“No, not at all; I expected it,” said Worth. He looked up with a slight smile. “What has he been doing to alarm his careful sister?”
“I think you know very well, sir. He is for ever at gaming clubs, and, I am afraid—I am nearly sure—worse than that. He has spoken of a house off St. James’s Street.”
“In Pickering Place?” he inquired.
“I believe so,” she said in a troubled voice.
“Number Five,” he nodded. “I know it: a hell. Who introduced him to it?”
“I am not perfectly sure, but I think it was Mr. Farnaby.”
He was shaking his mixture over one of the sheets of parchment. “Mr. Farnaby?” he repeated.
“You know him, sir?”
His occupation seemed to demand all his attention, but after a moment he said, ignoring her question: “I gather, Miss Taverner, that you consider it is for me to—er—guide Peregrine’s footsteps on to more sober paths?”
“You are his guardian, sir.”