And she wouldn’t protect his name any longer. Piero had sworn her to secrecy, arrogantly proud even as he let people believe his art collection was real. He had probably left it to her because anyone else would have found him out and denounced him as a fraud. And because of all he had done for her, when she was in desperate need of help, she had kept his secret. But that was before. Charlotte was afraid her respect for a dead man’s request had fooled too many people, and cost her too dearly.
“What the devil!” Stuart dropped his bar with a clunk. “All of it?”
She nodded. “All of it.”
“Surely not, Madame Griffolino,” protested Amelia, holding a small marble bust close to her chest as if to protect it. “They’re so beautiful!”
Charlotte gave her a sour smile. “He had talent, but no imagination. Apprentices learn the craft by making copies, and Piero simply never stopped. All the beautiful things he wanted to possess, but couldn’t—either because they were too expensive, or too fragile, or too well known—he replicated for his own enjoyment.” She waved at the statue she had almost dropped. “Piero’s favorite piece. It stood in his bedchamber.”
Stuart frowned, stepping over packing debris to take a closer look at the statue. It portrayed a young man half seated, half standing, cradling a harp in one arm while he plucked it with his other hand. His laurel-crowned head was tilted down toward the instrument, but his eyes looked up, as if catching someone watching him, and the faint suggestion of a sly smile curved his sensual mouth. “I would have never suspected. Why would he create forgeries? This looks quite good.”
Charlotte pointed at the god’s arm. “Except his left arm is longer than his right. His leg is scarred, where the polishing wasn’t good, and the lyre is too small.”
Lucia threw down her pen. “
Dio
! The old cheat. And he gave me many things as gifts!”
Charlotte shrugged half-heartedly. “At least he did not sell you any.”
“Then you knew all along the thief would never find anything valuable,” Stuart said slowly, his expression darkening. “And he broke in repeatedly, yet you never did anything. What were you thinking, Charlotte? What did you think the thief sought?”
“I didn’t know! I suspected he wanted something smaller, easily carried away, gold plate or a jewel-encrusted reliquary. Most of these are large items, framed paintings and statues. It would be difficult to carry Mercury through the streets unremarked, genuine or not.”
Stuart continued to frown in disapproval. “You took a terrible risk.”
“Until you crossed him, he did nothing threatening,” she said sharply, pricked again by the guilt that she had ignored the thief until it was too late. He hadn’t been fooled by Piero’s counterfeits, but had stolen the one treasure Charlotte had, her niece. And unless she could produce something of genuine worth from these crates, she might never get Susan back.
“Well, what are we to do with this, then?” Stuart threw up his hands. “If you say it’s all worthless, how shall we bargain with the kidnapper?”
“Why, have it appraised, Stuart dear,” piped up Amelia. She looked around sadly, still cradling her bust of Cupid. “Hopefully some of it will turn out to be authentic.”
“It won’t,” said Charlotte in disgust. She got up and stretched, bumping into the statue whose flaws she had exposed. In frustration and anger, she pushed it over, venting her feelings on the carved marble. It wobbled, then tipped, and fell to the floor with a tremendous crash. The god’s head broke off and split in two, one half sliding across the floor into a pile of straw, the other half coming to rest at the bottom of the stairs.
Stuart drew breath as if to scold her, then sighed. “One less for the inventory,” he said, leaning down to lift the headless Mercury. He grasped it by the neck and heaved it to its feet again. “This chap’s hollow,” he said with some surprise.
“The pinchpurse,” said Lucia with disdain. “A real sculptor would never use less than a perfect stone.”
“Rather fitting, though,” Stuart said, trying to move the ruined statue against the wall out of the way. “A hollow god for a fraudulent artist.” He gave it one last shove, and more marble crumbled from the neck. Stuart brushed the rubble away as a maid hurried up with a broom, but he stood, transfixed. “Charlotte.”
