Tomorrow's Treasure (6 page)

“I will take you there. We must do this—together. Its in the library. Come.”

“You are certain Julien's gone to Kimberly?”

She was as certain as she could be, and yet … there
was
that uneasy sensation that she was being watched. “I saw him ride away earlier this afternoon, but when it comes to your stepbrother, who can be sure of anything?”

“Here, leave your bag in that brush until we come back for the horses.”

Henry was still holding Katie's arm as they came silently up the back porch steps. The door remained ajar from when she had fled. She reached for the knob.

The kitchen was in darkness as they entered, except for the stream of moonlight coming through the high window above the pantry cabinet. Katie stooped and picked up the candle she had dropped earlier. She went to the oven to relight the wick on coals banked in the oven for the morning cook.

Henry knew the house layout perhaps as well as she. He had come here from England several times with his father and Lyle. When his father had married Julien's widowed mother, there had been a time
when Henry and Lyle had lived in Cape House. That, of course, was long before trouble developed between Henry and Julien. Lyle had been the silent one, the one who had made friends with Julien and married into the Brewsters.

When Katie turned around with the candle flaring, Cousin Henry was gone. She gasped, looking around. Had he abandoned her? No, she would have heard him if he'd opened the back door and gone out. She went into the hall. No sight of him. He must be in the library, waiting.

She trod the hall floor carefully, trying not to awaken anyone on the ground floor. The live-in Anglo servants all had their rooms near the kitchen and pantry, as did Anthony when he came to visit. Of course, Anthony had not dared show his face for some time. When she had written him about expecting the baby, he had not even replied.

When she came to the library, the heavy door stood open a few inches. She pushed it back and held the candle high. Henry was busy surveying the room of books, maps, and the hunting trophies Julien had collected from his trips into Angola.

She guessed he was checking his intuition as to where the Black Diamond might be hidden.

Katie pushed the door closed behind her. The candle flame reflected a bleak light in the mirror above the fireplace mantle, reminding her of a ghost.

She understood the danger with which she was flirting. Each step brought her closer to an action that she would never be able to reverse.
There is still time to turn back
, a small voice seemed to say.

No, not after getting cousin Henry involved. There is no other way out of my dilemma. I'm going through with it.

Henry came to take her arm. “Where?” His voice was barely audible.

Her hand shook as she led him to the old heirloom secretary. She hesitated—either she trusted Henry or she did not. There was no middle road. If he failed her as had Anthony, she would be twice a fool.

“Hurry!”

At his urgent whisper, she handed him the candle and turned to the
secretary. Carefully she pulled aside the two cabinet doors, revealing the lion carvings and the two lion knobs.

“So that's it!” He sounded furious with himself. “A hidden compartment in this old heirloom.”

Katie frowned. What had Sir Julien done when he'd had his back toward her? How had the secret door sprung open?

Outside the windows the wind rustled the leaves. The floors and walls creaked as the wood settled for the night. With her right hand she pushed against one lion, and used her left to maneuver the other, nothing happened. She tried again, her urgency increasing with the passing moments.

Her breath came rapidly. Standing beside her, she sensed Henry's impatience.

“Do you know what you're doing?”

“I'm trying!”

“Shh—quiet.” His fingers clasped her shoulder as he glanced toward the door.

Katie tensed. Had she heard something? Maybe she had just imagined the sound that day of a spring giving way in a drawer? Now, in the candlelight, she could see there was no keyhole. Julien must have pushed on something.

“There must be a secret lever or something—somewhere.” She looked helplessly at Henry.

“I'll try it.” He pushed her aside, then set the candle on top of the secretary and began pushing on the lion knobs, then turning, shoving, twisting again.

From somewhere there came a heavier creak. Katie caught her breath and looked at Henry.

He was now so engrossed in trying to figure out the lion knobs and how they worked that he paid no mind. Her heart pounded with heavy beats that took her breath away. She continued to look toward the library door. If Julien had come home … But they would have heard his horse approaching the stables.

As Henry struggled to solve the puzzle, she inched her way toward
the door. Was that creak from the wind, or a light footfall? Her mouth was dry. Her palms were slick with sweat, and her shaking fingers worked their way up the bodice of her dress to her throat. If Sir Julien found them here, he would use his pistol on Henry, she was sure of it.

Maybe on her too.

Oh, what have I done? What have I done?
She hurried toward Henry, clawing at his arm. “I think I hear someone—”

“Ah!”

The exclamation caught her attention. She heard a faint click, and saw a section of the carved paneling open a crack. Henry pulled it farther out, then picked up the candle and held it close to a small, velvet-lined cavern.

Katie forgot all her fears as the Black Diamond winked at them.

They both reached for it, but Henry grasped first, turning it over in his hand before the candle.

Katie looked up at him. His eyes sparkled with an ugly humor that repelled her. “I've defeated Julien! Its mine!” Greed larded his rough whisper.

She snatched the diamond away from him. “It is
ours.
”

“Look.” He took some soft leather pouches out of the drawer, opened a drawstring, and poured some of the whites onto his palm. The diamonds glittered in the candlelight. He grinned, then put them back in the pouch and pulled the drawstring, stuffing three pouches in his trouser pockets.

