It was nearly seven. Thea had been awake for what felt like a week by the time Minnie in full make-up allowed Alexa to usher her into the interview chair.

Luke sat in his, straightened his tie and flashed her the legendary Norton smile. Minnie looked right through him. Luke cleared his throat.

'OK,' said Thea, 'lights, camera-'

Dring, dring. Dring, dring.

'Oh my G.o.d I have to get this!' Minnie bolted across the room and s.n.a.t.c.hed her phone out of Leanne's hand. 'h.e.l.looo? Oh hi, bunny rabbit. Yeah, I'm really really well. The baby is adorable, thank you, yes! I know, he well. The baby is adorable, thank you, yes! I know, he does does look a bit like me. Weird, isn't it? Though G.o.d, changing diapers is the pits. I mean, of course, Rosalita does most of them but... uh, huh, uh, huh... So did you hear about Lily? Uh huh. Uh huh.' look a bit like me. Weird, isn't it? Though G.o.d, changing diapers is the pits. I mean, of course, Rosalita does most of them but... uh, huh, uh, huh... So did you hear about Lily? Uh huh. Uh huh.'

Everyone looked at their watches, but Minnie was oblivious. Ten minutes pa.s.sed, then fifteen. The chatter continued until suddenly: 'Nicole? She's coming? But you know how I feel about her. No, forget it.'

She flung her phone on to the floor. 'b.l.o.o.d.y Nicole,'

324.

she said to the room at large. No one dared answer. Minnie stood up and headed towards the bedroom. 'I've got a headache, I need to lie down.'

'Don't worry,' a panicked Leanne said to Thea. 'I'll go and talk to her.'

She was gone for half an hour. Raised voices could be heard. Finally, a battle-weary Leanne emerged.

'She'd like a word with you,' she said to Thea and Luke.

In the bedroom, Minnie was curled up in an armchair, her twenty-thousand-dollar gown replaced by a towelling dressing gown. At the sight of them, she groaned.

'Do I have to talk to them now? I feel really sick.'

'No, no, Minnie, of course not.' Leanne sounded like a doctor about to perform a smear test with a freezing speculum. She turned to Thea and Luke. 'Perhaps you should go outside again?'

They backed out of the room, like minions at the court of the Sun King.

'This is getting beyond a joke,' Luke growled.

Leanne reappeared.

'Thea, Luke, I am so sorry so sorry. Minnie really doesn't want to do the interview now. You've been kept waiting so long, she thinks you'll give her a hard time.'

'Sorry?' Luke said, as George stuffed his hands in his mouth to contain his mirth.

'Yeah, she was really angry that you'd been kept waiting so long. But she will will give you an interview. Soon.' give you an interview. Soon.'

'Like how soon?' Thea asked. 'Tomorrow?'

Leanne twisted uncomfortably. 'Actually, tomorrow she and Max and little Cristiano are going to Barbados.'

'So the interview's not going to happen?'

325.

'No, no, it will! We'll just have to reschedule.'

Suddenly, Minnie's head popped out from behind the door. 'Sowwy,' she whispered, 'but I'm weally not feeling tho good. But I will do the interview. I pwomise. I always keep my word, don't I, Leanne? By the way, could you make a reservation for me and Max for Rhubarb tonight?'

'Of course, Minnie,' Leanne said instantly. 'What time?'

Minnie yawned. 'Say nine. And call Witchery to say we'll be along later.'

'But it's nearly nine now,' Leanne pointed out. Thea eyed her sympathetically. What was it Gran said about how there was always someone worse off than you?

'Well, ten, then.'

'You couldn't do the interview before you go out for dinner?' Thea tried. 'It will only take half an hour.'

'Sorry.' Minnie shrugged and smiled winsomely. 'We'll just have to take a raincheck. How about next time I'm in London? We're going to be in London some time soon, aren't we, Leanne?'

