The Thief of Hearts

by Elizabeth Ellen Carter

  “Would you care to dance?”

  She accepted his hand and rose to her feet.

  “You were absolutely perfect tonight,” he said. “I can’t tell you how enjoyable this week has been for me.”

  Despite herself, Caro blushed. “Me too,” she replied and they danced in silence for a minute. He seemed quite contented but her mind roiled. “What are you doing for Christmas?” she asked at last.

  “I’m catching the train to Lancashire in the next couple of days to spend it with my family.”

  “Oh...” was all she could say.

  As they danced, Caro caught Margaret’s eye. Her friend raised an eyebrow, asking a question she was too polite to broach tonight. Tomorrow, however, there would be an interrogation more thorough than any detective’s.

  Caro was attracted to Tobias, of that there was little doubt anymore, but to be honest, the thought of something more than an acquaintance borne of this adventure hadn’t fully occurred to her. But now it took root as they danced. It had blossomed into something more for him too; she could see it in his eyes. And yet, after tonight, she wouldn’t see him again.

  Bertie tapped Tobias on the shoulder.

  “May I cut in?”

  Tobias bowed and backed away, letting Bertie take her hand. Caro’s disappointment, though kept to herself, was nearly smothering.

  “You’re probably tired of hearing it, but you were wonderful tonight, Caro, just terrific,” he said. She smiled tiredly at his enthusiasm. Then he turned serious. “I really have to see you tomorrow. Will you promise you’ll be at home? Promise me you’ll be there. It’s important to me. Very important. You won’t let me down, will you?”

  A lump formed in her throat, and she was surprised at the strength of her emotion.

  “I won’t, Bertie, I promise. Come early to our Christmas Eve party and–”

  A scream rent the air. Count Valois rushed into the sitting room, his face ghostly pale.

  “Mon dieu, mon dieu, I cannot believe it! The Star of December is gone!”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Tobias reacted before anyone and ran into the Count’s suite. Uncle Walter followed quickly behind.

  Caro pushed her way into the room and saw the safe open. The ebony box too was open... and empty.

  “But how?” The Count’s voice trailed away to a whisper.

  “Concentrate, it’s very important, Count. You put the diamond in the safe after the exhibition when everyone went to dinner, correct?” asked Walter.

  “I did,” he answered. “You were there, along with Monsieur Black. He was most interested in which was the glass decoy and which was the real diamond.”

  “That’s right,” Tobias confirmed.

  The distraught Valois continued. “I thought I heard a sound just a minute ago and I came in here but there was nothing amiss. I opened the safe and the box - then poof! The Star of December is disappeared!”

  Caro sensed something, felt it before she saw it. Saw him.

  She turned and looked directly at the window. Outside – eight floors above the ground – a man looked in, almost masked by the silk lace curtain. “There’s a man outside!”

  Tobias was closest. He tore away the curtain and flung open the window but the man was gone. Tobias looked out. “He’s making his way along the ledge!”

  Before anyone could react, he had climbed out the window after him. Edward and Bertie, along with the equerry, started to follow.

  Walter barked at them. “Don’t be fools, you three, you wouldn’t stand a chance! Come with me. He’ll have to come back in through one of the other suites – we’ll get him even if we have to break through every door. James!” Caro’s father stood to attention. “Find a bobby and get someone up here now!”

  Soon – with the exception of Count Valois, who had slumped into a chair – only the women remained. Caro rushed to the window and leaned out. Her panting breath plumed in the freezing winter air and was whisked away by the stiff breeze.

  To her left, she saw Tobias and the other man, a skulking figure in black, against the midnight blue sky. Looking down, she was stricken with vertigo and looked back across at Tobias in alarm. One misstep and he could plummet to his death!

  “Come away from the window, Caroline,” her mother advised.

  “I can’t,” she said.

  Suddenly she felt warmth. Gwen and Margaret huddled close behind her. Dear Margaret had drawn a shawl over her shoulders.

