Gideon said nothing. He was probably wondering how he could most tactfully recommend me to see a good psychiatrist.
I sighed. I ought to have kept it to myself. Now, in addition to everything else, he must think me crazy.
“Here we go, Gwyneth,” he said, pushing me a little further off and turning me around so that I could look at him. It was too dark to see the expression on his face, but I could tell that he wasn’t smiling. “It would be a good thing if you could stay standing right here for the few seconds after I’ve gone. Ready?”
I shook my head. “Not really.”
“I’m letting go of you now,” he said, and at the same moment, he disappeared. I was alone in the church with all those dark shadows. But only a few seconds later, I registered the dizzy feeling inside me, and the shadows began going around in circles.
“There she is,” said Mr. George’s voice. I blinked. The church was brightly lit, and after the golden glow of candles in Lady Brompton’s salon, the halogen lighting was quite hard on the eyesight.
“Everything’s all right,” said Gideon, after scrutinizing me quickly. “You can close your medical bag, Dr. White.”
Dr. White growled something I couldn’t make out. In fact there were all kinds of instruments on the altar that you’d be more likely to see on a trolley in an operating room.
“Good heavens, Dr. White, are those surgical clamps?” Gideon laughed. “Now we know what you think of an eighteenth-century soirée!”
“I like to be ready for all eventualities,” said Dr. White, putting the instruments back in his bag.
“We’re anxious to hear your report,” said Falk de Villiers.
“I want to get some of this stuff off first.” Gideon was undoing his cravat.
“Did it all … work out?” asked Mr. George, glancing nervously at me.
“Yes,” said Gideon, throwing the cravat aside. “Everything went according to plan. Lord Alastair arrived a little later than expected, but in plenty of time to see us.” He grinned at me. “And Gwyneth played her part to perfection. Viscount Batten’s real ward couldn’t have done it better.”
I couldn’t help blushing.
“It will be a pleasure for me to tell Giordano that,” said Mr. George, with a note of pride in his voice. He offered me his arm. “Not that I expected anything else.”
“No, of course not,” I murmured.
I WOKE TO HEAR Caroline whispering, “Gwenny, stop singing! It’s so embarrassing! You have to go to school.”
I abruptly sat up and stared at her. “Was I singing?”
“What?”
“You told me to stop singing.”
“I told you to wake up!”
“Then I wasn’t singing?”
“You were asleep,” said Caroline, shaking her head. “Hurry up, you’re already late. And Mum says you’re not on any account to use her shower gel.”
Under the shower I tried to suppress my memories of yesterday as far as possible. But I wasn’t very successful, so I wasted several minutes pressing my forehead to the door of the shower cubicle, muttering to myself, “It was all just a dream!” My headache did nothing to make me feel better.
When I finally came down to the dining room, luckily breakfast was all but over. Xemerius was hanging head down from the chandelier. “Sobered up again, have you, little tippler?”
Lady Arista looked me up and down. “Did you make up only one eye on purpose?”
“Er, no.” I was about to turn and go back to my room, but my mother said, “Breakfast first! You can put your mascara on later.”
“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” Aunt Glenda informed us.
“Nonsense!” said Aunt Maddy. She was sitting in the armchair beside the hearth in her dressing gown, with her knees drawn up like a little girl. “You can always leave out breakfast and save the calories to invest in a little glass of wine in the evening. Or two or three little glasses of wine.”
“A liking for the bottle seems to run in your family,” remarked Xemerius.
“We can see that from her figure,” whispered Aunt Glenda.
“I may be a little plump, Glenda, but I am not hard of hearing,” said Aunt Maddy.
“You ought to have stayed in bed,” said Lady Arista. “Breakfast is more relaxed for all concerned if you have your beauty sleep.”
“I’m afraid I didn’t get the chance,” said Aunt Maddy.
“She had another of her visions last night,” Caroline explained to me.
“Yes, I did,” said Aunt Maddy, “and it was horrible. So sad. It really upset me. There was this beautiful polished ruby heart sparkling in the sun.… It was lying on a rocky ledge above a precipice.”
I wasn’t sure that I wanted to know what happened next.
My mum smiled at me. “Eat something, darling. At least a little fruit. And don’t listen to her.”
“And then along came this lion.” Aunt Maddy sighed. “With a lovely golden coat.”
“Uh-oh!” said Xemerius. “And sparkling green eyes, I bet.”
“You have felt pen on your face,” I told Nick.
“Shh,” he replied. “This is where it gets exciting.”
“And when the lion saw the heart lying there, he gave it a push with his paw, and it fell down and down into the ravine below,” said Aunt Maddy, dramatically putting her hand to her bosom. “When it hit the bottom, it smashed into hundreds of tiny pieces, and when I looked more closely, I saw that they were all drops of blood.”
