The Lost Heiress

by Roseanna M. White

  Brook grinned at her father and stopped at his side. He would remember her exact words from their first meeting.

  The major’s nostrils flared. “But her smile. Her eyes.”

  It took all her will to keep from stepping half-behind her father. She could not imagine her mother ever being close to this man before her. “The Fire Eyes, Major. Not mine. What are they? And why was I nearly killed over them?”

  Rushworth spun away, spitting out an expletive. “It has found you. I thought … with ignorance would come safety—that the curse could not strike those who didn’t know about it.”

  “Curse.” Papa’s incredulity saturated his tone.

  The major turned back to them with a glare worthy of the Russians. “Don’t patronize me, Whitby, as if I am the fool. You think you can believe in your precious Lord in heaven without admitting there is another side? You think there is no power in darkness? I have felt it—I have heard it howling in the jungles while you’ve been safe in your mansion.”

  Lightning and thunder and darkness. Brook suppressed a shudder and made no objection when her father rested a hand on her back. Children of the light. Children of the day. “The Fire Eyes—whatever they are—carry a curse?”

  His eyes found hers, and they were a roiling brown. “So goes the legend—that hatred and eventually death will follow whomever holds them. I dismissed it when I heard it. And when my every relationship crumbled to pieces, I called it man’s greed, not a devil’s curse. But perhaps the two are not so different.” He nodded, and his gaze fell to her throat. “Your mother’s pearls?”

  Her fingers sought and found the familiar dangling globes. “She was wearing this necklace when she died—it was all I had of her until I came home last autumn. I always wear it.”

  Though the major’s lips turned up, it scarcely resembled a smile. Though he laughed, it carried no mirth. “Then you have always been wearing the Fire Eyes.”

  She pulled her hand away, the pearls scalding her.

  “What?” Papa turned a bit so they could see each other’s face, his eyes wide. “That is what you sent her with that letter? The Fire Eyes are pearls?”

  “I sent it to her. But they are not pearls.” He held a hand, motioned with his fingers. “If I might see it?”

  Papa seemed struck mute. So with a deep breath, Brook reached up and unhooked the necklace—stretched out her arm and let the gold and pearls drip into the major’s palm.

  He reached into his pocket, drew out a pen knife, and sank into a chair.

  Her fingers rested on her bare neck as he fiddled with the longer of the dangling pearls. Each pulse thundered, fluttered. Try as she might, she couldn’t make sense of it.

  Rushworth sent a hard glare to her father and then looked down again. “I meant only to hide the Fire Eyes—that’s the only reason I sent them to Lizzie. It was not … I knew she would never accept a gift from my hand—she had made that clear. So I wrote a letter and signed your name to it, Whitby. Sent the necklace with it. I thought she would stash it in her safe with her other jewelry, wear it once or twice, but otherwise forget about it, not even thinking to mention it to you. I knew you sent her endless gifts. I thought they would, for all intents and purposes, vanish.”

  Papa’s nostrils flared. “What are they?”

  The major grunted, focused on his task. “They, Whitby …” The tip of his knife seemed to have found purchase. A moment later, the pearl split into two perfectly even half spheres. He shook a red gem out into his palm. “Here.”

  He held the jewel on his outstretched palm, though it was a long moment before Papa reached for it. He frowned as he examined it. “Ruby?”

  “Ruby!” Rushworth barked a laugh. “Guess again.”

  “Well, it certainly isn’t a garnet.”

  “No.” Brook picked it up from her father’s hand and held it up to catch the sunlight shafting through the window.

  Fire leaped to life within it, sending a scarlet-toned rainbow dancing on the opposite wall. “It’s … it’s a diamond. A red diamond.”

  “Two red diamonds.” Rushworth held out a second one, which must have come from the other dangling pearl. “Identical. Flawless. Two carats each. Worth a fortune.”

  Brook accepted the second, held them up beside each other. The beauty of the stones, so pure a red, so bright with internal life, left her speechless.

