Free Dandy Gilver and a Deadly Measure of Brimstone by Catriona McPherson

over by tea,’ said Laidlaw. ‘Ginger snaps and cherry cake, I believe. But I did just want to warn you of the fire drill.’
    ‘When is it?’ asked Hugh, getting out his watch and flipping it open.
    ‘Over the course of the next few days,’ said Laidlaw. ‘A better drill if we don’t know exactly when, eh? But it’ll be in the night, save anyone clambering out of a bath and shivering on the terrace in a towel.’
    Hugh looked understandably disgruntled at this news but I knew he would not lament to me. He had been so pleased at besting me and escaping Auchenlea House that he would not for a pension admit he had let himself in for inconvenience and that I, tucked up alone in the room he had spurned, might have the better of it.
    ‘Very sensible,’ I said. ‘What’s a fire drill if everyone knows it’s coming?’
    ‘But you’re not actually staying in the Hydro, madam?’ said Laidlaw. ‘Nor the young men?’ He was giving me a sharper look than I had yet seen upon his face. I offered a faint smile in return. ‘And your husband tells me you made quite a recent booking. I see, I see. Well, welcome one, welcome all.’ He tipped me a salute and moved away.
    I roundly hoped that he did
not
see and I did not think that he could, for neither Alec nor I had done a single thing to raise suspicion of our intent. Still, I worried because his words were puzzling.
    ‘What a peculiar person,’ I said, falling back on my grandmother’s way of dealing with puzzlement: stake a claim to sense and normalcy and blame the other party for any troubled feelings or confusion they might have caused. ‘Finished, boys? What shall we do?’
    ‘I’m awfully tired,’ said Donald. ‘Like a pit pony at dusk.’
    ‘Like a python who’s just eaten an antelope,’ I corrected, looking at the crumbs on his cheese plate. ‘I’m not surprised. Why don’t all three of you tuck up on some of those nice deckchairs out on the terrace and I’ll tell the doctor where to find you.’
    ‘There’s a croquet lawn,’ said Teddy, hopefully.
    ‘Rest first,’ I said. Even Hugh agreed, to my surprise, and so I accompanied them out there, a deep terrace facing the lawns where the afternoon sun warmed the stones and released billows of scent from the stands of jasmine which stood like sentries outside all of the french windows. The deckchairs were filling fast, with the bright young things – not so young, all of them, but very bright – from the dining room, and I was forced to walk at an unseemly pace to secure three together from under the nose of another party.
    ‘Hmph,’ said one of these, a woman in her forties with the naked look of one who normally wears a great deal of paint but is currently doing without any. Perhaps such a look could not possibly be; it might come down to the over-plucking of eyebrows or the sheen of the wrinkle cream such women trowel on out of the same vanity that leads to the painting.
    ‘Awfully sorry,’ I said. ‘Were these yours?’
    ‘Come on, Pegs,’ said one of the men who was with her. ‘Let’s go and float in the swimming bath and call that our day’s treatment.’
    ‘Pegs’ giggled and turned with a swish of her pleats to follow the men back along the terrace.
    ‘We’re going to float,’ she called, waving at some swaddled nappers she was passing. ‘No contraptions for us today. Yah-boo! Sucks to you!’
    There was a wave of laughter at this wit. We four Gilvers pretended not to hear her and instead made ourselves busy with pillows and rugs and cranking the backrests up and down until the angles were agreeable.
    ‘I’ll tell someone to let Dr Laidlaw know where you are,’ I said. ‘And I’ll see you later. Now, be brave boys when the time comes, won’t you?’ I was looking at my sons but thinking of Hugh, naturally.
    ‘Brave?’ said Teddy. ‘There won’t be needles, will there?’
    ‘Not a one,’ I said. ‘I’m sure the doctor will be as gentle as gentle can be.’ I