“Must have missed the place,” said Sam, recalling the old man’s reaction to the name Illthwaite.

“Funny way of showing it if he does,” said Winander. “He’s a nosy old sod, always stirring it.”

“Why do you call him Noddy?”

“Enid Blyton. Gets a bad press these days but used to be like a set text way back. We called him PC Plod to start with, but that didn’t really fit till one of us kids said he looked more like Noddy the Elf, and that stuck. Like another beer?”

“No thanks. Time to go. Thanks for being so open with me.”

“I’m sorry we gave you the runaround,” he said. “I’ll see you out. Sure there’s nothing you want to buy?”

“Not on my budget,” she said, laughing.

“You never said what you’re doing here in the UK. Holiday, is it? The grand tour, backpacking round the world?”

They’d reached the front door and she was saved from answering by the appearance of an old pickup which came bumping down the driveway. In it were the Gowder twins. As it moved slowly by, Sam felt their eyes hold her in their sights.

“My helpers,” said Winander.

“They work for you?”

“And for anyone who’ll employ them,” said Winander. “The Gowders used to be important people round here, but even with the slow rate of progress we admit in these parts, they still managed to get left behind. Jim, the twins’ father, after his wife died he spent more time and money pissing up against walls than mending them. By the time the twins came into the farm there wasn’t enough stock or land left to make it a going concern. They’d have lost the house too if Dunstan Woollass hadn’t stepped in.”

“The squire?”

“The same. And old Dunny takes his squirely responsibilities seriously. When Foulgate, that’s the Gowder house, came on the market to settle their debts, he bought it and let them stay on at a peppercorn rent and saw to it that they can make a fair living odd-jobbing.”

“Very community-hearted of him. I gather Gerry takes after him.”

“Outdoes him in general do-gooding, but when it comes to the Gowders they’re miles apart. He hates their guts. I think they must have bullied him at primary school.”

“But you like them?”

“Good Lord, no,” he laughed. “But they’re part of Skaddale, like the rocks and the moss. And if you need brute force, send for a Gowder. Got to watch them, though. Because they can carry a tup under either arm, they think nothing’s beyond them. Block and tackle’s for wimps. We’re taking Billy’s angel down to the church later. Left to themselves they’d try to pick it up bodily and toss it into the back of the pickup. Eternal vigilance is the price of employing a Gowder.”

“I’ll leave you to it then,” said Sam. “See you later, maybe.”

At the gateless gateway she glanced back. Winander waved. The Gowders had halted their vehicle by the smithy and got out. She felt the intensity of their gaze like a gun leveled at her. And she knew with a certainty beyond the scope of mathematical logic that this was the same gaze she’d felt in that split second before the trap slammed shut on the church tower.

Suddenly her heart ached with a longing for home.

And I’ve eaten my last Cherry Ripe, too! she thought.

Mig Madero sat in the kitchen of Illthwaite Hall and felt happy.

He and Frek Woollass were to eat alone. On the landing they’d met Mrs. Collipepper, carrying a tray. Dunstan, Frek explained, usually returned to his bed after the exertion of descending for breakfast. He lunched off a tray, then reemerged for tea.

The housekeeper passed without a word. Madero smiled at her but she didn’t return the smile. He wasn’t bothered. He had other things on his mind. Frek had set off down the stairs and as he followed, despite all his efforts at diversion, he found his gaze and his fancy focused on the point, occasionally visible as her T-shirt rode up from her hipster shorts, where that arrow-straight spine split the apple of her buttocks.

In the kitchen she completed his happiness by apologizing for the absence of her father who along with Sister Angelica had gone to a meeting of an educational charity whose committee they both sat on.

He’d expected something like the room in the Stranger House where he’d drunk cognac with Mrs. Appledore the previous night, but this was completely different. Contemporary wall units and electrical apparatus all looked perfectly at home against a background of golden-tiled walls. The broad windows let in plenty of light and looked out on a rising bank of grass and heather out of which some kind of platform seemed to have been carved about ten feet up. In the middle of the kitchen was a pine table of generous dimensions but a mere dwarf by comparison with that in the Stranger. On it stood a cheese board, a fresh cottage loaf and a bowl of fruit.

Frek shook her head when Madero pushed the bread toward her. Instead she took an apple and cut it in two. As the demiorbs fell apart, Madero’s thoughts went back to his lubricious imaginings as he descended the stairs. Apple was wrong with its golds and reds. Frek would be white, two smooth scoops of ice cream with the promise of hot plum sauce hidden somewhere beneath…

“Are you all right, Mr. Madero? Not off with the spirits again?”

He realized he was sitting completely still with the cheese knife raised in his hand.

“I’m fine. But I wonder if I might have some water? It’s a bit warm in here.”

“Sorry. It’s the Aga. Pepi always keeps the temperature up high for Grandfather’s sake. Would you like a glass of wine? There should be a bottle… yes, there we are…”

She glanced around as she spoke. Like a sky-watcher who has found a new star, he kept his eyes fixed on her, and he saw discovery turn to recognition then to dismay.

He let his gaze drift along the line of her sight till it reached the looked-for bottle. It was his gift of El Bastardo standing already open next to a large crystal bowl through whose sides it was possible to see a layer of red topped by a layer of yellow.

“I think,” said Madero carefully, “your housekeeper is preparing a sherry trifle.”

“Yes. I’m sorry… Mrs. Collipepper must have picked it up by accident.”

“Of course. Perhaps we should lead her out of temptation…”

She rose and brought the bottle to the table. It was three-quarters full.

“Would you prefer something else? It hardly seems right, offering you your own drink… and I don’t even know if it goes with bread and cheese.”

“We will call them tapas, in which case the fino is the perfect accompaniment. Your father will not mind us sampling the wine without him?”

He asked the question gravely, saw her seeking a polite way of saying Gerry wouldn’t give a damn if they poured it down the sink, then smiled broadly and said, “Good. Glasses, if you please. Two. It is not polite to drink El Bastardo alone.”

She went to a cupboard and produced two wineglasses, not copitas – that would have been expecting too much – but medium-sized goblets which he half filled.

“Salud!” he said.

“Skaal,” she replied.

“What do you think?” he asked after they’d drunk.

“It’s different from what I expected,” she said.

“Not what you look for at the bottom of a trifle, you mean?”

“I have drunk sherry before, Mr. Madero,” she said. “Sometimes it’s unavoidable… Sorry, that sounds rude. I mean, sometimes…”

“Please, I understand,” he interrupted. “In Hampshire, too, where my mother lives, the famous English sherry party is sometimes unavoidable. Usually served at the wrong temperature in the wrong glasses.”

“I’m sorry if I’ve got it wrong…”

He said, “A bastard has to be robust enough to stand a little abuse. Which is not to say it lacks the refinement you would expect in a wine of such expense.”

“I didn’t imagine you’d brought Daddy a cheap bottle,” she murmured. “But it does seem a strange name to give to an expensive wine.”