“Chessyre was not within?” I concluded patiently.

“He was not. I lifted several sodden heads from stinking tables, the better to scrutinise their features; consoled one poor midshipman crying piteously into his beer; lent a pound to another who had just sold his last shirt — and upon further interrogation of the Moustached Proprietress, learned that Mr. Chessyre had not been seen at the Mermaid's Tail in at least three days.”

“Perhaps his taste in sinkholes has changed. I find nothing in this to silence alarm. Frank, how can you be so certain that Chessyre has fled?”

“Ah — but I am coming to that bit,” he assured me.

At that moment, Jenny appeared in the doorway; she had brought me tea and a quantity of soft rolls fresh from the oven. I sighed with contentment and prepared to endure the remainder of my brother's story.

“I managed to secure a guide to our lieutenant's haunts — a fellow of perhaps eleven, who works as potboy in the Mermaid's Tail. He was a likely lad, with the sharp chin and quivering nose of a weasel; he pocketed my money and led me through a warren of alleyways and foetid corners that I should never have believed existed outside of London. I poked my head into gin rooms and gambling hells and the offices of moneylenders; I visited cockfights and nunneries, and went so far as to interrogate a member of the Watch.[11] By this time, you may well believe, I had felt the loss of my dinner, and sought a poor sort of meal in the company of my young guide; the taverns were beginning to close, and I thought the boy should be sent home to bed. It was a quarter past one o'clock when I returned to the Dolphin—”

“—and was told that Lieutenant Chessyre never sought his room last night,” I concluded.

Frank's visage turned pink. “At this point I must confess that I engaged in an unpardonable subterfuge. I intimated to Fortescue that I was Chessyre's captain — that he was due to sail — that he was wanted at Spithead before the turn of the tide, or should be left aground — and in general, I made so much of a public fuss, that Fortescue agreed to unlock the Lieutenant's door.”

“Well done,” I murmured. “You examined the premises?”

“And determined that he had flown. The room was neat as a pin. It looked as though the man had been absent some hours already. The bed had not been slept in. There was not so much as a change of clothes, Jane, in the wardrobe. I rounded upon poor Fortescue and demanded to know whether he had mistaken the room! The fellow was quite put out. He had begun to suspect that he had been bilked of gold; for Chessyre had not settled the tenth part of his account, I understand.”

“—And has left any number of enemies behind him, but no direction for future enquiries!”

“He did, however, leave this” My brother flourished a crumpled sheet of paper as though it might have been his sword. The sheet had been torn in eighths, and laboriously pieced together with sealing wax. I took it from Frank and frowned over the scrawl of smeared blue ink.

“When will you heroes learn to command a legible fist?”

“When we are afforded a desk that does not heave and roll with every swell.”

I glanced up. “You believe this to have been written at sea?”

“Method, Jane!” he declared patiently. “Observe the heading.”

“His Majesty s Prize Manon, in the Bay of Biscay, 13 January 1807,” I murmured.” 'His Majesty's Prize' — this was written after the French ship had struck! I suppose it is in Chessyre's hand?”

Frank shrugged. “I suspect as much. I found it discarded among some other papers in his room. Give it here, and I shall attempt to read it aloud. It is a monkey's tangle; I am in some hopes you may make sense of it.”

There was no signature affixed, and no direction.

“A letter from one unknown to another,” I murmured, “and certainly unsent. He never intended it should be read.”

“No.”

“But this is vital, Frank! It assures us that Chessyre worked against his captain at the behest of another. Taken in company with the French surgeon's history, it smacks strongly of a plot. There cannot be two opinions on that point!”

“It was not a letter for Admiral Hastings to read, that much is certain. Though the author mentions the engagement, his thread descends swiftly into recrimination.”

I handed the piecemeal sheet carefully to my brother. “I must confess that I feel pity for the man. He is so divided in his soul! The writing smacks of torment. It is all pride and impudence, contempt and self-loathing. His conscience is uneasy. He has done that with which he cannot be reconciled; and he would blame the hand that moved him.”

“Save your pity for Tom Seagrave,” Frank told me brusquely. “Chessyre suffers from shame and pride, certainly — but he is perverse in his desire to bargain with his mover. Having sacrificed his Honour, as he puts it, he is ready to profit from the loss.”

“A man who fears the future may bargain with the very Devil.” I looked at my brother thoughtfully. “And you did say that he seemed mortally afraid. Do you think that he sent some version of this letter?”

“Not from the Manon, certainly, though this was written at sea. He was bound for port himself, and must arrive before any missive he could have pressed upon a homebound ship. I wonder that he wrote it at all.”

“Perhaps he merely attempted to order his thoughts.”

“A draft, you mean? Of a letter he later posted from Portsmouth? It is possible, I suppose.”

“His employer — if such we may call him — may have demanded the most immediate intelligence of Chessyre's deed.”

“I comprehend, now, why he said so little during our interview yesterday. He could not speak for himself; he moved under the prohibition of silence. His honour, we must assume, extends so far as the protection of his conspirator.”

“Then why did he call upon you here, Frank? It cannot have been with a view to reiterating his refusal.”

Frank glanced at me swiftly. “You think the man experienced a change of sentiment?”

“Why else consult with a superior he had spurned but a few hours before?”

“Remember that Chessyre is a mercenary creature. He may have thought to put a price on Thursday's testimony.”

“So much coin for Seagrave's guilt — for he must already have been well paid for the construction of the evidence — and so much more, for a subsequent avowal of Seagrave's innocence?”

“It might assuage his conscience, at the same moment it lined his purse.”

“And he could not hope for advancement in his naval career, did he recant of his charge,” I added thoughtfully. “Even did Chessyre profess himself confused— mistaken — unwitting in his accusation — he must be regarded as highly unsteady by the panel. He must be cashiered for calumny at least.”

My brother was silent an interval. Then he sighed. “I am too simple a man for prognostication. Chessyre is fled, Jane; and what Chessyre intends for the morrow must remain in question.”