'You are, Minnie,' Leanne said. Minnie walked out of the room and with a mouthed, 'Sorry', Leanne followed her.

34.

Thea broke the news to Dean from the bedroom of the Balmoral suite, while the rest of the team dismantled the unused lights and cameras, packed away the candelabra and folded up the billowy, white sheets.

'I fly people in from all over the world to interview Minnie Maltravers and she blew you out. Are you taking the p.i.s.s, Thea?'

'She didn't feel well,' Thea said. 'We tried, Dean, honestly. We tried everything. But she just wouldn't play ball. She says she'll do it in London.'

'When will she do it in London?' will she do it in London?'

'I don't know. Some time next week, her PA says. Hopefully.' The last word was whispered.

'She'd f.u.c.king better, Thea. Because this is a joke. Sort it out. Or else.'

Her spirits didn't improve when, at around eleven, their taxi pulled up outside the Hootsmon Hotel. From the website, Thea had hoped for a cutting-edge joint epitomizing minimalist, funky cool. What she got was a shabby unchic building on the outskirts of town with a lobby full of wilting flower arrangements and a blazing fire in the grate, despite the fact it was a warm May night. As they bundled through the door, they were greeted by the strains of 'Hi ho, silver lining' blaring through ancient fire doors.

327.

'It's a wedding,' said the elderly lady at reception, who looked as if she'd wandered out of an Agatha Christie series. 'I do hope they warned you. It might be just a wee bit noisy.'

Luke groaned and smote his forehead with his fist. George rubbed his hands in glee.

The receptionist glared at him over the top of her gla.s.ses, then turned to Thea. 'Your shower's a bit temperamental,' she warned her, handing over a bra.s.s key attached to a wooden plank so hefty it could double as a murder weapon, 'but otherwise it's a very nice room.'

'Is there a mini bar in the room?' George was asking the receptionist.

'No sir. This is a small, family-run establishment. No mini bars. However, the bar is open for the party, but I should respectfully ask you to make it clear you are not an invited guest and to pay for all your drinks.'

'Absolutely.' George smiled, a huge grin spreading across his face. 'Anyone care to join me for a nightcap?'

'All right,' Rhys said gamely. Luke, Alexa and Thea shook their heads.

'I, for one, am looking forward to my bed,' Luke said.

Four hours later, Thea was woken by a text bleeping. She rolled over and stared at the clock radio: 3.02 blinked the neon digits. In the dawn light filtering through the curtains, she fumbled for her phone.

Heard about the c.o.c.k-up. Really sorry. Call me if you want to talk. Sure we can sort something. Jake x She flung the phone across the room. b.l.o.o.d.y incompetent dwarf. He should have known something like this was going to happen. He should have somehow stopped it. It was her own stupid fault for thinking someone so young, so inexperienced, someone who should have been working as an extra in The Hobbit The Hobbit could deliver her a scoop. could deliver her a scoop.

She lay back on her lumpy polyester pillow and closed her eyes, but thoughts of the aborted interview rampaged round her head like a mad bull. It was no good. She wasn't going back to sleep. The plane was leaving at eight, they had to be at the airport at six. From downstairs, she could hear a faint wheeze of bagpipes. She might as well go and see what was happening rather than fester here. Cursing, she pulled on her jeans and sweatshirt and headed down the corridor to the creaking lift.

The wedding party was still in full swing. Bodies were draped across sofas, in armchairs, on the floor. Thea stepped over them and headed towards the library where a hard-core posse of three men in kilts were reeling vigorously with Alexa and another young woman in an unfortunate yellow dress. A CDplayer in the corner rattled out 'Scotland the Brave' as they clapped and stamped.

'All right,' bellowed one of the reddest-faced men. 'Gentlemen. Right hands joined over ladies' shoulder. Left hands joined in front. Walk forwards four steps, that's right...'

'Haii, caramba!' cried Alexa spotting her. 'Come and join us, Thea. Everybody salsa!'

