A Dangerous Fortune

  4

  AUGUSTA SAT IN THE BACK ROOM of the best jeweler's shop in Bond Street. Bright gaslights flared, making the jewelry glitter in the glass cases. The room was full of mirrors. An obsequious assistant padded across the room and placed in front of her a black velvet cloth bearing a diamond necklace.

  The manager of the shop was standing beside her. "How much?" she asked him.

  "Nine thousand pounds, Lady Whitehaven." He breathed the price piously, like a prayer.

  The necklace was simple and stark, just a plain row of identical large square-cut diamonds set in gold. It would look very striking against her black widow's gowns, she thought. But she was not buying it to wear.

  "It's a wonderful piece, my lady; quite the loveliest thing we have in the shop."

  "Don't rush me, I'm thinking," she replied.

  This was her last desperate attempt to raise money. She had tried going openly to the bank and demanding a hundred pounds in gold sovereigns: the clerk, an insolent dog called Mulberry, had refused her. She had tried to have the house transferred from Edward's name into her own, but that had not worked either: the deeds were in the safe of old Bodwin, the bank's lawyer, and he had been got at by Hugh. Now she was going to try to buy diamonds on credit and sell them for cash.

  Edward had at first been her ally, but now even he refused to help her. "What Hugh is doing is for the best," he had said stupidly. "If word gets around that family members are trying to grab what they can, the syndicate could fall apart. They've been persuaded to put up money to avert a financial crisis, not to keep the Pilaster family in luxury." It was a long speech for Edward. A year ago it would have shaken her to the core to have her son go against her, but since his rebellion over the annulment he was no longer the sweet, biddable boy she loved. Clementine had turned against her too, supporting Hugh's plans to turn them all into paupers. It made her shake with rage when she thought about it. But they would not get away with it.

  She looked up at the shop manager. "I'll take it," she said decisively.

  "A wise choice, I have no doubt, Lady Whitehaven," he said.

  "Send the bill to the bank."

  "Very good, my lady. We will deliver the necklace to Whitehaven House."

  "I'll take it with me," Augusta said. "I want to wear it tonight."

  The manager looked as if he were in pain. "You put me in an impossible position, my lady."

  "What on earth are you talking about? Wrap it up!"

  "I fear I cannot release the jewelry until payment has been received."

  "Don't be ridiculous. Do you know who I am?"

  "Yes--but the newspapers say the bank has closed its doors."

  "This is an insult."

  "I am very, very sorry."

  Augusta stood up and picked up the necklace. "I refuse to listen to this nonsense. I shall take it with me."

  Perspiring, the manager moved between her and the door. "I beg you not to," he said.

  She moved toward him but he stood his ground. "Get out of my way!" she blazed.

  "I shall have to have the shop door locked and send for the police," he said.

  It dawned on Augusta that although the man was practically gibbering with terror he had not conceded one inch. He was afraid of her, but he was more frightened of losing nine thousand pounds' worth of diamonds. She realized she was defeated. Enraged, she threw the necklace on the floor. The man scooped it up with no attempt at dignity. Augusta opened the door herself, stalked through the shop, and went out to where her carriage waited.

  She held her head high but she was mortified. The man had practically accused her of stealing. A small voice in the back of her mind said that stealing was exactly what she had been trying to do, but she stifled it. She rode home in a rage.

  As she entered the house Hastead tried to detain her, but she had no patience for domestic trivia at this moment, and she silenced him, saying: "Bring me a glass of warm milk." She had a pain in her stomach.

  She went to her room. She sat at her dressing table and opened her jewelry box. There was very little in it. What she had was worth only a few hundred pounds. She pulled out the bottom tray, took out a piece of folded silk and unwrapped it to reveal the serpent-shaped gold ring that Strang had given her. As always, she slipped it on her finger and brushed the jeweled head against her lips. She would never sell this. How different everything would have been if she had been allowed to marry Strang. For a moment she felt like crying.

