­vent that had, in Mlle Leonie’s favourite phrase, failed to fulfil its true potential. ‘Involving an upcoming cultural event and a massive amount of beer.’

Meilin groaned. ‘Are you not in enough trouble after sewing Suzanne’s skirt to her chair last week?’

‘It was a needlework lesson.’

‘She was wearing it at the time.’

‘Well, you know what they say: when things are bad – make them worse.’

‘No – that is what you say. Everyone else just ducks and runs for cover.’

‘So I can count on you, then?’

She grinned. ‘Of course, but how shall we get there?’

‘Bicycles.’

She looked faintly appalled.

‘There’s a shed full of them by the old stables, for fresh air and exercise. We may be breaking the rules, but we’ll be doing so in a healthy, non-­polluting and sustainable fashion.’

She groaned and covered her eyes, then uncovered them to say, ‘We will need to be out before seven p.m. when they shut the gates.’

‘Yes. Olga and Lucretzia will cover for us.’

By which I meant lie like stink as and when the situation demanded. In times of crisis, Lucretzia’s superpower was to sob prettily and Olga’s was to take refuge in incomprehensible Russian. Between them, they were impregnable.

 

‘They’ll be on the lookout,’ said Meilin, meaning the teachers.

‘Not a problem. We’ll be conspicuously here. We could be caught playing cards’ – which was very much against the rules – ‘and they’ll send us to our room to think about what we’ve done. Once there, we shoot down the fire escape and across the lawn to the stables. We liberate a couple of bikes and are straight out of the gates before anyone even suspects a thing.’

She regarded me with admiration. ‘Millie, you have a natural talent.’

I nodded modestly. ‘And then, after an evening’s fun, we cycle back, stash the bikes until later, and climb the wall. Olga and Lucretzia will open the fire escape for us and no one will ever know.’

Well, that was the plan, anyway.

It began well. Our card game in the library was duly discovered by Frau Fiedler, the duty mistress, who was suitably horrified. I think it was the fact we were playing poker that really got her going. If it had been an elegant game of baccarat, she’d probably have joined in and fleeced us.

Getting out of the gates was ridiculously easy. Surprisingly so, in fact. Although we did cut it a bit fine. We were only about a hundred yards away when I heard them clang shut behind us.

Do not expect a detailed description of the beerfest. My memories are a little hazy, although I do remember bands ranging from string quartets to heavy metal, long tables 

awash with beer, lots of fairy lights, steins, roast pigs, singing and so forth.

I’m certain the first person I saw was Madame Lavalle. And it turns out teachers are like pregnant women – once you’ve seen one, you see scores of them. They were everywhere. Mrs Newcombe. Frau Fiedler. And Mlle Leonie herself. Fortunately for us, they were all sitting at one of the more respectable tables. We edged our way around the market square to find something a little livelier – and out of their sight – and proceeded to enjoy ourselves. Massively.

 

Meilin and I were not, however, entirely given over to sin. We’d set ourselves a deadline. Back by midnight. Because midnight is a kind of demarcation line. Get caught before midnight, and you’re just late back, punishable with extra sessions in floral art and a disappointed look from Mlle Leonie.

After midnight, however, was debauchery, lust, strong drink, STDs, unwanted pregnancies, moral decay and no choice but to become a British politician.

Midnight was our deadline, therefore – and I still maintain we would have made it easily if Meilin had not fallen off her bike. I don’t know how she managed it. The road was clear, there was a moon, we had lights on the bikes – one minute everything was fine, and the next minute she and her bike were on the ground.

It took us ages to stop giggling. I got off to help her and then we discovered the wonky wheel. She’d buckled the fork or something.

‘Or,’ as she said, struggling to get up, ‘I forked the buckle,’ and we fell about laughing all over again. Then I had to nip behind a nearby bush because . . . beer, laughing, chilly night . . .

Eventually I was able to extricate her from the bicycle and she seemed unhurt, which was a huge relief because she and her bike had been horribly entangled and for one nasty moment I thought I was somehow going to have to cut her free. Of course, by the time we’d sorted ourselves out properly, it was long past midnight and we were well into the debauchery zone.

‘I mustn’t be caught,’ said Meilin, panicking suddenly and trying to clamber back on her bike. ‘I’ll be expelled and my family will be furious and I’ll be kept out of the business and have to marry my cousin who has very short legs and wears spectacles and whose sweat smells of garlic.’

