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agent, and he has been showing me the plans of the building. It is like a giant jigsaw puzzle. The wing we are all housed in is comparatively new, built during the last fifty years to accommodate the last Lord Kenilworth’s guests. Like the present one he had the reputation of being a great host, and his wife a great hostess. The present pair are trying to outdo them. They would be hard put to build such a puzzle as the new wing where stairs lead anywhere but where you might expect.’
    Dinah nodded. ‘I suppose,’ she said, ‘that one might get lost, and be found years later as a skeleton on some landing no one has thought to visit. Ought I to carry a cord with me, like Theseus in the Labyrinth, do you think, to keep me from such a sad fate?’
    He nodded lazily, handed her through a glass door and walked with her into the gardens, turning at the end of a long alley to look back at the Hall.
    He pointed to a window on the first floor. ‘I calculate that we are housed over there.’
    A balcony ran the full length of the house, saved only from spoiling its lines by the presence of a flat roof belowit where an orangery had been built on to its side by the present Lord Kenilworth.
    â€˜Should you like to live here?’ Dinah queried
    Cobie shook his head. ‘Not my style,’ he said decisively.
    Dinah wondered what his style was. Presently they turned away to stroll down to the lake where a folly in the form of a Grecian temple stood, and where Cobie had ordered his sketch-book, pencils and water-colours, and Dinah’s canvas-work, to be left.
    â€˜I thought that you might appreciate a little time on your own,’ he told her, beginning to draw the idyllic scene before them. ‘The next few days promise to be hectic, what with the races in the day, ceremonial dinners and equally ceremonial card-playing at night. We shall all be expected to join in.’
    Dinah did appreciate a little time to herself. She took out her tapestry and began to stitch. Presently Cobie rose and picked up his sketch-book. ‘You will excuse me, I know. I have a mind to draw the house in the background,’ he said, and walked away.
    She watched him until he disappeared from sight before resuming her work. He was aware of her gaze on him, but it was to escape it that he had left her. He stopped when the house lay plain before him, and he began to draw it carefully…but not because of its aesthetic interest. He took from his pocket the internal plan of the wing where all the guests were accommodated, and which he had drawn from memory after Kenilworth’s land agent had shown it to him earlier.
    Sir Ratcliffe’s bedroom was there , three windows away from his own, accessible both from the ground by way of the orangery roof and the balcony, and by the balcony from his own bedroom.
    Cobie began to turn plans over in his mind.
    He was still turning them over that evening when, to escape from everyone, he left the vast drawing room where tables had been set out for baccarat to be played when the Prince so ordered. He wandered into a dimly lit octagonal room, known as The Cabinet which had one window looking out on the gardens. The other walls were covered with cases of dead butterflies, pinned down in all their fragile glory.
    Another guest was inspecting them desultorily through her lorgnette: she was Lady Heneage.
    Cobie bowed, and began to retire. ‘I had not meant to interrupt you.’
    â€˜No matter,’ she said, almost curtly. ‘I would value your opinion on these,’ and she waved her hand at the cases.
    She was beautifully dressed, and was wearing the famous Heneage diamonds, a necklace, ear rings, two rings, and a brooch. Far from enhancing her, they added in some odd way to her insignificance—the most important thing about her being them, and them only.
    â€˜Oh, I can have no opinion on such things,’ he said coolly. ‘I am not qualified to