Luccas voice was low. Through the rain trickling off the brim of his hat I saw the muscles twitch under his good eye.

'The man who called knew you by name, so I just . . . Like I said, its a coincidence- Lucca cut my blustering. 'Because I know Misha would be incapable of harming anyone. And for that matter, why Misha? Why not any of the others from The Moika? They all have pale hair and speak with an accent. Perhaps you suspect every man I spoke to in Paris?

'But you have to see- I began.

Lucca raised his hands. 'No more. He didnt look direct at me, instead he stared over my shoulder. I guessed he didnt want me prying too deeply into his private thoughts.

'Come. We mustnt keep your grandmother waiting. He buried his chin into the folds of the muffler and strode forward. I had to scurry to keep up with him. I glanced up at his face from under the umbrella. I was on his bad side. Raindrops glistened on the furrowed skin of his cheek.

No wonder he was angry, I thought. The first time he finds someone who cares for him I sinuate he might be a monster. There was something there, though. Surely it was more than a coincidence that a white-haired Slav I was sure that was the accent Peggy had described had come calling at my house? If it wasnt Misha, then perhaps it was one of them others from the ballet Ilya, Stefan or Akady see, I remembered those names, despite the champagne.

And I remembered that Luccas friend was a musician called Misha too, but I didnt like to let on.

We turned down into Lucas Street. From the corner of my eye I saw Lucca cross himself as we passed the big grey chapel to the right. It was one of his. He was always particular about Sundays, but since that business with the missing girls hed become even more regular. Sometimes he took himself off to his Italian church up Covent Garden of a Friday.

He pulled his hat down lower as we passed a couple of lopsided sailor lads. In the narrow street the stench of gin rolled off them like steam from a wash tub. It wasnt even late but theyd already taken a skinful on board. It was a wonder they could stand, let alone walk. One of them caught my arm and slurred out a sort of invitation, although I doubt the word 'fuck appears in many manuals of etiquette. Lucca pulled me away and quickened his step. After a moment he turned to look back to make sure theyd got the message.

'Always the finest places for The Lady, he muttered. Despite everything I smiled. Shadwell was the last place Id expected to meet my grandmother again. She hadnt gone far, had she? All this time shed been sitting on my step like a spindly black spider still spinning her web.

I stepped aside to avoid a puddle of stinking brown muck spouting from a street drain. I had to hold my skirt up to stop it trailing in the foaming scum that bubbled across the cobbles. Lucca was right, this certainly wasnt the finest corner of Paradise.

Apart from that tart remark about The Lady he hadnt said a word since we talked about Misha. I needed to make peace with him.

'I . . . Im glad you came with me this evening. I couldnt go alone. I paused and tried again. 'She knew all about you. I think she liked you. When he didnt answer I fought the wind to dip the umbrella to one side and looked up. He was scanning the dreary street behind us. There was only one gas lamp along here and that was thirty yards back.

'Theyve gone now, Lucca. Anyway, Ive got you to protect my honour.

He shook his head. 'Its not those two. There is someone behind us someone who doesnt want to be seen. I wasnt sure at first, but now . . . He folded back the brim of his hat and peered into the wall of rain. 'I think we were followed from Commercial Road. Look there!

He pointed. I turned and tipped back the umbrella to get a clearer view. 'What am I looking at?

'Lombra the shadow there across the cobbles beyond the lamp. Someone is standing close to the entrance of an alleyway.

'People live here. It doesnt mean theres someone on our tail.

'Doesnt it? Lets go a little faster, Fannella. He took my hand and began to walk very quickly, dragging me along with him. At the same moment I heard footsteps tapping behind. Lucca picked up the pace and the steps came more rapid.

'Run! He yanked my arm so hard I yelped. As the pair of us pelted towards the end of the street the heavy drumming sound of someone chasing us echoed off the narrow walls and I knew he was right. I scrabbled to hold my sodden skirt high and clear from my boots and dropped the umbrella. It clattered to the cobbles and blew away, the wind catching under the canopy. I heard it bumping across the stones behind us as we ran on.

At the corner we turned into Shadwell High Street.

It was lively here. People were dodging about trying to avoid the rain and there were others sheltering under the bulging striped shop awnings that had been left furled out. A timber cart rumbled past, splashing more mud up my skirt. A man carrying a tray of days-end cabbages on his head pushed between us knocking me sideways into the gutter where a stream of water and God knows what else ran over my boots.