“What is it?” She took one look at his expression and hurried over to peer into Mercury’s chest. Just as Stuart had said, the statue was hollow, but deliberately so. The edges of the cavity were smooth and straight; someone had bored a hole down through the middle. She leaned closer. “It ... It’s not empty!”
Cries of interest echoed in the hall, and everyone crowded around to see. Carefully, Stuart extracted a tightly rolled sheaf of paper from the hollow. It was old and yellowed, torn around the edges and well creased. He glanced at Charlotte. “Have you any idea?”
She shook her head. “None.”
“What is it, Stuart?” Amelia asked. Her face was flushed with excitement, and Charlotte realized she must have been quite pretty when young.
“I’m not sure, Mother.” Stuart carried the roll of paper into the dining room and gingerly unrolled it on the table. The paper was thin, but held together except at the edges, where small sections simply crumbled into dust.
“They’re studies,” said Charlotte, holding the edge as Stuart continued unrolling. Smaller sheets of the paper sprang loose and curled back upon themselves, and she had to keep catching the edges. They were the sort of drawings a painter would make before setting his brush to canvas, for practice or for planning. The images, though, fairly leaped off the paper, all the more so when they were life sized. Wild-eyed horses plunged over each other, their riders locked in mortal combat. Men in battle dress impaled each other on javelins, and cowered beneath shields under the hooves of rampaging horses. There were pages of arms upraised with spears, hands clasped about sword handles, headless figures contorted in death throes.
“Very brutal studies,” observed Stuart, paging through the sketches of severed limbs. “But why were they hidden? Did Piero make them?”
Charlotte shook her head helplessly. “He was a better sculptor, but he did paint. These would be made before an original painting, though, and he didn’t have the patience for that.”
Stuart cocked his head, studying the profile of a man clearly exhorting his troops to charge. “Perhaps this was to be his masterpiece? His one burst of creative genius?”
Charlotte snorted. “Who would consider that a treasure, besides Piero himself?”
Then Lucia reached between them, and put her finger on the crest of a heraldic standard. “Anghiari.”
“What is Anghiari?”
“Anghiari,” explained Lucia, giving Charlotte a meaningful glance, “as any Florentine would know, was a famous battle long ago in which the Republic defeated the Milanese army.” Charlotte waited expectantly; Piero, like Lucia, had been Florentine, and very proudly so. “The magistrati commissioned two murals to commemorate their victory: the Battle of Anghiari and the Battle of Cascina. Michelangelo would paint Cascina, although he never did. Leonardo—a Florentine himself—would paint Anghiari, but his technique was flawed, and his work was lost.”
“What do you mean, lost?”
Lucia flicked her fingers. “Lost. The paint dripped from the wall.”
As one, all four turned to the drawing again. The detail, down to the bulging veins in the horses’ nostrils, was astounding. “Do you think these are his? Leonardo’s?” asked Charlotte in a hushed voice.
Lucia lifted one shoulder. “I do not know. His cartoon was copied by many others; even then Leonardo was recognized as a great artist.”
“So this is the treasure?” Amelia clutched at Stuart’s arm, still gazing reverently at the drawings. “Goodness, how much is it worth?”
“If it is Leonardo, it is priceless,” said Lucia, seating herself.
Stuart turned to Charlotte. “Is it possible?”
Charlotte hesitated. Could Piero have come across a priceless set of drawings and hidden them to avoid sharing them? He was capable of the last part, she thought, and Mercury was an ideal hiding place. But how on earth could he have gotten the drawings in the first place? One didn’t simply walk into a gallery and purchase them. “I don’t know,” she said at last. “But I find it hard to believe. He didn’t have a single authentic piece when I knew him. Everything was a fraud.”
“Well, that explains the jewels,” Stuart muttered, letting the drawings roll back into themselves in resignation.
“What do you mean?” asked Charlotte, surprised.
He shifted uncomfortably. He hadn’t quite meant to blurt that out. “You didn’t know some of your jewels might be, ah, paste?”
