The Windsor Knot

7

“What’s this in the diary for tomorrow?”

Rozie looked up from her keyboard at Sir Simon, who had popped his head round her office door. She tried to keep any hint of nerves from her voice.

“The afternoon, you mean?”

“Yes. She’s supposed to be visiting her cousin in the Great Park after lunch. It’s been in for weeks.”

“I know. But unfortunately Lady Hepburn’s brother died recently and the Queen wanted to see her. When the invitation to tea came, she asked me to accept.”

“When?”

“Yesterday.”

“You didn’t tell me.”

“It didn’t seem important.”

Sir Simon sighed. It wasn’t important, in the great scheme of things, but he was a control freak and that’s why he was so good at his job. He tried to relax and delegate. If you didn’t trust your subordinates, where were you? Even so, something rankled.

“How did Her Majesty know? About the invitation, I mean? I didn’t see anything.”

Rozie paused for half a second. Sir Simon saw every email, every log of every phone call, every message of any sort. And if he didn’t, he could check it out. He probably wouldn’t bother, but what if he did?

“I heard about Lady Hepburn’s brother from Lady Caroline.” She was improvising as she went. Sir Simon was not close friends with the Queen’s lady-in-waiting. She simply had to pray he wouldn’t check with her. In fact, Rozie had had a brief conversation with Lady Caroline about Lady Hepburn first thing this morning, but it had been the other way around: Rozie had engineered it, having noticed that they had houses near each other in Henley. She had wondered whether it might be presumptuous to assume rich, titled neighbors knew each other—but, no, that turned out to be a thing, and they were friends.

“Lady Hepburn’s brother died a few weeks ago, didn’t he? Heart attack in Kenya.” Sir Simon knew everything.

“Yes. And Lady Caroline said that Lady Hepburn was still very upset about it.” (She hadn’t.) “When I mentioned it to the Queen, she asked me to pass on her sincere condolences and when I did, Lady Hepburn invited her to tea and Her Majesty said yes.”

Was this even possible? Did such things happen? Rozie held her breath. Her heart hammered in her chest so hard she was sure Sir Simon would see it under her dress.

Sir Simon frowned to himself. This was most unusual. The Queen liked to visit Fiona Hepburn, but not on a whim. The Boss was not a whimsical person. How very odd. Perhaps it was a sign of advancing age. Not dementia, surely? No, that didn’t make sense at all. But there was something about Rozie that didn’t quite—

He stared at her for a moment. Rozie wouldn’t make anything up, surely? What would be the point? He made a mental note to double-check with the Queen that she really did want to go on this consolatory visit, and went back to his desk.

About an hour later, Rozie’s heart stopped hammering. She didn’t know whether to be very proud of herself or deeply ashamed. She had just lied to her immediate boss about the words and deeds of two lady aristocrats and the British monarch. In the privacy of the ladies’ loos, she sent her sister a Snapchat of various goggle-eyed expressions. Fliss would have no idea what it was about, but it helped.

The weekend was a difficult one. The Queen was already starting to notice the first ripples of a pebble dropped by MI5 into the Household pond.

The maid who delivered tea and biscuits to her bedside did so this morning with a doubtful expression and a biting of lip, suggesting huge discomfort and a need for reassurance. Had the Queen not known better, she would have asked a question and enabled a conversation. Usually, one could quickly solve the problem if one nipped it in the bud. But today she had no reassurance to offer.

Similarly, the page who later poured her Darjeeling in the breakfast room did so with a querulous look. She had known the man for years (Sandy Robertson; started as a beater at Balmoral; widower with two children, one of whom was at Edinburgh University studying astrophysics) and could easily read the unspoken message in his eyes: They’ve questioned me. And not just me. We’re all worried. What’s going on, ma’am?

The look she gave him back was just as easily translated: I’m sorry. It’s out of my hands. There’s nothing I can do. He nodded sadly as if they had actually exchanged words, and otherwise behaved with his usual calm efficiency. She knew he would report back to the servants’ quarters and the social club, though, and the news would not be good. Something was rotten in the state of Denmark and even the Boss could not guarantee it would blow over soon.

For the rest of the day, she felt the shadow of fear and uncertainty fall over the castle. She and her Household operated on a code of absolute loyalty: both theirs to her, and hers to them. They did not blab, did not sell stories to the Sun or the Daily Express, did not ask for or expect the exorbitant salaries they could command from the likes of Mr. Peyrovski, did not ask impertinent questions, or allow the inevitable belowstairs ructions or personal concerns to punctuate the smooth running of her affairs—or not often, anyway. In return, she respected and protected them, valued the sacrifices they made, and rewarded lifetimes of service with medals and other honors that were treasured far more than gold.

Foreign dignitaries, presidents, and princes marveled at the precision and attention to detail accorded to every aspect of their visits by these men and women. One’s family was jealous, frequently tried to steal some of the more exceptional stars, and occasionally succeeded. From Balmoral to Buckingham Palace, Windsor to Sandringham, the army of servants, hundreds strong, were family. They had nurtured her through ninety complicated years, been the buffer against the tides of disaffection that it sometimes pleased her subjects to display, and worked tirelessly to make a really rather difficult job at times look effortless. They worked on mutual trust, and now the Security Service was undermining it, one insidious interview at a time.

Still, the question remained: Had a member of the Household killed Brodsky? And, if so, why? Until she could answer it herself, she had to let Humphreys conduct his investigation in his own way.

On Sunday, the Queen was very pleased to escape the doom-laden atmosphere and accept Lady Hepburn’s kind invitation to tea at Dunsden Place, her small estate a few miles west, at Henley-on-Thames. They had been friends for decades, through Fiona’s tempestuous marriage to Cecil Farley in the fifties and sixties, her fascinating single years in the seventies, when she traveled the world on the arm of various eligible men, her quiet second marriage to Lord Hepburn in the eighties, and now her gentle widowhood.

Fiona was a good ten years younger than the Queen, but these days friends of one’s own age were like hen’s teeth—certainly those who retained their marbles—and it was a boon to talk to anyone who had lived through the war and shared the values that had pulled the country through.

She was also a gardener. The house—elegant Queen Anne with a spot of Jacobean folderol at one end and an unfortunate Victorian extension at the other—was in need of a little updating, but the garden was lovely. Fiona walked them through the house, looking pretty as ever with her white-blond hair piled high in a loose chignon, and a pair of baggy trousers showing only the faintest traces of soil.

Today, on a blustery weekend in April, vast pots of daffodils and narcissi glowed yellow and cream ahead of them against a verdant backdrop of box hedging and billowing topiary yew, through which one got the occasional glimpse of the river. Most people would have considered the day too cold to sit outside, but Fiona knew her guest, and had ordered homemade scones and prize-winning raspberry jam to be served on the terrace overlooking the parterre, with thick Kashmiri blankets for their knees and plentiful supplies of hot tea.

The Queen’s driver waited in the kitchen and her protection detail blended into the background, just out of earshot, refusing all offers of refreshment. The only other people outside were Fiona herself, Rozie Oshodi, and a bearded man in his midforties, in a tweed suit and tie, seated at a large teak table on the terrace. He rose to his feet as soon as they arrived.

“I invited Henry Evans,” Fiona said cheerfully, as if the idea had been her own. “I believe you know each other.”

Mr. Evans bowed. When he straightened and smiled, the Queen suddenly remembered what a sweet, boyish expression he had, and how charmingly innocent he seemed, given his specialist subject. “We do indeed. Good afternoon. How nice to see you.”

“And you, Your Majesty.”

“I hope it wasn’t too much trouble to get here.”

“On the contrary. A positive delight. Especially to come to Henley. You have a beautiful home, Lady Hepburn.”

“Oh, Henry. You charmer.” Fiona grinned. “Have a scone.”

They chitchatted with friendly politeness, while Rozie sat at a nearby table, pretending to be engrossed in her notes. She was impressed that Henry Evans managed to talk animatedly about the journey from the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst, where he worked as a lecturer, without showing the slightest concern about why he’d been summoned in the first place. Rozie hadn’t been able to explain much on the phone—beyond mentioning how much she, personally, had enjoyed his lectures when she had done her officer training there. That wasn’t relevant to today’s meeting, though, so she made do with a brief smile of recognition and kept herself apart.

After a while Lady Hepburn made some excuse about checking with the lady from the village who was helping out in the kitchen, and they were alone.

“Now, Mr. Evans, I wanted to ask you something,” the Queen said, almost without pause.

“Yes?”

“The suspicious deaths of Russians on British soil. You’ve been studying them for a while, haven’t you?”

“A couple of decades, ma’am.”

“You contributed to that report I got last year. I remember you accompanying the minister to the palace.”

“That’s right.”

“And you believe the Russian State has been murdering its enemies here in Britain with impunity?”

“Not exactly the Russian State, ma’am. Putin and his allies, specifically. I know he can be seen to embody the State these days. It’s all a bit murky.”

“Did the list include any journalists?”

“Only Markov, who worked for the BBC. He was the Bulgarian dissident writer, killed with the ricin bullet fired from an umbrella in seventy-eight. Before Putin’s time, of course—but it set a precedent.”

The Queen nodded. “On Waterloo Bridge, I remember.”

“Exactly, ma’am. It seemed almost too le Carré to be true.”

She nodded at the reference. People assumed she didn’t read—God knows why, she probably read more papers in a month than most people in a lifetime, and she was fond of a good spy story. Henry Evans understood her better than many of her ministers.

“How many deaths have there been since then?”

“On British soil? Five or six. The first was Litvinenko in 2006. He was the ex–FSB agent poisoned with polonium-210. Horrible business.”

“Quite. And yet no one was arrested or charged for any of them.”

“No, ma’am,” Evans confirmed. “Not since that agent we tried to extradite for the Litvinenko poisoning.”

“The Americans often tell my ambassador how furious they are with us.”

He gave a wry smile. “They’re welcome to supply the evidence.”

There was a pause while he took a quick sip of tea. Rozie noticed how naturally the Queen took the teapot to refill his cup. She was a remarkably practical person for someone with hundreds of servants to call on, and, in fact, an army. (As Rozie knew from experience, the British Army specifically pledged allegiance to her, not the government, and meant it.)

After another warming sip he went on. “Putin’s good these days. Since the slipup with Litvinenko, which was sloppy, all the subsequent deaths have been very professional. And there’s still a question mark over whether Boris Berezovsky was murder or suicide.”

“What do you think?”

“Oh, murder, definitely. The color of the face, the broken rib, the shape of the ligature . . . But one could of course argue, as they did, that he was found in a locked bathroom, and he was certainly depressed. Berezovsky’s a tricky case. He was the most high-profile of Putin’s critics, the richest, until the Abramovich lawsuit bankrupted him, the man most obviously in Putin’s sights. All I can say is whoever staged the suicide, if it was staged, did a damn good job of it. And the others were harder still to pin on Moscow.”

“Go on.”

“Well, Perepilichnyy died of a heart attack while out running four years ago. They found traces of a poison in his system, but no proof of how he came by it. Gorbuntsov was the victim of an assassination attempt in Mayfair the same year. He survived it, but the would-be assassin got away. Scott Young—he was the one with links to Berezovsky—was depressed when he fell onto railings. It’s not that we don’t suspect Russian involvement. It’s that we don’t want to start a diplomatic war without incontrovertible proof of why we’re doing it.”

“Naturally. They all died in their homes or public places?”

“Yes.” He seemed surprised that she would ask.

“And they all had high-level links to people in Moscow? I believe your report said as much.”

“Absolutely. These were quarrels about whistleblowing or money. That’s where their threat to Moscow lay.”

“Tell me, what do you think of the idea of these people killing someone purely to send a message?”

“What kind of message?”

“Just to say they can. Someone low-level. The wrong person in the wrong place, so to speak.”

Henry Evans considered the question. He stared out at the gunmetal-grey clouds, whose outline mirrored the billowing yew beneath. He was considering over two decades of research into suspicious deaths behind the old Iron Curtain, and later here at home, since he had first become interested as an A-level student at school in Manchester.

“It’s not Putin’s style,” he said eventually. “I can’t think of another example. Do you have someone in mind?”

