“Oh, stop wasting time!” clarioned Lady Godiva. “Shalt ne ‘er get anything out o’ this sullen strumpet by being polite! Start torturing her, can’t you—didn’t they teach you anything in basic training!”

“I’m asking the questions, madam!” snapped Archie. “And I’ll e ‘en do it by the book—”

“ ’Tis all I’m asking! Here be weighty tomes enow on these shelves! So pile ’em on her—’tis called the peine fore et dure, in case you didn’t know—crush her soft silicone-injected flesh ‘neath their ponderous mass, and a’ll sing like any canary, I warrant!”

“She’s never got over being head girl,” murmured Kylie to Gilderoy. “Honestly, two minutes late for hockey practice and up they went on the strappado before prep., even the teenies.”

“Ai must say, divaine Godaiva,” ventured Gilderoy, removing the ice-pack from his head, “thet Ai think yur being just a wee bit unjooly hursh. Ai mean, she is a woman … not mai type,” he added hastily, “but ‘twould be a bit of a waste—”

“Hold thy false Scots tongue, rock-snatcher!” cried Godiva, and smote her forehead in instant remorse, flying to kneel at his side. “Ah, forgive me, gentle Ebby, I don’t know what I’m saying, and how’s thy poor sconce its hurt …, thou treacherous snake, thou! Ah, me,” she went on, pressing her temples, “I’m still torn every which way, and know not whether to love or hate thee … Get a grip, Godiva! Right!” she resumed, turning on Archie. “Back to basics … art thou going to squeeze this defiant broad or no?”

From which you gather that, once they’d got their breath back, our hero and heroine had turned their attention to the interrogation of La captive Infamosa, Clnzh, and the impostor—for while Archie, you remember, had learned the general outline of Operation Heretic during his nocturnal eavesdrop behind Frey Bentos’s arras at Thrashbatter, he didn’t know the detail of its later stages, exactly, or where La Infamosa and the impostor had been intending to go from here.

“That a Spanish network is already in place in the Borderland is manifest,” he had pointed out, “and the only way to uncover it and so secure our green and pleasant land from Continental bondage is to turn this gang inside out, right?”

No one was arguing with that, even Gilderoy, once he’d come to and had the position fully explained to him by Archie, with occasional passionate interpolations from Godiva, which, since they alternated between melting tenderness and bloodcurdling abuse (the girl needs help, no question), were of little service to a slightly confused highwayman with an outsize lump on the back of his head. He had got the gist, eventually, and realising that Scotland’s security, no less than England’s, was teetering on the brink, had agreed to join the home team, “which patriotic survice Ai embrace the more gledly for thet it bringeth me closer to embracing thaiself, mai divinity,” he had concluded, turning up his amber gaze to full voltage and giving Godiva’s white hand the ‘tash treatment. Her limbs had turned to blancmange at his touch, and she had addressed him as “fond heart” and “thieving swine” in the same breath, to the jealous chagrin of Archie, who had sought to tip the scale by whispering: “His first name—wait for it—is Ebeneezer, no fooling, E-B-E-N-eezer, would you credit it?” but to no avail.

Which brings us to the point where La Infamosa—now more modestly clad in a Newcastle United strip donated by one of the Charltons, who had had to be physically restrained from helping her to put it on—was snarling defiance at Archie’s questions. She was their only hope, for the impostor was incoherent wi’ boozer’s gloom, and no one could understand Clnzh’s jungle noises. Godiva, her heart hardened by years of disciplining idle juniors, besought Archie to get practical.

“Hang her by the thumbs o’er a lighted candle!” she pleaded. “It always worked on the Third Form—ask Kylie! Or let those ghastly monsters in the sauna work her over … nay, though, she’d just enjoy it … I have it!—a gym slip, two sizes too small and soaked in brine before a blazing fire, shall so shrink and pinch her corpuscles—”

“Do you mind?” protested Archie, banishing the thought of what this one would be like across the breakfast table, gorgeous poppet though she was. “Anyway, we haven’t a gym slip—”

“And precious time flies, while you play Mastermind wi’ her!” blazed Godiva. “Aye, while that stinkard chaplain o’ mine blows the whistle on us to his accomplices, and any minute now the maids in this godawful pot-house will be keening at our doors in Filipino, wanting to make up the room—”

