The Lost Empress (11 page)

‘And my husband? Is Henry well? Tell me you haven’t harmed him because of me.’

‘He is quite comfortable, I assure you. And your son will make a speedy recovery. Now we must press on.’

‘Where is all this leading?’ Alice asked. ‘Why me? Is it because of who my father is? What do you really want?’

‘So many questions,’ Raskin said. ‘And they will be answered—that I do promise you. But not now. Now I have another task for you. Tomorrow you must go to the Burlington Hotel in Dover and speak to the head waiter, Raimund Drescher. Ask him how his mother is. Say you hope she is well. He will then tell you what you must do.’

‘His mother?’

‘His mother is dead. If you say this, he will know I sent you.’

‘I see.’

Raskin produced a notebook and pencil from inside his coat. ‘There is something I have to show you.’ He began to write into the notebook, and a moment later he held it to the candlelight so Alice could see what he’d written.

‘Alice is a good girl,’ she read aloud, confusion furrowing her brow.

Raskin didn’t elaborate. Instead he wrote something else into the notepad, taking longer this time. He showed her again, and Alice just stared at it. What he had written looked like unreadable nonsense. ‘Lac iie aso gdo igl r.’

‘It’s a cipher, Alice. A code if you like. I want you to use it for all further communication between us.’

Alice was still looking at it. ‘How does it work?’

‘It’s really very simple. Just swap each pair of letters around. Then write them out in blocks of three, which merely serves to confuse the eye. It’s called a transition cipher. There are many variants and some quite complex, but this will be sufficient.’

Alice looked at the text again and found she was able to read the original sentence quite easily now she knew how it worked. ‘It’s very clever,’ she said. ‘But what if I can’t do what Drescher asks of me?’ She knew from her experience in the slipway at the dockyard that she was ill suited to this.

‘You must do it.’

‘But what if I fail again?’

The question seemed to amuse the Dutchman. ‘Don’t you see, my dear Alice. It is the very fear of failure that will ensure your success. It doesn’t matter how you do it—what or whom you use to accomplish the task is irrelevant. But you must accomplish it. Do you understand?’

‘Yes,’ Alice said. She understood very well.

Chapter Twelve

Present day.

It was just before midday when Jefferson Tayte arrived at Gillingham Marina, where Davina Scanlon had said she would meet him for lunch. He was earlier than expected and somewhat confused because the restaurant he had just entered was the only restaurant at the marina, and the tanned young man who had introduced himself to Tayte as the restaurant manager had just informed him that they had no lunch reservation in Davina’s name.

‘I guess there must have been some mix-up,’ Tayte said. ‘Thanks for checking.’

He picked up his briefcase and was about to leave, but as he turned around, he saw her through the floor-to-ceiling windows. She was standing outside, smiling and waving at him in a low-cut summer dress. The sight of her made Tayte’s palms clammy. She was an unquestionably striking woman, and he couldn’t deny his attraction to her, which only made him feel worse because of Jean—not that he planned on trying to do anything about it. To the contrary, he wanted to run the other way. They met at the door to a chorus of crying seagulls.

‘You’re early,’ Davina said, still smiling. ‘You must be keen, is that it?’

Tayte’s mouth cracked into a nervous smile. ‘Actually, my visit with Lord Metcalfe didn’t go so well,’ he said, thinking that it was quite a setback in light of the fact that he already knew from his research that Alice’s daughter Charlotte had borne no children, making her brother’s bloodline the only Metcalfe line available to him. ‘I wasn’t at Hamberley half as long as I’d expected to be.’ He turned back to the restaurant. ‘I just checked, and they told me they don’t have a reservation. Maybe they can still fit us in, though.’

‘No need,’ Davina said. ‘I changed my mind. It’s such a nice day that I thought . . .’ her words trailed off as a playful grin danced across her glossy lips. She took Tayte’s arm. ‘Come with me and I’ll show you,’ she added. ‘You do like surprises, don’t you?’

Tayte snorted uneasily. ‘Who doesn’t?’ he said, already wishing he were back at his hotel having a room-service meal for one.

Davina led Tayte down towards the water, where reflections of the sun, now at its zenith, twinkled and shimmered between the yachts and the cruisers that were moored there. They took a pontoon walkway and were soon between the boats, and it didn’t take long for Tayte to realise where Davina was taking him.

‘Which one’s yours?’ he asked, showing his impatience to find out where Davina’s change of plan was going.

‘We’re coming to it. She’s call the
Osprey
.’

Seeing all those boats only brought bad memories to Tayte’s mind, most of which stemmed from his first assignment in England, when he’d almost drowned. ‘What did you have in mind?’ he asked when his impatience to know the answer got the better of him.

