An Improper Aristocrat

‘Tell me about the scarab,’ he said gruffly.

She took another drink of the brandy. ‘For as long as I can recall, it has belonged to Mervyn. He wore it always—in a pocket, or on a chain. When I saw it today in your hands, I believed that it meant that he was dead.’

‘Believed. Past tense.’ He glanced toward the note she still held in her hand.

‘Yes.’ She raised her chin in defiance. ‘ I know you will think that I am foolish, but there is good reason to trust in that note.’

He didn’t challenge her statement, or pursue her reasoning. ‘Did you know that Richard was searching for the scarab?’

‘Not really. He seemed genuinely thrilled to be going back to Egypt at last, and excited about his position with the Museum.’ She looked away. ‘I suspected that he was also searching for information about Mervyn’s disappearance, but he did not confide in me.’

‘Neither did he confide in me,’ Trey said flatly. ‘I do not know just where he found the thing. I do not know if the others who sought it in Egypt are the same ones who were here tonight. I still know nothing of importance, in fact. Yesterday you spoke of a jewel, but the jewels have long since been pried from the scarab. Tonight Drake talks of a Pharaoh’s jewel. Tell me now, just what is going on here?’

‘It is an old tale, an ancient legend.’ Her throat tightened until she thought she might choke on the words, but she forced herself to go on. ‘No one is sure just what the Jewel is. Some say it is a collar fashioned in the ancient style, made of gold and inlaid with hundreds of precious gems, others say that it is a huge diamond brought from the deepest Africa. I have also heard that it is an entire cache of jewels, stolen from a great king’s tomb long ago.’

‘Is the scarab part of the treasure, then?’

‘No, the scarab is reportedly the key.’

‘The key to what—the cache? Or is it a key such as you find on a map?’ She could heard the impatience in his voice.

‘Perhaps. I think someone once told Mervyn that the Jewel itself was a map, one that would lead to a lost land of many treasures.’

‘I see.’ The earl’s gaze wandered for a moment. She jumped when he snapped suddenly back to attention and barked out a question. ‘What did you grandfather believe?’

‘I don’t know!’ Her hands were clenched to the arms of the chair. ‘I was never truly interested in the legend, not in the way that the men in my family were. Did you know that my father was killed because of that cursed Jewel?’ She paused and swallowed, but now was not the time to reveal the truth of her family relationships. ‘He was murdered just because someone believed he knew something of it! When you showed up bearing that scarab, I knew that Richard had met the same fate and likely Mervyn as well. Now this note says that Mervyn is alive! His fate may hang in the balance and I just do not know!’

Panic reached down her throat and stole her breath away. What if it was true? She had despised the legend, hated the light in her grandfather’s eyes when he spoke of it, the excitement in her brother’s tone when he talked of leaving, of chasing after a myth. She had resented the way the story grew, interfering with their lives. When talk turned to the legend, she had turned away. And she had been right. Her father had been murdered because of it; most likely her brother had been killed seeking it. But what if her ignorance also doomed Mervyn?

‘Calm yourself,’ Trey ordered. He refilled her glass. ‘We shall sort it all out. Tell me what you do know.’

She breathed deep. Panic accomplished nothing. If there was one thing she had learned from her troubled early life, it was the value of a clear head in a time of crisis. She drank again and drew courage from the warmth the brandy spread through her chest. ‘That is nearly all of it,’ she said shakily. ‘The legend is old. It came to Europe when Bonapart and his delegation of scholars and artists returned to Egypt at the turn of the century. There was talk then, that the scarab had been found, and brought to France.’

‘It wouldn’t surprise me to find that true. Many items went home with the French.’