Suzanne Robinson (24 page)

As the August days lengthened into weeks, desperation compelled her to set watchers to spy on the North town house. Always the report was the same. The place was deserted, and no one seemed to expect the marquess to come to London. She continued to have the place watched anyway. It wasn’t until a few days ago that she’d been able to overcome her confusion and decide she needn’t remain in concealment.

Tying her bonnet ribbons, Emmie slipped on her gloves and picked up a leather case by its handle.
Inside, wrapped in velvet, were Henry Beaufort’s coins and jewels. She hadn’t gotten rid of them. Ordinarily she would do that as quickly as possible, but she delayed at first because she thought Valin would hunt her down through them. Later she decided the pieces were too distinctive to sell in England, and she should send them overseas. Once this decision was made, she still hesitated.

Betsy and Turnip grew annoyed with her reluctance to turn their find into money. A shouting match ensued, with Betsy accusing Emmie of not wanting to sell the treasure at all. After denying this vehemently, Emmie admitted the truth of the accusation to herself. She didn’t want to sell the jewels and coins. Much as she hated to admit it, she thought of them as her only connection with Valin. Sometimes, though, she hated the sight of them, blaming the shining hoard for her misery.

If she hadn’t discovered the clues to their hiding place, she would never have sought out Valin’s company and been caught in a trap of her own design. She would never have fallen in love with the sneaking, lying varmint. And the longer she kept the treasure the more difficult it was for her to contemplate selling it. It wasn’t hers; it was Valin’s. She had never stolen from someone she loved.

“Goodness gracious mercy,” Emmie said to
herself as she left the house. “What a time to acquire integrity.”

She got into her carriage and leaned out the window. “To the bank, Turnip.”

“Yes, missus.”

Emmie settled back against the squabs and gazed out the window at the sunny streets. If she wasn’t going to get rid of the treasure, she would put it in the bank. It was the safest place. Meanwhile she would compensate Becky and Turnip out of her own pocket.

That would be another strain on her purse. Her solicitor, who knew her in her guise as the children’s lady guardian, had informed her that the time for paying Flash’s school fees was approaching. She had but a couple of months. In addition, Phoebe would need a proper governess rather than a nurse. Soon she would be moving Pilfer into the household, and he would need special tutors to bring his education up to the standards required of Eton and Harrow.

Emmie began to feel overwhelmed again. Since she’d come home, her grief over Valin had served to make her other burdens more onerous. Sometimes it seemed all that kept her going was the knowledge that Flash and the others had no one else upon whom to depend.

The trip to the bank passed without incident, and Emmie returned to the boardinghouse. She
washed, changed into her Mrs. Apple clothes, and was putting away the bank documents when Dolly appeared and danced across the room in excitement.

“Hello, luv!”

“What’s gotten into you?” Emmie asked as she sat down at her desk.

Dolly pranced over to the desk and winked at her. “Heard a bit o’ news at the Black Peacock last night.”

Emmie’s heart battered against her ribcage. “About the marquess?”

“Him, nah. What would I hear about him? I heard of a lady’s maid what’s down on her luck in the servants’ lurk next door, so I went over and made her acquaintance, like. Her name is Kitty, and she told me her mistress tossed her out ’cause the master couldn’t keep his hands to himself. Their name’s Bagshot.”

Dolly poked Emmie with her elbow. “Upstart folk they are. Come from a family of secondhand clothes sellers, but come into blunt selling sewing machines.”

“So?”

“So Mrs. Bagshot has a mountain of jewels. Mr. Bagshot don’t believe in safes and banks, and all them necklaces and things is just laying in a locked closet.”

Dolly dropped to her knees and shoved Emmie’s
shoulder. “It’s just the kind of lay you like. Old Bagshot and his missus is mean, sly creatures. They don’t pay their servants hardly anything, and work them near to death. Tossed poor Kitty out without her wages, they did. Now she has no blunt and no character to show anyone who might hire her.”

“She’ll be on the streets in a week.”

Dolly nodded. “Sooner.”

Emmie traced the grain of the wood on the surface of her desk. If she managed this lay, she might be able to send Valin’s treasure back and use the new haul to provide for the children.

Turning to Dolly, she said, “You and me, Dolly. No one else. We’ll split everything equally.”

“You’re a good friend, seeing as how it’s you who knows how to get into houses and locked places.”

“You found Kitty and thought up the lay, so it’s equal shares.”

While Dolly chattered on about what she would do with her newfound wealth, Emmie’s spirits rose. She might be able to send the treasure back to Valin! Guilt had been weighing on her like those enormous black iron anchors on the freighters at the docks. If she returned the jewels and coins, at least she could comfort herself with the knowledge that Valin could no longer accuse her of stealing
from him. Perhaps his opinion of her would improve a little. Perhaps …

If only he’d been able to forget what she was and forgiven the lies she’d told him. But that was too much to ask of anyone, and he didn’t know about the children. Before she could start crying, Emmie dragged her attention back to Dolly and listened to her plan a bright new future for them both. She smiled at her friend’s enthusiasm, although she didn’t share it. Without Valin, no future of hers would ever be anything but desolate.

In a respectable if modest boardinghouse on the edge of the East End, Valin North prowled his rooms. He strode across the tiny sitting room to the bedroom and back, muttering to himself and occasionally glancing out the window at the traffic in the street several floors below. Rain had left the street wet, and the sweepers were busy clearing horse dung. He heard the cry of a flower vendor. A milk wagon passed by, then a chimney sweep with his load of brushes.