  Then she heard strange voices outside her bedroom door. A man ... two men, perhaps ... and a woman. They did not sound like servants and anyway her staff would not have the temerity to stand around conversing on the landing. She stepped outside.

  The door to her late husband's room was open and the voices came from in there. When she went in Augusta saw a young man, obviously a clerk, and an older, well-dressed couple of her own class. She had never set eyes on any of them before. She said: "In heaven's name who are you?"

  The clerk said deferentially: "Stoddart, from the agents, my lady. Mr. and Mrs. de Graaf are very interested in buying your beautiful house--"

  "Get out!" she said.

  The clerk's voice rose to a squeak. "We have received instructions to put the house on the market--"

  "Get out this minute! My house is not for sale!"

  "But I personally spoke--"

  Mr. de Graaf touched Stoddart's arm and silenced him. "An embarrassing mistake, quite obviously, Mr. Stoddart," he said mildly. He turned to his wife. "Shall we leave, my dear?" The two of them walked out with a quiet dignity that made Augusta seethe, and Stoddart scurried after them, spilling apologies everywhere.

  Hugh was responsible. Augusta did not have to make inquiries to establish that. The house was the property of the syndicate that had rescued the bank, he said, and they naturally wished to sell it. He had told Augusta to move out, but she had refused. His response was to send prospective buyers to view the place anyway.

  She sat down in Joseph's chair. Her butler came in with her hot milk. She said: "You are not to admit any more such people, Hastead--the house is not for sale."

  "Very good, my lady." He set down her drink and hovered.

  "Is there something else?" she asked him.

  "M'lady, the butcher called personally today about his bill."

  "Tell him he will be paid at Lady Whitehaven's convenience, not his own."

  "Very good, m'lady. And both the footmen left today."

  "You mean they gave notice?"

  "No, they just went."

  "Wretched people."

  "My lady, the rest of the staff are asking when they will get their wages."

  "Anything else?"

  He looked bewildered. "But what shall I tell them?"

  "Tell them I did not answer your question."

  "Very good." He hesitated, then said: "I beg to give notice that I shall be leaving at the end of the week."

  "Why?"

  "All the rest of the Pilasters have dismissed their staff. Mr. Hugh told us we would be paid up to last Friday, but no more, regardless of how long we stay on."

  "Get out of my sight, you traitor."

  "Very good, my lady."

  Augusta told herself she would be glad to see the back of Hastead. She was well rid of the lot of them, rats leaving the sinking ship.

  She sipped her milk but the pain in her stomach did not ease.

  She looked around the room. Joseph had never let her redecorate it, so it was still done out in the style she had chosen back in 1873, with leather-paper on the walls and heavy brocade curtains, and Joseph's collection of jeweled snuffboxes in a lacquered display cabinet. The room seemed dead, as he was. She wished she could bring him back. None of this would have happened if he were still alive. She had a momentary vision of him standing by the bay window, holding one of his favorite snuffboxes, turning it this way and that to see the play of light on the precious stones. She felt an unfamiliar choking sensation in her throat; and she shook her head to
make the vision go away.

  Soon Mr. de Graaf or someone like him would move into this bedroom. No doubt he would tear down the curtains and the wallpaper and redecorate, probably in the currently fashionable arts-and-crafts style, with oak paneling and hard rustic chairs.

  She would have to move out. She had accepted this, although she pretended otherwise. But she was not going to move to a cramped modern house in St. John's Wood or Clapham, as Madeleine and Clementine had. She could not bear to live in reduced circumstances in London, where she could be seen by people she had once looked down upon.

  She was going to leave the country.

  She was not sure where to go. Calais was cheap but too close to London. Paris was elegant, but she felt too old to begin a new social life in a strange city. She had heard people talk of a place called Nice, on the Mediterranean coast of France, where a big house and servants could be had for next to nothing, and there was a quiet community of foreigners, many her own age, enjoying the mild winters and the sea air.

