The Conquest of Lady Cassandra (9 page)

Two years ago, Cassandra would have never doubted that Aunt Sophie could keep Gerald at bay with one withering joke. Today, however, that hand felt very small and her aunt seemed vulnerable, and indeed in need of care and protection.

If the Continent was too risky, they would go to America. Cassandra thought she would not mind escaping England. The world was changing around her, and she felt herself
being nudged more and more to the edges of society. She tried not to mind that—she had all but asked for it, after all—but digging in her heels had become tiresome.

Her aunt’s attention became distracted by the garden again. This time it seemed those blue eyes grew paler yet. A girlish smile only made Sophie appear more distant.

“Yes, if Gerald does not behave, I will have to talk to the earl about him,” she mused.

“Gerald is the earl now. Papa is gone.”

Sophie blinked. “Of course he is. My mind was still on Leonardo, and I misspoke.”

She lifted her book again. Cassandra tried not to watch for a page to turn, but she knew too much relief when one finally did.

Yes, it was time to clear up the history of those earrings so Ambury did not put off paying for them any longer, and she could move ahead with her plans

“Aunt Sophie, I am curious about something. Last spring, when I said I had to sell some jewels, you were most particular about which ones they could be.”

“I was?”

“You insisted on looking at them all. Don’t you remember? It was back in March, and we spread all the jewels out on the carpet in the library. You strolled among them, pointing to the ones I should not consign to the auction.”

“Now I remember. I thought they enhanced the carpet so much. I thought jeweled carpets might become a new fashion, except that they would be difficult to walk on.” She frowned, as if the notion puzzled her. “Were they all on the carpet? Every one?”

“That is what you told me to do. Even the ones with the little notes were there.” Aunt Sophie had provided instructions with some of the jewels regarding when and where they should not be worn. One, for example, said, “Not to be worn in Vienna.” Cassandra assumed it had been a gift from Franz.

“Of course I did. I remember.”

Cassandra studied her aunt’s face, trying to decide whether Sophie really did remember. She hated how she checked things like that all the time now. Even if Gerald did not win this game, he had scored heavily just in playing it.

“Do you remember the sapphire-and-diamond earrings? They were old-fashioned but in the best way. The center diamond on each was quite large.”

“You would have appeared stunning in those. They would have flattered your eyes.” Sophie blinked. “You sold them with the others?”

“They went for a very high price.” Cassandra tried to speak lightly.
Ambury bought them. He says they were stolen, and I think he suspects you were the thief.
It would be a kindness to leave all of that unsaid. “Who gave you those earrings? Was it Leonardo perhaps?”

“Goodness, Leonardo was too poor to give me gifts like that. However, he was such a considerate lover that a woman could hardly mind. He had this wonderful trick he did with his—but I should not scandalize you. We don’t want to give your brother more reasons to disapprove of your living here, do we? Now, where did I get those earrings?” She frowned as she pondered the matter. “Perhaps I bought them. Yes, I am almost sure it was those earrings that I purchased that winter.”

“They must have cost a fortune.”

“I found those earrings at a pawnshop, and not nearly as dear as you would expect. Perhaps the pawnbroker thought the diamonds were merely paste.”

Sophie picked up her book again.

Cassandra sipped her lemonade. She had asked, and she had her answer. She could in good conscience tell Ambury at least part of the jewels’ history. The only point from the conversation left unexplained was what Leonardo’s trick had involved.

Yes, this should settle things nicely, provided she ignored the feeling that Aunt Sophie had just lied to her.

T
wo days later a letter from Ambury came in the morning post, asking Cassandra to call at his family’s house at two in the afternoon. The solicitor would be in attendance, and their business could be conducted with total discretion.

Another letter came at the same time. Emma wrote, telling Cassandra that she had returned to town. She asked Cassandra to call at her family’s auction house at noon.

Curious as to what brought Emma back to London so soon after her wedding, Cassandra presented herself at the auction house at eleven o’clock. She had feared she might never see Emma after the wedding and yet here they were, meeting as they had so often in the past.

