Below him the jangle of the chandler's door bell recalled Drinkwater to the present. The stranger emerged, settling his tricorne hat on his head and holding it there against the wind. The man turned away with his coat tails flapping, leaving the alley to the sleet and a solitary mongrel, which urinated purposefully against the wall of the pie shop opposite. The grey overcast was drawing the day to a premature close, but still Drinkwater sat on, recalling the twilight of that dawn, eight days earlier, when at the end of a night of planning he had sat at Lord Dungarth's escritoire. Apart from the servants, Drinkwater had been alone in the house, Isaac Solomon having departed an hour earlier, his lordship following, bound in his coach for the Admiralty.

'Do you write to your proteges, Nathaniel,' he ordered, 'and I will have orders drawn up for the expeditious preparation of a gun-brig for your escort. Deliver your letters by seven and I will have them carried by Admiralty messenger.' He had been about to depart then added, as an afterthought, 'If you wish to leave word for your wife, I will have it sent after your departure. It would be best if few people know your whereabouts.'