Her hand flew to her throat, even though she wore no necklace. “No!”
“Er, yes. The, ah, diamond and emerald necklace ...” She continued to gape at him. Stuart cleared his throat and busied himself with rolling the papers.
“How did you know, Stuart?” asked his mother.
“When he stole it, no doubt,” said Lucia from her chair. Stuart glared at her in annoyance; he was not in the mood for her teasing at the moment.
Amelia gasped. “You stole it?”
“Not precisely,” mumbled Stuart. “I gave it back.” He spread the drawings open again. “I for one think these may be authentic. They fit the description of a treasure, and they were hidden securely in a place no one would expect, since, as Madame da Ponte said, most sculptors use solid blocks of marble. No one would suspect anything might be hidden inside.”
“Then you have found the treasure,” said Lucia. “Of course you cannot give it to this madman.”
Amelia twisted her hands. “To whom do they belong, then?”
“To the people of Florence,” said Lucia. “It is their battle. Also, they paid for them three centuries ago.”
“I doubt they’re authentic,” said Charlotte. “I simply can’t believe it. They must be drawings from the original, and Piero may have hidden them because he planned to copy them and sell them. I always suspected he dealt in false antiquities and art, although he never admitted it.” She turned to Stuart. “And if even my jewels are fake, then I am doubly sure. He was a fraud, through and through.”
Stuart began rolling up the drawings again. “We have to be certain. Continue unpacking, and see if anything else interesting turns up.”
“What will you do?” Charlotte asked, helping him.
“I’ll see if I can authenticate these, or prove them false.” He gathered up the sheaf of papers and went into the front hall. Charlotte followed him.
“That may be impossible,” she warned him. “A good forgery—”
He stopped, and put up one hand. “It may be,” he agreed. “But we should try. Even if they’re false, we may be able to pass them off on the kidnapper as authentic; he doesn’t seem to know just what the treasure is, after all. He’s already seen most of the rest of the things, when he searched your house—and I have more to say on the subject of ignoring inherently dangerous people like burglars, by the by—and he didn’t seem fooled by it. But this he can’t have seen.”
“Then why can’t we use it to draw him out now?” cried Charlotte impatiently. “If it doesn’t matter ...”
“It matters,” he corrected her as he took his hat from the butler. “If these are authentic, they
are
an Italian treasure, and no one man, especially a thief, should own them. And we should know what we’re dealing with before we risk them.”
“Of course, but ...” Charlotte gripped her hands together, looking at the drawings longingly. “Couldn’t we let him know now, just in case? How long will it take to authenticate them?”
“There is someone who may know,” he said. “I studied under him at Cambridge.”
“I’m coming with you,” she said at once.
He grinned. “I knew you would.”
Charlotte turned to Lucia and Amelia, who had followed them into the hall by now. “We’re going to see someone who may be able to tell us if they’re genuine,” she told them.
Lucia waved her hand. “Go, then. Shall we continue here?”
“Yes, yes.” Charlotte nodded as the footman hurried forward with her bonnet and gloves. “We’ll be back soon.” The footman opened the door, and as they left, Charlotte heard Lucia ask, “Shall we continue smashing more things?” and Amelia’s horrified gasp.
Stuart hailed a cab, and helped her into it. “Oh, Stuart, do you really think this is what he wanted?” she asked as they bowled along.
“Hopefully we can persuade him it is. If he was watching the house just now, he’s seen us leave in a hurry after unloading all those wagons. With any luck, he’ll come to us now.” They looked at each other, brimming with barely concealed excitement.
“We may have Susan back soon,” said Charlotte softly. “Oh, how I hope your friend is at home!”
C
HAPTER
S
IXTEEN
As it turned out, he was not. Almost ill with disappointment, Charlotte allowed Stuart to hand her into the carriage. About to climb in himself, he suddenly stepped back out. “One moment,” he said, then hurried back up the steps to ring the bell again. Charlotte watched as he exchanged a word with the butler who had just crushed her hopes, and then Stuart loped back down the steps, a wide smile spreading across his face.
