by Mia Marlowe
“And how shall she know? You will tell her?” the ambassador demanded. His tone was very different from the genial host who’d plied Trev with vodka only a few hours earlier. Clearly, Artemisia could take no one at face value anymore.
“No, no, of course not.” Fear sent the voice straying into another octave. “But Beddington will know and he won’t keep mum, you can be sure of that. Whatever he knows, she’ll know.”
“Then Mr. Beddington we kill same as Shipwash when time comes,” Kharitonov said icily. “Perhaps, we do favor and send trouble-making stepmother to fishes with them, da?”
Artemisia’s hand went involuntarily to her chest. Trev’s grip on her other one tightened. She’d hoped her ears were playing tricks on her, but that hope died with the ambassador’s deadly offer. The other speaker really was Felix after all.
“What? No need for such drastic measures, I’m sure,” Felix said. “I’ll handle the duchess. Forget I mentioned it.”
Artemisia could almost smell his fear. It was clear her stepson had fallen in with the worst of companions and now had no clue how to extricate himself. At least, he hadn’t entirely thrown her to the wolves, or in this case, to the fishes, but he’d placed her in a deucedly difficult spot. Whether he realized it or not, in bartering for the key, Felix was hip-deep in the traffic of national secrets.
Men had been tried for treason and hanged for less.
Artemisia was so afraid for him, she was seized by the urge to give him a good shake. His father, the old duke, would have been mortified by Felix’s actions.
While she stewed over her stepson, the dust she and Trev had stirred in the attic began to make her nose twitch. She tried to suppress it again, but when a body wants to sneeze, it’s almost impossible to gainsay it a second time. She managed to cover her nose and mouth, but the sneeze erupted in an imploded squeak.
The voices beneath them fell silent. A booted tread clicked across the floor and stopped directly beneath her. She didn’t dare draw another breath. Trevelyn squeezed her hand, pleading for silence. Her heart hammered so loudly, she was sure the men below her would hear it.
“A flymouse. Or rat maybe,” a different voice finally said. “Whole city crawling with rats. Tomorrow, I lay out poison.”
“Nyet,” Kharitonov said. “Once we have key, back we go to St. Petersburg. Already I have dismiss English servants. Couldn’t cook anyway. First thing I do back in Mother Russia is have real food. Give me to eat stroganoff and borsch and you can keep kidney pie and stewed eels.”
Artemisia heard a thumping sound and imagined the ambassador pounding Felix’s back with mock affability.
“These pale Englishmen--any slimy thing between two pieces of bread they call sandwich and they eat, eh, Lubov?”
Felix giggled nervously at this slur on his national cuisine and excused himself.
Once he was gone, silence reigned for about a minute. Then the voice Artemisia didn’t know spoke again.
“Before we leave for St. Petersburg, you want me tie up loose end?”
“To kill Felix is waste of time,” the ambassador said dismissively. “Someone will do for us. The boy cheats at cards. Besides, him we own. A duke, bought and paid for, is like hog. We goad him now to do our will. Later, we make the bacon.”
The ambassador laughed at his own wit, then groaned. Artemisia heard the creak of a chair.
“You are ill?” Lubov asked.
“No, too much wodka. The Englishman this afternoon nearly bested me, but him I sent out feet first.” A smile crept into his voice followed by another groan. “His head I hope is worse than mine. Feels like peasant with pick-ax.”
Trevelyn grinned wickedly at the ambassador’s discomfort.
“You need sleep, Excellency. Here, I have laudanum. Keeps Shipwash quiet when workers are about,” Lubov said. “Is good, da?”
Trevelyn nodded, his excitement at this development clear. They needed the house quiet and the occupants somnolent before they could attempt the burglary. Artemisia had hoped to learn that Mr. Shipwash was held somewhere here in the residence, but Lubov’s words dispelled that notion. Workers being present sounded more like a factory of some sort.
