'Fetch Lord Alderberen. Mr Propp too, if you can find him. Tell them to meet me in the study. Tell them . . . ' He wet his lips. She felt his fingers relax slightly. 'Say I've solved the rat problem.'

She twisted free of his grip and ran.

'Hey!'

She kicked aside the heavy double doors and ran south, down the west gallery. Several windows were open and a cold breeze swept about her throat. Afternoon sun fell across the hallway in hot golden slabs. She ran past white busts with blind stares, footsteps resounding.

She glanced back as she opened the door to the music room. Lansley was marching, not running.

'Where are you going?' he shouted.

She ran through the music room, past the black harpsichord and the grand windows. She ran into the hallway heading east. She pumped her arms, accelerating down an empty corridor. She ran onto the chequerboard floor of the Great Hall. At the foot of the stairs was Daddy. He was caught in a sunbeam, half golden, half dark.

He turned, smiled.

'Delphy!' His face fell. 'Whatever's the '

She barrelled into him. He caught her.

'Oh daddy they're after me I heard them talking they're going to ah ah to take me away to give me to the to the ah across the channel oh daddy don't let them take me don't let them t '

'Shh shh shh.' He rocked her side to side. 'There, there. It's all right. You're safe. It's all right.' She closed her eyes and tried to lose herself in the swaying. She heard the door open. Footsteps.

Daddy's chin lifted from her crown.

'Ah,' he said.

She breathed in. She breathed out. She pushed gently away from Daddy's chest and turned to face her pursuer.

Lansley had broken a sweat. A slash of dark hair hung over his brow; his fingers rose and flicked it back into place. His hearing-aid cable was a sinuous black tendril trailing from his ear to the battery on his hip. He tugged his lapels and glared at Delphine.

'Come with me,' he said.

She clutched Daddy's arm. 'No.'

'What's going on?' said Daddy.

'I am not going to ask you again,' said Lansley.

Delphine looked up at her father. 'He hit me.'

Daddy looked from Lansley, to Delphine, then back to Lansley. 'What do you want with her?'

Lansley let out a little furious gasp.

'Your daughter, sir, has been breaking into rooms '

'I never!'

'Shut up!' Lansley screamed the words, rocking forwards onto his toes, spittle flying from his mouth. 'Your daughter has stolen keys, spied upon guests in their private quarters '

'He's a Bolshevik! I heard them plotting to bring down the British Crown and '

'Delphy.' Daddy stopped her with a stern forefinger. He turned to Lansley. 'Now, Mr Lansley ' Delphine noted with pleasure how Lansley flinched at the title Mr ' would you care to explain what is going on? What is Delphine talking about?'

'How dare you '

'Perhaps I.' A voice rang from the top of the stairs. They all turned to look. Propp was descending with that mild, waddling gait, hands behind his back, a slight smile beneath his white moustache. His brass buttons glistened in the sunlight, black patent-leather shoes silent against the soft red carpet. Down he came.

'And how are you today, my dear companion?' he asked Daddy.

Daddy's eye pinched. He nodded.

'Very well, thank you.'

'Wonderful.' Propp's tone was warm, deep, lulling. He stopped two steps from the bottom, slightly above Daddy's eye level. 'I wish to speak to your daughter for short time.'

Delphine felt a palm at the base of her spine.

'Of course,' said Daddy. He gave her the faintest of shoves.

She wobbled, shot him a look.

'Go on,' he said. 'You and I can talk later.'

'Daddy?'

He pushed her again, more forcefully. 'Don't be rude, darling. Mr Propp would like to speak with you.'

Propp smiled and bowed. He beckoned Lansley with a tilt of his bald head.

She backed away from Lansley. 'Daddy, don't let them take me.'

'Delphine, what on earth is the matter with you today? Mr Propp is asking for five minutes of your time and you're pitching a tantrum.'

A strong hand gripped her wrist and twisted it behind her back. Another dug into her armpit. Lansley leant in to her ear.

'Come along, young lady,' he sang quietly. She could smell the juniper tang of his hair tonic.

'Daddy! Help me!'

Lansley began pushing her towards the stairs.

Daddy frowned. 'Look here, don't yank her about like that '

Mr Propp approached Daddy and placed a hand on his shoulder. 'My brother, be at peace. Youth is full of fire. I will find what distresses her so. She will settle.'

