“Next to the hay bales,” I said, but when he opened the groom’s door, Cyril was standing just inside, wagging his pudgy body.

“Would you like to take a journey by rail, old man?” Terence said, and the two of them set off happily for the house.

I waited till the carriage had set off and Baine had gone back into the house and then legged it out to the laburnum arbor before the groom came yawning back to the stables, and then went out through the herbaceous border and across the croquet lawn to the gazebo.

There was someone in it. I circled round the weeping willow and came up behind the lilacs. A dark figure was sitting hunched on one of the side benches. Who would be sitting out here at this hour? Mrs. Mering, hunting for ghosts? Baine, catching up on his reading?

I parted the lilac branches so I could see better, sending a shower of water over my blazer and flannels. Whoever it was, they had a cloak wrapped around them and a hood pulled up over their head. Tossie? Waiting for a rendezvous with her life-changing lover? Or the mysterious Mr. C himself?

I couldn’t see the figure’s face from there. I needed to be on the other side of the gazebo. I carefully let go of the branches, dousing myself again, and stepped back squarely on Princess Arjumand.

“Mrowrrrr!” she yowled, and the figure darted up, clutching the cloak. The hood fell back.

“Verity!” I said.

“Ned?”

“Mreer!” Princess Arjumand said. I scooped her up to see if I’d hurt her. “Mere,” she said, and began to purr.

I carried her round the lilacs and over to where Verity was standing. “What are you doing out here?” I said.

Verity looked as pale as one of Mrs. Mering’s spirits. The cloak, which must have been an evening cloak of some kind, was drenched, and under it she had on her white nightgown.

“How long have you been out here?” I said. Princess Arjumand was squirming. I put her down. “You didn’t have to report in. I told you I’d do it when I brought Cyril down. What did Mr. Dunworthy say about—” and saw her face. “What is it?”

“The net won’t open,” she said.

“What do you mean, it won’t open?”

“I mean, I’ve been out here for three hours. It won’t open.”

“Sit down and tell me exactly what happened,” I said, indicating the bench.

“It won’t open!” she said. “I couldn’t sleep, and I thought the sooner we reported in, the better, and I could be back before anybody got up, so I came out to the drop, and the net wouldn’t open.”

“The drop’s not there?”

“No, it’s there. You can see the shimmer. But when I step into it, nothing happens.”

“Could you be doing something wrong? Are you sure you were standing in the right place?”

“I’ve stood in a dozen different places,” she said impatiently. “It won’t open!”

“All right, all right,” I said. “Could someone have been there? Someone who might have seen you? Mrs. Mering, or Baine, or—”

“I thought of that. After the second time, I walked down to the river and out to the fishpond and over to the flower garden, but no one was there.”

“And you aren’t wearing something from this era?”

“I thought of that, too, but this is the nightgown I brought through in my luggage, and, no, it hasn’t been mended or had a new button sewn on.”

“Maybe it’s you,” I said. “I’ll try.”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” she said more cheerfully. “The next drop should be any minute.”

She led me out of the gazebo and around to the side to a patch of grass next to a cluster of pink peonies. There was already a faint glitter to the grass. I hastily checked my clothes. Blazer, flannels, socks, shoes, and shirt were all the ones I’d worn through.

The air shimmered, and I stepped into the very center of the grass. The light began to grow. “Is this what happened when you tried it?” I said.

The light abruptly died. Condensation glittered on the peonies.

“Yes,” Verity said.

“Perhaps it’s my collar,” I said, unfastening it and handing it to her. “I can’t tell mine from the ones Elliott Chattisbourne loaned me.”

“It’s not your collar,” Verity said. “It’s no use. We’re trapped here. Just like Carruthers.”

I had a sudden vision of staying here forever, playing croquet and eating kedgeree for breakfast and boating on the Thames, Verity trailing her hand in the brown water and looking up at me from under her beribboned hat.

“I’m sorry, Ned. This is all my fault.”

“We’re not trapped,” I said. “All right. Let’s be Harriet and Lord Peter and examine all the possibilities.”

“I’ve already considered all the possibilities,” she said tightly. “And the only one that makes any sense is that it’s all breaking down, like T.J. said it would.”

“Nonsense,” I said. “It takes years for an incongruity to collapse the continuum. You saw the models. It maybe breaking down in 1940, but not a week after the incongruity.”

She was looking like she wanted to believe me.

“All right,” I said, sounding more confident than I felt. “You go back to the house and get dressed before you compromise us both and I have to marry you.”

That made her smile, at least. “And then have breakfast, so Mrs. Mering won’t think you’re missing and send out a search party for you. After breakfast, tell her you’re going sketching and come back out here and wait for me. I’m going to go find Finch and get another opinion.”

She nodded.

“This is probably nothing, a glitch, and Warder just hasn’t noticed it yet. Or maybe she’s shut down all return drops till she gets Carruthers back. Whatever it is, we’ll get to the bottom of it.”

She nodded again, a little more cheerfully, and I took off for the Chattisbournes, wishing I believed anything I’d just said, and that the Victorians hadn’t lived so far apart.

A maid in a ruffled apron and cap answered the door.

“Gladys, I need to speak to Mr. Finch, the butler,” I said, when I was able to catch my breath. I felt like Professor Peddick’s runner from the battle of Marathon who’d run all the way to Sparta. He’d died, hadn’t he, after delivering his message? “Is he here?”

“I’m very sorry, sir,” the maid said, dropping an even worse curtsey than Jane’s. “Mr. and Mrs. Chattisbourne are not at home. Would you wish to leave your card?”

“No,” I said. “It’s Mr. Finch I wish to speak to. Is he here?”

She had clearly not been briefed for this contingency.

“You may leave your calling card, if you wish,” she said, and held out a small silver plate embossed with curlicues.

“Where did Mr. and Mrs. Chattisbourne go?” I persisted. “Did Mr. Finch drive them?”

She looked completely undone. “Mr. and Mrs. Chattisbourne are not at home,” she said, and shut the door in my face.

I went round to the kitchen and knocked on the door. It was answered by another maid. This one had on a canvas apron and a kerchief and was armed with a potato peeler.

“I need to speak to the butler, Mr. Finch, Gladys,” I said.

“Mr. and Mrs. Chattisbourne aren’t here,” she said, and I was afraid she was going to be equally unforthcoming, but she added, “They went over to Donnington. To the St. Mark’s Fancy Works Sale.”

“It’s Mr. Finch I need to speak to. Did he accompany them?”

“No,” she said. “He’s up to Little Rushlade, buying cabbages. He left this morning carrying a big basket to fetch them home in.”

“When?” I asked, wondering if I could catch up with him.

“Before breakfast. It was scarcely light out. What’s wrong with Farmer Gamin’s cabbages down the road I don’t know, but he says only the best for Mrs. Chattisbourne’s table. I say one cabbage is as good as another.” She made a face. “It’s three hours’ walk at the least.”

Three hours’ walk. There was no point in going after him, and he wouldn’t be back soon enough to justify waiting. “When he gets back, would you be good enough to tell him that Mr. Henry from the Merings’ was here and to please come see him at once?”