Suzanne Robinson Read online

  One of the few good turns Edmund Cheap ever did her was helping her invent Mrs. Apple. To protect her from the dangers of the East End she acquired a fictional husband, who was conveniently dead. Learning rapidly, she had gathered around her protectors and allies, so that now she commanded the loyalty of over a dozen skilled subordinates. Yes, she owed Mrs. Apple to Edmund Cheap. She also owed him her mother’s death from grief and ill health brought on from living in the disease-ridden slum courts of London.

  Never mind. Cheap and his two wives were gone, and Emmie was left to fend for herself and her little family. She might have to spend her life among thieves, pickpockets, and harlots, but neither Flash nor Phoebe nor Sprout would ever set foot in the rookeries again. Emmie would steal from the queen herself before she’d let that happen.

  Now the children lived in Kensington in a lovely house surrounded by trees and gardens. Each would receive a proper upbringing and an education at the best schools, which would afford introductions to the right people. Respectable people, not the swell mobsmen who filched ladies’ purses and ended in Newgate. Not climbing boys who burgled houses, not mouchers who scrounged for what they could get.

  Not for her brothers and sister the thieves’ kitchens of east London, or the servants’ lurks where those who drank too much or stole from their employers took refuge. Emmie was sick of the dark labyrinths of the rookeries where traps were laid for the police or the unwary. But until she could get enough money together, places like that would serve as her office, drawing room, and bedchamber.

  The carriage stopped on the outskirts of St. Giles. Emmie got out on a corner where a woman was selling meat pies to two men in threadbare coats.

  “Getcher ’ot pies! Hot’n’fresh.”

  Emmie looked up at her coachman. “Well done, Turnip. Back to the stables with you.”

  “Yes, missus. Pleasant evening, missus.”

  Emmie turned to find the two men gulping down the last of their meat pies. “Hello, Snoozer, Sweep.”

  Her two bodyguards doffed their caps.

  “We was getting worried, Missus Apple,” said Snoozer. He had the build of a navvy, one of the thousands of railroad workers who plagued England with their rowdiness.

  Sweep wasn’t as burly as Snoozer, but he was much taller and got his name from his former profession as a chimney sweep. “We thought pr’aps that toff what you stole the picture from caught you.”

  “Now, Sweep, have I ever been caught?”

  “No, Missus, but you never know when some cove’ll peach on you.”

  “And risk your wrath?” Emmie replied with a grin.

  Sweep rarely smiled, but his lips did curl a bit as they set out down the lane. It took them half an hour to reach Madame Rachel’s Boarding House in Needle Street off Blackfriars, but Emmie was careful never to attract attention to herself by taking the carriage back to her rooms. In any case, it was necessary to go by a circuitous route to make sure they weren’t followed.

  Eventually Emmie was ensconced in her sitting room in the boardinghouse. It was filled with threadbare furniture bought secondhand, but it was clean. Above her were the rooms of Wombie the forger, and in the cellar Borgle, the most successful fence in London, plied his trade. By now he would be poring over the Holbein portrait. Once they settled on a price, Borgle would send it to a buyer in Holland.

  Downing the last of her cup of tea, Emmie listened to the swish of tarlatan skirts that announced the arrival of her friend Dolly Quill. Dolly sailed into the room without knocking, her wide skirts swaying. Miss Quill was one of the swell mob who operated among the gentry, dressed well, and lived in a good house in west London.

  “Well, there you are.” Dolly tossed her bright yellow hair and sat down beside Emmie. “All safe and successful once again, I see. I declare, Emmie, you’re the only woman I know who can keep company with smashers, coiners, and half-drunk hags and make a profit of it.”

  Emmie set her teacup in its saucer and sighed. “You know how I manage things, and it isn’t by wasting my time with petty thieves.”

  Dolly patted her hand, and Emmie smiled. Dolly liked to tease; it was her way of showing an affection that began when Emmie had saved her from Newgate prison. One day a few years ago she’d opened her carriage door to Dolly and hidden her from the policemen chasing her for stealing a lady’s shopping money.

