Touch of a Thief Read online

  But the injustice made Quinn ashamed to be British.

  He handed the Beaumont-Adams to Sanjay. “Put this in your luggage. You might need it.”

  “No, sahib. A man of my color in this part of the world would be in more danger if he were caught with such a weapon than if he were naked.” Sanjay pushed the revolver away. “You will protect me.”

  “We protected you right out of your kingdom.”

  “I trust you.”

  “I may not be able to change the policy that stole your throne,” Quinn said grimly, “but I’ll do everything in my power to see Amjerat’s treasure restored.”

  “If the Blood of the Tiger is returned to the temple where it belongs, I will hold your vow fulfilled, my friend.” Sanjay clapped a hand on Quinn’s shoulder. “The British have brought my country many great things. But they have taken from us as well. The people of Amjerat have a right to feel proud of who they are. The return of Baaghh kaa kkhuun will put heart back into them. It will help my people remember themselves.”

  Quinn was a soldier. He knew some fights had to be fought. But he respected Sanjay’s choice. No one hated war more than one who knew what it really was. “Someday both our people will understand that we have a great deal to learn from each other.”

  “That is my hope as well. But until that day, the people of Amjerat will teach their children what every blade of grass knows.”

  When Sanjay began speaking in riddles, Quinn had difficulty following. The Indian prince saw the world in fluid undulations. Quinn’s view was much more black and white. Things were either right or wrong, true or false, just or unjust. The Oriental mind was a puzzlement to Quinn, but one he enjoyed unraveling.

  “All right. I give up. What does grass know?”

  “Even stone is not forever.” Sanjay closed his luggage with a snap.

  But England is one bloody big stone.

  “The Blood of the Tiger must be returned to the temple,” Sanjay said. “Only in the care of Shiva can its evil bent be tempered.”

  Quinn silently dismissed his friend when Sanjay talked of curses and the evil inherent in the red diamond. Quinn was more concerned about the evil of men.

  Mutiny was being whispered in the bazaars. Mad holy men tramped up and down the Grand Trunk Road, spreading the dream of slaughtering hundreds of English women and children. If only the sepoys could be brought to rebellion, they urged, all the Angrezi would be driven into the sea and never return.

  Quinn had warned his commander that unrest was brewing. Seizing the kingdom of Amjerat played into the fomenters’ hands, but he’d been ignored. Worse, he’d been accused of “showing the yellow stripe.”

  Quinn protested when the viceroy acquired the Baaghh kaa kkhuun from the band of Thugs who’d stolen it. When Quinn continued to rail against the injustice, his commander demoted him and sent him Home with the stern admonition to “remember whose side you’re on, Lieutenant.”

  Now he could only try to right a small portion of the wrong done to Amjerat. And hope the English civilians living in the cantonments and residencies across Hind wouldn’t be made to pay for the sins of the East India Company.

  “I still wish you were not putting so much trust into the hands of this thief, this woman,” Sanjay said.

  “Who says I trust her?” Quinn shrugged into his greatcoat. “In any case, I know how to keep my friends close and my enemies closer.”

  “And Lady Viola, which is she?”

  “Both, I suspect,” Quinn said, remembering the strange glint in her hazel eyes when she handled the stones, the way she trembled like some wild young thing, wanting what he offered in his outstretched hand, but fearful at the same time. She was a riddle with feet, a lovely knot he’d enjoy untying. “Either way, it’ll be time well spent figuring her out.”

  “It’s unseemly for you to travel to Paris unaccompanied, Viola,” the Dowager Countess of Meade said as she grated a carrot into a bowl at the kitchen table. “I don’t like it.”

  “I’ll be fine, Mother.”

  Viola took the bowl from her and worked through the bunch of carrots at double her mother’s speed. Eugenia Preston, only occasionally known as Lady Meade now, wasn’t accustomed to manual labor. Even after four years of living below her station, she hadn’t shown an improved aptitude for working with her hands.

