By Lettice Davenport, 1931

‘You got a note too, I presume,’ Rosalind said, moving out from behind Posy now it was clear there was no danger. National treasure she might be, but it seemed to Posy that Rosalind King was a bit of a coward.

‘I did. Inviting me to a secret assignation.’ Caro waggled her eyebrows. ‘Obviously I couldn’t pass that up.’

Posy rolled her eyes at Caro in full Dahlia mode, but caught hold of the door as she sashayed inside, propping it open. She didn’t like the idea of anyone else sneaking up on them.

‘Now, let’s take a look at these notes,’ Caro said.

There was a rickety table underneath the far window of the narrow turret, and one by one they spread their notes on it to study. The wording was the same on each. Meet me at the folly at 3PM, scrawled on the back of the script text.

Caro’s right eyebrow jumped higher and higher as she read her way across the table – another Dahlia affectation.

‘Same handwriting,’ she said, more to herself than to Posy and Rosalind, it seemed, as she flipped the pages over. ‘And consecutive pages of the script, although not a particularly interesting scene. Still, we have to assume the same person sent all three.’

Posy looked between the two older women. ‘Did either of you … did your note come with photos?’

Caro’s sharp gaze snapped to Posy’s face. ‘You too, huh?’

‘Mine as well.’ Rosalind sighed. ‘So it’s blackmail, then.’

What secrets were the other two Dahlias hiding, Posy wondered? She didn’t ask to see their photos, though. Not when she had no intention of sharing hers.

‘Who would want to blackmail all three of us, though?’ Posy asked. ‘I assumed it had something to do with the film – with the curse. But—’

‘But I’m not in the film,’ Caro finished for her. ‘Yet, anyway. No, I’m afraid it seems this is nothing quite so interesting as that. Just ordinary, prosaic blackmail.’

‘You mean they want money,’ Rosalind said flatly.

‘That’s my guess.’ Caro shrugged. ‘People always think celebrities are rich.’

Posy thought of the dwindling balance of her bank account, and all the money her parents had taken from her before she was old enough to manage her own finances. ‘Then where are they? If they want our money, why aren’t they here? It’s past three o’clock.’

All three of them turned as one towards the door. In a movie, that would have been the perfect cue for the mysterious note sender to reveal themselves.

The doorway remained stubbornly empty, the folly silent except for the faint noises drifting on the breeze from the convention.

‘I don’t think they’re coming,’ Posy said. ‘Whoever they are … they wanted the three of us here together. I don’t know why. Maybe they just wanted to scare us?’