The Gentleman and the Thief

by Sarah M. Eden

  “Oh, Randolph.” Cora took hold of her husband’s hand. “She sounds perfect.”

  Not many in their circles permitted public displays of affection, not even something as simple as holding hands. Hollis had always admired that Randolph and Cora did.

  “Would you ask if she is interested or available for private lessons?” Randolph asked him. “I don’t know what flexibility she has, already being employed as a teacher.”

  Hollis understood the question his brother also wished him to ask: What would her fee be? “If you would be willing to drop me at Thurloe, I would be happy to inquire this very day.”

  Not many minutes later, they did precisely that. With an acknowledgment of Cora’s gratitude, Randolph’s trust, Eloise’s sweet kiss on his cheek, and Addison’s continued wariness, Hollis climbed from the carriage and made his way to the door of the school. This was calling day for the teachers, so he would be permitted ample opportunity to visit with Ana. If he’d thought he could manage it without drawing too much attention, he would have called every week.

  Randolph and Cora had given him the perfect excuse. He tipped his proverbial hat to them for that.

  To his relief, Ana appeared pleased to see him. A young pup had come to call on her, something that never failed to be the case on the rare occasions he, himself, made an appearance. He motioned with his head toward the man. Her look of exhausted frustration told him all he needed to know. The Dreadfuls might not have trusted him often with anything furtive, but he’d learned a thing or two about dispatching difficult people. With a quick dip of his head and a preemptive word of appreciation to the man for giving up his place, Hollis took the young gentleman’s seat, leaving him standing about.

  “What a pleasure to see you, Mr. Darby,” Ana said, her gratitude apparent. “What brings you around?”

  “It is calling day, is it not?” He offered his most winning smile.

  “You do not always come on calling day. Something has brought you here this time.”

  She was astute; there was no mistaking that. “I have, indeed, come with a matter of business,” he said. “But as I greatly enjoy your company, my business is not my only motivation in being here.”

  “You have piqued my interest, Mr. Darby. What is this business which compelled this visit?”

  “Have you any interest in providing private music lessons?” he asked.

  With a twinkle of mischief in her eye, she said, “Why, Mr. Darby. I had no idea you harbored musical ambitions.”

  If he thought for one moment she would be willing to teach him to play a musical instrument, he would have snatched up the nearest one and declared a lifelong desire to play it. “I have a niece—a delightful, somewhat precocious, tenderhearted girl of eight—who harbors a deep love of music. She has begun to learn the pianoforte, but her parents have discovered her governess—a paragon in all other respects—is dreadful as a music instructor.”

  “And her parents wish to ask me?” She seemed both flattered and confused.

  “I told them of your performance last evening, of your impeccable manners, how highly the headmistress here speaks of your abilities as a teacher—”

  She colored up beautifully. How could he have helped but fall top-over-tail in love with her? She was as lovely a person inside as out.

  “They hope that, perhaps, you have the time and inclination to add our little Eloise to your list of students.”

  “Oh, Mr. Darby. You are too kind.” She entwined her fingers, clutching her hands too tightly to fully hide her nervousness. “I fear they will be sorely disappointed when they actually make my acquaintance.”

  “No one who has ever met you could possibly be disappointed.”

  Her smiled warmed and softened. “I would have to ask Miss Black if it would be possible for me to accept your offer. But if she will permit it, I think I would enjoy that.”

  “You will love Eloise,” he said. “She is an angel.”

  “How soon would your . . . brother—” She tilted her head in a question.

  He nodded.

  “—need an answer?”

  “Whenever you have one for him,” he said.

  Another gentleman arrived, intent on being granted Ana’s time and attention. The other teachers had their visitors as well. Hollis sat among them all, listening to the general conversation and feeling rather like a one-legged horse in a race. He reminded himself what a lucky cove he was to simply be with her again—twice in two days, in fact.

  On the side table near Ana, peeking out from underneath a shawl he knew to be hers, was the familiar teal cover of Mr. King’s latest offering. She had already indicated she read and enjoyed the penny dreadfuls.

  Perhaps if she enjoyed Mr. King’s stories as much as she appeared to, there was some hope that his clandestine publishing life would not meet with her disapproval.

  Perhaps.

  by Mr. King

  Installment I,

  in which our Hero enlists the help of a brave and kind Neighbor and encounters a most dire Prediction!

  The grand estate of Summerworth sat nestled between a raging river and the windswept moors. Its turrets and towers loomed large, declaring to all who drew near that this was the home of a noble and exalted family. Yet, within its palatial walls, a mournful sadness wrapped ice around the heart of the only person who lived therein.

  After great tragedy and heartrending loss, only Mr. Wellington Quincey remained of those who had once made their home in the splendor of Summerworth. His family had dwindled to only one; the Summerworth staff had dwindled to only two.

  Wellington’s despondency had rendered the house an almost unbearably sad place to live. His sorrows were many. His companions were few.

  For all his anguish, he was not an unkind gentleman. Those who knew him liked him. Many a heart ached at his suffering and isolation. His family was gone. His home was remote.

