Star of the East: A Lady Emily Christmas Story (7 page)

“Good heavens,” he said. “I did not believe for a moment that you had gone upstairs with a headache, but you do look a fright. Are you quite well?”

“I have been skulking about everyone’s rooms and feel very much like I did when I lived in this house—constantly on the verge of finding myself in very deep trouble and disgrace.”

“Anything worth finding?” he asked, slipping off his jacket and hanging it over the back of a chair.

“I have not yet decided,” I said. “What about you? Was the talk over port of any use?”

“Other than it having the effect of making me very much want to throttle Capet, no, but I don’t know that I can credit the emotion to the conversation. I have never been overly fond of the man. Has he left you any roses yet?”

“No. Perhaps I have fallen in his esteem.”

“We should be so lucky. Or rather
I
should be so lucky. You might enjoy the attention.”

“It does seem to have the effect of keeping you on your toes,” I said.

“Do you like that?” He reached up and starting removing my hairpins.

“In fact, I do.”

I draw a veil over the remainder of the evening as it bears no importance to the narrative at hand. Suffice it to say I consider myself extremely fortunate in my choice of spouse.

* * *

I cannot account for the clarity of mind that I awoke with the following morning. Perhaps it was due to the peace that came from nearly eighteen hours without Henry having caused a commotion in the house. Or perhaps it was the shot of excitement I felt when I threw open the curtains to find a fresh, bright layer of snow covering the ground. Or perhaps it was an unanticipated effect of my husband’s vigorous demonstration of his affection for me the night before. Regardless, I descended to breakfast confident that I would soon be able to reveal the identity of the thief in our midst—other than Sebastian, of course.

There was only one remaining difficulty: I had not the slightest idea as to what had become of the gold bangle. Two difficulties, now that I thought about it. My evidence was slight at best, and based more on intuition than fact.

Sunita looked rather sullen as she poked her fork at a plate of eggs. Ned had brought down with him the copy of
The Phantom ’Rickshaw and other Eerie Tales,
and was reading it quietly while he munched on toast spread with a rather astonishing quantity of orange marmalade. I wondered if he had transferred the paper I seen in
Plain Tales from the Hills
. If so, it might suggest that the list was his, not something left in the volume by another reader.

“That is one of my favorite books,” I said to him. “May I take a look? I get chills whenever I think of Mrs. Wessington’s rickshaw. I don’t think I could ever ride in one without picturing her ghost.” He passed me the volume and I flipped through it, ostensibly searching for a passage. “Here,” I read, “
The presence of the ’rickshaw filled me by turns with horror, blind fear, a dim sort of pleasure, and utter despair. I dared not leave Simla; and I knew that my stay there was killing me. I knew, moreover, that it was my destiny to die slowly and a little every day.
Does it not give you the most delicious shivers?” I dropped the book on the floor and took the opportunity to flip through it while I was crouched down picking it up. There, twenty odd pages in, was the scrap of paper. I shoved it back inside and handed the volume back to him. “I do hope I haven’t lost your place.”

“No, the bookmark is still here,” he said, no hint of concern in his voice. “They are marvelous stories, aren’t they? Your father and I were up long after midnight talking about them.”

“He adores Kipling,” I said, removing a plate from a stack on the sideboard and filling it with sausage and eggs before accepting a steaming cup of tea from a footman.

“I have never read him,” Sunita volunteered, still moving the food around on her plate without ever putting any on her fork.

“I think you would enjoy it,” I said.

“I shall give it a try,” she said. “Do I hear your mother coming?”

“You do, and Mr. Capet is with her. His voice is unmistakable,” I said a moment before he flung open the door and bowed as she entered the room in front of him.

“Emily, Emily, I am thoroughly out of sorts with you,” Sebastian said, waving off the footman and his tea and refusing to so much as look at the food on the sideboard. He was wearing a scarlet turban, clearly fashioned from the cloth I had seen the previous evening in Ranjit’s room. “How is it that you have kept me from your charming mother all of these years?”

“Mr. Capet, you are a dreadful cad,” my mother teased.

