Chapter Two

Several days later…

The sun shone in upon the breakfast table, making everything on it look irresistible. Susannah lifted the lid of a speckled brown teapot and sniffed the rising steam. It had steeped long enough. She poured a cup.

There was toast in a rack, country butter, coddled eggs in porcelain cups, and her favorite treat, Devonshire cream with cherry jam. The little glass dish of jam caught the light and sparkled like… like rubies, Susannah thought. Which were safely hidden upstairs in the toe of her left shoe. At the moment, she would rather have the jam. Susannah believed in breakfast, and she was in a very good mood.

The sun was out. But that was only one reason. She was formulating a plan to find out how the rubies and sapphires had come to be in her corset.

Carlyle would know. Whether she had to kiss or kick the information out of him remained to be seen. For now, she was going to repair the thing and think it over.

She ensconced herself in a chair and put a napkin over her lap. Her hair was loosely pinned up and her morning gown, a paisley print, fell in loose folds over her knees‑she did enjoy being uncorseted. But Susannah had brought the pink corset downstairs with her, and a sewing basket, as she still had not finished its repair.

She lingered over the meal, sipping tea. The new downstairs maid cleared the dishes from the table and swept the toast crumbs into a silver crumb‑catcher. “Thank you, Molly. That will be all.”

The maid looked up, surprised to be addressed by name, let alone thanked. She only nodded and disappeared with the tray.

Susannah set down her teacup and picked up the corset, spreading it out before her. It was easy to flatten now that the hidden gemstones had been removed from the ribs. She traced a finger over the elaborate embroidery, admiring the seed pearl embellishment, and wondered again who had done it.

Reaching for the sewing basket on the floor, she unfolded the corset set atop it onto the table, then took out a pincushion, spools of thread, and a needlebook, setting everything out.

She jumped in her chair, startled by the knocks on the front door. The maid went to answer it and Susannah heard Mrs. Posey’s familiar wheeze.

“Good morning then. And where is Miss Fowler?” Directed to the front room, Mrs. Posey waddled in. “Ah, there you are. But you are not dressed for the out‑of‑doors.”

Susannah looked at her, puzzled‑and then she remembered. They were to go to the Chelsea physic garden. She had entirely forgotten.

“Well, well, no matter. I can make myself quite comfy while you dress. Is that dark girl about?” Mrs. Posey looked at the gorgeous corset spread open on the table with indifference, too nearsighted to see much without her spectacles. “You shouldn’t be mending. Put her to work after she gets you ready.”

“Lakshmi is ailing,” Susannah said. There was a noticeable edge in her voice. “She is still in bed. I am worried about her.”

“Now then, she only wants to sleep late. You mustn’t let a servant get the upper hand,” Mrs. Posey said. “Especially not a foreigner.” The older woman sank into an overstuffed, rather shabby armchair, which had been sat upon and sat upon until it was relatively soft, unlike most of the furniture in the house, which was good for one’s character. Those who did not sit up rigidly straight on horsehair upholstery were doomed to slide off it.

“Ahhh.” Mrs. Posey sighed with appreciation. The chair was in the direct path of the sunlight, which made her eyes blink and then close. Susannah had flung open the triple layers of window hangings, a very un‑English thing to do. Still, she so disliked the entombed effect of a properly curtained room that she did it every chance she got.

She made no reply to Mrs. Posey. Given the warmth of the sunlight and the cushioned arms of the big chair, her chaperone might very well drift off, and Susannah would be spared the excursion, although the physic garden was a pleasant place. But she had no wish to be lectured on the many uses of lavender.

Sure enough, Mrs. Posey dozed off within minutes. The ticking of the clock in the room punctuated her soft snores, and Susannah returned to her repair of the corset.

She threaded a thin needle and began to mend the small slashes in the ribbing where she had removed the stones. The sound of footsteps on the marble floor of the small entry hall reached her, but she assumed it was Mr. Patchen going about his morning routine, directing the airing of rooms and the polishing of banisters and other important tasks.

A deeper voice than his made her jump. “Good morning, Susannah. Forgive me for not knocking. Your manservant left the front door open. I saw him go down to the kitchen just before I came in.”

She looked up, startled to see Carlyle Jameson looking through the open door to the room where she sat.

“Oh‑hello.” Was it scandalous for a man to look at a woman who wasn’t his wife if she was wearing a morning gown? He seemed to like what he saw, so she had probably broken yet another unwritten rule. However, the loose garment and its intricate print revealed much less of her than a fitted dress would have done. She hoped Mrs. Posey would not wake up and pin her with an accusing look. She pointed to the sleeping old lady, hoping Carlyle would take the hint.

