My Favorite Thief (27 page)

There was no doubt in her mind that Harrison was telling her the truth. She had always known he abhorred violence—she had sensed it from the very moment she had come upon him in Lady Chadwick's bedchamber. She had felt it in the gentleness of his touch when he had grabbed her as she stumbled, had seen it in his reluctance to take her hostage, even though she practically begged him to do so. When she had learned that Lord Pembroke's butler had been stabbed in the chest, her reaction had been horrified disbelief, because she had known that Harrison would never have performed such a terrible deed willingly. But now he was saying he hadn't done it.

Which meant he was in Newgate waiting to be tried and hanged for a murder he didn't commit.

“If you didn't kill Lord Pembroke's butler, and you didn't shoot Inspector Turner last night, then who did?” Her voice was remarkably even, given the fact that she was almost ready to strangle him herself.

“I don't know.” Harrison was startled by her obvious fury. Whatever reaction he might have predicted from her, it was not the barely leashed anger he was currently seeing. “There was another man there. He is the jewel thief who has been breaking into wealthy homes in London these past few months, not me.”

Charlotte regarded him incredulously. “Are you saying you're not the Dark Shadow?”

“The answer to that is a bit complicated.” He sighed. “The night you found me in Lady Chadwick's bedchamber, I was there trying to catch him, not to steal her jewelry. I knew she had recently acquired an exquisite emerald necklace that had once belonged to a celebrated French noblewoman who was executed in the French Revolution. I broke into Lord Chadwick's home because I thought the Dark Shadow would try to steal that necklace that night. When you found me, I was looking through her jewelry case just to make sure that it was still there, not to take it.”

Charlotte frowned, trying to make sense of what he was saying. “How could you possibly have known that the Dark Shadow would try to steal it from Lady Chadwick on that particular night?”

“I didn't know for certain,” Harrison allowed. “I had been following his thefts for months, making note of every available detail, trying to link them into some kind of pattern, or perhaps a series of patterns. And I realized that as he grew bolder the Dark Shadow developed a penchant for pieces that were either greatly admired or famous. Lady Chadwick had worn her new necklace to a party the night before, where everyone had made a great fuss over it. That evening she and her husband were hosting a dinner in their home, and I didn't believe she would wear it two nights in a row—especially given that their party was an intimate affair, and the necklace would have seemed too ostentatious. Therefore three elements were in place: the first being the jewelry's recent notoriety; the second, the fact that it would likely not be worn that night; and the third, its availability, as the entire household would be occupied downstairs for most of the evening. It was a perfect set of circumstances for a jewel thief.”

“If you were so certain the Dark Shadow would try to break into Lord Chadwick's home that night, then why didn't you simply warn them so they could contact the police?”

“The police had been trying to catch him for months, without success. I had little faith in their ability to do much other than scare him off. I wanted him caught, not chased away.”

“Why did his capture mean so much to you, Harrison?” Charlotte thought of Lady Bryden, and the magnificent jewelry she had been wearing on the day Charlotte had met her. “Had he ever stolen anything from you?”

Her eyes were wide and filled with concern. It was as if she believed that if Harrison just told everyone the truth, that somehow his life might be restored to him. Unfortunately, he knew otherwise. The public was anxious for the case of the Dark Shadow to be solved, and Inspector Turner believed, not unreasonably, that he had done just that. Harrison was certain he would not be impressed by any partial confession. Besides, even if Harrison were tried only for the crimes he had committed sixteen years earlier, that would still be more than enough to keep him rotting in prison for years, during which his mind would almost certainly disintegrate beneath the same illness that had afflicted his father.

Either way, his life was finished.

The only person whose understanding he cared about at that moment was Charlotte. She had met him at his very worst; yet, instead of condemning him, she had risked herself to help him, even when he tried to refuse that help. It was cruel and unfair, he thought as he stared down at her, that this lovely, unassuming, determined young woman, who would finally delve beneath the lies and artifice and open up his heart, had only come into his life at the very instant when it was spinning beyond his control. In many ways, he and Charlotte were of the same spirit. Charlotte was a survivor, as was he. And because she had been forced to do things in order to survive, she did not judge others with the same pious superiority that virtually every other woman he had ever known did. That was why she had tried so desperately to help him on the night they met. It was why she had trusted him enough to turn to him for help when she needed it. And it was why she had opened herself to him, giving of her heart and body and soul, and then refused to pretend to be horrified or ashamed by the glorious passion that had burned between them. In her own quiet, courageous way, Charlotte was far stronger and more honest than he. He was humbled and awed by her.

And in that moment, all he wanted was to hold her close, and tell her the truth.

“When I was twenty-four, my father killed himself,” he began, his voice taut and void of emotion. “He shot himself in the head, either in a moment of utter madness or with complete lucidity—I can't be sure which. His mind had been eroding for years. What began as a few amusing incidents of forgetfulness and confusion had gradually turned into something far more hideous.”

“What happened to him?”

“He began to have excruciating, nauseating headaches, for which nothing could provide any relief except to shut himself in his room in absolute silence with the curtains drawn for a day or more, during which he refused any food, drink, or company. My mother summoned a succession of doctors from all over England and across the Continent, whose diagnoses varied from saying he merely suffered from a too rich diet, to having an insufficient supply of blood to his brain. One insisted a tumor was causing his pain, and was quite anxious to crack open his skull and take it out. He told my mother he didn't expect my father to survive the operation, but said the advance of science would be nobly served by his attempt. Needless to say, she ordered him from the house.

“Another suggested he was suffering from a form of headache called migraines, and he began dosing my father with a myriad of foul concoctions made from valerian root, Peruvian bark, hemlock, camphor, myrrh, and opium, among others. When they all failed to provide relief, the doctor burned blisters behind his ears and pulled out three of his teeth, which merely added to his suffering. He even bled him, for God's sake. And my father only got worse. His headaches persisted and his mind continued to deteriorate.