 

‘Oh yuk,’ I said, pot-­valiant. ‘We can’t have that. Come on.’

We wobbled our way past the gates and along the high wall, looking for the place to climb over.

‘Leave the bikes,’ I said, dropping mine in a ditch. ‘We’ll collect them tomorrow.’

‘Tomorrow I will be on a plane to Hong Kong,’ cried Meilin tragically. ‘Trying to accustom myself to the smell of garlic.’

‘Nil desperandum, baby,’ I said, my head swimming.

‘But no, Millie – very much desperandum.’

‘This is the spot,’ I

said, pointing. ‘There’s some missing stones for hands and feet and it’s not that high. Over you go. And shush.’

We made a complete mess trying to get over that sodding wall. That sort of thing isn’t as easy as people think. Especially when you might have had a few. Eventually, after Herculean efforts, we reached the top, where Meilin overbalanced, grabbed at me and we both fell off. Fortunately, we landed on the right side, because I don’t think we could have done that again.

The grounds were perfect for after-­hours activities, full of shrubberies and trees. For a reason that might have had something to do with the large number of teachers enjoying cultural enrichment sessions down in the town, the security lights had been switched off. Presumably it’s not all right for students to see the faculty staggering back full of beer and good cheer. We took full advantage, however, lurching from shadow to shadow, alternately giggling and falling into a ceanothus and then giggling and falling into the rhododendrons, finally fetching up at the foot of the fire escape that led up to our floor. It was a long way up and, possibly because alcohol had improved our hearing, we discovered the metal staircase had a tendency both to boom and squeak – often at the same time.

 

Meilin bent over the steps and put her finger to her lips, saying, ‘Shh,’ which set me off all over again, making me snort, which set her off as well, and much time was wasted while we pulled ourselves together and continued the epic climb to the top.

Which was when we discovered that Olga and Lucretzia had fallen asleep on the job. Literally. The door was closed.

‘Arseholes,’ I said. But quietly. ‘In fact, sodding arseholes.’

Meilin was all set to panic again and I could see I was going to get twenty more minutes of Cousin Whatshisname and his garlicky spectacles.

‘I told you,’ I said, ‘nil desperandum.’ I groped in my bag and pulled out the key.

She stared, whispering, ‘What is that?’

‘The key,’ I said, feeling around for the lock and praying the alarm system wasn’t activated. If it was and we were caught, then one of us would be sleepwalking and the other making a valiant but doomed attempt to return her to the safety of her bed. That would be the bare bones of my story, anyway. The inconvenient details, such as being fully dressed in inappropriate clothing and reeking of beer, could be addressed later.

Always have a second plan for if – when – the first plan goes tits up.

The system wasn’t activated. Another fact I ascribed to the local research currently being carried out in the town by our dedicated educationalists.

 

Meilin attempted sentences. ‘Millie, why have you the key? When? Millie? How?’

‘The law says if you lock a fire door, then the key must be kept in a case nearby,’ I said. ‘Which I unscrewed with a carefully procured Allen key. Just in case. Because you always need a Plan B. And – if possible – a Plan C as well.’

I relocked the door behind us and we made our way quietly to our room.

And yes, Olga and Lucretzia were in their beds, snoring their heads off.

And yes, our room did stink of stale beer the next morning. We had to have the windows open for days.

But, most importantly,

we got away with it. And I had learned valuable lessons. I’d made the whole scheme much more difficult than it should have been. We could have stayed out all night and returned before breakfast the next day – there were camping sites all over town with public tents for those who hadn’t brought their own. But I didn’t know that because I hadn’t done my research properly.

And I should have realised most of the teachers would attend, that they would be as desperate for entertainment as we were. The gates probably hadn’t even been locked. We could have just strolled out. And a taxi would have been a good idea. There were whole fleets of them lined up waiting to ferry people home.

Note to future self – don’t be timid. The bigger and bolder the plan – the more chance there is of it succeeding.

CHAPTER 4

My thirteen weeks in Switzerland went by much more quickly than I had expected. At the end I was presented with a very pretty certificate from Mlle Leonie herself. I thanked her prettily. She wished me the very best of luck out in the world. I refrained from advising her the world was certainly going to need all the luck it could get, and caught a plane home to Starlings. To find that Caroline had had Rosie and Doofus put to sleep. Because she didn’t like dogs.

‘You could have given them to Stevens,’ I said to George, still rigid with the shock of it. Stevens was the groom. ‘Or even Askwith. Rosie was Papa’s dog.’