  Together, they watched the nimble thief sidle along the ledge, his experience as an acrobat evident in the confident advance. Tobias was three yards behind, gamely moving forward, but noticeably less surefooted.

  Wind hit the building broadside. Tobias braced himself and waited for the gust to ebb away but it seemed not to bother the thief at all. Now he was at least five yards ahead and rapidly approaching the corner of the building. Once around it, he might be gone for good.

  Still, Tobias moved valiantly on.

  Further ahead, she caught movement. Someone had opened a window and was beckoning the thief!

  She leaned out to count just how many windows along before she was pulled back in by Gwen and Margaret.

  “Quick! We have to tell Uncle Walter,” Caro said, bustling past her mother and a rather surprised Count Valois. “Eight windows along, he’ll be in there. Come on!”

  She ran down the passage with the rest of their party following behind. Bertie and Edward were taking it in turns to shoulder charge a door. A moment later, the door gave in and the two men barrelled through followed by Walter.

  Loud thumps and the sound of glass breaking attested to the struggle going on inside. Caro hesitated at the door, unsure whether to follow into the melee. It was all but over when she entered the room. Bertie and Edward held one man by the arms, the fight apparently gone out of him. Tobias and Walter had cornered the other, but it seemed he was not going to make it an easy arrest.

  The big window in the room was wide open behind him, letting out the heat from the fire which burned brightly in the hearth.

  “Give it up, Pavel. It’s too late for you and Nemec,” Tobias panted heavily. “You can’t escape now.”

  Walter stepped forward. “Hand it over, Pavel.”

  As Caro would later recall it, everything seemed to happen in slow motion.

  The man named Pavel glanced at his friend and then back to Walter. He pulled out the blue diamond from his pocket and held it up to the light where it scintillated. Then he lobbed it into the air.

  Tobias and Walter tackled Pavel to the ground. Nemec struggled free of Bertie and Edward and surged forward, reaching out for the stone with both arms. Edward grabbed Nemec again by one arm and Bertie, flailing, struck the other. Nemec’s fingertips gave the stone a glancing tap, making it leap and pirouette into the air once more.

  Caro, and indeed everyone, saw the Star of December flash like lightning as it tumbled over and over in mid-air until it fell onto the grate.

  And shatter into a thousand little pieces.

  ***

  Gwen screamed. The Count fainted. Caro gasped as one large diamond became hundreds of little sparkling splinters lit by the tongues of fire. When she turned to Walter and Tobias, there were twin expressions of shock on both their faces as they looked back from the open window, the curtain billowing in the wind from outside.

  And Pavel was nowhere to be seen.

  “Great Scott! What happened here?”

  Caro turned to the voice. It was her father. Behind him stood two bobbies on alert.

  Walter pointed to Nemec. “Take this one away. The other one... good Lord. I can’t believe he did that!”

  “Did what?” asked Caro’s father.

  “He somersaulted backwards out of the window.”

  “Eight floors up? Then surely–”

  “–Not so fast, Mr Addison,” said Tobias who turned to lean out of the window once more. Over the wind Caro heard a faint cry of pain.

  “There’s a balconette
one floor below this. He’s broken an ankle by the looks of it.”

  Nemec apparently saw the wisdom of going peacefully and allowed himself to be handcuffed between the two police officers.

  “Take him down to the station first,” said Uncle Walter. “We’ll go downstairs and let Mr Pavel ponder the wisdom of his actions for a little while longer.”

  Caroline looked at poor Count Valois, now recovering on the couch. He looked as if his entire world had come to an end. What a dreadful thing to have happen to such a beautiful stone, and yet...

  “Diamonds don’t shatter.”

  The simple statement surprised her and she was the one who had said it. Caro looked about the room. Her mother was still in shock. The Count had an expression of dazed puzzlement on his face. The rest of her family and friends looked perplexed. Only Tobias regarded her thoughtfully, so she kept her attention on him.