The tall, cavernous exhibition chamber proved empty, its gray walls devoid of even a single painting. The wooden floor still displayed evidence of the scrubbing with sand that had heralded the end of the Season a few months earlier. None of the employees were about.

She followed sounds to the office at the far end of the gallery. Emma sat at a big desk there. The wooden surface in front of her had been turned into a field of jewels.

“I could not imagine what would draw you back to the city, Emma. I should have guessed it was rarities such as those.” Cassandra lifted a particularly eye-catching ruby suspended on a chain. The setting was simple, but such a jewel required little adornment.

She put it down. “You are supposed to be enjoying married life. I am surprised that Southwaite agreed to return to London.”

Emma poked at earrings consisting of little more than two perfect pearls. “He did not want to come, but felt obligated after learning the most recent war developments. Of course I did not want to be parted from him.”

Cassandra gestured to the desk. “Does he know about these?”

“I may
have neglected to mention them. Once I learned I would return, I arranged for their delivery. Temporary, of course, while I evaluate them.”

“And your brother? It is his auction house now. Should he not be—”

“He is ill. A summer fever. Nor does he know much about jewels. Even less than I, and I am no expert. Which is why I needed you.”

Cassandra turned her attention to the jewelry. She had learned about precious stones and settings from Aunt Sophie. During those first few years together, when she traveled with her aunt, Sophie had pointed out the very best gems adorning society on the Continent and given lessons on how to assess quality and value.

“Most of it is fairly recent, set perhaps twenty years ago.” She picked up a few pieces and held them to the light of the window. “The settings are very restrained. The value is in the stones. Most have excellent clarity. Where did you get them?”

“Marielle found them.”

“Let us pray that she found them in the legitimate possession of their owners.” Marielle was a young Frenchwoman, an émigré who had escaped the revolution when only a girl. She had become an agent for Fairbourne’s, serving as a go-between for other émigrés who wished to sell valuables brought out of France.

“The owners have agreed to be named, so we are probably safe there. What do you think? Are they as good as they appear?”

“They are worthy of Fairbourne’s. If you wait until autumn, I think they will fetch at least seven hundred in toto. If you try to sell them now, it will be half as much, if you are lucky.”

“Marielle says her friends can wait if I promise to include them when we start up again. Our next auction will be in mid-September, I think.”

Cassandra continued examining the jewels, returning each to the table in one of several rows that she formed. “Why has Southwaite returned to town?”

“You will hear about it soon enough. The situation in Ireland had taken a bad turn. French troops have landed in County Mayo. It is not known how many, but rebels are joining them, and on last report, they had not yet been routed.”

It was indeed shocking news, yet a development for which the whole country had been bracing. “All this fear about the southeastern coast, and they go to Ireland instead.”

Cassandra continued examining the jewels. The news that Fairbourne’s would hold an auction next month relieved her. If Ambury should prove yet more of a problem, she could put those earrings up for sale again.

“Will Southwaite be angry if he knows you met with me today?” she asked.

Emma came around the desk and embraced her. “I have explained to him how dear you are to me, and how we have a true friendship and not merely the sort of tolerance that I am likely to receive from the women in his circles.” Emma pressed her lips lightly to Cassandra’s temple. “He has not forbidden it. I had hoped that your invitation to the wedding would make that clear.”

Emma’s loyalty touched Cassandra deeply. Her throat burned. She pointed to the jewels. “Left rows to right are low values to high.”

Emma returned to her chair, removed a sheet of paper from a drawer, and began jotting notes. “Lydia has come back to town too.”

“I would expect her to remain at Crownhill if her brother did not. She prefers it there if she is alone. Why did she come to town?”

“I am not sure, but—I believe she did so to see you.”

Six months ago, Cassandra would have expressed naughty joy, and perhaps even included Emma on any plans
to circumvent Southwaite’s interference with the friendship. Now, however, Emma’s loyalties had become complicated.

