I could do it,” Mole urged. “Be the work of a moment, it would. The boy is around the stables at all hours.” Monsieur Foucault said nothing, and Mole couldn’t tell whether or not he appreciated this fine opportunity.

“I’m telling you, sir, the lad is in the palm of me hand. I told him I know of a horse that can count to five. I’ll get him to meet me outside the house, and toss him in a carriage, and there we are!”

Monsieur Foucault raised his eyebrows. “Where are we?”

“Well, we’d have the young lad of the house,” Mole blustered, with the uneasy feeling that sand was draining away under his feet.

“If by ‘lad’ you are implying that young Henri is Foakes’s son,” Foucault said languidly, “he is not. The boy is a French guttersnipe, picked up Lord knows where.”

“But they like the boy, don’t they? News is that he’s having a tutor next week, and he told me himself that he’s being sent off to one of them fancy schools in the spring. We’d need to move fast, but I’ve got him in me palm,” Mole repeated. “An’ if they like him enough to hire him a tutor, then they’ll pay a pretty ransom for him. I’m thinking he’s a by-blow of Foakes’s, that’s what.”

“But we don’t need a ransom,” Foucault said, the first signs of irritation appearing in his face. “Did you learn nothing of importance while you were entertaining all and sundry in the stables?”

“They’re at the outs,” Mole said promptly. “The honeymoon is over, they say. He’s off every night, staying in his offices till all hours, never comes to her room at all, and she goes driving all the time with a great swell. They’re telling, in the stables, how she wanted to marry this swell but then something happened and she gave him the mitten.”

“Interesting but not useful,” Foucault murmured. “Has François visited your humble abode, my dear Mole?” And, at his nod, “In that case, I shall request the pleasure of your company on Tuesday fortnight. We shall call on Patrick Foakes. You will be one Bayrak Mustafa, and I fancy that you speak no English. Will that be quite acceptable?”

And without waiting for a response, Monsieur Foucault rubbed a fleck of dust off his knee-high boots and strolled from the room.