‘Shoelaces?’ suggested Guy, the old teasing note back in his voice. But at once, the anger returned to his face. ‘Oh, God, why didn’t you wait!’ he burst out. ‘Were you so eager for the prince?’

Tessa, looking around for something to sit on, found the pedestal of her great-grandfather’s statue which had been too heavy to move. At the same time it occurred to her that she could at this moment have walked barefoot up Mount Everest, which would have been a record and pleased people.

‘I knew you’d gone to Spittau, but I thought I had time. And then they said the wedding had been bought forward—’ He broke off and turned away.

‘Yes,’ said Tessa. ‘I thought it would be a good idea. Heidi was so very pregnant, you see.’

‘Heidi? Who the devil? Oh, that dancing girl. What’s she got to do with anything?’

‘Actually, Guy, I was wondering if I shouldn’t train as an actress,’ said Tessa reflectively. ‘I never wanted to act before, but honestly I think I may have talent. I did the Stanislavski method before I came downstairs — you know, getting yourself into the part — and then I swept into the banqueting hall when they were all at dinner and called Maxi a vile seducer and pointed my trembling finger at him and everything. I think my bosom heaved too; I’m almost sure it did. And if I was a successful actress I could help you—’

Guy had walked over to her and pulled her up by the wrists. She smiled at him and he said, ‘Don’t smile like that, damn you! Tell me what happened.’

‘Well. I found out that Heidi and the prince had been—’ she flushed. ‘You know… It was incredibly stupid of me not to guess, but I didn’t because nobody brought me up to know anything useful.’

‘Go on.’

‘And, of course, it was obvious that they were just meant for each other, but Maxi isn’t… you know, very resolute. So I made this scene — I wanted to do it in a night-dress like in La Sonnambula but I thought I might trip — and denounced him and said he had to make an honest woman of my friend. And then the Swan Princess screamed and said she was going to have a heart attack and everybody ran about except Monteforelli who said God was almost certainly too busy watching sparrows fall to arrange anything so providential — only sotto voce, of course, and—’

Guy put a finger over her lips, which was a mistake because Tessa turned white and stopped.

‘Just get to the point.’

‘Yes, I will. But you mustn’t touch me when I’m trying to concentrate. So then I said, very well, I would take Heidi to her mother in Simmering and her unborn child would be raised to a useful trade, and the Swan Princess went into a paroxysm (which was her snobbery fighting with her blood-lust for babies) and her blood-lust won and she said no Spittau born or unborn was going to be raised away from the ancestral home, and then she told Maxi he had to marry Heidi! So then we had the wedding and I came to give Martha the Lily, only she wasn’t there.’ She broke off. ‘Guy, isn’t that Martha out there? Only, what is she doing?’

‘Good God!’

Tessa was looking out through the double doors of the hall across to the chapel — round the side of which there had just appeared, crawling slowly on hands and knees, the plump sandy-haired figure of Martha Hodge.

Guy was across the courtyard in a moment. ‘Martha, have you gone completely mad?’

His foster-mother crawled another painful yard, then rose stiffly to her feet. ‘Ee, I dunno,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘Rudi said as how I’d feel better when I’d done this penance, like, and I’ve ruined me stockings right enough and bruised me knees. But what the Reverend Ridley would say in Byker—’ And as Guy continued to look at her in stunned amazement she went on. ‘It’s what King Louis-the-something did when he got on the wrong side of the pope, crawled three times round the church, only on ’is stomach. It was all those lies I told, see — saying I was poorly and getting young David to call away the station-master and all that faddle so as to get the lass up here. And me not even knowing if she ’adn’t married the prince, like they all said…’

It was Tessa, coming up behind Guy and thoroughly familiar with the problems of guilt and retribution, who now took charge.

‘That wasn’t telling lies, Martha,’ she said earnestly. ‘That was strategy, like in a war.’ Then she exclaimed, ‘Oh, you’re wearing the locket! Isn’t the picture good of him! You wouldn’t believe the fuss he made about getting photographed.’

A great sigh of release and fulfilment now issued from Martha Hodge.

‘It was you, then,’ she said. ‘I knew… I just knew…’ and opened her arms.

But when the hugs and explanations were over and Martha had gone to change her lacerated stockings Guy and Tessa, seeking the shelter of the library, found themselves interrupted once again. Preceded by a fusillade of agitated knocks Herr Witzler, distraught and unannounced, burst into the room.

