But she would not forget Pratchet’s part in this disaster. He had bought the stones and kept the truth from her. If anyone deserved to be gaoled, it was him. But despite his protests of a gentleman’s agreement, he could prove in court that she’d had no knowledge of the provenance of the rubies she’d sold. She would pretend to overlook his crime, for the moment, at least. If she sacked him as he deserved, he might disappear just when he was needed to swear to her innocence.
She stared down at the twisted metal still in her hand that had once held such magnificent stones. It was a sad end to see it thrown away as scrap. But it would be even worse if she lost her livelihood over a piece of jewellery.
In the front room, the bell of the shop door rang. Pratchet had not locked it when he’d gone. Without thinking, she stepped to the doorway and called, ‘I am sorry, the shop is closed for the evening.’
‘Not to me.’ The voice was familiar, and yet not so. While she had heard him speak a hundred times, he had always been kind. Never before had she heard him use so cold a tone. Nor would she have thought it possible that three words could be imbued with such calculating, deliberate threat.
Framed in the entrance was the Marquess of Fanworth. And he was staring at the gold in her hand.
Even as the evidence mounted, Stephen could not help wishing that it was a simple, easily explained mistake.
The enquiry agent had positively identified the stones. There was no question of their identity. Stephen had written to his mother to assure her that the rubies were safe in the family again and would be returned to her when she came to Bath at the end of the month.
But that did not explain what Margot de Bryun had to do with any of it. Arthur claimed that the answer was obvious. Meaning, Stephen supposed, that he was as big an idiot as Father had always claimed. He had been duped by a pretty face and refused to believe the truth even when he could hold the evidence in his hand.
Stephen had stared, frowning at his brother, until the speculation had stopped. Arthur was always willing to see the worst in people, for he was the most cynical creature alive.
Then, he had sent the enquiry agent to speak to Margot directly. Mr Smith returned to say that Miss de Bryun had denied all knowledge of the gems. But there was no chance she would not have recognised them by the description he had given to her. In his opinion, feigned ignorance was little better than a lie and a sign of culpability on her part. A professional opinion from Smith was far more worrisome than Arthur’s accusations.
But damn it all, Stephen knew Margot de Bryun and was willing to swear that there was not a calculating bone in her body. And a luscious body it was. He would go to her himself and settle this small misunderstanding about the rubies. If she was innocent, then things would go back to the way they had been.
And if she was guilty?
He hoped, for her sake, that she was not.
Stephen would not know until he saw evidence with his own eyes, and not just assumptions and suppositions. He’d waited, all afternoon, hoping that she would come forward and explain herself, after Smith’s visit. But there had been so sign of her.
Perhaps she truly did not know his name or direction. Or perhaps she was avoiding him. If he wanted the truth, he must go to her and get it.
Dusk was falling as he was walked down Milsom Street towards de Bryun’s. It was later than he’d ever visited. It must be closed, or nearly so. But it would give them a chance to speak in private. He was sure she would be the last one out of the door in the evening, for she had but to climb the stairs and be home. When he arrived at the shop, the front room was dark and the sign turned to read ‘Closed’. But there was still a glow of light coming from the doorway of the workroom.
On an impulse, he tried the door and felt the handle turn. Not totally closed, then. The bell that rang as he opened was unnaturally loud in the silence of the empty room. When night fell, the cheerful elegance was replaced with a ghostly hush, made even more eerie by the gauze-framed doorways.
Margot de Bryun stepped through the sheer curtains, uttering the standard apology to a customer that had come too late. Then she recognised him and froze, framed in the doorway.
His beautiful Margot, in her simple white gown, was surrounded in a halo of candlelight and holding the empty setting that had once held the Larchmont rubies.
‘My Lord Fanworth.’ She dropped into a curtsy, as humble and submissive as any shop clerk that had ever waited upon the son of a duke.
The sight turned his stomach.
Idiot. Dolt. Worthless fool.
The words echoed in his mind as they had since he had been old enough to understand their meanings. But this time they were true. Damn his feeble wits. He had trusted her as if she’d been a part of his own body. Now he saw the truth. She knew him. She knew the rubies. Yet she’d said nothing. She’d let him stammer and flirt. She had pretended to laugh with him. But all the while he had been the butt of the joke. The whole time, she had been waiting for the right moment to spring the trap and prove him for the fool he was.
He ignored her beauty, staring through her as if it would be possible to see the black heart beating in that admirable bosom. From this moment on, she would see no more weakness in him. He would see her punished for what she had done. And then he would see her no more. ‘How long have you known my title?’
‘Since the first,’ she said, in a whisper.
‘Yet you said nothing.’
She shook head, bracing herself against the doorframe as though she needed support to hide the trembling in her body. ‘It was not my place to question you.’
‘Neither should you have sold me my own mother’s stolen rubies.’
‘I swear, I did not know.’ Her eyes were round, luminous coins in the firelight. If he was not careful, the soft side of him that had allowed her to lead him by the nose would be believing this story as well. She had lied once. She would do it again.
He stepped forward and snatched the twisted gold from her hand. Arthur might fault him for not recognising the stones, but on this part of the necklace he had no doubt. The prongs that had held the gems canted at weird angles where they’d been pried away. A few of the surrounding diamonds still remained, but most were like so many empty eye sockets staring back from around the gaping wounds that had contained rubies.
‘Do you wish the money back? I will get it for you this instant.’ Her voice was weird, distant. But he was lost in all the times he had seen the necklace on his mother. How happy it had made her. How devastated would she be to see it now?
‘I need no money.’
‘Then I will reset the stones, as they were. Simply bring them back and—’
‘You will not touch them again!’
He heard the gasp, as the words hit her like a whiplash. It was exactly what she deserved for ruining something so beautiful, treating it as nothing more than scrap.
‘Then what do you wish of me?’ she said, taking a deep breath to steady herself as she waited for his response.
What did he want from her? If the stones were reset, there would still be the memory of what had happened to them and how he had behaved, in this very room, mooning over her like a lovesick boy even as she had tricked him. No amount of money would erase such a thing.
‘Your Mr Smith was here today, threatening me with gaol or worse,’ she said, softly. ‘I beg you, my lord, there is no need. You have the stones. You have the setting. Keep the new setting as well. If you will not take it from me, I will return the