A Rumored Fortune

by Joanna Davidson Politano

  “Well, no one will have it if it’s not found.” Neville’s careful voice carried up to me. “I suppose the only way to handle it is to work together. I’m sure we each have a piece of the puzzle, things we knew or heard from Uncle Josiah that would help us figure this out. Perhaps if we work together and share—”

  “We will share nothing.” Ellen spat out the words.

  “Pardon my wife. What she means is—”

  “I’ll not listen to another word of this nonsense.” Andrew’s voice again rose above the others. “It’d serve you right if you left here penniless and disgraced, you miserable vultures.” He stalked from the room and slammed the door, the impact of it vibrating the wall I leaned against.

  Heartache threatened to engulf me. Why was I so surprised, though? The rumors of Father’s hidden fortune had slipped into the background of our local life, but it seemed his death had brought them back to the surface and made fortune hunters out of everyone—even my dear cousin.

  Ellen’s low voice chilled the air in the room they now had to themselves. “Have you lost your senses? Are you truly suggesting we divide up the fortune that rightfully belongs to us?”

  “We’ll never find it without help, especially from Tressa.”

  “Tressa has less need of it than anyone. She has no debts or obligations. Soon she’ll marry a wealthy gentleman and the fortune will be a mere afterthought to her. But if we lose out on that money . . .” Her voice tightened. “I cannot return to the Savoy.”

  The theater? She’d come from the theater?

  Her panicked voice sped up and she clutched her throat. “I cannot go back, Neville. I cannot. Cannot. Cannot—”

  “Don’t trouble yourself, dearest. Let her help find it. Let them all help.” Neville spoke with eerie calm. And then came the words that lit a string of goosebumps along my bare arms. “In the end it isn’t about who finds it, but who wants it most.”

  I flattened my back against the wall. Suddenly I found myself in the most dangerous place I could be—directly between greedy people and the thing they wanted most.

  8

  It matters a great deal which vine a branch clings to, for out of that vine flows the branch’s source of life.

  —Notebook of a viticulturist

  Andrew, wait.” I flew down the stairs toward him as he left the drawing room, for he seemed to be my only ally. I tripped over the rug at the bottom and stumbled. Landing with a soft thump against his chest, I instantly drew back and looked up into his shadowed face, tucking a loosened chunk of hair behind my ear.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  “I have to find my father’s fortune.” Panic tightened around me. “There are so many people about who want it, and I cannot risk losing it to them. I must figure out where it is, and I need to find someone who speaks Welsh, and—”

  “Of course,” he murmured as my voice trailed into utter despair. “Of course I’ll help you.” Pulling me close in a motion so familiar to me, his fingertips traced little patterns on my back between my shoulder blades. “I will always help you.”

  The soft voice pulled at my mind like quicksand. I pushed away to still the storm of feelings. The cool air that rushed between us tempered my thoughts and stilled my heart.

  “I’m afraid you’ve read too much into my display just then. I should never have—”

  “Yes, you should. I’m the one person you should be able to come to.”

  I placed a hand squarely on his chest, stiffening the arm that held us apart. “Perhaps that isn’t the best idea, Andrew. Mr. Carrington.”

  Emotion pinched his features. “Don’t call me that. Tell me what you need, Tressa.”

  “Do you speak Welsh? That’s what I need most right now.”

  “What about Latin or French? I speak both of those fluently.”

  Steps thudded against the rug in the drawing room, then clicked onto the wood, and Andrew stiffened, glancing at the door. “Quick, back to your chamber. We’ll speak later.” He gripped both my arms and studied me with a potent look. “This is not over.”

  Turning, he leaped up the steps two at a time and disappeared around the bend at the top. The drawing room door opened and I slipped around the corner into a dark hall and flattened my back against the wall.

  As I let out a breath, I became strongly aware of someone sharing the dark hall with me. A nearby shuffle, a low breath, the whoosh of movement. Eyes wide and searching, I waited.