  “It’s not as if I had to cancel a string of engagements. I shouldn’t be gone long enough for anyone to even notice.” Viola moved the bowl aside for their servant Martha to deal with later. “I’m not venturing to the wilds of New South Wales. I’m only crossing the channel to France, a thoroughly civilized country.”

  “That is an opinion open to debate,” Eugenia said with a sniff. “The only good thing to come out of France—”

  “Is French pastry,” Viola finished for her for the umpteenth time. As if they could afford any. “Yes, Mother, I know.”

  “You should at least take Martha with you.”

  Viola shook her head. “I’d be taking care of Martha more than she’d take care of me.” Their decrepit servant was often down with the croup or some other ailment and was rarely able to do a day’s work. But Viola kept Martha and her husband Phineas on because they’d been with the family for years and had no place else to go.

  Her mother gave a long-suffering sigh. “Then I suppose I’ll have to accompany you.”

  That would never do.

  “Mother, you get seasick just looking at the Thames. You’d be miserable on the crossing.” Viola cast a quick glance at her sister, who was humming in her rocker by the fire. “You’re needed here.”

  “But why must you go so far away?”

  Viola bit her bottom lip. Her mother was accustomed to Viola coming home with bundles of banknotes and assorted coin without explanation of how she’d come by them. So long as Viola assured her she hadn’t done anything to sully herself with a man, her mother accepted the funds as a gift from God.

  When the money ran out, Viola always came home with more. She couldn’t explain to her mother. The idea of the dowager countess hearing about Viola’s disreputable fence Willie and his sordid little shop made her shiver. Her mother was safer, and happier, not knowing the details.

  “I have something I must do and this particular something is in France,” she said curtly. “Someone has to provide for this family.”

  “You know perfectly well we could sell this town house and retire to the country.” Her mother launched into the old argument once again. They wrangled over it at least once a week. “We’d have enough and to spare, if we lived simply.”

  “We do live simply. If we lived any more simply, we’d be going about in potato sacks,” Viola snapped back.

  She didn’t want to live simply. She wanted the life she was born to.

  Her father had died without a son, so the bulk of the estate of his earldom, along with the income it generated, went to her weasel of a cousin, Jerome Preston. As her father lay dying, he had penned a letter directing Jerome to provide bountifully for his aunt and cousins, but a letter carried no force of law. The new earl simply pretended the old earl’s family didn’t exist.

  Her father had left Viola his only unentailed property, a London town house, but left her no funds to run it.

  Or to live as the daughter of an earl ought.

  “I’m sure Father would have wished matters differently for us,” her sister Ophelia said from her corner. Her pile of darning was dwindling nicely as her needle clicked in time with the creaky rocker. “He didn’t intend to leave us like this.”

  “Of course not,” their mother added. “No one intends to die.”

  But a prudent man might have given the matter more thought, Viola added silently.

  “When Teddy comes back, everything will be fine,” Ophelia said with confidence. She leaned down to ruffle the hair of the toddler who was playing with a kitten at her feet. “Isn’t that right, Portia? When Daddy comes home, it’ll be all right.”

  The little girl g
rinned up at Ophelia, then turned back to the kitten with a happy squeal. Viola and her mother exchanged a glance. Viola shook her head. There was no need to remind Ophelia once again that her feckless husband was not coming back. She’d only ignore the information and go on with her own version of the world.

  When Portia was born, Ophelia hatched the notion that Teddy was off on a tour of the Continent, giving poetry readings for heads of state. Nothing they could say would convince Ophelia otherwise and they finally stopped trying.

  She was happy with her fantasy. Who were they to strip it from her?

  But someone had to deal with reality.

  That lot fell to Viola.

  She kissed her mother’s sunken cheek and wrapped a cloak around her shoulders. “I’ll be home before you know it.”

  “Good-bye, sister.” Ophelia smiled sweetly at her. “Say hello to Teddy when you see him in France.”