“Give me that, we don't have time.” He snatched the Black Diamond from her, rolled it in the velvet lining from the drawer, and shoved it in his inside jacket pocket. He pushed on the carved paneling and then closed the two cabinet doors.

“To the stables.”

Henry surged ahead of her toward the library door. Katie rushed after him, her stomach clenching with fear and guilt. The candle went out, and she swallowed back her fear. Henry opened the library door a crack, looked out, then moved toward the back of the house.

The moon must have clouded over, for the room was in darkness—just
like Katie's aching soul. She was close at his heels when his steps halted at what must have been the kitchen. Her heart, too, nearly stopped.

She turned to look behind just as Henry lunged toward the kitchen door. A gust of wind sent Katie's skirts around her ankles. He reached back, latched hold of her arm, and pulled her toward the porch and down the steps. Crossing the backyard they started running.

When they reached the stables all seemed quiet. Laddie was nowhere to be seen, nor was Dumaka. Of course, they had not expected her to take anything from the house, so why would they be there? They would all certainly face Sir Julien tomorrow to be pounded by questions.

“Where is the Zulu?” Henry demanded impatiently. “She should have been here by now. Its after midnight.”

“She's waiting farther down the road, behind the trees.”

As he entered the stable for his golden gelding, Katie looked in the brush near the corral for her bag. Carrying it back, she paused, hearing the nervous neighing of the horses in their stalls for the night. Odd that they should be so nervous—probably not used to Henry's horse.

She waited. What was keeping him? She walked to the wide stable doorway and stared into the chasm of darkness, but could not see him. He must be farther toward the back.

She inched forward and whispered. “Henry? Where are you?”

The only sound meeting her was the nervous movements of the horses. She forced herself to enter, surrounded by deep shadows and the pungent odor of hay mingled with manure.

His horse, where was it? And where was the mare Inga had said would be saddled for her?

She turned full circle, glancing desperately about her. Then she heard a creaking sound—a door opening at the far end of the stable. The back door! She saw the wind moving it to and fro on its hinges. This discovery was followed by the one sound she feared: hooves, galloping away.

She ran through the stable and out the back door into the night.
“Henry!” she hissed. In the moonlight she glimpsed him, hunched low in the saddle, rounding a tree-lined bend, where he disappeared in the direction of the African huts.

Her heart sank like a stone. “No!
No!
” Her hands formed fists, and she doubled over. He had taken everything and left her here.
Betrayed!

Bitter rage filled her mind. She pressed the back of her hand hard against her teeth until it bruised. Tears streamed unheeded down her cheeks.
Henry … Henry, come back! I hate you … hate you …

She stumbled down the dirt road that led toward the African huts, running, sometimes staggering and stumbling, until she neared the trees. Here, she paused a moment to catch her breath.

A shrill bird's cry startled her. It was followed by a humming sound, loud, then louder still. Katie looked toward the trees. Jendaya had the four-horse carriage waiting in the myrtle trees and was drawing her attention, Zulu fashion, by the humming sound that made Katie shiver.

Jendaya held the reins with one sturdy hand and reached across the seat with the other to pull Katie aboard as she came hurrying up. She clamored onto the seat, gasping for breath.

“Hurry, Jendaya!”

The Zulu woman slapped the reins and the horses bounded forward onto the dirt road.

Katie clutched the sides of the seat as they weaved and bounced ahead. The horses galloped past the African huts. Katie feared the carriage might topple over on its side, but Jendaya handled the horses skillfully.

The warm wind swept Katie's face and sent strands of her tawny hair whipping. Soon, Cape House was left behind in the raw, dusty night.

Any hopes that Henry might be waiting for her along the road, or at the beginning of the township, proved vain. He, too, must be racing through the night astride his horse, the Black Diamond safely stashed in his jacket pocket. He must be throwing back his head and laughing with abandon at her folly for trusting him. She had delivered three pouches of cut diamonds, as well as the prized Kimberly Black Diamond, right into his hands, and he had simply ridden off.

Jendaya drove the carriage from the township and was on the road toward British-controlled Natal as the moon approached the hills that appeared like crouching lions on the horizon. They would reach the mission station near Rorke's Drift bordering Zululand by early morning.

Katie moaned. Her head throbbed, and desolation filled her mind.

Jendaya lifted a long, sleek dark arm with tight, beaded bracelets and made a sweeping motion inland toward the hills. “When the sun rises we will be near the Rock of the Crouching Lion. We will see the daktari and the mission station.”

Above, the sky mellowed and cleared as the night wore on, revealing numberless brilliant stars. Thorn trees swept past, horse hooves pounded their drumbeat upon the path, and the South African yellow moon crouched over the hills of Isandlwana. Though exhausted, Katie could not rest. Her heart, sore and distraught, would not let her.

There was little hope of taking Evy away and escaping to America now, unless by some unforeseen chance the missionary Dr. Varley and his wife agreed to help her. Or unless Cousin Henry changed his mind about his treachery and came to Isandlwana?
Too good to be true
, she scolded her hopes. When Sir Julien returned and learned that his diamonds were missing, he would certainly search for Katie. If she failed to escape, how could she ever explain—or convince him that Henry had taken everything and fled?

No, she had no choice but to go on. If only she knew where she was going on to.