  A deep male voice rolled through the darkness. “I speak Welsh.”

  I gasped, prepared to scream. A hand came to rest gently, firmly over my mouth, and it tasted of the outdoors and the sticky sweetness of vine sap.

  Keeping his hand in place, the interloper moved into the slant of light from the other room. It was Donegan Vance, of course, lurking about in the shadows of my home, as he always seemed to do. The man had the uncanny ability to be everywhere, even where he was not wanted. Which, in my mind, was most places on this estate.

  Lowering his hand, he watched me. “Best not to alarm the household, but I thought you should know. I speak Welsh.”

  “What are you doing here?” I hissed out the words.

  “Looking for you. It’s time we spoke honestly.”

  “I do believe at least one of us has been doing that from the start.”

  “Certainly you do not refer to yourself, the girl who led me to believe she was a servant upon my arrival.”

  “You cannot blame me for your own hasty judgments.” At his pointed look, I bit my lip and glanced away. “You happened upon me in a trying moment when I did not wish to discuss anything personal. Especially where it concerned being my father’s daughter.”

  His voice softened. “All right, then. This time I want the truth. Why can’t you pay the workers? What keeps such a wealthy family from providing the barest necessities to those who serve the household?”

  “Obviously you’ve overheard the answer.” I indicated the hall where Andrew and I had been talking.

  He frowned. “You claim the rumors are true, then. Your father hid his fortune—even from his own family.”

  My jaw twitched. “It is so.” Not only would he force me to unveil every bit of exclusive knowledge I had on the subject, but he’d ridicule my answers as well.

  “I don’t believe a word of it. What sort of fool in this modern world hides his money?”

  “The kind who tended his vineyards in a velvet smoking jacket and took soil samples with silver forks. I promise you the money is hidden and we have hardly a farthing to our names otherwise.” We’d traveled about the country and even abroad, needing little more than our name as currency, and Father paid the notes as they came.

  His dark, ominous gaze arrested mine and held it there in the dim moonlight. “Something odd is happening here. I will uncover it, so you’d best tell me straight out.”

  I wrenched my gaze from his face. “Before you were offering to help me find it, and now you don’t even believe it exists.”

  “My offer remains. Perhaps it’ll help me learn the truth. What do you need to read in Welsh?”

  I hesitated. “My father’s notebooks. All his notes on vineyards and grapes.”

  He raised one dark eyebrow. “Fascinating. I’ll make a trade.”

  “What sort of trade?” Surely he wouldn’t ask for immediate payment when he knew I had no funds.

  “I’ll work on translating the notebooks in the evenings if you’ll work beside me in the vineyards. And not just as an observer as you’ve already offered, but as a worker, dirtying your hands.”

  I looked up at him through narrowed eyes. “You’re mad. Why ever would you want such a thing?”

  “Perhaps I enjoy your company.” He shrugged, a smile turning up his lips. “You are the first person to ever claim that field work is an art.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “You wish to humble me.”

  “If you find it so detestable an arrangement, I’ll settle for 10 percent of the fortune.�
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  I flattened my shoulder blades against the wall behind me. “You are merely here for money too, aren’t you?”

  “That’s the reason anyone labors for anyone else.”

  “There’s more to it than that, isn’t there?”

  A muscle pulsed in his jaw as he glanced away, and his silence told me more than any words could say.

  9

  It always amazes me what can be hidden beneath a grape’s translucent skin. You cannot know for certain if a grape is as ripe and sweet as it looks until you have tasted it.

  —Notebook of a viticulturist

  What a foolish move, forcing a lady to work in a vineyard. Donegan threw down the end of the spade over and over the next morning with all the strength of his frustration. It seemed that his liking of her was directly proportional to her dislike of him. As his admiration rose, hers vanished with no effort on his part. Yet she lingered in the peripheral vision of his thoughts like the tart aroma of immature grapes that now surrounded him.

