The Necklace Affair

by Jennifer Ashley

  The man stood silently as I poured out and brought him a glass. He passed the goblet I handed him under his nose, then his expression changed to that of a man who'd unexpectedly come upon paradise.

  He closed his eyes as he poured a little brandy into his mouth, then he pressed his lips together and rocked his head back in pure delight.

  When he opened his eyes, I saw tears in them. "Thank you, sir. This is exquisite. I have not tasted such . . . in many years." He spoke heavily and slowly, pausing to make a low "hmm" noise in his throat.

  "My friend Mr. Grenville has impeccable taste," I said. "You are an emigre?"

  He had the bearing of wealth and breeding, but his cheap clothes, his heavy accent, and the fact that he was in London at all told me he'd fled France long ago, when Madame Guillotine had been searching for victims.

  "I am. I was. . . hmm . . . once the Comte de Mercier du Lac de la Fontaine. A long time ago now. Now the English call me Monsieur Fontaine."

  An aristocrat, which explained the bearing. Likely the master of a vast estate, with hundreds of peasants toiling to keep him in silk stockings and the best brandy. All gone in the blink of an eye. I wagered that Fontaine's estate was now in the hands of a nouveau riche banker from Paris.

  My wife lived somewhere in France, in a small village with her French officer lover. I doubted that this man knew her--I was willing to believe he'd fled France when the first danger had flared in Paris, before England and France went to war.

  "What may I do for you, Monsieur le Comte?" I asked.

  "My daughter, she is . . . hmm . . . married to an Englishman of some respectability. He is a member of White's club and quite proud of the fact." De la Fontaine gave me the ghost of a smile. I envisioned a pompous young Englishman pleased with himself that he'd landed the daughter of a French count.

  "Do I know him?" I asked.

  "It is possible you have met him, but he holds himself above all but the . . .hmm . . . top of society. He is acquainted with your friend, Mr. Grenville."

  Which meant that Grenville at least tolerated the man. If Grenville had disapproved of this son-in-law, he would have found himself eventually pushed out of his precious White's.

  "I can't speak for Grenville," I said. "If you wish me to ask him something on your behalf, I can't promise to. I suggest that you write to him yourself."

  Monsieur de la Fontaine's smile vanished, and the cold aristocrat returned. In spite of his cheaply made suit, he had the bearing of a leader, one whose ancestors had held their corner of France in an iron grip.

  "No, indeed, Captain," he said stiffly. "I have come to speak to you. About this affair of the stolen diamonds."

  "Lady Clifford's necklace?" I asked in surprise.

  "Not . . . hmm . . . Lady Clifford's, Captain. Mine. The diamonds that this English comtesse wishes you to find belong to me."

  *** *** ***

  Thinking it through, I decided I should not be very astonished. At the end of the last century, French emigres had sold what they could in order to flee France, sometimes giving ship captains everything they had in return for being smuggled across the channel. The necklace had been made in Paris, the pawnbroker I'd spoken to had told me. Everything fit together.

  "Captain, may we sit?" de la Fontaine asked.

  I noticed his hands trembling. He might once have been a proud aristocrat, but now he was an elderly man, his bones aching with the rain.

  "Of course." I gestured him to the wing chair, the most comfortable in the room and closest to the fire. I refilled his brandy while I dragged my desk chair over to his and sat.

  Another sip of brandy restored the comte's stern but dignified stare. "Do you believe me?" he asked.

  "I do," I said. "The necklace came from your family?"

  The count tapped the arm of the chair with his brandy glass. He was angry, and holding the anger in. "The diamonds entered the de la Fontaine family during the time of Richelieu. They were . . . hmm . . . handed down through the generations. Cut, re-cut, set, and reset. They reached their present form in the middle of the last century, when my grandfather was the trusted confidant of the king's official mistress. She had them set into the necklace as a gift to him. My grandfather gave them to my father, who gave them to my mother on their marriage. When my mother passed, they came to me, and I determined to give them to my own daughter when she married. My only son was killed fighting Napoleon for the English, and my daughter is all that is left of the de la Fontaines."

