She even believed them, or at least believed that he believed them.

What he meant by them was another matter.

Marriage had never been part of their arrangement. Just because she now yearned for it, wanted it—and not just because he got along so well with her brothers and had the wherewithal and character to guide and support them precisely as she’d always wished—just because she now realized that marrying him would satisfy every dream she’d never allowed herself to have, she couldn’t now turn back the clock.

Couldn’t now expect him to think in those terms just because her eyes had been opened. Shouldn’t be so naive as to read too much into a simple declaration of love. Pretending to herself would be the ultimate folly, the ultimate way to break her heart.

When Bertha returned at one o’clock, she rose, washed, and dressed. Calmly serene, she went downstairs and threw herself into the social round.

A note arrived from Christian Allardyce just as Tony was about to embark on another round of balls and parties at Alicia’s side. Also gathered in his front hall waiting for the coach to be brought around were Adriana, Geoffrey, and Miranda. Lady Castlereagh’s was to be their first port of call.

Tony scanned the note. Christian wrote to suggest they should meet at the Bastion Club to review progress. Tony surmised that the others—Christian, Charles, Tristan, Gervase, Jack Warnefleet, and even Jack Hendon—were keen to use the investigation as an excuse to avoid their social obligations.

Even with Alicia’s presence as reward, he, too, felt the temptation. For men of their ilk, balls were boring, pointless, and severely drained their never very deep reserves of civility. They’d spent the last decade avoiding fools— why change their ways now?

Noting Alicia, beside him, watching him, he handed her the note. While she read it, he glanced at Geoffrey. If it hadn’t been for the little chat they’d had that afternoon, he’d be irritated by Geoffrey’s and Adriana’s total absorption in the how and where of their nuptials; luckily, Geoffrey had had no argument with his assertion that he and Alicia should marry first, even if by no more than a week.

Given the way Geoffrey was watching over Adriana, as if determined now he’d won her no other would get close, it was clear he, at least, would resist the lure of the investigation.

Tony turned to Alicia as she looked up from the note.

“Are you going?”

He looked into her green eyes, hesitated. “If you would prefer I escort you to the balls tonight, I can put off the meeting until tomorrow.”

She looked at him steadily; he couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Then she glanced down at the note. “But that would mean actions that could be instigated tomorrow if you met tonight would be delayed, wouldn’t it?”

She looked up again. He nodded. Put like that, it was almost incumbent upon him to leave her to Geoffrey’s care and devote his attention to unmasking A. C. Still he hesitated, not liking the fact he couldn’t follow her thoughts, or see her feelings in her eyes. He usually could. “Are you sure? Geoffrey will stay with you—”

She smiled, confident, and assured. “Yes, of course. Indeed, I’m sure we’re starting to be the butt of comments about being forever in each other’s pockets.” Turning to Miranda, she caught her eye. “Tony’s been called away— I’m assuring him we’ll be perfectly happy with just Geoffrey as escort.”

“Oh, indeed!” Miranda flicked her hand at him. “Go, go!” She grinned, a devilish light in her eye. “I assure you Alicia and I will be excellently well entertained.”

She meant it in purely teasing vein, yet the barb slipped under Tony’s guard and pricked. He glanced at Alicia; turning to him, she gave him her hand.

“I’ll bid you a good night, then. I daresay we’ll be home long before you get back.” She raised her gaze to his face, but not as far as his eyes.

A sudden chill touched him.

Having heard his name and ascertained from Miranda what was going on, Geoffrey turned to him. “Don’t worry, I’ll bring them all safely back at the end of Lady Selkirk’s affair.” Meeting Tony’s gaze, he quietly added,

“Send word tomorrow morning if there’s anything I can help with.”

Tony nodded. He released Alicia’s hand to shake Geoffrey’s. When he looked back, he found she’d turned away and was embroiled in a discussion with Adriana.

There seemed no reason to dally. “I’ll leave you, then.” He made the comment general; with a single nod for everyone, he headed for the door.

What he learned at the club drove all other thoughts temporarily from his mind.

“We’ve narrowed the field to three possibilities.” As he’d suggested, Christian had acted as a central contact, compiling and disseminating information as the others brought it in. They’d all been involved, but in order to keep things moving, they’d simply reported, then got on with the next task, and left Christian to make sense of the whole. This was the first time they’d all gathered since the meeting in Tony’s library—the first time they’d heard the results to date.

“Between them, Jack”—Christian nodded at Jack Warnefleet—“and Tristan came up with a list of tea and coffee merchants they’ve since verified as exhaustive.”

“Can one ask how?” Charles asked.

Jack Warnefleet grinned. “Not if you want details. But I’m sure those merchants would be amazed at how much their wives, especially their competitors’ wives, know.”

“Ah!” Charles turned a limpid glance on Tristan.

Who smiled. “I left that endeavor to Jack. My contribution was verifying the information via the appropriate guilds. By a sleight of argument, I convinced the guild secretaries that I needed to examine their registers for cases of accidental cross-listings, where coffee merchants had been listed as tea merchants, and vice versa.”

“Which naturally left you with a list of those who were both. Very nice.” Charles looked back up the table.

“The list comprised twenty-three companies,” Christian continued. “We eliminated those we know lost cargoes, assuming no merchant is going to send a precious cargo to France just to cover his tracks. That took twelve names out—some of the sixteen ships carried cargoes for the same merchant.”

