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“You’ve already been paid,” Tybalt pointed out. “I doubt we could get much of it back if we tried. You were on deck some of the time, shouting insults at old friends.”

“I was,” Jackson admitted. “Showing Johnny some landmarks, too.”

“Then you didn’t see the revenue men inspecting the treasure chest?” Constance asked quickly.

“Nah. Seen it before. So’d Johnny.”

“I saw it,” Tybalt said. “There was only Mr. Lloyd and me and a couple of revenue men, one to poke about and write everything down. Presumably they’ll send Mr. Lloyd the bill when they’ve worked out what it is.”

“Was this all in Mr. Lloyd’s cabin?” Constance asked.

“It was.”

“Was young Mr. Lloyd not there?”

“To start with. Then he wandered off,” said Tybalt.

“And when the customs men left the ship, did you escort them?” Solomon asked.

“I did.”

“What did Mr. Lloyd do? Did he come up on deck with you?”

“No, he stayed with the treasure, as far as I know. In fact, he got Samuels—the ship’s carpenter we spoke of—in to tie it closed for transporting.”

“When did either of you next see the treasure chest?” Solomon asked.

“Quarter hour later?” Jackson replied with a shrug. “Whenever it was, Johnny and Squibbs lugged it up on deck. Which was when the gents got off the ship. His nibs—Mr. Lloyd—supervised its journey into his waiting carriage. Then we went off to the pub, me and Squibbs and Johnny.”

“Where were the rest of the crew?”

“Already disembarked,” Tybalt said. “I shook hands with the Lloyds, watched them leave, and then took my own trunk and went home.”

Solomon frowned. “Did Mr. Lloyd—either of the Mr. Lloyds—come up on deck with the treasure chest?”

“They were already on deck,” Jackson said. “Arguing about something. They did that a lot.”

Tybalt frowned at him but didn’t tell him off. The man was considerably more forthcoming than yesterday.

“How long before the treasure chest were they up on deck?” Constance asked.

“Couldn’t say precisely,” Jackson said. “More interested in getting to the Crown and Anchor.”

“You carried Squibbs’s and Johnny’s kits off the ship as well as your own,” Tybalt said. “You must have been in a hurry indeed.”

“Had quite a thirst,” Jackson admitted.

“So there were other chests or trunks standing on deck at the same time as the treasure chest?” Solomon asked.

“There were the Lloyds’ own trunks and mine,” Tybalt said, puzzled. “Why is that important?”

“Were any of them close to the treasure chest?” Solomon asked without answering the captain’s question.

“Mine wasn’t. I kept it well out of the way of the Lloyds’ baggage, which was piled up just at the gangway. Squibbs and Johnny took that first, didn’t they? Then came back for the treasure chest, which was when the Lloyds themselves finally disembarked.”

“What about your kit?” Solomon asked Jackson. “And your shipmates’?”

Jackson regarded him with derision. “In seamen’s kit bags? Couldn’t have crammed a lot of treasure in there however hard I tried.”

“I’m not accusing you,” Solomon said mildly. “Just trying to find a way for the impossible to become possible. Was all this baggage under your eye the whole time? You didn’t go off below for any purpose?”

“Too keen to get going,” Jackson said. “And no, I didn’t see nobody tamper with ’em neither.”

Solomon cocked an eyebrow at Tybalt, who shook his head.

“From the way Squibbs and Johnny carried the treasure chest,” Solomon said, “would you guess it to have been as heavy as before?”

“Oh yes,” Jackson replied. “Squibbs said it were like carrying a box of bricks.”

Perhaps it was .

“Squibbs does like to exaggerate,” Tybalt put in dryly.

“Going back a few weeks, to the island where you found the treasure,” Solomon said, “did the entire crew accompany the Lloyds ashore, or did some of you wait on the ship?”

“Samuels and I remained on board,” Tybalt said. “The rest went off with Mr. Lloyd.”

“Why Samuels?” Constance asked.

Tybalt shrugged. “He’s older. And we needed some repairs to the ship.”

“Didn’t you mind being excluded from the treasure hunt?”

Tybalt smiled. “Not really. I didn’t honestly think they’d find it. Between ourselves, I thought Mr. Lloyd was pinning too much on the ravings of a dying man.”

