Damsel in Disguise (41 page)

Now, that was a bit difficult to swallow. The locket could act as a key without even opening? How? Julia didn’t trust the man. He’d likely get his hands on the locket, rip it open, and wave whatever contents there were in front of everyone, destroying Rastmoor. At this point she didn’t know who—or what—could be trusted.

“Er, don’t you need two keys to open that box?” she asked suddenly. “What good will one be?”

“Yes,” Rastmoor agreed. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll just hang on to this until we can dredge up that other key.”

Dashford frowned. “If I’m not mistaken, Miss St. Clement is supposed to be in possession of the second key. That is what our fine actor here said, isn’t it?”

“No, that’s not precisely what I said,” Papa uttered, but Julia cut him off.

“Honestly, Papa. It’s a bit late for games. Why did you tell them I have the other key?”

“I didn’t,
ma chérie
!” he said with a fabricated look of hurt. “I told them you
owned
it. I never said you actually
possessed
it.”

“Oh, bother,” she grumbled. “What’s the difference?”

“The difference,
ma belle
, is that you may actually own the key, but
I
have it in my possession.”

“
You
have the other key?”

“But of course!” He smiled cheerfully. “Always have. I held it for you, and unlike my compatriot, I never cultivated friendships with such lowlife scum that I had to be concerned for its security. He may have given his elsewhere for safekeeping, but I have kept yours,
ma belle
. It is right here.”

None of this made sense. She could barely believe it when Papa reached into his coat pocket—quite a chore, given the many flaps and flounces in his foppish attire—and pulled out his own little cloth. Unfolding it, he uncovered a locket. From what she could see of it, it seemed very much like the one Rastmoor held clutched in his fist.

“By God, he has it!” Fitzgelder said with something like reverence.

“So we can open the box?” Lady Dashford asked.

“Well, there’s one way to find out,” her husband replied. “With Rastmoor’s permission, of course.”

Rastmoor thought for a moment then glanced to meet Julia’s eyes. She could have sworn the expression she saw there was one of question, as if he was asking her advice on whether or not to agree. But of course he really couldn’t expect her to know what to tell him, could he? He must know she was clueless about all of this.

She attempted a feeble smile and shrugged. Not very good advice, she had to admit, but she hoped he recognized at least she was being honest with him. At last.

“All right, then,” he said. “Let’s open it.”

 

 

RASTMOOR COULDN’T HELP IT. HE HAD TO WAIT FOR some sign from Julia before making up his mind. What a want-wit he’d become, that was certain. But truly, he knew she’d not steer him wrong.

Unfortunately, she didn’t seem to be able to steer him at all. She was obviously as much in the dark about all this as he was. He rather liked that, actually. They were on the same side.

With a well-practiced flourish, St. Clement stepped forward and held his locket up. He seemed almost to be making ready for some sleight of hand or display of sorcery. All eyes in the room were riveted on him. Rastmoor had to smile. The man certainly could play to his audience.

Carefully, he turned the locket over. He seemed to be toying with the ring at the top where the locket was held on to the chain. Indeed, he turned the ring very slowly. He leaned very close, as if listening. Perhaps he was listening to the object as he worked it, or perhaps he was merely giving his onlookers a dramatic exhibition. Either way, at one point he suddenly stopped, and the back of the locket sprang up, fanning open in two halves like the wings on a beetle.

Gingerly and perhaps timidly, St. Clement twisted these wings. Rastmoor would have loved to get a closer look at the works inside this device. Certainly, this was like no locket he’d ever seen before. Would the locket he still held in his hand do something similar? He rather hoped it would. From what he could see of the first one, the front part of the locket—the part where any incriminating paper or other evidence could be hidden—was still undisturbed. St. Clement seemed to have been telling the truth when he claimed he could open the box without opening his locket.

How very unfortunate for Fitzgelder. Odd that the man was still so eager to follow this through. Rastmoor would have expected him to show much more disappointment at having his dearest plans totally destroyed while being forced to watch someone else discover a treasure.

But at this point, Fitzgelder was easy to ignore. St. Clement was twisting the pieces of that locket into the most unusual shape. At last the pieces seemed to snap into place, and St. Clement smiled, holding it up for all to witness.

“Voilà!” he said. “The first half of the key.”

It was like no key Rastmoor had ever seen. The front portion of the locket looked as one would expect a simple heart-shaped locket to look. The back of it, however, was sprung out and flipped so that the points of the two halves jutted down and away from the body of the locket. It almost seemed the harmless object had just grown fangs.

St. Clement held it up toward the light streaming through the window. “See? There is a hole through it.”

Rastmoor leaned forward to see. Indeed, there was. It was hardly more than a pinhole, but it went all the way through the locket. Not that it meant anything to Rastmoor, of course, but the design was ingenious.

“Now we will see how the other locket fits into it,” St. Clement said.

Both St. Clement and D’Archaud reached their hands out to take the second locket from Rastmoor. He did not need another opinion on this, however. There was no question but that he felt more inclined to give it to St. Clement than his shiftless friend.

The man took it and held it up as he had the first locket. His fingers went immediately to the ring at the top, but after a moment or two, he paused. He held the locket closer for examination. He peered at it front and back.

“This isn’t it,” he said at last.

“What?” D’Archaud exclaimed, nearly yanking it out of St. Clement’s hand. “
Mon dieu!
This is not my locket!”

Rastmoor was stunned. Not his locket? That was not good.

“Where is the real locket?” D’Archaud asked, glaring first at Rastmoor then turning his anger on Fitzgelder. “Where is it?”

