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still asleep then. He would be proud of her. He would have to be.
    She counted out the seconds, then silently set about cranking the handle, and turning the great cheese. After she had turned the tiny sample Sturton too by hand, she grinned to herself as she
tried out her brand-new and unfamiliar sense of self-satisfaction.
    There was no point in trying to sleep until exhaustion kicked in once again, and Neverfell set about groggily preparing other orders, the dainties for the market gala, the camel cheese for the
eminent chocolatier and the delivery for Madame Appeline.
    Ten minutes before she was due to turn the Sturton again, the bells rang at Grandible’s front door. Neverfell tied her mask on crooked and ran to answer it, almost falling foul of
Grandible’s various lethal traps in her hurry. Peering through the spy-hole she saw a footman displaying a leanness and angularity of jaw usually reserved for lizards.
    ‘Your business?’ Neverfell tried to imitate Grandible’s brusque tone.
    The footman’s smile was instantly charming, whilst suggesting an awareness of his own dignity. His consonants all had a damp sound.
    ‘If you would be so kind, there is a package reserved for Madame Appeline. If it is ready—’
    The idea hit Neverfell like a fist. It hit her so hard that she actually rocked back on to her heels, then stood trembling and trying to decide whether to cry. It was a good idea, a brilliant
idea, perhaps the best she had ever had, better than the mangle-cheese-turner. But it seemed unfair that it should have occurred to her now, just when she was enjoying the thought of Master
Grandible being pleased with her. She deserved to feel that happiness a little longer. But no, now she had the idea and it had her. She gnawed her fingers, and the idea gnawed her, and she knew she
was going to do what it wanted.
    ‘One moment!’ she squeaked, then sprinted back towards the room where the Stackfalter Sturton lay in state.
    At the door she halted, then edged slowly into the room, softening her steps as best she could to avoid waking her master. Not two feet from the great sleeping Sturton nestled the baby sample
Sturton, ragged with its feathery white mosses. At Neverfell’s belt hung a circular steel cutter, designed so that you could push it in through the rind of a cheese and pull out a tiny
cylindrical sample. Hardly daring breathe, Neverfell reached out and picked up the sample Sturton between finger and thumb, wincing as she felt the tender mosses crush beneath her touch like loose
snow.
    She pushed her cutter into the base of the little cheese and felt a tingle of fear and excitement as the rind gave way. When she pulled it out with a small round of ripe cheese within it, the
exposed paste filled the room with the scent of wildflowers and wet dogs, and for a moment she was afraid that it would tickle Grandible’s well-trained nose and wake him. He snored on,
however, and she carefully returned the sample to its place, the new hole flush against the shelf so as to conceal her crime and stop the spread of the smell.
    She was partly doing this for him, she reminded herself. He needed friends in the Court, and soon he would have Madame Appeline.
    Back in the packing room she found the box put aside for Madame Appeline’s order, the pearl-grey round of Zephurta’s Whim already nestling within in its bed of olive leaves.
Neverfell quickly removed the stolen cheese from her cutter and wrapped it in muslin. In a moment of inspiration, she tied the muslin bundle with a piece of black velvet ribbon, so that Madame
Appeline would remember the black velvet mask and realize who was responsible.
    Out, out, out , said her heart with every beat. Doing this will get me out of here. Madame Appeline will make me a new Face, and I can go out.
    Grandible had hidden away the front-door keys once again, but there was a small much-bolted hatch beside the door for receiving small deliveries, and Madame Appeline’s