“As to Bentos, no man travels fast or far who has fallen head-first into a Carlisle Corporation tip,” retorted Archie. “He’ll take hours to recover. Nor shall the help intrude—I put out a ‘Disturb Not’ notice—”

“That just inflames them, fool! Any minute now they’ll be beating the panels, whining ‘Ello-o-o … sorr-ee’ … Look, let me at her—just five minutes with a nice springy slipper—”

“If you want her to tock,” interrupted Gilderoy, “Ai suggest thet you stend beck, and let the dug see the rebbit.” He removed the ice-pack, winced, and rose to his splendid height, his matinee idol features aglow with modest confidence. “Ai hesitate to say it, but the fect is that oll wimmen are clay in mai hends, ez these ladies”—he coughed diffidently, indicating Godiva and Kylie—“ken testifay. One touch of mai lips dis-trects, a second confuses, a thurrd disorientates entairely, end a fourth brings the truth gushing forth laike a burst wotter-main—”

“Stop, stop!” cried frantic Godiva. “Thou’ldst not pollute thy dear, wondrous, lying, deceitful lips by contact wi’ that Spanish scrubber!”

“A laight epplication should be sufficient,” shrugged Gilderoy. “Of course, if it’s her chaildhood memories yur efter, ettitude to parents, deep subconscious stuff, it maight be es well if the ladies left the room—”

With a wild cry Godiva stopped her ears, Kylie gnashed jealous pearls in Infamosa’s direction, and Archie, outraged reproof icicling his eye-lids, bellied up to the debonair Scot.

“That’s enough of that sort of talk!” he began, and then added uncertainly: “You mean you can snog it out of her?”

“They don’t coll me the Scopalomaine Smoocher for nothing,” remarked airy Gilderoy, and stepping forward he stooped o’er the chair in which La Infamosa sat bound and helpless, her full red lips and Newcastle jersey palpitating before his electrifying screen presence. He smiled, imps of mischief semaphoring from his smoky eyes, and leaned down into over-the-shoulder close shot.

“We-ell, hull-o thair …,” he murmured, and even ten feet away Godiva felt her senses swim, while Kylie began to chew a cushion. “Hev’nt we met before … shurrly? St. Petersburrg … in the whaite naights? Rothesay … at the Fair …?”

La Infamosa gave a goofed whimper, heavy wi’ yearn and terror. “Gerraway from me,” she quavered faintly. “My muvver warned me … ow, Gawd! … naow, naow …! Oh, yes … yes pleez!”

“Ai’ve ollways laiked the name Infamosa …” His voice was like honeyed curtains slowly drawn. “Ai say … Ai think mai horse has kest a shoo … end not a smithy in saight …” His lips brushed hers gently, and she whinnied; a second touch, and she went rigid, eyes rolling ere they glazed over. Gilderoy stepped back, eyeing her keenly and taking her pulse as she glooped into vacancy, parted red lips upturned and flapping gently. Frowning, he gave them a swift peck, and her earrings began to rattle ere they crashed to the floor. By this time Kylie was face down on the sofa, beating it with her fists; Godiva, forcing herself to watch, muttered ’twixt clenched teeth: “I will be brave … it’s scientific … he doesn’t mean it … he hates it … he hates her … I love him … no, I don’t …”

“Raight,” said Gilderoy, appraising the besotted tomato, “thet was the tranquilaiser … now for the ten-second whemmy … Notebook end quill ready? Turrn yur becks, gurls!” He started to hyperventilate, flexing his moustache, seized La Infamosa’s lolling head in both hands, and with a velvet growl of “Yur maine, d’ye heer? Helpless in mai power, har-har! poor fluttering wee herry!” scrunched her lips with torrid ardour what time his foot tapped off the seconds. He desisted abruptly as her sable tresses gave a warning crackle, anxiously lifting her eyelids and sighing with relief.

“Hev to be careful,” he explained. “Too much, end they nivver come beck. There’s a widow Ai met in the snake-house at Corstorphine zoo … poor women still thinks she’s Cleo-petra … Aye, this one’s well away. Oll set? Heer we go!” And while Archie stood by wi’ quill, Gilderoy began merciless third-degree:

Q: Yur name is La Infamosa?

A: Naow, it’s not. I’m Busty Basset.

Q: Thet doesn’t sound very Spenish!

A: It ain’t. I’m from Catford.

Q: Then whair’s La Infamosa, for hivven’s sake?

