Diamond in the Rough Page 4

  “What are these?” she asked, pointing to two rectangles he’d place by the pond.

  “Benches.”

  “Oh.” Her expression was not one of approval. “May I?” She took up the book, pencil, and paper and placed it on her own lap, her brow furrowing as she thought. “I thought an arbor would look lovely at the entrance to the garden. I saw some vines by the plants Mother picked out that I’m sure you could train to climb up the lattice-work.” She looked up at him expectantly, as if he’d have some opinion on that, so he nodded. “Excellent. I’ll have Mr. Billings—he’s a local woodworker—create something for you.”

  As she went through her requirements for the garden, it seemed her enthusiasm grew with each sentence she uttered, and Nathaniel almost felt sorry for her. She would never get the garden that grew in her imagination, unless the Andersons hired another man after he’d found what he’d come looking for. He took the time to look at her, to appreciate the delicate curve of her jaw, the soft outline of her lips, her gold-tipped lashes, which almost seemed to glow in the light of the setting sun. He rarely got the chance, he realized, to sit next to a lovely woman and just stare at her without her knowledge or the added strain of intentions. His one experience of officially courting a girl had been an awkward and eye-opening affair. While that particular girl had been pretty enough, she’d also been interminably boring and rather stupid. Their meetings were so fraught with tension, he could hardly take the time to really look at her.

  But Miss Anderson was so enthralled with her garden, she was completely unaware of his perusal. It was very nearly like staring at a fine work of art, knowing that one would never have the money to purchase it, but allowing one’s mind to drift to that place where owning such a masterpiece was a possibility.

  “Oh,” she said suddenly, and Nathaniel was jarred from his mental wanderings. “We should have a fountain, don’t you think?” She drew a circle and little dots that Nathaniel assumed were supposed to be water droplets. “Later, perhaps,” she said, obviously taking his silence as reticence. “I suppose we should concentrate on planting everything before it dies. I noticed some of the plants are getting a bit wilty.”

  “I noticed that myself, so I watered them this afternoon. I do believe they’ve bounced back a bit,” Nathaniel said, and immediately realized he’d allowed himself to forget where he was—and who he was supposed to be. Miss Anderson snapped her head around and stared at him wide-eyed.

  “Where are you from, Mr. Emory?”

  “Cumbria.”

  Her brow crinkled prettily. “A long way from home, aren’t you?” Then she looked out at the garden, at the mess of holes, then at the bundles of plants that were still sitting above ground. He could almost see her mind working, and prayed she was not as intelligent as she was pretty, but it would likely take a dull person, indeed, not to have heard the culture in his voice.

  “I need this position, miss,” he said, his voice low. He could feel his entire body tense. Everything depended on this girl letting the discovery go, throwing away her curiosity, allowing him to stay. For an instant, he wondered if he should tell her the truth, that he was looking for treasure that was rightfully—if not legally—his.

  “I’m sure you do,” she said softly. “Else why would an educated man such as yourself be working as gardener for a minor estate such as ours.” She let out a small laugh. “I should have realized when I saw your shoes.”

  “My shoes? Not my blistered hands?”

  “You can tell everything about a man by the shoes he wears, Mr. Emory. And no gardener I have ever seen wears the sort of shoes you are wearing.”

  Nathaniel looked down at his shoes, a pair he’d spent precious money on at one of the finest shoemakers in London. Even though funds had always been quite low, he had acquired a taste for the finer things—and a deeper appreciation than most of his peers because he actually had to work for whatever he purchased. Now, sadly, they were scuffed and dusty, but there was no hiding the fact they were not the type of shoes a lowly gardener would wear. “I need this position,” he repeated, feeling as if the world were about to drop out from underneath him.

  “I’ll not tell your secret, Mr. Emory. I have no doubt you do, indeed, need this position.” She smiled gently. “If only to pay for your expensive shoes.”

  He let out a low laugh. “Thank you.”

  “Someday, perhaps, you’ll tell me your story. I’ve no doubt that it’s an interesting one. For now, though, I’ll bid you a good evening. I am looking forward to seeing our garden when it’s completed.”

