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His brow cleared. “Ah. He’s running a thimblerig.”
“A what?”
“The game where street swindlers use the half shells of walnuts to hide a tiny ball and keep it moving so you can never tell where it is.”
“Exactly.” Reina smiled without amusement as she thought of how William would hate being compared to a street swindler.
“Reina, a magistrate won’t find it easy to compare entries in accounting ledgers. Can you find something on one page that makes it all clear?”
She went back to the cash book, her gaze skimming over entries. “Here,” she said in a moment.
John came around to stand beside her chair, and she showed him the entry.
(a) 6 February 1880
Credit: Suspense Ledger No. 4–Deferred dividends (B. Levington)
Amount: £1,025 9s 3d
Remark: Reinstated entry–original removed from main ledger
“This is essentially an admission of tampering with the records.” She paused. “Anyone in finance would sound the alarm after seeing this.”
John opened his clasp knife. After a stroke of the wickedly sharp blade, he tucked the neatly severed page into the private ledger. He tied the book’s attached leather cord to keep it firmly closed and handed it to her.
“I’ll put everything to rights,” he said.
Reina nodded distantly and stood there clutching the ledger, only vaguely aware of his efficient movements around her.
Not long ago, she’d visited the Lloyd’s of London underwriting room, just around the corner from Farlow’s. The meeting had been with a marine insurer, Mr. Rathbone, who had evaluated a packet ship she’d considered investing in.
“The ship’s chief weakness is her rigging,” the insurer had told her. “Over the years, the canvas was repaired with cheap thread and low-grade rope. Most of the hardware—turnbuckles and belaying pins and so forth—has been left worn and rusted. We’ve seen ships go adrift in open water when the rigging fails. They’re at the mercy of the sea. Can’t steer, can’t sail.”
John had closed the safe door, locked it, and re-covered it with the carpet. He pocketed the key to the Bramah lock. Carefully he picked up the mutilated copy of Queen of Your Own Castle and closed the cover to hide its gaping insides.
“Shall we take it with us?”
Reina loved him for having asked. She loved him for holding her book so respectfully. But she shook her head and put on her hat.
“It belongs here now,” she said.
John replaced the book on the shelf and extinguished the office’s oil lamp.
“You’re not really investing in a ship made of wood and canvas,” Mr. Rathbone had told her. “You’re investing in safe passage. You’re buying into a promise, you see.”
John carried the unmarked ledger and bullseye lantern as they went back along the hallway toward the service door. “We’ll slip outside and walk to the cab stand at Mansion House station,” he said.
“Will there still be drivers, this late in the evening?” Reina whispered.
“Aye, there are gentlemen’s clubs—” John stopped so abruptly that Reina bumped into him. Before another second had passed, he’d extinguished the lantern and was pushing her into the porter’s alcove. He gave her the ledger.
A blade of light cut through the hallway.
“Show your hands,” boomed a man’s authoritative voice. “What are you about, inside the bank after hours?”
John turned to confront the pair of men who approached.
Reina peeked around the alcove threshold with a sunken feeling.