“Ah, I see you are not alone. Very good.” His voice became softer. “Then it is entirely proper for me to call upon you.”

“I don’t know about that,” she answered quietly. “But come in.”

This unexpected visit would require her to think quickly. His reaction when he caught sight of the corset would tell her something.

Looking down at it, Susannah thrust the threaded needle into the pink silk again and began to sew. Prim and proper. She felt anything but in her morning gown. The circumstances seemed far too intimate, despite the presence of Mrs. Posey. They might have been lovers, meeting in the morning after a night of…Susannah, a virgin, which was as it should be, wondered nonetheless about nights of.

Keeping her gaze upon her work, she heard Carlyle cross the thick carpet, his footsteps muffled now. He came around the table and took the chair opposite her. His nearness was unsettling.

Her body, unconfined, betrayed her. Susannah felt her nipples tighten, stimulated by the loose material that brushed them each time she made a stitch. His gaze never left her face‑she could feel it.

It was not as if they had never sat at a table together‑they had, often, and faced each other across chessboards with their knees nearly touching. But the open‑air pavilion and the lofty marble halls of the palace kept everything light and breezy, unlike the hothouse atmosphere of a London parlor on a warm day. Perhaps flinging the curtains open had not been such a good idea after all. A touch of sepulchral gloom would be just the thing for cooling off her wayward thoughts.

Susannah stopped sewing and looked up into his gray‑green eyes. Carlyle regarded her with the calmness of a cat‑a very large cat, handsomely dressed in a light coat of dark wool and immaculate linens beneath a sober vest, clothes that did not hide his physical vigor and manly health.

He did not speak for a moment, holding her gaze, sitting quite still except for his large, sinewy hand, which tapped restlessly on the table as he smiled at her.

At last he looked down. Susannah noticed something flicker in his eyes‑she decided it was shock‑and felt a flash of satisfaction. So he had seen the corset before. Just as she’d suspected.

He lifted his hand from the table to adjust his collar. “Would you mind if I took off my coat? It is rather warm in here.”

“Not at all.”

Carlyle nodded and stood to remove the light wool coat. Susannah could not help but admire the power and grace of his tall body as he did so, looking intently at him when the sleeve of his shirt did not seem to want to part from the sleeve of his coat.

He tugged at it, not glancing her way. Fie. The most ordinary gesture or movement of his caused her to stare. She attempted a serene air, casting her eyes down to her work and putting a pin in her mouth in a seamstressy way.

Carlyle put the coat over the back of his chair and sat down again. “What a very appealing picture. Johann Zoffany might have painted you, Susannah. A woman en déshabillé , sewing a corset.”

Corset. The word seemed to hang in the air between them, suggestive and sexual. Susannah told herself that it was only an article of clothing and there was no need to simper or blush about a mere word.

All the same, he or someone known to him had seen fit to stuff this very corset with hundreds of gems. She glanced at him for only a fraction of a second…and immediately regretted it.

The intelligent regard in his eyes made her think that he knew precisely what she was up to. Susannah felt her cheeks turn pinker than the silk she was sewing and she almost swallowed the pin. She hastily removed it from between her lips, aware that he was watching her closely. “I am not familiar with that artist.”

He cleared his throat. “Zoffany painted the luminaries of the London theater and the great courtesans, then went to India to do portraits of native princes and the resident British. Before your time, my dear, but your father might have known Zoffany’s work.”

“He never mentioned the man.”

Carlyle did not seem offended by her blunt reply. “Oh. Well, it was just a thought.”

She would have to be blunter. “Hmm. I would prefer that you do not address me as my dear .”

He looked a little pained. “I used to in India. You did not mind it then.”

“We are not in India now.”

“No, we are not.” His voice was neutral and his steady gaze remained on her face. “You don’t like London, do you?”

“Not very much.”

Carlyle nodded. “I expect the endless parade of potential suitors is beginning to depress you. But I am sure someone will offer for you.”

Susannah fumed. Would he never notice the corset? Did she have to wave it like a flag?

“Someone whom you might come to love,” he added.

Perhaps he would receive a bonus, if that unlikely event should occur. “Have I no other choice in life?” Her vehement question seemed to take him aback.

He shrugged his shoulders, rubbing a hand thoughtfully over his chin. He had been well shaved, she noticed. A faint scent of bay rum came to her unwilling nose. She sniffed in reverse to get rid of it.

“Well, if you do not wish to marry, you can subsist on the income from your inheritance for some time,” he said at last, “if you can live modestly.”

“Hmph.” She waved a hand at the furnishings of the cluttered room. “I could live without all this, certainly. The British Empire raids the world simply to fill its parlors with useless bric‑a‑brac. Looking at it makes me want to run away.”

