Page 25

Before it was even light, she was outside Jackson’s tenement building.

Already the place was busy with people heading to or from places of work.

Women with bundles of laundry or mops and buckets, men with seamen’s kits on their shoulders or tools in wooden boxes and canvas bags.

A few vagrants popped up, shivering in doorways and scratching themselves.

Already the costermongers were there, selling hot and probably disgusting tea, thin sandwiches, and yesterday’s pies.

Once, she had been used to entering such ominous doorways with dark stairwells, the stink of all manners of filth in her nostrils.

She had entered this one only yesterday.

But she had grown soft. Climbing the stairs in daylight with the protection of Solomon and Captain Tybalt was quite different from doing so alone in the gloom of dawn.

Now, her flesh crawled and she felt far too exposed.

A large man running down with a sack on his shoulder barged past, swearing at her for getting in his way. And suddenly Constance remembered how she’d survived. She swore back at him, and felt much better when an old woman cackled from an unseen doorway.

Constance stopped, peering into the gloom. “Morning, missus,” she said cheerfully. “Looking for a sailor called Jackson. He does live here, don’t he?”

“Now and again. Next landing, second door, but he’s out.”

This suited Constance, but she just said, “Maybe he’s come back. Thanks, missus!”

There wasn’t even a lock on the door. She lifted her hand and knocked lightly, then louder. No one answered, and when she held her ear close to the door, she still heard nothing. It was too good an opportunity to resist.

She was aware, as she pushed open the door and called softly, “Hello, anyone home?” that Solomon would lambast her for endangering herself. Curiously, this made her bolder, as though the very thought of him protected her.

The room did not smell pleasant. A small family of mice, feasting on some crumbs on the floor, regarded her somewhat insolently without fleeing.

Clearly, they were used to living here untroubled.

There were four cots in the room, none of them occupied—fortunately—and only one of them had the blanket pulled up.

Odd bits of rough clothing were scattered across a couple of the other beds.

On the rickety table in the center of the room stood part of a loaf, a couple of dirty mugs, and a half-finished wooden figure of a ship with a knife beside it.

Leaving the door slightly ajar, she moved closer to the table and withdrew a crumpled piece of paper from beneath one of the mugs.

On one side was an official, printed form of some kind, in a foreign language she couldn’t read.

On the other, a pencil sketch of a face she instantly recognized as Jackson.

The door of the room swung open and Solomon walked in.

Solomon, wearing rough seamen’s clothes, at least a day’s stubble on his chin, and his hair miraculously grown by several inches since last night.

Her heart lurched. David .

It could only be David, Solomon’s twin.

He stopped at sight of her. “Who are you?”

His voice was enough like Solomon’s to give her gooseflesh. But the accent was wrong.

“My name is Constance Silver,” she said, since he seemed only mildly surprised by her presence. He certainly didn’t object to it.

“Jackson and Squibbs won’t be back till tonight,” he told her.

“That’s fine. It was you I came to see.”

His eyebrows flew up. “Me? I don’t know you.”

“I know your brother.”

He scowled. “I don’t have a brother.”

Oh, Solomon, what happened between you? “He sent you his card, via Jackson.”

Thrusting his hand in his pocket, he pulled out a familiar Silver and Grey card. So Jackson had given it to him. “You are Silver. What do you want with me?”

“I want you to go and see Mr. Grey.”

“Does he have a ship?”

“I believe he has several. Just go and talk to him.”

His gaze dropped to the sketch in her hand, but he said, “Why do you call him my brother?”

“You’ll know when you see him. He looks just like you.”

His eyes flew back to hers, alarmed and searching. Then he smiled, a cynical, sardonic kind of amusement. “Really.” It wasn’t a question of any kind. “I’ll think about it. Was there something else?”

“Yes, as it happens.” She set the sketch of Jackson back down on the table. “Do you know who drew this?”

“I did. Why?”

“It’s very good. You have talent.”

He shrugged. “It passes the time on long voyages.”

“Do you have others?”

She could see he was about to deny it. Then something kept him from saying the words. He was a stranger in a strange land, a man without a home. Like Solomon, who had a mere house and a very similar, chronic loneliness behind his eyes.

Without a word, he walked to the made bed, lifted the mattress, and withdrew several other pieces of crumpled paper, some torn scraps, some full sheets, printed or written on one side.

He held them out to her and she moved to take them from him.

He watched her steadily as she glanced through them with growing excitement.

One was of a girl, pretty and laughing. The next was Captain Tybalt, staring into the distance.

Barnabas Lloyd glared at her, his arrogance visible, somehow, in every line.

Then came a couple of strangers to her, although their faces were interesting and they obviously fascinated the artist. She glanced at the last, and her breath caught.

“Clarke,” she said. Clarke with a beard. But certainly the man whose sister Audrey Lloyd visited. The man who was not…

“Samuels,” the sailor corrected her. “Our carpenter on the Queen of the Sea .”

This changed everything! It had to.

“Thank you,” she said breathlessly, already dashing to the door. “Don’t forget to call on Mr. Grey! He truly wants to see you.”

*

Before she hurried on to Clarke’s house, she took the time to tear a page out of her notebook and scribble, Samuels is Clarke.

Sydney saw me at establishment last night — be prepared.

C. She folded it and wrote Solomon’s name and the address of the office, just to be on the safe side.

Then she cornered an urchin and asked if he knew how to find the address.

When he nodded eagerly, she gave him a sixpence and told him he’d get another when he delivered it.