A: ‘Ow the ‘ell should I know? I’m a temp.

Q: A temp? But, crivvens, how came ye in Dago employ?

A: Yer, well, I used to be in show-biz, see, wiv a troupe o’ lady wrestlers, Bess of ‘Ardwick’s Peeling Belles (gerrit?) an’ Master Burbage ‘ad us in ‘is all-girl production of As You Like It, an’ I was Orlando, an’ my mate Doris was Charles the Wrestler … ‘ere, we didn’t ‘alf pack ’em in—

Q: Fescinating … but how came the Iberian connection?

A: Ow, well, the boy-players picketed the Globe, the rotten little poofs, an’ the show got took off, an’ Bess booked us a club tour on the Costa del Sol, wrestlin’ in mud, mostly, but some-times in syllabub an’ negus—dead kinky, those Dons are—yer, we ‘ad a tag match in cointreau, even, an’ that finished us, ‘cos we got pinched by the Inquisition for not ‘avin a liquor licence—

“She’s delirious!” interrupted Archie. “Thou’st o’erdone it, man, and struck her natural!”

“Oh, peace! Tho’ it be drawn from thee wi’ trem-caurs!” hissed Gilderoy. “Ai’m probing, demmit! Go on, hen, whit then?”

A: Well, they said if we didn’t agree to work for Escurial Intelligence we’d go to the stake for indecent exposure. They said I ‘ad to impersonate La Infamosa an’ go to England wiv this fruitcake wot looks like the King o’ Scots, an’ meet up wiv Frey Thingummy. “An’ if yer don’t,” sez the Inquisitor, “it’ll be fryin’ tonight for yore mate Doris, ‘oo remains in the clutches o’ the ‘Oly Office” … ‘Ere, why you askin’ me all these question? Where am I …?

“She’s coming out on’t!” shouted Archie. “Haste, man, give her a booster shot!”

So fast did Gilderoy react that the sharp splunch! as he locked his lips to Infamosa’s drowned out Archie’s final words, nor did he de-couple until her expression had resumed its dead-halibut vacancy. Sweat stood in shapely beads on the Caledonian Casanova’s splendid brow, and his vocal cords thrummed with relief.

“Bai jove, just in taime—but Ai daren’t do it again!”

“Ye mean ‘twould damage her permanently?” cried Archie.

“Not hur—me! She must hev been living on gurlick, dem-mit! ’Tis laike kissing the population o’ Marseilles!” He resumed his interrogation with the speed of a pattering comedian.

Q: End whair was Frey Thingummy to take the impostor?

A: Eh? Wot’s an impostor?

Q: The fruitcake who looks laike the King o’ Scots, thou Ketford dumbo! What was his schedule?

A: Ow, yer … me an’ Frey Dooda ‘as to tike ‘im to a command bunker where there’s a wizard ‘oo’s goin’ to organise some caper called Operation Jimsnatch … but I don’t know nuffink abaht that …

Q: Keep tocking, gurl! Whair’s this commend bunker?

A: Not shore … funny name … somefink like Ealing … underground …

Q: Underground? Ealing? Not Hounslow, or Urls Court?

A: Naow, silly! It was Eel-somefink …

Q: Ecton? Hemmersmith? Boston Mennor?

A: Naow! Ow, I dunno … that’s me up to date … I’m tired … ‘ere, where’s that lovely big Scotch geezer ‘oo kissed me …? More, more …! Signin’ orf now … over an’ aht …

And she relaxed comfortably in her bonds, smiling blissfully and singing “Amazing Grace” in a dreamy whisper. Gilderoy shook his handsome head and gave his chin-beard a resigned pluck.

“Thet’s our lot, Ai fear … she’s in a trence, and won’t come round for hours, when she’ll be medly in love wi’ me.” He sighed. “Et least we know the impostor hes to be taken to some station on the Piccadilly laine.”

“Nay, ’tis not open for another four centuries,” quo’ dubious Archie. “And yet … she said ‘underground’ …”

“Well, it ken’t be the Glesgow system—she’d have mentioned the smell …”

“… and ‘wizard’ … and ‘Eel-somefink’ …,” mused Archie, and suddenly (since it’s his turn to do something clever) cried: “Of course! Eildon! Wi’ it’s well-known underground cavern, home to wizards and kindred warlocks! It fits! Bingo, i’ faith!” At which Gilderoy lit up, comprehending, and they slapped each other’s palms wi’ cries of “Right on!” and “Yay!” and “Ma main man!” and other of those sickening expressions of mutual congratulation to which the Elizabethans were so regrettably prone. Then they did a re-think.

