scribbling them all down.
Sophie grinned. ‘Mackintosh squares?’ she repeated. ‘Don’t you think that’s going a bit far? We’re not going into the wilderness, you know.’
‘Well, it’s always good to be prepared,’ said Billy rather indignantly.
‘Look – what do you think of this for Miss Blaxland?’ asked Sophie, pointing to a grey tailor-made outfit. ‘And perhaps that hat with the roses?’
Billy screwed up his face. ‘No. That won’t do at all. It’s too plain, and besides it’s last year’s. Miss Blaxland is very well-off, isn’t she? She’s bound to have the very latest thing.’ He pointed to a sumptuous midnight-blue travelling suit, new in from Maison Chevalier. ‘That’s more like it. With the hat with the plumes and the net veil.’
Sophie took the hat and tried it on uncertainly. Her face in the mirror looked back at her, very small and rather doubtful. Even knowing that Tilly would be coming too, a fluttering feeling of nervousness was growing in her stomach about the new assignment.
Billy seemed to know how she felt. He gently tweaked the hat into the right position. ‘There. Perfect. You can do this, Sophie,’ he said quietly. ‘I know you can.’
An hour or two later, the things were all packed neatly into two large trunks from the store’s Luggage Department. Once Billy had checked the list twice, and then insisted on checking it just once more to be sure; and once Sophie had made certain he had everything he would need to take charge of Taylor & Rose while she was away, she was at last ready to go. It felt very peculiar to be saying goodbye to Billy and Mei, and to be closing the office door.
‘Well, I suppose I’ll see you next week, when you get back,’ said Billy casually. He grinned at her, but then suddenly looked anxious. ‘You will take care, won’t you?’ To Sophie’s surprise, he gave her a sudden hug. ‘Good luck. Be safe.’ he said in a gruff voice.
‘I will,’ she promised him.
But as she walked out of the great doors of Sinclair’s amongst the shoppers, Sophie reflected that she was not sure she really wished to be safe any longer. Safe made her think of the person she had been before – a china doll, dressed in finery and kept on the nursery shelf. Yes, she was nervous about the assignment, but there was no doubt about it, there was a smouldering feeling of excitement too.
In the carriage on the way to collect Tilly the next morning, she took out the first volume of her mother’s diaries – the notebook in which she had written about her travels in Europe, and especially her visit to Paris. She hadn’t been able to resist slipping it into her pocket as she left, and now her hand closed around the well-known, worn shape of it: she remembered something that her mother had written. I do believe I have a taste for adventure. There it was again – that thrill of recognition. A feeling that told her this was what she was meant to do.
Fewer than twenty-four hours after she’d tricked the grey man at the Left Luggage Office, Sophie once more crossed the concourse at Victoria station. But the girl with the frilly dress and parasol had vanished. Now she was Miss Celia Blaxland, an elegant, sophisticated young lady. Her dark blue skirts swished; beneath her large plumed hat, her hair was piled high, and pearl earrings dangled from her ears. Behind her came a smart lady’s maid, carefully carrying a little fur in case her mistress should feel chilly on the journey, and last of all a station porter, pushing a trolley piled high with trunks.
As she approached the first-class Pullman carriage, her heart was thumping. A uniformed attendant bowed low and extended a hand to help her inside, and Sophie was aboard the express train to Paris.
Although she didn’t know it, somewhere further down the platform, a thin grey man carrying papers bearing the name of Dr Frederick Muller was getting aboard the train too.
‘We have travelled by ship, by carriage, by donkey and even once on the backs of camels! But my favourite journeys of all are those by train. The very smell of the smoke, the rattling of the carriage, the chatter of our fellow passengers, all seem to promise romance and adventure.’
– From the diary of Alice Grayson
Wilderstein Castle, Arnovia
Anna held her breath as she crept along the hall, towards the governess’s bedroom. It was past midnight and the castle was whisper-quiet, the passageway made strange with shadows. In the dark, the antlers of the stuffed animal heads on the wall, the rusting suit of armour, even the painted shield with the arms of the Royal House of Wilderstein seemed to shift into new and sinister shapes.
A long, thin crack of yellow light was visible at the bedroom door and Anna moved towards it, her bare feet soft on the chilly stone flags. She felt excited. She knew that she was not supposed to be out of bed late at night, creeping around the castle, but it was rather thrilling to be slipping along the passageway in the dark in her nightgown, without even her bedroom slippers. It was absolutely the kind of thing that the heroines of the Fourth Form would do, even if it meant breaking the rules.
There were certainly plenty of rules at Wilderstein Castle. The Countess’s favourite words were discipline and decorum, and each day was the same, following an exact pattern. The day began with the ringing of the gong for breakfast at eight o’clock sharp, and ended with the chime of the bedtime bell, which meant that Alex and Anna must go to bed. Sometimes Anna felt that she was no more than a tiny cog in the Countess’s giant machine: a kind of musical box, where the Countess turned the handle, and spinning on top in time to the music was Alex. Not the real Alex she knew, but the Alex who would one day become King, shining out light like a golden star.
They all moved in time to the Countess’s tune: even the Count was bound by her strict timetable. Left to his own devices, Anna knew he would have been quite happy pottering about the castle, tinkering with his latest hobby – butterfly collecting, or motor cars, or more recently, his new-found passion for flying machines. Instead, the Countess insisted that each day at precisely the same time, the Count took Alex into the castle grounds for what they called ‘drills’ – a series of physical exercises inspired by his army training, which Alex simply loathed. This would be followed by a discussion of weapons and military strategy; the Count would give a detailed explanation of battle manoeuvres, or test Alex to see if he could correctly distinguish between a sabre and an épee. Alex, who couldn’t care less about broadswords and battle-axes, would return to the schoolroom pink-faced and wheezing, whilst the Count hurried back to his workshop to pore over the plans of aeroplanes.
Meanwhile, Anna’s morning always began with time at the back-board to improve her posture, whilst the Countess lectured her on royal etiquette and the importance of decorum. ‘As the Princess of Arnovia, you are an ambassador for your country and the House of Wilderstein wherever you go,’ she proclaimed. ‘You must never forget that.’ The Countess had many such maxims, most of which were about what princesses did and did not do: Princesses do not run. Princesses do not slam doors. A princess should not be inquisitive. Princesses do not lose their temper. A princess must never raise her voice. Now, Anna added in her head: A princess should not sneak about the castle at night in order to spy on her governess.
One of the many things that had struck her as odd about Miss Carter was her lack of interest in rules and discipline, and what princesses did or did not do. She had no sort of a timetable: one morning she’d let them read poetry aloud, the next she’d take them into the grounds for what she called a ‘nature ramble’. She hardly ever scolded them, except when she heard them speaking German. Then: ‘In English, please!’ she’d say at once. That made sense, Anna thought, for Miss Carter was supposed to be preparing Alex for his English school. And anyway, neither of them really