Having forced Acton to admit his involvement in Emmie’s disappearance, Valin shook his brother until Acton’s head nearly snapped off. That was enough to elicit the fact that Emmie had fled to London’s East End. Valin had rushed to the city
immediately and reengaged Mr. Mildmay. He, the inquiry agent, and his staff had been searching ever since.

After all these weeks, Valin was beginning to think he’d made a mistake in hiring the man. The world of rookeries, thieves’ kitchens, and low taverns seemed impenetrable. Even the detective’s contacts had never heard of Emmie.

His time in the East End had served as a lurid introduction into the world in which Emmie lived. He’d learned about the infamous Holy Land in St. Giles, the most notorious criminal slum in England, of Seven Dials, Jacob’s Island, and Friar’s Mount. This last was an open space in Bethnal Green, Spitalfields littered with putrefying animal corpses. He wouldn’t have believed the place existed if he hadn’t gone there himself.

Where was she? How did she live in this place? How had she remained as fine as she was, when her days were spent among people who robbed children of their boots, stole laundry hanging out to dry, and purloined packets of silk from milliners’ shop girls? And these pursuits were some of the least nefarious of those he’d encountered. The whole of London from Blackfriars to the docks and beyond was a teeming infestation of human misery and degradation. Yet Emmie’s spirit seemed untouched, a pure crystal among rubble.

He had to find her. He couldn’t bear to think of her in this place. It was driving him mad.

Valin strode back into the sitting room and picked up a paper from the chair where he’d laid it. It was a drawing of Emmie. He’d made it himself from memory. He’d had it printed, and the package of copies had arrived. His men were to take the drawing with them and try to find someone who could identify it. Since no one seemed to know Emmie, he would find her by her face, her beloved face.

Valin smiled at the portrait. He hadn’t quite captured her air of teasing confidence, but it would do. His men would go to boardinghouses, pubs, and street vendors until they found someone who could put a name to the picture and, with luck, an address.

God, the longer the search took, the more desperate and anxious he became. He wasn’t even sure how to mend things once he found her. All he knew was that he had to get her out of this place permanently. He didn’t want the damned jewel casket back; what he really wanted was to make her return with him to Agincourt Hall. Given her present opinion of him, she would refuse.

Valin scowled at Emmie’s portrait. “You’ll have to come back. I don’t care what you want. This is
no place for you. You’re not staying here, even if I have to abduct you.”

Sighing, Valin remembered how hard it was to keep Emmie if she didn’t want to stay in a place. Yet here he was chasing after her like a demented hound.

“God help me,” he said to Emmie’s portrait, “I’m never going to stop loving you, even if I never see you again.”

What if she wasn’t in London? She could have left. Acton had said the East End was her destination, but that didn’t mean she had remained here. At this moment she could be in another city, in another disguise, charming another man.

Valin dropped the portrait as he gazed at the building across the street without seeing it. He’d been so busy trying to solve the mystery of Emmie he’d never considered another man. Why not? Because he’d been the first man to touch her. But that didn’t mean there wasn’t another man. What if there had been someone else all along? No, there couldn’t have been. He refused to consider the possibility.

While he was struggling with such thoughts, someone knocked. It was one of Mildmay’s men come to report another unsuccessful search of the area of Shadwell. Another soon arrived with the same news for Seven Dials in the West End. Valin was discussing their strategy for using the portraits
when Ronald Mildmay came in, his sorrowful expression in place.

“You haven’t found her, either,” Valin said as he closed the door behind the inquiry agent.

“Oh, yes, m’lord, I have.”

The news was so unexpected that Valin didn’t react for a few moments.

“Where!”

“It wasn’t a question of where, my lord, but who.”

“Mildmay, what are you nattering about?”

“We’ve been looking for the wrong person, my lord.”

Valin scowled at the man. “We have not.”

“I beg your pardon, but we have. The young person you know as Emmie is in reality someone called Mrs. Apple.”

“Nonsense, man. Emmie has never been married.”

“That’s as may be, m’lord. Nevertheless, the person you seek goes by the name of Mrs. Apple. I have excellent information from a contact in Whitechapel who emerged from the rookeries only this morning. We’re lucky he has been hiding from the police and needed money, or he’d never have talked to me about her.”

“Why?”

“Honor among thieves, my lord. It seems Mrs. Apple is an accomplished leader of a gang of professional
burglars and tricksters. She and her people can get into a place, strip it of valuables in minutes, and leave no trace.”

“I could have told you that.”

“Mrs. Apple isn’t an ordinary thief, my lord. She’s what’s called a swell mobsman, one of the elite who preys on the wealthy. Not a picker of bank clerks’ pockets.”

“Where is she?”

“She lodges in Madame Rachel’s Boarding House in Needle Street, off Blackfriars. Not the most improving residence, but certainly above the slum courts and ditches.”

“Ditches?”

“Yes, my lord, a bedding place for many unfortunates, I’m afraid.”

“Come, Mildmay. Take me there—no. No, if I’m going to succeed, I must know more.” Valin beckoned to the inquiry agent, and they sat down in armchairs beside the tiny fireplace. “I want to find out everything about Mrs. Apple, Mildmay, and you’re going to help me.”