It was late evening when Caleb Crowther emerged from Breckleton House and climbed into the waiting carriage. He had succumbed to a driving need in him to visit old haunts where there were women who would be only too eager to satisfy the basic urges that had come on him. ‘All the way to London, my good man!’ he called in a jocular voice as he climbed into the carriage. He felt good. Anger was an invigorating emotion that suited him well. Besides which, the gullible Martha had been like dough in his hands. Within the week she should be setting sail for foreign parts. He chuckled aloud at the thought of having manufactured yet another little plot that just might prove to be most rewarding to him. What was even more amusing was that the effort required on his part had been nothing at all. Let other fools use up their finances and their strength, he mused; the cost to him was only a little scheming. That was always a very gratifying pleasure.

As the carriage swiftly conveyed him out of Lancashire and along the highways to London town, Caleb Crowther was bloated with his own cleverness. It might have sadly deflated him to know that even at that moment he was not heading for pleasure or gratification, but was hurtling headlong towards catastrophe.

‘It’s too late, sir… we closed the doors at two o’clock this morning.’ The young man’s spotted face pushed itself closer to the small grille in the door. What he had first seen on looking out was a man too intoxicated for his own good, so intoxicated in fact, that it would be inadvisable to allow him into even this club, which was notorious for its inebriated membership. What he saw on closer inspection was a drunk who was well dressed and ‘possessed of an air of authority’. He thought it wise to address the toff with more caution – after all, a body could never tell who was knocking on these doors! It could be royalty, millionaires from America, or even the law in disguise. ‘I’m afraid I’m not allowed to let you in, sir… it could cost our licence if we opened these here doors after two in the morning.’

‘Damn and bugger your licence, man!’ Caleb Crowther rapped his cane into the grille, causing the poor fellow to snatch away his face for fear of losing an eye. ‘Open these doors, I tell you!’ There then followed a loud and abusive exchange, which in turn alerted the proprietor of the establishment, who came rushing to the door and at once pushed his well-fed face to the door, instructing the offender to ‘clear off… or I’ll call the law’.

‘Oh, you will, will you?’ demanded Caleb Crowther, whilst swaying in his boots. ‘You’ll call the law… to see off the law!’ He began laughing uproariously and clattering his cane up and down the door panels, until the sounds echoed in the dark early hours like an approaching army.