  When Viola had committed her first theft by lifting a jeweled hatpin out of desperation, she’d quickly realized she needed help turning her stolen good into ready coin. She wandered some unsavory streets, wondering whom to trust. In a flash vision the little garnet in the hatpin had shown her Willie’s face and the sign swinging above his shop.

  When she stumbled across his shop around the next corner, she decided to listen to the stone’s advice.

  At first, she let Willie believe she was parting with her own ornaments, but when she kept coming in, always in tandem with a reported jewelry theft, he tumbled rather quickly to her gift for larceny.

  And heartily approved.

  He suggested an arrangement that would benefit them both. He had connections in low places. As the daughter of an earl, albeit a threadbare one, Viola had access to the highest. They could help each other.

  Viola knew who owned what valuables. Willie found out through the servants’ grapevine and his friend in the masons’ guild where they stashed them. Viola never had to enter a home without knowing exactly where she would find the jewels.

  When she began stealing more costly pieces, Willie claimed his expenses went up. He had to bring in someone to dismantle the jewelry. Sometimes large stones were recut. It all cost money. Her return for each heist dwindled.

  Willie began suggesting specific targets for her housebreaking and promised to increase her share in the profits. So far, she hadn’t seen much increase in her take.

  He wouldn’t be pleased to learn she’d bypassed Lady Henson’s emeralds for Lieutenant Quinn’s stash and come away with so little. She’d left the lieutenant’s home with only the gray pearl in her pocket.

  “A show of good faith,” Quinn had said.

  “One of the diamonds would have shown more good faith,” she muttered as she left her hired hansom by the corner after telling the driver to wait. She darted down a narrow alley to Willie’s shop.

  A veil covered her face, but not because she worried that any fashionable member of society would recognize her there. It wasn’t the sort of place frequented by the high-in-the-instep crowd.

  The veil was for her. It helped her pretend she couldn’t see herself doing those lowering things.

  She pushed open the shop door and a little bell tinkled overhead. Willie appeared from the back room, his good-natured, ugly face split in a smile.

  “Good day to you, milady,” his gravelly voice rasped. He had agreed never to call her by name.

  “Hello, Willie.” She had never learned his full one. The less she knew about him, the better she slept. The shop was empty so she pulled a handkerchief from her reticule and undid the knot she’d tied around the pearl. “Not much to show for last night, I’m afraid.”

  She kept on her kid gloves as she nudged the pearl toward him. The last thing she needed was a vision-trance in that seedy little shop. Willie knew she was an accomplished thief, but she resisted letting him learn about her other gift as well. “This pearl is all I have.”

  “What about that lot of uncut stones the lieutenant was bragging about?”

  “Men love to exaggerate.” It wasn’t exactly a lie. Viola was careful not to add to her list of sins if she could help it. Let Willie make of it what he would. “This pearl is quite unique—very old and very rare.”

  “And that makes it very hard to move.” He named an insultingly low offer for it.

  They haggled over the price for a few minutes, but in the end Viola accepted much less than it was worth. Sometimes she was tempted to seek out another fence for her jewels, but the more people who knew about her activities, the more dangerous it became. For better or worse, she was stuck with Willie.

  “Don’t fret yourself, ducks,” he said as he counted out the payment. “You’ll see more when you pinch those emeralds.”

  “I won’t be doing that for a while.” Or ever, she amended silently. She folded the banknotes and stashed the coin in her reticule. She’d deposit it all in her mother’s account with the Bank of England on her way to the wharf to meet Lieutenant Quinn. Her mother would need the funds while she was gone. The Blood of the Tiger theft was his plan. He could pay her bills while she was in France. “You won’t be seeing me for a bit. I’ll be out of . . . town.”

  “Oh? Anything I should know about?”

  “No, this journey is unrelated to our partnership.”

  “Hmmm.” His face broke into a quick, slightly smarmy smile. “God keep ye safe then, yer ladyship.”

