The Lost Jewels

by Kirsty Manning

  “I understand all right—you’re a coward,” she hissed through gritted teeth as she tried to wrest herself from his grip. “Now let go of me.”

  “Calm down. You’re making a scene.”

  Essie’s chin started to throb, and she winced.

  Hooves thudded on cobblestones, a motorcar honked as a dray skidded into the gutter. Her chest thumped as the horse whinnied and tossed its head as it was yanked sideways by the out-of-control tilting dray.

  “She said to let go!” All at once Gertie flew out of the mist with wild eyes and lunged at Edward, pushing him away from her sister with both hands.

  Edward toppled backward on one foot, left leg flying and arms flapping as he tried to regain his balance. Gertie grabbed Essie by the elbow and whispered, “Quickly,” as they ran toward the pale-faced Mr. and Mrs. Yarwood who stood by a nearby lamppost.

  For the rest of her life, Essie would never forget the horror on her neighbors’ faces, the crack of bone on cobblestones, and the splatter as the metal wheel of the dray made contact.

  Chapter 25

  Kate

  LONDON, PRESENT DAY

  The Serpentine Gallery stood neat and proud in the heart of Kensington Gardens. Manicured lawns stretched in every direction, and the classical lines still felt more teahouse than art gallery. Crowds milled about, turning their faces to the morning sun like sunflowers.

  Bella greeted her in the foyer. “London’s going all out, isn’t she?”

  “And I thought Bostonians were obsessed with the weather!”

  Bella laughed and slipped her arm through Kate’s as they entered the gallery. “It was only when Mum went through all the stuff in the attic that she found out Gertrude had been painting and sketching for years. Plus there were her diaries from when she was a girl.”

  They’d wandered along the corridor to the final, well-lit room. As they stepped through the doorway, Kate stopped, arrested by the sight of a huge canvas of a female nude with her back to the viewer. The woman was painted the deep cornflower blue of a sapphire.

  Kate glanced at the painting as her phone pinged. She pulled it from her pocket to check the message.

  Sorry I haven’t been able to catch you to chat. Hope you enjoyed Paris. Shows insane. Will try tonight. Miss you, Marcus xx

  The tone was breezy—typical Marcus—but the last few words made her shiver. Miss you.

  Bella gave Kate a quizzical look. “You are somewhere else today . . . Look! That painting is the exact shade of your earrings.”

  “Blue was always Essie’s favorite color. Mine too. I think that’s why she gave me these.”

  “Clearly the sisters shared the same taste. I mean—” Bella waved her arm at the far wall, where the same nude figure lay curled asleep in one picture, and leaped across a river—a lake?—in another. As Kate drew closer, she saw faint lines across the bodies, like facets, as if they were made not of flesh, but gemstones.

  “These are remarkable. The figures are so sensual; they seem to have the luster of gemstones.”

  “I thought these would appeal to you.” Bella nodded. “But apparently the only jewels Gertie ever wore were her gold wedding band, a pair of pearl earrings, and this pendant.”

  They walked along, studying the canvases, until they came to a break on the wall. The museum had placed a series of black decals as quotes, perhaps to give the visitor a moment to pause and reflect as they went through the exhibition.

  Sapphires possess a beauty like that of the heavenly throne; they denote . . . those whose lives shine with their good deeds and virtue.

  Marbodius of Rennes (11th-century bishop and poet)

  Kate thought of Essie raising funds for libraries and public schools, establishing college scholarships, and her endless campaigning for free women’s health centers. Back in London, her younger sister Gertrude had been doing the same type of thing: campaigning for women’s rights, opening shelters.

  Two women, two cities.

  Kate looked at the gold button pendant peeping from under Bella’s silk shirt. There were no definitive answers about the button. No leads, only speculation. But if Kate could prove Gertrude’s button was a Cheapside jewel, it belonged at the museum. Yet it also belonged with Bella.

  Not everything in life is black and white.