  He caught my sympathy and my amazed interest. A necklace created by the mistress of Louis XV would be worth far more than the several thousand pounds Lady Clifford had claimed the necklace cost. James Denis's interest also became clear. Denis would not concern himself with a simple lady's necklace, but he'd consider one with such a history well worth his notice.

  "Why the devil does Earl Clifford have it, then?" I asked. "Did you sell him the necklace to pay your way out of France?"

  The anger built in de la Fontaine's eyes. "I never sold it, Captain. Everything else, yes. Hmm. Everything. To save my daughter, it was worth it. But I kept the necklace. It was her legacy. Then it was stolen from me. I had it before I crossed the Channel--when I arrived on this shore, it was gone."

  "The ship's captain? Or crew?"

  He shrugged. "In France, I had met an Englishman--Lord Clifford--who'd agreed, for a very large sum, to arrange passage for me and my daughter and son. My wife had succumbed to illness the year before, and my children were all I had left. I feared for their lives, and so we went. The voyage was fairly easy, and the captain seemed sympathetic. But when we disembarked, I discovered the meager belongings I'd managed to carry were all gone, and we had nothing but the clothes on our backs. When I reached London, I applied to Clifford for help, but was turned away at his front door. I was too proud to beg at his scullery for scraps, so I walked away. But the necklace was gone--I assumed stolen by the captain or one of his men. Lost forever. It . . . hmm . . . broke my heart. But at least I was alive and safe and so were my children."

  "I am very sorry for your circumstance," I said.

  I too, had lost much at the hands of others, and he had my sympathy. My estimation of Lord Clifford, not high in the first place, took a decided plunge.

  Fontaine leaned forward. "And then, one evening last summer, my daughter and her husband took me with them to Vauxhall." He chuckled, still with the humming sound. "Taking the old man out to entertain him. As we supped in the pavilion, Captain, I saw the necklace. The jewels belonging to my family were hanging boldly around the neck of Countess Clifford, wife of the Englishman who'd helped me and my children fly from France."

  "You are certain it was the same?" Even as I asked it, I knew he had been.

  "Very certain. My wife handed the necklace back to me the day she died, telling me she wished she could have seen our daughter wearing it. I walked up to Lady Clifford and introduced myself. She pretended to remember me as an emigre her husband had helped, but I knew she had no idea who I was. She never once blushed that she wore my daughter's inheritance, as you say, under my nose."

  "It is likely she did not know," I said. "I've met Lord Clifford."

  "Then you know what sort of man he is. I'd not have taken his assistance at all had I not been desperate. That night, he knew that I knew, but he looked at me and . . . hmm . . . dared me to say a word."

  "You did not go to a magistrate? Report the theft?"

  "I am French, I am in exile. You have just finished a long war with France, and even the fact that my son lost his life fighting Napoleon for the English has not made me beloved here. What am I to tell a magistrate? I have only my word. Any paper about it, any proof I have that the necklace belongs to the de la Fontaines is long gone. Earl Clifford, he has money and influence. I have . . ." He opened his hand. "Nothing."

  He was correct. De la Fontaine knew he could not prove the diamonds had belonged to him, and even I had to decide whether to believe him. He could be luring me int
o finding the necklace and giving it to him, whereupon he'd be several thousand pounds richer, and I'd be in the dock.

  But I did not think he lied. De la Fontaine did not have the bearing and manner of a liar, and I could verify the story by browbeating Lord Clifford--a task I'd cheerfully perform.

  "And what do you wish me to do?" I asked.

  De la Fontaine finished his brandy, set down the glass, and rested his hands on his knees. "What I would wish is for you to find and return the necklace to me, and tell the earl that you have failed in your quest."

  "And the moment your daughter wears the necklace to a soiree with your respectable English son-in-law? She or he will be accused of stealing it. Or at least of purchasing stolen goods."

  He closed his eyes. "I know. I have no solution. I considered having the stones reset, but given its provenance . . ."

  The fact that Madame de Pompadour had commissioned the necklace would be worth as much as the diamonds themselves. I appreciated his dilemma.