  She stood and walked to the house, leaving Nathaniel there feeling out of sorts and strangely irritable, but not knowing why. Then it hit him; she pitied him. Just that realization caused his cheeks to flush in humiliation. Pity was something he’d grown quite used to, having had a father who was the scorn of the aristocracy and a grandfather who was considered eccentric at best. Poor, motherless child with a wastrel father who was scorned by nearly everyone in the ton. He sat there, hands fisted, as he watched the setting sun and fervently wished he could return to his old life, where no one knew who he was. The only problem was, he’d always lived under the threat of discovery. If the other men he worked with had known he was a baron, they would have immediately treated him differently. And when they realized who his father was, how famously disgraceful he had been, that would have been far worse.

  “What can you tell me about our gardener?” Clara asked that evening as her maid, Jeanine, was fixing her hair for dinner. She found herself slightly disturbed by the man, and for obvious reasons. Hadn’t her mother found it odd that an obviously educated man would answer an advertisement for a gardener?

  Jeanine stepped forward holding a blue gown for Clara’s approval, and Clara nodded, for she didn’t really care what she had on her back as long as it kept her warm and covered. The Andersons always “dressed” for dinner, a habit that Clara found tedious in the extreme. Hedra insisted on acting like quality even though they were nothing of the sort. Unlike Harriet, who had only vague memories of their old life before their father’s tin mine began producing scads of tin, Clara remembered with great fondness a time when the Andersons lived in the village and were part of life there. They’d had a tiny cottage on a narrow, cobblestone street, where neighbors would drop in unannounced for a bit of tea. No one stopped by their house now; it was far too grand for their old friends to step inside. Or so they said.

  While Clara tried to act the lady, in her heart she knew she was nothing of the sort. She secretly preferred ale to that nasty sherry her mother insisted she drink and she much preferred a walk to the beach than a day playing pianoforte or working on her needlepoint, though she was more than proficient at both. Harriet would get quite cross with her, for Clara found such things easy to achieve but had no interest, whereas Harriet practiced for hours daily and didn’t seem to improve at all.

  “I could hold up a potato sack and you’d nod your head,” Jeanine said, laying the dress on her bed.

  “A potato sack would likely be more comfortable.” Clara sighed. “My hair is perfectly fine. It’s not as if we’re expecting company.”

  Jeanine came up behind her and pretended she was going to muss it up, making Clara screech in protest. “Scoundrel,” she shouted.

  “Harridan,” Jeanine returned without missing a beat.

  Jeanine was far more than her maid; she was her best friend, her confidant, though in front of her mother, Jeanine was the perfect lady’s maid.

  When Clara had been younger, the two of them made a great game of it, giggling hysterically when Hedra left the room. Now, they accepted their roles but kept their friendship a secret from all, including Harriet.

  “You haven’t answered my question,” Clara said when she stopped laughing.

  “About the gardener?” Jeanine wrinkled her nose. “A fine looking man but a bit of a mystery. Not at all
friendly. He comes into the kitchen to eat with the rest of us, then leaves without saying hardly a word. Something about him isn’t right, though I can’t put my finger on what.”

  “Oh.”

  “Is he giving anyone trouble?” Jeanine asked, her eyes narrowing. Jeanine, being three years older than Clara, acted more like an older sister and was extremely protective of Clara. “That Sara has been making all sorts of eyes at him but he doesn’t give her the time of day. I hope she doesn’t get into any trouble.” This last was said darkly, and Clara immediately understood what sort of “trouble” Jeanine was referring to. Another of their maids got into “trouble” with a stable hand and the two had to get married. Jeanine let out a laugh. “You should see her, mooning after him as if he were some sort of Greek god. Which he may be, given his fine looks. But he doesn’t give her the time of day. He doesn’t give any of us the time of day.”

  “Sounds like you’re the one smitten,” Clara said, then ducked when Jeanine threw a hair pin at her. “You’ll take out an eye someday.”

