“Shut up,” hissed Jake. “Now shove off.”

“Please let me stay. There’s nothing to do at home. I couldn’t sleep. I will help. Oh, doesn’t Smokey look sweet curled up in the rug? Are you really taking Africa?”

“Mind your own business,” said Jake.

Fen took the boiled sweet out of her mouth and gave it to Dandelion, who was slavering over the next half-door, then kissed him on the nose. Her shirt was already escaping from the jeans which she wore over her jodhpurs to keep them clean.

“Does Mrs. Wilton know?” she asked.

“No,” said Jake.

“I won’t tell her,” said Fen, swinging on Africa’s door. “Patty Beasley might, though, or Sally Ann; she’s always sneaking about something.”

Jake had already sweated uncomfortably over this possibility.

“They’re probably too thick to notice,” she went on. “Shall I make you a cup of tea? Four spoonfuls of sugar, isn’t it?”

Jake relented. She was a good kid, cheerful and full of guts, with an instinct for horses and a knowledge way beyond her nine years.

“You can stay if you keep your trap shut,” he said. “I don’t want Mrs. Wilton waking up yet.”

After she had spilt most of the tea in the saucer, Fen tied Dandelion up outside Africa’s box and settled down to washing his white patches, managing to get more water over herself than the pony.

Jake half-listened as she chattered on incessantly about her sister Tory, who was doing the season but not enjoying the parties at all, and who often had red eyes from crying in the morning.

“She’s coming to the show later.”

“Does your mother know you’re here?” asked Jake.

“She wouldn’t notice if I wasn’t. She’s got a new boyfriend named Colonel Carter. Colonel Cart-ah, he calls himself. He laughs all the time when he’s talking to Mummy and he’s got big yellow teeth like Dandelion, but somehow they look better on a horse.