  Pouring herself a cup of tea, Dolly settled back in her chair and took a sip. “Fancy someone paying all that blunt for a moldy old picture.”

  Emmie didn’t bother to explain the importance of the Tudor portrait or its painter. Educated by her mother, she had found her gentle upbringing both an advantage and a hindrance among the denizens of underworld London.

  “You sure that marquess won’t discover the switch tonight and come looking for you?”

  “Why do you think I chose the Norths for this lay?” Emmie replied. “The marquess is known for his dislike of London and the Season. He won’t be here for the whole of it, and he spends most of his time at his country house or abroad. While he is here, he’ll be too busy with engagements to inspect the gallery.” Emmie frowned as she recalled both the handsome marquess and her lack of funds.

  “What’s wrong, my dear?”

  “It’s not enough, Dolly. Flash must be sent to school—Eton or Harrow—next year. A governess is all very well for the younger ones, but Flash will be eleven next year. I can’t wait any longer than that.”

  “Don’t see why he’s got to go at all.”

  Emmie pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes shut. The worry was making her head ache.

  “It’s quite simple,” she said. “Acquaintances and friendships formed at schools like that introduce a child to Society. Without them, Flash won’t be able to pursue a respectable profession or make a suitable marriage.”

  Dolly leaned toward her and spoke gently. “And that’s why you live two lives—one here and one with the children. So’s they can be respectable.”

  “Without respectability and education they’ll descend to slum courts and streets with open sewers running down the middle of them.”

  “Like you,” Dolly said.

  Emmie swallowed hard. “Like me.”

  They sat in silence for a while before Emmie began drumming her fingers on the arm of her chair. Dolly raised a brow.

  “What’re you planning now?”

  “I need more money, quick.” Emmie stopped drumming and tapped her front teeth with a fingernail. “Hmmm. Tonight’s lay was so easy, I think I’ll go back and have another try. I saw a good bit of silver lying around collecting dust.”

  Dolly shook her head until her curls came loose. “Don’t! It’s too dangerous.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “What’s got into you? You got a precious strange look in your eye, my girl.”

  “Nonsense. There’s no danger, and besides, North deserves to be taught a lesson in humility. I’m just the one to do it.”

  “If you don’t look sharp and control yourself, you’re going to end up lagged.” Dolly was watching Emmie closely. “This North, he’s weighing on your mind. That’s not like you.”

  “Valin North is spoiled, rude, arrogant, and selfish.”

  “And pretty, from what I hear.”

  “He may be,” Emmie said, “but he knows it. It was disgusting to watch him play the grand lord and turn his back on a girl simply because he wouldn’t trouble himself to be patient with her. He thinks he’s entitled to the cream of life and has the right to trod upon everyone’s feelings.”

  “That’s the same things you say about old Mr. Cheap. You’re letting your feelings run your head. Leave North alone, my dear, or you’ll end up in Newgate, or worse.”

  “Not me,” Emmie said as she poured herself more tea. “I’m going to get the money I need and humble that odious Valin North at the same time. He can spare the blunt, and he can certainly spare a bit of his arrogance. I intend to see that he learns consideration and humility, and
I won’t do him a morsel of harm.”

  Dolly was looking at her with suspicion. “Why are you so bloody anxious to see this toff again if he’s such an arse?”

  “I’m not,” Emmie exclaimed.

  “Plenty of other blokes with valuables worth stealing.”

  “I already know the lay for this one.”

  “Never go back to the same place for your pickings,” Dolly said. “It’s a rule.”

  “But not a law.”

  Dolly rose, shaking her head again. “It’s a rotten idea.”

  “Don’t worry,” Emmie said with a grin. “It will be a lark.”

  2

  The next morning Emmie woke feeling sluggish from a night of disturbing dreams. That damned marquess had invaded her sleep. In the dream she, not the voluble Lady Millicent, had been introduced to him.