  But she could not live on nothing a year. She had to have enough for rent and staff wages, and although she was prepared to live frugally she could not manage without a carriage. She had very little cash, no more than fifty pounds. Hence her desperate attempt to buy diamonds. Nine thousand pounds was not really enough, but it might have sufficed for a few years.

  She knew she was jeopardizing Hugh's plans. Edward had been right about that. The goodwill of the syndicate depended on the family's being serious about paying off their debts. A family member running off to the Continent with her luggage full of jewelry was just the thing to upset a fragile coalition. In a way, that made the prospect more attractive: she would be happy to trip up the self-righteous Hugh.

  But she had to have a stake. The rest would be easy: she would pack a single trunk, go to the steamship office to book passage, call a cab early in the morning, and slip away to the railway station without warning. But what could she use for money?

  Looking around her husband's room she noticed a small notebook. She opened it, idly curious, and saw that someone--presumably Stoddart, the agent's clerk--had been making an inventory of the house contents. It angered her to see her possessions listed in a clerk's notebook and casually valued: dining table PS9; Egyptian screen 30s; portrait of a woman by Joshua Reynolds, PS100. There must be a few thousand pounds' worth of paintings in the house, but she could not pack those in a trunk. She turned the page and read 65 snuffboxes--refer to jewelry department. She looked up. There in front of her, in the cabinet she had bought seventeen years ago, was the solution to her problem. Joseph's collection of jeweled snuffboxes was worth thousands, perhaps as much as a hundred thousand pounds. She could pack it into her luggage easily: the boxes themselves were tiny, designed to fit into a man's waistcoat pocket. They could be sold one by one, as money was needed.

  Her heart beat faster. This could be the answer to her prayers.

  She reached out to open the cabinet. It was locked.

  She suffered a moment of panic. She was not sure she could break it open: the wood was stout, the panes of glass small and thick.

  She calmed herself. Where would he keep the key? In the drawer of his writing table, probably. She went to the table and pulled open the drawer. In it was a book with the horrifying title of The Duchess of Sodom, which she hastily pushed to the back, and a small silver-colored key. She snatched up the key.

  With a trembling hand she tried it in the lock of the cabinet. As she turned it she heard a bolt click, and a moment later the door opened.

  She breathed deeply and waited until her hands stopped shaking.

  Then she began to remove the boxes from the shelves.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  DECEMBER

  1

  THE PILASTER CRASH was the society scandal of the year. The cheap newspapers reported every development breathlessly: the sale of the great Kensington mansions; the auctions of the paintings, antique furniture, and cases of port; the cancellation of Nick and Dotty's planned six-month honeymoon in Europe; and the modest suburban houses where the proud and mighty Pilasters now peeled potatoes for themselves and washed their own undergarments.

  Hugh and Nora rented a small house with a garden in Chingford, a village nine miles from London. They left all their servants behind, but a muscular fourteen-year-old girl from a nearby farm came in the afternoons to scrub floors and wash windows. Nora, who had not done housework for twelve years, took it very badly, and shuffled about in a grubby apron, halfheartedly sweeping floors and preparing indigestible dinners, complaining constantly. The boys liked it better than London because they could play in the woods. Hugh traveled into the City every day by train and continued to go to the bank, where his work consisted of disposing of Pilasters' assets on behalf of the syndicate.

  Each partner received a small monthly allowance from the bank. In theory they were not entitled to anything. But the syndicate members were bankers just like the Pilasters, and in their hearts they thought There but for the grace of God go I. Besides, the cooperation of the partners was helpful in selling off the assets, and it was worth a small payment to retain their goodwill.

  Hugh watched the progress of the civil war in Cordova with an anxious heart. The outcome would determine how much money the syndicate would lose. Hugh badly wanted them to make a profit. He wanted one day to be able to say that no one had lost money rescuing Pilasters Bank. But the possibility seemed remote.

  At first the Miranda faction seemed set to win the war. By all accounts their attack was well planned and bloodily executed. President Garcia was forced to flee the capital and take refuge in the fortified city of Campanario, in the south, his home region. Hugh was dispirited. If the Mirandas won they would run Cordova like a private kingdom, and would never pay interest on loans made to the previous regime; and Cordova bonds would be worthless for the foreseeable future.

