Touch of a Scoundrel (Touch of Seduction 3) (23 page)

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Authors: Mia Marlowe

BOOK: Touch of a Scoundrel (Touch of Seduction 3)
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C
HAPTER
26
E
mmaline felt an unspoken rebuke in his abrupt change of subject, but for the life of her, she couldn’t see how she’d offended. She wanted to ask him more about his gift of foreknowledge. She and Monty had several nefarious friends who pretended to have the ability to peek into the future. They did quite well bilking the gullible out of their funds with their fabricated prognostications, but to actually see what lay beyond the next breath . . . She’d never known anyone who could really do it.
Griffin’s guarded expression warned her off. She sensed he wasn’t happy about his ability, but he wasn’t willing to talk about it. Her brief look into his private life was over.
“Why would someone try to steal the statue, you ask? Monty weaves a spellbinding tale. He could convince people that Tetisheri descended from the clouds on a pillar of smoke if he was of a mind to,” she said. “And I’ve no doubt the rumors floating about have further embellished his claims. Undoubtedly, our thief is unaware the statue is a fraud.”
“Maybe.” He paced, barely contained energy roiling off him. “Or maybe there’s something about it we’ve overlooked.”
“Why do you say that?”
He stopped pacing and drilled her with a pointed stare. “It was just an observation.”
“You’ve had a vision about it,” she guessed.
“Blast it all.” The pacing resumed. “Has it occurred to you that a man resists telling a woman his secrets because he dislikes having them thrown back in his face?”
Emmaline crossed her arms over her chest. “I did nothing of the sort. I merely made a logical assumption given the information I have.” Then her posture relaxed. It would do no good to meet his surliness with her own. “Don’t worry, Griffin. I believe you and I won’t tell a soul. Now tell me what you’ve
Seen
.”
He gave a loud exhalation and returned to settle beside her. “All right. I’ve had two
Sendings
about the statue, but they weren’t the usual sort.”
“How do you mean?”
“Most of the time, my visions are detailed and specific. And the fulfillment of them takes place within no more than twelve hours of the
Sending
.” He dragged a hand over his face. “These were like . . . trying to see through fog.”
“So you’re unsure of their meaning?”
“No, I’m certain they mean the statue is dangerous, but I wasn’t shown why.” He rose again. “Where is it now?”
“In my chamber.”
“Where is everyone else?”
“I left them all in the parlor,” Emmaline said. “Monty and Theodore were losing rather badly at cards to the countess and Louisa.”
“Which means they’ll be at it a while. Ted never concedes a game when he’s behind,” Griffin said, holding out his hand to her. “You and I have bared our secrets to each other. Let’s go have a look at Tetisheri and see if we can uncover hers.”
Griffin dropped her hand and offered his arm as soon as they cleared the library doors. In a house where the help knew everything, he considered it a point of honor to make it as difficult as possible for them to glean juicy tidbits of information about the family they served.
Sometimes, he suspected Baxter and the rest of the staff considered it a game to see who could conceal and who could most reveal the secret doings in the house of Devonwood. Fortunately, the help were all loyal in the extreme. While they might enjoy gossiping below stairs about the goings on above them, none would dream of carrying tales beyond the threshold.
Baxter ran a tight ship. As all but lord of the staff, he’d dismiss without character anyone who breathed a word of scandal about the family.
In the meantime, Griffin escorted Emmaline about the great house coolly and correctly. No one would suspect he’d just lifted her skirts in the library and lost his heart at the same time.
Griffin gave himself a mental shake. He couldn’t allow himself to love her. Her life had been difficult enough before this. She deserved someone with fewer complications than he brought. Someone normal.
Someone like his brother.
No,
his heart rebelled. Even though she’d been prepared to accept Theodore’s suit and was willing to bed him to make certain of it, Griffin refused to imagine her with Teddy.
But he also refused to consider what her life would be like with him.
What a perfectly wicked little circle.
As they ascended the stairs together, he studied her in his peripheral vision. Alert, curious, her cheeks still kissed with color that proclaimed she’d recently been shagged senseless, she was so full of vibrant life, his guarded existence seemed pale and colorless by comparison.
“Wait here in the sitting room,” she said when they entered the Blue Suite. “And leave the hall door open.”
Emmaline disappeared into her bedchamber in search of the statue.
He grinned wryly after her. She knew the walls had eyes, too. Though it wasn’t unusual for him to shut himself in the library and expect not to be disturbed, a closed door in the afternoon on the third floor would beg the upstairs maid to open it.
“Here it is,” Emmaline said, carrying the statue back into the sitting room. She didn’t bother to lower her voice. If a member of the staff was hovering, they’d see only their lord and his guest poring over the Egyptian oddity together and decide there was nothing of note to report.
Emmaline set Tetisheri in the center of the chess table and sank into one of the heavy Tudor chairs. She studied the statue with furrowed brows for a moment. “It looks the same to me as always. A carved granite figure with hieroglyphs ringing the basalt base.”
Griffin narrowed his eyes at the statue. “I’ve seen a number of pieces similar to this at the British Museum, but I’ve never seen one with a base made of different material. Have you?”
Her brows shot up in surprise. “No. Now that you mention it, I haven’t. I wonder if the statue was carved at one point and the base added at a later date.”
Griffin wished he could pick it up to examine it more closely, but he suspected that action would result only in another enigmatic
