They handed over their coats, and Kim led the way through a procession of rooms and halls. The decoration was pretty old-fashioned to Will’s mind, although his main point of reference was Kim’s well-lit flat with its clean lines and bright colours. This place was ornate, designed for display rather than comfort, giving no sense of the owner’s personality beyond his well-stuffed wallet. Lots of furniture, lots of oil paintings, lots of things. It was impeccably clean, and it looked like nobody lived here at all.

Maybe he’d been born in a museum.

The smell of cigar smoke was almost a relief. It led them through to the Blue Drawing-Room which was, unsurprisingly, decorated in blue: deep dark shades for the upholstery, paler on the walls, dominated by a painting of a woman in powder blue satin and sapphires. She had very dark eyes and the sort of uncompromising expression that, were she three decades older, would see her called hatchet-faced, and if she wasn’t Kim’s mother, Will would eat his hat.

And, talking of his family...

They were both wearing evening dress, although there was nobody else here. Lord Chingford sat with his legs spread wide in a velvet-covered chair, cigar in hand. His gaze passed over Will as though he were furniture, and rested on Kim with the expression of pop-eyed hostility that seemed to be his instinctive response to his younger brother. “It’s here, Father,” he remarked, and puffed hard on his cigar.

The other man in the room was significantly older, in his early seventies, perhaps, tall and thin. Facially he resembled his elder son more than the younger, except that his expression was reminiscent of Kim at his most unpleasantly sneering. “Arthur,” Lord Flitby said.

“Sir.”

“Only the extraordinary circumstances, and your extraordinary claims, have caused me to permit this visit. I expected you earlier.”

“Once again, I disappoint,” Kim said. “I beg your pardon.”

Lord Flitby’s nostrils flared. “It is far too late to discuss your business tonight and I am engaged with Stratton tomorrow. I shall not rearrange my affairs for your convenience. You may stay until my return. I hope you understand the tolerance that is being extended to you. Send your man to the servants’ hall.”

“John Willerton is my friend and a guest in this house,” Kim said. “Charmed as ever, sir. Chingford.” He wheeled around and stalked out. Will followed in silence, through corridors and up stairs and round corners, until they reached a second-floor stretch that was wallpapered with a profusion of peonies. Kim tried a couple of doors. “Here we are.”