For while they knew the rendezvous, other problems loomed, e.g., if the trance-induced Andalusian type was indeed Busty Basset, lady wrestler, where was La real Infamosa? For that matter, who was La Infamosa? And such was the Machiavellian subtlety of thought process among Tudor agents that they even started to shoot suspicious glances at Kylie and Godiva, who, their shared jealousy having subsided now that Gilderoy had stopped his osculatory interrogation of B.B., were resuming their debate about Kylie’s borrowing Godiva’s evening kit, with recriminations going back years to disputed tennis rackets, lipsticks, sweets, copies o’ Buntie, underwear, and boyfriends, and cries of “Did!” Didn’t!” “Beast!” “Pig!” “Up thine!” and “Sucks to you, too!”

“Neither sounds as though she could be La genuine Infamosa,” said Archie. “Nay, what am I thinking of! My beloved Godiva, a Spanish agent? ’Tis not on!”

“ ‘Twould be a cunning twist o’ plot,” mused Gilderoy.

“At this stage o’ the story? Nay, too complex by far—no author would dare!”

“True,” quo’ Gilderoy, “end Ai’ve just remembered something that proves their innocence beyond doubt. Neether of them,” he said impressively, “tasted of gurlick.”

“Thank God! That settles it! Mind you, I never seriously suspected Godiva … and blondie’s a non-starter—bright, but no conspiracy cred …”

“Ai concur. Cute, playful, but not intrigue-smert …”

“Except in amorous carry-on and Cupid’s arts, I daresay …”

“Not even in delliance. Leads wi’ her teeth … Ai’ve got the marks to prove it …”

“So,” reasoned logical Archie, getting back to basics, “if neither of them is La Infamosa,* and this Basset is mere stalking horse, ’tis plain that the authentic Sevillian Seductress is still out there somewhere, probably conspiring away like crazy—”

“Cogently reasoned, Noble!”

“—and that louse Bentos isn’t going to take for ever to get cleaned up and back on track. Which means,” and here Archie’s handsome features hardened into a fair facsimile of the Boulder Dam, “that we must penetrate this nest o’ Dago mischief ‘neath the Eildons wi’out delay, for while by capturing yon recumbent lush we have snootered Operation Jimsnatch, ’tis vital that we squelch this Wizard and his gang before they can take off and do this sceptred isle some new despite—”

“Laike for instance?”

“How do I know? Metrication, political correctness, female clergy, changes in the offside law, Bishops in your own ghastly Scotch Church—who can say what subversion their foreign malice can devise? Nay, in the boot must go, and speedily—”

“But wi’ what means? Scottish Commend won’t listen to me, now thet Ai’m off the strength—”

“No time ha’ we to enlist official muscle—and they’d just foul up, anyway,” insisted the sturdy English ace. “We alone must work it—and cop any gongs and credit that may accrue.” His reckless fighting smile briefly illuminated the apartment. “Look, this Wizard expects La Infamosa and the impostor to roll up any minute at the Eildons, accompanied by Frey Bentos, doesn’t he? And so they shall! Two can play this impersonation game, and there”—he flung out a determined finger at Godiva, who was now perorating on the subject of her favourite rag-doll, allegedly lost overboard when Kylie tried to teach it to swim during a royal water progress on the Thames—“is an Infamosa shall con these Spaniards stupid!”

Heroes seldom goggle, but Gilderoy managed it. “Ye’d hev mai adored goddess penetrate enemy HQ disgaised as the Granada Gorgon? Ye care not, do ye? Heer, but hold on—we ken’t pess off a bogus Bentos on them, well known to them as he must be—”

Archie borrowed the goggle briefly, then brightened. “You can say he sprained his ankle, or his tonsure, or something—”

“Ai ken say?” Gilderoy snatched the goggle back, distraught. “What d’ye mean—’Ai’?”

