‘Too busy watching the show,’ said Harry bitterly. ‘Monsieur Lemonier, you must know this is rubbish. For a start, Lady Rose was with us in Saint Malo at the time of Madame de Peurey’s murder.’

‘Nonetheless, to be thorough, we will take a copy of milady’s handwriting.’

‘I have a note Lady Rose wrote to me,’ said Daisy. ‘I’ll get it. No need to bother my poor lady at the moment. You can see she is not well.’

Daisy went to her room and found a list of things to be packed Rose had given to Daisy in London and brought it back.

Lemonier read it carefully and compared it with the note. ‘I have my police combing every hotel and lodging house in Paris, although we have only a vague description. Police are interviewing everyone who was on the quay. Can you remember seeing anyone, milady?’

Rose shook her head. ‘Funnily enough, just before I was pushed I began to feel afraid and realized how stupid I had been to go out on my own. I did not see anyone. There was no one on the quay when I went down the steps.’

* * *

Benton, the duchess’s lady’s maid, came in to see her mistress in a high state of excitement. ‘You will never believe what has just happened, Your Grace. Lady Rose went out walking beside the Seine and somebody pushed her in! The police are here.’

‘Will this never end?’ demanded the duchess crossly. ‘I am no longer amused. We will leave tomorrow, Benton.’

‘But Your Grace, the police said –’

‘Do you think I care what a lot of frog policemen say? My orders are to pack. Fetch Kemp.’

When her butler arrived, the duchess said, ‘Take a telegram. Right. Got paper and pen? Good. “Dear Polly. Daughter involved in murder and mayhem and whole business is too vulgar for words and can no longer chaperone her so suggest you catch train to Paris and get to the Crillon toute suite and take her away because I have had enough of it. Effie.” Send that right off, Kemp.’

But when the telegram arrived at the Palace Hotel in Monte Carlo, Lord and Lady Hadshire were on their way to Cairo and had left no forwarding address.

Daisy rapped on Harry’s door during the night and when he answered, she whispered urgently, ‘Oh, Captain, Rose has a bad fever. She needs a doctor.’

‘I’ll see to it right away.’

Harry ordered a doctor to be sent immediately and told the hotel manager also to hire a trained nurse. Then he quietly entered Rose’s room. She was tossing and turning and her face was flushed.

Daisy began to cry softly. ‘I should never have left her.’

Harry sat down beside the bed and took Rose’s hot hand in his own and held it tightly until the doctor arrived.

Dr Maurey was an elderly gentleman with silver hair and a gold pince-nez. He sent Harry out of the room while he examined Rose. Harry paced up and down the corridor wondering whether he should wake the duchess. When the doctor called him in, he said he thought Lady Rose was suffering from a severe chill and shock. He had prescribed powders which Miss Levine was to dissolve in water and get the patient to drink every four hours. He would call again in the morning. Harry told him a nurse had been ordered and if the doctor waited a few more minutes, he was sure the nurse would arrive. Rose needed expert care.