‘She was old,’ he said feebly. ‘It was a kindness.’

Doofus had loved going to the vet because they always made a big fuss of him. I could just picture him bundling into the surgery, tail wagging, eyes shining, tongue lolling. Full of trust because nothing bad had ever happened to him there. Ten minutes later, he’d be dead. Did he die wondering where I was? Did he wonder why I’d left him? I couldn’t bear it.

‘Doofus was my dog.’

‘Oh, it’s you,’ said Caroline, sweeping into the room. ‘Obviously. Back ten minutes and screeching like a fishwife already. There’s a considerable sum of money flushed down the drain.’

 

‘Rather like my dog,’ I said. ‘Let’s hope we never have to do it to you. Oh wait . . .’

She shrugged and moved past me. ‘George, I want to talk to you about . . .’

She stopped and glared at me. ‘Amelia, dear, that is rather your cue to disappear.’

I stayed put.

She sighed. ‘As deficient in manners and understanding as ever.’

I stayed put.

‘Come along, George.’

As they left the room, I heard her say, ‘George, I’ve told you. I won’t have her in this house.’

I noticed the darlings and babes had completely disappeared.

 

I stayed out of everyone’s way while I found my feet in a house that had changed beyond belief in the time I had been away. Mrs Tiggy had been replaced by some wannabe TV chef whose idea of a good meal was something the size of a postage stamp served on a black plate. Who the hell eats food that has to be dished up with tweezers? As if a tiny purple flower laid on top of half a lettuce leaf is an actual meal. And served with a dribble of foamy sauce that – as I informed Caroline – looked as if someone had gobbed on the plate.

Cleverly was still here. I suspected George might have put his foot down over that. Cleverly was his only link to pre-­Caroline times. The new people were all young, terribly, terribly smart, and didn’t have a clue.

 

Mostly, though, I was shocked at the change in George. He’d always been vague, but now he was remote. He was drifting around the place as if he’d lost all focus. He would shut himself in Papa’s study – his study – and I sometimes didn’t see him for days on end. No one did. Other than Caroline, of course.

I didn’t know if any estate business was being done. Papa had worked from around ten until four in the afternoon – with the occasional half an hour to engage with the peacock, of course – and he’d regularly visited his tenants and properties and generally made himself visible and accessible. As far as I could see, George was neither.

I mostly stayed in my room, but I did go down to lunch one day for the purpose of asking Caroline if she’d had my horse put down as well. She started to tell me not to be ridiculous – Pye had been sold to a very good home and . . .

I walked away and pinched George’s car and drove into Rushford where I had a very illuminating chat with Mr Treasure, Papa’s solicitor, asking him if he could represent me in the future. He replied that he could, and since George had moved both the estate and family affairs to Caroline’s solicitor, there would be no conflict of interests. In fact, it would be his pleasure.

I asked some questions, listened to the answers, issued some instructions, shook his hand, enjoyed a pleasant tea at the Copper Kettle and drove home. Where, it appeared, George had been looking for his car all afternoon and did I know how rude, selfish, inconsiderate, etc., I’d been?

I replied yes, of course I knew how rude, selfish, inconsiderate, etc., I’d been – that was why I’d done it – and left Caroline once again in mid-­splutter.

After that, neither of us even bothered to go through the motions. George was missing in action most of the time. I suspected he was deeply unhappy but, as I pointed out to him, at least, unlike Doofus, he wasn’t actually dead. I think that was one of the last times we spoke. We parted bad friends and never had a chance to make up. Perhaps I shouldn’t have left him to Caroline’s tender mercies. On the other hand, for all I knew, he sincerely loved her.

 

As much as I could, I lived a separate life from them. Not too difficult. I had my own suite of rooms in the West Wing. Caroline, obviously, had moved George into the rooms traditionally occupied by the Earl of Goodrich. I couldn’t even bring myself to walk past. Vivid memories of Papa and the peacock yelling at each other. The peacock shitting mightily and Papa calling for his gun. If I closed my eyes, I could still hear the echoes. So I kept to myself. My Rushford schoolfriends had moved on. Some were taking their A levels and planning for university. Others had apprenticeships or were making plans to travel. It’s interesting, isn’t it? You can never go back.

I don’t know for how long this state of affairs would have continued but along came George and Caroline’s Big Party and then the shit really hit the fan.

