Christopher grinned at her. ‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said, thinking that after her unexpected but extremely welcome enthusiasm for his book he was probably due for a little deflation. He got up. ‘Life is looking up for me again,’ he said. ‘I mustn’t let it get away from me. Thank you more than I can say. I don’t intend to make an embarrassing point of banging on about my prison sentence in the future, but neither do I want it to be any sort of mystery . . . so if by any chance anyone is speculating, it’s quite all right by me to be open about it. I’ll probably mention it to the Grants. Just thought I’d like you to know that.’

‘Thank you. That sounds a good decision. We’ll keep our fingers crossed that Jonathan agrees with me about the book.’

At that moment there was a series of frisky little taps on the door and Bunty poked her head round it without waiting for a response to her knocks. ‘Only me,’ she said cosily, pattering in on the little feet that looked far too small to support her weight. She was so heavily endowed in front that Christopher thought it was amazing she didn’t overbalance and fall on her face every time she got up. Perhaps she was specially weighted internally like those toys that babies can’t push over.

‘Oh, hello, Christopher.’ Bunty, who had just overheard a most interesting bit of gossip, gave him an unmistakably beady look of unveiled curiosity. Before finding her way up to the tower, she had popped into the kitchen, the hub of the Glendrochatt household, where there was usually something interesting going on, primarily to check if Rory might be around, but ostensibly to search for her reading glasses, and found Isobel, who was making shopping lists, being regaled with a riveting piece of information. Bunty had hardly been able to believe her ears and – naturally not wishing to intrude – had managed to stand in the doorway for several minutes before she was noticed.

She favoured Christopher with her warmest smile – and Bunty’s smiles could be very warm indeed – in which compassionate understanding and burning interest were about evenly balanced.

‘And how are you, dear, after all your ordeals?’ she asked solicitously.

‘Very well, thank you,’ said Christopher, a gleam of amusement in his eye. Bunty looked so pregnant with speculation that he knew immediately that he must have been the subject of a very recent conversation. He felt a twinge of disappointment – it obviously hadn’t taken Marnie much time to spread his story, and though he had not told her in confidence – rather the reverse, he realised ruefully – he was, all the same, surprised. While it was clearly as natural for Bunty to gather and spread rumours as a bee collecting pollen, somehow he had not expected it of Marnie.