Nathaniel stepped back. ‘You can get out of here too. You can’t bring your pets down here, de Guise, not on a night like this.’ He turned. ‘If Hélène isn’t here in one minute, Brogan, you’ve some explaining to do.’

Nancy put an arm around Billy and escorted him back to the dressing-room door.

‘I shouldn’t have done it. I know it. I’m not proud. I . . .’ The words were pouring out of him in an unstoppable torrent. Somewhere inside Billy Brogan a dam had burst, and now the waters were running wild. ‘You have to believe me. I should have taken my punishment, whatever was coming to me, but . . . She has ways, Nance. She does. She looks into you and it’s like . . . she can see everything. It’s my own fault. I know it is. I should never have—’

Nancy gripped him by the chin, forced him to look into her eyes. ‘Take a deep breath, Billy. You’ll have to start at the beginning.’

‘But that’s just it. I don’t know how it started. I’ve always run favours in this hotel. Always made drop-offs and collections for people. I didn’t know, the first time I went to the Midnight Rooms, what I was going there for.’ Nancy’s face furrowed. She remembered how Billy had confidently led her down the Midnight Rooms stairs, how he’d stepped so easily through that door, but she’d thought it the first time he’d been there too. Had she been wrong? ‘It was Mr Simenon who sent me. He did it as a favour to Miss Vivienne Edgerton. What she asked for, she got. Only it’s below Mr Simenon to go to a place like the Midnight Rooms, so he sent me. And I’d bring them back for her, those powders she has. The cocaine . . .’

Nancy’s face drained. She stepped back from Billy.

‘You’d better go on, Billy,’ uttered Raymond. ‘What in God’s name have you done?’

‘After what happened to Miss Edgerton, after how you found her, Nance, we was meant to stop procuring powder for her. And we did – for a little while, at least. Only . . . she said she’d tell. If I didn’t get her what she needed, if I didn’t help her out, she’d go ratting to Maynard Charles and . . . Scandals, Nance. Any sniff of a scandal and the management have to stamp it out. I can’t get stamped out. What’ll happen to me without the Buckingham Hotel? What about all my brothers and sisters? So, Lord help me, I did what she asked. I told her. I told her where Miss Marchmont goes.’

Raymond was about to grab Billy by his collar when Nancy, sensing his anger, stepped between them.

‘You know everyone’s secrets, don’t you, Billy?’ snapped Raymond. ‘You were happy enough passing mine to Maynard Charles—’