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Josh appeared intensely relieved, but Harrison and Gibson weren’t as forgiving.

Harrison looked hopefully at Stokes. “Can’t we help you catch him?”

Barnaby stepped in to save Stokes from issuing an adamant “No,” instead pointing out, “Given he’s been paying you to keep his secret, that might not be wise.”

Jordan elaborated, “We can’t be sure who else might turn up, so best if you three stay far away.”

“Amen,” Stokes muttered.

Harrison and Gibson exchanged disappointed glances, but reluctantly agreed that they would return to Falcon Street and remain there until the following day.

“We may as well be off, then.” Gibson looked at Harrison and Josh. “Gun running.” He shook his head. “Even in my wildest dreams, I would never have imagined it was that.”

When no one encouraged them to remain, the three nodded to all and started to trudge down the track. Then Gibson paused and looked back. “Ruthie?”

Jordan glanced at Ruth, standing beside Penelope, and called to Gibson, “I’ll see Miss Cardwell home.”

When Gibson arched a brow at Ruth, she hesitated, then nodded. “I’ll be fine. Go—and keep your head down.”

Barnaby didn’t need to see his wife’s expression to know what she was thinking.

They watched the three men walk to the street where several hackneys, having delivered passengers to the out-of-the-way address, had loitered, hoping to secure fares to take back to town.

Once the three had climbed into a hackney and it had turned and rattled off, Jordan looked at Ruth. “We should probably head off, too. There’s nothing we can accomplish by staying, and your mother must be wondering where you are. Your shopping trip has taken hours.”

“Oh! Yes—I’d forgotten.” Ruth turned to Penelope. “I really better go.”

“Of course.” Penelope squeezed Ruth’s hand and beamed at Jordan. “No doubt we’ll be following you shortly.”

Stokes looked up from dealing with his constables.

“I’d appreciate it if both of you would join us at Albemarle Street tomorrow morning at nine.

Barnaby and I will need to share what we learn from Chesterton’s arrest tonight and combine that with what we’ve already gleaned before we formally interrogate the man. ”

Ruth glanced at Jordan, then both readily agreed.

Jordan waved Ruth down the track. “Let’s grab one of those hackneys before they get tired of waiting and take off.”

Barnaby smiled as Ruth and Jordan made their farewells. Then Barnaby watched his wife stare intently at the pair as they walked close beside each other, rather studiously not touching, all the way to the street.

Jordan led Ruth to the best-looking hackney of the three lined up on the verge. It was the same hackney he’d hailed in Falcon Street and had proved to be well sprung.

He handed Ruth into the carriage and called to the jarvey, “Finsbury Circus.”

The jarvey smiled and saluted with his whip, entirely willing to embark on such a lengthy trip.

The instant Jordan had climbed aboard and settled beside Ruth on the padded bench, the jarvey’s whip snapped, and his horse stepped smartly out.

In seconds, they were bowling through Tilbury, then swung north onto the London Road.

They’d traveled that far in silence, both no doubt thinking of the recent discoveries and their implications. But as they left Tilbury behind and the horse’s pace picked up, Ruth said, “I own to being rather surprised by the inspector’s invitation to join the meeting tomorrow.”

Jordan shot her an amused glance. “You shouldn’t be.

You’re by far and away our best source of insight into Thomas’s thoughts and likely reactions.

” He paused, then facing forward, added, “Being able to judge with some degree of confidence how he might have acted in a given situation—for instance, discovering those guns—will be crucial to figuring out what he did next.” And presumably, that was what led to him being killed.

A faint frown in her eyes, Ruth glanced at him. “I’m fairly certain that what he did next was send that letter to your employer asking for advice.”

Jordan conceded, “That seems likely. He sent the letter on Monday, so it must have been on the Sunday night that he followed Chesterton to the warehouse.”

“Oh, look!” Ruth leaned forward, staring to the right. “There’s the pub.”

They were crossing Orsett Heath, and separated from the road by a decent-sized yard, a squat, whitewashed building with multiple bay windows beneath a steeply sloping roof sported a sign across the front labeling it “The Fox.” There appeared to be two main doors, one at either end of the almost triangular facade.