“Someone’s got to impersonate the impostor, haven’t they? Well,” Archie pointed out, “certes it must be someone wi’ a Scotch accent and all the patter, able to converse at need on haggis prices and Stenhousemuir’s promotion prospects—”

“But, demmit, Ai’m six two and splendid of mien, and anyone impurrsonating Jolly Jim—or his double—must needs be a shilpit wee bauchle wi’ a face laike a ruptured bunion! Anither thing—the men tocks laike a keelie, end shembles end slavers most scunnersome—”

“Bend your knees and wear false whiskers,” Archie dismissed. “Anyway, ’twill be but a brief imposture, just long enough to get into the cavern, case the layout, distract their attention, and as soon as thou’rt spotted, cry ‘Geronimo!,’ whereon the Charltons and I, lurking without, will sally in and o’erwhelm them, capture their secret files before they can be shredded and so wrap up their whole British network!” Visions of honour and glory flickered in his honest eyes with subliminal speed. “Golly, I could get a K out of this … and a few bob, I trow … perhaps an estate in Kent from a grateful monarch … oh, well, on Wearside, anyway … and then … ah, then …!”

The homely grey of his irises took on a rosy tint which would have made him look like Dracula had his fair face not been shining with nobility. “Then,” he glooped reverently, “then I can woo my sweet Godiva on equal terms—well, pretty equal … make her Lady Noble … open a joint account … and who knows, perchance,” he went on, blushing slightly, “the patter of tiny Nobling feet … Godfrey, after her, and Samantha, because it’s such a pretty name, don’t you think? And why are you coughing in that sardonic manner?”

“Just a mainor point.” Gilderoy’s tone was of soufflé lightness. “You’ll hev to tock her into this Infamosa imposture furst. Shell we join the ladies …?”

And while they do, let’s quit the torrid atmosphere of the Priest’s Hole Suite (Sir John Harington hadn’t got round to air conditioning yet) and catch up on something we should have checked on ages ago—remember we speculated idly a few pages back on what the opposition might be up to? Yes, it’s all very well our hero scheming brilliantly and getting gung-ho, but if he could have seen what was happening ‘neath the dreaded Eildons he’d not only have lowered his voice, he’d have resorted to sign language, for the devildoms of Spain are firing on all cylinders … or will be as soon as the cauldron technicians have got the thing working again …

“ ’Twas that damned pygmy of Bentos’s!” The Wizard’s skeletal features were contorted by rage into a knife-grinder’s dream. “Well I wotted the little bugger wasn’t house-trained when he tried to drink my cauldron—and then he had to swim in it, yet, polluting its precious magical fluid with his Amazonian smells and microbes! Look at it!”

He gestured bonily at the cauldron, which had been detached, wi’ infinite labour and grunts of “Doon your end, Wullie!” from its bed in the basalt conference table, and now lay apart in a tangle of cables and micro-circuits covered with cabalistic wiring directions, while a party of small Scottish warlocks in overalls peered glumly at the liquid’s blank surface and agreed that by rights they ought to drain it down to get at the control unit.

“Is’t no’ under guarantee, whateffer?” hiccoughed Lord Anguish, who, with Don Collapso, had been summoned to a final briefing on Operation Jimsnatch. (Just in time, weren’t we?)

“How can it be, Scottish sot?” hissed the Wizard. “ ’Tis a Spanish model, brought hither by secret ways in crates labelled ‘Banana spares—do not bend’ and assembled by Escurial experts who, alas, are now sunning themselves on the beach at Malaga while these local cowboys,” and his crackling glance shrivelled a couple of warlocks into smoking puddles on the stone floor, “talk of draining and unobtainable parts! I feared the worst when it started to show repeats of old autos da fe, and now they tell me it hath a virus in its memory! Aye, a Clnzh virus! Just when our plot is ripe, and I wait helpless for a sight of Bentos and La Infamosa!”

“Shoulda been assembled in Espana,” opined Don Collapso, smacking liver lips o’er his ortolan sandwich. “These assemblee keets are nevaire reliable, weeth thair Japanese een-stroctions.”

“Got any lizard entrails, jimmy?” inquired the warlock foreman, and the Wizard, having briefly turned him into a toad and thought better of it, snatched a flask from his work-bench and thrust it impatiently into the other’s hand. “Ta. Noo, let’s see … crivvens, this is weel past it’s shelf-life … ‘bottled in Taiwan’ … jeez, it’ll be yin o’ they Gobi lizards … Aye, weel, Ah’m no’ promisin’ nuthin’. Stand by wi’ the newt’s gall, Wullie … jist a wee drap, mind, when Ah intone the magic word ‘Dalgliesh’ …” And he began to chant on a rising note:

Bogle’s blood an’puddock’s feather,
Banshee virus, stint yer blether,
Belial’s granny, Hecate’s mither,
Cauldron, get yer act thegither!

