But then he thought of Vivienne Edgerton and Mr Simenon, his illicit trips to the Midnight Rooms, the phials he brought back. He thought of how she had cornered him in that suite, and the look of neediness and desperation on her face.

And the thing he had promised to do, all so that she would not tell.

Serving Mr Charles and whoever he was working for was one thing. That was a noble secret. But being in the service of Vivienne Edgerton? Betraying his friends, so that he himself might not be betrayed? Well, that was quite another.

What if I don’t do it? he wondered. The thought kept him awake long into the night. If I say no? Well, then she tells Mr Charles who’s been supplying her, and then . . . then it’s my neck on the chopping block, then it’s me being marched out of the Buckingham without even a letter of recommendation to my name.

Then it’s me coming back home, empty-handed every night. No wages. No little extras. No treats saved from the dustbins being brought back to feed that lot through there. And . . . Billy thought of his father, all of the days he’d come back from the fish market not knowing if there would be work for him the next day, the next week, the next month. The world was cruel out there. The well-fed one day were starving the next. All those faces, depending on me. How could I let one of them go hungry for even one night? What does right and wrong matter when there’s hungry children to be thinking about?

Somewhere out there, over the rooftops of London, Big Ben began to toll midnight. Christmas Day had come.

Chapter Thirty-one

Chapter Thirty-one

Earlier that same night and the chambermaids of the Buckingham Hotel ought to have been in bed long ago. Yet here they were, gathered in the staff kitchenette, all clamouring for a story. ‘Tell us!’ the girls said. ‘Every . . . last . . . detail!’ they insisted. Nancy Nettleton craned around, taking in each of their faces in turn. Rosa and Ruth. Agatha and Frances.

‘We know how it started,’ Rosa laughed. ‘Dance lessons. And then—’

‘What did he do, just kiss you?’

‘You ever been kissed before, Nance?’

‘I reckon she has! Girl from a mining town like that. You’d have been fighting ’em off, were you, Nance?’

‘Wait, wait, wait!’ Nancy cried out. ‘I’ll tell you,’ she said – and there was an audible gasp around the room. ‘But you have to promise me. This is our secret, girls. Please. If Mrs Moffatt were to find out . . .’

‘Oh, rot!’ Ruth cackled. ‘She’s only a dragon half of the time. You think you’re the first serving girl, Nancy Nettleton, who’s fallen for somebody she shouldn’t in this hotel? When I first got here, there was Suzanne. Now, Suzanne and this guest, Lord Some Such or Other, they were found in—’