Collis leaned forward. ‘What is it,’ he asked her, ‘that I hold so dear?’

Delphine turned towards her mother and Ida, who had paused to listen for a moment. When they saw that she was looking, they immediately plunged back into their conversation like two diners gobbling the same bowl of spaghetti. Delphine looked back at Collis with her amused, entrancing smile. ‘They seemed to be pleased that we’ve got together,’ she said. ‘Do I sense a plot?’

‘Probably,’ said Collis. ‘But who cares, if the plot has such happy results?’

‘I don’t know whether it has,’ Delphine replied.

‘You grieve me,’ said Collis, trying hard to look grieved.

‘No, I don’t,’ said Delphine. ‘I don’t think you’re capable of being grieved, not for anyone else’s sake, anyway. That’s because the thing you hold dearest, as I was telling you, is your scandalous reputation. You care for your public notoriety more than anything else, and you would defend it to the death.’

‘Then you have heard about me,’ said Collis. That was bad news. If she accepted his advances at all, he would have a long, uphill struggle trying to convince her that he was reformed, and that he would never gamble or drink or touch the ladies of the night again. A pretty creature like Delphine Spooner certainly wouldn’t have to put up with an erratic, erotic, boastful rake. She could pick any one of dozens of respectable young bankers instead, and live happily and substantially ever after.

‘Yes, I admit I’ve heard about you,’ Delphine told him. She took another spoonful of ice. ‘In fact, your escapades are quite well known.’

‘They’re very much exaggerated,’ said Collis.

‘Oh?’ she said.

‘Oh, yes, indeed. Well, you know how people like to talk, and how a story gets embroidered in the telling. Most of the stories that people tell about me are quite inaccurate. Some of them are downright lies. That was why I suspected you might be suspicious. Anybody would be suspicious if they heard stories like that. But they’re not true, I assure you.’

Delphine inclined her head to one side. ‘That’s a pity,’ she said.

Collis stared at her. ‘I beg your pardon?’

She turned her eyes towards him. ‘I said, “That’s a pity.”’

‘I’m sorry,’ he said awkwardly. ‘I don’t understand what you mean.’

Delphine bent her bonnet confidingly towards him. ‘It’s a pity,’ she said softly, so that Ida and Winifred were unable to hear, no matter how far they inclined themselves in her direction, ‘because I have wanted for a very long time to meet you.’

‘You have? I’m afraid I still don’t understand.’

‘You’re being very obtuse.’

‘My dear young lady, I’m not being obtuse at all. It’s you. You’re talking in complete riddles.’