He recognised a few of the faces – the moustachioed face, for instance, of R. Samuel Keen, an American whose every book had to have either an unnaturally wise child or a psychic dog. His latest one, which Gordon had tried to listen to as a book on tape before the cassette unspooled in his car, had both. It hadn’t been very good.

He saw Adrian Sykes, a soft-spoken Geordie whose work was fantastically gory and outrageously imaginative. The theme of the party was, as usual, horror, and Sykes had come dressed as one of Clive Barker’s Cenobites, all black leather and hooks. Gordon had met him only once before, and had come away thinking of him as a thoroughly decent person. It was occasionally true to say that the writers of the most disturbing horror stories were among the nicest people you could possibly meet.

There were exceptions, of course. For instance, the gentleman Sykes was chatting to, Edgar Looms, another American, was a man of singular vulgarity. Gordon had first met him ten years earlier, just after Gordon’s first book was published, and since then he had developed quite an abhorrence of the man. Tonight Looms was one of many who had come dressed as Frankenstein’s monster – from the James Whale movie, not the book.

For his first time here, Gordon himself had come as the Creature from the Black Lagoon – a costume he’d had specially created at no little cost. It was worth it, though, even if the flippers made it difficult to walk and the mask made it difficult to see, hear or breathe. It also made it difficult to be heard, which may have explained why his companion hadn’t responded to his politician line.

Gordon leaned in closer, careful not to topple over in his costume, and said, quite loudly and clearly, “Invitations to these parties are rarer than an honest coin in a politician’s pocket.”

His companion, dressed as he was in a 1930s suit and tie, his head covered in bandages exactly like Claude Rains from The Invisible Man, turned slightly, so that Gordon could see his own costume’s reflection in those sunglasses.

“Are you having a stroke?” Skulduggery Pleasant asked. “You keep repeating the same phrase. Is it hot in there? It looks hot.”

“It is,” Gordon admitted. “But I’m not having a stroke. I’m too young. I’m only thirty-five, for God’s sake. Though I may start hallucinating, and thirst will likely become an issue before too long.”

“How do you take the mask off?”

“I’m not entirely sure. It took two people to get me into this thing. They probably told me how to take it off, but the mask makes it hard to hear properly.”

Skulduggery said something.

Gordon leaned in again. “What?”

“I said what about toilet breaks?”

“I hadn’t thought of that. Can you see a zip anywhere?”

“It looks rather seamless.”