“Just a figure of speech, old boy. My friend here, if you can use the word, is Perseus Belloc. He’s a dashed rum sort, and between you and me, I think he’s a spy.”

“If I were a spy,” replied Perseus Belloc, “would I not be less, how you say, rum?”

Liza had never heard the words rum or, for that matter, how you say used in cold blood in her life, but this was a very exclusive hotel and probably attracted strange people. “I’m Liza,”—she took the offered handshake—”and this is …”

“Your lady wife, no doubt,” Sir Richard finished for her. Then he cast a coolly smug glance at Belloc. “You see, we can all play the remarkable deductions game.”

“Pathetic. You saw their wedding rings. A child’s trick.” Belloc made a precise, dismissive gesture. He had a neatness to him that bordered on the meticulous, his movements matching his suit in their crispness.

“And you guessed that they were from London,” retorted Sir Richard, “because you saw their car out the window and, like their clothes, it’s expensive but not ostentatious. Add in the fact that—sorry, rude of me, didn’t let you give me your name.”

“Hanna,” said Hanna. She didn’t look especially amused.

“That Ms Hanna,” Sir Richard went on, “has the formal air of a city financier about her, while dear Liza—sorry, couldn’t resist—carries herself in a more alternative fashion, implying a background in the creative industries. I fail to see what other conclusion you could possibly have come to.”

There was, at last, a pause in the barrage of verbiage, although neither Hanna nor Liza were quite sure what to say into the gap. Fearing that the opportunity, if missed, would pass them by forever, Liza tried: “So, is it nice?”

“Oh yes, capital place.” Sir Richard was still beaming. “Come here all the time with the old aunt. Mountain air, see, good for her lungs.”

“And the food is excellent,” added Belloc. “The chef, she is magnifique.”

Hanna had slipped away from Liza’s side and poured them both a cup of tea. Again, thoughtful. And in fairness, it was exactly what Liza would have wanted, but it would have been nice to be consulted. But that was Hanna all over, sweet and considerate and high-handed and arbitrary all at once. In a fruitless act of defiance, Liza sweetened her mug with two lumps of sugar she normally didn’t take.

“And what is it you both do?” Liza asked. There had been, she was sure, a time she was better at small talk, although maybe that was just the confidence of youth.