“Ruddy ’ell, miss. You mean I got to take it back up all them stairs again?” she demanded.

“Just leave it for now and go and get my tea,” I said. “I’ll feel better when I have something warm in my stomach.”

“You should see what’s going on downstairs, miss,” she said, pausing to look back from the doorway. “Apparently them people what we stayed with in France are coming to stay. You know, the stingy ones what only had one piece of cheese and crackers for their dinner?”

“It was lunch, Queenie,” I corrected. “Remember I told you that people of my class eat luncheon in the middle of the day and dinner at night.”

“Well, whatever it was, there weren’t enough food to feed a ruddy hamster,” she said bluntly. “I expect they’re coming here for Christmas so they can eat your brother’s food instead of their own.”

“That’s not for you to comment on,” I said. “You must watch what you say. If my sister-in-law ever heard you, I really would be forced to sack you. You realize that.”

“Sorry, miss. My dad always said my big mouth would get me in trouble, if something else didn’t first.”

“So the servants are getting their rooms ready, are they?” I asked. “That must mean they are arriving very soon.”

“It’s a pity you aren’t going away after all,” Queenie said. “I don’t see a very happy Christmas shaping for us.” With that she made a grand exit.

I got up and went over to the window. The world was covered in a blanket of white, apart from the black water of the loch, which lay mirror-still reflecting the crag and the pine trees. For once the scene looked almost like an Alpine picture postcard and I tried to cheer myself up by thinking of the fun I’d have building snowmen and going sledding with little Podge, my nephew. He was almost five years old now and splendid company.

When I came down to breakfast, however, I learned that Podge had developed a cold and was not to be allowed out in the snow. “But you can take Maude out tobogganing when she comes,” Fig added, as if that were an incentive. Maude probably wouldn’t want to do normal things like tobogganing, I thought. I’d never met a drearier child. Nor a worse know-it-all. I looked up as Hamilton came in with the morning post on a salver.

“Anything for me, Hamilton?” I asked hopefully. If Darcy was back in London, surely he would have written. . . .

“I’m afraid not, my lady. Only a letter for His Grace and some magazines.”

Magazines were better than nothing, I supposed. I took Country Life and The Lady and went to curl up in an armchair by the fire in the morning room, which was the only room in the house that became passably warm. I flicked through the pages, trying not to feel anxious and depressed. Every page seemed to show pictures of jolly Christmas house parties, hints on how to decorate with holly and mistletoe, amusing cocktails for New Year’s bashes. . . . I put down Country Life and thumbed idly through The Lady. I was about to put it down when some words leaped off the page at me: Tiddleton-under-Lovey.