Sending
. Standing close to it, he detected a soft hum, barely on the edge of sound.
Sometimes an object seemed to sense his presence, emitting a thrum of warning. He was certain he was the only one who could hear the low vibration. He’d long ago stopped asking “Do you hear that?” of his family and friends. It had irritated his father and made his friends cock their heads in bewilderment. Over the years, he’d learned to appreciate when an item announced it had something to tell him ahead of time. It meant he could avoid hearing what the object had to say if he wished.
“Since Tetisheri is seated, she’s stable enough,” he said, keeping his hands firmly in his pockets. “Why add the base at all?”
“At a guess, so the artist could add the hieroglyphs. They couldn’t very well have been carved on the hem of her robes.” Emmaline lifted the statue and turned it upside down to examine the bottom of the base.
“You do that very easily,” Griffin said. “How heavy would you say the statue is?”
Her eyes widened. “Not as heavy as one would expect if it’s all stone. Oh! Do you suppose the statue is hollow?”
“That might explain it,” Griffin said.
“According to Monty the second side of the base said something about ‘opening the portal.’ Perhaps there’s a way to remove the base and look inside.”
A stifled sneeze in the hallway made his head jerk around.
“Baxter,” he called.
The butler appeared in the doorway, hastily replacing his handkerchief in his breast pocket. “How may one be of service, your lordship?”
“Well, for one thing,” Griffin said, “if you’re that interested in antiquities, you might come in and have a seat with us instead of skulking in the hall.”
“That would be most improper.” Still, the man had the grace to look chagrined as he advanced into the room. Under his breath, he muttered, “One was
not
skulking. One was dusting the China Dog in the hallway niche.”
“Nevertheless, I do require your assistance,” Griffin said, certain dusting was beneath his butler’s wintry dignity.
Pity eavesdropping is not.
“Most specifically, I require your gloves.”
Baxter was never without a pair of spotless white ones. He raised a quizzical brow, but removed them without comment and handed them to Griffin.
“What are you going to do with those?” Emmaline asked.
“I’m going to see if there’s a way to open the statue,” Griffin said. “The gloves will give me a better grip.”
And protect me from an unwanted
Sending. If he thought the statue would give him any answers, he’d risk it, but all it had done in the past was give him allegorical riddles. As long as his bare skin didn’t touch it, he’d be safe from another shadowy
Sending
.
“Excellent idea, milord,” Baxter said, not missing a chance to toady up after having been caught spying. “That thing”—he favored the statue with a curled lip of distaste—“is thousands of years old. Who knows what sort of ancient grime it might have embedded in the crevices?”
“We’re about to find out.” Griffin ran a gloved forefinger around the base, feeling for any space between the granite and the basalt. There was no give at all. “Surely any sort of epoxy would have dissolved long before this. The two materials must be joined by some mechanical means.”
“Maybe it’s like a pickle jar,” Emmaline suggested. “With threads that screw together inside.”
“A pickle jar that’s been closed for a few thousand years.” Griffin tucked the statue under his arm and braced it against his body while he strained to see if the base would budge. After a few minutes” struggle, it turned ever so slightly.
Griffin set it down and drew a deep breath.
“If one might suggest, milord,” Baxter said, “simply because the civilized world has decided that a left turn will loosen a screw, it does not signify that other peoples might not have other ideas, however misguided.”
“By Gum, you’re right. I may have simply tightened it up just then. Here.” Griffin handed the statue to his butler. “Hold it steady and I’ll try turning it the other way.”
This time, over the low menacing hum, Griffin heard the scrape of stone on stone as the ancient threads ground against each other.
“Oh, it’s working. You’re doing it.” Emmaline danced like a colt on a short tether. “Do you suppose there’s anything inside it?”
“Some ancient jewelry wouldn’t come amiss,” Griffin said. “A golden torc hidden inside would explain why someone tried to steal the statue. Ancient gold is even more costly than newly mined ore.” He shot her a pointed look. “I’d imagine it would go a long way toward paying for Dr. Farnsworth’s recovery in the Alps.”
Her eyes sparked with hope.
Of course, if the statue was filled with gold, she wouldn’t need him any longer. Griffin wasn’t sure what to wish for as he felt the base give completely. As he lifted it from the statue, the last thing he expected to see was . . .
“Sand?”
The interior of the statue was filled almost to the brim with grainy, reddish-brown matter.
Baxter reached in and rubbed a pinch of the substance between his thumb and forefinger. “I rather think not,” he said, forgetting in his excitement to refer to himself as “one.” “It has the texture of coarse ground meal of some kind.”
Emmaline’s shoulders slumped. “You mean this statue is nothing but an ancient kitchen canister?”
“Not necessarily,” Baxter said. “Whatever this substance is, we may assume it had special significance. The design of the statue is too ornate, and too unwieldy for storage of an ordinary foodstuff.”
“Perhaps it’s a virulent sort of poison,” Griffin said, remembering the sinister aspects of his previous Sendings. The asp in his first vision and the god of death in a field of grain in the second suggested as much.
Baxter’s brows shot up. “One’s nephew is studying the chemical properties of natural substances at University. He’s home in London for the summer. If one might be so bold as to suggest, your lordship might authorize one to take a sample of the material to him. Young Tim may be able to tell us what sort of grain it is and why it was important enough to preserve in this fashion.”

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