SEBASTIAN CALLED a special meeting of the Inner Council at his flat in Regent's Park and presented his idea for the challenge. Only Caton-James and St John Warner complained, considering the exercise to be a waste of time and money, but their objections were quickly overruled. In particular, Caton-James felt that Sebastian was using the situation to indulge his love of games, but he remained silent while the chairman outlined his proposal.

'From time to time throughout the century, the members of the League have been required to make a stand for the things in which they believe,' Sebastian pointed out. The eleven men gathered before him sat patiently listening. 'That occasion has arrived again, just as it did in my father's time. I think, gentlemen, that it will prove the solution to our internecine problems.' There were murmurs of agreement as he laid down the ground rules.

'The challenge must provide a genuine test of knowledge that teaches our young man a lesson. It must provide a fair opportunity to reach a solution. That means you cannot require him to visit, say, a club that refuses entrance to non-members, or a guildhall that bans public entry. Besides, I have a feeling Mr Reynolds would be able to handle problems like that. He got into the Holborn Chambers without too much trouble. Exercise more subtlety. Mess with his mind. He thinks he's closer to the street than you or I, and he's right, if the street includes the gutter. I want you to take the strut from his stride. Make him realise that he owns nothing of this city, and that his kind never will.'

'Fine,' said Caton-James, 'so long as you don't mind us adding a few rules of our own. After all, this isn't just about you and the boy, is it? There's the matter between ourselves to settle.'

'I understand, of course.' Sebastian was chastened. 'Tell me what you want.'

Caton-James proceeded to outline a handwritten page of additional points. It took another two hours for everyone to fully agree an order of events, but by the end of the meeting full approval from the other League members had been granted.

After the rest had taken their leave, Sebastian sat by the window thinking. It really could work. He could kill two birds with one stone, and enjoy the game along the way. There were hazards involved, of course, but where was the challenge without them? Best of all, there was something about Vincent Reynolds that he genuinely admired. His unrepentant questioning, his enthusiasm for tasks that offered little or no reward. Sebastian thought of him as a reconstructed cockney, a kind of junior Sid James, muddling through the post-war debris, making the best of things. He had earned his right to be an opponent. It helped to balance the odds, and made the risk all the more worth taking.

First of all, though, a gesture was required. Something that would prepare Reynolds for the seriousness of his situation, and goad him on. He set to work immediately.

'IF YOU are prepared to accept Jesus into your heart, the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven shall be yours. HALLELUJAH!'

Carol Mendacre grimaced and dug about on the passenger seat until she found an unboxed cassette. She inserted the tape and adjusted the volume, then returned her concentration to the lane ahead. The rain had renewed its strength half an hour ago, and she had lowered her speed accordingly. At this time of night the wet roads were easier to negotiate, save for the spray from articulated trucks heading South West. Carol hated driving, and only undertook journeys of any length when she knew the traffic volume would be lighter. Why did they always have to hold publishers' conferences at hotels in the heart of the countryside?

'There is something indefinably keen and wan about her anatomy; and she has a watchful way of looking out of the corners of her eyes without turning her head, which could be pleasantly dispensed with – especially when she is in an ill humour and near knives.'

Carol recognised Dickens's description of the maid from Chapter 12 of Bleak House, and recalled that she was a considerable way past that point in the novel. She glanced over at the seat; the 'Talking Book' tapes had slipped from their case and become muddled.

She was considering the best way to sort them out without leaving the road when the car behind switched its headlights to full beam. She was unable to make out the vehicle that loomed in her rear-view mirror. What was its problem? She was doing nearly sixty in the centre lane, and there were no other cars around. Was the driver mad? Her heart started thumping as her grip tightened on the wheel. Her mirror was a panel of white glass. The interior of the car was filled with light.

When the vehicle came so close that it gently touched her rear bumper, she panicked, allowing the wheel to slip through her hands as she swerved left into the slower lane. But the car was still with her, just as close, and she fought to control the sliding wheels beneath her and failed. The last thought to pass through her mind as her cigarettes slid from the dashboard and the vehicle began to slowly turn over, fighting the force of gravity, was the realisation that she would not hear the end of Dickens' epic tale of chancery.

On a freezing afternoon in early November Vince met with Esther Goldstone at her office in Covent Garden, and described what had happened in the Holborn chambers. Esther listened patiently, waiting for him to finish. She looked tired.

'I have some bad news,' she said finally. 'Your commissioning editor – my friend – was involved in an accident a few nights ago. Her car left the road and overturned just outside Bristol. It was burned out by the time the emergency services arrived. Nobody seems very sure how it happened. There were no other vehicles involved.'

'Prometheus brought her fire,' said Vincent.

'What do you mean?'

'Sebastian warned that Prometheus would bring me a fiery sign. It was meant to show me the seriousness of the challenge.'

'You think Carol's death was to do with you?' Disbelief creased Esther's face. 'Even if it were true, how could you prove such a thing?'

To Vince, this was obviously the handiwork of the League. They were stopping the book at its source. 'That's how they work, don't you see,' he said quietly, 'they leave no trace. You told me to use my heart, my instincts. Well, I know they did it, and I have absolutely no way of proving it. The fire cleanses. It destroys all the evidence, wipes out everything except your inner knowledge of the truth.'

Esther eyed him unsurely. The distant soprano was singing her scales in the Opera House's rehearsal room. On such a day as this it was hard for anyone to imagine that behind the normality of the streets, real, honest-to-God conspiracies were being hatched. Esther tried to shake his fears from her head. 'If these people really were responsible for such a terrible thing – which I have to say I doubt – they've failed to stop the project going ahead.'

'Why?'

'I offered to take her work over as a freelance assignment, and the publishers accepted. I came from the editorial ranks, after all. I'm familiar with the background and I'm aware of Carol's intentions for the series. I also know most of the authors involved. As far as I am concerned, the book will remain on schedule. And I hope to God your fears are ungrounded.'

'I'm positive the League was involved -'

'Carol was a terrible driver,' Esther cut in. 'It was late at night and raining hard, and she'd had a couple of glasses of wine. I know. I was with her when she drank them.'