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Opening extract:

Diana ‘Dee’ Gascoigne felt a flutter of trepidation as she pushed open the door to the restaurant. It had been almost nine months since she’d seen her former mentor, Mildred Evans, headmistress of Lady Adelaide’s School.

She could see Miss Evans already at the table, a glass of what Dee guessed was white wine at her right hand. Miss Evans glanced up, spotted Dee, and her face broke into smiles. Even her eyes seemed to smile, and Dee’s nervousness vanished. She hurried over to the woman who was already on her feet to welcome her.

‘Miss Evans, how lovely…’

‘Dee, my dear girl! Such a pleasure. How well you’re looking.’

They settled into their seats, gave their orders to the waiter, and at leisure once again, began to chat.

Miss Evans said, ‘I’ve missed you dreadfully at the school, my dear. The place just isn’t the same without you.’ Before Dee could reply, Miss Evans went on, ‘Those wretched second formers are now of course, third formers, and are the responsibility of Betsy Kerridge. Remember Betsy?’

‘Of course. Is she still terrified of the children?’ Dee smiled, remembering a number of occasions when Betsy has sought refuge in Dee’s classroom during breaktimes, eager to let off steam.

‘Oh, she’s absolutely useless. I don’t know why anyone would devote a life to teaching when they detest young people completely. You don’t miss it, I suppose? What are you doing with yourself now?’

Of course, Dee had known this question would arise almost immediately, it was only natural. She told Miss Evans what she was doing, and watched as the headmistress’s eyebrows rose almost to her hairline.

‘A private investigator? A detective? My word!’ Miss Evans stared at Dee for a moment or two. Dee was unsure whether the expression was one of approval or not. But then, with a broad grin, Miss Evans leaned forward. ‘How terribly exciting! I’m so jealous.’

Dee grinned back at her. The waiter arrived with their soup, then poured their wine and departed once more.

‘Do tell me a bit about it,’ Miss Evans urged. ‘I suppose it’s not confidential. Or is it? Are you like the police, and can’t tell members of the public any of the gory details?’

Dee paused for a moment, remembering some very fresh, very recent gory details. It had been a few weeks since she’s done anything more than track down missing relatives or to serve legal documents to people that clients of the firm where she worked were suing. But she’d recently had a case—her first—which had some awful moments.

She told Miss Evans a few things—enough to assuage her thirst for the supposed excitement of the life of a detective, but in all honesty, Dee felt compelled to admit that there had been times when she had been terrified and in real danger.

Miss Evans, setting aside her empty soup bowl, was all ears, drinking in everything Dee was willing to tell her. But when she saw Dee’s expression as she recounted the incident of the fire in a churchyard, and the way Dee had helped a young woman whose clothing had caught alight, her face lost its look of excitement, and serious once more, she said,

‘My dear Dee, I do hope you know how to take care of yourself. It sounds awfully dangerous. Have you had some training?’

‘Er, no, not as yet. Well, I’ve had a little, I suppose, mostly about legal situations and the duties of a private investigator.’

‘But I’m talking about keeping yourself safe. How to act in a crisis—although from what you’ve just told me, you are a commendably quick thinker. One shudders to think what might have happened to that poor young woman. But, no, I’m taking about defending yourself against an armed assailant, and learning how to do first aid, that sort of thing.’

‘Hmm, I hadn’t really thought about that, if I’m honest. Perhaps I should ask Monty about it.’

‘Monty?’

‘Montague Montague, my employer. He’s a top legal bod, though I actually knew him first through family connections. M’dear Monty, as he’s known, is a dear family friend. He must be nearly ninety, I should think. But a sweetheart, and as sharp as a tack. My brother Rob works for him too, as a newly qualified solicitor and trainee barrister.’

‘Oh, this Montague fellow sounds quite the character. But yes, dear, do see if he can send you for some kind of training. It could save your life, you know.’

Their soup bowls were cleared away, and their main courses arrived—both ladies had opted for the roast beef with all its traditional accompaniments. As neither woman was driving, they ordered another bottle of wine.

Inevitably conversation turned from Dee’s professional to her private life. Miss Evans, watching Dee closely over the rim of her wine glass, asked,

‘So, is there a young man in your life?’

