Aunt Sophie's Diamonds (23 page)

"Oh, no."

"Good-night again,” he said, and took her hand as though to shake it, hut instead he raised it to his lips. Then he turned and left.

"He is trying to jolly you into being on his side,” Luane said the minute the door was closed. From the moonstruck look on her cousin's face, she feared he was succeeding, too. “He always takes to being gallant with ladies when he means to bring them round his thumb. He was such a tyrant, cousin! He wouldn't let me finish my apple tart and hauled Gabriel right up from the table by the collar and shook him. I was
furious!
And Gabriel doesn't stand up to him in the least, just as though we were doing something wrong to stop for a bite to eat, when we were both
famished."

"We'd better let the others know you're back,” was her reply.

"You tell them. I'm tired,” Loo said, and ran up the stairs to her room.

Claudia did no more than stick her head in at the door and tell her mother Luane was home but had gone to bed already. Then she went up the stairs after her.

"Tell me all about it,” Claudia invited, throwing herself onto Loo's dimity-covered bed.

"I wish I could
show
you all the lovely things I bought, but, of course, that old stick of a Hillary won't let me have them and will likely cast them into the fire, for he doesn't like me to look too attractive in front of Gabriel. Such a sweet bonnet—a great high poke right past Gabriel's head, with the gayest red ribbons. I looked a very dasher in it; everyone was turning to stare at me."

"I thought you only put it on after you were in the parlor."

"Well, I put it on in the carriage before we went into the inn, for how would anyone see it otherwise? I hope what he said about my being a hussy won't put you off from wanting to be my chaperone."

"He has no thought of that. He has already hired Miss Bliss. I had hoped I might be an abigail for you, but he didn't mention it to mama at all. It was just talk."

"That sounds just like him. You notice how he said Gabriel would have to marry me,
then
said we were both too immature. He always pretends he is going to do something nice for you, but it never happens. He was afraid to let Gabriel come to see me alone tomorrow, for fear he'd offer for me. That's what all his coming to see
you
is about. And now he is trying to turn you against me, too, by calling me a hussy."

"He didn't mean it; he was just angry."

"Poo, what has
he
got to be angry about?
I
am the one who was bilked out of my nice black opal, only because he didn't tell me it was valuable before I sold it."

"He had no idea you were going to sell it."

"I wouldn't have had to if he'd sell my diamond as I
begged
him to. Only think of the injustice of it—I am
rich
and can't get my hands on a penny because he won't let me. And there is no reason why Gabriel must leave tomorrow either. Lots of people travel on Sunday now. Sir Hillary does himself, and it is all fudge that he doesn't want Gab to travel on Sunday."

"Grandpapa never travels on Sunday, except to church, of course."

"He is just afraid I will get Gabriel to offer for me if he is allowed to stay over another day, and I should too, if I had my ten thousand pounds. I got him to admit as much today. He said anyone could live on five hundred a year."

"You have your ten pounds anyway. Or did Sir Hillary take that, too?"

"No, for it's still in my old reticule, and he forgot to take it."

They talked for half an hour, with the younger girl castigating Sir Hillary as the blackest of villains, while the elder tried to excuse his faults. Luane began yawning, and then Claudia realized that she too was tired. Just before she left, she said, “And we are never to dig up Aunt Sophie again? I am sorry about that."

"If you want an adventure, I imagine Jonathon is going digging tonight. Gabriel thinks so, but it is illegal, and he will have to give the diamonds back in the long run and likely go to jail too."

"It wouldn't be any fun with Jonathon. I'll go down and say good-night to mama before going to bed. Good-night, cousin."

It had been a long day and an eventful one for a young girl accustomed to no excitement at all, but still it was not over. When Claudia returned to the Crimson Saloon, mama's visitor had arrived at last, and Claudia was reintroduced to Mr. Blandings whom she had met briefly at Bath some years ago. She did not remember that he was so big, so black of hair and swarthy of face, so loud of voice, so altogether common. Or perhaps it was only that two years ago she had not been comparing him to Sir Hillary Thoreau.

"So this is your little girl,” he said, arising and pumping Claudia's hand which he held in a viselike grip. “Don't take after you—but she wouldn't, of course."