  He had all but given up on finding companionship and love and a new beginning by the time he reached his twenty-fifth year. Loneliness was his lot in life, and he would endure it. But there was one thing he could not sort out. How was it an estate as far from neighbors as his, so devoid of staff and visitors, was the victim of an unending string of thefts?

  Jewelry had disappeared. Silver. Paintings. Priceless heirlooms. His trusted servants hadn’t the least idea what precisely had befallen Summerworth. The missing items could not be located. No clues had been left behind. He was utterly and completely baffled.

  It was with this mystery hanging heavy on his weary mind that he mounted his trusty steed and dedicated a morning to riding a circuit of the estate. He was not at risk of being beggared by the thefts, but neither could he ignore the growing list of pilfered items. Who could possibly be taking them? What ill-intentioned thief was bringing such misery to his already painful life?

  He rounded a turn in the path as it passed the cottage of the estate steward. Elmore Combs had remained in his post after the death of Wellington’s grandfather some fifteen years earlier, Wellington’s father ten years after that, and Wellington’s older brother a mere two years ago.

  Combs’s daughter, Tillie, stood outside, pulling laundry off the clothesline. Wellington had known Tillie since they had been children running and skipping and laughing through the meadows and lawns and streams of Summerworth. They had been dear friends during those long-ago days. He hadn’t seen as much of her the past few years as he would have liked. Life had demanded too much of him.

  “Good morning, Tillie.” He pulled his horse to a halt beside the house. “How are you faring this fine day?”

  She folded a sheet against herself and smiled at him. “I’m well, sir.”

  “You needn’t call me ‘sir,’” he said as he dismounted. “We have been friends all our lives.”

  Tillie laid the sheet in her large basket. “But you’re grown now,
and the master of the estate. Things ain’t quite what they used to be.”

  He pulled another sheet from the line and began folding it himself. “Are we not still friends, Tillie?”

  “You’re hardly here anymore. I’ve a closer friendship with the hedgehog who lives in back of the cottage.”

  Her words struck deep. Heaven forgive him, he had been neglectful. He’d lost his grandparents, his parents, and his brother. He seldom saw his friends from Cambridge. He had no true friends amongst Society in London, merely a list of vague acquaintances. He kept to himself, a shield against the grief of losing people he felt close to. But it meant he remained painfully lonely.

  “I could come help you fold laundry,” he offered. “Then we could talk as we work.”

  Amusement danced in her eyes. “Folding laundry ain’t for the master of the estate.”

  “I’m doing it now.” He dropped the sheet into the basket. “Besides, who will even see me working other than you and your father? This needn’t be a source of teasing, unless you mean to engage in jests at my expense.”

  “’Course not.”

  He took down a serviceable-looking apron and folded it as well. “If laundry is off-limits to me, what will you permit me to do? Sweep the front stoop? Weed the kitchen garden? Are either of those acceptable for a ‘master of the estate’?”

  She folded a shirt, no doubt her father’s. “I suspect you’ve spent time weeding and sweeping at your own house, it being short-staffed like it is.”

  “Lately, I’ve invested most of my time attempting to locate a virtual treasure trove of missing things.”

  Nothing remained on the clothesline. She took up the basket and held it against her hip. “Things’ve been swiped?”

  “Quite a number of things,” he said. “Jewelry. Silver. Paintings.”

  “And you’ve not located any of it?”

  He shook his head. “I fear this mystery will prove utterly unsolvable.”

  He walked beside her back to the quaint and inviting cottage. The door stood open, allowing them to enter without a pause.

  Her father was inside and greeted Wellington. “Welcome, Mr. Quincey. Have you come on estate business?”

  “I stopped to offer a good morning to my lifelong friend but have been rightly informed by your daughter that I have not been an attentive companion to her these years.”

  Mr. Combs turned wide eyes on his child. “Tillie. You’d speak so critically to a gentleman of his standing? ’Ave you taken leave of your manners, girl?”

  “Pray, do not scold her,” Wellington insisted. “I was rightly chastised, and I mean to make amends.”

  “How?” Tillie never had lacked for boldness.

  “We spend little time together, as you rightly observed, and I have a maddening riddle at the estate. Perhaps you might help me sort it.”

  She looked intrigued. If she agreed to join the hunt for the elusive thief, he would have her company again. The house would not be so empty. The joys of their childhood friendship would bring light back into his darkened world.

  “Would you help?” he pressed. “I would be greatly obliged.”

  “I do have a knack for sorting mysteries.” She carried her basket to the table. “We could solve this’n together.”

  “I would be deeply indebted to you.” He turned to Mr. Combs. “A great many things have gone missing up at the manor house, odd bits and large pieces. I cannot for the life of me guess where they’ve gone or who might have taken them. You would not begrudge Tillie some time spent helping me discover what’s happened to them, would you? I would not, for all the world, wish to add to your burdens here.”

  “We’ll manage,” Mr. Combs said. “Besides, I’m curious to know who—or what—has been making off with your things.”

  “‘Or what’?” Wellington repeated.

  Tillie nodded. “My father is quite well versed in all the old tales and creatures: pixies, fairies, changelings, redcaps.”