Dee, pushing aside intrusive mental images of her sort-of cousin Bill Hardy, shook her head, replying, ‘Well, as you probably know, I’m still married to Martin. We shan’t be able to be divorced for at least another year and a half.’

‘I suppose he’s not the sort of chap to do the decent thing and allow himself to be seen with another woman?’ Her tone confirmed what Dee had always suspected, that Mildred Evans had no love for the school’s (what did martin teach?) -master, Martin Clarke, still Dee’s husband in the eyes of the law, but whom she had left, triggering an immediate decision by the school’s governors who felt it was too scandalous to keep her on its staff. It had been left to the school’s headmistress, Miss Evans, to break the news to Dee.

‘Well, if Martin is seeing anyone, unusually for him, he’s being bloody discreet about it,’ Dee grumbled, then hastily apologised for her bad language.

Miss Evans waved it away. ‘But then he is a bloody boring man, so he’s probably still on his own,’ she said with another uncharacteristic grin.

Dee laughed. ‘He certainly is.’

‘And one with a nasty temper, I believe you indicated?’ Again, the eyes lit on Dee’s face with a little too much attention to be comfortable. Dee’s response was just to nod to that and say nothing.

‘Hmm, well, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, you’re better off without him, dear. But what a shame you can’t find someone new.’

Keen to change the subject, Dee said, ‘And how is the new modern languages teacher getting on?’

‘Oh, my dear! I was coming to that. If the governors thought that a woman leaving her husband was a terrible scandal, then let me tell you, you’d be welcomed back with open arms! Your misdemeanour, as they saw it, is as nothing beside the horror of Mr Andrew Fairlie!’

Dee, astonished and intrigued, leaned forward to hear more. Leaning forward to meet her, in a low voice, Mildred Evans announced,

‘He got that horrid girl Stephanie Tillson in the family way!’

‘No!’ Dee could only stare at her, horrified.

‘Yes indeed! Oh, such a stink, my dear. Understandably so! Her parents threatened to destroy the school unless he made an honest woman of her. She was only just sixteen. I did feel so terribly sorry for the girl. Wayward, yes. Obnoxious, too, obviously. And always into some kind of mischief. However, marriage to him, and a mother at only sixteen, seem like an awfully high price for the girl to pay. But one would expect that a man in his thirties would know better. It’s utterly shameful. And of course, we couldn’t keep it quiet. All the parents are rioting, absolute disgrace, questions in the House. Well, the board of governors anyway.

‘He had to be dismissed, of course, and what use he’ll be to the poor girl now, I’ve really no idea. Then, from a purely selfish point of view, there’s the appalling damage to the school’s reputation—parents and governors all asking how we could have such a wolf in sheep’s clothing in the place, etc, etc. We’ve had fourteen girls withdrawn by their parents. And really, one can hardly blame them. Of course, we had to issue a statement, the school deeply regrets, etc, etc, steps have been taken, a new female member of staff has been appointed in his place, all that sort of thing.

‘One can only hope it’s enough. I dread to think of the school closing. I’ve been there since I was twenty-one. A lifetime, one might say. My dear, it’s been the scandal to end all scandals.’

Miss Evans glanced down briefly at her apple crumble. Dee had no idea when their desserts had arrived. Miss Evans glanced back up. ‘I was hoping, I have to admit, to lure you back. I’ve even been permitted to offer you a pay-rise. Say you’ll at least think about it?’

Dee was already shaking her head. ‘I’m sorry, Miss Evans, but I couldn’t possibly…In any case, there’s Martin…’

Miss Evans gripped Dee’s arm in a pincer grip that made her flinch. ‘Oh Dee, my dear, I thought I said? Of course, you wouldn’t know… Martin’s left! Gone to a boys’ school in Edinburgh at the end of August. Head of Department. Does that change your mind at all?’

Surreptitiously rubbing her arm, Dee took a few seconds to absorb this information. The school, without Martin, would doubtless be a much pleasanter place to work, but…

She shook her head, decisively this time. ‘No, I’m sorry. I’ll admit it’s tempting. And it’s very generous of you to think of me. But I’m afraid…’

‘You’re too much of a detective to go back to teaching?’

‘Sorry.’

‘Oh, it’s all right. I knew it wasn’t very likely you’d say yes. And I’m really terribly glad you’ve got a new—and exciting—career!’

***