  In the dream, he had scowled at her in that off-with-her-head manner of his, just as he had poor Lady Millicent. But in the dream she had widened her eyes in response, and his scowl vanished like mist blown by a gale.

  Suddenly Valin North’s face lost the hardness of a Cossack warrior. Without harshness, it was a face of near perfection with its high forehead, emphasized by dark hair swept back in long soft waves. In a man without that straight nose and gently curved mouth the severity of such a haircut would have exposed and emphasized any imperfections. But what attracted Emmie’s attention, what caused her blood to pound in her temples, were his eyes. Light gray, deep-set, and provocative, they seemed to bore through her, searching, invading, and thrusting aside all resistance.

  In her dream Emmie met that compelling gaze for an eternity before the marquess stretched out a hand. Just as he touched her she woke.

  “Gracious mercy,” she muttered to herself. “I’ve lost my wits.”

  She was sitting in her shabby-genteel sitting room at a small desk going over her accounts for the fifth time. Laying down her pen, Emmie sighed and pressed her palms to her closed eyes. She was irritated at herself for losing her concentration.

  All morning her thoughts had strayed from business to the dream, to Valin North. She was growing more and more uneasy. In all her exploits, all her deceits, she’d never encountered a man who hadn’t vanished from her memory the instant he was out of her sight. Perhaps she should heed Dolly’s warning.

  With resolution she harnessed her thoughts again. Her conclusion of last night had been correct. She desperately needed more money for Flash, Sprout, and Phoebe.

  A knock at the door interrupted her fretting, and Wombie the forger entered. Wombie was dressed as a clerk, in a black suit. When he wasn’t speaking of business, he had a number of chronic ailments that made up the bulk of his conversation. Wombie had taken up forgery so that he needn’t pursue more physically demanding work that would aggravate his complaints. He wore spectacles with bottle-glass lenses, and boasted a luxurious mop of gray hair.

  Wombie pushed his spectacles up the bridge of his nose with one hand while he clutched a flat wooden box with the other. “Missus Apple, might I trouble you to keep your parcel in your rooms while I go out?”

  “What’s wrong?” Emmie rose and took the box from him.

  “I am Suffering From My Head, this morning. It’s giving me terrible trouble, and I got to go to the apothecary for headache powders afore I’m forced to take to me bed.”

  Wombie also Suffered From His Feet and From His Back in a never-ending cycle of affliction. “I’d leave it with my ’prentice, but he’s copying a will what just come to us sudden-like.”

  “You should stop here and send your ’prentice for the powders.”

  “Thank you, missus, but the will’s got to be done by tonight, and since I’m Suffering From My Head, the boy’s got to do this piece of work.”

  When Wombie was gone, Emmie returned to her desk and set the box down. They were waiting for Borgle to ship the painting tonight, but the box hadn’t been nailed shut yet so she took the opportunity to remove the painting. Since Wombie hadn’t yet reframed it, she was able to lay the picture flat on the desk to admire it.

  Hans Holbein the Younger had been a favorite artist of Henry VIII and one of the finest painters of his time. After the theft, Emmie hadn’t had time to study the naturalism of this portrait of the king’s sister Mary Tudor, whose dark-haired and pink-cheeked beauty seemed as fresh as the day it was painted over three hundred years ago.

  “Three hundred years,” Emmie murmured, suddenly aware of how fragile the portrait might be.

  She picked it up gently, intending to replace it in the box, but she noticed that the top edge of the canvas was uneven. She touched a bit of material sticking out there, thinking she would have to call it to Wombie’s attention. As her finger slid over the flaw Emmie frowned. The protrusion was sharp, like paper rather than canvas. She peered more closely, then turned the painting over and examined its edges.

  There was an extra layer of backing that had been glued onto the back of the original. When she’d cut the painting out of its frame, she’d loosened it. What she was looking at was the corner of something stuck between the portrait and the backing.

