Edward shook his head at the fashionable get-up of his friend: the Captain had been a clothes horse even back when they were young men knocking about in university, and, without skipping a beat, he’d matured into a dashing le grande monde, the masculine object of affection of many a London debutante.

After a further exchange of warm greetings, Edward’s face turned serious. “I need a favor,” he said without preamble, and then turned around slowly to look at the river. He looked furtively around him as he did.

John picked up on his friend’s heightened sense of awareness, and leaned over the railing casually also. Gazing to his right, away from Edward’s direction, he asked, “How can I help?”

“This isn’t official,” Edward started.

“That’s alright,’ John responded smoothly. “Just two friends talking, right? Enjoying the end of a nice, pleasantly cool spring day?”

“I know you play cards in the gentlemen’s club off of the Strand,” Edward continued. “There’s a man who plays there also, from time to time. From Mayfair, just like you. I’ve had some men following him, and I think he may be planning a pull.”

“A pull?” John asked his friend curiously and shot him a quick look, before glancing away from him again to see if anyone from his side was observing them.

“A heist. Scotland Yard thinks he’s planning to rob the payroll of the company laying the transatlantic cable from London to New York. He may strike on the next payday … in Greenwich.”

John turned around to casually lean against the railing, just as Edward had done as he spoke. “If you know this already, what do you need my help for?”

“I think it is a lay,” Edward answered.

“A lay?” John asked again.

“A diversion,” Edward explained. “In fact I am certain that it is. I think he is planning to rob gold that will be transported through London, bound for Paris.”

“How do you know this?”

“I don’t have time to explain all the details,” Edward began to talk more hurriedly, checking around him again before continuing. “I had an informant who told me two weeks ago about nefarious deeds this gentleman had been doing over the past three-four years while pretending to be travelling for leisure or adventure in America, Africa, South America, and lands in the East.”