“More likely she wants to see her other friends, or place orders for a new wardrobe.” She picked up her reticule. “Now, I must leave you. I have promised to rendezvous with someone in half an hour.”

T
he mansion owned by the Earl of Highburton could not fail to impress, situated as it was on Pall Mall, near Marlborough House. A property with impeccable pedigree, it was of a size and luxury befitting peers who had prospered by living with moral restraint and by managing to align themselves with the winning side of most political controversies over the last few centuries.

The morning paper had reported that Highburton had returned to London and was in residence. Normally Cassandra would feel uncomfortable intruding into the home of a dying man, but the earl surely had an expansive apartment and inviolable privacy inside this huge pile of stone. She doubted that he would even be aware of her appearance at the door.

When the footman escorted her into the drawing room, Ambury was already there.

He greeted her with a smile and bow. She noted again, as she curtsied, how maturity suited him. His father was still famous for his handsome face, and the son took after him in that at least, even if everyone knew their minds had little in common. His disagreement with his father on almost everything of importance had created a rift even before he left university.

That Ambury lived outside the strict and conservative notions of behavior that his family had long espoused had not helped matters, she supposed. Even generations ago, when most everyone of their class enjoyed a degree of licentiousness, the Earls of Highburton and their families had been
famous for their uprightness. Ambury, however, had the reputation for being a libertine. The notes about him in the scandal sheets were not at all ambiguous. Unlike his friend Southwaite, he was not even especially discreet about his affairs.

“Won’t you sit? The solicitor will be here very soon.” Ambury gestured to one of a pair of chairs set quite close to each other.

Cassandra did not want to perch there if this man intended to put his hard bum on the cushion next to it. He looked too handsome today for comfort. The kind of handsome that turned a woman all tingly and silly. She needed to keep her wits about her.

“The solicitor will not be necessary. I have asked my aunt about the earrings. She remembers purchasing them from a pawnbroker some years back. How they came to be in his possession is anyone’s guess.”

“Some years back? Two years? Thirty?”

“She did not say.”

“Which pawnbroker was it?”

“She did not say that either.”

“It is all very ambiguous. Is your aunt getting vague in her memories in a general way, Lady Cassandra? Sometimes—”

“Not at all. Why would you suggest such a thing? She is as sound of mind as you are. I did not quiz her closely on the earrings. It would be rude to do so.” She withdrew a little velvet sack from her reticule and set it down on a table. “Now at the risk of being extremely indelicate, I will give you the earrings, and you will give me the money.”

He turned one of his smiles on her. She tried not to allow it to affect her, because she guessed it heralded trouble.

“First I must ask that you attempt to learn more from your aunt about when and where she found the earrings.”

“She has told me all she knows.”

“I doubt that. They are not the kind of jewels that one forgets obtaining.”

“Are you daring to say my aunt lied?”

“I am suggesting that she answered your discreet question and offered nothing more. By your own admission you did not ask for details. I am sure that she would be more forthcoming if I broached the subject. Since she will not see me, I ask that you raise the matter again, with less circumspection.”

She could tell he would not budge. He was going to hold off on payment until she either discovered the entire history or the month had passed. In a gesture of pique, she snatched up the velvet sack and stuffed it back into her reticule.

She paced slowly around the chamber. “There has been some recent redecorating here. The obvious Pompeii influence is gone.”

He glanced about as if he had not noticed before. “I forget that you visited several times during your first Season. I suppose there have been changes since then.”

She paused to admire a chair that displayed restrained Gothic elements in the carving on its arms. The countess must be trying out this style to see if it suited her and the drawing room. “I was here not only during my first Season. I attended a few salons with my aunt after I went to live with her. I do not think that your mother really wanted my presence, but Aunt Sophie managed to extract invitations for me.”

“My parents always had a fondness for her, despite her unusual life. My father was a friend of your father, and had reason to be tolerant of his friend’s sister.”