  "Then I do not understand why you believe I can help," I said.

  De la Fontaine opened his eyes. He had deep blue eyes, and now they looked old and tired. "I want someone to know the truth. I want you to find the diamonds and make certain they are safe. If they must reside with Lady Clifford forever, then so be it."

  His resignation decided the question for me. Remembering Clifford snarling at Grenville that he ought to be ashamed to interest himself in the affair, and then watching this aged, exiled man slump in defeat, angered me not a little.

  "You may leave things in my hands," I said. "I might be able to find you some justice."

  De la Fontaine shook his head, his ghost of a smile returning. "Do not make promises, Captain. I have grown used to losing."

  I rose, made my way to the brandy decanter, and poured him another glass. We'd finish all the brandy quickly at this rate, but Grenville would be happy to know it had been drunk by two men who appreciated it.

  "Why do you not return to France?" I asked as the liquid trickled into his glass. "The king is restored, the emperor dead. There is peace now."

  Fontaine saluted me with his goblet before he drank. "All I had in France is gone. My daughter is here, married to her fussy Englishman, and I have grandchildren who are growing rapidly. This has been my life for nearly thirty years. I have no reason to return."

  I nodded, understanding. I was much like him--except for the fact of his ancestors ruling France and having diamonds set for them by Louis XV's beautiful mistress. My ancestors had been wealthy landholders, but their little estate in Norfolk was as nothing compared to the vast acreage this man must have commanded.

  Now we both had nothing, reduced to wearing secondhand clothes and enjoying brandy gifted to us by a wealthy acquaintance. Out of place, wondering how this came to be, and not knowing what to do with ourselves.

  We did finish the brandy. De la Fontaine seemed to want to linger, and I let him. He asked me how I came by my injury, and winced in sympathy when I described how I'd been beaten to a bloody pulp by a band of French soldiers then strung up by the ankles. One of the more sympathetic men had cut me down after a time, but when English and Prussian soldiers had attacked the French deserters' camp, killing them to the last man, they hadn't noticed me among the dead.

  De la Fontaine shook his head at my story and told me how his son had been in the infantry, dying at Badajoz. I hadn't met the young man--I'd been cavalry in the Thirty-Fifth Light Dragoons, and we'd been fairly snobbish about the infantry.

  "Bad fighting there," I said. "Brave lad."

  "Oui. So I have heard."

  We finished the decanter in silence. When de la Fontaine made to depart, I gave him a box of finely blended snuff--another gift from Grenville. I rarely took snuff, preferring a pipe the rare times I took tobacco, but de la Fontaine thanked me profusely.

  I led him back down the stairs, and we took leave of each other. De la Fontaine shook my hand in the English way, lips twitching when he saw me bracing myself for a farewell in the French way.

  Still smiling, he walked down Grimpen Lane, a bit unsteadily, through the rain. I leaned on the doorframe and watched him, wondering how the devil I was going to find the blasted necklace for him.

  *** *** ***

  Three days passed. I told Grenville about de la Fontaine's visit and his assertion that the necklace was his. Grenville professed to be amazed, and his anger and disgust at Lord Clifford escalated to match my own.

  Grenville and I continued searching for the necklace, taking into account Lady Breckenridge's intelligence that a lady wishing to sell her jewels to pay her creditors would find someone very discreet to make the transaction for her. Her man of business, perhaps, if she could hide such a dealing from her husband.

  However, when Grenville and I visited Lady Clifford's man of business, we found a dry, very exact man who seemed to march in step with Lord Clifford regarding household affairs. Ladies were fools and ought to do nothing without the approval of their husbands. In his opinion, Lady Clifford had carelessly lost the necklace and tried to pretend it stolen to shift the blame from herself.

  This left us no further forward.

  I could see that Grenville was losing interest in the problem. Lord Clifford's grumbles about Grenville poking his nose into other gentlemen's business were beginning to circulate through the ton. While Grenville refused to bow to public opinion--any indication that he cared about such a thing could spell his downfall--he also did not believe there was much more to be done. Though Grenville agreed that de la Fontaine's story was creditable, he also suspected that the necklace would never see the light of day.