“Old Sherry’s gone to his club,” he said, swinging up to sit beside her. He leaned forward and gave the driver his parents’ address. “I’ll try him there.”
“I want to come, too.”
He shook his head. “You won’t be allowed entrance. I’ll take you home and go myself.”
“But—”
He kissed her. “No,” he said softly but firmly. “I will not allow you to sit in a cab by yourself for an hour. Sherry’s a good fellow, but a bit of a rambler. It may take a while to work a definitive answer out of him.”
Charlotte uttered a particularly vile curse in Italian, but made no other protest. At the Drake house, Stuart helped her out and held her hand a moment longer than necessary. “I believe we’ve found what he wants,” he said. “Whether or not the drawings are authentic. We’re close to finding Susan, but must be patient to the end. A move too sudden may send him off in a panic. Promise me you’ll wait for me to return.”
“Promise me you’ll be back within an hour,” she retorted.
“Charlotte,” he warned, although his eyes crinkled as he spoke.
“All right. But you must hurry!”
“For you, I will hurry.” He turned her hand over and kissed her palm, the heat of his mouth seeping through her glove.
“For you, I will wait,” she said, a trifle breathless. With one look he managed to remind her of last night, all that he had said and done. As if he knew, he leaned forward, his blue eyes alight with laughter.
“I love you,” he whispered.
It still seemed incredible to Charlotte. She smiled, swaying toward him, momentarily forgetting the mysterious drawings, the tension of the last week and the next hour, all the guilt and regret and doubt that had frayed the edges of her conscience. His lips brushed hers, too lightly, and then he jumped back into the carriage.
She watched the cab leave, a vaguely silly smile still on her face. At the corner Stuart leaned out and waved. Charlotte raised her hand in reply, and he was gone. She turned and climbed the steps, where the footman already stood beside the open door.
In the hall, it was quiet. The straw had been cleared away, and the false treasures still sat undisturbed, even the decapitated Mercury. For a moment Charlotte contemplated it; it was a fitting end to the miserable little sneak, she decided.
Amelia came into the hall, stopping short when she saw Charlotte. “Well? What did you discover?”
“Nothing. The gentleman wasn’t at home.” Charlotte took off her bonnet and gloves. “Stuart’s gone to try Mr. Sheridan’s club.”
“Oh, dear.” Her face fell. “He’s sure to be at the club. Gentlemen are always at their clubs.”
“Let us hope,” said Charlotte. “Has Lucia gone?”
Amelia nodded. “She returned to her hotel to rest once it seemed pointless to unpack the rest of the things.”
Charlotte turned and walked into the drawing room, where Benton was packing some of Piero’s collection, with less care and more speed than before. “You may go,” she told him. “This can wait. You deserve a rest, after bringing it all to London so quickly.”
He bowed. “Yes, madam. I was pleased to be of service. How unfortunate it was not more useful.”
Charlotte considered that as he left. If it led to Susan’s return, it would be useful, or at least no longer a liability. She wondered what Piero had intended her to do with it; had he thought she would eventually find the treasure? He hadn’t left her anything else of value. Even though she hadn’t counted on much from Piero, she had always kept the jewels in the back of her mind as a comfortable reserve, one she had been considering using. Her mother had left her an inheritance which provided a modest income, but Charlotte had spent a great deal of money looking for Susan. In fact, unless she planned to begin spending her capital, she would soon be as penniless as Stuart.
A sad smile twisted her lips. What a pair they were, their fortunes worsening by the day. Since the moment he told her he loved her, Charlotte had been hoping—dreaming—things would work out well for them. Unfortunately, she just didn’t see how that was possible. At this rate they wouldn’t have two shillings between them by the end of the week.