“Did you know this Silas Cauley who gave him the map and the story?” Solomon asked.

“I did.” Tybalt hesitated. “Look, he was a good man in his day. Bit of a rogue, I suspect, long before I came across him. He was still fit enough in his body, but he was forgetting things, often at just the wrong time. I couldn’t send him up the rigging in case he forgot where he was and fell.

If I gave him an order, he forgot it before he got to where he was going.

He was a liability because his mind was going.

He talked a lot of nonsense. In fact, if I’d known when we set off that Mr. Lloyd’s information came from Cauley, I’d have advised against the whole expedition. ”

Solomon held his gaze. “Did the crew get paid?”

“Yes.”

“Did you?”

Again, the wry, flickering smile. “Mostly. But yes, I have a vested interest in your finding Mr. Lloyd’s treasure.”

*

“As far as I can see, the only time the chests could have been switched was about ten minutes between Lloyd coming on deck and Squibbs and Johnny bringing up the baggage.”

Constance spoke in frustrated tones as she walked beside Solomon toward the alehouse that was the address Samuels the carpenter had given to Captain Tybalt.

Tybalt himself had pleaded an appointment with family, and given that the man was only a few days returned from a long voyage, that was not an unreasonable excuse.

“Which on the face of it,” Solomon agreed, “would point to either the captain, or one of the Lloyds themselves. There’s no quick or easy way from that part of the ship to the crew’s quarters.”

“And yet the ship’s carpenter is the best candidate for making a replica of the chest. Plus, he was there, helping Lloyd secure the chest with ropes.

I just don’t see how he can have done it and got the original chest off the ship.

All the crew but Jackson, Squibbs, and Johnny had gone by the time the Lloyds disembarked.

Surely one of them trundling the treasure chest—or even a large trunk—would have been noticed.

The sailors only carry meager kit on board, and that seems to be in soft bags or rolls. ”

“I can’t imagine any of the Lloyds having any knowledge whatever of woodwork,” Solomon said.

“Which leaves Captain Tybalt. The crew would be too used to his comings and goings all over the ship to pay much attention to him unless he’s issuing orders.

A mere ten minutes below could have passed Jackson by.

And Tybalt was quartered in the right area of the ship and was the last to disembark. He could have taken the chest.”

Constance nodded. “He could , perhaps, have knocked together the replica, hidden it in his cabin, and, once the revenue men were seen off, hastily swapped the chests, waited until the Lloyds were gone with a chest full of rubbish or stones or whatever, and departed at leisure with the stolen chest among his own belongings.”

“He doesn’t seem that kind of a man,” Solomon said regretfully. “From a character point of view, I could more easily imagine it was one of the Lloyds.”

“Me too, only we don’t actually know Tybalt, do we?

And besides, what possible motive could either of the Lloyds have?

If it is not for the insurance? Oh.” She took his arm and cast a quick look up at him.

“We were distracted. You never did tell me what you learned from the maker of the strong room and the solicitor.”

“Sadly, nothing that helps. Lloyd’s notes with the solicitor on the subject of the strong room are kept safely, and have never been asked for or disturbed.

All Lloyd’s contracts and insurance agreements are lodged with him, including insurance for this last voyage, which does not include cargoes of any value, let alone the kind of treasure he found.

He loses everything by this theft. So does his family. ”

“Unless Sydney has it all,” Constance said.

“How? I could imagine him finding a time and a way to unload everything into his own trunk—though it would be tight—but the chests themselves were switched. He might have been able to hide a replica in his own cabin, but how the devil did he make it?”

Constance considered. “An accomplice among the crew? Samuels the carpenter? It could work. Only…”

“Only his father tore the house apart,” Solomon finished for her. “When he discovered the theft. Besides, it seems an unnecessarily complicated way of stealing it when he had full access to the keys. Why not just take them while his parents were engaged that night, swipe the treasure, and flee?”

“Because there would have been a watch for him at every port?”

“Would there? Would Lloyd risk the scandal?”

Constance considered. “He might, to get his treasure back. After all, if he doesn’t, he risks a scandal anyway, with bankruptcy, poverty, and disgrace for his whole family.”