The Russians talked a few more minutes about Mr. Shipwash, but Lubov finally took his leave without giving any other clue as to his hostage’s whereabouts. Then the light from the cracks winked out.
Trevelyn blew out their candle, plunging them into total blackness.
“Trev—“
His hand found her and traveled up her body to clamp over her mouth. Suddenly his lips were beside her ear.
“If we could see their light, the ambassador might see ours now that his is out,” he whispered so close his breath tickled the small hairs that escaped her chignon. He must have felt her tremble for he moved onto the chest beside her and took her in his arms. “Hush now, there’s my brave girl.”
Darkness enveloped her like a suffocating shroud. She couldn’t see anything. Not the rafters above her. Not the hand she waved before her face. Not the man who held her to keep her from crying out. Panic rose like gorge in her throat, but she swallowed it back.
Artemisia heard the heavy tread of the ambassador and his servant leaving the room below them, but Trev didn’t re-light the candle. She knew they needed to give the ambassador time to go to sleep, but the knowledge was small comfort there in the dark.
Trevelyn rocked her slowly, and gradually she let her head settle on his shoulder, her breathing slow and even. She closed her eyes. There was no point in leaving them open, after all. The tremors drained from her body as time stopped around her. She had no idea how long they sat there together in the darkness.
“That’s better,” he said softly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were afraid of the dark. After all, I found you in your dark studio the night of the masquerade.”
“There was still moonlight coming through the window. But ever since I was a little girl, dark places give me nightmares,” she admitted, burrowing deeper into his shoulder, drawing comfort from his solid presence in the black void. “I couldn’t have been more than five or six.”
“What happened?”
“There was an uprising. A unit of sepoys rebelled and went rampaging through the district, killing and looting. We hid in a dark root cellar while Rania and Naresh told the raiders we had fled to the hills. They destroyed the residence and moved on. But we didn’t dare come out of hiding for fear they’d return. Finally, the military routed them.”
“How long were you there?”
“I don’t know. Days. To a child, it seemed like an eternity, but the thing I remember most is that my father was afraid as we huddled in the dark. That scared me more than anything.”
“He was afraid for you,” Trev said. “That’s why it makes more sense for a player in the Great Game to be a confirmed bachelor.”
Like you, she almost said. She put a hand to her forehead. She couldn’t think about him leaving for India yet.
“Now the dark always calls that terror back for me,” she whispered. “I’m sorry. I feel so foolish.”
“Don’t. Only the foolish fear nothing.”
“So what are you afraid of?” she asked.
“Losing y—“ He stopped himself.
She wished she could see his face so she could read on his expressive features what he decided not to voice.
“I know you’re no fool.” Artemisia brought a hand up to caress his jaw. “So by your own words, you must have some fear.”
“I used to fear never being able to please my father,” he admitted. “Now I know pleasing him is impossible, so I’ve stopped trying.”
“You must love your father greatly if it meant so much to you to win his approval.”
He snorted softly. “Love is not a word my family is accustomed to using. But the truth is, my father is a miserable person. My brother, Theobald trots after him like a basset hoping for a scrap. But even boot-licking isn’t enough. No one is worthy, you see. I have
to live with the fact that I haven’t ever . . .”
“Ever what?”
Artemisia felt him struggle to find the right words. When his muscles went slack, she thought he’d abandoned the search.
“I haven’t ever given him reason to be proud of me,” he finally said.
Her heart constricted for him.
“He’ll die someday.” His voice held the flat monotone of a prophetic utterance. “And word will come to me and there will be this unspoken conversation hanging over us, never resolved. But I fear by then, I won’t care.”
She felt his body shudder.
“I fear I’ll be just like him.”
Chapter 26
Trev gave himself a brisk shake. “Well, that’s about as maudlin as I’ve ever been in my entire life.” He rose to his feet and retrieved the candle. “Must be the after-effects of too much vodka, though I’m not suffering from a bad head like the ambassador fortunately is. Surely it’s been long enough for that laudanum to send him to oblivion.”