  Her father shook his head. “They are lovely, but rather small, aren’t they? They can’t be worth more than a few thousand pounds.”

  “Are you daft?” Rushworth motioned toward the jewels. “They are the rarest diamond in the world—only a few have ever been discovered, and the largest is only five carats. To have two of them—flawless, identical, and that large … Kings have killed for these jewels. Wise men have abandoned faith to search for them. According to Indian legend, entire villages were wiped out, burned to the ground, in the pursuit of them.”

  Brook lowered them, let them fall back into her palm, and then held them out. “How did you come by them, then?”

  The major put his hands behind his back. “A stroke of luck—bad luck, I now firmly believe. They were being sold as rubies by some chap from the jungles desperate for enough money to buy food. I bought them more out of pity than anything. But when I examined them, I soon realized what I had. I asked questions—my second mistake.”

  Since he wouldn’t take them, she closed her fingers around the diamonds. “Because then word spread that you had them.”

  “And everyone wanted them. The natives say the Fire Eyes were forged by the gods and given to Dakshin Ray, the tiger god. But humans stole them, and so Dakshin Ray put a curse upon them. To turn brother against brother, father against son, until chaos reigned—and then the tiger would come.”

  “You can’t believe that.” But Papa’s voice was not so firm, not so strong.

  Rushworth sank back down into the chair. “I didn’t. But what I did believe were the three attempts on my life after I bought them. I thought it the craze of the locals, so I took my leave and came home. In England—sensible, staid, cool England—I knew logic would prevail.”

  And yet it was here, in sensible, staid, cool England, that someone had nearly killed her for them. Where this man’s niece had declared her an enemy because she thought Brook had them. Thought they must have been among her mother’s things.

  And she had been right.

  Brother against brother … apparently cousin against cousin too.

  “You must have told your brother, and he his wife.” She leaned into Papa’s side. “That must be how Lady Catherine knew of them. They told her.”

  The major sneered. “No doubt raised her to think they were by rights hers, and I stole them. The moment John set eyes on the things, he wanted them. The Indians would have said the curse’s fangs sank into him. I never should have brought him in. I shouldn’t have told anyone about them. But I had been too long out of the country. I needed help finding a reputable jewel dealer. But a finder’s fee was all I offered, not the equal partnership they claimed. Next thing I knew …”

  He shook his head and averted his face. “They pitted us against one another. They would have torn us all apart. I did the only thing I could think to do and had this necklace made to hide them. Got rid of them.”

  “Hidden is not rid of.” Papa took a step away from her, putting himself back in the major’s line of sight. “Why not actually do it? Toss them into the sea?”

  “You might as well ask why we don’t destroy Rome, since people once fought over it. The history of those jewels, Whitby …”

  “It isn’t the history you wanted to preserve.” Brook strode over to the side table on which he’d set the necklace. She put the diamonds back inside the shells and found they snapped together without a visible seam. Such amazing craftsmanship, all to deceive. “If that were the case, you would have donated them to a museum. Instead, you sent them to my mother knowing well you could get them back someday. And hoped that in the meantime
, your brother would forget about them.”

  Rushworth ran a hand over his moustache but wouldn’t meet her gaze. “I underestimated their potency then—I won’t now. I gave them to your mother, young lady, so they are now yours. Donate them if you want, toss them in the drink if you’d prefer. But I want nothing to do with them again. I’ve lost enough thanks to those accursed diamonds. My brother, my best friend.”

  “My mother.” She traced a finger along the necklace with its vicious secrets.

  “Now, see here.” The major rose, too fast, too close. “You can’t lay the blame for that accident upon the Fire Eyes. I told John I’d sold them without his help, and I left the country. No one knew I’d sent the necklace to her, and it was so long afterward that she died …”

  “What?” Papa stepped to her side again. “You couldn’t have even boarded the boat yet when she was killed.”

  “Has your memory left you, Whitby? I went back in August. It was October she died.”

  “No, it was August. The nineteenth. The day you left York for Bristol.”

