Joe cheerfully told him he could resist the fairy charms for the moment. Duty called him to stay at home and get to know some of the other inhabitants.

‘Thought you’d say that. But I also came to say—remember I have a camera. One or two in fact. For different uses. Not just for pleasure and art. And one of their uses is recording evidence, you know. The Ermanox will be perfect for the job. I was wondering if I might sneak into the chapel under a corner of your blanket permission to rove about. How about it? Shall we make a foray together into the forbidden chapel and take some shots of the depredations? If you think it’s worth it? Word is that you went in there yesterday …’

‘I was wondering how to ask!’ said Joe. ‘I found nothing very sinister, I’m afraid, but a record would be a useful thing to have.’

‘That’s great! Look—the light will have gone by the time I get back from the fairy realms … morning light is much better and that place has sensational east windows. How about an early start tomorrow morning, Wednesday, before the Inspector gets himself up here from Marseille? Present him with a fait accompli?’

‘And yourself with an unusual photographic opportunity?’

Nat grinned. ‘The thought had crossed my mind.’

‘You’re on!’ said Joe. ‘I’ll look forward to it.’

Left alone, he stood at the window sipping his tea and reviewing his day.

‘The lord sees that their everyday needs are catered for,’ Estelle had told him.

Well, this was certainly to all appearances a happy colony of worker bees, Joe had to think. He’d made full use yesterday of his leave to snoop about the castle and, after his visit to the chapel, had reconnoitred unchallenged, to his heart’s content. He’d leant over shoulders and admired half-finished works; he’d watched a lady sculptor pounding and chipping—‘No! No! The shape’s in there … I just have to reveal it …’; he’d helped Frederick Ashwell to mix and apply a coat of plaster to a wall ready to receive the fresco the lord had commissioned. He’d been impressed by the boy’s professionalism and had listened enthralled as he explained his techniques. Speed and forethought, apparently, were the watchwords. Knowing exactly what you were doing. Impossible to have second thoughts. The preliminary designs complete, the final painting had to be done at the moment the plaster reached the perfection of dampness.

He’d decided on a tactful approach for today. He would wait until the guests were once again at lunch before he’d go, list in hand, to check on the sleeping quarters of each person Guy de Pacy had named. The only names that did not appear were those of the steward himself and his lordship. Orlando had indicated vaguely that the two men occupied rooms in two of the corner towers.

The single men seemed content with their dormitory arrangements, bunking down on camp beds set out, suitably enough, in the old guardroom. A similar area had been allocated to the women on the floor above. Scattered on both floors were small, cell-like spaces put to the use of married couples of whom there were two and, of the others, one had been awarded to Joe and another to the Russian gentleman. Joe had protested his readiness to muck in with the other men but de Pacy had insisted he avail himself of a measure of privacy—‘in case you need to interview someone—or I need to speak to you.’

His things had already been brought up and unpacked while he was at lunch on the first day so he’d conceded with good grace and settled to enjoy his solitary state.

Why in blazes was he staying on? He asked himself the question constantly and the same answers came back ever more strongly. Two answers.

There had been the surprise of discovering that one of the faces around the lunch table had been familiar to him from photographs and newspaper articles he’d seen some years ago in his early days at the Yard: Earl’s Daughter lets her hair down at the Savoy with Dancing Dreamboat … Every playgirl’s favourite partner cuts a rug at Ciro’s … That sort of nonsense, he remembered. But Joe’s professional antennae had quivered at the sight of this guest who he was reasonably sure had a darker side to him than the limelit, cocktail-fired image the press displayed. He was known to the Vice Squad back home in London. But Joe’s hands were tied. There was no way he could make an accusation or even a discreet enquiry based on a piece of sketchily recalled Scotland Yard gossip.

And yet the man’s reported proclivities were too objectionable for Joe to ignore in the circumstances. He had to ask himself whether it would be sensible at least to alert Orlando, and decided that it was more than sensible—it was essential.

And then—the most surprising part of his day—there’d been Estelle’s strange behaviour.

The drinking and the yarning and the laughter had gone on until past midnight, he remembered, and the women had defiantly stayed on at the table. When the moment arrived, he’d looked questioningly at de Pacy and wondered which of the women would take it upon herself to rise and suggest that the ladies might like to withdraw. De Pacy had grinned and, in a marked manner, had launched into a conversation with Jane Makepeace, inviting her opinion on the mental state of Vincent Van Gogh at the moment he severed his own ear. Instead of the heavy psychological diatribe Joe had feared, her crisp answer had raised a shout of laughter around the table.

‘Formidable woman,’ he’d commented to Estelle.

‘You don’t say!’ she’d drawled. ‘Forget it, Joe! You’d need steel-lined underpants to tangle with that one! She wouldn’t be interested in you.’

Estelle had offered to walk him back up to his room after dinner and taken his arm firmly in hers. And the flourish had not gone unremarked by the crowd remaining in the hall. She was wearing a fetching midnight blue gown in a silky fabric cut on the bias. The gown clung flatteringly to her slim figure and her slim figure clung flatteringly to him. Her hair brushing his shoulder smelled heavenly—Après l’Ondée, he thought, or something equally special. She’d been scintillating and funny over dinner; a girl with further plans for her evening, he’d have said. But whom did her plans involve? She’d flirted openly with several of the men. And yet it was on Joe that her choice had fallen when she left.

Intrigued, excited but slightly alarmed, Joe began to try to estimate the quantity of wine he’d downed at dinner and could only conclude: too much. Should he say something … issue a caution? Or hope for the best? They’d arrived at his stout oak door and he’d turned to her apologetically. ‘I say, Estelle—’ was as far as he got before she put a finger over his lips.

‘Shush!’ She’d made a pantomime of listening. Cheery sounds of the women settling down for the night came from their dormitory; a drunken chorus from Iolanthe rose up from the floor below and was quickly extinguished by yells of protest and possibly the application of a pillow. A child called out in its dreams and instantly fell silent.

Reassured by what she was hearing, Estelle whispered: ‘Got a torch, Joe?’

He took one from his pocket. ‘A torch? Never walk castle corridors without one. Er … what do you have in mind? If you’ve found the bloodstained key to Bluebeard’s lair, we’ll have to come back in the daylight. Not at my sharpest at the moment, I’m afraid.’

‘Can you at least stagger along to the end of this corridor? That’s all you have to do.’ She’d squeezed his arm reassuringly.

She led him along to the end of the corridor, eased open a window and let herself through on to a flat square of roof contrived between two dormers. Joe followed to find himself on a lookout platform with a low balustrade to ward off vertigo. From up here there was a clear view over the courtyard closed off at one end by the bulk of the chapel.

The cigarette butts underfoot explained the girl’s interest in this private little space, he guessed. He shone his torch on to the roof tiles below, lighting up several packets’ worth of mostly half-smoked ends. And a scattering of something else.