With a troubled teenager on her hands, Scotland’s richest woman stakes her fortune on defending the slander and libel charges brought against her by two ordinary women, the schoolteachers Miss Pirie and Miss Woods. In fact she takes a certain sadistic pleasure in it. Is she shrewd or foolish to refuse a settlement? “What do you mean I’ve only got the second best solicitor in the country? Get me the first!” To prevail, Lady Gordon of Gordonstoun must now match wits with high court justices, seasoned advocates and even her own wily granddaughter, Jane—adversaries with stakes every bit as high as her own.