The Queen ignored his question. “Imagine they’ve changed tack. That it’s not about who, it’s about where.”

Evans’s brow furrowed. “I don’t understand.”

The Queen tried to channel Gavin Humphreys as objectively as she could. “They’ve used poison in the past, have they not? Sometimes rare, radioactive poison, as if to make it clear that they are the perpetrators, even if they can’t be brought to justice.”

“Yes, but that’s for revenge. Revenge on individuals for specific acts, and to send a message to other individuals not to do the same. I can’t see how that works if it’s just the location that matters.” He still looked perplexed by the Queen’s line of reasoning.

“What if the location were very . . . specific? Designed to show how brazen they can be when they want to?”

“It just . . . I . . .” Evans trailed off. He was frustrated. He genuinely wanted to support his sovereign, to follow her argument and agree with it if he possibly could. He’d never known her to spout what in other company would be robustly referred to as “bollocks,” so he was very surprised by what she was suggesting. Whoever heard of an assassination based on location? What was she on about?

“And you said the Litvinenko murder was sloppy,” the Queen added. “Agents don’t always behave as professionally as they should. Do they sometimes panic? Have you come across this?”

Again he stared at her and tried not to seem rude. “Panic, ma’am?”

“Yes. The Berezovsky case, too. You said there were problems with the ligature.”

“Well, apparently it was the wrong shape: circular, not V-shaped, as one would expect from a hanging. But whoever did it, if they did it, managed to leave the bathroom door locked from inside, which doesn’t smack of panic, exactly. . . .”

“And Litvinenko?”

“They didn’t panic there either, I wouldn’t say, ma’am. They poisoned the man in a hotel tearoom, in cold blood, and walked away.” He shrugged. “The sloppiness came earlier, leaving radioactive traces in various places they visited beforehand. They probably weren’t familiar with how trackable those things are. Polonium isn’t exactly typically on the weapons training syllabus. . . .” He realized that he was piling up counterevidence to her argument again, and this was hardly polite. He slowed to another halt, still perplexed.

“Thank you,” she said. Which confused him even more.

“I’m sorry, ma’am. I don’t think I’ve—”

“You’ve been more than helpful, Mr. Evans.”

“I really don’t think—”

“More than you know. Might I just ask . . . ?”

“Of course.”

“Well, it’s been very nice to see you again. But this is a very sensitive issue and I’d be extremely grateful if, when you’re asked about today . . .”

She paused to choose her words carefully, and before she could find the right ones, he butted in. “Nothing happened, ma’am.”

“Thank you.”

“I wasn’t here.”

“You’re very kind.” She nodded and smiled gratefully. From her nearby seat, Rozie noticed an unspoken agreement pass between them. From her own experience, she could translate it now: Henry Evans would say nothing, regardless of who asked him, even the commandant at Sandhurst and his contacts in MI5 and MI6. This conversation was absolutely private.

Rozie wondered for a moment why it had been so easy for Mr. Evans to make this silent pact, when for her it had seemed more complicated. But she reflected that for her it was more complicated. Evans simply owed his ultimate loyalty to the Queen and that was that. The man Rozie had to hide this conversation from—lie to, if necessary—was the Queen’s own right-hand man, and that made her secrecy so strange and uncomfortable. It wasn’t that the Queen didn’t trust Sir Simon, Rozie felt sure of that. She had seen the warm, long-standing relationship between them at firsthand. It was something else. . . . What? She didn’t know.

Meanwhile, by some telepathic trick, Lady Hepburn returned right on cue with a fresh-brewed teapot and a coffee-and-walnut cake that she had made herself that morning. The conversation turned to the cricket, where England were doing well in the Twenty20 World Cup in India. The Queen, who had seemed perfectly herself before, looked to her friend now as if a giant unsuspected weight had lifted off her shoulders. She positively sparkled.

“Would you like to see the pots?” Fiona suggested. “I’ve got some rather lovely narcissi from Sarah Raven’s catalogue that are doing awfully well.”

They were joined by her golden retrievers, Purdey and Patsy, who flowed down the terrace steps to the parterre beyond. Henry, whose wife and mother were gardeners, took a surprising interest in the niceties of “lasagne” planting. Rozie, whose mother could kill a balcony tomato plant at ten paces, did not. But she perked up when Lady Hepburn turned to the Queen with a sudden smile and changed the subject.

“I heard you had a lovely time on Monday evening.”

“Oh?” The Queen looked surprised.

“Caroline told me. We were on the phone about Ben’s memorial service. Oh goodness, which reminds me—of course there was that young man. I heard something . . . a heart attack, was it? The next day? Nothing to do with the dine and sleep, I hope? I assume it wasn’t a guest? No one you knew?”

“No, no,” the Queen said carefully. Her friend was not fishing, merely trying to avoid putting her foot in it without meaning to—as she unfortunately had. However, it was strictly true to confirm that young Brodsky wasn’t a guest. And one couldn’t claim to have known the man. Not exactly.

“Oh thank goodness for that. It’s awful how these fit young people seem to die these days for no reason at all. Or at least, unsuspected cardiac trouble or whatever it was. Perhaps they always did, and one didn’t hear about it so much. Anyway, on a happier note, Caroline said the evening was a smashing success. Lots of super dancing after supper. I do so enjoy a good dance, don’t you? I can’t remember the last time I properly did it. And apparently there was this dishy young Russian who danced with all the ladies.”

“Yes, there was.”

“Did he dance with you?”

“He did, actually.”

“Oh, how wonderful! Was he as good as Caroline said?”

“Well . . .” The Queen wondered how effusive her lady-in-waiting’s description had been.

“Ha! I can see from your face he was. And then he absolutely swept that other woman off her feet.”

“Which woman?” the Queen asked. “He danced with a ballerina, I remember.”

“Caroline said he danced with two of them. To perfection—just like something off Strictly Come Dancing. But then he got together with another lady, a guest, and they simply went mad. It might have been after you went up. She said it wasn’t the dancing, exactly. They did the tango, but it was something between them. Electric.” Lady Hepburn twirled her wrists and spread her fingers. “Almost too personal to watch. Like Fonteyn and Nureyev.”

“Oh, I doubt that!” the Queen scoffed.

“Well, almost. Caroline might not have mentioned Nureyev, come to think of it, but that’s what I like to imagine.”

“Your imagination always amazes me, Fiona. Look, the tips of poor Mr. Evans’s ears are burning.”

Flustered, Henry tried vainly to deny it.

“It’s the only thing that keeps me going, these days,” Fiona opined. “That and the garden. And visits from delightful academics. Do say you’ll come again, Henry. You’re always welcome.”

“Thank you, Lady Hepburn.”

“We must go.”

The Queen had spoken these words to Rozie, who glanced at her watch and saw that exactly sixty minutes had passed since their arrival. She hadn’t seen the Boss consult a timepiece once, but her punctuality was legendary.

“I’ll get the car, ma’am,” she said, and soon they were on their way home again, the Queen sitting upright in the back of the Bentley, hands neatly resting in her lap, eyes fluttering closed in the very definition of a power nap.

8

In the morning, Sir Simon was in a cheerful mood when he arrived with the battered red boxes that contained the government paperwork for the Queen to review that day.

“You’ll be pleased to hear they’ll be finishing the interviews with staff today or tomorrow, Your Majesty,” he said, placing the boxes on her desk.

“That’s excellent news. Are they changing the line of inquiry?”

“No, ma’am, not at all. Apparently they’ve uncovered two members of staff with surprising links to Russia who were sleeping in the castle that night. It’s lucky, in a way, this happened—I know it’s tragic for poor Brodsky, of course. But who knows what havoc they could have wreaked, in time.”

“Oh dear. Who are they?”

Sir Simon took a small folder from under his left arm and consulted his notes.

“Alexander Robertson, your page, and an archivist called Adam Dorsey-Jones. Both based at Buckingham Palace, but Sandy Robertson is here with you for the Easter Court, of course, and Adam Dorsey-Jones was visiting the Round Tower to consult the library. He’s working on the project to digitize the Georgian Papers. I believe he joined about five years ago. I can check if you like.”

“Yes, please.”

“Ma’am.” He made a lightning note and continued. “They’ve been relieved of their duties and put on extended leave while the police test their alibis and Box does more background checks. There are a few more people they want to question, just to be on the safe side, but Mr. Humphreys is pretty sure they have their man.”

“Not Sandy!” she exclaimed, exasperated. “You know him, Simon. His father was a ghillie in Balmoral. They’ve been with us since Andrew was small.”

“Yes, ma’am. But that might make him an ideal sort of person to target. Apparently his wife was very ill for a long time. Big medical bills.”

“What about the National Health Service?”

“Perhaps she went abroad for it? I don’t know. That’s all there was in the report Humphreys showed me. It’s all rather early days. And Adam Dorsey-Jones”—he peered at his notes again—“studied history and Russian at university and his live-in partner deals in Russian art.”

“I see.”

“He asked to come to Windsor at the last minute to look at some letters, and the theory is he might have been instructed to get himself down here when they discovered Brodsky was going to be in the Peyrovski party.”

“‘They’ being his Russian handlers?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Did you say Mr. Dorsey-Jones joined five years ago?”

“Indeed.”

“Five years,” she mused. “Simon, don’t you think it rather odd that a young musician with an unknown website should be the target of such a drawn-out plot?”

Sir Simon gave the comment a good few seconds’ consideration before replying.

“It’s above my pay grade. Box knows what it’s doing. We have the best world experts on Russian statecraft.”

“Yes, but is Humphreys consulting those experts?”

“I’m sure he is, ma’am. If we have an insider at work, he’s doing whatever it takes to find him.”

He worked hard to reassure the sovereign, though he sensed her resistance. It was understandable: she was devoted to her staff. It must be a shock to realize treason could exist so close to home—though goodness knows, it often had before. Sir Simon was an avid historian and could name two dozen treacherous English courtiers down the ages at the drop of a hat. The Queen felt safe because she had people like him to serve and protect her. He thought, not for the first time, how delicate she seemed, like fragile porcelain. He would happily lay down his life to save her. Gavin Humphreys, too, he was sure.

Fired up, and rather wishing for opportunity of a puddle, so he could throw his cloak over it (would a Savile Row jacket do?), he spent another five minutes explaining the emerging plans for more comprehensive background checks on future servants. But he sensed the Queen wasn’t really listening. Far from reassured, she looked brooding.

“Can you send Rozie in to collect the papers?” she asked. “I won’t be long.”

“I can always come and—”

“I’m sure you’re busy, Simon. Rozie will do.”

“Ma’am.”

Alone at last, the Queen looked out of her sitting room window at a plane on its landing path, against a watery blue sky. She was furious and frustrated, and a few decades ago she might have railed at her helplessness. But not anymore. One learned one’s lessons. She couldn’t always do the right thing, but at least she could try.

Rozie was growing accustomed to the feeling of her heart hammering against her rib cage. It was getting dark. She stared out past the raindrops battering the windscreen of the Mini, looking for a sign that read kingsclere and praying she was not about to make the biggest mistake of her life.

She had told Sir Simon that her mother, back in the family flat in London, had fallen out of bed and broken a hip. With immense grace and kindness, he had told her to dash to the hospital bedside, do whatever was necessary, and not think for a moment of rushing back. Which in royal circles meant she had about twenty-four hours.

Her mother was still safely in Lagos, visiting the extended network of aunties and uncles, and fit as a flea. A part of Rozie wondered whether Sir Simon would check the flight manifests for the last few days and find that out. She chided herself not to be so paranoid. Sir Simon was lovely, the ideal boss in many ways. It was not his fault that she was habitually making up stories to get round him. But enough was enough: she needed to know at least why she was doing it.

This morning the Queen had asked her to do some further research into the night of the dine and sleep. She had three interviews lined up in London for tomorrow. And none of this was to be mentioned to Sir Simon.

Her mind was racing. The Boss was up to something. Surely such tasks should be left to the professionals, not entrusted to an ex-banker with three years in the Royal Horse Artillery to her name? The Queen had the whole of MI5 and the Metropolitan Police to call on. Or the prime minister. Or, if she liked to keep it close to home, Sir Simon himself or her equerry.