  Drumming her fingers on the desk, Emmie stared at the Holbein. One of her advantages over the ordinary villains of east London was her education. Mother had taught her more than simple reading and writing.

  Emmie had learned history, literature, languages, and art. She’d tried to continue with some of her education on her own. Her education had enabled her to recognize the value of the Holbein and choose North as her victim. Mother had also taught her etiquette and the nuances of titles—and the stories of England’s great families.

  It was Mother who had told Emmie about the Norths and their great country house, Agincourt Hall, where a great treasure was said to have been hidden shortly before King Phillip of Spain sent the Armada against England’s Queen Elizabeth. Agincourt Hall had been owned by the Beauforts then, a Catholic family who had secretly plotted with the Spanish against the Protestant Elizabeth. Fearing the discovery of their plans and the Spanish gold sent to finance them, Henry Beaufort was said to have hidden the treasure somewhere in the house. He was arrested for treason and died in the Tower before he could reveal what he’d done with the treasure.

  That was the story. Everyone thought it false because Elizabeth’s master spy, Throckmorton, had scoured Agincourt Hall looking for the gold and discovered nothing. As a child Emmie had loved the story, though, because it was so much like a fairy tale. After the evil Beauforts had been disgraced, good Queen Bess had given the title and lands to a loyal man—Valin North’s ancestor.

  This portrait might have been among the original Beaufort possessions left at Agincourt. Emmie’s drumming fingers stilled. They drifted toward the paper sticking out of the canvas, grasped, and tugged. More paper came out, then stuck. It appeared that there was more than one piece of paper folded together. Emmie grabbed a letter opener and carefully separated the backing from the portrait until there was room to slide out a sealed packet.

  There was nothing written on the outside of the packet, but there was an impression on the wax that held it shut. She could make out a swan with its wings held back-to-back; perhaps the heraldic emblem of the Beaufort family? With precision she slid the blade of the letter opener under the seal. She was able to open the packet without damaging the wax.

  Slowly she unfolded the papers and anchored them to the desktop with her inkstand and a paperweight. Then she sat there staring in disappointment at the top sheet of paper. It was yellow with age and written in an archaic script, but she could make out most of the words. At the top of the paper was a poem, and below this had been written a household register, a list of the members of the household of Henry Beaufort, Marquess of Westfield.

  “Humph.” Odd how she kept picturing Beaufort. He looked exactly like Valin North.

  Shaking her head, Emmie went on to the next piece of paper, but as she turned the top sheet over, she noticed more writing on the back. Evidently the poem
and register had been written on the reverse of an old letter. The second sheet was just as uninteresting. Emmie’s gaze traveled down a list of rooms assigned to each household member who resided in Agincourt Hall itself. Next came a paper consisting of a series of foreign phrases, such as a student might copy for a lesson. Some were in Latin, and some in French and English.

  Emmie studied a Latin phrase with little interest. Sic itur ad astra. The papers were worthless.

  “Drat.” She pounded her fist on the desktop. “Serves you right for letting your imagination rule your reason, my girl.”

  With a sigh Emmie pressed her palms against her eyelids again, then began to gather the papers. The sheet with the poem on it caught her attention as she placed it on top of the other two.

  “What odd phrasing,” she muttered as she read it again.

  Tho mighty Harry perish

  And stalwart castle decay,

  Brave Westfield conquers triumphant.

  Mote and knole, hearth and court remain,

  For God’s labor we do perform

  ’Gainst Satan’s evil and baseborn tyrant.

  To cast out the heretic serpent,

  To avenge one to the true church born.

  “Henry, old cove, you were no poet.” Emmie read down the list of household members that had been added below the poem. “You had a giant household, I’ll admit.” She read the old names with growing interest.

  HOUSEHOLD REGISTER

  At my Lord’s Table

  My Lord

  My Lady Margaret

  Mr. Beaufort

  John Musgrave

  Monsieur d’Or

  My Lady