“That’s a good size,” Jordan remarked, “and close to Tilbury but not within the town. I imagine that on any given night, it would host a large and varied crowd.”

Ruth nodded. “Judging by the windows, it looks to have multiple public rooms inside.” She sat back as the pub fell behind. “A crowded place with adjoining rooms. Thomas wouldn’t have found it difficult to follow and watch Gibson without being spotted by Gibson, Harrison, or Josh.”

A second later, she heaved a deep sigh. “I miss Thomas.” She looked out to the side. “He was…always there. The steady rock the rest of the family leaned on. I might be the eldest, and Gibson after me, but Thomas was our anchor, and with him gone, the family—all of us—feel…adrift.”

Jordan waited in silence. There was little he could say.

After a moment, her gaze still on the passing landscape, Ruth went on, “Bobby is still immature, and as you saw today, Gibson is also naive in many ways. He and Bobby seem to have not quite grown up—our father was like that, too. Gibson and Bobby take after him, while Thomas and I take after our mother. We’re the responsible ones, while the other two are…

not bad-hearted at all but flighty. Difficult to rely on. ”

We need to find another anchor.

Jordan heard the words she didn’t say. He clasped his hands firmly against the compelling urge to reach out and close his hand about hers and tell her he was willing to audition for the part.

That he felt such an impulse—heard the words ready-formed in his brain—was something of a shock.

A development startling enough to make him pause and think—and then firmly set aside the issue for later examination.

Regardless of what he might actually want, now was not the time to make any sort of advance.

Keeping his gaze fixed forward, he racked his brain for some innocuous topic of conversation to fill the minutes to Finsbury Circus.

Barnaby crouched beside Stokes behind a stack of crates in the dank, dark confines of the old warehouse.

They’d found a spot along the front wall where the planks had warped enough to allow them to peer out and watch the track and view any activity in the yard in front of the doors.

Elsewhere in the warehouse, several groups of Stokes’s men were likewise waiting in the dark.

They’d moved into position half an hour ago, along with the rest of the sizeable force Stokes had assembled and deployed, and the warehouse was now effectively surrounded while they waited for Chesterton and his drivers to arrive.

The night sky was cloudy with the moon well screened, which was a blessing.

The land around the warehouse was relatively flat, with only the occasional bushes and clumps of vegetation dotted about.

Nevertheless, those delegated to remain outside had found somewhere to crouch out of sight, and as timepieces ticked past nine o’clock, all were alert and growing increasingly impatient.

Barnaby glanced at Stokes, a shadowy presence in the darkness, then grinned to himself.

At Penelope’s suggestion, Griselda, Stokes, and their family had joined the Adairs for dinner, arriving early enough so that the four children could take their meals together as well.

After presiding over that event in the nursery, the adults had left their offspring to play and returned to the peace downstairs.

They’d dined at half past six, and Penelope and Griselda had waved Barnaby and Stokes off at a quarter past seven.

It had been transparently obvious that both Penelope and Griselda had wanted to come—to be there to see Chesterton captured—but they’d reluctantly accepted their lot and consented to remain in town and await the men’s return.

In truth, the only reason for Barnaby’s presence was the possibility that someone else would arrive with Chesterton, someone who might be Chesterton’s coconspirator, and legally speaking, having a reliable and unimpeachable non-police witness might be a very good thing.

Other than observing, there was little for Barnaby to do.

Stokes and his men were, by now, experts in staging successful traps.

In addition to those inside the warehouse, ready to witness and deal with whatever transpired, the bulk of the force had spread to right and left of the building, in position to close in once their quarry had halted before the doors, hemming them in with a ring of blue.

O’Donnell had taken on the role of primary watchman, the one with the key to the padlock on the chain securing the doors. It would be largely up to him to string Chesterton along until the drays arrived. The Commissioner wanted the entire crew taken up, not just Chesterton.

Stokes suddenly shifted, leaning closer to the wall as he peered through a chink between two planks.

Following Stokes’s lead and staring out through a gap a little farther along the wall, at first, Barnaby could see nothing, then a horse materialized out of the gloom shrouding the track and came plodding toward the warehouse.