  “Diamonds are supposed to be the hardest natural substance in the world,” she continued.

  Tobias smiled and she took a step towards him.

  “That wasn’t the real Star of December!”

  His smile turned into a grin and she took another step forward, adding a slightly accusing note to her voice.

  “That was the decoy.”

  Behind her the Count gasped. She felt rather than saw everyone’s eyes on her and Tobias.

  He straightened himself and shook out his arms. With his right hand, he tugged at his left sleeve.

  “There’s nothing up here...”

  Then he tugged his right cuff with his left hand.

  “...and nothing up here, so...”

  He touched her ear with his right hand.

  “...you must have it.”

  He drew back his hand and there in his palm was the Star of December diamond in all its blue, shimmering, genuine glory.

  “Mon Dieu! How...?” asked the Count who was now straightening himself on the chair. Caro observed the colour beginning to return to his visage.

  “I palmed the real gem and slipped the fake into the top of the box as you were returning it to the safe after the performance. I knew that would be the only time the diamond would be unattended. It made sense that Pavel and Nemec would try to grab it then.”

  Walter slapped Tobias on the back. “That was an excellent plan, son, but I wish you’d let me on it. I nearly had a heart attack when that stone shattered!”

  “I was just wondering...” interjected Margaret. “Who’s staying in this room?”

  “I think Pavel and Nemec were,” replied Walter. “Why?”

  “I was wondering if perhaps the Longmuir Hotel has been the gang’s headquarters all along.”

  “If so,” Gwen added with growing excitement. “Does that mean everything stolen by The Phantom is in this room? And if so, where is Van Dyke?”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “It was most unfair that your uncle wouldn’t let us stay for the search at the hotel,” said Margaret as she reached for another strip of coloured paper in yellow. Caro picked up a strip of paper in pink, threaded it through a circlet and glued down the ends to create a new link in the paper chain.

  Beside her, Gwen had just finished wrapping gifts, finishing each one with a pretty red and gold ribbon. She reached for a handful of bright red glass berries and soft white satin berries attached to copper wire to work on making extra centrepieces for the table.

  Caro had been told this morning there would be extras for dinner, so a fourth leaf would have to be dropped into the dining table to accommodate them all.

  “Well, Uncle Walter said it was so as not to taint the evidence,” she said. “I really think he wanted to be sure we didn’t slip away with any souvenirs from our adventure.”

  The door to the drawing room opened, bringing with it the scent of pine as Edward, Bertie and the footman wrestled the Christmas tree through the doorway. Edward kicked a box sitting on the floor. Glass ornaments rattled ominously.

  “Careful there, sir!” said the footman.

  Caro watched them manoeuvre the tree into its cast iron stand. Edward bent down to tighten the clamps to hold the trunk in place. Then the three left with as much noise as they had entered.

  “Caro?”

  She started at the sound of her name.

  Gwen shook her head and smiled at Margaret.

  “Caro’s been wool gathering all day,” she said with an affectionate tease in her voice. “After so much adventure, she must be finding the prospect of an ordinary Christmas rather dull.”

  “Ah,” added Margaret. “That must be it, because I’ve never ever seen you glum around the holidays, Caro dear.”

  She glanced up at them but didn’t say anything. She continued making her paper chain. It wasn’t going to be an ordinary Christmas, was it? At any time between now and the arrival of their other guests, she and Bertie would sit down and have a serious conversation about their future.

  He would pull out the ring – most likely the sapphire one – go down on bended knee and ask if she would do him the honour of ‘making him the happiest man in England’.

  What should she do?

  The husband she wanted would be clever, intrepid, fun and resourceful. She supposed Bertie could be those things, or some of them perhaps, but in her heart, she knew he was not really. He was kind and faithful and would love her, and she could learn to love him, she supposed, but not in the way she yearned to because he was, well... Bertie.