  I saw that I would be soldiering on alone. I had not yet heard from Lady Breckenridge, but I did hear again from Denis, whose carriage pulled in behind me when I left Grenville's on a wet evening three days after de la Fontaine's visit.

  The rain that had begun the afternoon I'd met de la Fontaine had continued with little abatement. The downpour was not as freezing as a winter rain, but still as drenching. When the carriage halted next to me and the door opened, I could not help but yearn for the warmth of its plush interior, in spite of the coldness of the man inside.

  "De la Fontaine," Denis began as soon as I was sitting opposite him, the carriage moving on its way to Covent Garden. "One of the wealthiest men in France before the terror. Now living in a back bedroom in his proper English son-in-law's house, treated like a poor relation." Denis shook his head, but no emotion crossed his face. "Not a happy tale."

  * * * * *

  Chapter Six

  "I do not remember mentioning de la Fontaine to you," I said. Not that I was amazed that Denis knew all about de la Fontaine's visit to my rooms. He kept himself well informed.

  "He is quite right about the necklace's provenance," Denis said, ignoring my statement. "A heavy blow to him that he lost it."

  "Am I correct in guessing that you did not know that Lord Clifford had de la Fontaine's famous necklace?" Unusual for Denis, who hired people to roam Europe looking for such things for him, the rightful ownership of which was, to Denis, a trivial matter.

  "I confess that I did not." Denis's brows drew together the slightest bit, a sign that the man behind the cold eyes was angry. "Hence why I wish to examine the piece myself. I knew the de la Fontaine necklace had disappeared many years ago, but not until Lady Clifford made a fuss about hers being stolen and involved Bow Street did it come to my attention that the two were one and the same. I had not thought Clifford resourceful enough to steal such a thing, but perhaps he seized an opportunity. Or perhaps the ship's captain stole it and sold it to Clifford, neither man appreciating what it was." Again the small frown. "Clifford owes me much money and has been reluctant to pay. He might have reported the necklace stolen to prevent himself from having to sell it to pay me, or in case I took it in lieu."

  "Lord Clifford owes you money," I said. "I might have known."

  "Many gentlemen owe me. Including you."

&n
bsp; I let the remark pass. It was an old argument.

  "If Clifford were to sell the necklace," I asked, "or his wife were to, how would they go about such a thing? Beyond common pawnbrokers and jewelers I mean. Who would they contact?"

  Denis gave me a touch of a smile. "Me. I know of no other who could discreetly dispose of so obvious a piece."

  "But if they did not realize what it was?"

  "They might try the usual avenues, of course, but as soon as it came onto the market, jewelers in the know would put two and two together. Most likely the jewelers or pawnbrokers would offer the necklace to me, or at least ask for my help in shifting it."

  "And you have not heard of it coming up for sale?"

  "No. Not yet."

  I twisted my walking stick under my hand. "If you do hear of it, will you tell me?"

  "As I said, I want a look at it first."

  "I am aware of that. But I've pledged myself to find it. Will you tell me?"

  Denis regarded me in silence while I kept twisting the stick. There was a sword inside the cane, a fact he well knew.

  When he spoke, Denis's voice held a careful note. "You have done me good turns in the past, Captain, and you are fair-minded. But I like to keep the balance clean, or at least bending slightly in my favor. If I do keep you in the know regarding this necklace, I will expect a like intelligence in return."

  I hadn't the faintest idea what I could know that would interest him, but I was certain he'd come up with something devious. Denis liked things all his own way.

  "It is a simple matter," I said. "I want to be informed if the necklace comes up for sale or when you lay your hands on it."

  "Certainly. I will allow you to be in on the bidding."

  "Bidding?" I clenched the walking stick, which stopped its twirl.

  "If the necklace proves to be the de la Fontaine diamonds, I will assuredly wish to sell it," Denis said. "I am not in the business of assisting impoverished French emigres or feckless English aristocrats. Clifford owes me money, and whatever price I can obtain for the necklace will more than suffice to pay his debt. He will not fight me for it."