One Night of Scandal (24 page)

Olivia shook her head. ‘No, for they were interrupted before they could empty it. Some of the glasses that Ross purchased at the Customs House auction are still here. They are very pretty, but they have no real value. I cannot understand it…’

Deb opened the lid of the case and picked up one of the remaining glasses. She had never seen them properly since it was only by accident that she had bid for them in the first place and it was Ross who had paid and brought them home. Now she turned the object over in her hands, admiring the quality of the crystal and the delicate engraving of a seagull on one side. It was beautifully executed, caught in full flight, with the wind beneath its wings.

‘The glass is very fine and the workmanship exquisite,’ she said. ‘I imagine they must be worth far more than Ross paid for them.’

‘I expect they are worth a lot to a collector,’ Olivia agreed, taking out the second of the six and examining it. ‘Ross said that John Norton approached him with a view to
buying them, but as I had already expressed an interest in starting a collection, Ross would not sell.’

Deb frowned. ‘But Sir John was at the auction. He could have purchased them then.’

‘Maybe he was caught by surprise when you outbid him,’ Olivia said drily. ‘Look at the engraving on this anchor, Deb! Is it not the most delicate thing? An artist must have great skill to create such work.’

Deb bent her head and studied the picture. There was something about it that stirred a memory, although she could not place it. She looked at the engravings on the other glasses. They all carried two pictures, one on each side of the glass. The one with the seagull had a tree on the other side. The one engraved with an anchor had the sun on its reverse, and there was another with a ship, that also bore a picture of a small cottage.

‘That one is rather attractive, is it not?’ Olivia said, with a smile. ‘The cottage looks very pretty…I cannot recall the pictures on the other glasses but they were all very finely drawn. There were twelve glasses originally, but the thief must have got away with six of them.’

Something clicked in Deb’s memory and instead of the glass in her hand she saw a sheet of paper with cipher symbols on it. She put the engraving down quickly and turned to her sister.

‘Liv—’ she began.

The door opened.

‘Lord Richard Kestrel has called to see you, madam,’ Ford announced. His tone was slightly more quavering than normal, although whether that was due to the shock of the previous night, or the whisky still coursing through his blood, Deb was unsure.

Olivia was smiling. ‘Oh, show him in, Ford! And pray send to the long paddock to tell Lord Marney that Lord
Richard is here. Lord Richard!’ She advanced towards him, hand outstretched. ‘How kind of you to call. You can see that we are not in as parlous a state as last night’s reports may have led you to believe.’

‘I am glad to see that the experience has not overset you, ma’am,’ Richard said, a twinkle in his eyes. He bowed to her and then came across to Deb, taking her hand.

‘Good morning, Deborah. How are you?’

‘I am very well, thank you, my lord,’ Deb said, feeling a quite-out-of-proportion pleasure that now they were betrothed, albeit fictitiously, he could address her in so personal a manner. ‘It is fortunate that you are here,’ she added, ‘for there is something I need to speak to you about. Urgently. In private,’ she amended, for good measure.

Richard gave her a quizzical look. ‘Is there?’

‘Yes,’ Deb said. ‘Perhaps you would care to come with me to the conservatory and inspect Olivia’s collection of
Buxus sempervirens
? They are very fine.’

‘Are they?’ Richard said. ‘Then I cannot wait to see them.’ He turned to Olivia. ‘If you would excuse us, Lady Marney?’

‘Of course,’ Olivia said, smiling widely. ‘Since you are betrothed, there can be no objection to you spending a little time alone together. I had no notion that you were so interested in my horticultural work, Deb!’ she added. ‘You must let me show you my cuttings from the
Campsis radicans
.’

Deb managed to look suitably grateful. ‘Dear Liv, I should be delighted. Just now, however, I do not wish to delay Lord Richard, who is no doubt anxious to be away to discuss horseflesh with Ross.’

‘Of course,’ Olivia said sweetly.

Deb grabbed Richard’s arm and hurried him out into the hall, closing the door behind them. ‘There is something that I need to tell you about the burglary,’ she said.

