But all was well. The set for the first scene, a Victorian garden outside the palace, was simple: a blue backcloth, bay trees and geraniums in stone urns, a highly sentimental statue of a woman with a lute, and two ornate cane armchairs with cushions and footrests. At the side of the stage stood the props table. She checked over the assortment of Ambrose's Victoriana assembled for the indoor scenes; vases, pictures, fans, glasses, even a child's rocking-horse. A suede glove stuffed with cotton wool was placed ready for the prison scene and did, indeed, look unpleasantly like a severed hand. The musical-box was here, as was the silver-bound jewel chest for the Second Act. Cordelia opened it, but no missive lurked in its rosewood depths.

There was nothing else she could usefully do. There was still an hour before she was due to wake Clarissa. She walked for a time in the rose garden, but the sun was less warm here on the westerly side of the castle and, in the end, she returned to the terrace and sat in the corner of the bottom step leading to the beach. It was a small sun trap; even the stones struck warm to her thighs. She closed her eyes and lifted her face to the sun, relishing the soft air on her eyelids, the smell of pines and seaweed, and soothed by the gentle hiss of the waves on the shingle.

She must have dozed briefly, but was roused by the arrival of the launch. Ambrose and both the Munters were there to receive the cast, Ambrose already changed and wearing a voluminous silk cloak over his dinner-jacket, which gave him the appearance of a Victorian music-hall conjurer. There was a great deal of excited chatter as the cast, some of the men already in Victorian costume, jumped ashore and disappeared through the archway which led to the eastern lawn and the main entrance to the castle. Cordelia looked at her watch. It was two twenty; the launch was early. She settled down again but didn't dare risk closing her eyes. And twenty minutes later, she set off through the french windows to call Clarissa.

She paused outside the bedroom door and glanced at her watch. It was two forty-two. Clarissa had asked to be called at two forty-five but a few minutes could hardly matter. She knocked, quietly at first, and then more loudly. There was no reply. Perhaps Clarissa was already up and in the bathroom. She tried the door and to her surprise it opened and, looking down, she saw that the key was in the lock. The door opened easily with no obstructing wedge of towel. So Clarissa must have already got up.

For some reason which she was never able afterwards to understand, she felt no premonition, no unease. She moved into the dimness of the room calling gently:

'Miss Lisle, Miss Lisle. It's nearly two forty-five.'

The lined and heavy brocade curtains were drawn across the windows, but brightness pierced the paper-thin slit between them, and even their heavy folds couldn't entirely exclude the afternoon sun which seeped through as a gentle diffusion of pinkish light. Clarissa lay, ghost-like, on her crimson bed, both arms gently curved at her sides, the palms upwards, her hair a bright stream over the pillow. The bedclothes had been folded down and she was lying on her back, uncovered, the pale satin dressing-gown drawn up almost to her knees. Lifting her arms to draw back the curtains, Cordelia thought that the subdued light in the room played odd tricks; Clarissa's shadowed face looked almost as dark as the canopy of the bed, as if her skin had absorbed the rich crimson.

As the folds of the second curtain swung back and the room sprang into light she turned and saw clearly for the first time what it was on the bed. For a second of incredulous time her imagination whirled crazily out of control, spinning its fantastic images; Clarissa had applied a face mask, a darkening, sticky mess which had even seeped into the two eye-pads; the canopy was disintegrating, dripping its crimson fibres, obliterating her face with its richness. And then the ridiculous fancies faded and her mind accepted the stark reality of what her eyes had seen. Clarissa no longer had a face. This was no beauty mask. This pulp was Clarissa's flesh, Clarissa's blood, darkening and clotting and oozing serum, spiked with the brittle fragments of smashed bones.

She stood at the side of the bed, shaking. The room was full of noise, a regular drumming which filled her ears and pounded against her ribs. She thought: I must get someone, I must get help. But there was no help. Clarissa was dead. And she found that her limbs were rooted, only her eyes could move. But they saw things clearly, too clearly. Slowly she turned them from the horror on the bed and fixed them on the bedside chest. Something was missing, the silver jewel casket. But the small round tray of tea was still there. She saw the shallow cup, delicately painted with roses, the pale dregs of tea with two floating leaves, the smear of lipstick on the rim. And beside the tray there was something new: the marble limb, thick with blood, resting on top of a sheet of white paper, the chubby blood-stained fingers seeming to pin it to the polished wood. The blood had seeped over the paper, almost obliterating the familiar skull and crossbones, but the typed message had escaped that insidious stream and she could read it clearly:

Other sins only speak; murder shrieks out:

The element of water moistens the earth,

But blood flies upwards and bedews the heavens.

And then it happened. The alarm clock on the other bedside cabinet rang making her leap with terror. Her limbs were galvanized into life. She dashed round the bed and tried to silence it, grabbing it with hands so shaking that the clock clattered on the polished wood. Oh God! Oh God! Would nothing stop it? Then her fingers found the button. The room was silent again, and in the echo of that dreadful ringing she could hear once again the thudding of her heart. She found herself looking at the thing on the bed as if terrified that the din had woken it, that Clarissa would suddenly jerk up stiff as a marionette and confront her with that faceless horror.

She was calmer now. There were things she must do. She must tell Ambrose. Ambrose would have to ring the police. And nothing must be touched until the police arrived. She found herself looking, round the room, noticing all the details with great intensity: the balls of cotton wool smeared with make-up on the dressing-table, the bottle of eye lotion still unstoppered, Clarissa's embroidered slippers neatly placed on the hearth-rug, her makeup box open on a fireside chair, her copy of the script fallen by the bed.

As she turned to the door it opened and she saw Ambrose with Sir George behind him, his binoculars still round his neck. They stared at each other. No one spoke. Then Sir George pushed past Ambrose and moved up to the bed. Still without a word he stood gazing down at his wife, his back rigid. Then he turned. His face was taut; all its restlessness stilled, the skin almost green. Then he swallowed and put his hand to his throat as if he were about to retch. Cordelia made an instinctive movement towards him and cried:

'I'm sorry! I'm so very sorry!'

The words in all their futile banality appalled her as soon as she had uttered them. And then she saw his face, a mask of astonished horror. She thought: Oh, God, he thinks I'm confessing! He thinks I killed her.

She cried:

'You employed me to look after her. I was here to keep her safe. I should never have left her.'

She watched the horror drain from his face. He said calmly, almost crisply:

'You couldn't have known. I didn't, believe she was in any danger, no one did. And she wouldn't have let you stay with her, ' you or anyone. Don't blame yourself.'

'But I knew that the marble had been taken! I should have warned her.'

'Against what? You couldn't have expected this.' He said again, sharply as if he were giving a command: 'Don't blame yourself, Cordelia.'