  What she’d said about vineyards as an art form had especially remained in his mind, for no one else had ever put into words what he thought about his work. It was as if she spoke the same language as he, but she spoke it more fluently and gracefully than he ever could. Different as she was from himself, something about her resonated deeply with him, and the draw to her only grew with each encounter.

  Yet she had made her position quite clear—she could not stand him. It would serve as a supreme torture to have her around all the time, especially with her distaste for him radiating off her very being.

  Right now, though, the only task that mattered was proving to her that he had no intention of ruining her family’s vineyard. Although why she felt such a personal tie to what most would deem a mere crop he couldn’t fathom. It was another intriguing aspect to this princess of the castle.

  “What do you know about the girl?” He tossed the question casually to the ragged youth hacking at the weeds one row away.

  “The girl? You mean Miss Harlowe?” Tom stood and smeared his bare forearm across his forehead. “A nice sort, I’ve heard. Not that any of us speak with her.”

  “She doesn’t associate with the laborers?”

  “Wouldn’t be proper now, would it?” Tom’s silly grin stretched his narrow face.

  “Hmm.” With a breath, Donegan allowed that revelation to sink in, to churn his heart and destroy the infatuation he’d developed, but it failed. The words circled his brain, but before they could take root, they simply disintegrated and fell away.

  In their place, the weight of a vague conviction settled over him, starting as a gentle pressure and then increasing to a substantial heaviness about his shoulders. Instantly he recognized the sensation, but this time it confused him. It was the weight of responsibility and calling. Toward her.

  God wanted him to help her?

  The burden settled firmly on his shoulders that were already sore from work. He stretched them and frowned at the sun high in the sky. Countless numbers of poor and struggling people had received his help as God had convicted him, but why her?

  I am but a working man. What could a servant offer the master?

  When he looked up from that thought, her regal figure strode toward him, the lift of her chin telling him she came somewhat unwillingly. Sea breezes lifted the fringe of tendrils around her face, softening the hostility that hardened her features. Her plain gown hung in the perfect lines that spoke of costly fabric, even for a work dress. Yet in addition to the expensive clothing, she also wore that same desperate, plaintive expression beneath the thin veneer of self-reliance. Whether she wore the ragged cloak in which he’d first seen her or this costly dress befitting her wealth, there was the same poverty in her spirit that had touched him before.

  “I’ve brought one of the notebooks.” I clutched the volume in the vineyard’s midday heat as Donegan paused to wipe his brow and study me with unreadable thoughts in his deep brown eyes. I held the precious book to my chest for the barest moment longer before extending it to him. Perhaps I shouldn’t do this. Who knew what the man might do with the information? If only I knew someone else who could read Welsh.

  “It’ll be a nice evening diversion when my work is done.” He accepted the book and tossed it into a wooden wheelbarrow, where it broke up loose dirt chunks.

  I cringed but set my jaw. I needed this man’s help if I had any hope of tapping into this hidden piece of my father. With all the treasure hunters about, these notebooks were the only advantage I might possess.

  Finally he paused to fully look at me, an internal battle of some sort playing across his chiseled features. “I wish to help.” The statement came out in one quick breath and was followed by a brief silence. “You need help finding this fortune, and I wish to help in the search.”

  I frowned. “For what purpose?”

  This question clearly caught him off guard, drawing his brows together and causing his weight to shift. “What does it matter?”

  “Your motives matter a great deal, Mr. Vance.”

  He heaved a sigh, cupping the back of his neck. “If nothing else, maybe it’ll rid you of this fool notion that I’m out to ruin your vineyard.”

  “Or convince me you’re only here to hunt for gold.”

  After a moment of hesitation, he lowered his hand and beckoned me deeper into the rows of winding greenery. “Come. I want to teach you something.”

  The man’s arrogance really was trying. “Do you not think the daughter of a viticulturist would know vineyards better than almost anyone else?”

