The carriage stopped in front of the house. The footman descended from the box and opened the door. Mr Norrell stepped out. He was so wrapped up in mufflers that his shrunken little form appeared almost stout. Immediately Mr Marston hailed him and began to say something to him. Mr Norrell shook his head impatiently and waved Mr Marston away.

The fashionably dressed lady passed Childermass and Lucas. She was very pale and solemn-looking. It occurred to Childermass that she would probably have been considered handsome by the people who cared about such things. Now that he looked at her properly he began to think that he knew her. “Lucas,” he murmured, “who is that woman?”

“I am sorry, sir. I don’t think I ever saw her before.”

At the foot of the carriage steps Mr Marston was growing more insistent and Mr Norrell was growing angrier. Mr Norrell looked around; he saw Lucas and Childermass close at hand and beckoned to them.

Just then the fashionably dressed lady took a step towards him. For a moment it seemed that she too was going to address him, but that was not her intention. She took a pistol from her muff and, with all the calm in the world, aimed it at his heart.

Mr Norrell and Mr Marston both stared at her.

Several things happened at once. Lucas loosed his hold of Childermass – who dropt like a stone to the ground – and ran to help his master. Mr Marston seized hold of the lady around her waist. Davey, Mr Norrell’s coachman, jumped down from his box and grabbed the arm which held the pistol.

Childermass lay amid the snow and shards of glass. He saw the woman shrug herself free of Mr Marston’s grasp with what seemed like remarkable ease. She pushed him to the ground with such force that he did not get up again. She put one small, gloved hand to Davey’s chest and Davey was flung several yards backwards. Mr Norrell’s footman – the one who had opened the carriage door – tried to knock her down, but his blow had not the least effect upon her. She put her hand upon his face – it looked like the lightest touch in the world – he crumpled to the ground. Lucas she simply struck with the pistol.

Childermass could make very little sense of what was happening. He dragged himself upright and stumbled forward for half a dozen yards, scarcely knowing whether he was walking upon the cobblestones of Hanover-square or an ancient road in Faerie.

Mr Norrell stared at the lady in the utmost horror, too frightened to cry out or run away. Childermass put up his hands to her in a gesture of conciliation. “Madam …” he began.

She did not even look at him.