‘Is that why you called her Ruse?’ Payne asked. ‘Because of her penchant for porkies?’

‘I suppose so. She got the Ethiopian idea from a book – some legendary Ethiopian saga. Had a snake in the title. What was it? Cobra something?’

‘Kebra Nagast. The legendary Ethiopian saga.’

‘Yes. Goodness, Hughie, how do you find the time? You mustn’t allow him to read so much. Saps a man’s energy,’ Lady Grylls told Antonia. ‘That’s what Hughie’s uncle used to say. Rory never read a novel in his life. He started a Dornford Yates once and it nearly killed him… Incidentally, has Hughie taught you to ride yet?’

Antonia answered that he had – but she had been hopeless.

‘You weren’t too bad.’ Payne kissed her. He turned towards his aunt. ‘Tell us more about Ruse, darling.’

‘Well, her people were frightfully conventional. Her father was a stockbroker, her mother played bridge. They lived in a mock-Tudor house in Kettering. Extremely well off – her father had made a fortune on the Stock Exchange – but frightfully conventional. Ruse despised them, rather. I became Ruse’s confidante when she fell in love with le falcon noir. That was the name we had for the Frenchman who was eventually to become Corinne’s father. Franglais, you know.’

Lady Grylls paused and her eyes narrowed. ‘His name was Francois-Enrique. He was much older than us, at least twenty years older. Tall, terribly good-looking, in a dark, brooding way. Yellow-grey eyes. His nose did resemble a beak and he wore a long, black coat with a scarlet silk lining. He was a prosperous French businessman who had divorced his English wife. I was there when Ruse first met him, you see.’

‘Where did you meet?’