  And unfortunately, over the past two weeks, every time she thought of the type of man she wanted to marry, he looked suspiciously like Mr Tobias Black – who was, by now, half way at least to Lancashire by train to spend Christmas with his family. And who knew? Perhaps there was a sweetheart waiting for him there.

  The more she thought about it, the more depressed she became. Even the thought of their annual Christmas Eve dinner party wasn’t enough to buoy her mood.

  Every year a group of the Addison’s closest friends gathered at their home for a dinner party. It had become quite the tradition. Everyone would exchange light-hearted gifts and break open the Christmas crackers before heading off to church for midnight Mass. The family would then spend Christmas Day at home where more personal gifts would be exchanged.

  Of all the presents she could give to her mother, the acceptance of a marriage proposal would be the greatest. Oh, Bertie.

  Oh, Tobias...

  The three of them had fallen into silence and Caro felt guilty at being the cause of it. She determined to pull herself out of her funk and restore their Christmas cheer. She drew in a deep breath.

  “Well, I can tell you one thing,” she said. “Mr Hargreaves, the jeweller, had the diamond butterfly brooch back on display today.”

  “They found it!” Gwen exclaimed and gave a little clap.

  “Did they find everything?” asked Margaret.

  “I’m not sure,” Caro answered. “Uncle Walter is sending his men to every jewellery fence in the city.”

  “Fence?” Margaret laughed. “I swear Caro, you ought to write some of these things down. You might not be able to practice law when you graduate, but you could tell a jolly good detective story.”

  “I agree,” Gwen piped up. “You’d be awfully good at it.”

  “Really?” Caro asked, intrigued. “I’d never given it a thought.”

  “‘The young woman who helped Scotland Yard capture The Phantom brings her true life adventures to print’,” Gwen said stretching out her arms like an impresario. “No publisher could resist the story of a brave female detective. It’s never been done before and it’s about time it was.”

  This time Caro’s grin wasn’t forced. “I think you’re right. I should!”

  The more she thought about it, the possibilities danced in her head more enticingly than sugar plum fairies.

  “I think I shall call the first one The Magician’s Secret and start on it immediately in the New Year.”

  The rest of the afternoon passed quickly with Margaret and Gwen add
ing suggestions to her first detective story while they worked on decorating the tree. By the time the large gold star had been placed at the top, Caro’s mind was filled with settings, characters and an absolute corker of a plot.

  ***

  “Caro?”

  She turned at the sound of her name.

  “Are you alone?”

  There was a look in Bertie's puppy dog eyes, an earnestness, an excitement she had never before seen in her dear friend.

  “Yes. Gwen and Margaret have gone upstairs to dress for dinner.”

  She swallowed the lump in her throat as he took her hands and led her to the fireplace. He paused as though searching for the right words to say.

  “We've known each other for years, haven't we?”

  “At least twenty,” she agreed.

  “And you know I hold you in the deepest regard. You're as much a part of my family as I am!”

  Caro couldn't help the heat running up her cheeks.

  “Well, I'm about to ask the most important question a man can ever ask, and I need your honest answer.”

  The lump in her throat descended to her ribs, making it impossible to take in a full lungful of air. He released her hands. She watched, as though in a dream, while he pulled out of his jacket pocket a small velvet covered ring box.

  “I took your advice back in the jewellery store and picked the ring that most reminded me of the woman I want to give it to.”

  He opened the hinged lid and inside was the beautiful Alexandrite and seed pearl ring, the blues and greens shimmering in the prism of pink stone.

  “Do you think Margaret will like it?”

  What little air remained in Caro’s lungs came out with a whoosh.

  “You're going to ask Margaret to marry you?” Her question was little more than a whisper.

  “Yes!” And this time it was Bertie's turn to blush. “On New Year's Eve.”

  “Oh, Bertie!”

  “I spoke to her father last week. He told me my affection for Margaret was not unrequited. But I know how close you two are and I wanted you to know and give you my solemn vow that I will make her happy, always.”