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seem reasonable to you now? Have I made my position clear?’
    ‘Quite clear,’ said Giles. His voice was quiet and deathly weary. He could see that once again he was beaten. That once again, he must wait. Wait for his birthright, wait to take his place at the head of Lyttons.
    ‘Good. Well now, another toast. To Lyttons. Its future.’
    ‘To Lyttons,’ said everyone obediently.
    ‘Good,’ said Celia, briskly. ‘Well I’m glad you are all – happy with the situation. As I am. Although,’ she smiled again, the same self-mocking smile, ‘I am sure you will understand this too, it will not be entirely easy for me.’
    Good, thought Giles; I hope it’s quite horribly difficult for you, I hope you are wretchedly unhappy with Lord Arden, I hope—
    ‘Giles, we must go.’ Helena was standing up, her face frozen with disapproval. ‘Celia, do forgive us. Thank you for a very – interesting evening. George, Mary, say goodnight to your grandmother.’
    She’s very upset, Adele thought, watching her leave the room, and who could blame her really. She had spent the whole of her married life waiting for Giles’s success and it had never come, not properly. The nearest had been the publication of his book, so well received and well reviewed; but that was in the past now. Poor Giles; white-faced, wretched, kissing his mother as only he could, quickly, hardly touching her face. And the children, the dreadfully dull George and Mary, kissing her dutifully too: but at least they had come. Had not sent rudely dismissive notes. She had got something terribly wrong with Lucas; and she didn’t know how to put it right.
     
    They were all gone by ten-thirty; Celia had expected that, had known – of course – that they disapproved of her and what she was doing, known too that she could not properly explain. It could not have been a Lytton evening, one of those endlessly warm, bright occasions, fuelled with gossip and literary allusion, with fierce argument and fun. They would never be the same again, those evenings. Not quite. She could see that now. Unbelievably, after half a century at the heart of the family, she had moved herself out from it. By choosing to marry Lord Arden, that was what she had done. She had shocked and saddened the family, she could see that very clearly. And she had lost Sebastian too: perhaps for ever. Even possibly, it seemed, Kit. Which was harder still.
    But given the the savage and shocking degree to which she missed Oliver, the discovery that she did not want to grow old alone, and neither did she want to find her way in the strange new world that publishing was fast becoming, or to slither into a position where she was regarded with pity or derision or both, and given that Bunny was sweet and funny and affectionate and rich – and impotent – she still felt she had served herself – and them – rather well.

CHAPTER 3
    ‘I shall do what I like and you can’t stop me. You’re a witch, a wicked, wicked witch and I hope you die in a car crash today—’
    ‘Thank you for that. No doubt you’ll hear about it if I do. If not I’ll see you later.’
    Barty picked up her briefcase and walked out of the kitchen and across the hall; she was just opening the door when she heard footsteps running after her and felt a pair of small arms winding round her waist.
    ‘Wait, stop, I didn’t mean it, I love you really.’
    ‘Jenna—’
    ‘No, no, listen to me, it’s true, I do, I do, so, so much.’
    Barty turned round to look at her; at this difficult, dazzling eight-year-old who was at once the light and the blight of her life, whose two-year-old’s temper tantrums had never eased, whose adoration of her was irresistible and whose hatred of her in the face of any opposition was alarming.
    ‘Well I’m glad to hear that, Jenna. And I love you too. But you are not going to host a sailing party at South Lodge. And that is the end of the matter.’
    ‘But why not?’
    ‘Because sailing is dangerous.