 

It was to be a massive affair. Celebrating their acquisition of the title – or Papa’s death, as I said to Caroline – together with a wedding anniversary. Can’t remember which one. The guest list was massive. All her London friends. All the media people she thought might be useful to her. All the county people. A few local politicians. Even a couple of minor royals. Caroline was nearly fainting with the joy of it all.

Armies of people moved into Starlings to spruce the old place up. A couple of interior designers turned up – I recognised the ones who’d decorated the church at her wedding. They really are from another planet, aren’t they? It’s very possible they would have displaced HMRC on Papa’s list of things to rid the world of. Personally I think he’d have just let rip with both barrels and damn the lawsuits. And I would have loaded for him. Sadly, those days were gone.

 

The ballroom – and most of the ground-­floor rooms – were draped in vast swathes of silver tulle and black wire. Because they made for an interesting dichotomy, darling. Great clumps of black roses sprouted everywhere. Like giant targets. I could feel my trigger finger itch. Except that Papa’s guns, like my dog and my horse and most of our lovely staff, had all disappeared.

All the furniture was moved around. The Gainsboroughs – the real treasures – were stored in a remote attic as demanded by the insurance company whenever we had a crowd in the house. I wondered if Caroline – quite inadvertently, of course – had ever had them valued because she thought she could sell them

She’d come unstuck if she tried. They were part of the estate property.

It was during all this upheaval that, walking along the landing one day, I noticed several lighter patches on the walls where paintings had once hung. And when I started to look more closely, there were other items missing as well – a snuff box presented to the fifth earl by the Prince Regent, a glove that might have – but probably hadn’t – belonged to Charles II, and a small book of poetry gifted to the probably very ungrateful sixth earl by a young Queen Victoria.

Then the caterers turned up. They took over the kitchen, the pantries, the storerooms. Tents – sorry, marquees – were erected all over the lawns outside. An entire small country’s worth of champagne was delivered. Wine by the lakeful. Food by the mountainful. I began to worry for the estate. There was an awful lot of money going in the wrong direction.

 

At this point I should probably say there was no need for me, personally, to be anxious. Not financially, anyway. Smallhope women look after each other. The way we look at it – it’s bad enough that we’re lumbered with Smallhope men, without being poor as well. So I had Grandmama Alexandra’s money. And Mama’s. And Great-­aunt Essie had also left me something. So as you can see, I was never going to starve. None of it would be mine until I was twenty-­five, but the one thing I did own in my own name were Mama’s diamonds. The Skeffington diamonds. Beautiful pieces, bequeathed to me in her will. There was a small tiara, an elegant necklace, and two beautiful bracelets. None of it brash or showy. Good stones, well set.

And mine.

I stood in my window watching the frantic ants milling around below – I suspect our ancestors had gone off to war with less fuss – and drove myself into Rushford to consult with Mr Treasure again, to find he shared my concerns about Starlings. I couldn’t do a lot – under eighteen and all that.

‘But not for much longer,’ said Mr Treasure, which was true. I was seven months off my eighteenth birthday. ‘And you have a home at Starlings until then. No one can take that away from you.’

No, but I could still be forced out somehow.

Neither of us gave voice to that thought.

Anyway, I was able to hand him his invitation to the ball. He was delighted. And Mrs Treasure, apparently, would be thrilled.

 

I left well pleased. Utilising all my recently acquired know­ledge, it was time to start gathering friends and allies.

I had no idea the biggest and best friend and ally of all was about to turn up. Uninvited, obviously.

 

With just over twenty-­four hours to go, everyone but me had reached fever pitch. Unlike Caroline, still endlessly indecisive when it came to clothes, I knew what I would be wearing. I had a neat black dress – nothing fancy and it would set off the diamonds nicely.

I asked Cleverly to bring them up and knew immediately that something was wrong.

‘I regret, Lady Amelia, that I am unable to comply.’

I asked why, although I already knew the answer.

‘Her ladyship asked me to bring them to her yesterday, my lady.’

He stopped there and I wasn’t going to embarrass him any further.

Caroline was in George’s study, which was no longer full of ancient leather saddleback armchairs, Papa’s battered desk, copies of the ancient rent roll bound in leather, and smelling of cigars and port. These days it was draped in limp young people being exquisite and, this close to D-­Day, having their own personal meltdowns every ten minutes. The noise was phenomenal. Even the peacock would have given up in disgust.

She saw me at once, knew why I was there and, presumably in an attempt to pre-­empt me, said, ‘Not now, Amelia. We’re all a little busy, you know.’