“You have no idea.” I gritted my teeth.

“Do come take a turn with me, Emily. I have some very stern words for you.” Sebastian wrenched me from my seat without giving me the chance to reply. I did not protest, as I suspected this was nothing more than a ridiculous and unnecessary ploy to get me alone so that he could tell me what he learned when he spoke with the servants.

“There is no need to be so rough,” I said, pulling my arm away once we had reached the music room, far across the house from where the others were breakfasting.

“I did not mean to hurt you,” he said, his voice soft. “I have a tendency to get carried away when I take on a role. Will you forgive me?”

“It is of no consequence,” I said. “Please tell me you got something of use from the servants.”

“I do believe that I have convinced at least two of the footmen that they ought to read Karl Marx. His views on the bourgeoisie ought to resonate with them after having worked for your mother.”

I cleared my throat. “And?”

“So far as I can tell, no one who shouldn’t have been in either your room or Sunita’s was there the night of the theft,” he said. “Nanny and one of the maids brought the boys to your room to tell you good night, but you had already gone to the dining room, and that was before the jewelry had been stolen, which is unfortunate, as I do like the idea of one of your children taking after me. Other than that, nothing seems to have happened beyond the servants’ ordinary tasks. No one was lurking in corridors after you all went to bed.”

“And what about Sally?” I asked. “Were you able to discover anything that might have led her to act in desperation?”

“If Sally were a decade younger than she is, I would be concerned that she now expects me to suggest an elopement, but as she is closer in age to my grandmother than, shall we say, you, I felt on fairly safe ground using every means possible to extract information. Fortunately, she took my good-natured conversation as it was intended. She is quite thoroughly panicked that she will be blamed for the theft, but I do not believe her to be guilty.”

“Why?” I asked.

“I cannot reveal all my methods. You know better than to ask.”

“I do not think she took it, either,” I said, “but I am glad to have you confirm my conclusion.”

“What led you to it?”

“I cannot reveal all my methods,” I said. “You know better than to ask.”

“Be coy if you like. You’re very pretty when you are out of sorts. Your cheeks go pink.”

“That turban does not suit you at all,” I said.

“I should expect nothing else from you, should I?” He sighed. “Regardless, and much though it pains me, I must return to your mother. I have very nearly convinced her to have her portrait painted in the style of the Pre-Raphaelites. Can you picture it? Lady Bromley as the drowned Ophelia?”

“Lady Macbeth would better suit her,” I said. “You are quite confident no one was seen entering Sunita’s room?”

“I am, but that does not bring us closer to identifying the culprit.”

“No, but it does suggest that the servants are not lying.”

“I am certain they are not,” he said. “They seem to be more or less convinced that your mother could slay them using only her mental prowess if they ever disobeyed her.”

“What a pleasant place to work,” I said.

“What a pleasant place to be a little girl.” His blue eyes met mine. “I am sorry, Emily. She is a bear and it cannot have been easy.” He pressed my right hand between both of his, and then raised it to his lips. I tolerated this for an instant longer than I ordinarily would have before pulling it away.

“Thank you,” I said. “Is there anything else I should know?”

“The Blue Room is extremely secure. It would be difficult to access from outside without a ladder. The ground is frozen, but I saw no signs of one having been used. The snow could have hidden any marks there, but none were left on the outside of any of the windows on that side of the house. Generally, a ladder will scar the paint at least a bit, unless it is used by someone of consummate skill, like myself.”

“Colin searched outside that morning and saw no signs of anyone having trudged through the snow.”

“Then your thief, my darling girl, is one of your own. I put my money on the earl. He might prefer a stint in jail to being trapped here with his wife.” He tapped on my chin with his finger. “Does that cheer you up?”

“It does, thank you.”

“Harassing my wife, are you, Capet?” Colin asked, striding into the room.

“Far from it. She did, after all, request my assistance.”

“Yes, yes,” Colin said. “So where are we?”

We discussed all of our limited evidence, but I still was not satisfied. “I feel so close to the truth, but I cannot quite grasp it. I do have one idea, though. Gather everyone in whichever is my mother’s preferred drawing room—that ought to appease her—and I shall join you as soon as possible.”