Davina turned to him as they walked. Her playful grin had returned. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, clearly sensing his unease. ‘I wasn’t planning to take you for a ride.’ She winked. ‘Not today anyway. I just thought that, as the weather’s so nice, we’d have lunch on the boat instead of at the restaurant.’

‘Oh, okay,’ Tayte said, thinking that this was all going to be far more intimate than he wanted it to be.

Davina stopped beside a gleaming white cruiser that looked to be around forty feet in length. Its marine blue canopy was folded down, revealing a white leather lounge deck around a table set for two, flowers and all. Tayte’s eyes fell on the bright red rose in the table centre and the beads of condensation on the ice bucket, which just made his throat feel all the more dry.

Davina stepped aboard. Then she turned and offered Tayte her hand. ‘Welcome to the
Osprey
.’

Tayte whistled. ‘She’s a lovely craft.’

‘She was my husband’s pride and joy.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Tayte said. ‘I didn’t mean to—’

‘It’s okay,’ Davina interrupted, saving Tayte from an awkward apology. ‘Actually, I like being here. I like being close to the things that remind me of him.’

Tayte stepped aboard, and the boat swayed and settled again.

‘Everything’s ready,’ Davina said. ‘I’ve even brought my research down so we can go over everything here.’

‘Great,’ Tayte said, glad to know that he no longer had to find uncomfortable small talk to fill the conversation with. Or so he thought.

‘You don’t mind if we save all that for after lunch, though, do you?’ Davina added. ‘I’d like to find out all about you first.’ She indicated the table. ‘Have a seat. I’ll be right back.’

With that, Davina opened a small door beneath the cockpit and disappeared below deck. Tayte took his jacket off, carefully folded it, and laid it over his briefcase. He sat down and tried to think of something interesting to say that wasn’t about his latest assignment, coming up blank as he knew he would by the time Davina returned. She was carrying two plates, which she set on the table.

‘I hope you like seafood?’

‘Sure. See food and eat it,’ Tayte said, eying the plates of dressed crab and brown shrimp, salad, and baby potatoes. ‘There isn’t much I don’t eat,’ he added, and immediately wished he hadn’t.

Davina smiled. ‘I like a man who likes his food.’ She reached for the ice bucket, pulled the bottle out and showed Tayte the label, cradling it in a cloth napkin to catch the drips. ‘I bought us a nice Sauvignon blanc—Pouilly-Fumé,’ she said. ‘Would you like some?’ She pouted her lips at him. ‘Please say you would. I really don’t like drinking on my own.’

Tayte gave the label a cursory glance, knowing he would have had a glass, whatever it was, just to settle his nerves. ‘That would be very nice. Thank you.’

Davina poured the wine and sat in the curve of the seat beside Tayte, shifting around until their knees were touching. ‘Cosy, isn’t it?’ she said, and Tayte just smiled and unfurled his napkin.

‘So, tell me something about yourself,’ Davina said as they started on the meal.

Tayte laughed through his nose. ‘I’m afraid there really isn’t much to tell.’

‘I don’t believe that for a minute. Let’s start with where
you’re from.’

Tayte wanted to say that he wished he knew, but he didn’t want to get into the mystery of his own ancestry right now. He just wanted to get on with his assignment. ‘Washington, DC,’ he said. Then to save time, he rattled off just about everything else about him he could think of, holding back anything he thought could lead to deeper questions about himself and his lifelong search for his biological family. ‘I’m a Redskins fan, and I like Broadway shows. Beyond that, I seem to spend my waking hours with my nose buried in my work.’

Davina sat back and stared at him with a look of mild surprise. ‘Broadway? I adore musicals. What was the last show you saw?’

‘Jersey Boys.’

‘I love that show,’ Davina said. ‘I saw it in the West End a couple of months ago. So you’re a Valli fan, too?’

‘I wouldn’t say that. I just like the shows.’

Davina topped up the wine, and they ate and drank and talked about musicals all through lunch, during which time Tayte felt himself becoming more and more relaxed in Davina’s company. She’d bought a New York cheesecake for dessert, which she’d said was to make him feel more at home, and Tayte thought that was a nice gesture.

‘So what was that about having nothing much to say about yourself?’ Davina said with a smile as she topped up Tayte’s wine glass again. ‘We’ve found something in common and haven’t stopped talking about it since.’

Tayte smiled along with her, thinking that maybe small talk wasn’t so difficult after all, or maybe he’d just got lucky this time around. He finished his cheesecake and sat back, having waited until Davina had finished hers so as not to appear too eager to devour it.

‘That was a fine lunch in a fine setting, Davina. Thank you.’

‘You’re welcome,’ Davina said. ‘It was nice to have someone to share it with.’

There was a solemnity in her tone as she finished speaking. Tayte was so used to dining alone that he never gave it much thought, but he imagined that mealtimes had been difficult for Davina since her husband’s death. He didn’t want her mood to slip, so a moment later he grinned and said, ‘So, can we talk about my assignment now? I’m dying to go over your research.’