This statement reminded Claudia that for the duration of the man's visit she was to be on her guard against being mama's daughter, as well as being her true age. A sharp nod from her mother told her she better not forget it.

"She is a Milmont through and through,” Marcia decreed, to give some explanation to Jonathon for her lover's peculiar statement. “But how comes it, Mr. Blandings, you were so late in coming? I made sure you would be here a couple of days ago."

"There's the bad luck of it, my dear. I wasn't in London when your note arrived. I'd gone off to Hampshire to give a mortgage on a nifty little property—at ten per cent too. I make it a point to pace out every acre before I give a mortgage on it. There's no saying it won't end up being mine, for ten per cent is the worst you can do on a mortgage, as against five per cent in the funds. With luck, the fellow will default, and the whole lot will fall into my hands. Much good it would do me if it turned out to be a swamp or a bog. Pace every foot of it out myself. Yessir, Jeremy Blandings didn't become the Trump of Mortgagees by buying a pig in a poke. And how did your business fare, my dear?"

"Mr. Blandings, I am not here on business!” she objected.

"I mean the will, of course,” he explained, surprised at this obtuseness on the part of his beloved, whose mind usually kept pace with his own financial reckonings. “Did she leave you anything of account?"

"This is no time to talk of such things, when we are in deep mourning,” she replied, with a sanctimonious face, from which avaricious eyes peeped out. As she spoke, she unconsciously fingered her rope of pearls, which were usually to be seen around her neck.

"Left you the pearls I see,” he answered.

"Yes, and Claudia got that fine emerald,” she answered. She had made her obeisance to propriety in mentioning that they ought not to discuss such things, and now felt free to go into all the details. “Show him the ring, Claudia."

Claudia held out her hand. “The mischief of it is she has managed to get it shoved on to her finger and can't get it off,” Marcia added.

To the utter amazement of Miss Milmont, mama's suitor pulled a jeweler's glass out of his pocket and stuck it into his eye to examine her emerald. He dragged her to the lamplight to do this, twisting her finger this way and that to get the best view. “A poor light. I'll have a look in daylight tomorrow. I can't see any flaw in it. It's a good deep color—and large. Fifteen carats, I make it."

Claudia's amazement gave way to amusement, and she could scarcely keep from laughing aloud. She found herself wishing Sir Hillary were there to share it with her. “I didn't realize you were in the jewelry line, Mr. Blandings,” she said.

"I turn a penny where I can,” he admitted carelessly. “Many of these old families that are mortgaging their places are happy to sell off their unentailed heirlooms to help raise the wind. That's why I carry this little lens with me. You never know when someone will want to sell a ring or a jeweled piece of some sort. Picked up a dandy little bracelet from this chap in Hampshire,” he said to Marcia. “You will like it, my dear. Diamonds and sapphires."

"Mr. Blandings! What will my daughter—my—Claudia think, to hear you talk so. She will think I am in the habit of accepting gifts from you, and you know very well I have never taken a thing."

"That's very true. You will never accept so much as a rubbishing little diamond or ruby or a thing. I picked your stepmother up a dandy little masterpiece by a feller called Rembram or some such foreign handle, to hang over her rose sofa.” He added aside to Marcia, “Where you mentioned you wanted a little picture to hang in the corner, my dear. And what does she do? She refuses outright to accept it—a mere trifle—and I had to hang it in my pantry, for my saloon walls are crammed as full as a picture gallery. Not an inch of wall to spare anywhere."

"I didn't care for the scowl on that old lady's face, Mr. Blandings,” Marcia said playfully. “If you want to get me a picture I would like, you must get a nice Gainsborough, or a Reynolds, and not give me a dark picture of a homely old malkin with a broom in her hands. Not that I would accept it, of course,” she added firmly.

"I was told Rembram was a good investment,” he assured her.

Jonathon had been auditing this conversation and now spoke up. “Did you call Claudia Marcia's stepdaughter?” he said to Mr. Blandings.

"Yes, so I did, and it was very bad of me, for I know she likes to call her her daughter. She told me so dozens of times."

"Well, she
is
her daughter!” Jonathon announced, rather angrily.