He smiled slightly. “If the money must last, there will be no travel, no servants, no extravagances. That might prove difficult for a girl who grew up in a palace.”

“My dear Carlyle,” she began, forgetting that she had asked him not to call her my dear . “I did know it wasn’t my palace.”

“But you seemed somewhat‑” He pressed his lips together for a second, not wanting to say something that would upset her. “Somewhat unaware. Everything you needed appeared as if by magic.”

“My toys were mine. And when I was older, my books and my piano. My clothes, of course. It is true that I wanted for nothing, but I had very little I could call my own.”

“And yet you were content.”

She nodded. “Yes.”

“The happy empress of your own domain.”

Susannah shot him a wry look. “Are you saying that I was spoiled?”

“No, no. Not at all.” Carlyle leaned back in his chair.

Liar , she thought, nettled. Do not make yourself so comfortable .

“Do you know, I once saw you leading a flock of peacocks about the palace grounds. You certainly looked like an empress.”

She waved a dismissive hand. “Peacocks, bah. I would rather have twenty thousand pounds a year.”

His mouth quirked up. “And so would we all. By any means possible.”

“And what means would those be?” Her tone was barbed. “Men are free to do what they will. A woman is not.”

He studied her intently for a long moment. “Don’t worry so, Susannah.” His tone was kind enough, but she could hear the hypocrisy underneath. “If your dowry is not spent it can be invested in the funds and that will help. You should do very well.”

She raised an inquiring eyebrow. “How well?”

“That remains to be seen,” he said.

Indeed it does, she thought. Carlyle would make a handsome sum if he sold the rubies and sapphires. If they were his. She was no closer to finding that out than when he had walked into the room. His bland assurances were not comforting.

Susannah crossed her legs and swung her foot under the table. Kissing the truth out of him would be nowhere near as satisfying as kicking him.

“But should you wed‑”

“I shall never‑ow!” She jabbed her fingertip by accident with the needle and a tiny drop of blood welled up. Susannah put her finger in her mouth and sucked before she thought of what she must look like.

“How do you know?” Carlyle’s eyes shone with amusement. “Should I ring the maid for a sticking‑plaster?” he inquired. “You would not want a bloodstain, however small, on your best corset.”

At long last they had come back to the corset. Good. But her finger was throbbing. It was amazing how much a little sting could hurt.

“No,” she said at last, removing her finger from her mouth. A childish cure but it had worked. There was no more blood. His last statement piqued her. “How do you know that it is my best corset? Have you seen the others? Have you been skulking about my boudoir?”

He looked uneasy, which pleased her very much.

“Certainly not. But this corset is a very fine one, perhaps one of the most beautiful I have ever seen.” He was talking fast. “The embroidery is unique and‑”

“It sounds like you have made a thorough study of the subject of corsets,” she said, a distinct edge in her voice.

“No, not really. Of course, one is much like another. It all depends on what’s inside them.” He gave her a smooth smile.

She gave him a narrow look in return. He was not to be trusted. She ought not to care. But she did.

And why is that? she asked herself, supplying an annoying but astute reply in an instant: Because you used to trust him. And you hoped he cared for you.

But those days were gone forever and she had changed. She was no longer a giddy, sheltered girl half in love with a dashing officer. She was a woman who had to make her own way in a cold and unfriendly metropolis, because the dashing officer was looking out only for himself. The corset in question‑hers‑had contained a small fortune in gems of uncertain provenance‑his.

She amended the thought, but only to be realistic. Being fair had nothing to do with it. The gems were probably his. She still didn’t know for certain.

It occurred to her that his very coolness gave away his guilt. Staying silent, she folded the corset lengthwise. His smooth smile faded away.

Susannah had a sinking feeling she was about to be bested at a cat‑and‑mouse game. If Carlyle Jameson knew anything about the gems she’d found, he wasn’t going to confess.

They had talked at cross‑purposes, and she felt deeply irritated. More with herself than him, however. She had bungled a heaven‑sent opportunity to find out who’d hidden the rubies and sapphires. But then he had taken her unawares. Still, he could not have known she would be here, sewing away on the corset.

He glanced again at the corset she clutched. “Put it away. A lady keeps such things well hidden.”

Susannah glared at him. “Are you saying that I am not a lady?”

“Not quite.”

“Oh! You are insufferable!”

Furious with herself for seeming interested in what he thought, she gave a sharp shake of her head and her hair tumbled down. Susannah let it alone. Pinning it back up would mean looking for the hairpins on the carpet and that would mean bending down and he might very well interpret that as some sort of surrender.

Her agitation made her breath come faster. She parted her lips to speak but could think of nothing at all to say.