So why me?

And then she had remembered an offhand comment from her predecessor during the handover a few months ago. Katie Briggs had been the assistant private secretary for five years, before succumbing to mental health issues that were never fully discussed. Rozie admired the fact that Katie’s privacy had been maintained throughout, that Sir Simon and the Queen were never anything but kind when talking about her, and that she had been quietly provided with accommodation on the Sandringham estate so she didn’t have the stress of worrying about somewhere to live while she got better. During the final handover day, when they were briefly alone, Katie had said, “One day, she’ll ask you to do something strange. I mean, every day will be strange, but you’ll get used to that. One day it will be super strange. You’ll know it.”

“How?”

“You just will. Trust me. And when you do, go to Aileen Jaggard. She was APS before me. Her details are in the contacts book. She explained it all to me and she will to you, too.”

“I don’t get it. Can’t you tell me now?”

“No. I asked the same thing. It has to come from her—from the Boss, I mean. When it does, track down Aileen. See her in person if you can. Just say ‘It happened’ and she’ll know.”

At that moment, Sir Simon had interrupted them to invite them for lunch and Katie had made a point of pretending they had been talking about the calendar entry system. Whatever it was, Sir Simon wasn’t a part of it.

The rain outside beat harder, bouncing off the bonnet of the car. Ahead, Rozie’s headlights briefly caught the sign she was after. The Mini’s satnav swore blind there was no turning here, but a fork in the road proved otherwise. Rozie turned off the main road and followed the narrower, unlit one up a gentle hill until she reached the residential streets of the village of Kingsclere. Aileen’s cottage was halfway down the main street, within sight of a squat stone church tower. Rozie parked the car opposite the church and was surprised to find, walking back, that the address she had been given was that of an art gallery. Peering through nets behind old Georgian windows, she could just about make out modern paintings against crisp white walls. She rang the bell and waited.

“Ah, you came.”

The woman who opened the door to her was tall, very slender, and much younger looking than the sixty-one it said on her Wikipedia page. Her highlighted hair was swept into a bun held in place with a pair of chopsticks, and she was wearing what looked like cashmere yoga pants and a baggy T-shirt. Her face and feet were bare.

“I hope I’m not disturbing you,” Rozie said, aware that she must be.

“No, it’s good to see you. Come and join me for a glass of wine. You must need it after that drive. So, you’re the new girl. Let me look at you.”

Rozie stood in the narrow hallway while the older woman paused for a moment, smiling quietly to herself, taking in the short, sharp hair, the immaculate eyebrows and contouring game, the athletic body clad in a pencil skirt and figure-hugging jacket, the high-heeled shoes.

“Things have changed since my day,” she said, still smiling.

“For the better?” Rozie batted back, with more than a hint of challenge in her voice. She’d driven a long way in the rain and the dark and the last thing she needed was a bit of Establishment racism—which, to be fair, she wasn’t used to getting from the Private Office. The tabloids had published a couple of articles about the Queen’s “distinctive new assistant,” taking care to point out her “exotic looks.” At the royal palaces she was used to the odd startled raised eyebrow and some exaggerated politeness, but no one within the Private Office had commented on her appearance, other than when Sir Simon had pointed out she might find it difficult to walk at speed in a tight skirt. (She really didn’t.) Aileen was the first person to say something outright.

“Definitely for the better,” the older woman agreed. “Come on up. Careful on the stairs in those heels—just don’t let them catch on the matting. I live above the shop. Funny, really, that’s what the Queen used to say. Here we are.”

They stood in a long, low-lit room, furnished in white and cream and hung with the same sort of pictures as downstairs. The television was showing Netflix with the sound off. Without asking, Aileen padded across the floor to a kitchenette in one corner and poured a third of a bottle of red wine into an enormous glass, which she handed to Rozie.

“As I was saying, things have changed. And about bloody time, if you ask me. Anyway, how are you finding it?”

“Fine, until now. Great, actually. Then it suddenly got complicated. Katie Briggs told me to say ‘It happened.’”

Aileen’s eyebrows shot up. “Tell me everything.” She gestured to a corner of a squashy cream sofa, sitting cross-legged on the floor nearby, nursing her own glass of wine.

“I’m not sure how much I can say.”

“Look, I joined the Royal Household in the year dot,” Aileen said, “and I did the job for over a decade. There’s nothing that’s happened in any of those residences that I don’t know about. No scandal, or divorce or disaster. And I know about the other stuff, too. The things she doesn’t tell Simon. She’s on a case, isn’t she?”

“She . . . What?”

Aileen grinned. She gestured to a side table temptingly laid out with bowls of Doritos and guacamole. Rozie suddenly realized how hungry she was. “Look, help yourself. You came to me because she’s asked you to do a bit of digging about, hasn’t she?”

Mouth full of Dorito and avocado, Rozie nodded.

“You kind of know you’re not supposed to tell anyone, but it feels horribly wrong?”

Rozie nodded again.

“Is it that dead young man at Windsor Castle?”

Rozie swallowed. “How did you know?”

“Actually, I hoped it wasn’t,” Aileen admitted, taking a swig of merlot. “I saw a very low-key news report about a heart attack and hoped it was just that. But when you called me this morning . . .”

“He didn’t die naturally.”

“Damn! At Windsor!”

“Why at Windsor, particularly?”

“Because it’s her favorite place. How are the police getting on?”

“They don’t seem to be doing much. It’s MI5 who— Look, are you sure we can talk about this?”

Aileen gave Rozie a sympathetic look and shrugged. “You called me. We’re not being bugged. Katie warned you something odd would happen, yes?”

“Yes.”

“And it did, and here you are. You have to decide if you want to trust me, but I’m you, remember. If we can’t trust each other, who is there?”

Rozie had already thought about this. She quelled the panic that the Official Secrets Act always induced and took a deep breath. “The head of MI5 thinks Putin ordered a hit, but the Queen’s going in a totally different direction. The victim was an entertainer at a dine and sleep. She wants me to talk to one or two of the guests.”

“And Box?”

“They suspect the Household staff. Sleeper agents.”

“Oh God, she’ll hate that!”

“I think she does.”

“And let me guess, Simon’s fine with it.”

“He seems to be, yes. I mean, it’s a nightmare organizing the interviews with them all, and the atmosphere is terrible and that’s upsetting, but he’s getting on with it.”

“He would,” Aileen said, with some finality.

Rozie was confused. “I mean, yes. Why wouldn’t he?”

Aileen stared into her glass for a moment. “I don’t know, exactly. But I do know that if the Boss thinks it’s a bad line of investigation, it probably is. Has she tested it out?”

“Um . . . well, yes, she has.” At last the meeting with Henry Evans made proper sense. “She met with a man who’s studied the subject for years,” Rozie explained. “The death at Windsor didn’t seem to fit the pattern at all. The victim wasn’t high-profile or well-connected, like they usually are outside Russia. He wasn’t in his own home. And the murder was sloppy. She seemed to know the details didn’t fit.”

Aileen laughed.

“Yeah. She doesn’t just trust her instincts—she trusts her experts. And she’s the best at knowing which ones to pick. You would be, after seventy odd years, wouldn’t you?”

“I guess,” Rozie said. “Sixty-five years, I suppose. Officially.”

“Oh, she’s been doing this much longer than that.”

“What do you mean?”

An enigmatic smile stole across Aileen’s face. She closed her eyes briefly and rolled her shoulders. Then she put down her glass and fixed Rozie with a steady gaze. “The Queen solves mysteries. She solved the first one when she was twelve or thirteen, so the story goes. On her own. She sees things other people don’t see—often because they’re all looking at her. She knows so much about so many things. She’s got an eagle eye, a nose for bullshit, and a fabulous memory. Her staff should trust her more. People like Sir Simon, I mean.”

“But he trusts her totally!”

“No, he doesn’t. He thinks he does, but he also thinks he knows best. All her private secretaries do. They always have. They think they’re brilliant, which to be fair they usually are, and they think the other men in their clubs are brilliant, and the heads of the big organizations who went to Oxbridge with them are brilliant, and they’re all being brilliant together and she should just sit there and be grateful.”

Rozie laughed out loud. She was really very fond of Sir Simon, but this described his style exactly. “OK,” she agreed.

“They should trust her. But they don’t. She’s one of the most powerful women in the world, supposedly, but she spends her whole bloody time having to listen to them and they don’t listen back. It drives her bonkers. I mean, she grew up with it. She was a girl in the thirties; male domination was normal. God, even now I bet you get it, too, but at least we know it’s wrong. She’s had to work out for herself how good she is, what she can do. And what she can do is notice things. See when something’s off. Find out why. Unpick the problem. She’s a bit of a genius at it, actually. But she needs help.”

Rozie bit into the last green-laden Dorito and looked regretfully at the empty bowl. “Female help,” she said thoughtfully.

“Uh-huh. The help of someone who isn’t trying to constantly buck her up. Someone discreet. A listener. Our help. Oh, look, you’re still starving, aren’t you? Let me get the pasta on.”

They moved to the kitchen corner and Rozie put together a small salad from the leaves and tomatoes Aileen set out in front of her, while her hostess whipped up a dish of smoked salmon, cream, and tagliatelle in what seemed like no time at all.

“Did you help her a lot?” Rozie asked as they sat down on either side of the kitchen bar and Aileen lit a candle and topped up their glasses.

“A few times. Thank God mysteries don’t crop up every day. But Mary—she was my predecessor’s predecessor back in the seventies—she could tell you a dozen hair-raising tales of missing ambassadors and stolen jewelry and goodness knows what. They were a real team, those two. The Queen must miss her. It must be odd when your fifties were forty years ago, don’t you think?”

Rozie shrugged. Her fifties were nearly twenty years ahead. She couldn’t begin to imagine them, really, never mind life beyond. Also, she was wondering about something else. “So how come, if she’s solved all these mysteries, nobody talks about it? I mean, even at the palace? Not a whisper.”

Aileen’s face lit up. “Ah, good! I’m so pleased. It’s because that’s her style. My favorite part. She’ll get you running round like a mad thing, finding out details, lying like a trooper where you have to, and then, when it comes to the big showdown . . . it never happened.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’ll see. You have to savor the moment.”

“But I—I really don’t understand.”

“You will. Trust me. Ah, I envy you a little.” Aileen reached for the thin stem of her glass and lifted it until the bowl glowed bloodred in the candlelight. “Here’s to the real queen of crime.”

Rozie lifted hers, too. “The real queen of crime.”

“God save her.”

9

The Queen surveyed the outfits laid out for her today. After lunch she would change from her comfortable skirt and shirt into a raspberry wool dress and diamond brooch, because later there was a Privy Council meeting to attend. Windsor was not all fresh air and fun.

Her thoughts were in London, though, where she felt the answer to the death of Maksim Brodsky lay. If Henry Evans was right, there had been no castle-based plot to murder Brodsky—so he must have been killed by one of the people he traveled down with, surely? Or someone he met at the dine and sleep. Fiona Hepburn’s comments about that late-night dance had given her pause for thought. Did Brodsky perhaps already know this woman? Did they meet up later? It was an interesting idea. She wanted to know more.

And what about Peyrovski? He had rather insisted to Charles about bringing Brodsky down with him that night, even though it was most unusual for a guest to suggest the entertainment. Almost unheard of, in fact. Could it be a coincidence that the entertainer in question had ended up dead? What was Peyrovski’s relationship with him? There was so much she needed to find out, and she had hoped that Rozie could help discreetly on that front, but last night Sir Simon had sent a message to warn her the APS was off for a day’s compassionate leave, because her mother was unwell.

It was so frustrating! What bad timing. But it couldn’t be helped. She would have to see what the girl could do when she got back.

At eight thirty in the morning, a week after the discovery of the body, Rozie parked in a loading bay outside a small row of shops near Ladbroke Grove. Normally she wouldn’t dream of dumping the Mini somewhere so obviously begging for a ticket, but she didn’t have twenty minutes to spend circling for a proper space. And this was her manor. She grew up round here, knew every side road—and knew that at this time on a Tuesday morning such spaces were as rare as invitations to a dine and sleep.