"Yes, yes, so she is,” Mr. Blandings agreed imperturbably, and Claudia began to suspect for the first time that Mr. Blandings might have more of the true gentleman in him than she first thought.

Her mother, she observed, was jiggling in her seat in embarrassment and, to smooth over the pass, Claudia said rather quickly, “When did you turn from your metal work to general business, Mr. Blandings?"

She could not have posed a question more likely to divert him, for he was justly proud of his accomplishments. She sat through a long speech outlining his rise to fortune from two years spent—wasted, he insisted—in a parish school through his apprenticeship to an ironmonger; his gradual but steady rise to assistant manager and, eventually, owner of the establishment; his inventions that bettered the production and profit of iron; and the amassing of his first fifty thousand, at which time he figured he was ready to sell out and set up as a man of property. But time had hung heavy on the hands of a man used to work and, bit by bit over a period of only a few months as it turned out, he had become completely involved in mortgages. He was now worth, he told her proudly, one million pounds, give or take a couple of thousand, and known throughout the country as the Trump of Mortgagees.

"How interesting!” she exclaimed, impressed at his wealth and title.

"Oh, yes, could buy and sell half the titles that look down their knife-sharp noses at me. But I don't care for rubbing shoulders with the nobs, except in the way of business. I'm no good at scraping a leg, or twirling about on a dance floor, or doing the pretty with the ladies. I'm a plain man. A country squire is what I'll be happy to be, if I can talk a certain little lady into being my missus,” he said coyly with a smile in Marcia's direction.

"Well, my dear,” he went on, “what was it you wished to consult with me about?"

Marcia looked at Jonathon and at Claudia and replied, “We'll discuss that in private, Mr. Blandings, if you please."

"Ah, I have stuck my foot in my mouth again,” he said, unoffended. “As you wish; we'll discuss it later. Tell me, what happened to that great diamond necklace of your sister's? The Beresford diamonds you called it, if I mistake not. Who got it?"

"Nobody. It was buried,” she told him.

"Eh?” He shook his head, and actually stuck a hairy finger in his ear to ream it out, for he could not believe he had heard aright. “Thought you said it was buried,” he laughed at his own folly.

"So I did. She had the diamonds buried on her body, and the corpse is sealed in a metal coffin."

"That's a bad business,” he shook his head. “Become crazed, the poor old lady. You'll be having the will contested then."

"No such a thing!” Marcia fired up. “We can't even say she's crazy, for if we do, we won't get the money, which is to be given out in a year's time, but there are conditions. Miss Bliss thinks one of the conditions might be that if anyone tries to have her declared insane, that person won't get any of the money."

Mr. Blandings considered this matter and shook his black head again in consternation at such unbusinesslike goings-on. “That kind of monkeyshines is what I don't hold with. If you mean to give a person a thing, give it to her. To be giving with one hand and holding back with the other is a mealy-mouthed way to do a thing. The pearls were given outright, were they?"

"Yes, the pearls are mine, and the emerald. That is, the emerald is Claudia's, of course."

"This is a mischievous business. Those diamonds won't be in the earth above a fortnight. It wouldn't surprise me if someone has snatched them already."

"Sir Hillary Thoreau—he's one of the executors...” Marcia began.

"Is
he
in on this business?” the Trump enquired.

"Yes, he's a connection of Sophie's. He hired a man with a gun and two dogs to guard the grave."

"That was well thought of. With Thoreau in charge, this matter might be straightened out yet. A good head on him."

"Yes, well, the dogs bit a little boy, and the constable made him call them off, so the diamonds are just sitting there waiting to be taken.” Marcia then remembered that she was discussing in public what was for Mr. Blandings’ ears alone, and she sent Claudia off to bed. Jonathon, she feared, she would have to hint away, but he had matters of his own to attend to and rose and went off with Claudia.

"You have hit the nail on the head, as usual, Jerry,” Marcia said, reverting to his first name when they were alone. She also moved from the frayed petitpoint chair to the lumpy sofa beside him. “The grave is unattended, and someone will certainly steal the diamonds. Now, who has more right than her own sister to them? Tell me that."

"No one, my love. She should have left them to you. I made sure she would."