His eyes widened for a fraction of a second. “I was only teasing you, Susannah. I meant that you are young yet, and not quite a lady. But…may I say that you are lovely?”

What blather. And how humiliating. Mrs. Posey was probably feigning sleep and listening to every ridiculous word. Susannah rose swiftly, clutching the folded corset within the folds of her gown. “Go to the devil!”

He stood up very quickly. Susannah flung the corset at him. He caught it with one hand, tossed it aside, and backed her into a corner by the window where the sleeping chaperone could not see them if she awoke.

He was too fast to fight off and in an instant Carlyle silenced her with a kiss. It was not a brief one. His lips were inexpressibly tender, and the sensation of being swept off her feet and held in such strong arms was a thrill. His powerful thighs pressed against her and her body arched into his.

Instinctively‑she had no other word for the shamelessness of it‑she pressed her soft breasts against a linen‑clad chest that was hard and warm, feeling her hard nipples grow harder still. Susannah slipped one hand over his heart without thinking, feeling it beat faster while she permitted him every liberty that a kiss had to offer.

He caressed her back, then slid both big hands down over her hips and bottom, pulling her closer still to him. Still kissing him back, Susannah struggled not to moan. She was entirely bare under the gown and he seemed well aware of it, handling her with very masculine skill. The sheer pleasure of it was nearly too much for her. Scared but wildly curious, she reached around to feel his hard buttocks. Oh, no. He was rigid. She moved her hands up quickly to his waist and felt those muscles tighten.

And all the while his mouth was on hers. So that is a kiss, she thought dazedly, when he broke it off and held her head close to his shoulder, stroking her tumbled hair. He bent to her, rubbing his head against hers like a huge cat.

No‑no. It wasn’t a kiss. It was his kiss.

Confused as she was, Susannah did not suppose that every man kissed in such a way that his partner might well swoon with pleasure.

She put both hands on his chest and pushed him away. Something had changed forever in that magic moment when he had claimed her lips. She belonged to him in some indefinable way that infuriated and frightened and thrilled her beyond measure. Gasping a little, touching a finger to lips swollen by the ardent pressure of his, Susannah backed away from the corner and from him.

Carlyle watched her, a troubled look on his handsome face. He too seemed to be fighting for breath, but he stayed where he was. After a moment, he bent down and picked up the corset. He said but one word as he threw it to her.

“Catch.”

Susannah didn’t even try. She watched the crumpled pink corset unfold as it fell to the floor once more.

Mrs. Posey emitted a wheeze and the folds of flesh around her eyes squinted into wrinkles. But she did not open them, not just yet.

Carlyle took his coat from the chair, taking his time about putting it over his arm. “Thank you for allowing me to share your morning. It has been a very great pleasure.” He coughed. Susannah stared at him incredulously. “I do hope you enjoyed our conversation as I have. Good‑bye.”

Susannah clapped a hand to her cheek. How could she have been so foolish‑and how could he have done what he did with no resistance from her?

He made a half‑bow before she came up with answers to those questions. “I will see myself out.”

She stood there and watched him go, the coat slung over his broad back. Unwillingly, she took him in, from his tousled dark hair to his boots. His confident stride extended from the muscular buttocks she had shyly touched, moving in rhythm with long legs that had captured his prey: Her.

He was gone. She heard the front door shut.

If only she had a fraction of his confidence. Or should she call it arrogance? She had been planning to kiss or kick what she wanted to know out of him, and he had beaten her to it.

But what a kiss. What a man. He was capable of anything. She almost…admired him for it.

Susannah picked up the corset once more, moving to the open door to hear if he had gone. He was exchanging pleasantries with Mr. Patchen. As if nothing at all had happened.

Her ire rose up again and she reminded herself how much she hated losing as she paced, her rapid strides quickening as she thought. More than ever, she was convinced that he had hidden the jewels in the corset.

The kiss had blindsided her. Owing to her regrettable curiosity to find out what happened next‑what she had felt while clasped in his arms no more than that, surely‑Susan‑nah had not been able to winkle the truth out of him. He would be exceedingly wary from this moment on.

Carlyle had bested her without even trying. She hated him. Suddenly, madly, deeply.

“Now who was that, Miss Fowler?” asked the old lady in the chair, yawning. “I seemed to have dozed off. Did I miss anything?”

He waited until he reached the end of her street to put his coat back on. He’d stalled as long as he could in her front room, hoping to get a better look at the corset, but the fire in her eyes told him that she was very close to flinging something breakable‑a china vase, perhaps‑that would have woken Mrs. Posey.