‘Herr Farne, I have bad news! Everything else is all right, I completely assure you. Every single article is labelled and waiting in the warehouse in Neustadt to be brought back when you give the order. But I, personally, have broken a Dresden figurine. Boris warned me… I knew you only wanted the stage-hands and it is true that I myself am not actually used to moving furniture, but I wanted to come too. After all, it was my company.’ And as Guy frowned, he added hastily, ‘I was extremely well disguised: my Aryan outfit. There was no question of Frau Hurlingham recognizing me. But in the excitement, I dropped the figurine. I understand that it is very valuable. Will you accept the first takings from Fricassée as compensation?’

‘No,’ said Guy. ‘Our deal was that I would get the theatre back for you if you carried out your task successfully. Fricassée was nowhere mentioned and I am not remotely interested in financing it.’

‘Herr Farne, I assure you that once you have heard—’

‘I’ll talk to you later, Witzler. Now, go away.’

‘Yes, Herr Farne.’

But Witzler had now seen Tessa, standing beside the Englishman and reminding him suddenly of Our Lady of Sprotz, glowing with candles as she was carried through the streets at Easter — a sinful and unforgettable sight he had beheld from his bedroom window while studying for his bar mitzvah. He bowed, left and rushed down the steps to where Boris was waiting.

‘It’s all right, it’s splendid — it’s all as we hoped! You should see how he looks at Tessa: as if she had at that moment been lowered from Paradise!’

‘So he should,’ said Boris gruffly. He had been so impressed by his own appearance as chief bailiff that he was growing a South American moustache, an enterprise still in its infancy.

‘Tristan is a herring compared to him,’ continued Witzler. ‘You’ll see, he’ll deny her nothing! Our accounts he may audit,’ Jacob admitted, ‘but that is all.’

A great radiance spread over his Old Testament countenance as he looked into the future. The plate-layers’ chorus wafting from the battlements… Raisa soaking up the ultra-violet… Pino’s uvula awash with eggs… And later, Cosi Fan Tutte and Figaro…

‘I shall learn to milk a cow,’ said Jacob, and hurried off to find a telephone and give his Rhinemaiden the joyful news.

‘Guy, I don’t think I completely understand,’ said Tessa, when they were alone at last.

‘It’s quite simple. I decided that the time had come to terminate my engagement to Nerine. However, I had no desire to humiliate her personally, nor did I wish to be embroiled in a messy breach of promise case. So I hired Witzler’s troupe to act as bailiffs and strip the place. Your friend, Bubi, gave me the idea — bailiffs seemed to be much on his mind. It was an absurd charade and wouldn’t have deceived anyone with the slightest faith in me. Even Martha smelled a rat, though fortunately, she held her tongue. But as you see, it worked.’

‘So you’re not ruined at all?’ said Tessa, abandoning with reluctance the free and roaming life with shoelaces she had envisaged.

‘I’m afraid not. In fact, I used the time to pull off a couple of rather profitable deals. You’re disappointed, I see. Don’t you think a wealthy husband might be quite useful, in view of your penchant for succouring the arts?’

Tessa nodded, seeing the justice of this. ‘Only, I do have this wedding dress which I think it would be a pity to waste. It’s from Lucia di Lammermoor, but it’s not bloodstained. It’s the nightdress that’s—’

But the helpful exposition on the plot of Donizetti’s masterpiece which Tessa was preparing, was cut short by Guy who now told her to be quiet.

‘I’m going to kiss you, you see,’ he explained.

Then he kissed her.

It was a very long time before he let her go. When he did, she looked up at him, hurt and bewilderment on her face.

‘Why did you stop?’ asked Tessa.

‘I thought you might want to breathe,’ said Guy carefully.

‘Breathe?’ said Tessa, shocked. ‘I don’t need to breathe when I’m with you.’

What came into his eyes then — eyes which seemed, at that moment, to have invented the colour blue — made her put up a hand as though to shield herself from so much joy.

This hand he now removed.

‘In that case…’ said Guy.

The Author

Eva Ibbotson was born in Vienna, but when the Nazis came to power her family fled to England and she was sent to boarding school. She planned to become a physiologist, but hated doing experiments on animals, and was rescued from some fierce rabbits by her husband-to-be. She became a writer while bringing up her four children, and her bestselling novels for both adults and children have been published around the world. Her books have also won and been shortlisted for many prizes. Journey to the River Sea won the Nestlé Gold Award and was runner-up for the Whitbread Children’s Book of the Year and the Guardian Fiction Award. The Star of Kazan won the Nestlé Silver Award and was shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal. Eva lives in Newcastle.