‘I don’t see why not,’ Davina said. ‘You’ve been very patient with me. I suppose it’s only fair. Let’s go inside. As lovely as it is out here, I think I could use some shade. I’m melting.’

‘That sounds good,’ Tayte said. ‘Let me help you clear up the table.’

The space inside the
Osprey
’s cabin was small, but it was bright and airy because of the white leather and cherry wood furniture that had been designed to maximise the space. All the same, Tayte couldn’t stand up without stooping, but he was pleased he hadn’t had to squeeze through or around anything to get to the table he and Davina were now sitting at by one of the starboard portholes. On the table, Davina had a lever arch file containing her research. Tayte had his briefcase open beside him.

‘Looks like someone needs a new briefcase,’ Davina said, casting a studious eye over Tayte’s long-serving travel companion.

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Tayte said. He looked over the battered leather edges and at the handle that he’d worn to a high shine. Then his gaze drifted to the repair he’d made to the bullet hole in the side, which he’d picked up on a previous assignment. ‘We’ve been through so much over the years, I’m sure I couldn’t bear to part with it.’

Davina smiled at him. ‘So you’re the sentimental type?’

Tayte shrugged. ‘I guess, maybe.’

Davina opened her file and removed the contents, which comprised several loose sheets of paper and a few folders. ‘So, what happened at Hamberley?’ she asked. ‘You said your visit hadn’t gone too well.’

‘Not well at all,’ Tayte said. ‘I tiptoed around Alice for as long as I could, but when I mentioned her name and showed Lord Metcalfe the photo I have of my client’s grandmother, he became very upset about it—much as Raife Metcalfe did when I asked him
about Alice.’

‘You shouldn’t be too surprised,’ Davina said. ‘They’re an old and proud family, as devoted to their country as I should think anyone can be.’

‘It’s hardly scandalous news today, though, is it?’

‘No, perhaps not, but you have to remember that Reginald Metcalfe is of a generation when such things were highly scandalous. I don’t imagine his views have changed much with the times.’

‘But what about Raife? He’s a young man. He was just as upset, if not more so.’

‘I’m sure most of the family who know about Alice have had the need to forget her drummed into them over the years. Knowing how his grandfather is about the black sheep of the family, I’m sure Raife was simply reflecting Lord Metcalfe’s wishes.’

‘You’re probably right,’ Tayte said. ‘He just seemed to go a bit over the top about it, threatening to see me off the property with his shotgun like he did. Anyway, it’s clear that I’m not going to get any assistance from the Metcalfe family anytime soon.’ He indicated Davina’s research. ‘You said on the phone this morning that you had a photograph you thought would be of particular interest to me.’

Davina flicked through her papers, nodding as she did so. ‘Here we are,’ she said. She slid an old sepia photograph in front of Tayte. ‘It’s a family-and-friends gathering, circa early 1900s, I should think.’

Tayte studied the image, and his eyes were immediately drawn to the young girl on the knee of the bearded naval officer in the foreground.

‘I believe that must be Alice,’ Davina added, ‘because that’s her father, Charles Metcalfe. Her mother Lilian is standing beside them.’

‘Can you put names to all these faces?’

‘No, not all,’ Davina said. ‘Although I’ve tried to. My husband was able to help with some, and I managed to connect others by talking to the family over the years.’ She leaned closer to Tayte and put a finger on one of the figures to the side. ‘That’s Alice’s Aunt Cordelia and her Uncle Oscar, who as you know is my husband’s great-grandfather.’ She laughed to herself. ‘Chancers and wheeler-dealers, the lot of them by all accounts. I suppose that’s why Lionel was so well suited to the antiques business.’

‘Who are these gentlemen?’ Tayte asked, pointing to a line of highly decorated naval uniforms in the background.

‘I don’t know all their names,’ Davina said. She indicated a white-haired man with wiry sideburns. ‘His name’s Waverley—he was another admiral I believe, like Lord Charles Metcalfe. To his right is Lord Ashcroft. I’m sure they’re all friends of Charles through their connection to the Royal Navy.’

‘And who’s this smart young fella?’ Tayte asked, indicating a boy who looked no more than a few years older than Alice, standing straight as a ship’s mast before the naval officer who Davina had informed him was Lord Ashcroft.

Davina paused before answering. Then she nodded to herself and said, ‘That’s Archibald Ashcroft—Archie, I believe he was called.’

‘Do you know whether the Ashcrofts were from around here?’

‘Yes, I’m sure they were, although I’ve no idea where they live now. I think the two families lost touch over the years. I did hear that Archibald and Alice were to be married. At least, that was the hope of their parents, but it never happened.’ Davina caught Tayte’s eyes. ‘Love should come from the heart. Don’t you think?’