"I've heard the name," I said.

"Well, never mind. That's who I resemble when I'm all tarted up for the show."

"Brilliant," I said, not meaning it. She could see that I was a bit put off.

"What's a nice girl like you doing hanging about in a place like this?" she asked with a grin, taking in the whole of the churchyard with a wave of her hand.

"I often come here to think," I said.

This seemed to amuse her. She pursed her lips and put on an annoying, stagy voice.

"And what does Flavia de Luce think about in her quaint old country churchyard?"

"Being alone," I snapped, without meaning to be intentionally rude. I was simply being truthful.

"Being alone," she said, nodding. I could see that she was not put off by my bristling reply. "There's a lot to be said for being alone. But you and I know, don't we, Flavia, that being alone and being lonely are not at all the same thing?"

I brightened a bit. Here was someone who seemed at least to have thought through some of the same things I had.

"No," I admitted.

There was a long silence.

"Tell me about your family," Nialla said at last, quietly.

"There isn't much to tell," I said. "I have two sisters, Ophelia and Daphne. Feely's seventeen and Daffy's thirteen. Feely plays the piano and Daffy reads. Father is a philatelist. He's devoted to his stamps."

"And your mother?"

"Dead. She was killed in an accident when I was a year old."

"Good Lord!" she said. "Someone told me about a family that lived in a great rambling old mansion not far from here: an eccentric colonel and a family of girls running wild like a lot of red Indians. You're not one of them, are you?"

She saw instantly by the look on my face that I was.

"Oh, you poor child!" she said. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to ... I mean ..."