And it was. Old Fergus looking very grand in his kilt and bonnet. We lined up behind him and marched down the hall to the banqueting room. The room, with its rough stone walls and high arched windows, can be austere at times but tonight it was ablaze with candles. Their light sparkled from the silverwear and highlighted the starched white tablecloth, stretching down the length of the room. Fig had certainly pulled out all the stops. I sat in the middle of the table, between Lachan and Prince Siegfried. Babe sat opposite and was clearly fascinated by Lachan’s Highland dress.

“So is it true what they are saying, that Scotsmen wear nothing under their kilts?” she asked.

“If you care to reach under the table you can feel for yourself,” Lachan said. Babe shrieked with laughter.

“I was hoping to serve you our traditional haggis tonight,” Fig said. “But unfortunately—”

“Unfortunately we weren’t able to catch any today during our hunting expedition,” Murdoch interrupted.

“Catch them? I thought haggis was a type of sausage thing,” Hugo said.

“Oh aye, it is. That’s how you serve it after you’ve caught it,” Lachan said earnestly. “You mince it up and make a sausage of it, but before that it’s a canny wee beast. Ferocious for its size.”

“Mercy me,” said the countess. “And what does it look like?”

“Verra hairy,” Lachan said. “With pointy little teeth, and it lurks in the heather and goes for the ankles of bigger prey. In fact if I hadn’t seen Binky’s trap with my own eyes, I’d have thought he’d been attacked by a band of haggis.”

Those of us in the know were trying not to laugh, but Babe and the countess were gazing at Lachan, quite fascinated.

“We could take you on a haggis hunt tomorrow if you like,” he suggested. “We saw haggis tracks today when we were out on the moor.”

“That would be just fascinating, wouldn’t it, Earl?” Babe said.

I waited for someone to burst out laughing and tell them the joke, but nobody did.

“So how was the climbing today, young fellows?” the Prince of Wales asked. I noted he had been seated nowhere near Mrs. Simpson and she, as a result, was sulking. “Did you plant the flag on any summits and claim them for England?”

“That would hardly be wise, seeing that we’re in Scotland,” Prince George replied. “But alas we reached no summit. We stupidly left the ropes and climbing paraphernalia behind. Didn’t think we’d need it, you see, until we came to this great overhang. Well, we weren’t prepared to tackle that with no ropes and pitons so we had to retreat.”

“You should take Georgiana with you,” Binky said. “She knows these munros better than anyone.”

“Munros?” Gussie asked. “What the deuce is a munro?”