"I asked at the club, no one has seen him."<br/><br/>"But surely..."<br/><br/>"No. I think we need to alert the police, Celia."<br/><br/>"Oh, Charles, but just think how people will talk. Did you look at the theatre? He so loves the theatre."<br/><br/>"Yes, I looked everywhere I could think of." Even through the door, I could hear my father's muffled voice tighten with concern. There was a long pause before my mother replied.<br/><br/>"But the police, Charles? Isn't that a bit drastic? We have a dinner engagement tomorrow night, after all."<br/><br/>"And don't you think Lord and Lady Audley will notice our son is not present?" my father countered, exasperated and severe. "If he isn't home by tomorrow morning, I am informing the police that he's missing, dinner engagements be damned. Now if you'll excuse me, Mrs. Gregory" he said, followed by the sound of heavy footsteps coming towards the door.<br/><br/>I sprang away from the crack of the closed parlour door where I had long been eavesdropping on my parentâ€™s argument. I dashed down the hallway, despising the very idea of my father finding me listening in on a private conversation like some common scoundrel. He strode into the corridor a moment after I turned the first corner on the hall and was hidden from view. He went in the opposite direction of myself, towards his study, but I stood leaning against the wall for a time, waiting for my stomach to unknot and my anxiousness to fade, until I realized it was not my father whom I was truly worried about. My brother Phillip had not be seen in two days.<br/><br/>Dread and a horrible, creeping suspicion roiled within me. And then a sturdy resolve stole over me. I tried to suppress it; I struggled to think of a better solution, but each alternative ended in my father's face crumpled and filled with contempt and revulsion as I revealed my beliefs of my brother's whereabouts. And if I was<span style="font-style: italic">wrong</span>, if I had fancied such an undesirable situation for my brother when he was perfectly safe and had a legitimate reason for his unexplained absence, then I couldn't begin to imagine my familyâ€™s the horror and disappointment in me. There was only one thing I could think to do.<br/><br/>I slipped silently through the house, donning my long jacket, walking boots and hat. Almost as an afterthought, I hesitantly crept into the kitchen and found a sizeable knife, wrapped it in a handkerchief and stuffed it into my boot.<br/><br/>I quietly left through the back door, and walked through the dark night until I found and hailed a hansom cab. I didn't have an exact address, but once when he returned home is strange daze Phillip had told me the area in which he was discovering all his new delights. I had to repeat my instructions to the driver twice. "I'll take you there, miss, if that's you're wanting," he said. "But you'd better be careful down in the East, pretty little thing like you. Don't want you getting hurt, none."