He had seen a small cut in one of the corset’s ribs when he’d sat down. And the thing had been limp‑Susannah folded it easily. Therefore, she had removed the rubies and sapphires that had made it stiff enough to stand up by itself. There was no doubt in his mind that she suspected him of using her personal belongings to smuggle jewels, and despised him for it. It was too bad, but explaining Lakshmi’s predicament would reveal more than that unfortunate young woman wanted the world to know.

Spouting off about the paintings of Zoffany had distracted Susannah just long enough to make a second quick study of the corset. He was sure that she had not found the diamonds inside the ribbon rosebuds nestled in the corset’s frill, and that fact meant he breathed a little easier as he walked away from Albion Square. But only a little.

Though there were only six diamonds, Carlyle happened to know that they were worth far more than the rubies and sapphires. He might have to resign himself to Susannah keeping those, especially since she had found them. The diamonds, however, were a different matter. They were much prized by the maharajah, who boasted that they had once belonged to a Mughal emperor. In an offhand conversation about the old fellow’s love of baubles, Alfred Fowler had said the same thing and added that they were a set, perfectly matched for extraordinary brilliance and clarity.

The maharajah had unwisely bestowed them upon his favorite, who had given them to Lakshmi in secret, and they were the stones, Carlyle knew, that the old fellow was most likely to want back. The diamonds had been easy enough to conceal, from what he could make out of Lakshmi’s tale.

Bloody hell. Carlyle told himself it was only a matter of time before she found the diamonds, too. He would have to get them first and try to figure out some way to return them to the maharajah. That process would take months and was sure to cause no end of ill‑feeling‑meaning he would have to explain everything to everybody eventually. The prospect was daunting.

She very well might try to sell the rubies and sapphires‑certainly she understood their value. If he told her that Lakshmi had removed them from the maharajah’s palace, she might not. But it was difficult, if not impossible, to predict what Susannah would do.

The smaller gems were in her possession and possession was nine‑tenths of the law. And they were worth a fortune, and what woman would not want to control a fortune of her own? It was becoming increasingly clear that she valued her independence more than he’d thought. That was only one reason why marrying off Miss Fowler was a thankless task, he told himself. Of course, the candidates thus far had been a lackluster lot. He could not blame that entirely on the half‑aunt.

Carlyle had arranged several of the introductions, relying on recommendations from friends at his club, and choosing the safest‑seeming men, in deference to Mr. Fowler’s last wishes.

Yet he knew quite well that they were not suited for her, a curious fact he could not deny. He didn’t understand it, but he was not inclined to soul‑searching. Carlyle prided himself on being a man of action.

Still, her happiness was important to him. They had been fast friends in India. If he had been the unprincipled seducer and corset connoisseur she now seemed to think he was, they would have been lovers.

But nothing had happened. She was too young and too headstrong and too innocent‑a volatile combination in every way. And her father had been his good friend. Carlyle considered his sexual attraction to Susannah quite understandable, but he also prided himself on his self‑control.

He turned the corner, took a deep breath, and summoned up every ounce of it he had.

If she really did not wish to marry, then he might as well let her have the little gems, so to speak, and sell them to provide for herself. She could not prove he had put them in the corset. He hadn’t. She might ask why she hadn’t told him right away. He couldn’t, that was all there was to it.

Time would pass. It seemed unlikely that she would accuse him outright of smuggling and even less likely that she would swallow her pride and ask him to explain. No, most likely she would simply sell them quietly through an intermediary‑and get a good price, too. She was the daughter of the famous Mr. Fowler and that counted for something.

Her misguided suspicions concerning him were something that he would have to live with. He hated the idea that, as of this morning, she thought less of him for something he had not done. Especially since she had looked so astoundingly sensual in that flowing dress, her hair tumbling over her shoulders, her lips parted as she tried to think of something vile to say to him. He’d had to kiss her. Did she even know how irresistible she was?

The thought crossed his mind that he might have fallen in love with her. Hmph. He wanted to laugh and made do with a wry smile.

A little sweeper at the curb saw the smile and seized his chance to beg a penny from a man in a good mood. Carlyle found three shillings in his pocket and dropped them into the lad’s grubby hand.

“Aow‑thank ye!”

“Carry on,” he replied absentmindedly.

“Good day and good luck to ye, sir.”

He would need it, because he did intend to get the diamonds back. Keeping a straight face while he had simultaneously teased her and pricked her pride had been the only way he could think of to distract her. The combined effect of remembering how she had looked in it last night‑and finding that part of the treasure was no longer in it this morning‑had been almost too much for him.

She was sensitive enough to read his mind‑perhaps she had. The damned corset had been right under his nose. All he thought of was the diamonds once he realized the rubies and sapphires had been removed. God only knew where a woman would hide so many gems. They could be anywhere and everywhere.