  “No.” Rushworth’s eyes went foggy. “It can’t be. I got the telegram after I’d been back several weeks, and it said it had only just happened, after Pratt’s murder … .”

  Brooke remembered Lady Catherine’s mention of Pratt’s father being shot in a back alley soon after her mother’s accident. Might the two be connected?

  “I would not have …” The major’s eyes widened. “You mean to tell me I could have gone to her funeral? Why did no one send a message while I was yet in Bristol?”

  Her father drew in a long breath and heaved it back out. “I cannot answer for your brother. For my part, I could think of nothing but the loss. Lizzie dead, Brook missing. Nothing else mattered. I can scarcely even remember the trip home from London after Mr. Graham wired the news to me.”

  “John.” Now it was his brother’s name that Rushworth spat out like a curse. He passed a hand over his gleaming head. “Were he not dead, I would throttle him.”

  “Do you think he … ?” Papa’s breath came too fast and then seemed to bunch up. “Could he have found out somehow that you sent them to her? Could he have threatened her—could that be why she was on the road that night?”

  The major shook his head, but it didn’t seem to be in answer. “I dare not say it’s impossible, not at this point. Not if my niece has been asking your daughter for the diamonds.”

  Silence pulsed through the room for a long minute. At last Rushworth stood, tugged his jacket down, and met her father’s gaze.

  “I am sorry, Whitby. Much as I never liked you, I never meant to bring tragedy upon your house. I certainly never meant to hurt Lizzie.”

  “I know that,” her father said, voice hushed.

  The major’s gaze shifted to Brook. “And it’s then because of me that you were lost for so long. I am sorry for that too. I never wished anything but joy for Lizzie’s girl.”

  Brook could only nod.

  “I’ll do what I can to set things right, though heaven knows I cannot undo the things that really matter. But I’ll pay a visit to Crispin and Catherine. I documented everything, knowing I’d someday need proof the Fire Eyes were mine.”

  They wouldn’t believe him—there was no doubt of that. Documents could be so easily forged. But she appreciated that he wanted to try. “Thank you.”

  He jerked his head once in a single nod and made for the door. She thought he would charge through it without another word, but instead he paused in the threshold and turned back. “My first stop when I leave here will be my solicitor, drawing up a new document verifying they have been legally given to you. But if my niece and nephew do not cease their pestering, you may want to consider that donation, my lady. And make it very public, with cameras flashing at every turn. Where the press is—”

  “There is safety. A friend of mine recently said as much.”

  “You have wise friends. You’ll need them.” His shoulders rising with his breath, he nodded once more and disappeared.

  Brook turned to her father. “What now?”

  Papa reached for the necklace on the table and held it up. “I don’t believe in curses.”

  Thunder and lightning and darkness. Brook shuddered. “I do. There is a reason the Bible warns us not to dabble in such things—and it cannot be because they are fables.”

  He granted that with a tilt of his head. “Allow me to rephrase—I do not believe curses can have more power than our Lord. We will pray for guidance. We will trust in Him. And …” He reached around her to fasten the necklace in its usual place. “Until we receive guidance from Him, we do nothing out of the ordinary. They don’t know they’re in this necklace, so it is, for the moment, the best place to keep them.”

  She touched the pearls. So many times over the years she had done so, never guessing at what lay within.

  They would never feel the same to her again. “When she fled, she thought this from you. Whatever sent her to the road that night, she was wearing this because it was the most recent gift you’d given her.” But it had all been a lie, and it could well have killed her. Brook shook her head. “We could give them to Catherine. Make the madness stop.”

  Papa’s nostrils flared, and he blinked. “No. If the Rushworths are somehow responsible for her death—no. I’ll not let them profit from it. It isn’t right.”

  No, it wasn’t. But then … so little seemed to be.

  Twenty-Four

  Deirdre got past the door of the Hendon Hall Hotel this time. No Major Rushworth waited in the garden to halt her, and the frazzled maid who greeted her at the door waved her in and up the back stairs.