Lucca pulled me into the crowd and out across the road. We disappeared behind a hack pulled up outside a tavern. He tapped the side and the driver leaned down to speak to him.

I watched Lucca press some coins into the drivers hand and then he turned back to me and hustled me through the lamplit doorway of the tavern. The air inside was thick with the stench of liquor, smoke, wet clothes and sweat.

Keeping hold of my hand, Lucca forced a way to the frosted window letting out onto the street. 'Well watch from here. He bent to peer through the parts of the glass where the taverns name, 'The Hop Pole, was picked out in gold letters set into small clear panes.

He rubbed a spy hole in the steamy glass and pulled me closer. I hunched forward to see out to the street. The hack was still there, but of a sudden the driver cracked his whip and shouted, 'Right you are, sir, madam. He called so loud I heard him quite distinct. The horse whinnied and the hack jerked forward, bouncing over the glistening cobbles.

I nudged Lucca. 'Well?

He rubbed the glass and looked through the spy hole again.

'There do you see him, Fannella? I pressed my nose to the pane. A tall man in a long black coat stood just outside. He was wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a muffler that covered most of his face. In his left hand he carried a long cane. He watched the hack as it rumbled away up Shadwell High Street. There was a flash of silver as something arced into the air beside him. A moment later he smashed the gleaming head of his cane into the palm of his right hand. He stood and stared along the street for a moment and then he started to walk fast in the direction the hack had taken. I cleared a wider circle and saw him break into a run.

'Did you pay the cabbie to take off empty?

Lucca nodded. 'I hoped it would put him off whoever it was.

I peered out through the misted pane again. 'Did you catch anything of his face?

'Nothing you?

I shook my head. 'Do you think hes gone, then?

Lucca glanced at the bar where a stout, red-faced woman with arms like joints of gammon was leaning across to talk to a punter. Cushioned in her low-cut gown plaited with dun-coloured ribbon, the barmaids breasts looked like a couple of ostrich eggs jostling for space in a badly made nest.

His nose wrinkled. 'Well wait here for ten minutes. Were in good time. He nodded up at a fancy gold clock set in a wooden panel over the bar. It was twenty to nine.

Chapter Fifteen.

As we turned off the Ratcliff into Cannon Street Road a bell went off in the tower. Im no expert when it comes to buildings, not like Lucca anyway, but there was always something about St Georges that struck me as sinister. It didnt look like a church, more like someone had been playing a game with a full-size version of one of them sets of building blocks you give to a child Joey had one, I recall. Nanny Peck only let us break it out of its wooden box and over the rug in front of the fire on Sunday afternoons.

I looked up. All I could make out in the dark was the great black shape of the church over to the right, a jumble of sharp points and turrets no lights in any of the windows. I wasnt surprised at that. Whod want to be shut in there for the night?

Mind you, it was typical of my grandmother, I thought, to choose somewhere so grimly theatrical for a meeting. No doubt shed arranged it to appear like Old Nick himself in a sudden flare of torchlight on the steps. She was going to give a pantomime performance, was she? Well, I was ready for her.

It was still pelting down. I bent forward to keep the rain out my eyes and saw the poor sodden ghost of a feather from my bonnet dangle limp in front of my face. I clutched my bag to my chest as we followed the line of the wall towards the entrance to the churchyard.

We turned at the gate and Luccas hand tightened on my arm. I looked up.

There was a carriage drawn up ahead alongside the double set of curved steps leading into the church. It was lacquer black neat with glowing lamps, two horses in the traces and a hunched figure up top. One of the horses turned to look at us. It tossed its head and skittered about on the stones.

The huddled driver leaned down to rap on the side.

Immediately the door opened. A narrow set of steps clattered down and a figure in a long dark gown stepped out. The old Chinaman bowed and motioned to the carriage. Of an instant I was minded of the time just before my first night up in the cage when The Lady had taken the trouble to visit me and remind me of my duties. Fitzy had to carry me across the yard at the back of The Gaudy because my slippers wouldnt take the snow, and then hed delivered me through the door of this same carriage, practically into her lap.

I took a sharp breath. 'Lady Ginger might well want to speak to me, but Ive got a few things I want to ask her as well. Come on then, Lucca.

We walked towards the carriage, but as we came close the Chinaman stepped forward to bar our way. He drew a hand from a baggy sleeve, pointed at Lucca and shook his head.

I gripped Luccas hand. 'Surely she cant mean to leave you out here in this! She knows I wouldnt have come here without you. I raised my voice to be sure shed hear.