He would have to find a way to get her out of the house somehow‑and soon‑and get the six diamonds out of the ribbon rosebuds. And those would have to be sewn back up just so, or she would notice that the corset had been tampered with again.

Carlyle frowned. He had never threaded a needle, never sewed so much as a button. He would have to enlist Lakshmi’s aid once more. The Indian maid would be terrified of being caught once she knew that Susannah had found the other gems.

Poor Lakshmi had many things to fear. Serving as go‑between for the maharajah’s favorite and her young lover had been an awful mistake. The unfaithful favorite had given her the gems, prying them from their settings and ruining all her jewelry as a final act of rebellion against her lord and master. She had told Lakshmi to flee the country, knowing they both faced the ultimate penalty.

Carlyle had felt sorry for her and for the favorite, and his judgment had not been the best. At the time his overwhelming concern had been for Susannah. Had he but known…et cetera. But he hadn’t.

What to do? If he succeeded in finding the corset in Susannah’s bedroom, he could not just take it to his tailor’s and have him or his busybody wife mend the opened rosebuds. The fellow was entirely too friendly as it was, always inquiring into Carlyle’s life and loves.

And what if Susannah wore it night and day, instead of hiding it?

Preoccupied, he went hurrying down an unfamiliar street crowded with shops. Carlyle slowed his steps. Looking into windows would be a pleasant enough distraction. He came to a jeweler’s. Bright little things winked at him from the boxes on display. Good God. No. He moved on to the next shop, a tobacconist’s, and clasped his hands behind his back, studying the humidors. They were brown. They were square. There was one in a rectangular shape. He found their very plainness soothing, but there was a limit to how long a man could stare at mahogany boxes.

Onward he went. The shop next door to the tobacconist’s sold prints and engravings. He glanced idly at the display in the main window. There was one of a lady in the elaborate gown of an earlier historical period, powdered hair piled high, bosom popping out of her tight bodice‑

Don’t look, he told himself.

An odd little man, his hands thrust into the pockets of a shabby coat, sidled up and leered at the same print. Carlyle sighed. He had fallen low indeed if this was the company he was keeping.

He stepped well away from the fellow, examining a group of botanical prints in the side window. Apples. Quinces. Pears‑ah, that one was particularly nice. He peered through the glass, reading the fine engraved script beneath the two nicely rounded pears in the picture: Cuisses de Nymphe.

Nymph’s thighs. He almost groaned aloud and then remembered the odd little man not far away, still leering at the prints. Judge not, Carlyle told himself, lest ye be judged. He had been reminded of Susannah by a colored engraving of fruit that was suitable for a Methodist’s parlor. He strode away, swiftly putting as much distance as he could between himself and all stimulation.

He finally stopped in a park and sat down on a bench under a tree. Carlyle was beginning to realize that his brains were still addled by his unexpected glimpse of Susannah last night. But why? He was a grown man, not some randy lad, achingly stiff and stupid after just one look at an unclad woman.

And yet the mere sight of her had undone him. He was almost jealous of the damned corset, if it was possible to be jealous of an inanimate object. It was able to encompass her slender waist just as he wished to do with his hands, it had the privilege of cupping her beautiful breasts, it was warmed by her silky skin‑he had no doubt that her skin was silky. At his level of amorous expertise, Carlyle was good at guessing such things.

He wanted to caress her with all the skill he possessed, wanted to rain kisses on her bare shoulders, wanted to tease her sensitive nipples, wanted to fondle her glorious rear with both hands, then beg permission to touch her as intimately as she might wish‑damn, damn, damn. Right now he wanted to shoot himself more than anything. He could not have her.

Susannah knew that dressing herself would be a bit of a struggle, but she vowed to do it, even if her corset‑the corset‑ended up going on crooked. She could tighten the crisscrossing back laces before putting it on over her camisole and then take a deep breath and hook it in front somehow. It had lost much of its stiffness since she’d removed the gems. She might even be able to breathe.

She had looked in on Lakshmi, who still slumbered in her narrow bed in the chamber under the eaves, though it was past noon. Susannah had no idea what ailed her, but it seemed that the very least she could do was go out and purchase a tonic from the apothecary or medicinal herbs to make up a posset.

She was thankful that Lakshmi was not suffering from fever, but had no idea what her illness might be. Would an English doctor prescribe the right remedy? Susannah doubted there were any practitioners of Indian medicine in London.

The physic garden could be just the place to find something that would help her, though Mrs. Posey might say something disparaging about Lakshmi again. Susannah resolved to sack her if she did. Unfortunately, she would have to be replaced and there was no shortage of chaperones for hire.