'You're not in Guatemala now.'

329.

'Oh s.h.i.t. Nor I am. Arriba, arriba! Arriba, arriba!' She clicked a pair of imaginary castanets.

'I thought you were going to bed?' Thea couldn't help smiling.

'I was talked out of it.'

'How nice to see you,' said a voice behind her. A flushed but slightly more cheerful-looking Luke was leaning back in an armchair, nursing what looked like a large gla.s.s of Scotch.

'I thought you wanted to go to bed. Am I the only one old-fashioned enough to think a few hour's kip might be in order?'

'Looks like it. The rest of us decided it would be rude not to toast the happy couple.'

'Where are they?'

'They left for their honeymoon at midnight.' He laughed.

'Right.' Thea looked at the devastation. 'Where's Rhys?'

'Head down the toilet. These young ones are such lightweights.'

'George?'

'In bed with the matron of honour.'

'The matron matron? You mean the maid.'

'I mean the matron; the bride's elder married sister. Her husband's over there.' He nodded in the direction of a chaise lounge, where a man with a ginger beard lay comatose.

'Oh, good Lord,' Thea started to laugh.

'It's good to see you smile again.' He nodded towards the bar. No one was tending it. 'Fancy a tipple?'

'Yup, I think this calls for a large... Oh, I don't know, let's make it a pina colada.' She smiled at him, as he held a gla.s.s up to an optic, which dispensed a measure of whisky.

'That's a bit miserable,' Luke said. 'Let's double it. No, sorry, triple it.' He handed her the gla.s.s br.i.m.m.i.n.g with neat alcohol and raised his. 'Cheers, then.'

'Cheers.' They clinked. Memories of other bars, other late nights, other large whiskies flooded Thea's mind. She swallowed hard.

'Good luck to the happy couple,' Luke said. 'May they have better luck than I have.' He nodded towards a pair of French doors. 'Shall we go outside? s.n.a.t.c.h a breath of air?'

'Why not?'

Luke opened the door and she followed him outside on to a terrace. The Hootsmon was on a hill. The craggy spires of Edinburgh lay spread out beneath them in the midsummer dawn like a city in a fairy tale. They leant against the parapet.

'Christ, I thought we'd never be alone,' Luke said.

Despite the whisky, Thea's throat was suddenly dry. 'It's been a busy day.'

'I'll say.' He grinned. 'Busy week. Manic. I've enjoyed it, though. I miss my old life on the road, b.u.mbling from place to place not knowing where you're going to lay your head that night.' He paused. 'But I realize my full-time roving reporter days are over. Getting too old.'

You're only as old as the person you feel, Thea thought with sudden viciousness, but she said, 'You're hardly old. You're what forty-five?'

'Fifty-one.' Her white lie cheered him enormously. 'That's not that old these days, is it?'

331.

'Of course not. John Simpson's sixty-three or something and he's still going strong.'

It was the wrong thing to say, she realized. Luke loathed his BBC rival. He scowled.

'Well, hardly going strong, Thea. I mean, those reports he did recently from South Africa were pretty weak.'

'You're right,' she agreed hastily. 'What I meant was he's still working as much as ever and no one's talking about replacing him.'

'What do you mean? Are they thinking about replacing me?'

G.o.d, she shouldn't have taken such a big slug of whisky. 'No, no, of course not, Luke. You are are the the Seven Thirty News Seven Thirty News. It would be unthinkable without you at its helm.'

'Hmm.' Luke frowned, then looked at her again. 'Just like old times, isn't it? You. Me. A hotel. On location.'

'Um...'

'Anyone in your life right now?' he asked, staring straight ahead towards the mossy green mound of Arthur's Seat. Before she could reply, he continued, 'I can't believe believe you're still single. An attractive woman like you.' you're still single. An attractive woman like you.'

'I'm happy this way.' She shrugged. 'You know that.'