Charlotte arrives in her customary flurry of excitement, with Terence, my rather aged butler trailing in her wake bearing the tray of drinks. I know him to be uneasy with heights, so that he has to steel himself to walk about on the roof garden. He is certainly no Withers, but he is quiet and diligent, and since he’d been wounded in the war and lost an eye, I know he would have struggled to find a position elsewhere. He lives with other servants in the building in the staff rooms in the basement, which suits us both. There is a restaurant on the ground floor from which food can be sent up, as well as my own small kitchen where Terence assembles breakfasts and suppers. Mama cannot fathom how I manage to live like this, but I find it blissfully uncomplicated and far more private than life at Fitzroy Square ever was.

“Lilith, darling!” Charlotte kisses me quickly and then flops onto a chaise longue, tugging off her gloves and removing her hat. “Goodness, coming up here is like visiting some rare bird up in its aerie.”

“I think that would make me an eagle.”

“Really? Oh no, that won’t do. Much too predatory.”

“An owl, perhaps? I am something of a night bird.”

Terence hands us both tall glasses of gin and tonic with generous slices of lime and lashings of ice. He picks up Charlotte’s discarded accessories and leaves us, walking a little unsteadily back to the lift door on the far side of the garden.

“No, owl won’t do,” Charlotte goes on. “They are too plump, somehow. I have it! You are a phoenix! You have risen from the ashes of Fitzroy Square and flown up to this lofty perch in all your glorious colors!”

I laugh at her. “Charlotte, what nonsense you spout. I am the least colorful person I know.”

“Oh well, have it your own way.” She sips at her drink. “I must say, that new man of yours might be unsteady on his pins, but he’s a whiz with the gin bottle.”

“He’s settling in.”

“How you manage without a lady’s maid I simply cannot imagine. Lord knows it’s an utter nightmare trying to find servants these days. Any worth having are all snapped up. Perfectly good maids have got all sorts of modern ideas into their heads since the war and now don’t want to be in service. I mean to say, how is one supposed to function? Mummy says if things continue the same way we shall be forced to give up Glengarrick.”

“Oh, surely not. The estate’s been in your family for generations. Can’t you just, well, manage with fewer footmen?”