With a quick check in the mirror that the scarf she’d wrapped around her head to protect her hair from the rain was immaculately in place, she got out and ran across to Costa Coffee, where her cousin Michael was waiting for her at a table. He caught sight of her immediately and grinned.

“Hi, baby girl! Long time no see. You baff up good.”

She smiled, a bit embarrassed, as she slunk into a free chair at his table. “Have you got it?”

“Of course.” He took a small, cheap black plastic phone out of his backpack and handed it over. “Locked and loaded. Fifty quid on it. Plus the fifty to buy it.” He watched as she swiftly stashed the phone in her handbag. “I s’pose it’s not worth asking what you want it for. A nice, well-brought-up girl like Rosemary Grace Oshodi? Ex Her Majesty’s armed forces. Ex la-di-da Posh Boys Investment Bank? You dealing or what?”

“You got it,” Rozie deadpanned. “The Queen’s got me pushing tea round the back of Windsor Great Park.”

“I don’t think that’s the lingo, fam. What programs have you been watching? I took time off work to get this for you.” He looked slightly pained, mostly teasing, and Rozie realized how much she had missed him.

There were three levels of cousin in Rozie’s life. In the outer ring were the family in Nigeria and America. Newly married Fran was among them, running a yoga studio in Lagos while her new husband, Femi, managed several of the nightclubs where Rozie and her sister, Felicity, had danced the night away on the wedding trip. In the middle ring were the Peckham crew, who grew up in South London, where she and Fliss were born. And then there were Mikey and his brother, Ralph.

They were the inner circle and Rozie thought of them more as brothers. Her mum and his had always been close. They’d moved together from Peckham to Kensington when Auntie Bea married Uncle Geoff. That was a cataclysm for the family. Uncle Geoff was not a member of the Church; he was not a native of Peckham; he didn’t speak Yoruba. And he was white. But he was a great artist and musician, he adored Auntie Bea, and when Rozie’s mum had uprooted her own young family to be with them, Rozie learned what love and loyalty meant. Growing up in the mean streets of Notting Hill, Mikey and Ralph had watched out for her and Fliss, and saved Rozie once or twice, before her self-defense skills matched up to her gift for sass.

He’d changed his hair, too, Rozie noticed: three sharp lines were shaved into a close-cropped cut. Rozie felt jealous. In her pre-army days, she was known for dyeing the top of her hair gold. Now it was back to its natural color and, despite the new cut, she missed the drama.

“Thanks for doing this for me. It’s good to see you, Mikey.” She took out her wallet and extracted five twenty-pound notes, withdrawn from the cashpoint outside the minimart in Kingsclere that morning. “Here you go.”

“Nice one.”

“How’s work?” she asked, breathing a bit more calmly.

“Scintillating. Yesterday I spent four hours in a windowless room talking about sales targets.”

“Ouch.”

“When I got promoted I thought it would be all minibreaks in posh hotels. Not four hours looking at PowerPoint slides in some rank basement off Earls Court Road. Then I get back to the store and this guy asks me about a smart TV that you can plug into your PC and play games off and stuff. So I spend half an hour explaining everything, then he actually goes on Amazon and orders it right in front of me on his phone. Right in front of my face! So he could save a hundred quid. Nice, man. You go right ahead and use me like a walking Wikipedia.”

“I’m sorry, Mikey.”

“Not your fault. I bet you at least go outside before you get stuff off Jeff Bezos.”

“I—”

“I’m kidding you. But you didn’t need me for that.” He indicated the cheap phone stashed in Rozie’s bag. “I mean, anyone can buy a pay-as-you-go phone. You could have got it yourself, you know.”

“I didn’t want it to be traced to me.”

“So you asked your cousin? Who works for PC World?”

“I was in a hurry.” Rozie knew it was hardly perfect tradecraft—but at least a call to Michael wouldn’t look unusual on her phone records. “You should be flattered I trust you.”

“With your burner phone.”

He raised an eyebrow and flashed her a grin. Rozie decided it was time to change the conversation. Mikey was studying for a part-time degree now, and had a girlfriend she’d never met, because they couldn’t afford to fly out for Fran’s wedding. She had so much to catch up on.

“How’s . . . ?” she asked, hesitantly.

“Janette?”

Was that the girlfriend’s name? She nodded.

“She’s cool. Always busy. You’d like her.”

“I’m sure I would.”

“And Fliss?” he asked. “She doing OK? How’s Germany?”

Rozie fought to keep her smile in place. Her sister’s recent move to Frankfurt hurt like an open wound. “She’s doing great. She loves it.”

It was true. Fliss worked as a family counselor and therapist. Last year she had fallen in love with a German on one of her courses. Her skills were in such high demand that she could work almost wherever she wanted, despite her rudimentary grasp of the language at the time—although by now, being Fliss, she was nearly fluent.

Rozie remembered how the world had spun around her the day Fliss told her of the plan. “But you got your new job,” Fliss had insisted. “Your fancy career. You’ll hardly notice I’m not here.” This was at Christmas, two months after Rozie started at the palace. The worst Christmas she could remember. The long and short of it was . . . she noticed. She also noticed that Mikey hadn’t asked just now if Rozie herself was hooked up with anyone. And he was correct not to bother: it was never going to happen. Not in this job.

Mikey was staring at Rozie’s hands and she realized she was fiddling with her car keys.

“I got one of those, too,” he said. “Fran sent it to me, to remind me of their perfect love.” With a sickly smile, he fished in his pocket and showed Rozie an identical key ring to the one she was using, featuring the heart-shaped shot of the happy couple on their big day. Rozie remembered the Mini. She made a face and got up.

“Sorry, I’ve gotta run. The car’s on a double red. Give my love to Auntie Bea. I wish I could stay, but—”

“Duty calls,” he finished for her with his best fake-posh accent. “Queen and country.”

She nodded.

Mikey pulled her in for a bear hug. “Give Her Maj and the Duke a high five from me.”

“Will do.”

Back in the car, Rozie thought of the phone in her bag, in the passenger footwell, like an unexploded bomb.

A burner phone! For goodness’ sake! She was turning into Jason Bourne.

She had discussed the idea with Aileen late last night, wondering how the “helpers” had coped without getting caught by their own Sir Simons, before the age of prepaid phones. It was easier then, apparently. The various residences were full of rooms you could nip into, unobserved, all with a landline you could use, and no one to say for certain who’d made the call. Not anymore. Smartphones were great, but you paid the price for convenience with traceability.

By now, Rozie had already done as much as she dared on her office mobile, which was the only one she had. If questioned, she could just about cobble together an excuse for each call she’d made so far, but any more would look beyond suspicious. And if questioned, she knew, she would never drop the Boss in it. She would take the rap, and then who would look like the sleeper agent to MI5?

She navigated expertly through familiar roads, past building sites, flash new blocks of flats and old ones dressed up in fancy cladding, mentally running through the list of calls and messages she needed to send before her first proper meeting. This was not the job Sir Simon had so graciously explained to her that glorious day in Buckingham Palace. She might joke about being a weed dealer to Mikey, but that’s how it felt. Rozie had tried all her life to do the right thing and stay out of harm’s way. Now . . . she was literally using her family to stay one step ahead of the Security Service.

No wonder the Queen had given her that strange look, that day in her office when she had first mentioned Henry Evans. She had known it would inevitably lead to days like this.

Westbourne Grove was not far from Ladbroke Grove geographically, but it would never have occurred to Rozie to meet Mikey here. Coffee shops adorned their midcentury modern chairs with sheepskin rugs, the single charity shop was full of designer castoffs, and all the independent boutiques set out to appeal to the ladies who lunched and lived in pastel-colored multimillion-pound houses around the corner. The number of black and brown faces among the white ones diminished with each passing street. From that point of view, it was a bit like being back at work.

Rozie found a parking space eventually—a proper one, this time—and checked her watch. Ten minutes to spare. She rubbed her hands with some shea butter and consulted the bright ankara notebook she had bought as a souvenir on a shopping trip with Fran and Fliss in Lagos.

After a few pages of bad poetry to put a casual reader off the scent, all information relating to the Brodsky case was captured old-style, in pencil on the notebook’s ruled paper, for fear of leaving a digital trace. Luckily, Sir Simon had no such concerns back in the office, and all the names, addresses, and contact numbers for people who had been invited to sleep at the castle that night were faithfully recorded on a spreadsheet the master of the Household had been asked to provide to the police. Rozie had accessed the file and copied them out yesterday morning. She called one of the numbers now (there had been no response yesterday) and spoke to a young man who agreed to meet her late in the afternoon. It would be her fourth interview of the day. Then it was time to head to Meredith Gostelow’s flat in Chepstow Villas.

The woman who met her at the top of the steps looked nervous and distracted. She was wearing an emerald-green floor-length robe above oversize retro trainers. Wild wisps of hair poked out of an extravagant red half turban. Her only makeup was a slash of matching red lipstick. But there were bags under her tired blue eyes, laced with traces of yesterday’s mascara, and she avoided Rozie’s gaze while ushering her in.

“Come this way. I haven’t . . . I didn’t know what you wanted.”

She led the way down a black-and-white tiled hallway to a small, untidy kitchen overlooking a shady garden.

“Tea?”

“Lovely. Whatever you’ve got.”

Meredith pulled a couple of spotted mugs from a shelf, fished out a couple of tea bags from an old dented tin, and sloshed in water from a kettle. Milk came from a fridge whose shelves exuded the odor of something long past its sell-by date. Rozie steeled herself for the interview to follow and was not remotely surprised when she felt something rub at her ankle and looked down to find a tortoiseshell cat staring back up at her with impassive green eyes. Of course the mad old bat would have cats.

The architect took a mug and wandered back down the hallway. Rozie picked up the second one and followed on, just in time to catch the emerald robe disappearing through an open doorway. She followed and stood . . . amazed.

The room was long and wide, with windows framed in lavish pink silk curtains. The walls were painted a delicate china blue, but they were almost hidden by a patchwork of paintings, lithographs, and textiles in mismatched frames; a vast antique mirror; and floor-to-ceiling shelves of books, immaculately arranged. Furniture was simple and geometric, but clearly expensive. A couple of console tables displayed collections of jade and little bronzes. The effect was breathtaking, and it was something to do with the hidden lights, the artful use of color, the way the eye was constantly drawn to different details, and the confidence and perfect finish of it all.

Meredith Gostelow simply did not care about kitchens, Rozie realized. Or making tea. She cared about entertaining spaces, and she was a bit of a genius at creating them.

“Excuse the mess,” she said, picking up a paperback from a sofa seat—the only object out of place—and installing herself among its comfortable cushions. The tortoiseshell came to sit beside her. Rozie sat down on the matching sofa opposite and put her tea on the table between them—itself a work of art in bronze and glass.

“This isn’t what I expected,” she admitted.

“Oh? What did you expect?”

“I don’t know exactly. I don’t know any architects. Something white and minimalist?”

Meredith sighed. “Everybody does. As if architecture stopped at Norman Foster. It’s so boring. What about maximalist? Clashing cultures, vivid memories. Isn’t it joyful? It’s what my clients pay me for.” But she didn’t look joyful. She looked bleak.

“Are you working on something at the moment?” Rozie asked.

“Several things, as always. Mexico . . . Saint Petersburg . . . You’re lucky you caught me in the country. I’m off to Heathrow at seven. Look, let’s get this over with, shall we? I assume you’re here about Maksim. Are you MI5?”

“Definitely not,” Rozie assured her, rather startled. “Quite the opposite, really.”

“You said you were from the Queen’s private office. . . .”

“Yes.”

“So who sent you?”

This was a perfectly legitimate question, and Rozie saw that she was probably going to be asked it quite a lot—if she was lucky to continue in the job beyond tomorrow. She needed a clever answer.

“Her Majesty.” There was no clever answer. All she had was the Boss’s magic dust.

“Bloody hell.” Meredith sat up straighter. “D’you mean it? Really?”

“Yes.” Rozie saw Meredith’s skeptical gaze transformed by wonder.

“Why does she want to talk to me?”

