Belinda sighed. “You really are a cocoa type of person, Georgie. God, and I was looking forward to that. There is something about powerful men that really attracts me. And he was obviously good at it too. And now I’ll never know. . . .”

Another awkward silence. “I’ve said I was sorry,” I repeated. “I don’t know what else to say. And you’ve used me often enough, including turning up out of the blue in Hollywood, so I do think you owe me the odd favor.”

There was a long silence as she went down the stairs and over to the cabinet in the corner. I heard liquor slosh into a glass. Or rather two glasses. She came back up the stairs, holding out a half tumbler of whiskey for me. “Here, drink this. You need it as much as I do. And you’re right. I did offer you my house and I have used you shamelessly on many occasions. Go on. Down the hatch.”

I did as she commanded, feeling the fiery liquid going down my throat and spreading warmth throughout my body. I coughed and wiped my eyes. She laughed. “You must be the only Scot who can’t take her whiskey,” she said.

“I’m only a quarter Scottish,” I said, managing a weak smile. “And I’ve never developed a taste for it.”

“You and your bloody cocoa,” she said, and she started to laugh again. “Oh well, I don’t suppose it would have led anywhere. It was just one of those shipboard flings. And now he’s gone home.”

“Back to his wife, if I remember correctly,” I said. “And wasn’t he the one who gave that speech about the sanctity of the family and every proud Englishman being king of his own castle with his wife and children around him?”

She nodded. “He’s a politician, Georgie. They say what people want to hear.”

“Belinda, I think I did you a favor. You could have caused real trouble. You could have brought down the government.”

“That might have been interesting,” she said. “At last people would know who I was then. I’d be a celebrity.”

“Of the wrong sort,” I said. “No respectable household would invite you for dinner, in case you seduced their husbands.”

“I suppose you’re right as usual,” she said. “It did cross my mind that it might be nice to be someone’s mistress, taken care of, set up in a swank flat somewhere.”

“With no security whatever, Belinda. Why not someone’s wife? Your pedigree is as good as mine—well, almost.”