The lad sped off, highly delighted, and Constance, equally elated for different reasons, dashed on toward Clarke’s house.

This was surely the connection they needed.

Why should Clarke have used a false name on the ship, grown a beard that he had subsequently shaved off, unless he was up to something nefarious?

Because Lloyd might recognize his real name?

Or even his beardless face? He was the carpenter, likeliest candidate to have made the swapped chest currently in Lloyd’s strong room, though exactly how the switch was made remained unclear to her.

Was she about to find the treasure itself? Not that Clarke-Samuels was likely to simply hand it over. Probably she would need to keep him talking until Solomon got here, hopefully with another strong man. Perhaps she should send for her own footmen…?

She could just observe the premises until then.

It would be wiser and safer, although it went against the grain.

Then again, if she bumbled in there, even if she got out again safely, she would not be able to arrest the man, only warn him they were onto him.

He would flee with the treasure and they would be back to the beginning again.

Reluctantly, she came to the conclusion that she must merely observe. Unless he went out, in which case, she was prepared to either call on the sister or simply break in.

Her decision made, she had to rethink everything. For when she knocked on the familiar blue door, it creaked and moved under her hand. It was open already. She glanced at the windows, which were still shuttered, although it was light now. Unease crept over her.

She pushed the door again and stuck her head in. “Hello?”

Silence greeted her. She pushed again, meeting resistance, but finally stepped into the little hallway, which had a door on either side and a steep, narrow staircase leading to the floor above.

It was a moment before she saw what had impeded the door. The still figure of Clarke the carpenter lying on the floor. There was blood around his chest and on the floor, and his eyes were open.

In horror and pity, Constance threw herself to her knees and reached for his hand, seeking a pulse. His flesh was cold and lifeless. He had been dead for hours.

Behind her, the door slammed. Before she could even jerk around, something crashed into her head. There was blinding pain, and then the world went black.

*

Solomon, thrilled by his growing closeness to Constance, entered the office with all the eagerness of an infatuated schoolboy.

“Good morning, Janey,” he said cheerfully as the girl appeared while he was removing his overcoat. “Is Mrs. Silver here yet?”

“Morning, sir, and no, not yet, but she shouldn’t be long. I know she was up early.”

Janey presented him with tea in his office and a new letter of inquiry. Before he could sit down to read it, the knocker sounded on the front door. Maybe Constance had forgotten her keys…

And maybe it was David.

He tried to remain calm, though his heart thundered so loudly, Janey should have heard it before she even entered the room.

“Mr. Sydney Lloyd, sir,” she said so firmly that he knew the young man had set her back up and she had only just prevented him from the impropriety of barging in unannounced. Very few people, he imagined, got the better of Janey. “Shall I show him in?”

“Yes, and tell Mrs. Silver when she arrives.”

“Of course, sir.” She curtseyed, which was more than she usually did, and left, saying grandly, “Mr. Grey will see you now.”

She had barely finished speaking before Sydney brushed past her like a gust of wind, striding into the room.

“Two things, Mr. Grey!” he announced, and for the first time, Solomon saw Sydney’s arrogant father in his expression. The man was angry and worried and yet very, very superior.

“Please, sit down and tell me,” Solomon said civilly, rising to his feet. “Tea?”

“No, I don’t want any damned tea!”

Sydney threw himself into one of the armchairs next to Solomon’s, so Solomon sat down again and reached for his cup. “I’m sure there is good reason for your…haste.”

If Sydney recognized the rebuke for discourtesy, he gave no sign of it. Instead, he glared aggressively. “Your so-called partner is a damned whore, and I’d like to know what you mean by foisting such a vile creature on my mother and—”

Solomon had knocked over his cup and sprung to his feet without realizing. The rare red mist was down over his eyes as he hauled Sydney to his feet by his waistcoat and raised one purposeful fist. Only the sudden fright in the youth’s eyes held that fist in check.

“If you want to live,” he said, hearing the danger in his own soft voice, “you will keep your nasty little mouth shut. On your way out.”

Sydney’s face flamed. He tugged violently, failing to free himself until Solomon let him go so suddenly that he fell back into his chair.

“I can’t go,” Sydney said in sudden panic. “I am here on behalf of my father.”

“What?”

“Aunt Aud… My aunt has disappeared from the house. Her bed has not been slept in and most of her clothes are missing, along with personal items such as…” He trailed off.

“Understand,” Solomon said slowly, “that I will do nothing for your father or have anything to do with your family if I hear one word against the lady who will be my wife.”

Sydney swallowed. A weak flare of defiance sparked in his eyes and died. When Solomon neither moved nor spoke, merely regarded him with infinite contempt, he finally really realized he was expected to answer.

“I understand,” he said hoarsely, and tugged at his collar.

“Then begone. I will be at your father’s house directly.”

“The carriage is—”

“I have no intention of sharing a carriage with such an ill-conditioned pup.”

The door opened again and Janey came back in bearing a scrap of folded paper. “An urchin brought this, says the lady promised him sixpence. I gave him a shilling. It’s from Mrs. Silver.”

Solomon took the note while Sydney sidled out of his chair and toward the door, which Janey held for him.

“I did see her there,” he said defiantly.

Solomon didn’t answer. He was too busy scanning Constance’s note. His blood ran cold. Because he knew she had gone alone to Clarke’s. And if Clarke was Samuels, then he was surely also the thief. With nothing to lose if he were discovered.