“I can’t answer that directly, but I can say that anything you tell me is in absolute confidence. She wants to know what Mr. Brodsky did after the party. I gather from the way you were dancing, you might have got close to him. Perhaps he talked to you that evening. Or did you already know him?”

The architect’s expression was a tangle of mixed emotions. Eagerness fought with wariness, then both were followed by something calmer. The planes of her face settled. She leaned back in her seat.

“No, I didn’t know him. As I told the nice policeman who questioned me after he died. We danced the tango, that’s all.”

“But it wasn’t all, was it?” Rozie asked gently.

“No, it wasn’t.”

There was a brief silence while Rozie wondered what to say. She thought back to Lady Hepburn.

“I gather it was an amazing tango.”

“Thank you.” Meredith took it as her due. “I learned it in Argentina. I thought so.”

“It was much admired.”

“The Queen wasn’t there, though, by then. She’d gone to bed.”

“True,” Rozie agreed.

“So why does she . . . ? Why does it matter?”

“I can only say it matters very much. She wouldn’t ask you if it didn’t.”

Meredith got up, walked over to a wall of artwork, then across to the window and looked out at the cherry blossom view. “If I tell you, do I have your word that it goes no further?”

“Did you kill him?” Rozie felt as if she was living in an alternate universe. How could such a sentence seriously pass her lips?

“No, of course I didn’t!” Meredith exclaimed. “This has nothing to do with his death. Don’t be ridiculous!”

“Then you have my word. No further,” Rozie said. She allowed the ensuing silence to fill the room.

Meredith stood for a moment, framed by the light.

“Do you dance, Miss—?”

“Oshodi.” She pronounced it like they did at home: O-show-dee.

“D’you dance, Miss Oshodi?”

“A little,” Rozie admitted.

“Well, I dance a lot. Not often, but when I do, I dance with my very soul. I studied ballet as a girl, took all the exams. I wanted to be a ballerina, but then, who doesn’t? Then I grew these”—Meredith gestured to her bosom—“and also too tall, and, and, and . . . We all have our excuses. I went abroad, traveled through South America, met a man. . . .”

Rozie nodded, but Meredith obviously thought she wasn’t paying enough attention. The architect’s voice resonated with intensity as she walked across the room and sank into a seat beside her visitor.

“He taught me tango. And, Miss Oshodi, I’m very good. I’d forgotten how good I was, over the years, trying again with different partners and never quite capturing the flick, the drama, the spark.” Meredith gestured with one arm and Rozie could well imagine her on stage, commanding an audience. “I gave up. My feet were still. And then there was Maksim. Of course he was gorgeous—everyone must have told you that. And he danced with these beautiful young creatures and they were perfect, but they didn’t feel the dance to their very souls, didn’t give themselves up to it entirely. And, I don’t know, Maksim must have seen something in my eye. He asked me onto the floor of that Crimson Drawing Room and I said no. How could anyone follow those ballerinas? But he insisted and insisted, and someone said something encouraging beside me and the next thing I knew he was holding me and saying something to the pianist, and whoever that was struck up a brilliant version of ‘Jalousie,’ and we were off.”

“I wish I’d been there.”

“I wish I hadn’t,” Meredith rasped. She got up again and started pacing the carpet. “That dance brought out the eighteen-year-old in me, and at the same time something ageless in Maksim. You’d think he’d lived a thousand years, not twenty-four, or whatever he was. You see? I don’t even know his age! We hadn’t even spoken during dinner. Even then, our bodies did most of the talking and, yes, when they say dancing is the vertical expression of horizontal desire . . .”

Rozie sensed where this conversation was heading, but couldn’t quite believe it. She fought to keep her expression neutral. Would it even have been possible in that place . . . ?

“You became very close?” she ventured.

“We became absolutely intertwined. You get very physical with the tango; together and apart. When he pulls you in . . . It was obvious he wanted me. Of course, I wanted him. I mean . . . it’s absurd, isn’t it? I can see from your face you think so.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“A fifty-seven-year-old woman and a twenty-something man. A woman like me.” Meredith glanced down disdainfully at her breasts and belly. Rozie had seen flair when she first saw the emerald robe and trainers, but Meredith only saw the three stone in weight she had put on since the menopause. She moved more slowly, ached more frequently, had to work harder every day not to feel invisible.

“I just meant . . . How did you do it? At the castle?” Rozie asked.

“Sleep with him?” Meredith’s smile was both wry and triumphant. “Have you ever had one of those moments, Miss Oshodi, when you absolutely need to be with someone, and it makes no sense and it’s probably wrong, but nothing else matters?”

Rozie swallowed.

“You know. You know! Well, Maksim and I both realized, on the dance floor, that this tango was just the start of something. We had to continue it. It was utterly, utterly mad and the most exhilarating feeling I’ve had in years. He whispered filthy things in my ear and when I whispered filthy things back, he laughed. He didn’t see our ages, my . . . this . . . it just didn’t matter. He asked where I was sleeping, and when I told him where the guest suites were, he said he’d sort something out. He had a word with that fabulously beautiful Peyrovski woman, who he obviously knew quite well, and I saw her smile and mutter in return. Then he told me he’d meet me in my room within the hour. Just to wait for him there.”

“Um, so it was your room you went back to, not his?”

“Yes?” Meredith said. She sounded puzzled, rather than anxious at being caught out in a lie.

“And did you go to his room at any point?”

“No, of course not! Mine was much nicer. I had this gorgeous suite with Regency furniture and I imagine he had a rabbit hole somewhere. Why would we go to his?”

“I’m sorry, I interrupted you. You went back to your room.”

Meredith nodded. “I said good night to everyone and ostentatiously went up on my own. I was sure the feeling would wear off as soon as I was alone, but it didn’t: I just fizzed. Here I was in Windsor Castle and every cell in my body was alive. I wanted to laugh and make love all night. I felt . . .” Meredith paused to find the right words, and bleakness stole back across her features. “I felt like me. Les neiges d’antan. Like I hadn’t done for a very long time.”

“And he came?”

Meredith threw Rozie a look and screwed her face into a smile. “You could say that. He knocked at the door about thirty minutes later. He was clutching a spare bottle of champagne. We drank some of it and, as you say . . .”

Rozie gazed down at the piled-up art books on the coffee table. She couldn’t catch Meredith’s eye. “Mmm-hmmm.”

Meredith laughed. “He stayed for about an hour. Or two—I have no idea. And that is all I am going to tell you. I hope it’s enough. His phone went at some point. A text. He rolled over and looked at it and reluctantly said he must go, and he did. I smiled and said nothing. I was certain I’d see him again. Not as a long-term lover, don’t misunderstand me, Miss Oshodi. I didn’t think it was the start of a beautiful relationship. A friendship, perhaps. But the next thing I knew, he was dead and it was all . . .” The bleakness was back. She looked hollow. “Over.”

“Do you know what he did while you went up to your room?”

“Not exactly. But he was wearing different clothes, come to think of it, when he came in with the champagne. A suit. I remember thinking it was a shame, because he’d looked so gorgeous in his dinner jacket, but then, he wasn’t wearing the suit for long.”

“Did you have the impression that he was meeting someone after you?”

Meredith sucked in a cheek while she considered. “No, not really. He might have been. He just said, ‘Don’t tell anyone about this,’ but he said it laughing, not as if he was ashamed, but as if he wanted it to be our secret.”

“Thank you for being so honest.”

“I know I should have told the police, but as far as I know those were his last words. And I didn’t promise not to tell anyone out loud, but in my head I did. I keep my promises to the dead.”

And yet she had told the story now. It was the Queen’s magic dust that did it. Rozie felt powerfully the trust that Meredith had bestowed on her. She didn’t see how it helped explain Brodsky’s death, but perhaps the Boss would spot something she had missed. She got up and thanked the architect once again.

“Actually, you’ve helped me,” Meredith said. “I couldn’t really make sense of it until I said it out loud. I thought I’d done a terrible thing and been punished for it, but really, it was lovely.”

Rozie smiled. “I’m glad.”

“Apart from the cystitis.”

There was a second’s silence while their eyes met and Rozie tried to bottle up the laugh bubbling in her throat, but she couldn’t do it. Then Meredith laughed, too, throwing her head back and hooting.

In the end they hugged each other. Meredith accompanied her guest affectionately to the hall. “God, imagine you telling the Queen about my sex life,” she said, opening the door.

“I’ll do it gently,” Rozie promised. “Only the salient details.”

“Do it with brio,” Meredith urged instead. “Do me justice. Don’t forget about that tango.”

10

The council meeting was long and dull. The privy councillors themselves, carefully chosen over the years, were a decent bunch whose wisdom and support had proved invaluable in difficult times. The Queen was a ruthless chairman who conducted the meetings standing up and never liked these things to overrun; but unfortunately there were myriad arrangements for the celebration of her upcoming birthday, and somehow they had found themselves on the council’s agenda. Really, all she wanted was a visit from the great-grandchildren, a few nice letters, and a decent ride in Home Park. Instead there would be the lighting of beacons; endless events of various descriptions, most of them on foot; and, on the official day in June, a service under television cameras at St. Paul’s Cathedral. One was used to it, of course. And glad of a grateful nation. But honestly.

Meanwhile, her thoughts kept straying to Rozie. Would she return tonight, as she had told Simon? When she got back, there would be a lot for her to do, and the Queen still didn’t know if she was ready for it. She had done well with Henry Evans, but that wasn’t unduly difficult. And if things got complicated, she might not have time to follow up on all possible ideas anyway.

There was always Billy MacLachlan, of course. After working on her protection team, he had made it to chief inspector. He had helped often enough before; and as well as being utterly discreet, he was hugely inventive. He was good at asking questions without anyone really remembering he was there. She knew he was finding retirement dull. He might appreciate a job like this. Even if Rozie turned out all right, he could always help. Something to bear in mind, at least.

Rozie’s next call was to the honey-toned bar of a bland, upmarket Mayfair hotel. She nursed a coffee in a quiet corner, behind a display of white orchids. The woman who arrived ten minutes later had attempted to disguise herself with mannish sunglasses, a baggy black hoodie, and a baseball cap; but anyone who knew her would instantly recognize the trademark pout, the sculpted jaw, and skinny thighs in Lululemon running gear.

Masha Peyrovskaya slid into the opposite seat and glanced back at a distant table where two bulky bodyguards were making themselves comfortable.

“You are the woman who called me?”

Rozie nodded. “I am.”

The Russian took off her sunglasses and stared at Rozie for a moment, tilting her head to one side. Rozie maintained her even smile for such situations. The one that said Yes, I am the lady from the Queen’s private office. Perhaps I’m younger than you expected?

“So,” Masha said eventually, with a tiny shrug. “I told them you were interviewing me for a blog about art.” She gestured back towards the bodyguards. “Make this quick. I need to be home in thirty minutes.”

Rozie had wondered how you make small talk with billionaires. Perhaps you just didn’t.

“All right. It’s about the night of the dine and sleep.”

Of all the visitors that night, Masha and her maid seemed to be the best acquainted with Maksim Brodsky. Rozie had arranged the meeting to find out if Masha or her husband could throw any light on what had happened to him. But now, she knew for certain that Masha was involved. She wanted the whole story.

“From what I understand, you knew Mr. Brodsky quite well. . . .”

“Quite well. He taught me piano.”

“You helped him that night.”

“I did not,” Masha responded, with a flash of challenge in her eyes.

Rozie waited to see who blinked first. She had played this game since primary school. “You say you don’t have much time,” she observed. “And I’m not asking if you helped Maksim; I’m saying you did. You arranged for him to see Meredith Gostelow without the castle staff and police finding out about it. And you saw him afterwards yourself.”

Masha blinked hard. She had been playing it cool so far, but now she bridled. “It’s not true!” she expostulated. “Who tell you that?”

“You called for him; he came.”

Rozie was fishing, hoping for a reaction, but this was not the one she had expected. Masha half stood, leaned across the table, and hissed in Rozie’s face.