  But then came an unexpected development. Tonio's family, the Silvas, who for some years had been the mainstay of the small and ineffectual liberal opposition, joined in the fighting on the president's side, in return for promises of free elections and land reform when the president regained control. Hugh's hopes rose again.

  The revitalized presidential army won a lot of popular support and fought the usurpers to a standstill. The forces were evenly balanced. So were the financial resources: the Mirandas had spent their war chest on a fierce all-out initial assault. The north had nitrate mines and the south had silver, but neither side could get its exports financed or insured, since Pilasters was no longer in business and no other banks would take on a customer who might vanish tomorrow.

  Both sides appealed to the British government for recognition, in the hope that it would help them get credit. Micky Miranda, still officially the Cordovan Minister in London, furiously lobbied Foreign Office officials, government ministers and members of Parliament, pressing for Papa Miranda to be recognized as the new president. But so far the prime minister, Lord Salisbury, refused to favor either side.

  Then Tonio Silva arrived in London.

  He turned up at Hugh's suburban home on Christmas Eve. Hugh was in the kitchen, giving the boys hot milk and buttered toast for breakfast. Nora was still getting dressed: she was going into London to do her Christmas shopping, although she would have very little money to spend. Hugh had agreed to stay at home and take care of the boys: there was nothing urgent for him to do at the bank today.

  He answered the doorbell himself, an experience that reminded him of the old days with his mother in Folkestone. Tonio had grown a beard and moustache, no doubt to hide the scars of the beating he had been given by Micky's thugs eleven years earlier; but Hugh instantly recognized the carrot-colored hair and reckless grin. It was snowing, and there was a dusting of white on Tonio's hat and the shoulders of his coat.

  Hugh took his old friend into the kitchen and gave him tea. "How did you find me?" he asked.

  "It wasn't easy," Tonio replied. "There was no one at your old house
and the bank was closed. But I went to Whitehaven House and saw your aunt Augusta. She hasn't changed. She didn't know your address, but she remembered Chingford. The way she said the name, it sounded like a prison camp, like Van Diemen's Land."

  Hugh nodded. "It's not so bad. The boys are fine. Nora finds it hard."

  "Augusta hasn't moved house."

  "No. She's more to blame than anyone else for the mess we're in. Yet she of all of them is the one who refuses to accept reality. She'll find out that there are worse places than Chingford."

  "Cordova, for instance," said Tonio.

  "How is it?"

  "My brother was killed in the fighting."

  "I'm sorry."

  "The war has reached a stalemate. Everything depends on the British government now. The side that wins recognition will be able to get credit, resupply its army, and overrun the opposition. That's why I'm here."

  "Have you been sent by President Garcia?"

  "Better than that. I am now officially the Cordovan Minister in London. Miranda has been dismissed."

  "Splendid!" Hugh was pleased that at last Micky had been sacked. It had irked him to see a man who had stolen two million pounds from him walking around London, going to clubs and theatres and dinner parties as if nothing had happened.

  Tonio added: "I brought letters of accreditation with me and lodged them at the Foreign Office yesterday."

  "And you're hoping to persuade the prime minister to support your side."

  "Yes."

  Hugh looked at him quizzically. "How?"

  "Garcia is the president--Britain ought to support the legitimate government."

  That was a bit feeble, Hugh thought. "We haven't so far."

  "I shall just tell the prime minister that you should."

  "Lord Salisbury is busy trying to keep the lid on a boiling cauldron in Ireland--he's got no time for a distant South American civil war." Hugh did not mean to sound negative, but an idea was forming in his mind.

  Tonio said rather irritably: "Well, my job is to persuade Salisbury that he should pay attention to what is going on in South America, even if he does have other things on his mind." But he could see the weakness of this approach, and after a moment he said: "Well, all right. You're English, what do you think would engage his attention?"