‘Shan’t keep you,’ I said cheerfully. ‘Just come to collect Mama’s diamonds. You know – the ones you’ve stolen for yourself.’

 

And that’s how to silence a room.

Caroline’s lips disappeared completely. I’d done it now.

‘What nonsense,’ she said. She went to bend back over the table again and paused. Pitching her voice so I could hear – so everyone could hear – she said, ‘So after that happens, Tristan, I’ll go upstairs, put on the diamonds and make my entrance. Please can you ensure everyone is . . .’

‘Mama’s diamonds are mine,’ I said, equally clearly. ‘She left them to me.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. She was George’s mother too. He’s as entitled to the diamonds as you and he’s given them to me. Now if you don’t mind, we’re very busy here and you’re just wafting uselessly around the place as usual. Go away, there’s a good girl.’

Someone tittered.

That was the moment that changed my life. That was the moment I decided to take the fight to her. And win. The blood of Perfectly Normal Agnes pounded in my veins. From this moment on, my life would go my way or there would be trouble. Lots and lots of trouble. For other people, obviously. I would trample their broken and bleeding bodies. And then I would still get my own way.

‘Sorry,’ I called, ‘didn’t realise you were busy with such important stuff,’ and backed out of the door, straight into a man I’d vaguely seen around the place, wearing a smart dark green apron as he carted stuff from A to B and back again according to the whims of various hysterical party planners.

I was unsure whether he was one of ours or one of theirs, though he didn’t look like Caroline’s type of person at all. Medium height, stocky build – not one of the skinny exquisites with which she usually surrounded herself. His white-­blond hair was cut short – brutally short, actually. His eyes, hard and grey, showed beneath darker brows. Frankly, he looked like a serial killer. Not the ones everyone is astonished to find are serial killers because people thought they were so nice and quiet – but definitely someone who had his very own wanted poster.

 

I said, ‘Sorry,’ walked around him and didn’t give it another thought.

I sat on my bed, missing

Doofus more than ever, and began to think. I mean think properly. Not just thoughts of slow-­roasting Caroline over an open fire, not just simple revenge, but actual, full-­on, in your face, in-­front-­of-­everyone revenge. Something even she could never come back from. And – it goes without saying – would get me Mama’s diamonds back.

I knew where they would be – in the small safe in Caroline’s dressing room – and there were several issues to be considered here. Yes, the diamonds were in the safe – but that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that of access. Under the terms of the insurance, once they were out of the attic strongroom they had to be stored in the safe in her dressing room. This was the one used for storing smaller, more portable items. Papa had shown me how to open it years ago. Yes, there’s a combination, but it’s useless if you don’t know where to give it a jolly good thwack with the heel of your hand because the door sticks.

My problem was that the door to her dressing room had to be kept locked unless the room was actually occupied. I didn’t have a key. And no chance of getting it. I needed to think outside the box. Literally outside the box.

 

I got up and went to the window and thought some more. Then I threw up the window and stuck out my head.

My rooms are near the corner of the West Wing, adjoining the central block. Starlings is a plain building – thank God the Tudor front had been done away with by some philistine Smallhope in the 18th century – decorated only with tall windows, a handful of slightly wonky pillars around the front door and steps, and a wide-­ish ledge running under the first-­floor windows to meet the lopsided pediment over the front pillars and porch.

Actually, when I say wide-­ish, I mean quite narrow, but certainly wide enough to stand upon. Whether it was strong enough, of course, was completely unknown. The ledge ran all around the older part of the building. Accessing it would be no problem. I could simply climb out of the window and work my way around the building to the front. I’d done it once before when I was about twelve – just to see if I could. On that occasion, I’d only gone a few feet before losing my nerve and climbing back in again, but I didn’t remember it being that difficult.

I’d need to inch my way along the side of the building for about forty feet or so, around the corner – which would be tricky but let’s not worry about that yet – and along the front. Past the two windows of Caroline’s sitting room – rarely used, fortunately. Her dressing room was right next door. Then their bedroom, then their bathroom, then George’s dressing room, then Papa’s gun room – all locked up now – then around the corner to the East Wing.

I wouldn’t have to go that far. It was Caroline’s dressing room I was after because that was where the safe was.

The only tiny flaw in it all was the ledge. I hadn’t stuck my head out of the window for years and

I definitely didn’t remember it being this crumbly. I wondered what I weighed. Very possibly more than the ledge could hold. But it was such a good plan. Tomorrow – the day of the party – I’d wait until she dressed and went downstairs for dinner. Climb out of the window. Along the ledge. In through her window – oh, wait – I’d have to find an opportunity to nip into her dressing room ahead of time and release the catch. She’d never notice, and I could be out in three or four seconds.