  “Yes, I would.” His mouth jerked up at the corner with a trace of humor. “It’ll only take a moment. You did agree to help in the vineyard.”

  I studied him, this odd man who had appeared from thin air with unclear motives and all the manners of a bull. Had I agreed? As I remembered it, I had yet to decide between his two options. I followed along the row as the scruffy workers looked on.

  “The most important part of the vineyard is the sap, its life source. It is to the vine what blood is to humans.” He knelt before a plant, his knee sinking into the soil as he traced a fingertip along the vine from the root base and up the rough bark to the branches. “That sap travels up from the roots and the vine pushes it out to every branch and leaf, every morsel of fruit. See how many paths it has to take, and how much plant it must fill?”

  “I understand the concept of pruning.”

  “Your vines need far more pruning than they’ve had.” He pushed against the ground and rose. “That’s what I was doing the other day.”

  “My father has turned out many successful harvests without pruning them bare.”

  “And this vineyard’s about to experience its last few, unless someone removes much more. For years the grapes have grown lush and healthy by sucking the life out of the branches. See how weak they are?” He flexed one branch with a single finger. “If you continue to allow this many grapes and shoots on your branches, they’ll all be withered and dead before long. This year’s grapes are already suffering because there isn’t enough sap to go around.”

  I stepped back, watching him. “These are all just the theories of an amateur.”

  “As are any ideas you have to the contrary, but what does that matter? It’s like they say about the two vessels—what’s the difference between the Tayleur and the ark from Scripture?”

  “The Tayleur? You mean the cruise liner that sank?”

  “Yes. The only difference is the failed Tayleur was built by professionals and the ark by an amateur.”

  “So how do you plan to make it up to us if your theories, amateur or professional, fail like the Tayleur and our crop is ruined?”

  “It can’t be any more ruined than it already is.” He brushed off his hands and turned back to the vines. “If nothing else, you’ve gotten everything out of me that you’ve paid for. Now, if you want to make yourself useful, start pinching off leaves. They should be spaced several inches apart. I assume
you’re not opposed to a simple springtime pruning of shoots.”

  Clamping my mouth closed on what I wished to say, what politeness dictated I not say, I merely smiled and said, “Thank you for the lesson on vineyards. I’ll look forward to receiving your translation of the notebook.” As I knelt in the dirt, I hesitated, then looked up. “I do hope I can count on you to keep the contents of the notebook . . .”

  “Of course.”

  I turned to my task and he strode farther down the row. A fine mess I’d created for myself with this partnership. But had I any other choice?

  Later, when I’d stretched my stiff back and wandered into the house, voices carried through the nearly closed door of the small front parlor. I spun at a tap on my shoulder just outside the door.

  Margaret stood behind me with a round-shouldered posture of concern. “The greengrocer came to the door, miss. It gave your mother such an upset that we had to placate her with false assurances. But the truth is, they’ll not give us supplies anymore without pay up front. We’re counting our blessings that they haven’t called in the past debt yet.”

  “You were right to bring it to me, Margaret.” I bit my lip and glanced about the dim hall. “How much produce remains?”

  “Enough for a few more meals for the guests and staff, but no fresh fruit.”

  “Tell Cook to scrimp where she can and that nothing is to be wasted. I’ll think of something.”

  She nodded, but the tension that had pinched her face since our arrival did not relax. Making my escape past the open door and down the hall, Margaret’s words swam around my mind. Perhaps I could sell something—but what, the furniture? I’d have to haul it to London to find a buyer for the ancient pieces, and besides, none of it was mine to sell. Calling it mine would mean admitting Father was dead, and I couldn’t bear to do that. Hope felt too wonderful.

  In my chamber, I leaned against the wall and shut my eyes. Everything depended upon me finding that fortune, and I had to do it alone. Everyone around me, even those supposedly here to support me, had the same goal. And only one of us could attain it.