  Room six, the maid had said. She found it on the second floor easily enough and knocked. Lightly at first, though she’d been told the major was out, so she had little fear of disturbing him. When no reply came, she knocked louder.

  Was that a groan from within? Her pulse increased. “Uncle Seamus? Is that you?” She pounded harder but could hear nothing else from within. “Uncle, it’s DeeDee.” He was in there, and the major wasn’t … so she put her hand to the knob and turned.

  It gave under her hand when she pushed. “I’m coming in.”

  No objection sounded, so she pushed the door open the rest of the way.

  And screamed.

  ’Twasn’t her uncle sprawled on the floor in a pool of red, that she saw in a moment. But it did nothing to keep her from screaming again, from pressing to the wall. Her knees went weak. The khaki pants, the scuffed boots, the gleam of sun on his head … the major. The maid had been wrong—he was here, and someone had … had …

  Did he live? She couldn’t imagine how, with all the blood soaking into the wooden floor beneath him. But she had heard a groan, hadn’t she?

  She heard it again, seconds before the pounding of feet sounded on the stairs. Not from the major—from the room to the right. Deirdre stumbled that direction and through the open doorway. “Uncle Seamus.”

  He lay on a cot in a stained undershirt, a sheet pulled up to his waist. Despite the years since she had last seen him, she knew him immediately—he looked like Da, but for the silver hair. “Uncle Seamus.” Her knees gave out before she could lower herself gracefully to the floor, but she made it to him and gripped his hand.

  No blood, praise be to the Lord.

  But plenty of shouting now, from the outer room, and a flurry in her uncle’s room as well. It all blurred together. A cacophony, when all she wanted was a whisper from her uncle’s lips. Figures darting around her periphery, when all she wanted to see was the lifting of his eyes. “Uncle Seamus. Uncle, it’s me. It’s DeeDee. Are you all right? Speak to me, I beg you.” She said it over and over again.

  Finally he blinked.

  And then hands closed over her shoulders and pulled her away. She tried to shrug them off, to slap away the arms that turned her. Her struggle stopped cold when she caught sight of the Scotland Yard uniform on the man who held her.

  His eyes were i
cy and hard. “Are you the one who found him?”

  How had the police arrived so soon? Or was it soon? How long had she been on her knees, gripping her uncle’s hand, ignoring the buzz around her? “I … I came to see my uncle is all. The maid said the major was out. I … He’s sick. Uncle Seamus is sick.”

  The officer’s hands gripped her tighter. “Were you the one to find the major?”

  She wanted home. She wanted Hiram to put an arm around her. She wanted Lord Whitby to stalk up behind her and command this man to let her go. She wanted … she wanted to wake up and find this nothing but a nightmare to make her thrash about on her bed the way the baroness always did.

  “Miss!”

  “Yes.” Her eyes slid shut, and her knees felt weak again. “Yes, I found him.”

  “You forced the lock?”

  “What?” Her eyes opened again, though they refused to focus on him. “No, sir. It was unlocked. I turned the knob, is all. I … I wanted to see my uncle. The major was out, she said, and I heard him groan.”

  His hands left her shoulders, and for a second she knew relief. Then he gripped her by the elbow instead and propelled her forward, out, into the buzz and cacophony. When he aimed her for the exit, she dug in her heels. “No! My uncle!”

  “We’ll see to him. You need to come with me to the station.”

  She nearly fell on the way down the stairs, earning her a curse from the officer—detective? He all but shoved her into the police carriage waiting outside, though then he left her in there alone for half of forever.

  The other half was saved for the agonizing ride through the city.

  Though when he hauled her into Scotland Yard as if she were a criminal, she began to wish the ride had lasted longer. He sat her down on a hard chair and positioned himself behind a desk. “Your name?”

  “Deirdre O’Malley.” Oh, how her mum would be appalled to see her here now. She twisted her fingers around each other.

  “Your uncle is the batman of Major Rushworth?” The detective—there was a little board on his desk that labeled him as Detective Cole—scribbled something onto a page.