Whatever else she might be, Charlotte was a realist. Regardless of what she might be willing to give up for love, she could hardly expect Stuart to give up not only Oakwood Park but any chance of prosperity. He had said he didn’t want to be a dependent his whole life, but he hadn’t meant to be poor instead. No matter how much they loved each other, she feared what genteel poverty might do to them. Would he come to wish he had married better? Even if he didn’t blame her, could she bear to see him so disappointed?
She didn’t think so.
But he had never offered her anything, anyway. He had told her he loved her, but that didn’t mean he wanted to marry her. She ought to know by now that passion didn’t necessarily translate into marriage. She should treasure this rare connection between them for what it was, and not pin her hopes on anything more. Losing Stuart wouldn’t be the end of her life; she would have Susan back—hopefully soon—and that responsibility would occupy her time and thoughts. And if there were always a small place in her heart that never got over him, well, she would accept that. Unlike the other broken hearts she had suffered, this one would have been worth it.
Amelia bustled in then with a maid and tea in tow, and Charlotte thankfully turned her attention to her hostess. Unfortunately, Amelia mostly wanted to talk about the terrible trick Piero had played on her by leaving her a collection of forgeries. Charlotte had many things to say about Piero and his frauds, but none she felt comfortable expressing in front of Mrs. Drake. If just a few of the paintings or sculpture had been real, she would have money, enough to support herself, enough to live without regard for fortune. Enough even to marry the man she loved.
“A message, madam.” The butler had come in to hand her a note. Charlotte seized it with relief.
“Why, it’s from Stuart,” she said, reading. She glanced up at Amelia. “He asks me to join him, but says nothing of what he’s learned.”
“Not at all?” Amelia asked in astonishment. “How could he?”
Charlotte frowned as she studied the note. “This is not the house we called at earlier.” Stuart had said he was going to the man’s club, where she would not be admitted. If it wasn’t Mr. Sheridan’s home or his club, what was it? “I wonder where he’s gone.”
Amelia sat on the sofa with a little sigh. “Are these really all forgeries?” she asked yet again, wistfully. The bust of Cupid she had held earlier sat on the mantle, smiling beatifically as if enjoying the joke he had played on them.
Charlotte continued to frown at the note. There was something about it that struck her as odd, but she couldn’t put her finger on what. Perhaps she was just piqued because he hadn’t told her anything. There was nothing suspicious about the message, it was just brief. Frustratingly brief.
Come to me at once
, it said, and included a direction. Like the other message he had sent, it was only signed with a sharp, slanted “S.”
“Mrs. Drake,” said Charlotte slowly, “does this note seem odd to you?” She held it out.
Amelia leaned forward to see it. “What do you mean, odd? It really doesn’t say much, does it ...” Her voice trailed off as she read the message again.
“What?” asked Charlotte, sensing a change in her hostess’s demeanor.
“It’s only ... Well, this does not look like Stuart’s hand.” Charlotte’s head snapped up. “But of course I do not see his handwriting often.” Amelia retreated immediately at her expression. “It may have changed; he does not write me often. Perhaps he wrote this more quickly than usual, or ... Oh dear.”
“I have the note he sent the other day,” said Charlotte. “Let’s compare.” Amelia agreed, looking relieved, and Charlotte hurried up the stairs to her room, but couldn’t find the message. Where could it have gone? She was quite sure she had placed it in the drawer beside the bed, right under the window.
Charlotte stared with narrowed eyes at the window, which overlooked a stretch of garden. Slowly, gently, she drew back the drape. The window was unlatched, and opened soundlessly at her touch. A wall-scaling thief would have no trouble getting into her room. Just as he had had no trouble climbing into Susan’s room.
She spread out the note again. This, then, was not from Stuart. It was from the kidnapper. She rifled through the drawer looking for the note from him, but it, too, was gone. Only Susan’s cheerful message was in the drawer where all three had once been.
