‘How old were you then, Peter?’

‘Twenty-one; full of illusions and trying hard to look sophisticated. Sargent saw through that, damn the fellow! Here is Gerald, with a horse, by Furse; and downstairs, in the horrible room he calls his study, you will find a picture of a horse, with Gerald, by Munnings. Here’s my mother, by Laszlo-a first-class portrait of her, a good many years ago, of course. Not that anything but a very rapidly moving picture could really convey her quality.’

‘She fills me with delight. When I came down just before lunch I found her in the hall, putting iodine on Bunter’s nose, where Ahasuerus had scratched him.’

‘That cat scratches everybody. I saw Bunter-he was very self-conscious about it. “I am thankful to say, my lord, that the colour of the application is exceedingly transient.” My mother is rather wasted upon a small household. She was at her best with the staff at the Hall, who all went in mortal terror of her. There is a legend that she personally ironed our old butler’s back for lumbago; but she says it wasn’t a flat-iron but a mustard-plaster. Have you seen enough of this Chamber of Horrors?’

‘I like looking at them, though they make me feel sympathetic to the hosier’s widow. And I’d like to hear some more about their histories.’

‘You’ll have to get hold of Mrs Sweetapple. She’s the housekeeper and knows them all by heart. I’d better show you the library, though it isn’t what it ought to be. It’s full of the most appalling rubbish and the good stuff isn’t properly catalogued. Neither my father nor my grandfather did anything about it, and Gerald’s hopeless. We’ve got an old bird muddling round there now-he’s my third cousin, not the one who’s potty and lives at Nice, his younger brother. He hasn’t got a bean, so it quite suits him to toddle about down here; and he does his best, and really knows quite a lot of antiquarian stuff, only he has very short sight and no method, and never can keep to one subject at a time. This is the great ballroom-it’s rather fine, really, if you don’t object to pomp on principle. You get a good view from here over the terraces down to the water-garden, which would look much more impressive if the fountains were turned on. That silly-looking thing among the trees there is one of Sir William Chambers’s pagodas, and you can just see the roof of the orangery… Oh, look! there you are-you insisted on peacocks; don’t say we didn’t provide them for you.’

‘You’re right, Peter-it is a story-book place.’

They went down the great staircase and across a hall chilly with statuary and thence by way of a long cloister to another hall. A footman came up with them as they paused before a door ornamented with classical pilasters and a carved cornice.

‘Here’s the library,’ said Peter. ‘Yes, Bates, what is it?’

‘Mr Leggatt, my lord. He wanted to see His Grace-urgently. I told him he was away, but that your lordship was here, and he asked, could you spare him a moment?’

‘It’s about that mortgage, I expect-but I can’t do anything about it. He must see my brother.’

‘He seems very anxious to speak to your lordship.’

‘Oh-very well, I’ll see him. Do you mind, Harriet? I won’t be long. Have a look round the library-you may find Cousin Matthew there, but he’s quite harmless, only very shy and slightly deaf.’

The library, with its tall bays and overhanging gallery, looked east and was already rather dark. Harriet found it restful. She wandered along pulling out here and there a calf-bound volume at random, sniffing the sweet, musty odour of ancient books, smiling at a carved panel over one of the fireplaces, on which the Wimsey mice had escaped from the coat of arms and played in and out of a heavily undercut swag of flowers and wheat-ears. A large table, littered deep in books and papers, she judged to belong to Cousin Matthew-a half-written sheet in an elderly man’s rather tremulous writing appeared to be part of a family chronicle; propped open on a stand beside it was a fat manuscript book, containing a list of household expenses for the year 1587. She pored over it for a few moments, making out such items as ‘to i paire quysshons of redd sarsnet for my lady Joans chambere’ and ‘to ii li tenterhooks, and iii li nayles for the same,’ and then continued to explore, till rounding the corner of the bookshelves into the end bay, she was quite startled to come upon an elderly gentleman, in a dressing-gown. He was standing by the window, with a book in his hand, and the family features were so clearly marked on him-especially the nose-that she could have no doubt of his identity.

‘Oh!’ said Harriet. ‘I didn’t know anyone was here. Are you-’ Cousin Matthew must have a surname, of course; the potty cousin at Nice was the next heir, she remembered, after Gerald’s and Peter’s lines, so they must be Wimseys, ‘are you Mr Wimsey?’ (Though, of course, he might quite well be Colonel Wimsey, or Sir Matthew Wimsey, or even Lord Somebody.) ‘I’m Peter’s wife,’ she added, by way of explaining her presence.

The elderly gentleman smiled very pleasantly and bowed, with a slight wave of the hand as though to say, ‘Make yourself at home.’ He was slightly bald, and his grey hair was cropped very closely above his ears and over the temples. She judged him to be sixty-five or so. Having thus made her free of the place, he returned to his book, and Harriet, seeing that he seemed disinclined for conversation, and remembering that he was deaf and shy, decided not to worry him. Five minutes later, she glanced up from examining a number of miniatures displayed in a glass case, and saw that he had made his escape and was, in fact, gazing down at her from a little stair that ran up to the gallery. He bowed again and the flowered skirts of the dressing-gown went whisking up out of sight, just as somebody clicked on the lights at the inner end of the room.

‘All in the dark, lady? I’m sorry to have been so long. Come and have tea. That bloke kept me talking. I can’t stop Gerald if he wants to foreclose-as a matter of fact, I advised him to. The Mater’s come over, by the way; and there’s tea going in the Blue Room. She wants you to look at some china there. She’s rather keen on china.’

With the Duchess in the Blue Room was a slight, oldish man, rather stooping, dressed neatly in an old-fashioned knickerbocker suit, and wearing spectacles and a thin grey beard like a goat’s. As Harriet entered, he rose from his chair and came forward with extended hand, uttering a faint nervous bleat.

‘Oh, hullo. Cousin Matthew!’ cried Peter, heartily, clapping the old gentleman smartly on the shoulder. ‘Come and be introduced to my wife. This is my cousin, Mr Matthew Wimsey, who keeps Gerald’s books from falling to pieces with age and neglect. He’s writing the history of the family from Charlemagne downwards, and has just about got to the Battle of Roncevaux.’

‘How do you do?’ said Cousin Matthew. ‘I-I hope you had a pleasant journey. The wind’s rather chilly today. Peter, my dear boy, how are you?’

‘All the better for seeing you. Have you got a new chapter to show me?’

‘Not a chapter.’ said Cousin Matthew. ‘No. A few more pages. I’m afraid I got rather led away upon a sideline of research. I think I have got upon the track of the elusive Simon-the twin, you know, who disappeared and was supposed to have turned pirate.’

‘Have you, by jove? Sound work. Are these muffins? Harriet, I hope you share my passion for muffins. I meant to find out before I married you, but the opportunity never arose.’

Harriet accepted the muffin, and said, turning to Cousin Matthew: ‘I made a silly mistake just now. I met somebody in the library and thought it must be you, and addressed him as Mr Wimsey.’

‘Eh?’ said Cousin Matthew. ‘What’s that? Somebody in the library?’

‘I thought everybody was away,’ said Peter.

‘Perhaps Mr Liddell came in to look up the County Histories,’ suggested the Duchess. ‘Why didn’t he ask them to give him tea?’