"Did you give her money, too?" Caroline asked.

"Yes. And directions to a charity house that would have provided her with a bed and a warm meal. But I expect she spent the money on opium or gin and dice, just as Nan will no doubt do tonight."

"You know this but you give the women money anyway?"

`Some of them have children to feed." His face was harsh in the shadows. ^"Sometimes it is the children I see waiting under the lamps."

She could feel his quiet anger swirling in the darkness around them.

The carriage turned another corner and halted in the middle of the street. Caroline looked out and saw an unlit doorway.

^"Come," Adam said.

He climbed down and reached back to assist Caroline. "We will be a while, Ned," he said. "Go and get something warm to drink from the tavern at the top of the street.

I'll whistle when we're ready to depart."

"Aye, sir." Ned touched his cap.

Adam guided Caroline to the dark vestibule. There he removed a key from his pocket and unlocked the door.

They entered a small hall. Adam lit a small lamp. Carrying it in one hand, he took Caroline's arm and started up a flight of narrow steps.

"There is no one living here at the moment," he said. "I own the building and have scheduled some renovations."

She was more intrigued than ever. "What do you intend to do with it?"

"I have plans." He did not elaborate.

When they reached the landing, he drew her down the hall and stopped in front of a closed door. He took out an-other key.

Without a word, he unlocked the door and stood back to allow her to move past him into a dark, low-ceilinged room.

She entered slowly, keenly aware of the heavy weight of significance that imbued the atmosphere. This small, shabby room was very important to Adam.

The single window was covered with a simple curtain made of canvas. The furnishings were minimal. She saw a cot and a table. The floor was bare. There were no personal items of any kind lying about the place but the room was clean and well-dusted. A fire had been laid on the hearth.

Adam followed her across the threshold, closed the door and set the lamp on the table. He turned to look at her.

"This was where I lived until the beginning of my eighteenth year," he said.

He watched her with that enigmatic calm that was so characteristic of him but she sensed the powerful emotions simmering under the surface.

"You were not born into wealth?^" she asked, feeling her way.

He looked wryly amused. "My mother worked in a milliner's shop. She married my father when she was eighteen. He was a clerk in a shipping company. He was killed in an accident on the docks two years after I was born. Mother was left with nothing except his ring and his books. She pawned the ring to pay the rent and buy food but she kept the books"

The terse summary was given in an emotionless tone, as though Adam were recounting some rather boring bits of ancient history.

^"Your poor mother must have been quite desperate," she said quietly.

"Yes. She spent all day at the shop. At night she taught me to read and write using the handful of books that my father had left us"

She clasped her hands in front of her. "She was obviously a woman of great courage and determination."

"Yes, she was" His expression grew even more detached and distant. "She died of a fever when I was eleven."

"Adam, I'm so sorry. What did you do? How did you survive?"

"My mother had taught me to read and write, but I had also received another sort of education growing up on the streets in this neighborhood. It had begun to come in handy before Mother died. It kept me fed and paid the rent after she was gone."

"How did you make a living?"

"I bought and sold other people's secrets," he said simply. "I don't understand"

^"Remember Maud Gatley? The opium addict whose diary I am trying to recover?"

"Yes, of course."

He angled his chin toward the door. "She was a prostitute who lived across the hall. She frequently brought her clients upstairs to her room. Occasionally some of her customers whispered their secrets to her and she, in turn, told them to me."

`And you found a market for them?" she asked, incredulous.

His smile was cold. "There is a vast and lucrative market for secrets, especially when those secrets belong to gentlemen from the better social circles."

"I hadn't realized that."

"Maud was very beautiful in those days and she had not yet fallen completely under the spell of the drug. She counted a number of men of the Quality among her clientele. It was my job to find buyers for the gossip and rumors she picked up in the course of her work. We split the profits. The arrangement worked well for both of us for some time."

A rush of wonder swept through her. "Yours is an amazing story."

He raised one brow. "I am glad you find it intriguing. But I warn you, if a single word of it appears in one of your novels, I will be very displeased."

She gave him her most demure look. "I would, of course, change the names"

"A change of names would not be nearly enough to placate me," he warned.

"I was only teasing, Adam, as I'm sure you are well aware. Tell me the rest of the tale."

"Over the course of the next few years I acquired two sisters and a brother"

"How does one acquire siblings?^" she asked.

"It varies. Sometimes one finds an orphan who is about to be auctioned off in a brothel that caters to gentlemen who prefer virgin girls under the age of twelve"

"Dear heaven"

"Sometimes one finds a girl abandoned at the age of three next to a pile of trash and sweepings."

"Adam, are you telling me—"

"Sometimes one finds a boy who, at the age of four, has been set out beneath a streetlamp to beg but whose parent never came back for him."

"You took them all in to live with you," she whispered. "I do not know what to say. I am quite stunned"

He shrugged. "I was making good money on the streets in those days. I could afford to feed a few extra mouths. It made for company in the evenings."

"Did you teach them to read and write as your mother had taught you?"

"There wasn't much else to do at night," he said.

She waved one hand to indicate the spare little room. "How did the four of you escape this place?"

"The situation changed in the middle of my seventeenth year. I came into possession of a particularly valuable secret. It involved a large-scale financial swindle that affected a number of high-ranking investors. I sold the information to a new client, a wealthy, widowed gentleman. He used it to prevent himself and several associates from losing a great deal of money"

"Go on," she said, fascinated.

Instead of answering immediately, he straightened away from the wall, unfolded his arms and crossed the room to the fireplace. Going down on one knee, he struck a light and ignited the kindling.

He watched the small blaze take hold for a moment or two. She got the impression that he was reviewing scenes from the past and deciding which ones to reveal.

"The wealthy gentleman had lost his wife and children to a terrible fever several years previously," he said finally. "The gentleman was very rich but quite alone in the world. After the two of us had done some business together over the course of several months, he went so far as to offer me a position as a sort of unofficial man-of-business."

"You were only seventeen years of age. What sort of tasks did you perform for him?"

"As I told you, my mentor was very fond of secrets of all kinds and I had a talent for collecting them. I got them not just from Maud but from others who were in a position to learn them." Adam rose slowly. "Tavern keepers, chambermaids, footmen, hairdressers, washerwomen, men who work on the docks. The list of people who are in a position to provide useful information about others is endless."