He turned the brim of his hat lower against the rain.

'Of course, but its you The Lady wants to speak to, Fannella, not me. Lucca glanced up at the brooding bulk of the church. 'I will wait under the porch. At least its dry there. He squeezed my hand, released it and loped up the steps. At the top he saluted before dipping into the shadow.

The old Chinaman watched him go and then he bowed again. Now he shuffled aside to let me climb into the carriage. I couldnt see inside, the curtains were drawn at the narrow windows and the door was only half open. But I could smell her.

I held the bag close to my chest and reached for the gilt handle beside the door. The carriage rocked about as I climbed the steps and dipped my head. The opium came strongly now as I pushed the door.

Firm hands gripped my shoulders and pulled me roughly inside. Something cold was clapped across my face. I struggled and tried to shout, but the cloth smothered my nose and mouth. I could feel bony fingers pressing it tight. There was another scent now a sickly sweetness with an undertow of the cleaning stuff Id used with Lok.

I tried not to breathe, but the hand clamped down harder. At the same moment I was hauled deeper and pushed down into the seat. It was black as a cassock inside the carriage. I twisted round trying to make some sense of what was happening, but I couldnt see anything clear just shapes and shadows. Someone pinned my arms to my sides and another person forced me forward so that my forehead would have touched my knees if it hadnt been for the hand in between. Through the soaked rag, the fingers felt like a mask stiffened across my face.

My tongue began to burn and my nostrils stung. The last thing I heard before I went was the rattle of my bag as it tumbled to the carriage floor.

When I opened my eyes it was almost light. An arch of palest purple showed where a thin curtain had been drawn across a window a few yards away. My head was throbbing as if someone was standing over me twisting a fork into my right temple.

I screwed my eyes down tight and opened them again. The room was square with a large brick fireplace over to the right. The remains of a log still glowed in the hearth, filling the air with the rich scent of burning cherry wood. It would almost have been a comfort if I had the first idea where I was.

I was stretched out on my left side, my right hand resting on some thick, rough material. I could feel the embroidered pattern of it under my fingertips. I followed the line of the looped flower with the pad of my index finger and stared at the window.

I couldnt remember how I got here. The last thing I could bring clear to mind was Lucca standing at the top of St Georges steps. He raised his hand, waved and then . . .

And then what?

I shifted about to see more clearly. I was fully clothed and lying on top of a narrow bed with a sort of canopy overhead. The folds of material above me were pleated into a tent-like affair fringed with tassels. Beyond the canopy I could see a ceiling supported by three broad wooden beams.

The bed creaked as I pulled myself into a sitting position and the tassels up top began to sway. Immediately my stomach turned itself inside out. I tried to swallow the bitterness that bubbled up into my throat, but it was no good. Someone had set a china bowl on the nightstand next to the bed. I took it quickly into my lap and bent forward, spattering clear liquid across the delicate painted flowers.

A minute later it came again, but after that second bout the cramping settled. I set the bowl back on the nightstand, pulled up my knees and stared at the panelled room around me, taking more of it in now in the thin light. There was a padded chair next to the fire and my bag and bonnet were on it, the ribbons of the bonnet had been laid flat over the arm so that the fire could dry them. My feet were bare someone had removed my stockings and they were now hanging from the mantle. I saw that my boots had also been set neatly next to the hearth.

Something like this had happened before. I thought of that time I woke in my bed at Mother Maxwells to find James Verdin curled up next to me. He was naked, point of fact we both were my clothes were flung around the room like a bomb had gone off in a laundry. It wasnt a thought I liked to dwell on. I pulled at the stiff hem of my skirt, rifling through the cotton petticoats to check my unders. I was wearing my drawers. Apart from the stockings and boots I was still buttoned up tight.

Over to the left there was a door. I slipped from the bed, freezing up like one of them museum statues Lucca likes to draw as the old boards beneath my feet betrayed me. It didnt seem to matter where I stood, they groaned as if an elephant was tramping about on them. I made my way over quiet as I could and tried the handle, turning it gently so as not to make any more of a racket, but it was locked.

My hair had come loose somewhere along the way. I pushed it back and knotted it tight at my neck. My head was still bad, but it was more of an ache now rather than the stabbing pain Id woken to. A memory swam into my mind and I tried to net it before it vanished into the depths again.

Darkness a carriage?