  * * *

  At their allocated time to examine the diaries, Bella and Kate made their way into a private reading room and were seated at a mahogany table. A prim assistant in a button-down shirt and cardigan entered carrying a stout oak box and placed it on the table. With a flourish, he produced a giant Victorian iron key from a keychain on his belt, unlocked the box, flicked back the gold clasps, and lifted the heavy lid. The release of pressure made it sound like the old oak box was sighing. Bella raised her eyebrows and covered her mouth to stifle a giggle at this theatrical gesture.

  “You have one hour—and please use the gloves when handling the documents.”

  Kate picked up a pair of protective gloves and handed them to Bella, before pulling on the second set. “Of course. Thank you.”

  The assistant left.

  Kate lifted out some letters and diaries, then reached for her eyepiece and spread her sketches from Boston across the table in front of her. Bella leaned toward her as she opened an accounting ledger book and saw the girlish script on the front page: Gertrude Murphy.

  The letters were cataloged chronologically, the first from Essie dated 1918. Essie told Kate when she was writing her college entrance essay that she’d left London in 1912. Why weren’t there any letters from Essie in the years immediately after she left England?

  Dearest Gertie,

  I’ve received your monthly letters but I’m sure you’ll understand why I thought it not safe to respond until now. I’m both shocked and proud to hear about your work for the war effort and pray that this madness will be over soon and we can arrange to see each other . . .

  Kate smiled as she read the descriptions of her grandfather Joseph’s first day of elementary school, his refusal to wear his socks pulled up, and his constant sullied shirts and torn collars from the playground and the precious dimpled cheeks and lopsided smile that so reminds me of our Freddie . . .

  She flipped through the letters before starting on the diaries and sketches. The archives contained page after page of sketches: chickens; twin girls holding hands and laughing; a trail of flowers down a drainpipe; a corner view of the dome of St. Paul’s. Every page was crammed with drawings, and every image was vivid. Each one told a tale. As she turned the pages, she noticed where some had been torn out and held her own ledger pages up one by one, ragged edge to ragged edge. Each was a match, as true as the line of freckles and dark curls trying to escape from the braids of Flora and Maggie.

  The last picture was a sketch of the twins asleep, eyes closed, candles by their heads. There was a stillness to them that filled Kate’s eyes with tears.

  Bella reached for her hand and squeezed it. “Well,” she whispered. “I think we’ve solved the mystery of who drew the pictures.”

  “I think so,” said Kate as she started flipping through the ledger again, looking for a glimpse of a button—or any other jewel. There was none.

  She sighed.

  As Kate turned the final page, the light overhead caught the slightest impression on the page. The previous page had been torn out, but a ghost of script remained. Using her eyepiece, she recognized the handwriting that had graced so many of her birthday and Christmas cards for years.

  Mrs. Edward Hepplestone

  Mr. Edward and Mrs. Esther Rose Hepplestone

  That was curious. Who was Edward Hepplestone? Essie quickly jotted the name into her notebook. There was no mobile reception in this room, so she’d have to wait until she was elsewhere to google it.

  “Does the name Edward Hepplestone ring any bells with you?” she asked her cousin.

  “None,” replied Bella.

  “I’ve been asking the wrong questions and looking in the w
rong places. I wanted to link Essie with the Cheapside collection based on a few fairy tales . . . but really it’s Essie’s story I need to uncover. There’s so much about her early life I know nothing about. Gertrude and Essie wrote frequently, judging by this stack of letters.”

  “Yes. It’s lovely. Standard letters and clippings, news of the family, christenings, occasional rages against Thatcher, a picture of Gertie in her academic gown flanked by two elderly people in their Sunday best.”

  Kate flipped the picture over and saw written in Gertrude’s hand: Graduation, St. Hilda’s. Mr. and Mrs. Yarwood. Mr. and Mrs. Yarwood . . . Who were they? she wondered.

  She looked from Bella to the stack of letters and the inky shadows of the sleeping twins in the ledger book.

  “For the life of me I can’t work out why Essie never returned to London,” she said. “She could afford it. She met her sister in Hawaii every year, and Gertie came to Boston a dozen times. But why did Essie never come here? I mean, it’s London. And it’s family. Why stay away forever?”