The greenish liquid began to froth and bubble, the cauldron vibrated as the warlocks clung to keep it upright, the Wizard’s eyes glittered with baleful hope, Lord Anguish gulped a nervous Glayva cocktail, and as the word of power was spoken and the newt’s gall infused, the troubled surface calmed as though by magic (well, that’s what it was, after all), dim shapes writhed in its depth, and it needed only a supplementary spell from the foreman (“Go on yersel’, McCoist!”), and suddenly the face and figure of Frey Bentos came into clear view.

“We ‘re the wee boys!” exulted the warlocks, but the Wizard and his companions could only gape appalled at the limpid screen, until:

“Whit the hell’s he daein’ in a washeteria?” belched Lord Anguish.

“Een hees long Johns?” wondered Don Collapso.

The Wizard gave a screech which could only be described as eldritch. “He’s doing his laundry, the Dominican dope! While the fate of Europe lies i’ the scale, he labours on his turnout wi’ poss-stick and Ariel! Why?” He knew nought of the cleric’s immersion in the corporation tip, of course. “Nay, but this shall cost him a few de-merits! Happily,” he continued, stabbing buttons and muttering spells, “La Infamosa knows her duty, and is doubtless hasting us-wards even now, with the impostor in tow … see, gentlemen, there she is … uunnghll!”

His words died in a stricken gulp as into view swam Busty Basset, chairbound in a Newcastle jersey and sunk in beatific stupor; the comatose figure in tweed trunk hose was unmistakably the James VI substitute, and in the background Clnzh could be seen sullenly eating a potted plant. Lord Anguish did a bleary peer.

“That’s them, a’right … aye, inna Priest’s Hole Suite—I mind we had a St. Andrew’s bash there a coupla years ago—”

“Silence!” grated the Wizard, adjusting the remote control to take in the whole chamber. Something, he was thinking, has come grievously unglued … but he wasn’t a double first (Intrigue and Necromancy, Salamanca) for nothing, and even as he lamped the four other figures in the chamber, his talonish fingers were activating the cauldron’s identification banks, and his gimlet glare was scanning the parchment print-out:

“Noble, Archibald, English agent and hero (00 classification), b. corporation almshouse, Haltwhistle, 1572 … Gilderoy, Ebeneezer (repeat, Ebeneezer, true fact!), Scottish agent, amorist, part-time highwayman, b. Gorbals, 1571 … Dacre, Lady Godiva, English aristocrat, Sloane Ranger, and knock-out (wow, check those buns!) …” At this point the parchment began to scrunch up and whizz fast-forward until the Wizard put it on pause with a timely curse. “…  b. Mayfair, 1577 … Delishe, Kylie, English court groupie, Dacre confidante, pushover, b. Nether Wallop, 1578 …”

There was lots more, of course, for the Spanish intelligence service were gluttons for gossip. Thus the watching trio learned that Archie, working under cover in Cadiz in ’88, had actually travelled home aboard the Armada, spending the whole voyage hiding in a sack of lentils, as a result of which the crew of the flagship Santa Mañana were disabled by digestive upsets; that Gilderoy’s uncanny power over women was attributed (by a Jesuit psychiatrist) to porridge and his curious accent, the latter being a consequence of his removal from Gorbals to Giffnock in infancy; Godiva’s vital statistics, over which Don Collapso drooled in lecherous disbelief; and the inside story on Kylie, the gardener’s boy, and the jammed zip fastener, of which the headmistress had written in her school report, “I wolde nott sullie this faire page nor thy decent minde, honest parent, with more fuller disclosure, but do assure ye her pockett monie is stoppt!”

The Wizard’s lips tightened, Don Collapso’s eyes bugged, and Lord Anguish’s tartan trews paled as they read. Then the Wizard summed up.

“Woe, woe, and thrice woe!” he exclaimed. “We’re rumbled. Yet shall this work to our advantage, for see, these heretic swine who have, by some mischance, put the mockers on our vital operatives, will suppose themselves i’ the driving seat. Little do they know,” he cackled, blue sparks flying from his white locks, “that we are now privy to their conference, and will learn all that they intend! List, oh list, for now cometh the good stuff …!”

