In the morning a hard-boiled egg and toast were brought up to my room. Queenie finished repacking my things and I went downstairs to send someone to find a cab for me. I looked up when I heard the brisk tap of feet and for a moment I thought I was seeing yet another ghost. Then I saw that this man was very much alive. He just bore a remarkable resemblance to the major who had been his predecessor at the palace and who had died in a tragic fall.

“Lady Georgiana,” he said, in his fruity military tones, “I can’t apologize enough. I had no idea, you see. I understood from the servants that you had already departed and left your maid to have your belongings sent on. If I’d known you were still to be in residence I would have made sure that you were properly fed and looked after.”

“It’s quite all right, Major . . . ?”

“Halliburton,” he said. “Grenadier Guards.”

“Major Halliburton,” I said. “Please don’t apologize. I had intended to be gone but I had to return unexpectedly. I’ll be moving to my brother’s house this morning, so I’ll be departing in a few minutes.”

“No, no. Please feel free to stay as long as you want,” he said.

“But I understood the place was to be closed up and the servants sent elsewhere today,” I said.

He glanced around before lowering his voice. “That was to make sure a certain other lady went home to wherever she came from,” he said, giving me a conspiratorial grin. “I understand that she expressed an interest in staying on indefinitely, and as she was not the easiest of guests . . .” He didn’t have to finish the sentence. “But with you it is quite different. That lady invited herself, so I am told. She wasn’t even supposed to be here. Everyone was surprised when she showed up on the doorstep.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll both be out of your hair today, I promise,” I said.

“What does this major have in his hair?” a voice behind us demanded, and there was Irmtraut, dressed for travel in a green Austrian cape. “I hope it is not fleas or lice. I do not think this place is cleaned very well.”

“It is merely an expression, Countess,” the major said. “An English idiom.”

“I am glad that I return to a country where people say what they mean. And no silly expressions like ‘toads in the cave’ and ‘raining cats and dogs.’”

Then she swept past us and out the front door.

The major and I exchanged a smile.

A taxi was summoned, and the luggage was piled in for the short trip to Belgrave Square. It was still horribly foggy and we crept through Kensington Gardens, seeing only a few feet in front of us.