  “Well . . .” Bella tapped her chin thoughtfully, “from my experience in family court, people leave their families behind for any number of reasons. I’ve seen mothers leave their children because they felt it was for the best; they felt that the child would be better provided for by the father or another family member. Or they knew that they simply did not have the capacity to care for the child. They were severely traumatized, suffered crippling postnatal depression—or they were drug addicted.”

  A tear ran down Kate’s cheek. “I just can’t imagine leaving behind someone so precious. A baby—or a beloved little sister.” She traced one of the twin’s sunken cheeks with her gloved finger.

  “I can’t begin to imagine your pain, Kate,” Bella said softly. “Losing your baby . . . Jonathan.”

  Kate nodded, wishing she could dive into the blue expanse of one of Gertrude’s paintings and ease the pain and grief laced around her heart. “Do you think Essie left London because she thought her family was better off without her?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. But I met Essie that summer when we visited the US on our family-tree tour. Remember? She was really something . . . She offered me my first sip of champagne out in your back courtyard, you know. She lived every moment.” Bella recalled the Marbodius quote they’d seen out in the exhibition: “Essie had a life that shone with good deeds and virtue.”

  “I get that, but—” Kate stopped, remembering the haunted look in Essie’s eyes that day in her study on Kate’s eighteenth birthday. Essie had said she’d made a terrible mistake . . . and I live with that guilt each and every day. Kate had assumed Essie’s mistake, her regret, was not returning to London. But what if it was the mistake that had forced Essie to flee her home in the first place?

  “There are no answers here,” Kate said as she placed the ledger and letters back in the box and closed the lid, deflated.

  Bella put her hand on Kate’s forearm. “Kate, if there are any dark secrets in Essie’s past—or Gertrude’s—isn’t it better to leave them be? When someone leaves a loved one behind, in my experience it is never because they don’t care. It is perhaps the single most torturous decision they will make in their whole life. In court—and in counseling—it is almost always referred to as a breaking point.”

  “But—”

  Bella held up her hand. “No buts, Kate. Every single time, the woman feels she had no choice but to walk away. Stay and she might be killed by a partner who beats her. Stay and she might overdose. Stay and she might find herself unable to cope with the demands of a child. A woman very rarely leaves her loved ones in danger.”

  “You’re saying that Essie left Gertrude behind not to start a new life for herself, but so that her sister would have a better life?”

  “Both can be true. See those blurred lines?” Bella pointed at Kate’s scraps of paper spread across the table. “Life’s full of messy edges.”

  * * *

  Following the morning at the Serpentine, Bella had rushed back to court and Kate to her hotel room at the Mandarin Oriental.

  She’d fallen behind on the Cheapside essay, and the magazine’s deadline was next week.

  A cold cup of Earl Grey sat on her desk, and chocolate licorice bullets lay in a small pile by her computer—she’d decided to reward herself with a bullet per paragraph. So far the candy pile was barely diminished.

  Taking a moment to procrastinate, she googled Edward Hepplestone 1912, and a small notice from The Times appeared on her screen. As she read, she tugged at a curl and made yet another futile attempt to tuck it behind her ear.

  26 NOVEMBER 1912

  MAN KILLED BY HORSE TRAP AT PICCADILLY CIRCUS

  Mr Edward Hepplestone, son of Mr George and Mrs Audrey Hepplestone of Mayfair, was knocked down and killed by a horse and cart at Piccadilly Circus yesterday evening. Police are looking for witnesses and the family have offered a £1,000 reward to any persons who come forward with information.

  Two women of small build and dark hair were spotted running from the scene, but as yet have not been identified. The investigation is ongoing and police expect charges to be laid.

  Chapter 26

  Kate

  BOSTON, PRESENT DAY

  On her first day back in Boston, Kate met Molly and Emma for a bowl of deconstructed lobster bisque at a new bistro overlooking the Charles River. Rowers glided past in neat pairs, battling the fine misty rain and sharp wind sending ripples across the river.

  The sisters first caught up on Molly’s news; she was coming up for partnership in the fall, and she and Jessica had plans for their new kitchen. Jess wanted pale blue, Molly wanted charcoal and stainless steel.