Charlotte was so still the beat of her heart felt jarring. The thief had been in her room, searching her belongings again. Not only did he come and go as he pleased in her Kent house, steal her niece away, and follow her about London, but he broke into her host’s home. Would she never be free of him?
With jerky movements she opened the wardrobe door and retrieved her pistol. She loaded it with practiced efficiency, and stalked back down the stairs.
“Have you found ... Oh!” Amelia’s eyes flew wide open at the sight of the pistol. “What are you doing?”
“This note”—Charlotte waved it—“is from the kidnapper. The last message from Stuart as well as the message from the kidnapper are missing from my room. He broke into your home and stole them, and now has sent me a forged message to lure me to him.”
“Oh, but my dear!” Amelia’s face was white. “You must wait for Stuart! He would never forgive me if you were injured!”
“You may must tell him where I have gone.” Stuart had been gone barely half an hour; she couldn’t possibly wait. She couldn’t let Stuart go in her place in any event. If she didn’t respond at once, the kidnapper would know she hadn’t been fooled, and might take it out on Susan. Charlotte read the note one more time, memorizing the direction before handing it to Amelia. “I cannot wait. The man who has my niece has proven himself capable of anything, and I will not send Stuart in my place on an errand which would surely endanger him.”
“But it is equally dangerous for you!”
“Not half as dangerous as it is for the kidnapper,” vowed Charlotte. “And if I do not go, he may harm Susan.” She strode into the hall, and almost collided with Mr. Drake, who was just coming in.
“Your pardon, sir.” Charlotte brushed past him and handed her pistol to the dismayed butler as she put on her cloak.
“Impertinent chit,” grumbled Mr. Drake. He caught sight of the pistol and scowled. “What the devil are you doing with that?”
Charlotte lifted her chin. “It was my father’s,” she said calmly, deliberately misinterpreting his question. “I inherited it from my brother. I am taking it to shoot the villain who has abducted my niece.” She tucked the pistol into the folds of her cloak. “Good day, Mr. Drake.” She turned and marched out of the house, hearing Mr. Drake bellow for his wife. The footman scrambled to hail a hackney, and she climbed in, a cold, deadly calm creeping over her. No more waiting and worrying; one way or another, things were coming to a head.
Stuart stepped out of the carriage in front of the Cantabrigian Society for Antiquarians, a club composed of former Cambridge fellows who had a passion for history and the arts, the older the better. The man Stuart was looking for had been a founding member, and had zealously recruited his former students to join him. Stuart, naturally, had preferred other activities, but he did still have a passing interest in the subject.
He walked through a number of bright, sparsely furnished rooms. In the dining hall, he came upon an argument between two society members. One was standing, an upraised fork in his fist as if to stab his companion, who was arranging the other silver into military formation, shaking his head vigorously. As Stuart approached, the argument grew more heated. The man with the fork began stabbing at the silver on the table, and the man who had arranged it leaped to his feet and began shoving it around the dishes.
“Mind you don’t let him take your wineglass, Sherry,” said Stuart with a chuckle. “He’s massing for a flanking maneuver around the salt cellar.”
“Ah, young Drake!” Jasper Sheridan’s eyes lit up. “Have you come to join our society?”
Stuart smiled. Sherry was a stout little figure resembling nothing so much as a hedgehog, which had been his nickname among the students at Cambridge. His hair, considerably grayer now, stuck up in a ruff about his round, apple-cheeked face. Stuart recalled him charging around on the balls of his feet, leaning slightly forward as if against a strong wind. He was a curious character, Sherry was, but he was also a leading scholar of Roman history, and had a special interest in art. “Unfortunately not. I haven’t the mind for it.”
“Nonsense! We require only enthusiasm.” Sherry chuckled, putting down the fork. He excused himself to his companion and motioned Stuart over to a vacant pair of chairs. “And we never hold examinations, although you made a fair showing. Most of the time, that is.”