As you might well have supposed, by this time my patience with Andrew Savill was sorely tried. There had been not so much as a mention of any replies to his letters. When I enquired after them he would offer some excuse or other: ‘The Prince is not in town at present,’ or, ‘I understand that the Princess currently suffers with the dropsy and has not entertained a soul since February.’ He would smile as he spoke, though his eyes remained as dead as those of a landed trout.

My champion may have been content to pass his days in idle amusement or pretending to transact business, but I was not. The true cost of this folly was mounting by the hour. By the conclusion of that week the thought of my expenses had come to preoccupy me. At the risk of giving Madame Bonet’s cook offence, I refused to take any further meals from her kitchen, but rather sent Lucy to collect my victuals from a traiteur. My maid laundered my linens herself and I took to lighting no more than three candles upon any given night, leaving Madame’s glittering chandeliers to hang in darkness. Needless to say, I did not succeed in currying favour amongst her household. Her housekeeper and footmen eyed me with disdain and I feared that they would soon share their suspicions with the proprietress. Daily I felt my thin lace of falsehoods stretch further and further. One day, quite soon, I knew it would snap.

Fearing that this occasion was close at hand and having no indication that my Irish protector had received even the briefest note from any of his ‘numerous acquaintance’, I resolved to confront him. I had cogitated a good while upon this and had begun to fear that Andrew Savill was as much a fraud as was I. During all of our excursions abroad, our visits to the theatre and constitutionals, not once had we encountered a soul who knew him. But for his banker, no one called upon him. Indeed, I could not even determine if his affairs of business were genuine, or if the horses he professed to trade in were any more real than the Pegasus.

I prepared myself to greet him that morning and found him in his usual chair, with his white-stocking-clad legs crossed and outstretched. In his hands he held the same small dish of sweet tea or coffee he had supped upon day after day. He rose at once and offered a flourish of bows.

‘My lady, how might I be of service to you today?’ he said.

Reader, I fear I could bear it no longer.

‘Mr Savill,’ I began. ‘When we first arrived in Paris more than a week ago, you assured me that you were possessed of many friends here who might offer me some assistance.’

‘I did, my lady.’

I held his gaze. There came not a twitch of concern.