  Jeanine retrieved the hairpin, laughing. “You know I’m soft on Charlie. That gardener’s too big, too moody. George said he looks like he’s got something to hide. Prison maybe. I don’t care for him a bit, for all his good looks.”

  Clara shrugged—something she would never do in front of her mother—and said, “He doesn’t seem so awful to me.” Though Jeanine was her best friend, she wasn’t about to tell her how she felt about their new gardener. He was, as Jeanine so succinctly put it, like a Greek god. Tall, of fine form, handsome in a breathtaking way, with thick dark hair and a perpetual dark shadow on his jaw. Indeed, Clara wasn’t certain she had ever seen a more handsome man than their new gardener. As the elder daughter of the household, she knew she shouldn’t think of a servant in such a way, but it was difficult not to when looking at the man.

  Jeanine was correct, though. He might be handsome, but he did not appear to be particularly intelligent. What sort of man of culture would settle for a gardener’s position? Either a stupid man or…

  …one who was in terrible trouble.

  Chapter 2

  Roger King looked up from his desk as a middle-aged man of apparent means walked through his door, and he immediately set aside the report he’d been working on—the dealings of a man who wanted to marry a bit above himself. The girl’s family was not going to like what he’d found.

  Standing, he said, “How can I help you, sir?”

  The man looked around the room as if searching for another person. As Roger’s office was only slightly larger than a wardrobe, it was a futile search. “You’re the detective?”

  “I am,” Roger said, nodding his head and indicating a seat in front of his desk. Roger studied the gentleman, noting the fine cut of his suit, one that was well-made but seemingly tailored for a slightly smaller gent. Or a gent who had gained a few pounds and did not have the cash to purchase another. This could be a problem. His shoes were highly polished, which meant he had a valet, and the signet ring on his finger was thick and gold. This could be his payment should the fellow not have the available cash, and he found himself relaxing.

  The newcomer had deep brown eyes that assessed him nearly as thoroughly as Roger assessed the man. “How old are you?”

  Roger smiled slightly. It was a question he got often, for he looked a bit younger than his years. Sixty on the inside, twenty on the outside. “Thirty.”

  “And you have experience?”

  More experience than a man should have. When he was twenty-three, he married, and his darling wife had twin girls just one year later. They were slaughtered while he was at work. He’d come home from his job as a bank clerk to find them together on a blood-soaked bed, throats cut. One daisy had been laid carefully on his wife’s chest in a macabre contrast to the ugliness of the scene. His family’s murder was his first case and the only one he’d yet to solve. His grief had been so overwhelming, the constables never doubted his innocence and his alibi was easily corroborated. After a year of watching the police bumble about, then forget his family’s murder, Roger decided to take things into his own hands. He’d been searching ever since.

  “I’ve plenty of experience, sir. And I’ve never not solved a case for which I was hired.” To be honest, most of them were solved in a single afternoon. People, he realized soon after he’d begun his work, were bloody stupid, particularly the criminals. “And plenty of work.” Now, this was a lie. Weeks could go by without his office door opening, and other than the small case he was wrapping up, it hadn’t opened in a while. He pretended to look in his ledger on the ruse of searching for time in his schedule.

  “I’ll double your normal fee,” the man said.

  Now, this was interesting. Most people found his normal fee, two pounds a day, exorbitant. Roger gave the man another assessing look. “I’m afraid I cannot take the money of a man whose name I do not know.”

  “Jonathon Belmont.”

  “Are you a relation to…”

  “Viscount Heresford. Yes. My uncle.”

  Roger suppressed his excitement. “My fee is five pounds a day,” he said, feeling only a twinge of guilt for asking slightly more than double his fee.

  “Ten pounds then?” His brows snapped together and Roger was just about to clarify what he’d meant, when the older man said, “Done.”

  Roger swallowed and clenched his fists in his lap. Ten pounds a day would pay his rent and feed him for weeks if he took a few days to solve whatever it was he was solving.

