We rumbled through Weston at a steady pace, for the coachman was eager to be home in his bed, and I was no less impatient to regain Castle Square. The hour was close to midnight, and the ferryman must be asleep at his post; for as we rolled down Weston hill to the river, I espied a second carriage, waiting on the desolate shore. My driver pulled up, and quitted the box to hold his horses’ heads — and a low murmur of conversation ensued beyond my window. I raised the glass and peered out. Neither ferry nor ferryman was in sight; but a lanthorn glowed on the opposite shore, and the neighbouring chaise was Lord Harold Trowbridge’s. In another instant the gentleman himself had approached the window and extended his hand. I grasped it in my own. The current of life in his fingertips was so strong that I trembled.

“Jane,” he whispered. “Well met, my dear. Are you comfortable in that bandbox?”

“Not at all,” I replied. “Are you comfortable in your soul? Do you really mean to kill that poor boy, who has no more idea of a duel than he has of the interior of White’s?”

“Better that he should learn, then, from a proficient. I do not take kindly to being slapped with a glove — but it is not the first time I have suffered the insult. I shall inflict nothing worse than a flesh wound; his heart shall be saved for another meeting.”

“Who shall act as your second, my lord?”

“Orlando, of course. I can summon no one else on such short notice.”

“Orlando?” I cried. “Has he then returned? What were his adventures? How does he appear?”

“Like a man reborn,” Lord Harold replied. “A common sailor discovered him in Portsmouth, lying unconscious near Sally Port. There was a great deal of trouble last night in Portsmouth, as no doubt you are aware—”

“But how did Orlando come to be there?”

“His story is a strange one. You will recall that he did not return to the Dolphin Inn, Sunday evening.”

“And you were anxious.”

“After leaving you and Miss Lloyd at the Water Gate Quay, he returned to Netley — though not, this time, to the Abbey. He waited in darkness for Mr. Ord, and witnessed him quit the Lodge well after the dinner hour — at perhaps nine o’clock.”

“I recall that you set Orlando on to follow him.”

“Though Ord was on horseback, he went at a walk, and thus Orlando was able to keep pace. The American travelled not in the direction of Itchen ferry, as one might expect — but to the northeast, and the village of Hound.”

“And what did he there?” I whispered.

“He pulled up his mount before the cottage of a family called Bastable, though the hour was exceedingly late and all such simple folk are early to bed. He knocked — gained admittance at once — and disappeared within.”

“That is decidedly strange!”

“I agree,” said Lord Harold coolly, “for even did we believe him capable of a liaison with Sophia’s late serving-maid, we must assume her to claim a populous family, not excepting a querulous old grandparent, which must decidedly diminish the charms of amour.”

“Mrs. Challoner believes Flora Bastable to be an agent of blackmail,” I said thoughtfully. “She received an unsigned missive, alleging privileged knowledge, and suggesting a meeting to the advantage of both.”

“Blackmail?” Lord Harold repeated with quickened interest. “Is it possible that Ord was sent as intermediary?”

“Possible,” I said doubtfully, “but I cannot say whether the note I read tonight was received so early as Sunday.”

“That was the day the girl Flora was turned away from her employment, was it not?”

“For an injudicious fit of strong hysterics — the natural result of having witnessed a bout of witchcraft, or a Catholic Mass.”

“I recollect a commotion in the servants’ wing near the close of my call at Netley Lodge: the sound of tears and lamentation, and the hurried departure of a girl in the direction of Hound. Perhaps Sophia regretted of her haste, and despatched Ord later as supplicant for Flora’s return.”

“Such solicitude is hardly in keeping with Mrs. Challoner’s character! We must declare it a puzzle, and have done. But tell me of Orlando!”

“As he waited in suspense in the underbrush of Hound, a man came upon him from behind, and delivered such a blow to the head as to knock him insensible.”

“No!”

“Orlando was bound hand and foot, and spent the better part of the night and day subsequent in the Abbey tunnel. He awoke to find himself bobbing down the Solent in his own skiff, with a Portuguese gentleman in a long black cloak and hat plying the oars — bound for Portsmouth. His captor having achieved Spithead, Orlando was tossed summarily into the water, and left for dead.”

“Good Lord! The cloaked figure from the subterranean passage!”

“Mon seigneur, ” Lord Harold agreed. “He must have worked at Ord’s orders, and mounted watch upon his confederate’s back when the American ventured to Hound.”

“—and served poor Orlando with such vicious treatment! No wonder you feel no compunction in challenging Ord to a duel! But, my lord—” I paused in puzzlement. “I had thought the cloaked figure to be the Conte da Silva. And we know him to have arrived at Mrs. Challoner’s on Monday.”

“Do we?” Lord Harold countered.

“Flora, the serving-maid, did observe a tall man in a black cloak to enter the house on Sunday,” I said slowly, “the man we presumed to be a priest. But perhaps it was the Conte.”

“However that may be — Orlando is an adept at freeing himself from tight corners, and had the better of his captor. He slipped his ankle bonds and swam so far as Sally Port, where he dragged himself up onto the breakwater. From that position he witnessed the liberation of the prison hulks.”

“With mon seigneur—the liberator?” I breathed.

“Would that Orlando knew the man’s name — or had seen his countenance! But he was struck on the head by a flying splinter from one of the fired boats, and nearly drowned. When the seaman roused him at dawn yesterday, Orlando had swallowed a quantity of the sea, lost a good deal of blood, was chilled to the bone — and was taken at once to tell his story to the Master of the Yard.”

“An unenviable position, in the circumstances.”

“Yes,” his lordship agreed grimly. “Orlando was nearly hanged for the second time in his young life. It seems the Royal Navy was convinced they had a spy on their hands: a foreigner out of Oporto, who could neither produce his employer nor explain his presence near Sally Port. He cooled his heels a full day before they sought my advice at the Dolphin Inn.”

“Poor fellow! I saw the marks of his struggle on the passage floor,” I mused. “They were everywhere in evidence.”

His lordship’s profile was suddenly arrested. “You returned to the tunnel, Jane? Quite alone?”

“Yesterday morning. I was under Mr. Hawkins’s especial care. We ventured within, but were surprised by a man in a black cloak, who dashed out our tapers, hurled me flat against the wall, and stole Mr. Hawkins’s boat!”

“Left to your own devices,” he murmured, “you shall get yourself killed, one day. What if it should have been Orlando’s assailant?”

“I must assume that it was. But why should he return to the Abbey?”

His lordship shrugged. “To hide from the naval authorities presently in search of him? Or. . to retrieve something precious he once dropped there?”

Lord Harold reached for the gold crucifix at my neck and held it up to the lanthorn light. “The gold is warmed by the pulse at your throat,” he said softly. I could not speak — and for a second time that evening, felt as though I might swoon.

“Did anyone at the Lodge deign to notice this?” he asked.

“The Conte da Silva,” I replied with difficulty.

“He all but accused me of stealing it — and claimed that the seal of his house is stamped on the obverse.”

Lord Harold turned the cross in his fingers and peered at it more closely. The brim of his hat grazed mine; I closed my eyes, and drank in the scent of tobacco that clung to his greatcoat.