I frowned, leaned back on the door and stared at the unfamiliar room. And then, of a sudden, it all came back. The Chinaman, the hand over my face, the drug-soaked cloth.

Where the bleedin hell was I?

I walked over to pull back the curtain. A dew-soaked garden several floors below was silver green in the early light. Rows of hedges romped off across a well-tended lawn towards a bank of trees. Some of the hedges had been clipped into shapes. There were balls, pyramids and great lumpen things that put me in mind of a herd of animals standing guard.

I could hear gulls making a racket, but that didnt mean much. You get them on the river and they follow the carts round Billingsgate, yowling and diving on the boxes like cats with wings.

I pressed my forehead against the glass, my breath misting the latticed pane. I rubbed it clear and caught sight of a lead pipe running down beside the window. I could climb down and sprint across the grass and into the trees and then keep going.

I listened for a moment. Except for the ticking of a clock set on a chest against the wall there wasnt a sign of life. I tested the window, quietly at first so as not to draw attention, but after a moment I was scrabbling at the lattice work and rattling the curled iron handles.

It was no good. Like the door, it was locked. I was a prisoner.

I went over to the fireplace and took my bag from the chair. I snapped it open. The letters were still inside along with my purse and David Lennoxs broidered kerchief.

None of this was making sense. Was this where The Lady was waiting for me or had I been drugged and taken to someone else? I thought about that night at The Gaudy and brought my hand up to my ear. There was still a crust of blood where the dangling jewel, a ball of faceted green glass, had been ripped away.

I glanced up at a painting over the hearth as if I might find an answer there. A young couple sat together on a bench in a landscape full of sheep. The man looked very pleased with himself and his livestock. His hat was set at a jaunty angle and his hand rested in a lazy, proprietorial manner on the shoulder of the girl with him.

If I was the fanciful type I might have said that she had the look of Ma about her. She was dainty and fair with large dark eyes that seemed almost too large for her small pointed face. Her stockinged feet, encased in prettily ribboned shoes, poked out from under a bell-shaped skirt. They werent the kind of shoes a girl could walk far in.

I moved my bonnet, reached for my own stockings and sat down heavily in the chair to put them on. If I was going to make a run for it at some point I would need my boots.

The clock on the chest cleared its throat and began to chime.

On the sixth and final stroke there was a jangling sound as someone unlocked the door. It swung open and the old Chinaman whod come with the carriage last night shuffled into the room. He bowed once and gestured to the door. He coughed and dabbed his mouth on his sleeve, before speaking.

'The Lady will see you now.

Chapter Sixteen.

By the time wed got to the second flight of stairs Id given up trying to get anything out of him. Lady Gingers Chinaman had turned his back and waited at the door while I pulled on my stockings and buttoned my boots, but when I stood up and asked him to tell me where we were he just shook his head and bowed. It didnt matter what question I put to him, the answer was always the same.

Now I was following the old boy down a long, dark corridor two floors higher than the room Id woken up in. Like the bedroom below it was panelled and gloomy. Wide wooden floorboards creaked beneath our feet as we made our way along. The old man was brisk. I couldnt see his feet under the hem of his gown but I could hear the shuffling slap of his slippers as he led the way.

There were paintings along the wall to the right, but I couldnt see them clear because the tall, square windows all down the left side were shuttered or curtained. I could tell a fine day was blooming outside because the light creeping round the edges was tinged with gold. Just occasionally I could see dust dancing about in a brilliant sliver that dared to cut across the boards at our feet.

We walked on past the biggest fireplace Id ever seen, propped up either side it was with life-size marble statues of men who had half a fish where their legs should have been, and into a part of the corridor where the curtains were pulled so close that the day couldnt come in. The only light here came from a couple of candles set in silver cups shaped like shells set either side of a massive door.

The Chinaman halted. He knocked once, bowed again and stood aside.

As the door swung open the smell of Lady Ginger not just the opium, but the warm, sour smell of her old body came rolling out to meet me.

And then it happened, just like all the other times. I suppose I shouldnt have been surprised, but it wasnt until that moment when the door opened and something of her leeched out that my body remembered the things my head was trying to bury.

My neck went cold like a frozen hand had clamped across the back of it. I tried to wrestle my breathing to a steady rise and fall, but of a sudden it came fast and shallow. I wasnt seventy foot up on a trapeze, but for some reason the impression of being dandled over something dangerous went through me. Of an instant the wooden floor beneath my feet felt less substantial than I knew it to be.