“You know absolutely nothing! Did the old woman say it to you? She lies! She’s jealous! She thinks I sleep with Maks, everybody does. Even my husband. Do you understand? He could kill me!” She slumped back down again and started to scratch the table angrily with the stone in her magnificent engagement ring, muttering as she did so, “And yet I take a risk for Maks, as a friend, and for that bitch. Because they wanted each other. He was laughing; he was desperate. He said, ‘You can get me up there, to her bedroom, I know you can. Make it happen.’ And I did.”

“How did you manage it?” Rozie asked, more gently than before. This was a woman who needed to feel appreciated, she realized. She adapted her style to fit.

Masha’s eyes glittered. “I think of the plan in moments. I tell him to go back to his room and change into clothes such as Vadim might wear. Vadim is Yuri’s manservant. He wears smart suits—smarter than Maks’s, but your Queen’s staff do not know that, I think. Maks must say he is Vadim, and go to the bottom of the stairs leading to the guests’ sleeping quarters, where I will meet him and say to the servants I need his help. I give him some champagne I find. We go up the stairs together. Yuri is outside with his friend Jay at this time, smoking cigars and drinking port and talking about his space trip and all the things they talk about—”

“His space trip?” Rozie interrupted, unable to help herself.

“Yes. He wants to go into orbit. He has paid for a flight in two years’ time. It cost ten million dollars.” Masha looked at Rozie as if this was the most obvious, boring part of her tale, like saying Yuri wanted to get a puppy or a flight to New York. “But I did not know for how long they talk, and maybe he call for Vadim for real when he come upstairs, so I said to Maks I will warn him when Yuri comes to bed. And I did. That is all.” She practically snarled this last sentence.

“And Maksim took this as his cue to go back to his room?”

“I suppose so.”

“Wasn’t there a danger he might pass Vadim on the stairs? What would he have said?”

“That was his problem.” Masha shrugged. “He have plenty of time to think about it.”

“Did Vadim come, in the end?”

“Yes. Yuri was so drunk he could not undress himself.” Masha looked matter-of-fact about her husband’s inebriation. “But he did not call him for a while. He try to make love to me first.”

She maintained her deadpan look, as a challenge to Rozie, who deadpanned back. “I see.”

“I did not stop him. He came towards the bed and said all the usual things and quoted Russian poetry to me. Pushkin—do you know him?”

“Not really.”

“You should. Lermontov, also. I let him say those lines, and take down the straps of my nightdress, but then he look at me as if he is suddenly disgusted, and he turn away. That’s when he called for Vadim.”

Rozie had the odd feeling that she was somehow being used as a makeshift therapist by this hostile, angry woman. She wanted to reach out and take her hand and ask what was really wrong. Instead, she asked, “Do you think it was something to do with Maksim? Did he suspect something?”

Masha’s eyes blazed. “There was nothing! Why should he?”

“I believe you, but—”

“Yuri does not trust me. And yet he is surprised when I find someone who treats me like a human. But that is all I do. I play the piano with this man. Rachmaninoff. Satie. Debussy. We laugh, because he is kind. There is always someone in the room with us, always. Ask those men over there. They are with me every minute. If I was unfaithful, they would know. . . . I go now. I’m late.”

“Wait!”

Masha was getting up, putting her sunglasses on. “What?”

“Do you know anything about what Maksim did afterwards?”

“Of course not, I told you.”

“And Yuri?”

“He fell asleep beside me. Snoring like a pig. What else could he do?”

“Vadim—wasn’t he questioned about his trip to your room that night?”

“I guess so. I tell him to say to them he had gone up two times. I didn’t want the police talking to Yuri about it. One good-looking young Russian look the same as another in a servant suit, yes? Vadim is gay, so at least Yuri think I am safe with him.”

And with that, Rozie realized, Masha had outfoxed the protection arrangements for the overnight guests of one of the most guarded monarchs in the world, in a thousand-year-old castle bristling with tech and layers of top security. With a swish of her ponytail Masha turned and left, threading her way back through the tables, her baggy hoodie signally failing to hide her sexy strut.

It seemed hard to imagine that Yuri was not somehow behind what happened to Brodsky later, though if Masha was telling the truth, he couldn’t have done it himself. He might have ordered it beforehand. Would a man kill for a woman like Masha Peyrovskaya?

Yes, Rozie thought. A certain kind of man probably would.

11

The following morning Sir Simon was due to be in charge of the Queen’s office schedule, but she asked him to liaise with the Cabinet Office about a difficult diplomatic issue regarding the Sultan of Brunei, and so it was Rozie who came in to collect the boxes.

“I gather you were away yesterday,” she said, looking up. “I was very sorry to hear about your mother.”

“My mother’s absolutely fine, thank you, Your Majesty.”

“Well, I’m pleased to hear that.”

“I had quite a busy day in London. I wondered whether you might be interested to hear about it.”

The Queen was absolutely delighted. So the sick parent had been a ruse! She had underestimated Rozie. This prompted an idea, before they got down to business. “I wonder whether you might perhaps like to meet one of your predecessors—Aileen Jaggard. I sense you might have a lot in common.”

“I met her two nights ago, ma’am. Katie recommended her to me. And, you’re right, we do.”

“Ah. I see.”

The Boss’s smile lit up her face with girlish excitement. Rozie had seen it before, but never had it focused exclusively on her. She basked in it for a moment. It was difficult to be businesslike again, but Rozie knew they didn’t have much time.

“I had a conversation with Mr. Brodsky’s dance partner and discovered what he did that night.”

“Go on.”

Rozie recounted her discussions with Meredith and Masha, skirting over the sex but noticing that the Boss wasn’t remotely fazed by any of it, though surprised and at times amused.

“They were very generous with their time,” the Queen observed. “Do you believe what they told you?”

“I do, ma’am. I’m no expert, but they didn’t need to tell me anything. I think they wanted you to know the truth. Meredith swore me to secrecy. She wanted me to tell only you.”

“And you promised?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

The Queen frowned. “This makes things a little difficult.”

“Oh, does it? I’m sorry. I—”

“We’ll deal with that later. Go on.”

“I met up with the ballerinas after rehearsal. They didn’t really add anything to what they’d already told the police. One of them had met Brodsky before socially, but didn’t know him well. Again, I’m no expert, but I didn’t get the sense they were lying. They were both very upset at his death, understandably.”

“And the young man himself?” the Queen asked. “Apart from his penchant for tango, did you learn anything more about him?”

Rozie had tried. Late in the afternoon she had visited his flat in Covent Garden and talked to his flatmate, whom she had managed to contact on the burner phone. The flat was on the top floor of a building above a restaurant not far from the Piazza. It was a brilliant location, with windows looking out on the buzzing streets below and sounds of buskers and theatergoers wafting in on the breeze. The interior was basic, though, painted white and furnished with secondhand finds and badly made pieces from Ikea, untidily strewn with clothes and pizza boxes, smelling of musky men. It did not reek of offshore money and hidden bank accounts, as she had half expected it to.

Rozie had said she was from the Russian Embassy (warming to her role by now), keen to understand if Mr. Brodsky had any debts, such as rent, to pay, with a view to helping, if possible, in such difficult times. But the flatmate, Vijay Kulandaiswamy, assured her the rent was in his name, paid for by his job in the City. In fact, he was looking for someone to replace Brodsky to cover the extra costs, though he’d often paid those himself, too. Maksim had been hard up as long as he’d lived with him.

Rozie was surprised. “According to our records he went to an expensive public school.”

Vijay had laughed. “So did I. Same school—it’s how we met. But it doesn’t necessarily tell you much. He had the fees paid for him, I think. But that all stopped once he left. And whoever paid them didn’t hang around. Some boss or mate of his dad’s, I think. He didn’t talk about it much. I got the impression he was kind of grateful, kind of furious. He liked his life here and he loved the music, but he felt dislocated, like he didn’t really belong anywhere. It made him kind of restless.”

Maksim thought maybe one day he’d become a writer, Vijay said, but meanwhile he was trying to make it as a professional musician, supplementing his income with piano lessons and tutoring rich teens in maths and computing. He spent a lot of time on the Internet, as they all did.

No, Vijay hadn’t known he ran a blog, until the police told him about it. Maksim wasn’t a hacker, or super tech savvy either. You didn’t need to be, to teach secondary school computer science: the syllabus was still in the dark ages. Vijay had friends at work who were big tech guys, and they said he wasn’t remotely in their league.

Maksim hadn’t talked about Russia much, except in the context of Putin and his cronies. He was definitely political. Even at school, where he was a couple of years below, he was known for his rants about the suppression of opposition politicians in Moscow and the deaths of dozens of journalists. He was compiling a spreadsheet. Truth was a dangerous game in Russia, he’d said. “If a tree falls in the forest and there is no one around to hear it, does it make a sound? And if a journalist falls from a window . . . does anybody care?” He used to get pretty depressed about it.

At this point in their conversation, Vijay remembered he was talking to a member of the embassy and had clammed up. Rozie, too, had been jolted back to her cover story.

“Listen,” she had asked, “is there anyone else we should get in touch with? A girlfriend, for example? Did he have anyone special? Someone we should talk to about this unfortunate incident?”

Vijay had shrugged. There were various girls, but nobody who stood out. Maksim was a popular guy, but he had split up from a long-term girlfriend a couple of months before and he was too brokenhearted, and too damn nice, to get deeply involved again so soon.

“I miss him, you know?” Vijay had said. “I just . . . He was good to have around. I miss the sound of the piano. I miss the peanut butter running out just when I need it. I miss girls calling and having to tell them he’s busy because he isn’t interested. He owed me, like, a few hundred pounds in utility bills and stuff, and I just don’t care. He’d have paid me eventually. It didn’t matter anyway. He was . . .” Vijay sighed deeply, looking a bit lost. “Like I say—he was a good guy. No one deserves to go like that. He looked after himself; he seemed so healthy. I had no idea about his heart.”

It came home to Rozie then that a real human being had gone that night, not just a “case.” She didn’t know if envoys from the Russian Embassy gave people consoling hugs, but she decided that in this case they did.

Rozie reported the basics of this conversation back to the Queen.

“I was trying to find out who in Brodsky’s past, or his home life, might have wanted him dead,” she said. “Apart from maybe Mr. Peyrovski. But I didn’t find anything, ma’am. Unless you think I missed something?”

“No,” the Queen agreed. “From that point of view, I fear Humphreys is right, and the motive is here somewhere.”

“Sir Simon told me this morning that Mr. Robertson and Mr. Dorsey-Jones have been sent on leave and put under a sort of house arrest. That must be difficult for them.” Rozie remembered the Queen’s conversation with Henry Evans, and what she obviously felt about Humphreys’s theory.

The Queen merely nodded. “I imagine it is. I have another job for you, Rozie. Do you mind? I do understand this is not in your job description. It might mean working on your day off.”

“Whatever you want, ma’am.”

The Queen gave her swift instructions. The new girl was working out even better than she had hoped. She couldn’t be another Mary, surely? Mary Pargeter had been in a class of her own when it came to these little mysteries. But Rozie Oshodi—who was a good ten years younger than Mary had been when she started—promised very well.

12

Later, there was an investiture in the Waterloo Chamber. The Queen always enjoyed holding them at Windsor. Though the chamber was vast, dominated by portraits of the kings and statesmen who came together to defeat Napoleon, it was more informal than the ballroom at Buckingham Palace. Anything was more informal than the palace. Nevertheless, there was the appropriate pomp as she awarded honors to the great and good under the loving eyes of their families, attended by her Gurkha orderly officers and the yeomen of the guard.

After it was over, she was grateful for tea and a slice of chocolate biscuit cake in her private sitting room, while catching up with the racing results on Channel 4. Sometimes she liked to take a little nap before the evening’s activities, but today she had other things in mind. She asked the footman to warn the housekeeper of her plan. One could do what one liked in one’s own castle, but staff did not appreciate surprises in areas they considered their own. She gave them a few minutes to spruce things up.

It had been a while since she had last set foot in the attic corridors above the Visitors’ Apartments. She took the younger dogs, who were keen to have the exercise and padded along ahead of her, sniffing at doorways. The journey down the Grand Corridor, from the Private Apartments to the Visitors’ Apartments on the south side of the quadrangle, took a good ten minutes, going at dorgi speed.