  “I’ll pay you fifty pounds in advance, for you’ll need to travel.” Belmont took out his billfold and counted out five ten-pound notes. “I don’t want this to take more than a month.”

  Roger just about fell off his chair. That was three hundred pounds. Enough money to allow him to concentrate on his family’s murder for months. “This must be exceedingly important to you.”

  “Mr. King, you have no idea. My father was betrayed by his best friend. An item of great worth was stolen from him by the scoundrel, then hidden. I want it found. Not only for its value, but as retribution for what was done to my father.”

  “Are you certain this object has not already been found, sir?”

  “We would know.” He let out a low chuckle. “Everyone in England would know.”

  His curiosity piqued, Roger asked, “What is this object?”

  “A diamond. A blue diamond worth a king’s ransom.”

  Chapter 3

  “Mother, what are your plans for the garden?”

  Hedra looked up, her face registering her surprise at her daughter’s question. “I’ve hired a gardener. I expect he’ll plant one.”

  “I was wondering if I might take that on as a special project. You know, Mrs. Pittsfield mentioned that gardening was a lady’s venue, and I am getting terribly bored with painting and the pianoforte. Harriet is the artist in the family.” Beside her, Harriet snorted in an attempt not to laugh. Harriet was an abysmal artist and she well knew it. That snort earned Harriet narrowed eyes from Hedra, but for once their mother let it lie.

  “I suppose that would be all right. A lovely garden is something we could show off when we entertain. I approve,” she said, dipping her spoon into their fine pilchard stew. For all that the Andersons had heartily embraced everything upper crust, Hedra, unless they had company, ordered their cook to prepare good old Cornwall cuisine.

  “What is your obsession with gardening all of a sudden?” Harriet asked.

  Clara laughed. “It’s hardly an obsession. But I do adore being out of doors and I don’t want to take long, boring walks like you do.” She gave her sister a nudge. “It’s a ladylike pursuit that I find interesting.”

  “Just as long as it does not interfere with your pianoforte, voice, and dancing lessons,” Hedra said. “A lady must apply herself to the finer arts if she wishes to attract a husband.”


  “Yes, Mother,” Clara said, ignoring the kick her sister gave her beneath the table. It did seem as if every conversation they had at the dinner table somehow circled back to the fact that Clara was expected to find a husband. It was, she knew, her only true purpose in life, according to her parents. Clara was their ticket to true respectability, and though it was a role Clara did not cherish, she hated to disappoint her mother and did try her best to emulate the ladies her mother so wished her to become.

  “Speaking of which,” Hedra said, wiping her mouth delicately, “we’re off to London in the autumn for the Little Season. While we’re there, we can order dresses for next Season. Isn’t that right, Silas?”

  Her father looked up as if surprised to be addressed. “Dresses? Oh, yes. Our Clara needs ‘em.”

  Clara pressed her lips closed, trying not to think about the disaster London had been last Season. They’d rented a townhouse at a fashionable address, and her mother thought this was all that was needed for them to be admitted into London’s ferociously guarded society. They’d driven in Hyde Park behind a pair of outrageously decorated horses, bearing bright red plumes and jangling collars—another dubious recommendation of Mrs. Pittsfield. Clara had tried to gently steer her mother away from the older woman’s recommendations, but Hedra would not hear of it. Mrs. Pittsfield, having been a lady’s maid to the now-deceased Dowager Duchess of Canton, was as close to the aristocracy as her mother was likely to get, and she listened to every bit of advice as if the duchess herself had written it.

  Clara didn’t much care for Mrs. Pittsfield, who seemed to relish her role as arbiter of all that was aristocratic a bit too much. Her poor mother sat on the edge of her seat every time the old termagant opened her mouth. Hedra had a small notebook that she would feverishly write in whenever they returned from a visit, and Clara’s stomach coiled in dread whenever she saw it in her mother’s hands. Mrs. Pittsfield was to blame for Clara’s having to suffer through finishing school and practice the pianoforte until her fingers were numb. The dance lessons, the lessons in elocution, painting, needlepoint, voice. If a lady did it, then Clara must excel in it.