‘Until then, good day, Miss de Bryun.’ He gave a slight respectful bow and exited the shop.
For a moment, Margot was frozen in place, unsure of what to do next. Then she glanced around her to be sure that the other customers in the shop had been too preoccupied to hear any of the exchange between herself and the thief taker. When she was sure that not even the nearest clerk had eavesdropped, she hurried to the little office she kept at the back of the workroom.
Once there, she brought down the account books, tracing her fingers down lines of sales until she found the records of shipments taken in. And there was a purchase of loose stones large enough to hide the Larchmont rubies.
Had the merchant passed the stones on to her? The man was a gypsy, but well connected, and the natural son of an earl. She’d never had reason to be suspicious of him before. But then, she’d never been accused of dealing in stolen merchandise.
She went to the files and found the detailed inventory of the purchase. It had been checked in by Mr Pratchet, the description of the gems written in his tidy hand. They were mostly opals, this time, and a nice selection of emeralds. It appeared that she’d had the best of a shipment from the Americas: Brazil, perhaps. And there, at the bottom of the list, were the rubies. Their description was identical to the one that Mr Smith had just shown her.
The pure red of those stones could only have come from Burma. What were they doing with Brazilian emeralds? Mr Pratchet had paid out more than she’d expected to spend on that order. But the amount listed for the rubies was less than a tenth of their actual value. The ink on the line did not seem to match the rest, as though the last item had been added as an afterthought. The total below it had been carefully altered to include the amount paid out for the stolen stones.
She stared at the books for what seemed like hours, trying to understand how she had not noticed before. But hadn’t Pratchet just demonstrated how careless she had become while fawning over the Marquess of Fanworth?
* * *
When the senior clerk, Jasper, came to her for permission to shut the shop, she gave an absent nod. The sun was near to setting. The other clerks had already gone home to their tea and the building had grown dark and quiet. She followed the boy out into the shop and locked the door the minute he was thorough it. Then she hurried back to the workroom.
If there was an explanation to any of this, it would lay with Pratchet. She went straight to the desk he used as a workbench and searched the drawers, not sure what she expected to find. More stolen gems? Thank God, there were none. Perhaps he was not responsible, after all. He might have been gulled, just as she had been, when presented with a fine bunch of loose stones and a price too good to resist.
But then she turned to the box of scrap gold on the floor beside the table, waiting to be melted and recast. It took only a few moments’ prodding to find the setting for the duchess’s rubies lying twisted and empty at the bottom.
‘What are you doing there?’ Mr Pratchet was standing in the doorway, watching as she rifled his workspace.
‘What are you still doing here?’ she said. For a moment, irrational instinct took her and her eyes darted around the room, searching for a defensive weapon.
‘I forgot to take my coat...’ As he stared at the broken necklace in her hand, his voice trailed away, reminding her that such fear was overblown. He might be a thief, but he was an unprepossessing specimen who would not further risk his livelihood by attacking her.
‘You know what I am doing.’ She held the setting out in front of her, so that there could be no denying. ‘Explain this.’
‘You will not like what I have to tell you,’ he said, stepping forward, unthreatening but unafraid.
‘There is no doubt of that,’ she said. ‘You used me and my shop to trade in stolen materials.’
‘Only once,’ he replied, as though it should matter.
‘And the one time you were caught in it. An enquiry agent has been here today, searching for the necklace. What am I to tell him?’
‘I warned you of the dangers in dealing with the marquess,’ Pratchet said, as though it were somehow her fault that they had come to this.
‘What has he to do with it?’ she asked, afraid of the answer. ‘Other than that he came to the shop looking for rubies, only to have me sell him his own gems. And how am I to explain that?’
‘You won’t need to explain it,’ Pratchet said. ‘He already knows.’
‘He does not.’ Her heart sank. He had not so much as batted an eye on taking the stones back. But then, her sister had always warned her that attractive men were often the most skilled liars.
‘You are naïve, Margot,’ said Pratchet, in a voice he probably thought was kind. In truth, it was no less patronising than the tone he had used to discuss marriage. ‘Have you not wondered how I came by the stones?’
‘I assume the thief sold them to you.’
‘But why did the thief choose this shop and not some London Lombard merchant? And why did I succumb so easily to the temptation?’
‘I have no idea what your motives might be. Perhaps he knew you to be a habitual criminal.’ She wanted that to be true. But he had said that this was an isolated occurrence and she believed him. Even now that he was caught, there was nothing in his nature that seemed suspicious.
His face was as bland as it ever was, offering no sign of subterfuge. In fact, he was looking at her with pity. ‘I took the stones because I feared giving offence to the man who held them. I had no idea he would report them as stolen, or that his family would send the law to this shop to harass you over them.’
‘Are you claiming that the marquess himself gave them to you?’
‘I gave my word as a gentleman to say nothing of the truth to anyone,’ he said. ‘But I did the best to warn you that such a close association with a man like Fanworth was unwise. You cannot understand the motives of the nobles in their great houses. Perhaps it is all an attempt to gain the insurance money while keeping the stones for themselves.’
There was a perverse logic in it. To have a new necklace made would be one way to hide beloved heirlooms in plain sight.
‘The fact that he involves you in his schemes is particularly worrying,’ Pratchet continued, although she had not asked for his opinion on the matter. ‘Since you are young, lovely and unprotected by marriage, I think we can draw the obvious conclusion as to his real motives.’
He made it sound as if those qualities rendered her one step from stupidity. Or perhaps that was what he thought of all women. ‘Until I have spoken to Lord Fanworth on the subject, I will not know what to think.’ But she did not wish to speak to him, ever again. The truth was likely to ruin everything.
Mr Pratchet let out an incredulous laugh. ‘You mean to speak to him? It is clear that the family does not want to admit their part in the disappearance. To call attention to it will only anger them. And to admit that you held the stones...’ Pratchet shook his head. ‘If you go to him over this, he will have you arrested. Or he will make the unsavoury offer he has been planning all along.’
‘I refuse to believe that.’ But she could not manage to sound as sure as she had been. Hadn’t her sister offered the same warning? But she had been too flattered by Fanworth’s visits to heed.
Mr Pratchet gave her another pitying look. ‘When you are proven wrong, come to me. Perhaps, if you are married, he will leave you alone. Together we might find a way out of the mess you have created for yourself.’ He went to the corner, collected the forgotten coat and went out into the street.
The mess she had created? It was true. She had convinced herself that the Marquess of Fanworth would stoop to be interested