She knew the main guest rooms well, popping in quite often to check on the state of the furnishings, or to ensure everything was in place for a particularly honored visitor. But the attics were another matter. They had once housed sparrows and a family of jackdaws, along with abandoned furniture and assorted Victorian fancy dress costumes. Philip had been instrumental in getting them cleaned out fifty years ago, when it became clear the family would be spending most of their weekends here. When one is the Queen, and one’s home is one’s castle, it comes with an awful lot of servants, and they need space. Servants, and guests’ servants, too, and other visitors who are not servants at all but are important to the running of the castle and can’t be housed in any of the other properties on the estate. The more rooms they made available, the more people it seemed they needed to make room for. And somewhere, they had found room for Maksim Brodsky.

The time had come: she wanted to see it for herself.

The top-floor corridor was whitewashed and hung with various Edwardian etchings deemed unsuitable for the downstairs rooms. Bedrooms were spartan and functional, recently decorated in greens and creams, with the odd touch of purple in a blanket or a seat cover. Philip, when he popped in to see the refurbishment, had said they looked like something out of a motorway hotel (how would he know?), or Gordonstoun, or—given the color scheme—Wimbledon. She wasn’t sure there was a problem with any of these analogies, though they had not been given as a compliment. Either way, visitors wouldn’t mind.

Along the way, she passed various chambermaids, footmen, and a fender smith, all busy with a task or on their way to one. One footman, carrying a covered tray, was rudely assaulted by the dogs but took it well, nimbly twisting out of reach with barely a break in stride. The head housekeeper, Mrs. Dilley, was waiting for her in the section of the corridor containing Mr. Brodsky’s room. To her left there was a door with a sign indicating a shower room. Behind her, the Queen could hear the sound of convivial chatter coming from another room. She was glad that whoever was inside was unaware of her presence: wherever she went all conversation stopped, and sometimes it was nice to hear the staff just being themselves.

“This is the room, ma’am,” Mrs. Dilley announced, leading the way. She inserted a small key to open the door with a push. It was a perfectly plain door, varnished a rather horrible fake mahogany color, and sporting the number 24 etched into a small brass plaque. There was a laminated-paper notice on the front, saying something about do not enter. The last time the Queen had visited, she was sure such rooms were locked from within using an old-fashioned bolt, if so desired, but many of the doors had stood open. The castle of old used to assume that the inhabitants would respect each other’s person and possessions, and it was rather cozy that way. Now, everyone assumed the worst, and doors closed with the click of a latch; valuables were safe, but the air of informality had gone.

Brodsky had probably known his killer, she reflected as she entered the room. Unless he left the door on the latch, he would have had to open it to him. Why do so in the middle of the night to a stranger?

Mrs. Dilley went to stand near the head of the single bed, waiting patiently while the Queen looked round. There wasn’t much to see. A small window to the right of Mrs. Dilley’s head showed only a thin grey patch of sky between open purple curtains. All the bedding and any extraneous objects had been stripped out. There was a bare mattress on a wooden base to her left, against the wall beside the door. Next came the wall with the window, under which sat a side table and a hard-backed chair. They faced a wall with a small chest of drawers missing half their handles (one must get that fixed). And in between, against the wall opposite where she was standing, was a narrow, modern wardrobe that stood open to reveal . . . nothing. There were no stains, no sign of life, or death, no sense that anything important had happened in this place at all.

The Queen stole a closer look at the open wardrobe door, whose D-shaped handle had housed the second knot. The whole thing looked flimsy—hardly strong enough to hold a man, never mind hang him. What sort of person would look at such a thing and think instrument of murder?

She cleared her throat. “It must have been very difficult for the housekeeper who found him.”

Mrs. Dilley looked up. “Mrs. Cobbold? Yes, awful, ma’am. She couldn’t get in at first. She had to go to the office and get the master key. Then she opened the door and there he was, right ahead of her with that cupboard door open and his legs sticking out. She nearly fainted. But she’s much better now, ma’am.”

Everyone always sought to reassure one. Except Philip: he was the only person she could trust to be perfectly straight. Back tomorrow, Sir Simon had told her. And not a moment too soon.

“I’m glad to hear it. Is she back at work already?”

“Oh, no, ma’am. Next week, possibly.” But Mrs. Dilley looked doubtful.

So, not as much better as all that. Well, not surprising.

“Thank you, Mrs. Dilley.”

“Ma’am.”

“I hope it hasn’t been too much of an inconvenience, with the police here at all hours?”

“No, ma’am. Just rather dreadful. For all of us.”

Mrs. Dilley caught the Queen’s eye and held it, woman to woman, and there was huge sympathy there. She knew how much it must mean to her, this tragedy so close to home. The Queen looked away and called to the dogs, who had been milling about in the corridor. They padded in now, circling her legs and giving the room a brief semblance of normality.

“Candy, Vulcan—time to go.”

The walk downstairs and back along the Grand Corridor seemed twice as long this time. She took it slowly. She was unprepared for the shock she felt, not by what had been in the room but what hadn’t been, which was any sense of the life that was lost. Brodsky had vanished from the world, it seemed, without a trace, and one felt somehow responsible.

Sir Simon would have told her not to go, had she consulted him, which was of course partly why she didn’t. He would have said it wasn’t necessary, which was quite untrue, and that it might be upsetting, which was so infuriatingly right. The thought of it pricked her, even though she had not given him the chance to say it. She batted it away. As Queen Mary had always insisted to her as a little girl, it did not do to dwell.

Instead, she thought about the door that could not be opened from the corridor without a key. Brodsky had been away until the early hours of the morning, so whoever he let in, or whoever came in with him, must have lingered until late to do him harm. A spy could have had a master key cut, she supposed. All part of this big plan Humphreys insisted on imagining. And yet the failure to tighten the second knot suggested it was an improvised attack. It couldn’t be part of a long-running feud, as Brodsky didn’t know anyone here. Nor did it seem likely to be based on sex. The young man had had enough of that downstairs and there were only so many unorthodox lovers one could take at Windsor Castle in one night. Even Philip would think so, surely?

And so . . . who had done it?

Not Putin. Gavin Humphreys was an imbecile with an obsession, and every bone in her body told her so.

Not Charles, who had gone back to Highgrove that night with Camilla. (She was trying to be objective and consider all possibilities, and Charles had after all arranged the evening.) Similarly, the provost of Eton had gone back to his house at the school, half a mile away. But Brodsky’s adventures with the architect woman had proved that, with a little ingenuity, it was possible to move between staff and guest quarters without impediment. At this point the suspect list became almost comic, including as it did Sir David Attenborough and the Archbishop of Canterbury. No—honestly, no. If one could not trust these men, one might as well give up.

Nevertheless, even excluding them, the range of possibilities remained disconcertingly wide. There was no reason to suspect the former ambassador, but it was not impossible that his life in Russia had created links to young Brodsky that she was not aware of. The police had uncovered no connection between the young man and the novelist or the professor—but Blunt had been an academic. Of course, most of them were pillars of the Establishment, but one never quite knew. . . . Then there was the architect herself—the woman who had danced the last tango. The Queen pondered for a minute, trying to create some kind of motive from what she knew from Rozie’s account, but everything in the tragic story suggested quite the opposite. The poor woman had been besotted. That left Peyrovski, his wife, his hedge fund manager friend, and their servants. This was where the police should be focusing, surely?

At this point in her walk, she passed a policeman guarding the entrance to the Private Apartments and in nodding to him the Queen was reminded of the madness of this location. If you were in day-to-day contact with a man you hated, for whatever reason, why choose the castle for his murder? True, within its perimeter, tight security—apart from around herself—was not an area of concern normally. Once inside, what guests chose to do with their staff, or each other, after hours was up to them. True, too, the perpetrator had got away with it so far. But it was the highest-risk strategy there was. Once foul play was discovered, every high-ranking detective and spymaster in the land was bound to descend on the case. Why strike here, when an enemy could do it so very much more easily in Mayfair or Covent Garden?

In that case, it made sense for the murderer to be someone who didn’t know Brodsky well—and that opened up the list of suspects back to everyone in and around the Upper Ward that night.

She had reached her own rooms at last, and sensed she had made little progress in her thinking at all. If anything, she had gone backwards, with more uncertainties than ever.

Something odd had happened the evening of the dine and sleep. Not during the event but beforehand. A memory lurked in the corner of her brain and tugged at it occasionally. As the dogs preceded her into her sitting room, it almost came back but was lost.

She made a mental note to ask Rozie for a full list of last Monday’s overnight visitors throughout the castle. And to chase the Russian Embassy for more news of Brodsky’s family. It pained her to think he had disappeared so completely from this life, having been so fully engaged in it—and had nobody to mourn him.

Sir Simon was waiting for her with a slim sheaf of papers to sign. At his elbow was a footman with a tray containing a tumbler, ice and lemon, a bottle of Gordon’s, and another of Dubonnet. She glanced at one with brisk efficiency and the other with a little longing. Five minutes more and then, for a little while at least, one could relax.

13

“Morning, Cabbage. Everything under control?”

Sitting at the breakfast table on Thursday morning, Philip looked as if he had never been away.

“I thought you were arriving this morning.”

“Got in last night. Quick dinner with some friends in Bray. God, you look ghastly. Have you been sleeping?”

“Yes, thank you.”

She tried to say it crossly, but he had such a grin on his face. There was always the hint of a joke in his eyes, unless he was furious with someone. He was perfectly dressed for the day, as always, in a check shirt and knotted tie. The radio was on, there was toast on the table again, and already it felt as if the place had come back to life. She couldn’t help smiling.

“Did you bring me the fudge?”

“Damn. Forgot. Have you seen the pictures of William and Catherine in the papers? Cover to cover, practically. I told William he’d enjoy India. Did you see them at that safari park with the elephants and rhinos? Lucky buggers. Beats sticking medals on breast pockets.”

The Queen refused to rise to the bait. “How was the salmon?”

“Bloody impressive. Caught four. I brought them down with me in an icebox. Thought the chef could do something with them for your birthday.”

“Thank you.”

“Mind you, they probably decided the menu six months ago.”

They had.

“But they can always change it,” he mused.

“Mmmm.”

That wasn’t going to happen, but she would think of something. She was really very touched that he had been thinking of her birthday. And that he had thought four large fish an appropriate present—which they absolutely were. Salmon was always being recommended for one’s diet. Good for the brain, apparently. And it was a nice reminder of days out by a fast-flowing river.

Companionable silence reigned for a while, apart from the radio in the background, until he looked up from his toast and said, “That bloody Russian. Tom said it was foul play.”

Philip’s equerry, Lieutenant-Commander Tom Trender-Watson, was good friends with Sir Simon and usually up to speed on all the details of the castle. He was also reliably discreet, thank goodness.

“Have they found the bugger that did it yet?” Philip asked. “I haven’t heard anything.”

“No, they haven’t,” she said. “The Security Service thinks it was Putin.”

“What? In person?”

“No. In the guise of a royal servant.”

“Bloody idiots.”

“That’s rather what I thought.”

“Have you got someone in mind?”

She stared into her tea and sighed. “Not exactly. The place was full that night, but I can’t see why anybody here would want to kill him.”

“Half the ladies would have wanted quite the opposite, from what I heard.”

“Mmmm. Yes.” She was tempted to tell him about Brodsky’s after-midnight shenanigans with the architect, but she knew he would love the story and share it widely with his staff who, equerry excepted, were bound to spread it like wildfire. At the moment even she wasn’t supposed to know about it, so she kept her counsel.

“Well, they need to sort it out sharpish,” Philip observed. “Does nobody any good, worrying about consorting with murderers. And, by God, it needs to be fixed before the press get their hands on it. They’d have a field day.”

The Queen, who knew all of this, merely obliged him with another “mmmm.”

“You should have a word with whatever police johnnie is in charge of it. Ignore Box. Putin! Pah!”

With that, he pushed back his chair and opened the paper. The Queen was, in equal measure, mildly infuriated by being told to do what she had been about to do anyway, and relieved that he was home, so she could be reassured by words like “Putin! Pah!”

He honestly kept her sane.