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me?” Kate asked with a chuckle.

  As the wine was poured, Kate produced the envelopes of Essie’s—Gertrude’s—sketches. She pulled the sketch of the button to the top and described how similar it was to Bella’s button, then showed her the photos of the buttons at the Museum of London.

  “Well, the button in the sketch looks the same as the ones in the photos, but this evidence is circumstantial at best. It’d never stack up in court. Have you told Bella?”

  “A little. I showed her the images from the museum, of course.”

  “And?”

  “And nothing! But if we had concrete evidence . . .”

  “You’d suggest she donate it to the museum? I know you. But no one can identify who the original owners are, Kate. What’s the point?”

  “I’m not sure. But I want to find out.”

  Kate was interrupted by a poke to her thigh.

  “I went to a Dora party,” said Emma.

  Molly laughed. “It’s a thing!” She reached for her wineglass. “God help us. How are we into themed parties when they can’t even—”

  “Mommy! I’m talking to Aunty Kate.” Emma turned back to Kate and began to recount in great detail the party she had attended. “There was a Dora birthday cake, and a whole backpack full of candy!”

  “I thought candy was only allowed at my house,” Kate said.

  “Shh,” Emma said. “Mommy doesn’t know . . .”

  Her niece smelled of milk and soap, and Kate couldn’t stop stroking her flyaway wisps of blond hair. The little girl was heaven. It had only been a few weeks, but Emma looked older already. Her cheekbones were a little more defined, and her words were clearer.

  “So how many cities did you go to this time, Aunty Kate?”

  “Four.”

  Emma counted out four on her fingers and held her hand up for approval. “Are you staying here now?” Emma’s chin jutted out, and she wrinkled her nose. Her niece looked a little like the twins in Gertrude’s notebook. Kate leaned over and gave her a hug.

  “Yes. For a bit.”

  Molly reached across the white tablecloth and squeezed Kate’s hand. “You look different.”

  “It’s the tan. My delicate Irish skin is not used to the rays.”

  “I d
on’t mean the tan. I mean something’s changed. Your posture, your . . .” Her eyes narrowed as she sat back in her chair. “Did you get laid?”

  “Mol—” Kate looked at Emma, who was now occupied with The Very Hungry Caterpillar, which Molly had brought along as a distraction.

  “I knew it! It was that spunky Aussie photographer that you were working with on the Cheapside job, wasn’t it? Marcus. I met him when I was your date to the Tiffany thing in New York, remember?”

  “Honestly . . .”

  “What? That’s great. He’s gorgeous.” She raised her eyebrows as she took a sip of her Chablis. “So when are you seeing him again?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Don’t know when you’re seeing him, or if you’re seeing him?”

  “Both, I guess,” said Kate as the waiter placed bowls piled with steaming lobster and scallions on the table. Emma was given a small bowl of pasta and some fries, so naturally Kate and Molly each stole some.

  “Hey,” said Emma, trying to swat away their hands. “Mine.”

  “Yours!” the sisters said at the same time, and burst into laughter.

  Outside, a sculler was heaving the oars in a steady rhythm. His arms were lean and powerful, and Kate remembered Marcus’s arms tight around her in her Sri Lankan hotel room, then again at the stifling Colombo airport when he’d hugged her goodbye.

  “Did you get that postdoc application in?” Molly asked.

  “Not yet. I’ve been thinking it’s not for me at the moment. But I did send my divorce papers back to the lawyer.”

  “Cheers to that!” Molly clinked her glass against Kate’s. “You okay?”

  “I’m good.” And for the first time in years, she actually meant it. Marcus still hadn’t sent the champlevé ring images, and she didn’t know when, or if, she would see him again. But she felt steady and strong—as if she’d just stepped outside onto fresh wet grass after a storm had passed overhead.

  Her phone beeped, and she pulled it out of her pocket to turn it off, but saw Marcus’s name. Was the man a mind reader?

  “Sorry! Text.”

  “No phones at the table,” said Emma as she waved a fry at her aunt.