Fitzgelder simply grinned. “What a shame, D’Archaud. You lost your fancy locket.”

“Someone deliberately replaced it,” St. Clement said. “This locket appears very similar, but it is not the right one. Someone has deceived us.”

Fitzgelder laughed as if this were all great sport. “For once, I am innocent of the crime!”

Oh, hell. The locket had taken such a roundabout way to get here—being smuggled by Penelope, given to Fitzgelder, stolen by Sophie, retrieved by Lindley—there was no way to know when the real locket had been replaced by this alternate. Clearly someone in that chain of handlers knew the secret and decided not to part with such a valuable object. But who was it? And why?

The most likely suspect was Fitzgelder. He’d made it very clear he had something in mind for what he believed was in that locket. Obviously he would have had ample reason to keep it close to him. But why chase after Sophie if he knew she had the wrong locket?

Lindley, on the other hand, had indeed chased after Sophie. He, in fact, was the one who took the locket from her, wasn’t he? He would have had plenty of opportunity to open it and find the evidence Fitzgelder swore was inside. Lindley was just intelligent enough to figure out how to profit from that evidence. Hell, he was intelligent enough to discover any other unusual features of the locket, too. He would have realized it was part of something much bigger than simple blackmail.

Unless of course D’Archaud had lied from the start. He claimed he’d given the locket to Rastmoor’s father for safekeeping, hadn’t he? Well, Rastmoor still found that a bit shaky. Surely his father would have told him if he truly held a locket with damning family secrets or keys to untold treasure. Wouldn’t he? Of course he would have. That left D’Archaud’s story sounding very thin. He could have easily kept the right locket in the hopes that once the wrong locket turned up, someone else could be blamed while he went behind everyone’s back and got the treasure for himself.

Damn it, there was just too much to consider, and frankly, there was still entirely too much about this whole thing that just didn’t make sense.

“So,” Rastmoor said with a heavy sigh. “Who has the real locket?”

As one voice, the group chorused, “Not me!”

Julia pretended she could ignore the rapping at her door. After that fiasco in the drawing room, being allowed to come up here to peace and solitude was heavenly. She half expected Lady Dashford to throw them all out, but the viscountess had not. She’d been overly kind and had servants look to the needs of all of Papa’s troupe. When her ladyship invited Julia to return to the room she’d been using during her brief, deceptive stay at Hartwood, she could have wept. Lord, but she needed some time to collect her thoughts.

Papa had gone with his troupe to the kitchens, where there was a luncheon being prepared for them. Julia was glad not to have to face him with all the questions running wild through her mind. She needed some time alone, time to process all she’d just seen and heard.

Surely the others were as confused as she. Presumably Fitzgelder had been placed back under guard in his room, where he could stew about his lost opportunities. Rastmoor had probably gone to confer with Lindley and Dashford while his mother and sister, as far as Julia knew, had not yet been notified of any of this. As far as she was concerned, that particular revelation could wait all year.

As for Lady Dashford, she was busily seeing to everyone as if they were guests she had invited into her home. Probably she had never envisioned her first few days of marriage to be like this. However, she appeared to handle it all with inherent grace. She even seemed quite eager to accept D’Archaud into her family, despite the man’s questionable ethics. Julia could only guess how Lady Dashford must feel to suddenly be handed such a kinsman.

No worse, she supposed, than to suddenly discover her father was a treasure hunter who kept friends with such scabs like D’Archaud. Heavens, but that had certainly caught her unawares. She’d never known her father to be anything but honorable. True, he may not have been born a gentleman, but he had certainly always behaved as one. And he’d expected nothing less from her. Now to find out he was not what he’d seemed, Julia just wasn’t certain of anything.

Well, she was certain whoever was knocking at her door was determined not to leave her in peace. Halfheartedly smoothing her hair and fluffing her skirts, she left the bed where she’d fallen lifeless just a few minutes ago. With a smile that was merely superficial, she opened the door.

It was Lady Dashford.

“I just wanted to make sure you have everything you need, Miss St. Clement,” she said and gave every indication of being sincere.

“Yes, thank you. The luncheon plate your servants brought up was quite filling.”

The viscountess smiled, but it was a nervous smile. “Good. I want you to be comfortable here. Truly, I do.”

Since she didn’t give any indication that this was the end of the conversation, Julia felt the polite thing to do would be to invite her in. Her ladyship graciously accepted. Drat. What on earth could she need to discuss? Julia was almost afraid to find out.

Lady Dashford glanced around the room then made herself comfortable in one of the chairs at the window. Julia joined her there, but could not really say she was comfortable. Certainly she owed their hostess quite a bit of explanation.

But before she could start, Lady Dashford spoke. “I, er, I know my husband may have said some unkind things. Some horrible things, really. But please do not hold that against him. He’s a good man, and he cares deeply for his friend. It was just such a shock, that’s all. In time he will soften.”

Now Julia really did not feel comfortable. How on earth did one begin to make amends after such fraud? She should be begging her ladyship’s forgiveness, not the other way around.

“Please, my lady, he had every right to be upset. I came to your home under false pretenses. I knew very well I would not be welcome if my identity were known. You’ve been more than kind, but I’m sure my father is eager for us to be on our way and out from underfoot as soon as possible.”

“I’m afraid Dashford has requested that your father remain here until we have some resolution on this. Really, it is a fascinating situation, isn’t it? Imagine, we find you alive, my cousin’s father also is alive, and now we learn that the Loveland treasure is not merely a myth or a joke, but it is real, as well! How remarkable.”