They craned over the cauldron, where our four were plain to be seen, Godiva in full haughty harangue, Kylie agog, Archie trying to get a word in, and Gilderoy observing his efforts wi’ sardonic complacency. The Wizard gave a strangled yelp.

“There’s no sound on th’accursed thing!” he cried, and the warlock foreman sighed, put down his mug and his E’entide Tymes, rose, peered at the cauldron, gave the Wizard a withering glance, and said: “Ye’ve got it on mute.” Patiently he murmured a potent charm (“Shankly for King”), the mute button clicked off, and the dank cavern walls reverberated to a Benenden contralto raised in passionate protest …

“… and besides, I don’t speak Spanish!” stormed Lady Godiva.

“You don’t need to! She can’t either!” insisted Archie, indicating the unconscious Basset. “Well, not beyond a few elementary phrases, like ‘Split, girls, it’s a raid’ and ‘Not guilty, alcalde,’ I imagine. She’s as English as we are—”

“As you, possibly,” observed Godiva tartly. “There are distinctions, don’t you agree?”

Archie ground impatient teeth. “Do me a favour! The point is she comes from Catford, so the Eildon conspirators will expect her to converse according, wi’ a Cockney accent—”

“Catford? Cockney?” Godiva’s slender eyebrows shot north and vanished into her crowning glory. “What, am I to go abroad crying ‘What cheer, gossips’ and ‘Stone the crows’ and asking for jellied eels—whatever they are? Doubtless,” she sniffed daintily, “thou’dst have me push a barrow into this Eildon place, calling ‘Chairs to grind!’ or ‘Any old whelks?’ ”

“Or singing ‘Knees Up, Goody Browne,’ ” suggested mischievous Kylie.

“Since you seem to know the words, hoyden,” snapped Godiva, “do you play the part—marry, aye, ye have all the brassy vulgarity for’t!”

“She’s not tall enough!” Archie adopted a winning wheedle. “Nor has she thy queenly presence, thy command, thy style—”

“Thy honest bulk,” murmured Kylie.

“—thy wit and resource,” said Archie, hurriedly getting between them. “Nay, dear lady, anyone can do the ockney-cay ackchat-bay, honnist, swelp me gorblimey Ginger yore barmy, innit? ‘Ah’s abaht it, gel?”

“I’m sorry,” said Godiva coldly. “I don’t speak Danish either.”

“Ekshully,” interposed Gilderoy, “the eccent’s immaterial. Oll you people south of Gretna sound aidentical to outland ears—”

“Dare ye suggest,” iced Godiva, “that I sound like that nasally challenged slattern yonder?”

“Nay, sweet nobility!” smoothed the M₇₄ Lothario. “To me thay speech is laike no human vice, but rather as faerie musick that whispereth in Ercady.” He stooped to ‘tash her limp fingers, and Godiva wilted, murmuring, “Ah, fond blackguard,” at his touch. “Ai simply meant thet the Wizard won’t know the difference, espeshly if ye swathe thet swan-laike neck in a woolly muffler end say ye cot a chill on the Aisle of Men ferry, so ye may speak i’ thet sexy whisper that churrms mai senses quaite. Ai only hope,” he added, giving her the wistful amber, “thet Ai can shemble and slobber convincingly maiself … ah, but with thee et mai saide, how ken Ai fail?”

Love and hate wrestled in Godiva’s senses. “Thou’lt shamble and slobber like any Apollo,” she husked, “thou dastard rotter!”

“Gosh, what a team you’ll make!” enthused Archie. Jealous as sin, he yet recognised that Gilderoy’s line of oil had won her compliance, and quickly got executive before she could change her mind. “Now, then, I’ll just run through it all again from the top …” And vibrant of voice, reckless of smile, resolute of hair with confidence fairly rippling from ear to ankle, he repeated his plan …

 … while in the shadowy depths of that ghoul-haunted cavern below the Eildons all was sinister activity, Don Collapso and Lord Anguish ordering up mini-brooms and horses, and the Wizard listening in to Archie’s every word, chuckling full malevolent as the warlock foreman turned up the cauldron’s volume with the dread conjuring words “Firhill for Thrills” …

* Author’s guarantee: Lady Godiva is not La Infamosa. Neither is Kylie. Honestly.