  “Thank you.” She hoped it would be the last time she’d ever see him. Once she had the jewels Lieutenant Quinn promised her, she wouldn’t have to use Willie’s services. She’d make Quinn give her a bill of sale, so she could prove she owned them legitimately. Then she’d take them to a reputable jeweler where she’d receive full value for them.

  She’d deposit the money with a venerable man of business and live as she was meant to. Her mother would never have to grate another carrot. They’d find a doctor to cure Ophelia’s troubled mind. No more worries about keeping Portia’s pudgy growing feet in a pair of shoes that fit her. No fretting over the unpaid butcher’s bill. There’d be endless soirees, nights at the theatre, and as many new gowns as she wished. Viola could even fund her own dowry if she wanted to marry.

  No, she decided. Men are far more trouble than they are worth.

  The important thing was she could put this sordid little shop and all her thefts behind her. Her life would be back to normal.

  And she’d never see Willie’s tobacco-stained smile again.

  “Good day.” She pushed out of the shop, eager to breathe the fresher air outside.

  “And to you, milady,” he called after her.

  Willie swiped the pearl off the counter into his beefy hand. It was mighty fine. There was more where that jewel came from or he was a Dutchman. “Duncan!”

  His spotty-faced shop boy appeared from the back room. “Wot?”

  “Something’s not quite coupled up with milady’s story. She just left the shop. Nip after her. See where she goes. Find out what you can about where she’s off to, who she’s with, and what she might be doing once she gets there.”

  The boy untied the leather apron around his waist.

  “Hurry up, boy!”

  Duncan jumped, dropped his apron and ran out the door.

  “If you lose her, you worthless little bastard, don’t bother coming back,” Willie shouted after him. “Save me the trouble of takin’ it out of your miserable hide.”

  CHAPTER 3

  The Minstrel’s Lady was tied up at the pier as Lieutenant Quinn had told her it would be. The man himself paced with obvious irritation at the foot of the gangplank.

  Viola’s lips curved into a satisfied smile. Tall, battle-hardened Quinn was an impressive figure of a man. His trousers and jacket were cut in the first stare of fashion and the lean lines suited his masculine frame. He’d obviously updated his whole civilian wardrobe since returning from India. Traveling with such a presentable fellow would be no hardship.

  And if she’d made him fret about whether
or not she’d show, so much the better.

  It always does a man good to wait. Makes him more appreciative of the honor bestowed upon him once a woman does arrive.

  She allowed the cabby to hand her down and fetch her two valises and hatbox from the boot. “Thank you, good sir. Now if you’d be so kind as to wait a moment, the surly-looking gentleman coming this way will pay my fare.”

  “There you are! Finally. I was within an ace of coming to get you.”

  “Be thankful I arrived at all. May I remind you I had very little notice for this trip?” Having removed her veil before arriving at the wharf, she tucked a wayward lock of russet hair that always escaped her bonnet back into the lacy confection. Her hats were the one extravagance she’d not been able to wean herself from entirely, even when her family’s need was dire. “There were certain matters that required my attention before I left London.”

  “Well, you’re here now, so hurry or we’ll miss the tide.” Quinn turned from her sharply and began to stalk away.

  “Half a mo’, guv,” the cabby piped up. “You’ll be owin’ me for the lady’s fare.”

  Quinn grumbled, but paid the cabby and tipped him handsomely. He started back toward the ship again.

  “Lieutenant, aren’t you forgetting something?”

  “What now?”

  “My baggage, of course.”

  “Of course.” He smiled thinly at her. “I thought I told you to pack light.”

  “I did.”

  Quinn picked up her hat box, leaving the two heavy bags on the ground. “This is packing light.”

  “But what about my other things?”

  He was no longer smiling, merely baring his teeth at her. “Carry them yourself or leave them. It makes no difference to me. Whatever you think you need, I’ll buy for you once we reach Paris, but get your sweet little bum on that ship right now. Or I’ll rethink my plan and turn you over to the magistrate quicker than you can pick a lock, milady.”

  He wheeled around for the last time, leaving Viola staring after him.