‘Oh, Rose, please.’

Rose sat with her head bowed for a moment. Then she raised her blue eyes and looked into his black ones. ‘Very well,’ she said with a little smile. ‘Truce.’

‘Thank God for that,’ chirped Daisy. ‘All this heavy silence. It was like being back in the convent.’

The duchess finished speaking to her friend and turned her attention on Daisy. ‘Do I detect a certain Cockney accent there, Miss Levine?’

Daisy looked wildly at Rose. ‘Miss Levine,’ said Rose repressively, ‘is a distant relative of mine from a branch of the family which fell on hard times. She has not had my advantages.’

‘Really?’ said the duchess, unabashed. ‘I had such a business ages ago when Warnford fell for a chorus girl at Daley’s. He even had her invited to a house party where she pretended to be a lady. I saw through her little act and sent her packing.’

‘I do not see what your husband’s amours have to do with my companion,’ said Rose angrily. ‘Pray talk of something else.’

The duchess raised her lorgnette. ‘You know, animation suits you. You should cultivate it.’

The duchess turned her attention to her dinner. She was a messy eater and the front of her gown was soon decorated with the detritus of her meal. Rose, who had been taught to eat ortolans by dissecting them with a sharp knife, wondered what her mother would make of the duchess’s table manners as the little duchess picked up the small bird and crammed it in her mouth and then began to pick out the bones.

The pudding was a meringue confection and soon the duchess’s gown was liberally sparkling with meringue dust.

‘Where shall we stay in Paris?’ asked Rose.

‘I have reserved a floor at the Crillon. We could have stayed with an old friend of mine, but I decided it would be as well to keep our mission discreet. Society does gossip so. We should retire now because we need to make an early start.’

‘How early?’

‘We catch the nine-o’clock to Dover. Ladies, wear your motoring gear when we set out.’

A Daily Mail reporter lurked outside Claridge’s the next morning, hoping for some news about celebrities. He saw that someone very important was about to depart. There was the duchess’s Daimler and behind it, Harry’s Rolls, and behind that, a carriage for the servants. The duchess was travelling accompanied by her lady’s maid, two footmen and her butler. The reporter watched as those huge trunks called Noah’s Arks were loaded into the back of the motors and into the rumble of the servants’ carriage.

He went up to the doorman. ‘Who’s leaving?’

The doorman stared impassively ahead. The reporter pressed a guinea into his hand.

‘The Duchess of Warnford,’ said the doorman. ‘Her Grace is going to Paris.’

‘Who goes with her?’

Again that impassive stare. The reporter sighed and fished out another guinea.

‘Captain Cathcart, Lady Rose Summer and Miss Levine.’

The reporter grinned. Lady Summer was news. Nobody had heard of her since that murder. He retreated a little way down the street, waited for the party to emerge and began to make notes.