He struck a match. The amber circle of light illuminated his face and Artemisia’s spirits rose considerably. Not just for the way the shadows retreated around them, either. Trev had bared far more of himself there in the dark than he ever had when his body was unclothed in her studio. He’d allowed her a glimpse of his soul.
Whatever his faults, and she suspected they were many, she was convinced that soul was a good one. Whatever became of them, she was glad she knew him.
“Now what?” she asked.
“We look for the trap door. There must be a set of stairs leading down into the ambassador’s residence.”
They tiptoed from beam to beam, searching in earnest. Finally Artemisia found the framed opening hidden beneath an ancient trunk plastered with travel stickers from the four corners of the globe. When Trevelyn eased the door open, they discovered no narrow stairwell at all. Instead, the candlelight illuminated an upstairs maid’s linen closet, about four feet square. The shelves were filled to bursting with muslin sheets and pillow cases and velvet draperies no longer in use, but too good to be thrown to the rag-picker. The musty smell of old linen and dusty velvet mingled with the stale, vaguely mousy air of the garret.
“Gentlemen first,” Artemisia said hopefully.
“No help for it, I’m afraid.” He braced his arms on either side of the opening and lowered himself down. He found his footing on one of the shelves and eased his way to the floor without a sound. “Right, then. Can you hand down the candle?”
It would leave her in darkness again. She hesitated.
“If it’s too hard, just leave it. We’ll muddle through,” Trev whispered.
“No, we may need it,” she said, determined to be a help instead of a hindrance. She dropped to her knees, balancing on the beams and stretched her arm down, leaning her ear to the frame of the opening.
“Got it.”
She sat back up, grateful that the candlelight still shot up through the trapdoor at least. Then it dimmed as Trevelyn pushed the linen aside and placed the candle on one of the shelves.
“Now, for you, Larla,” he said. “Feet first.”
She swung her legs over the opening and tucked her skirt through so it wouldn’t catch on anything. Even with her layers of petticoats, if she didn’t keep her knees together, he’d have a clear view of the slit crotch in her bloomers. A naughty tingle of sudden warmth shot to the area in question.
“This arrangement provides quite an indecent sight for you, sir,” she whispered down to him.
“Why do you think I insisted on going first?” He grinned wolfishly, raising his arms in invitation.
“A gentleman would close his eyes.”
“And yet mine will remain wide open.”
“Swine,” she said.
“How well you know me, sweeting,” he whispered up to her. He grasped her dangling ankle and gave it a tug. “Easy there. No, not on my head. Put your foot on my shoulder. That’s good. Now, if you can just—oh!”
She lost her grip on the edge of the frame and fell. Her skirts billowed over him and she landed with one thigh on either shoulder. His face was hidden beneath the many layers of her petticoats. He swayed slightly and she grasped his head to steady herself, pushing his face even more firmly between her legs.
“Don’t drop me,” she hissed as they tottered dangerously.
“Furthest thing from my mind,” came the muffled reply. He spread his stance and braced his feet, grasping her buttocks to steady her. Artemisia’s wobbling ceased. She felt his breath hot on her delicate folds. The feeling was delicious.
“Larla,” his voice floated up to her through the many layers. “Any fellow who tells you this isn’t a man’s dearest dream is lying, but perhaps we could choose a more appropriate time and place.”
She pulled her skirt and petticoats up and looked down into his face. Here they were, breaking and entering, preparing to burgle, and Trevelyn could still set her pulse dancing.
“Perhaps we could,” she conceded. “I don’t suppose you have a linen closet back at the Golden Cockerel.”
“No, but I’m inspired to have one built.” He waggled his eyebrows at her naughtily.
Swallowing a giggle, she eased her thighs off his shoulders and slid down his body till her toes touched the floor. How she loved the hard, broad planes of him. He slipped a finger under her chin and tipped her face up. His brows now furrowed together.
“It will probably be dark in the ambassador’s chambers,” Trevelyn said in a whisper. “You said the statues are very like.”
