In the end, rather than suborning a shipping agent and getting into the hiring yard, they wait outside the dock gates and hire the first man who shows up with the shine; they take him to breakfast.

He turns out to be Dan Henwright, and he’s clearly a bit edgy about this situation. He tries to be vague about what actually happened (there’s a mention of “John shouldn’t have said that, should he?”, though he refuses to say what it was that John said), but several of the group get the feeling that he’s developed a narrative and he’s sticking to it as preferable to his actual memories. Eventually it seems that Gertrude pushes him too far; he stands up abruptly, looks as though he’s about to go for Gertrude, then turns and stalks out. Bessie noticed the shine getting stronger as he got angrier; it was most obviously on his left forearm and the right side of his neck, though a certain amount showing through clothes too. (Contagion from an embrace, perhaps?)

Dan seems to be heading back to the docks in the hope of a second day’s pay; Bessie, Milly and Lin Tan head to his lodgings, with the others keeping an eye out from a nearby caff. The front door’s not locked, and there’s nobody immediately about. Milly and Bessie spot one of the door-knobs that’s distinctly shiny; there’s someone moving about upstairs, but nobody immediately nearby, and Bessie picks the lock.

This is clearly a bachelor’s lodgings. There’s shine on the bedclothes, and on some of the everyday clothes, though not all. Milly theorises that the contagion hasn’t been on Dan for as long as it had on Mattie.

Someone comes downstairs and opens one of the other doors; it might be someone cleaning the house.

There are a few exotic souvenirs, but nothing that excites unconventional perceptions; the three slip out, Bessie pausing to re-lock the door. Whoever was upstairs shouts at them, but doesn’t pursue.

The five talk with Mattie’s (and now Bessie’s) landlady. Mattie had only moved in a couple of weeks earlier, when her husband went out on his latest trip on the SS Scoresby (which should have reached Alexandria by now and be on her way back). His previous run had been to the West Indies, but she doesn’t know which ship.

Audrey writes up a report for Miss Allen, and does an appalling job.