“Poor beggars,” Jack Hendon said. “Knowing how close some of them sail to the wind, I’d be surprised if none have gone bankrupt.”

“Some have,” Gervase answered. “Yet more damage to add to A. C.’s account.”

Tony stirred. “So that left us with eleven companies.”

Christian nodded. “Courtesy of you all and your chameleon like talents, passing yourselves off as potential coffee-shop proprietors and the like, not to mention your ability to tell barefaced lies, by focusing on who had stock after the last A. C.-induced shortage, we’ve ended with three names—three merchants. All had stock to sell

when the price last soared, and even though that incident was nearly a year ago, we have enough corroboration to conclude that only those three had stock to sell at that time.”

A general hubbub ensued, centering on whether there was any easy way to narrow the list further.

Tony didn’t contribute; reaching out, he took the sheet lying in front of Christian and read the names. “So,” his voice fell into the lull as the prospect of a simple next step faded, “A. C. is associated with one of these three.”

“Yes, but,” Christian stressed, “two of the three are not involved. Given what we’ll need to do to ferret out a hidden partner, we need to be absolutely certain which of the three it is before we move in.”

Tony nodded. “If we get it wrong, we’ll alert A. C., and given his record in covering his tracks, all we’ll find is another corpse.”

Jack Warnefleet sat forward. “So how do we pinpoint the right merchant?”

“The right merchant landed cargoes before each prize was taken.” Tony looked across the table at Jack Hendon.

“You said once we had a merchant’s shipping line, we could verify the safe landing of A. C.’s cargo via the records at Lloyd’s. We have three merchants—if we learn which shipping lines they use, could we check all three lines for safe landings in the relevant weeks preceding each prize-taking, and check the cargoes landed?”

Jack held his gaze for a long moment, then asked, “How much time do we have?”

“By my calculation, not a lot. A. C.’s been quiet for nearly a week, but he must know we haven’t given up. He’ll try something else to deflect the investigation—he won’t succeed, but the faster we can conclude it, the better.” Tony paused, then added, “Who knows what he might do next?”

It was a point on which he tried not to speculate, yet it hovered in his mind, a constant threat. To Alicia, to him, to their future.

Jack was thinking, calculating—glancing around the table, he nodded. “Given our number, it’s possible. And it might be the best way. The first thing we need to learn is which shipping lines those three companies use, but to do that without alerting the companies, you’ll need to ask the shipping lines.”

“Can you do that?” Christian asked.

“Not me. As the owner of Hendon Shipping, the instant I start asking questions like that, there’ll be hell to pay.”

“No matter.” Charles shrugged. “You tell us what answers we need, and what questions will best elicit them, and leave it to us.”

“Right.”

“Easy enough.”

The others nodded. It was Tony who asked, “How many shipping lines are there?”

Jack met his gaze. “Seventy-three.”

When the others stopped groaning, Jack continued, “I’ll put a list together tonight—we can meet here first thing tomorrow. If we push, we should get the information by evening, and then”—he met Tony’s gaze again—“we’ll first need to get access to the shipping registers and get the ships’ names, then we’ll revisit Lloyd’s. We’ll be able to find the answer—which company A. C. is behind—there.”

Tony returned Jack’s gaze, then nodded. “Let’s do it.”




NINETEEN

THE NEXT DAY WAS CHAOTIC.

Six members of the Bastion Club attired as no gentleman would normally be met with Jack Hendon in the club’s meeting room at eight o’clock. Over breakfast, they divided his list on the basis of the location of the shipping lines’ offices, then each took a section and set out. They were masquerading as merchants, all appearing older and a great deal more conservative than they were.

Whoever discovered a link between any of the three merchants and a shipping line would send a messenger back to Jack at the club. They’d decided against calling a halt until all seventy-three shipping lines had been assessed; there was always the possibility that a merchant used more than one, especially if that merchant had something to hide.

Tony had taken a group of fourteen offices congregated around Wapping High Street. Charles, who had drawn the area next to that, shared a hackney down to the docks. They parted, and Tony began his search for a reliable shipping line to bring tea from his uncle’s plantations in Ceylon. Once he had a shipping manager keen to secure his fictitious uncle’s fictitious cargo, it was easy to ask for references in the form of other tea merchants the line had run cargoes for in the last few years.

By eleven o’clock, he’d visited six offices, and scored one hit. One line which, so the manager believed, had an exclusive contract with one of their three merchants.

Tony stopped in a tavern to refresh himself with a pint. Sitting at a table by a window, he sipped and looked out. He appeared to be watching the handcarts and drays and the bustling human traffic thronging the street; in reality, he saw none of it, his mind turned inward to more personal vistas.

Things had started to move; the pace always escalated toward the end of a chase. They’d soon have A. C., or at least his name. Dalziel would have his man; Tony would take great delight in delivering him personally.

He needed to keep his eye on the game, yet the very fact it was nearing its apogee had him thinking of what came next. Of Alicia and him, and their future life.

The closer the prospect drew, the more it commanded his attention, the more sensitive to threats to it he became. Last night in the hall, he’d been touched by premonition, by an unfocused, unspecific belief that something was wrong, or at least not right. Something in the way Alicia had reacted had pricked his instincts.

Yet when he’d returned home just after midnight, it was to find the others already back, and Alicia waiting for him in her bed. Explaining that they’d all wished for an early night, she’d encouraged him to tell her all he’d learned; she’d listened, patently interested, to their plans.