I rushed to my father’s study, where, after a brief telephone conversation, I was confident in the conclusions I had drawn. As I left the room, Jones came to me.

“Mr. Hargreaves says you will find him and the others in the Gold Drawing Room. Also, Nanny asks that you come up to see the boys,” he said. “Evidently they have made drawings for you.”

“Tell her I shall be there within the hour. Thank you, Jones.” I smiled. Drawing was one of the few activities all three boys enjoyed equally. Richard would have used every single color available to cover every square inch of his paper; close examination would reveal Tom’s careful scribbles to be recognizable animals; Henry’s would be an exuberant mess, his pencil applied with such force it most likely would have torn through the paper.

“She did mention, Lady Emily, that Master Henry quite refused to draw. She’s rather cross with him.”

“She often is. You know that she prides herself on having raised Colin so well. I believe she fears Henry may be her only failure.”

“If I may, Lady Emily, he is a good little chap and will turn out well.”

“I do hope you are right, Jones,” I said.

When I entered the drawing room, a space in which fashionable knick-knacks relentlessly covered every single surface, the mood was somber. Much though I would like to blame it on the décor being stifling, I had to admit that my mother, although a slave to many trends of the moment, had fine taste, and the objects she chose to choke her tabletops managed to do so in as elegant a fashion as possible. Nonetheless, no one was speaking. Sunita was seated between her parents on a long horsehair-covered divan, Ranjit and Ned opposite them on the chairs that completed the set. My mother, in her favorite spot in front of the blazing fireplace, was looking up at Sebastian, who was hovering next to her. Colin, leaning against the wall, looked disgruntled as he watched them, and my father stood near a window a little away from the rest of the group, his face so deep a shade of crimson I feared he was ill.

“Papa?” I crossed to him. “Are you unwell?” He waved me away, shaking his head, his eyes bulging. I looked to Colin, who shrugged and nodded in the general direction of Sebastian and my mother. I glanced back at my father, whose shoulders were now shaking, and began to suspect that he was trying not to laugh.

“Hargreaves tells us you know what happened to our jewels,” the maharaja said.

“I do.” I said nothing further until I had taken the time to analyze each person’s reaction to my statement. This act proved disappointing, for aside from Sebastian adjusting his turban, no one made the slightest movement. “It seems, your highness, that your daughter has not been entirely straight with you concerning her plans for the future.”

“Do you accuse me of being a liar?” Sunita asked, rising and turning to face her parents. “All I want is to be married and have a home of my own.”

“Your words may possess a certain literal truth, but they do not reveal the more substantive parts of your plan, do they?” I asked. “You have been most deceptive.”

This brought Mr. Drayton to his feet. “I cannot stand by and let you criticize her—”

“I would expect nothing less, Ned,” I said.

“Mr. Drayton—” Now the maharaja rose from his seat and took two steps toward the young man.

“Everyone please do sit,” I said. They all obeyed except Sunita. “After mulling over the facts, I have determined that we do not exactly have a thief among us.” I shot a meaningful look in Sebastian’s direction. “Sunita took her own jewels because she feared there was no other way to finance her education.”

“Finance? Education?” The maharini reached for her daughter’s arm and pulled her back onto the divan. “What is all this?”

“It is nothing,” Sunita said. Her tone was light and dismissive on the surface, but I could hear concern underneath her forced brightness. “Lady Emily knows not of which she speaks.”

“What has troubled me from the beginning about the theft—if I may still call it that—is that the diamond was returned. Surely someone in need of money would not have done such a thing. And if, as I suspect, the
tika
was placed in my room in a desperate effort to remove it from the possession of someone else, someone who knew Colin was searching the house for it, why was the bangle not left as well?”

I paused and studied my audience. They were very still. Sunita was looking at the floor.

“You have already accused my daughter of the act,” the maharaja said. “Why would she not have simply returned the jewels to her own case?”

“Because she no longer had them,” I said. “She had given them to Ned.”