Susannah, who had left Mrs. Posey to her knitting in the front room, began to make a mental list.

First, she had to help Lakshmi. She decided to ask the Rajasthani family they had met‑she would have to find them somehow. Or, first she had to talk to a dealer in precious stones‑she knew just the fellow, she would write to him today‑and have the rubies and sapphires appraised.

She wondered what Carlyle would have done if she’d simply spilled the stones on the table in front of him and asked where they had come from and what they were worth. His face had been close to expressionless when he saw the pink corset. Provoking of him. Perhaps he was a better strategist than she had thought. It all depended on what game he was playing.

Two days later…

Her face hidden under an overlarge bonnet‑she had added a veil for good measure at the last minute‑Susannah waited on the step for the clerk on the other side of the shop door to unlock it from the inside. Not wanting the servants to know about this confidential errand, she had traveled most of the way here via horse‑drawn omnibus, a jolting journey that exhausted her, until she got out in Oxford Street and walked the rest of the way, looking in the shop windows along the way.

This shop’s wares were not shown in the window. Indeed, there was no window and there were no goods sold here‑only skill. Rough gemstones were cut, faceted, and polished behind the heavy doors, and sent back to those who had purchased them elsewhere.

The narrow lane was a warren of similar shops, some at street level and some within the taller buildings that loomed over the old ones.

She heard repeated clicks and then the door suddenly swung open. An elderly clerk peered at her doubtfully.

“I am Susannah Fowler,” she said.

“Of course. Mr. De Sola told me you would be coming. My memory‑” He tapped the side of his head. “Please enter.” He stepped to one side of the door, peering up and down the empty lane.

She looked where he was looking and thought she saw the shadow of a man melt back into an alley. Had she been followed? The idea was frightening. No one besides Carlyle knew that she had found the stones. She looked again and saw nothing. The clerk was far too frail to deal with ruffians, but she supposed that a watchful eye was better than nothing. There was undoubtedly a burly fellow somewhere on the premises. Anything to do with jewels carried a risk of theft and worse.

She went in, lifting her veil over the bonnet, and was greeted by another man, white‑haired and short, who came out from an inner office. Behind it, she guessed, was the cutters’ room, where rough stones were assessed, sometimes for months, before the final decision to cut was made.

The man who greeted her was soft‑spoken and utterly unassuming. But she knew he was Moise De Sola, the man who had cut and faceted the legendary Gulbahar diamond and several of the largest jewels in the royal collection. Still, one might pass him in the street and never remember him. He gave her a kindly smile and clasped her hands in his.

“My dear girl.” His voice had a slight accent. “It is an honor to meet the daughter of Mr. Fowler. You are as lovely as your father said, very like your mother. I cut the diamonds for her wedding ring, you know.”

“I didn’t.” The ring had been buried with Georgina Fowler. She had never seen it.

Mr. De Sola sighed. “So much time has passed. I did not see him often after they left London‑before you were born, Miss Fowler. But he sent many stones to me. Your father had an eye for beauty.”

“Yes, he did.” Her voice quavered. It was odd to hear her parents spoken of in a place where they had once been, perhaps standing where she was right now.

“I grieved to hear of his untimely death so far from home. But here you are‑” He stopped when he saw an inadvertent tear trickle down her cheek. Susannah dashed it away.

“My apologies. Perhaps I should not have mentioned such sad things. But so many memories came back to me when I received your letter in yesterday’s post‑your father was a very interesting man. A rough diamond himself.” He patted her shoulder. “My little joke.”

Susannah composed herself. Though she had never been here, meeting someone who had known her father stirred emotions that she had kept firmly in check.

“Thank you, Mr. De Sola.” She looked about her. The office was as her father had described it. Solid, plain chairs were set around a desk in the center of the room, which held grooved trays covered in black velvet. A jeweler’s loupe rested on one, along with a pair of thin, long‑fingered tongs with padded tips.

“What do you have to show me, my dear? I know you are here on business and we will close soon. It is Friday‑our Shabbat. I must be home before sundown.”

“I have some stones. I‑I am not sure where they come from.” She blinked a bit. The gaslight fixture that hung from the ceiling cast a circle of brilliant white on the desk, leaving the rest of the room in semidarkness.

“Please, sit down,” Mr. De Sola said.

Susannah settled herself in one of the chairs, coming as close to the desk as she could without getting in the light. She took out two bulging envelopes of light paper that she had folded around the rubies and sapphires, and opened them, pouring the stones into a mingled heap.

“Some stones? I would say there are more than a hundred.” He smiled again. The old man put the loupe to his eye and picked up a stone with the slender tongs, separating the rubies from the sapphires, and examining them one by one.