  “You suspect my thief is a mythical monster?” The moors were filled with mystery and magic, but Wellington hadn’t thought such had bled onto his own estate. “Is that your theory as well, Tillie?”

  “I think we’d best assume anythin’ is possible.”

  “Mark me, children, there’s more in this ol’ world than can be seen or understood.” Mr. Combs eyed them in turn. “Unless you proceed with a healthy dose of respect for what you can’t explain, you’ll forever be chasing what you can’t foresee.”

  If you have the least concern this will reflect poorly on Thurloe, I’ll turn the Darbys down.” Ana hoped that wouldn’t prove necessary. Though she enjoyed her work at Thurloe, she hadn’t always wished to be a schoolteacher. Working as a private tutor, with more independence and greater control over her time and choices, was more to her liking.

  Elizabeth nodded. “Providing musical instruction for a family of the Darbys’ standing will not be looked down on in the least. Further, it will give you more income.”

  Ana smiled. “I do not consider my wages here to be miserly, I assure you.”

  “If you would prefer, I am certain Mr. Darby would agree to not pay you.” Elizabeth’s humor was often so subtle that those who didn’t know her well missed it entirely.

  “I would hate for him or his wife to be accused of being stingy,” Ana said. “I shall accept payment for my efforts—for their sake, you understand.”

  “Very good of you.” Elizabeth dipped the nib of her pen into the inkwell. “Arrange with the Darbys to hold your lessons at a time when you aren’t teaching here. That should allow you to accept their offer.”

  “How far away do they live from Thurloe?” Ana asked. “I’m not certain I can walk there and back and still have time for the lesson if I have to schedule it between my students here. And if I pay for a hansom cab, I’ll spend all my extra income very quickly.”

  Elizabeth looked up from her pile of parchment—she was, no doubt, working on her next silver-fork novel. “I’m sure Mr. Hollis Darby would see to it you are fetched and returned without incurring the slightest expense.”

  “I don’t wish to burden him. He’s been very kind.” More than she deserved.

  Though she could not be entirely certain, Ana thought she saw Elizabeth actually roll her eyes. “Hollis Darby is the epitome of a gentleman. He asked you to do this for his family; he will not permit the doing of it to bankrupt you. Further, he would not wish you to exhaust your time and energy walking from here to his brother’s home and back. Further still, I believe he would not feel the least put out spending the length of a drive in your company.”

  That was reassuring. “Of course, if it proves a burden to him, other arrangements can always be made.”

  “Certainly.” Elizabeth offered an encouraging smile.

  Ana carefully penned a note for Mr. Darby—the younger Mr. Darby as he had been the one to extend the opportunity—and gave it to Fanny, their chambermaid and sometimes errand girl, to deliver to him. Having finished all she needed to do for the day, Ana pulled on her dark wool coat and comfortably worn boots. She did up her hair in a flattering but modest chignon. She pulled a certain silver bracelet from her violin case and tucked it into a cleverly hidden pocket sewn into the lining of her coat.

  Ana spent most of her evenings away from the school, undertaking important errands, but Fridays were set aside for her most important, most personal appointment.

  The walk to Pimlico took nearly an hour, yet she made the walk every week, no matter the weather, no matter her exhaustion. She first stopped at various vegetable and fruit carts, then a local butcher who always had a small chicken or two for a reasonable price. With her basket heavy laden, she made her way down once-familiar streets, followed at every turn by memories and regrets. If any of the residents of the increasingly fine houses she passed recognized her, none said as much nor stopped
her for a bit of reminiscing.

  She reached the faded blue door on St. George’s Road that she had once walked through every day and, using the old brass key she kept with her, let herself inside. The parquet floors in the entryway were dull and covered in a thin layer of dust. The faint trail of footsteps were hers, ghosts from a previous visit. She closed the door behind her and turned the bolt. Light filtered in through the dingy, arched transom window.

  The doors she passed as she crossed the entryway were closed, as they had been for years. She climbed the once-carpeted stairs to the first-floor landing. It too had suffered the ill effects of neglect. The beautifully carved molding no longer drew the eye or elicited admiration. The house had once been a jewel; now it was a shell.

  Ana stepped through the first door at the top of the landing, the only room still in use other than the kitchen. A tall, broad man at the far end of fifty sat in a straight-backed chair near the empty fireplace. He looked up as she stepped inside. He rose and crossed to her, took the basket of food, and left the room. The interaction was well known to them both.

  She continued to the window seat, where another man, younger but more gaunt than the first, sat on the cushionless bench, looking out over St. George’s Road.

  He wore a tattered dressing gown over his threadbare clothes, several years out of fashion. His hair stuck out in all directions, clean but unkempt. He’d not shaved that morning, likely not the morning before either. His eyes were wide, anxious. A less charitable person might have insisted there was madness there. Ana knew better. He was not of unsound mind. He had simply given up on life.

  “Good evening, Father.”

  “Mr. Thompson has been out at all hours. Up to nothing good. Society’ll forgive him though, mark my words.” His voice didn’t hold quite the flavor of Mr. Walker’s, but he’d never fully mastered the accent of the upper class. Mother had been better at that, and she’d insisted Ana behave and speak properly.