‘Felicity,’ he said, and gave a little flick of his hands in the direction of the men who held me. The man holding my hair let go and I sagged forward, Walt holding me up. ‘Good Lord but you’re every bit the surprise that Cordelia spoke of. What the blazes are you doing fumbling about up there?’ He peered past me into the crater in the roof. ‘You really did that? She will be most impressed.’

I was too banged up to really take any of it in. It felt like listening to a conversation but from far away or under water. He looked past me and gave a reassuring little smile to the men who’d flung themselves backwards when the ceiling gave in.

‘Nothing to worry about, gentlemen. These old houses – the floorboards are held together with spit and wishful-thinking. Clearly the woodworm got tired of linking arms and holding the roof up. Would you care to re-take your seats? And please, Pelletier, do go and check on our other guests.’

I heard the door open. Heard muffled shouts and bangs and the scrape of chair-legs being dragged across the floor. Walt helped me to a chair, turning me around and propping me up to face the door. Pelletier and one of the big men came back with John and Sera. John could barely stand but when he saw the state of me, laid out in the chair and covered in blood, he did his damnedest to take a swing at the man holding him. He got a punch in the ribs for his trouble and went down to his knees. Pelletier held Sera by the arm, his manner as respectful as he could make it. She looked around urgently at all the eyes upon her. Looked at me and then past me, to where her brother cowered in the corner; blood seeping from a wound to his shoulder, one hand pressed bloodily to the hole and a gory, elderberry-coloured blood leaking through his fingers.

‘Be calm, please, Sera,’ said Walt, apologetically. ‘Such things often look a great deal worse than they are.’

‘This is her, is it?’ asked a man with an American accent. He was a good-looking fellow, neatly pressed: an expensive black polo neck under a dark grey suit. He’d settled himself back in his chair and was looking around him as if this was all a pantomime. A heavily built chap stood a few paces behind him. He held a gun in his right hand and something told me he was a bodyguard of sorts for the American.