She looked around. One of the housemaids was polishing the big windows by the front door, her hand moving slowly as she gawped through the glass at the groom who was leading a horse through its paces on the gravel sweep outside.

‘We cannot talk here,’ she added. ‘We had best go and see these miniature box trees, or whatever it is that Olivia has in the conservatory.’

‘That sounds like the sort of invitation I would issue,’ Richard said, with a grin, but there was a keen expression in his eyes as he took her arm and they walked down the corridor into the cool green space of the conservatory beyond. Deb unlatched the door and drew him inside, taking a seat on the rustic wooden bench and gesturing to Richard to do the same. All pretence of indolence had dropped from his manner and he watched her with acute interest.

‘What is it you have to tell me?’ he asked softly.

‘Olivia has a collection of glasses that are engraved with the same symbols that were on the secret message,’ Deb said, trying not to allow the disturbing effects of his proximity to distract her from her tale. ‘I saw them for the first time this morning and recognised the symbols at once—’ She broke off at a soft oath from Richard.

‘Tell me the entire story, please,’ he said tersely.

Deb did so, trying conscientiously to relate it in order and leave nothing out. She told him how she had accidentally bid for the glasses at the Customs House auction, how Sir John Norton had bought a second set and tried to purchase the first from Ross and how half of them had been stolen the previous night. Richard listened and ventured no comment, but Deb could tell he was weighing her words with sharp perception.

‘But I cannot understand the connection with the cipher,’ she finished. ‘Why were the same symbols on the glasses
as on the message? It makes no sense.’ She spread her hands. ‘No one would use engraved glasses to pass secret messages! It would be far too cumbersome a process and take too long.’

Richard nodded. ‘That’s true. Most messages are undoubtedly written and passed by hand, like the sheet you found in the book. A spy network might, however, use engraved glasses as the master cipher.’ He drove his hands into his pockets and got to his feet, pacing the floor thoughtfully.

‘I do not understand,’ Deb ventured, after a moment.

Richard shot her a look. ‘In a written code, the letter A, for example, might in reality represent the letter P. You would go through your secret message substituting all the As for Ps and the same with every other pair of letters, to spell out the message. But this is a pictorial code and until today we had no idea what the pictures meant. But it could be very simple.’ He ran his hand through his hair. ‘You said that each glass bears two pictures. Suppose, for example, that this is the master you need to break the code. A glass with a picture of the sea and a picture of the sun…’

‘Oh!’ Deb’s face cleared. ‘You mean that in the message, the symbol of the sun might represent the sea.’

‘Precisely. The pictures are in pairs. If we went back to our secret message and saw that the first symbol was of the sea, we could conclude that the sign we need to replace it with is that of the sun.’

Deb pulled a face. She was struggling. Cryptography evidently was not her strong point. ‘It still does not make sense, however,’ she complained. ‘What does the picture of the sun actually mean?’

‘Daylight?’ Richard hazarded. ‘There might be a corresponding one of the moon to represent night-time.’

‘There is!’ Deb said excitedly. ‘There was a crescent moon and a full moon!’

Richard smiled at her enthusiasm. ‘How gratifying. I do believe that we may at last be close to understanding the code.’

‘Except that we only have six of the glasses,’ Deb said, deflating, ‘and no way of knowing how many there were in the first place.’

Richard’s eyes narrowed. ‘Perhaps that is something we could work on from the other end,’ he said. ‘Find the engraver. I doubt it can be anyone locally, for that might draw too much attention. London seems more likely. I shall send word to Lucas.’

Deb laughed. ‘Or we could find the other glasses! Procure invitations to all the houses in Midwinter and see who is using engraved glasses for their wine!’

Richard’s face was grim. ‘I suspect that that is exactly what they
are
doing—right under our noses! It would be typical of the damnable arrogance of these spies, drinking toasts to the King with glasses that proclaim their treason. It is a trick that has been used before. The Jacobites did it last century.’

‘Raising their glasses to the King across the water,’ Deb said, remembering Mrs Aintree’s history teaching.

‘And inscribing coded messages on the glass as well.’