'Daddy!' Her legs folded beneath her. Lansley grunted, hoisted her upright, dragged her up the steps. 'Daddy!' She was screaming. 'He's hurting me! Daddy, he's hurting ' Lansley wrenched her wrist round on itself; she howled.

Daddy was talking: 'I'm so sorry. I don't know what's got into her.'

'Brother, I understand.'

Her sandals slipped on plush carpet. She called and called, even as she realised it was hopeless.

'Thank you,' she heard Daddy say. When she looked back, he was walking away.

It was not like The Champion at all.

They did not tie her to the chair. They did not produce gleaming instruments of torture, one by one, from Lansley's medical bag.

Alice brought coffee and a dish of ginger snaps.

They were in Lord Alderberen's study, the room on the other side of the peep hole. There were two doors, one leading to his bedchamber, the other to the hall. The hall door had a letterbox. These were the rooms in which the Silent Earl had spent his final years stewing, losing his mind. Delphine sat in the sagging leather club chair. On the wall was a painting of a matador a very bad painting, the bullfighter clutching some sort of dishcloth, the crowd pink smudges.

Delphine inhaled, felt the shiver in her breath.

Propp leaned back in his chair. Alderberen sat to his right, a loose-woven shawl across his shoulders. Propp dipped his ginger snap into his coffee and sucked it. Brown droplets collected at the tips of his white moustache.

'Well?' Lansley was standing in a corner.

Propp placed the half-eaten biscuit on the lip of his saucer. He turned to Delphine.

'Now, my dear child.' His face softened into a smile. 'What were you doing in the wall?'

Lansley clutched his brow. 'What do you think she was doing? She's a spy, she's a bloody spy.'

Alderberen squinted over his little gold-rimmed pince-nez. 'Doesn't look much like a spy.'

'They generally don't. That's generally the whole bloody point.'

'She's a child, Lansley.'

'Children can be spies.' He rounded on Delphine. 'Now, the game's up, you little devil. Do you understand? It's over. Who put you up to this?'

Delphine forced herself to meet his gaze. He was shuddering with rage. She could trace the dark lines of sleep deprivation around his eyes, see the ridge of his yellowed teeth beneath the dry lips that Mother had kissed, chewed upon, pushed herself into.

'I'm going to ask you one last time,' said Lansley. 'Who put you up to this?'

She looked him dead in the pupils.

'The League of Ovaltineys.'

He hit her. Something hard clipped her eye. Her head bounced off the back of the chair.

'Who was it?'

Delphine clutched her watering eye. Propp and Lord Alderberen looked on gravely.

'No one,' she said. 'I was just playing, I no!' Lansley raised his hand and she cried out, hated herself for crying out.

'Please,' said Mr Propp.

She bit her lip, swallowed back a stammer. 'Ah-ah-all right. Just make him stop.'

Propp gestured for Lansley to sit down. Dr Lansley adjusted his cuffs, glaring at Delphine. He stepped back.

'Now.' Propp opened his palms towards her. 'In your own words, please.'

Delphine looked from Propp, to Lansley, to Alderberen. She breathed out.

'I was playing in the passageway. I hardly heard anything.'

'I see. You do this many times?'

She shook her head.

'How many times?'

'This was the first time.'

'Oh.' Propp put down his cup and saucer. 'First time just today, yes?'

'Umm hmm.'

'Mmm. So today for first time you find door, you find key to door, you explore, yes?'

'It was open.'

'Hmm?' He cupped a palm to his ear. 'Again?'

'It was open.' The club-headed key, threaded on a string, lay cold and spiky down the back of her knickers, poking her in the bottom.

'Open. Ah. And what did you hear?'

'Nothing, really. I wasn't really listening.'

'Do not test me, girl,' said Lansley.

'"Nothing, really",' said Propp. 'Are you sure?'

Delphine lifted her head to look him in the eyes, but he was gazing into his coffee.

'Yes.'

'So why, then,' said Lansley, 'did I find her wailing to her father that we were all of us guilty of treason, that we were a pack of Guy Fawkeses plotting to bring down the country?'

Mr Propp chuckled gently, the skin around his big eyes creasing. He looked at Delphine.