 

OK – so, in through her dressing room window. The safe was behind the little Dutch landscape, a lovely thing. Enter combin­ation. Thump the door. Grab the diamonds – two flat boxes, not large. I’d need both my hands free for the return ledge-­creep so I should take a game bag with me to carry them. Out of the window again. Remember to close it behind me. Back along the ledge. Into my room. Change into my dress. Down the stairs. Grand entrance. Wearing Mama’s diamonds, of course. After all, Caroline could hardly rip them off me in public, could she?

I do like a good plan.

I kept my head down the rest of the day. If Caroline wanted to picture me weeping helplessly into my pillow that was fine with me. Various members of her ghastly family, plus those guests coming from a distance and staying a couple of nights, would be arriving tomorrow afternoon so everyone was busy anyway.

I let myself out by a side door and walked around the house a couple of times, discreetly sussing things out. Seen from below, the ledge looked narrower, crumblier and much further up. I reckoned if things went wrong then I’d fall about fifteen to twenty feet. It’s not the distance, though, it’s the landing surface. If I was lucky I’d just end up in a bush. If I wasn’t, then I’d fall on to the gravel, which would be much less fun. I’d probably have a broken bone or two to account for. Although I could tell everyone that Caroline had driven me to suicide. Hm – that plan could have merit. I’d consider it as the ambulance whisked me off to hospital. Always supposing, of course, I didn’t spend my final hours sprawling undiscovered on the gravel and slowly bleeding to death.

 

I discarded that idea. Smallhope women don’t lie around bleeding to death. In times of crisis, we chuck people down wells.

I walked around the house once more, listening to the sounds of hysteria all about me. Caroline was definitely kicking off about something. I caught a glimpse of George nipping through the kitchen-­garden gate. He was pushing off to the pub and I didn’t blame him. In fact, I was very tempted to join him even though we hadn’t actually spoken for some time. If I had – if we’d enjoyed a quiet drink together in the pub garden as dusk slowly fell, if we’d laughed together over the ridiculousness of the party and everything else, if we’d talked a little of Papa, which we hadn’t at all – how much of my future would have been different? And his?

It didn’t happen though, so no point in dwelling on it.

 

No time spent planning is ever wasted. I can’t remember who said that, but they were right. That night, I went over everything in my mind. Step by step. I paced it out in my room, trying to anticipate everything that could go wrong and what I would do about it.

The opportunity to fix

the window came more quickly than I expected. I heard Caroline’s voice moving away towards the other landing where her guests were staying and decided to take a chance. I nipped along to her dressing room and tried the door. I had a book in my hand just in case. Though why Caroline would want to read a book of mine wasn’t a question to which I had an answer. Especially as I had strong suspicions she’d never read a book in her entire life.

 

The handle turned easily. That meant she’d be back at any moment and I needed to be quick. Very quick. No need for lights – the outside lights threw a faint gleam through the window.

Shit – I hadn’t thought of that. The exterior of the house would be lit up like a firework display tomorrow night. Think of that later. One thing at a time.

I crossed swiftly to the window. God only knew when it had last been opened so I had a small tin of WD-­40 up my sleeve. But it wasn’t needed. The catch moved silently. I was surprised. I could have sworn it hadn’t been opened in years and here it was, working perfectly. In fact . . . I rubbed my fingers. Was that oil?

I turned away and caught sight of the little landscape on the wall. Should I risk trying to take the diamonds now? I hovered. Yes? No?

No. I had a plan and I should stick to it. If I was caught now, then it would be game over. Caroline could be back at any moment. I nipped back across the room and eased open the door. No one in sight. I slipped through – not without a quick sigh of relief – and closed it behind me.

And opened it to shoot back in again to pick up the book I’d left behind on the table. That was a valuable lesson learned. Always check and check again before leaving the scene of a crime.

 

She was just coming up the stairs as I crossed the landing. I’d made the right decision by not going for the diamonds tonight. Another lesson learned. Don’t swap horses mid-­stream. We eyed each other like a couple of tom cats – minus the 

urine spraying, of course – and carried on our separate ways.

After all that, I found I was hungry so I nipped down to the kitchen for something to eat. An early night, I decided. Big day tomorrow. ...