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mustn’t forget your willing participation in the creation of this infant, especially when it makes for such pleasant reverie.’
    â€˜I hope you have other things you can think about during the day.’
    â€˜Yes . . . but they’re not half as pleasant.’
    Colour touched Charlotte’s cheeks and she buried her face against his shoulder. She’d never expected to love a man so completely. ‘Stop teasing me, Seth Hardy.’
    Marianne had told Adam that the funeral parlour had gone. However, death had not travelled far from the place, for the premises now sold the weapons that caused the final end product.
Henry Palk and Son. Sporting guns. Duelling pistols. Sword sticks. Weapons of defence.
Bars guarded the window and the glass panels in the door, which also had a stout metal lock to secure it. The shop front resembled a prison cell, but perhaps it was designed to deter aspiring robbers by showing them what to expect.
    Henry Palk was in residence behind the counter, looking like a fixture. ‘I haven’t had a sale all week,’ he said gloomily, when Adam introduced himself and stated his business.
    â€˜I wondered if there were any funerary records left behind.’
    Henry looked doubtful, then he brightened. ‘As I recall there are some papers down in the cellar. I’ll get my son to take you down and you can have a look when he comes back. It’s a gloomy hole though and it smells a bit. Sometimes we store bits and pieces down there. Not that we keep much on the premises, and we always take the bolts home with us.’
    He gazed doubtfully at Adam’s immaculate appearance. ‘It’s easy enough to go down but it’s as black as a coal bunker. A tall man like you will have to stay bent over lest you thump your head on the beam. Best you leave your hat and jacket up here with me so they’ll stay clean. At least your trousers are dark.’
    â€˜That’s kind of you, Mr Palk.’
    The door opened as he spoke and a man who appeared to be in his forties entered. He was of a short, stocky stature.
    â€˜This is my son, Thomas Palk. Thomas, Mr Chapman is a detecting agent making enquiries about a deceased person. I said he could look through that old trunk in the cellar and go through the funeral parlour records. Take him down if you would.’
    â€˜Right then, I’ll fetch a candle. Come through behind the counter, sir; the trapdoor is in the back room.’
    â€˜They used to prepare the bodies for burial in that back room,’ Henry offered with a shudder.
    Thomas rolled his eyes. ‘Someone has to do it, and at least it’s a profession where you don’t run out of clients. You can help me lift the trapdoor if you would, sir.’
    Henry took Adam’s coat and hat from him. ‘Keep a look out for ghosts,’ he said, as Adam followed Thomas down.
    Henry had been right. The cellar was small and low, and smelled of damp, mould and mice. It was also filled with cobwebs and scuttling creatures and Adam thought he might have welcomed a couple of ghosts to scare them off. He found a trunk full of yellowed papers that seemed to be in a state of decomposition, and which were filed in a manner that offended his tidy mind. He had to squat on his haunches to go through them.
    Thomas said, ‘You won’t mind if I go back up again, will you, sir? I can’t abide the feeling of being closed in down here.’
    By the time Adam was halfway through the papers his back ached from bending almost double and his hands were black with dirt. But he’d found what he was looking for, the record of the interment of Caroline Honeyman some eighteen years before.
    Henry had some soap and water waiting for him. ‘Best you wash those hands before you touch anything.’ He gently brushed cobwebs, dust and a couple of spindly long-legged spiders from Adam’s trousers before handing him his coat. ‘I’m going over to