Ravi Singh was reminded, more than anything, of the time he won the Year Nine debating competition at school. His hands trembled slightly in exactly the same way, and he could feel his blood pulsing in his head. It was the only time he had been called in to see Mrs. Winckless, the headmistress, who lurked in a paneled office down a long, tiled corridor at the posh end of his grammar school’s rambling site. She had a bowl of flowers on her desk, he remembered: pale, mop-headed things he had subsequently learned to recognize as hydrangeas. And an electric-blue dress that encased a larger expanse of bosom than a teenage boy was entirely comfortable with.

The Oak Room, where the Queen had granted him an audience, was not the same as that paneled room, of course. It was bigger, and oddly shaped, owing to its position in a sort of tower. It had white walls, comfortable sofas, and a roaring fire, alongside unexpected details such as one of Her Majesty’s TVs. But the sense of meeting a powerful woman one was, without knowing exactly why, slightly afraid of, and feeling guilty, even though he had as far as he knew done something good, was identical.

I am the Met Police Commissioner, he reminded himself as he sat down. I have reached the top of my profession. She is not going to tell me off.

The Queen sat opposite him on a small sofa near a large, elaborate window overlooking the quadrangle he’d just come from. She was indeed all smiles and the offer of a biscuit to go with his tea. The dogs made themselves at home near his feet. He wasn’t in trouble.

He thought of the sharp look Humphreys had given him when he’d heard about the requested meeting. “Make sure you tell me everything. Word for word. We need to know what she’s thinking.” But the Queen, blandly polite, just seemed to want to catch up with the investigation in general terms. Which was only fair—it was her castle.

“Obviously, MI5 have their specialist checks going on, but the overall suspect list remains long, I’m afraid, ma’am. A lot of people had access to that corridor that night. Oh, you’ve seen it, have you? We’ve conducted interviews with all of them. Obviously, it’s difficult when you don’t want to let them know it’s a definite murder investigation. It also makes it harder to do a DNA match with the hair we found on the body. Obviously, once we have a firm suspect, we will.”

He realized he had said “obviously” three times. And he was perspiring under his jacket. Her Majesty was a lovely woman who hadn’t asked a single difficult question, but this was worse than doing the Today program on Radio 4.

“I’m sure you’re doing everything you can.”

“Of course, ma’am. Obv— I mean, we’re clearly focusing on the people who knew Brodsky or had Russian links. The manservant, who had the room next door; the maid; the ballerinas, though their computer records suggest their FaceTime alibi checks out. There’s a librarian who’s an expert on Russian history, but she lives in rooms halfway across the site. The archivist—well, Mr. Humphreys can tell you more about him, I imagine.”

“And Mr. Robertson? Is there any news of him?”

“Nothing yet, ma’am. Nothing certain. It turns out he does have an explanation for some payments that were of concern, but the investigation is ongoing.”

“I see. And is that all? Who else have you talked to?”

The commissioner consulted his notes. “The communications team was having a bit of a conference, ma’am, so there were about five of them visiting from the palace, plus those who already work here. Various staff who stay on a regular basis. A group of guests of the governor.”

“And my guests on the floor below.”

“They’re out of the picture, ma’am. You can’t get between the guest suites and the visiting staff quarters without passing two sets of security, and they didn’t see anything.”

The Queen gave him a smile which, if it hadn’t come from Her Majesty, he would have called playful. “Oh, there have been some rather surprising stories over the years, Commissioner. Philip was reminding me only this morning about a famous time when the French ambassador managed to smuggle a cabaret artiste up to his suite, disguised as a housemaid, for a bet.”

“Not this time, ma’am,” Singh assured her, making a mental note to share that one with the lads back at New Scotland Yard.

“Well, that’s a relief.”

The Queen knew that at this point it was her duty to tell him what Rozie had learned from Meredith Gostelow and Masha Peyrovskaya—but equally, Rozie had promised secrecy. The Queen felt this had been unwise. One never knew what one might be required to do or say. However, telling Mr. Singh anything would bring Rozie into the story—and ultimately herself—which of course one must avoid at all costs. If the commissioner was primed with the possibility of staff and guest shenanigans, perhaps he could find out for himself. For now, she graciously accepted his reassurance. “And is there any news from the embassy?”

“Ma’am?”

“About Brodsky’s family? Has someone come to take the body?”

Singh paused for a moment. Nobody had asked that question recently. “No, ma’am. I imagine it’s still in the morgue. Would you like me to find out what we know?”

“Yes, please. That’s very kind. And do tell me, how are the new stab vests working out?”

With that, following her lead, Singh pivoted on a sixpence and talked instead about the new uniform his staff had been issued, about which the Queen was remarkably well-informed. She misses nothing, he thought. Now, she reminded him of his great-grandmother Nani Sada, who was, if anything, more terrifying than Mrs. Winckless in her paneled office. But at least he could tell Gavin that she was happy with the way the investigation was progressing.

14

The block of flats was long and low, four stories of reddish-brown brick with matching balconies and modern plate-glass windows. It might have been built in the 1960s, Rozie thought, though she was no expert on architecture. It was not a prepossessing building in itself, but what marked it out was the view: beside the River Thames, overlooking the massive hulk of Battersea Power Station through the trees.

This was Pimlico, home to many an MP’s London pad, and an odd mixture of posh, stucco-fronted houses and postwar flats, like these. It would be about half an hour’s walk to Buckingham Palace from here, she reckoned. A nice one, on a sunny morning. And not a bad place to come back to, with that view.

She maneuvered a wicker hamper marked with Fortnum & Mason’s distinctive “F&M” from the back seat of the car. It had been a hair-raising drive from Piccadilly, racing through the morning rush hour traffic, knowing she had two deliveries to make and must still be back by three. A “day off,” in the Queen’s private office, really meant half a day, and lateness was not an option. She closed the car door with her knee, locked it with the key fob dangling from her fingers, and carried the hamper to the nearest entrance.

The inside door to flat 5 was opened by an unshaven man with salt-and-pepper hair, wearing baggy gym shorts and a sweaty T-shirt, with a towel around his neck. He had only answered on the third ring of the bell. At first, she was horrified to think how he had really let himself go, but then she realized he’d been exercising. This was encouraging.

“Mr. Robertson?”

“Yes?” He was staring at the hamper, which was as large as could fit in the back seat of the Mini and seemed out of place in the narrow communal corridor where she was standing, with its strip lighting, peeling paint, and missing carpet tiles.

“I’m here from the Private Office.” He would know which one. “This is for you.”

“What?” He rubbed the side of his face with the towel. “You’d better come in.”

She followed him across a little hallway that somehow managed to seem immaculately tidy despite containing two road bikes, a coatrack, several framed photographs, and a shelf of running shoes. The room beyond it was the kitchen, which was half the size of Meredith Gostelow’s in Westbourne Grove but had the benefit of uninterrupted views towards the abandoned power station’s iconic chimneys. Surfaces were white or stainless steel, and gleamed.

“Can I offer you something?” he asked.

“No, thank you. I’d better be quick.”

She put the hamper on the counter next to the sink and smiled at the royal page. “My name’s Rozie. I— The office wanted to give you this as a token of our understanding of everything you’re going through. I really must emphasize that it’s from the office. Not Her Majesty personally.”

Lady Caroline, in passing on the Queen’s message, had been very specific about this. Also, she must not apologize. One did not say sorry for the things one’s public servants, such as the Security Service, did in one’s name. That would be hypocritical and wrong.

Sandy Robertson rubbed the side of his head again, looking perplexed. “You must emphasize that, must you?” he echoed. His voice was deep, with a gentle Scottish burr, and very pleasant to listen to. Rozie imagined him offering drinks to the Boss, pulling out her chair, ensuring everything was just as she wanted it. He seemed the sort of person you would want to have around. “Well, let’s have a look at it.”

He unbuckled the hamper and lifted the lid. Inside was wine and whiskey, jars of thick-cut marmalade, and eau de nil–blue tins of shortbread and ginger biscuits. There was also a card, blank and unsigned, featuring a watercolor image of a white camellia.

Sandy looked up sharply at Rozie, who said nothing, then down again at the provisions. He ran his fingertips over a marmalade jar, picked up a tin of biscuits to examine it, and put it back again. Then he rested a forefinger on the card, without lifting it, and looked at Rozie again.

“The Queen Mother’s favorite flower, the white camellia. Did you know that?” There were tears in his eyes, Rozie thought.

“No, I didn’t.”

“My wife’s, too. I told her that once, seven years ago, when Mary died.”

“Oh.” Rozie did a rapid mental calculation. The Queen Mother had died in 2002—Sandy wasn’t referring to a conversation with her.

“Once,” he repeated, his finger still resting on the card. “Seven years ago. What a woman.”

Rozie coughed. “As I say, we at the office just wanted to . . . We probably shouldn’t have . . . but we—”

“Tell her thank you,” he interrupted, in his Highlands burr. “Thank you very much.”

Rozie found she had a lump in her throat. She nodded, unable to help herself, and said she had better leave.

Her visit to Adam Dorsey-Jones’s flat was slightly different. For this, she drove south of the river to a row of converted Georgian houses in Stockwell. There was no card with a white camellia this time, but the man in jeans and green woolen jumper who let her in reacted similarly to her protestations that the Queen was not involved.

“Of course she wasn’t,” he said. “You did this out of the goodness of your heart.”

“You could say that.”

“Well, thank you very much, assistant private secretary lady I’ve never met.”

“You’re welcome.”

“You’re very generous.”

Rozie fought not to grin.

He put the hamper on the coffee table of his art-filled living room and said, “You obviously don’t think that because I have a boyfriend who’s been to Saint Petersburg I must be a Russian spy.”

“I’m not qualified to say,” Rozie told him evenly.

“And yet . . . this hamper.”

“It’s just . . . from the office.”

He sat her down then, and told her about the two years he had spent on the digitization project he’d been put in charge of. He recalled his excitement at finding long-lost papers from George II, the nights he’d worked late to meet the deadlines they had given him, the fact he’d missed his boyfriend’s birthday party to go to Windsor Castle to get the final info he needed before giving a progress report to visiting dignitaries a fortnight ago.

“They won’t tell me what they think I’ve done,” he said, “but it’s obvious from their line of questioning they think I’m KGB or FSB or whatever it is. They seem to think if you like Russian literature you must be a fan of the Kremlin. I wrote my thesis on Solzhenitsyn. If you really want to see how they tortured the human spirit, read Cancer Ward. Jamie’s gallery specializes in early twentieth-century art, when the Russians were leading the way in abstraction and experimentalism. The revolutionaries hated it. They killed or exiled practically everyone, or just made their lives impossible. Doesn’t endear you to the Russian State. But what do I know?”

“This will blow over,” Rozie said. She knew she didn’t have the right to reassure him. She could see herself as a minor character in a historical analysis twenty years from now: the naïve figure from the palace who took pity on the spy. But she felt his bitterness at the way he had been summarily cast aside, and thought that could possibly be the greater danger. “I’m sorry.”

He looked across the coffee table at her. “Yeah. I do believe you are.”

On the way home, she listened to Radio 4 as she negotiated her way back through heavy traffic on Cromwell Road. The World at One was full of the latest sightings of the Cambridges on tour in India. Rozie couldn’t quite believe that in a couple of weeks she’d be seeing them in person at the castle, and probably hearing some of their adventures firsthand.

Among other news stories was a report about two City analysts found dead from cocaine overdoses. The journalist, her voice brimming with urgency, wondered, “Is recreational drug use in the Square Mile reaching a dangerous level? And how far are middle-class drug takers responsible for fueling the deadly trade that decimates communities in South America?”

But by now Rozie wasn’t listening. The reporter had named the two analysts: a thirty-seven-year-old man called Javier something who worked at Citibank, and a twenty-seven-year-old woman called Rachel Stiles, who worked for a small boutique investment firm called Golden Futures.

“Rachel Stiles” and “Golden Futures” were familiar names to Rozie: she had seen them on the spreadsheet listing all the visitors given rooms in the castle the night of the dine and sleep. The one the master of the Household had pulled together for the police and that the Queen had asked for. “Golden Futures” had stood out to Rozie because it seemed to hold so much promise.

And now, at the age of twenty-seven, the girl was dead.