“The problem was, none of us realized just how severe that deterioration was. Whenever he forgot something or grew enraged for no apparent reason, we attributed his absent-mindedness and fits of violence to the medications he was taking. My mother insisted his outbursts were completely understandable, given how much he was suffering—even when he tried to strangle her one night. She had always been extremely protective of him, and nothing could dissuade her from the idea that once she found a cure for his headaches he would return to his former self. In the meantime, his children and his servants were to treat him with respect, tolerate his wildly vacillating moods, and make discreet excuses for him if anyone beyond our household noticed his increasingly bizarre behavior. And while we were all going about pretending he was fine and respecting his dignity and his privacy, my father managed, through no fault of his own, to virtually bankrupt us. And then he went into his study and shot himself.”

Charlotte watched as Harrison struggled to keep his expression even. She could see that this was enormously painful for him, despite his attempt to make it sound as if he was talking about something that had long since lost its power to hurt him. Yet she also sensed his desperate need to talk about it, to share this terrible part of his past that had altered the course of his life.

“Go on,” she said quietly.

“I was twenty-four. And perhaps no more of a fool than the other young, callow nobles with whom I associated, but unfortunately, my lack of responsibility had disastrous consequences. I had fancied myself in love with a dancer from a music hall, and that affair managed to take up most of my waking hours. I had not made any effort to learn anything about our family's finances or investments, or just what it was, precisely, that paid our bills. I suppose I thought there were heaps of money sitting in the bank, and that when I finally became earl in ten or twenty years, I would simply inherit that money and use it to keep everything going. As I quickly learned after my father's funeral, that was not the case.

“In the two years preceding his death, my father had made a dreadful series of investments in business ventures that initially appeared promising but then failed, dragging him deeper into debt. He began to use anything as collateral, including properties, artwork, and our family's jewel collection, which was significant. The men with whom he did business were most accommodating about accepting collateral as payment. They even helped him by providing discreet buyers. The documentation for all of this was confusing and incomplete, but I soon began to suspect that my father had actually been defrauded. I went to the authorities, who told me there wasn't enough evidence to proceed with an investigation, which would be long, costly, and almost certainly unsuccessful. And so I was left with a staggering pile of debt, several overmortgaged properties, and a mother, brother, and sister who were crushed by my father's death and couldn't comprehend how our finances could possibly be so dire.”

“And so you decided to steal some of it back—starting with the jewels.”

He nodded. “The banks were unwilling to extend me any more credit. And I was furious that I had let this happen—that I had somehow been naive enough to believe my mother when she insisted that my father was perfectly capable of conducting his business affairs. Once I realized the truth, I had to do something quickly. Since I believed everything we had lost had effectively been stolen from us, I decided to just bloody well steal it back. Of course stealing the artwork was impractical—too cumbersome, and nearly impossible to sell anyway. But the jewels were another matter. They were small and easy to sell, because they could be removed from their settings and sold as loose stones.

“So over a period of a year, I broke into houses and took only those jewels I believed were rightfully mine. The newspapers dubbed me the Dark Shadow, and in my anger and my arrogance, I was quite happy to have them romanticize me in their writing. They took great pleasure in describing my latest thefts, and much of London enjoyed the fact that someone was running about stealing jewels from the rich, yet not actually hurting anyone. I sold the jewels and reduced my debts, while also making some careful investments. Fortunately, my instinct for business was sound, and gradually I began to rebuild my family's wealth.”

“How long were you breaking into houses?”

“Almost a year. I might have continued for longer, but I had a bad fall one night as I was climbing out of a window and I injured my back. For a moment I didn't think I could get up. That was when I knew I'd had enough. It was foolish to think I could keep on and not get caught, and my mother, Margaret, and Frank needed me. So the thefts stopped abruptly. People speculated that the Dark Shadow had been killed, arrested for a lesser crime, or retired to a villa in the Mediterranean.

Then suddenly, a few months ago, someone adopted my guise and started stealing again. He actually left notes identifying himself as the Dark Shadow. At first I just ignored it. I thought he would quickly be captured and that would be the end of it. But as he grew bolder and the police failed to capture him, I grew concerned that some earnest investigator might open the old files on the Dark Shadow and see if they could solve the mystery of his identity by looking at the past instead of the present. Whether this new thief realized it or not, his thefts were posing a threat to me and my family.”

“So you decided to try to capture him yourself.”

“Yes. And I came damn close. That night at Lord Pembroke's house, I actually confronted him. We fought, but unfortunately he got away after tearing off my mask.”

“Did he see your face clearly?”

“Yes. He recognized me—he said my name. Then he hurled a blade at Lord Pembroke's butler before I could stop him. I got away, but I knew time was running out. Whoever this Dark Shadow was, he had the advantage, because he knew I was after him. If he hadn't already made the connection to my past, he did that night. Which meant he could start leaving evidence that would point to me.” He shook his head, infuriated by his own stupidity. “I still believed I could outwit him, because I thought I could anticipate his next move. When I heard that Lady Whitaker was flaunting the Star of Persia, I was certain the Dark Shadow would want it. I didn't realize that Inspector Turner had already linked me to the thefts. He had found a monogrammed handkerchief of mine outside Lord Pembroke's home on the night his butler was killed, which quickly led him to me.”

“Did you drop it?”

He shook his head in frustration. “I don't remember.” He did not tell her that there were many things he had been unable to remember of late. “I'm usually extremely careful about what I carry on me when I'm the Dark Shadow. But I suppose it's possible that it was in one of my pockets and I just didn't realize it.”