Rionna and Kaz took ownership, pulling at his jacket and touching his crisp white shirt. ‘Look at you, Ferdia. All grown-up.’
‘And hot.’
‘Ah, stop.’ His cheekbones reddened. ‘They’re only clothes.’
‘Aha!’ Micah called. ‘I hear the dinner gong!’
‘I heard nothing,’ Jessie said. ‘Am I going deaf?’
‘I think the gong is imaginary,’ Rionna said. ‘Like the luxury accommodation, the three-hundred-thread-count bed linen, the –’
‘Sorry,’ Johnny said. ‘I’m so sorry about all of this.’
So you fucking should be, you mean-spirited, stingy bastard.
Startling everyone, a woman burst in. ‘Lady Ariadne Cornwallis,’ she announced herself. ‘Argentine heiress!’
It was Muiria in a black dress, a wig of long, dark curls and a slash of Frosty Shimmer lipstick.
‘Oh, Jesus Christ!’ Rionna turned away quickly, her shoulders shaking.
‘Lady Ariadne,’ Micah said. ‘Here is your special cocktail.’
‘Indeed! My special cocktail!’ Lady Ariadne made quite a show of drinking her special drink and replacing the glass on the tray. ‘Thank you, young Micah.’
‘How was it?’ Kaz asked eagerly.
‘Taste slightly different from usual?’ Rionna’s voice held a hint of malicious glee.
‘A touch of almond?’ Jessie said.
‘Why almond?’ Kaz asked.
‘That well-known poison, cyanide, is almond-flavoured.’
‘Please stop!’ Johnny said.
Nervously, Micah said, ‘Let us process through to the dining room.’
Surprisingly, the dining table looked the part. An elaborate chandelier hung over a long, white-clothed table, the light winking off silver candlesticks and crystal glasses.
‘Sit where you like,’ Micah called.
In high spirits, everyone found a place and introduced themselves to their neighbours, under their new name. Jessie was glad that their crowd were bonding with ‘The Other Six’: it made things less awkward.
Clifford arrived with a trayful of small plates. He and Micah placed mozzarella salads in front of everyone.
However, Annette’s husband Nigel, at the end of the table, was given nothing and not a single item remained on Clifford’s tray. No one could begin eating until Nigel got his starter – and that didn’t look like it was about to happen any time soon. All three of the McStitts were in the room and Jessie knew in her bones that no one would bound through the doors with a spare mozzarella salad and save the day. Tense expectation hung in the air. People were hungry: they wanted the night to get under way, the wine to be poured, a murder or two to take place …
Behind her, Clifford and Micah were murmuring: ‘… sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty.’
‘We’re missing one.’
‘But how? You said twenty, I plated twenty.’
‘It’s Mammy!’ Micah said. ‘She shouldn’t have got one.’
‘Bang on!’ Clifford picked up Lady Ariadne/Muiria’s starter, gave her a glare and placed it before Nigel. ‘Bon appétit,’ he declared to the room.
But now Lady Ariadne had no food. ‘Please start,’ she said.
‘Aren’t you eating, ah, Lady Ariadne?’ Ferdia asked.
She looked longingly at his plate. ‘Ah, no, I’ll get something in the kitchen later. I mean, I’m … I never eat!’
While Micah poured wine, Lady Ariadne engaged all of them in meaningful conversation. ‘Who are you, sir?’ she asked Ed.
‘Stampy Mallowan.’
‘So, you are a ruthless American industrialist?’
‘Stampy’, accessorized with a cigar and a gaudy, yellow tweed waistcoat with matching dicky-bow, said, ‘Ah, yes!’
‘Are you married, Mr Mallowan?’
‘I believe I’m not. But I am in the company of,’ he consulted his piece of paper, ‘“Jolly Vandermeyer, a picaresque showgirl”.’
‘That’s me,’ Saoirse said.
‘But you were once married?’ Lady Ariadne pressed Stampy Mallowan.
‘Was I?’ Ed consulted his page. ‘So I was. But my first wife died in “mysterious circumstances”.’
‘This is a hoot,’ Rionna said.
‘Take it seriously,’ Johnny begged.
Lady Ariadne pressed on with her interrogations and, even though it was stilted, a picture began to take shape. ‘We have met once before, Lord Fidelis …’
‘Miss Elspeth Pyne-Montant, I believe you knew my late husband …’
‘Were we not at a weekend shooting party at the estate in Monserrat, Dr Theobald-Montague?’
Eventually it was clear that everyone had previously crossed paths with Lady Ariadne.
The main course arrived and was ‘perfectly edible’, to quote Rionna.
Just after it was cleared away, Micah and Lady Ariadne exchanged a nod, then she made a choking noise, grabbed her throat and fell, face down, onto the table.
‘Game on!’ someone said.
‘I will fetch the doctor!’ Micah cried.
‘I’m a sports masseur!’ Liam yelled.
‘Hold on,’ Johnny said. ‘I believe I’m a doctor!’ Now even Johnny was sabotaging things.
‘Don’t you have a stain on your reputation?’ Ferdia asked, and laughter rose to the ceiling.
‘Aye!’ Micah said, in evident relief. ‘You have been struck off.’ He darted from the room.
‘Are you really a sports masseur?’ Mary-Laine’s husband, Martin, called to Liam.