Deb was frowning. ‘There are still many questions. What were the glasses doing at the auction? And who was responsible for the burglary? It cannot be John Norton or Lily Benedict, or Lady Sally, for they were all at the ball last night. I suppose there must be someone else in the Midwinter spy’s employ…’

Richard shook his head. ‘I confess that that is one of the things that puzzles me,’ he said. ‘The greater number of people involved, the greater the risk of exposure. It makes
sense to keep the matter between as small a group as possible.’ He frowned. ‘I wonder if there is someone we have overlooked…’

‘There is no one else,’ Deb pointed out. ‘At the least, there is no one else connected with the reading group.’

‘No.’ Richard straightened. ‘I had better go and take a look at those remaining six glasses. I would like to know what pairs of symbols we do have.’ He took Deb’s hands. ‘For goodness’ sake, be careful, Deborah. I mislike your involvement in this.’

He pulled her to her feet. They were standing very close together. Richard caught her up in his arms and planted a hard, swift kiss on her mouth.

‘Be careful,’ he repeated, as his lips left hers.

‘I understand,’ Deb said. She rubbed her fingers over his lapel. ‘You do not want anything to happen to me—’

‘No,’ Richard said. He looked so fierce that Deb almost flinched. ‘I could not
bear
it if anything were to happen to you.’

Their eyes met and held. Deborah took a short, shaken breath. She felt even more dazed by his tenderness than by the kiss, for there had been so much intensity in his eyes that it frightened her. She realised that he was about to say something else. Nervousness gripped her.

‘Go,’ she said. ‘Ross will be awaiting you.’

‘Deb—’ Richard said.

Deb felt terrified, as though she was on the edge of a precipice, with insufficient courage to carry her through.

‘Please,’ she said beseechingly. ‘I will speak with you later, Richard.’

She saw the stubborn determination on his face and felt almost suffocated by feelings that she could not begin to understand. She turned on her heel and left him standing there, and she knew even as she went that once again it was herself she was running away from, and not he.

Chapter Thirteen

D
uring the week that followed, Deb was obliged to admit that there was something very pleasant about being affianced to Lord Richard Kestrel. It was all too easy to forget that this was only a pretence of an engagement. Richard was extremely attentive to her in company; on the occasions that they were alone together, his behaviour towards Deb did not alter, which made it even more seductive to imagine that the betrothal was real. Never by word or deed did he imply that they were only involved in a deception. Fortunately also for Deb’s peace of mind there was no repetition of the scene in the conservatory. Richard’s mood seemed as light as hers and he made no difficult demands on her emotions.

Ross and Olivia watched the courtship with indulgent eyes and even Mrs Aintree was heard to say that Lord Richard had hidden depths. After a while it seemed to Deb that she was the only one who remembered that they were playing a game, and even she was having difficulty quelling the little voice inside that told her it would be pleasant if the betrothal was more than a charade.

Richard escorted her to the theatre in Woodbridge, took her boating on the River Deben and danced with her at the
assemblies and private balls. He never once paid the slightest attention to another woman, other than out of courtesy. Deb marvelled at it. Olivia seemed unsurprised when she confided her surprise.

‘I always told you that you were misjudging the man,’ she said, with a smile. ‘He has eyes for no one but you, Deb.’

It was disconcerting to Deb to realise that this was true. Either Lord Richard Kestrel was an extremely accomplished actor who had no trouble in sustaining the impression that he was in love with her or…But Deb refused to contemplate the alternative. Richard had spoken no words of love and just the thought that he might was enough to create a fear and a longing in her that threatened to overset all her careful plans. The engagement was to be of short duration only; it was a pretence; she had no wish to lose either her head or her heart over such a man. And yet Deb knew that she was already in danger and that every moment she spent with Richard just made that danger more acute. The more she tried to ignore it, the more dangerous it seemed.

‘It is no wonder that you never catch any spies,’ she said one evening, when they were sitting together on a knoll overlooking the Winter Race at sunset. The sky was an angry red that evening and it felt as though there was thunder in the air.

‘You have spent all your time with me these two weeks past, Richard, and given nary a thought to your work. The whole of Midwinter could be bursting with nefarious characters for all the attention that you are paying. You must be the poorest spy catcher in the government’s employ.’