She had seen her father do the same thing many times and knew the process would take awhile. Mr. De Sola said nothing. He set aside the largest stones for a more careful look and arranged the rest in two neat rows of red and blue.

Then he studied the largest, five in all, for several more minutes, holding them carefully in the tongs and turning them this way and that under the light.

“Very interesting,” he said at last. “I have seen these before. I think I cut these two rubies. The flaws and inclusions are where they were on the shank of the stone‑where their setting would conceal them.”

“Oh.” Susannah gave him a surprised look. She had not expected him to recognize the stones. But he was well known for his uncanny ability to do so. There simply were not that many large, fine gems in the world.

Mr. De Sola took the loupe from his eye and set down the tongs. “All of them are of the highest quality. The rubies are from Burma‑as you can see, they are the color of pigeon’s blood, the most valuable. The sapphires are certainly from Kashmir. That cornflower blue is unmistakable.”

He regarded her with a serious air, his white eyebrows lifted high over his dark eyes. “All of them have minute scratches, Miss Fowler. As if they were pried from their settings and not with care.”

“Ah‑I know nothing about their provenance.” Her mind whirled. Carlyle Jameson a thief? It seemed impossible. She reminded herself that she had no proof whatsoever that the stones belonged to him. She had found them in her corset. That was all.

He gave an eloquent shrug. “Perhaps someone didn’t want you to know. I think they are stolen.”

Susannah turned pale. Meaning that if she were caught with them, a case could be made that she was a thief.

“Would you like a glass of tea?” Mr. De Sola asked solicitously.

“Y‑yes,” she stammered. Her father’s old friend would not think that of course. But she needed something to calm her.

He called into an interior room, and in a few minutes, a young woman in a loosely cut dark dress came in with two glasses of hot tea. The glass was held by an openwork cup of silver that fitted it perfectly, with a silver handle.

“My daughter‑in‑law, Rebecca. This is Miss Susannah Fowler.”

The other woman greeted her in a low, pleasant voice and handed them their glasses, going back for a bowl of rocklike lump sugar. Mr. De Sola took a lump and held it in his teeth, sipping the tea through it. He looked thoughtfully at the rubies and sapphires, and occasionally at her.

Susannah sipped her tea the way it was, not taking sugar. It was hot and strong‑exactly what she needed. She had no idea what to do next.

So the jewels were stolen. Her father said that it often happened. Precious stones cast a spell upon the most reasonable of men. People would steal, even kill to get jewels they could not buy, and unusual ones had an unholy power far beyond their size.

She remembered the rare star sapphire her father had once shown her when she was very young, its six‑pointed star shimmering within the blue depths of the stone. Then he had brought out a star ruby, rarer still, and let her hold the magnificent gems in her palms, cool and round.

“None of the stones in the maharajah’s treasure chests compare to these, Susannah,” he had said. “But they are only pretty little rocks.”

To him they were worth nothing more than what people were willing to pay for them. But she had been completely dazzled by the sapphire and ruby in her hands. A little of that magic had emanated from the stones she had found in such quantity and heaped in her lap.

Susannah and Mr. De Sola finished their tea, and he helped her refold the stones in their paper envelopes.

“Would you venture a guess as to‑as to what they might be worth?” she said. “I shall have to return them to their rightful owner.”

The old man thought for a moment and named a sum in the thousands of pounds. “Maybe more,” he added quickly.

“I see.” She slipped the envelopes back into her purse and tucked it inside the light fitted jacket that matched her dress.

“Miss Fowler.” He seemed to be studying her carefully. “Sometimes stolen gems cannot be returned.”

“Why is that?”

He shrugged again, pushing away the tools of his trade. Then he clasped his hands together and set them on the table. “Sometimes no one knows where they came from. I last saw those two rubies fifteen years ago. They came in uncut; they went out to Argentina.”

“A country I have never visited.”

Mr. De Sola nodded sagely. “And somehow they got to you. An innocent young lady who lives in London. I will say no more.”

Susannah got up. “Thank you very much for your time and expertise, Mr. De Sola. What do I owe you for the consultation?”

“Only a promise.”

“Certainly.”

“Be careful, my dear. And keep those stones in a very safe place.”

She nodded. Mr. De Sola rose a bit stiffly and rang a bellpull for his clerk. It seemed an eternity until the man arrived but she was outside soon enough, her veil drawn over her bonnet once more. She looked up and down the lane, and glimpsed the same shadow, where it had been. Susannah fought the impulse to touch a protective hand to the pocket in her jacket where she had put the gems, and walked away as quickly as she could.

Date: 2015-04-20; view: 591