I swallowed. Suddenly I felt queasy.
“Oops,” said Xemerius.
“Then what happened?” asked Charlotte.
“Nothing,” said Aunt Maddy. “That was all—and quite nasty enough, too.”
“Oh,” said Nick, disappointed. “It started so well.”
Aunt Maddy’s eyes flashed at him angrily. “Young man, I’m not writing film scripts.”
“Thank God,” murmured Aunt Glenda. Then she turned to me, opened her mouth, and shut it again.
Charlotte spoke up instead. “Gideon says you did all right at the soirée. I must say I’m very relieved. I think everyone will be very relieved.”
I ignored her and looked reproachfully up at the chandelier.
“I was going to tell you yesterday evening that your pushy cousin had supper at Gideon’s place. But you were—how can I put it? You were a little indisposed,” said Xemerius.
I snorted.
“Well, I can’t help it if your sparkly diamond friend invites her to stay and eat, can I?” Xemerius took off and flew across the table to Aunt Maddy’s empty place, where he sat upright on her chair and curled his lizard tail neatly around his feet. “I mean, I’d have done the same in his place. For one thing, she spent all day babysitting his little brother, and then she tidied up his apartment and ironed his shirts.”
“What?”
“I said, I can’t help it. Anyway, he was so grateful that he decided he had to show her how fast he could conjure up a spaghetti dish for three.… Wow, he was in a really good mood. Like he’d scored points or something. Now close your mouth. They’re all looking at you.”
They were, too.
“I’m going to finish doing my other eye,” I said.
“Maybe a touch of rouge on your cheeks, too?” said Charlotte. “Just a friendly hint.”
“I HATE HER!” I said. “I hate her. I hate her!”
“Oh, come on! Just because she ironed his stupid shirts?” Lesley looked at me, shaking her head. “I mean, that is plain silly!”
“He cooked for her!” I wailed. “She spent all day in his apartment!”
“Yes, but he was snogging with you in that church,” said Lesley, sighing.
“He wasn’t.”
“Well, no, but he’d have liked to.”
“He kissed Charlotte!”
“Only a good-bye kiss. On her cheek!” Xemerius shouted right into my ear. “If I have to tell you that once again, I’m going to explode. I’m off. All this girly stuff is more than I can take.” He flapped his wings a few times, flew up to the school roof, and made himself comfortable there.
“I don’t want to hear another word about it,” said Lesley. “Right now it’s much more important for you to remember everything you heard yesterday. And I mean things that really count. Matters of life and death!”
“I’ve told you everything I know,” I assured her, rubbing my forehead. My headache had gone, thanks to three aspirins, but it left a dull sensation behind my temples.
“Hm.” Lesley was poring over her notes. “Why didn’t you ask Gideon how he’d met up with this Lord Alastair eleven years ago and what fencing match they were talking about?”
“There’s a whole lot more I didn’t ask him, believe you me!”
Lesley sighed again. “I’ll make you a list. Then you can ask a casual question now and then, when there’s a good strategic moment and your hormones let you.” She put her notepad away and looked at the school entrance. “Come on, we must go up or we’ll be late. And I don’t want to miss it when Raphael Bertelin walks into our classroom for the first time. Poor boy—he probably feels the school uniform is like a convict’s outfit.”
We made a brief detour past James’s niche. In all the pushing and shoving of morning school, no one noticed if I spoke to him, particularly when Lesley acted as if I might be talking to her.
James raised his perfumed handkerchief to his nose and looked around cautiously. “Ah, I see you didn’t bring that badly behaved cat today.”
“Guess what, James, I was at Lady Brompton’s soirée last night,” I said. “And I curtseyed just the way you taught me.”
“Lady Brompton, hm,” said James. “She does not necessarily have the reputation of moving in the highest circles. They say her parties can be very free and easy.”
“If that’s what they say, they’re right. I hoped that was normal in eighteenth-century polite society.”
“Thank God, no!” James pursed his lips, looking offended.
“Well, anyway, I think I’ve been invited to a ball given by your parents, Lord and Lady Pympoole-Bothame.”
“I find that hard to imagine,” said James. “My mother sets great store by the impeccable social standing of her guests.”
“Well, thank you very much,” I said, turning to go. “What a snob you are!”
“I didn’t mean it as an insult,” James called after me. “And what’s a snob?”
Raphael was already leaning in the doorway when we reached our classroom. He looked so gloomy that we stopped dead.
“Hi. I’m Lesley Hay, and this is my friend Gwyneth Shepherd,” said Lesley. “We met on Friday outside the principal’s office, remember?”
A faint grin lit up his face. “Well, I’m glad you recognize me, anyway. I had problems with that when I saw myself in the mirror just now.”