“And children can always hide things from their parents if they try,” Solomon agreed. “Even a parent in a rage. Especially , perhaps, a parent in a rage. But the point is…”

“The change of chests,” Constance said. “Yes, we really do need to speak to this Samuels—unless he’s already in France selling the treasure.”

“Can you see Sydney handing it over and trusting a mere ship’s carpenter with that?”

“No.” She sighed and asked without much hope, “What of the locksmith?”

“It was a one-off set. He destroys the originals.”

This didn’t seem to surprise her. She lapsed into silence.

They had left the noise and bustle of the docks by this time, but there were still costermongers with their stalls and barrows selling everything from hot tea and soup to flowers, old boots, and fresh meat.

The calls of criers and patterers spilling actual news among their made-up stories and songs would have amused Solomon at another time.

Just now, he had to concentrate on the wonder of the woman beside him to stop the unbearable, aching thoughts within him.

He wasn’t really surprised when she said, “Have you considered that Johnny was the accomplice? Especially if he has already sailed. Or is about to.”

“I don’t think he has,” Solomon said with difficulty. Openness was new enough for him. About David, it was painful. “I think he’s lodging with Jackson, or at least in the same building. If he truly doesn’t know London, where else would he go?”

Her gaze was a caress, yet seemed to burn a hole into his head and heart.

“And yet you walked away.”

“I did.” He drew a breath. “Jackson is right. Every man has the right to choose whom he talks to. If Johnny is David, he knows who I am and where I am.”

For an instant she pressed her head into his shoulder and gripped his arm more tightly—the only comfort he could bear.

For if these roles had been reversed, if Solomon had been presented with David’s whereabouts on a card, and they had been in the same city, within the hour he would have battering down the door to get to his brother, his twin, his missing self.

The boy he had quarreled with the very day he’d disappeared.

However stupid, he had never shaken off his fear that whatever he had said or done was the reason David was lost, had run away, had never come back. And now it seemed he might well have been right.

Desperately, he wanted something else to focus on, anything until the pain receded. As always, Constance gave him what he needed. “Is that the alehouse Tybalt spoke of?”

“Yes,” he said gratefully. “That’s it.” Now he could shove the ache aside, slam the door, and concentrate on the matter in hand. “I don’t know whether it’s worse to leave you outside alone or take you in there.”

“It’s a step up from the Crown and Anchor. And I was never really a lady.” She shoved her charming hat to the back of her head, ruffled her hair, and changed before his eyes.

Her smile was bold and inviting. Her hips rolled temptingly as she walked. Not a professional woman of the streets, but what one might call an enthusiastic amateur. He didn’t know whether to laugh or groan until her dancing eyes gave him no choice. She really was rather wonderful.

The public house was a definite step up from the Crown and Anchor. The barmaid was polite, for one thing.

On the other hand, she denied knowing anyone called Samuels.

“I believe he lodges here,” Solomon said.

“Does he?” The girl looked surprised and called, “Alf! You got a new lodger?”

The landlord himself loomed up to the counter. “Lord, no. Who you looking for, sir?”

“Arthur Samuels,” Solomon said patiently. “I was told he lodges here.”

“Not unless he’s changed his sex,” Alf said with a wheezy laugh. “It’s old Mrs. Simmonds what lodges with us. Has done for ten years.”

Constance laughed. “It’ll have been his little joke,” she said, in an accent much closer to those she had grown up with. She even nudged Solomon as she spoke. “I’ll bet he’s here so often he seems like your lodger. Seafaring cove, ship’s carpenter by trade. Not as young as your fine self.”

Inevitably, Alf responded, holding his sides and laughing. The maid smiled perfunctorily but still looked mystified.

“We don’t know anyone like that, do we, Alf? Unless it’s an occasional drinker. Here, what about that quiet cove what sits over there by the window when he comes in?”

“Haven’t seen him for months,” said the landlord. He grimaced. “Reckon he’s dead. Or moved house.”

“Gentle soul. Always polite, with a cheery word,” the maid mused. “Sad eyes, though. Hope he ain’t dead.”

“Actually, he might be a carpenter,” Alf reflected, raising Solomon’s hopes momentarily. “In fact, he is. Heard someone talking business in here with him once. Never heard of him going to sea, though.”

“I don’t suppose,” Solomon said, his buoyancy seeping away again, “that you know where he lives?”