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.
Then he’d joined her under the covers and she’d turned to him, welcomed him into her arms, into her body with her usual open and generous ardor. No hesitation, no holding back. No retreat.
When he’d left this morning, she’d still been asleep. He’d brushed a kiss to her lips and left her dreaming.
Perhaps that was all it was—that the social round, now frenetic, combined with the stress of watching over Adriana, was simply wearying her. God knew, it would weary him. When he’d returned to her last night, there’d been no sign of whatever he’d detected earlier, that slight disjunction that had seemed to exist between them.
He spent another five minutes slowly sipping his ale, then downed the rest in two swallows. He had eight more shipping lines to investigate. The sooner they could bring A. C.’s game to a conclusion, the better for them all.
Tony got back to the Bastion Club just after three o’clock. He was one of the last to return; the others were lounging around the table in the meeting room with Jack Hendon waiting impatiently for his report.
“Please say you’ve found a line working for Martinsons,” Jack demanded before Tony could even pull out a chair.
He sat and tossed his list on the table. “Croxtons in Wapping have, so the manager assures me, an exclusive contract.”
“Thank God for that.” Jack wrote the name down. “I was beginning to think our plan would go awry. We’ve identified two shipping lines for Drummond, one from the east, one from the west, reasonable in the circumstances, and four—two in each direction—for Ellicot. Croxton runs ships both east and west, so Martinsons can indeed use them exclusively. Now”—he looked down his list—“all we need is for Gervase to confirm none of the three— Martinsons, Ellicot, or Drummond—use any other line.”
But when Gervase came striding in fifteen minutes later, it was with different news. “Tatleys and Hencken both carry goods for Ellicot.”
They all looked at him; Gervase slowly raised his brows. “What?”
“You’re sure?” Jack asked. When Gervase nodded, he opened his eyes wide. “That’s six shippers who carry Ellicot’s goods, and two of those lines run ships to both the East and West Indies.”
Tony caught Jack’s eye. “Is it wise to place any great emphasis on that?”
Jack grimaced. “No, but it’s tempting. If you wanted to disguise any pattern in shipping around the dates the prizes were taken, then the use of multiple lines and therefore different ships for each safe cargo brought in would totally obscure any link.”
“The most likely people to check any connection would be the Admiralty,” Gervase said, “yet their records show only the ships and shipping lines. There’s no way to detect a link that exists at the level of cargo.”
Tony frowned. “Customs and Revenue have records of the cargoes, but even there, the records are sorted by ports, and different lines use different home ports.”
“So,” Charles said, “this was an extremely well-set-up scheme. It’s only because we used Lloyd’s that we’ve been able to put things together.”
“Which leads one to conclude,” Christian said, “that the scheme’s perpetrator knows the administrative ropes well. He knows how the civil services work and which avenues to block.”
“We’ll still get him.” Jack had been reexamining his list. “We have nine shipping lines—more than I’d like, but seven are small. We now need a list of all the vessels each has registered.”
“Can we get that before tonight?” Tony asked.
Jack glanced at the clock on the sideboard, then pushed back his chair. “We can but try.”
“I’ll help.” Gervase rose, too. “I know the business well enough to deal with the intricacies of the registers.”
“You two concentrate on getting a list of the ships’ names,” Tony said. “We’ll take care of the rest.”
Jack and Gervase left, conferring as they went. The others turned to Tony.
“Once we have the list of ships,” he said, “we’re going to have to search Lloyd’s records. We need to identify which merchant consistently brought in a cargo in, say, the week before a prize was taken. Searching in the weeks before three separate incidents should give us one name and one only. If not, we can look at a fourth incident, but chances are three incidents will give us only one merchant who fits our bill.”
The others nodded.
“Once we know the particular merchant involved, we should confirm that in each case they did indeed bring in tea or coffee.”
“Can we do all that via Lloyd’s?” Charles asked.
“Yes. If Jack and Gervase get the ships’ names by this evening, I’ll revisit Lloyd’s tonight.”
“I’ll come, too” Charles said. “There’s this horrendous ball my sisters want to drag me to—I’d much rather hone my filing skills.”
“You can count me in,” Jack Warnefleet said. “I’ve never had to track anyone through such a maze before.”
They made arrangements to meet later that night.
Only Tristan demurred. “I’ll keep a watch on things in the ballrooms. Having had the good sense to get married, I, at least, am safe from the harpies.”
Charles grimaced. “Half your luck. I don’t know how you managed it so quickly—and now look at Tony. You’re both safe. What I want to know is how long
Both Tony and Tristan made sympathetic noises. The mood of teasing camaraderie disguising their implacable resolve, the meeting broke up and they each headed home.
Tony found Alicia in the garden.
Admitted to the house by Hungerford, he’d slipped upstairs and changed into more normal attire before setting out to search for her.
She was walking alone; Hungerford had told him the boys were in the park—it was a perfect day for kites. It seemed odd to find Alicia by herself; pensive, head down, deep in thought, she slowly, apparently aimlessly, wandered the lawn.
He watched from the terrace—Torrington House was centuries old, the gardens stretching behind it