“They are. The poses are virtually identical,” she admitted. “But I can tell them apart by feel.”
“How?”
“Perhaps you didn’t notice this afternoon, but Mr. Beddington has . . . well, I tried to make him realistic, you see,” she said.
“From the brief glimpse I caught of your work between drinking the ambassador’s vodka and killing his fern, I’m sure both your statues are true to life.”
“Yes, but Mr. Beddington has a . . . well . . . it’s really quite understated, but I always aimed for realism even as a child.” She rolled her eyes at him. “Mr. Beddington is definitely a male.”
She felt his belly quiver with a suppressed laugh. “You mean to say he’s got a tallywhacker.”
“An exceptionally small tallywhacker. In fact, you might miss it if you didn’t know it was there.”
“You do seem bent on making them smaller than usual. How old did you say you were when you sculpted him?”
“Twelve,” she said primly. “I wonder if that’s why my art was considered precocious.”
“Without doubt.” His lips curved into a lop-sided grin. “A kiss for luck, my precocious one.” He covered her mouth briefly and then released her. The smile disappeared. “If something goes awry—“
“It won’t.”
“If it does, I will detain whoever is interfering with us and I want you to take the statue and run. Do not look back. Take the horse and do not stop until you’re safe in your own home.” He lifted the candle from the shelf and put a hand on the ivory doorknob. “Promise me, Larla.”
She swallowed hard. No matter how enthusiastic Trevelyn was about ‘The Great Game,’ clearly this was no child’s play. “I promise.”
“And even if you must destroy it, the key must not fall into the wrong hands.”
And if it comes into Trev’s hands, she reminded herself with a catch in her breath, he’ll be gone with the next ship. With great effort, she thrust that thought away. The peril to Mr. Shipwash and the fate of her father’s operatives back in India were surely of more import than her personal loss.
It just didn’t feel that way right now.
She nodded, and he turned the knob. The latch gave with a soft click and they tiptoed into the hallway. There were three doors leading from it besides the linen closet.
“Which one?” she asked with the barest of whispers. It still sounded like a shout to her ears. It really was
most fortunate the ambassador had dismissed his extra servants. She wondered if the gruff-voiced Lubov was still somewhere in residence, perhaps sleeping behind one of the closed doors.
Trevelyn pointed to the dark portal at the end of the hall. No light showed on the polished hardwood through the crack at the base of the ambassador’s chamber. Artemisia followed Trev down the narrow corridor. They took care to move slowly, feeling their way to avoid any creaky boards.
He stopped when they reached the door and tossed her a wink. It eased her nerves no end. They might be in a precarious position, but Trevelyn’s light manner kept her from panic. She smiled back at him and wished they’d had more time—no, she couldn’t let her mind travel that road. She must focus on retrieving Mr. Beddington, not on whether this would be their one and only great adventure together.
Trevelyn blew out the candle and set it down outside the threshold of Ambassador Kharitonov’s room. The scent of old wax and burnt wick rose around them. He eased the door open by inches while Artemisia prayed someone had oiled the hinges lately.
One of the ambassador’s windows had been left open, the dark curtains billowing. The room was much too cold for sleeping by English standards, but the stentorian snores coming from behind the bed curtains proved Kharitonov was unaffected by the brisk breeze. Fortunately, moonlight followed the fresh night through the open window washing the room in shades of silver and gray. There was light enough to see her way as Artemisia crept toward the shelving in the corner that held the ambassador’s collection.
She hadn’t feigned interest in the statues. They were fascinating. After a glance at the ones he kept in his chamber, clearly the others weren’t even his finest pieces. Here was an Arabian stallion of worked gold with carbuncles for eyes, an onyx and ivory zebra, a small marble piece obviously the work of an ancient Greek—it was all Artemisia could do to keep her hands from straying to explore the exquisite pieces.
But where was Mr. Beddington?
Finally, she spied him on the topmost shelf, far beyond her reach.
