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- Herausgeber: Allison & Busby
- Kategorie: Krimi
- Sprache: Englisch
December, 1922. Ruby Vaughn is looking forward to a quiet, relaxing trip to Oxford in the week before Christmas with her octogenarian housemate and colleague Mr Owen. Far away from the arcane, unusual - and occasionally illegal - books that seem to always get her into trouble. The most she expects to do is attend a handful of his antiquarian society meetings. But when the body of disgraced scholar Julius Harker is amongst his exhibition of Egyptian antiquities looted by Napoleon, panic spreads throughout the cobbled streets of Oxford. The last thing Ruby wants is another investigation, but then an old friend comes begging for her help. If that wasn't enough, her past insists on haunting her when Ruan Kivell, the intriguing folk healer that she met in Cornwall, suddenly reappears. It seems there is much more going on in Oxford that meets the eye.
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The Devil in Oxford
JESS ARMSTRONG4
5
For J and the boys.
You are an endless source of inspiration and joy. P.S. I’m sorry I have yet to include a pet chicken into the plot as requested. One day.
6
Contents
Chapter One
En Garde
Oxford, England, December 1922
In my thirty years of existence, I had come to know myself fairly well. Oh, I harboured no delusions of being redeemable, as I had more than my share of flaws: headstrong – though Mr Owen, my employer, would say mulish – a mite impetuous, and most certainly unsteady in affairs of the heart. Yet, as I lay there flat on my back upon the brightly polished wooden floor of the Artemis Club with a blunt-tipped sabre pressed to the two-month-old scar on my chest, I realised one other essential truth about myself.
I, Ruby Vaughn, had never, ever before lost upon the fencing strip.
Not even when said piste was little more than a makeshift rectangle hastily hashed out in the dirt behind a military hospital in France. But I supposed in time everything must change – even me.
‘Best of three, eh, Vaughn?’
I glared through my mesh mask at Leona Abernathy, whose sabre remained pressed gently against my breast. My muscles screamed in protest as moisture soaked through my thick white fencing jacket. Gasping, I stared up at the ornately carved white scrollwork adorning the ceiling. Around us, the sound of metal upon metal rang out as other pairs practised with their blades.
Leona laughed, tugging off her own mask, and offered me a gloved hand. A shaft of light came in through the window, 8catching in the dark browns and umbers of her hair. She hadn’t aged a bit since we’d been stationed together at that hospital in Amiens. I watched my old friend’s brown eyes dance as she wiped the sweat from her brow with the back of her sleeve.
She’d got far better since our wartime duels. During the bloodiest months of the cataclysm, teaching her to fence had served as a distraction from the slow, beating drum of death raging outside the hospital walls, and the growing spectre of my slipping grasp on sanity. The war had tested me in ways that I did not wish to think on. Certainly not here. In Oxford. During the week before Christmas. The past – that particular past – had no business in my present.
‘Best of three?’ I gasped indignantly, rolling over onto my hands and knees. ‘Are you trying to kill me?’
‘Where’d be the fun of that?’ Leona tugged her long dark braid over her shoulder and ran her hand along it loosely. I sprang to my feet with a grunt. I seldom had the opportunity to fence nowadays, spending most of my time in the stuffy old bookshop I ran alongside my octogenarian housemate and employer, Mr Owen, back home in Exeter. Life as an antiquarian-turned-lady-sleuth-detective had clearly taken its toll on my body.
Though by all appearances, time spent in scholarly pursuits hadn’t taken a toll on Leona at all. She looked much the same as she had during the war, with large brown eyes set into a heart-shaped face and the sort of effortless beauty that would have launched a thousand ships in another lifetime. She was lithe and strong, possibly stronger than she’d been back then. Who knew that sorting through antiquities and translating ancient scrolls would do such wonders for a girl’s health?
She nudged me again with the sabre, drawing my attention back to her. ‘Besides, you’re here for two more weeks. I’ll wait at least until the new year to finish you off.’
‘Wonderful … I shall eagerly await my demise.’ I adjusted 9my grip on my own blade, lightly bouncing the hilt in my palm, gaze drifting to the grey world outside the windows. Bundled-up shoppers passed the faintly fogged window as the first fat snowflakes began to fall from the afternoon sky.
My afternoons with Leona at the Artemis Club had become a respite from my worries of the last few months – the increasingly peculiar situations in which Mr Owen had got me ensnared, my multiple brushes with death, the fact that I’d fallen in love with a witch who possessed an uncanny ability to hear my thoughts. Dreadful thing, love. Of course, my indecision put a quick end to that short-lived romance. So, when Mr Owen informed me that we would be spending Christmas in Oxford to attend the annual gathering of his antiquarian society, I leapt at the chance to escape the doldrums of my life and nurse my aching heart. Unfortunately, the trip had the opposite effect – for Mr Owen’s antiquarian friends had been taking up more and more of my time with each passing day thanks to Howard Carter’s recent discovery of a new tomb in the Valley of the Kings. Egyptology and, consequently, my ability to read both hieratic and demotic scripts had kept us quite busy since arriving in town.
Leona nudged me again. ‘Where’d you go?’
‘What do you mean, where did I go? I’m right here.’
She frowned, pursing her lips, and gestured vaguely at my chest. ‘Your body is standing there, but your head has been elsewhere all day.’ She tapped the side of my mask with her forefingers. ‘It’s no wonder you lost the match. You’re distracted and it’s left you flat on your back twice now.’
‘I’m fine,’ I huffed, swatting away her fingers. My breath uncharacteristically ragged as I tugged off my own mesh mask, gulping in the warm damp air. ‘And much as I would love to let you beat me again – I’m late as it is. Another dinner with the antiquarians. Mr Owen will be terribly cross with me if I don’t show myself.’10
Leona laughed merrily, taking a challenging step closer. ‘The Ruby Vaughn I knew never lost, nor did she worry about being late for a fusty supper full of conversation with men old enough to be her grandfather. Come on, once more for old times’ sake? I’ll buy you a drink after?’
It was tempting, to be certain, but I loved Mr Owen – far more than I ought, considering the messes he’d got me into. ‘I’d love to – truly. But I can’t. I’ve been busy with the antiquarians from the moment I arrived here in Oxford. You would not believe the things they’ve pulled out of their mouldering attics for me to examine. I do not know how you stomach it day in and out at the museum.’ I laughed, placing my sabre beneath my arm as I fiddled with the fastenings on my jacket. It was unbearably hot in here, as if someone hadn’t bothered to turn down the radiators. I fanned my neck with my glove as another irritating bead of sweat found its way between my breasts.
She grinned. ‘Welcome to my life. I swear, for the last two months I have been mostly living at the museum. Poor Annabelle must feel like she’s a queen, living by herself in our little flat, with no roommate to bother with. It’s enough to make me wish Howard Carter had never gone to Egypt at all. Let that poor soul rest in peace and not be subjected to all this—’ Her hand flung out to the side.
‘But you’re happy working at the museum? Truly? You never speak of your work in your letters.’
There was an odd flicker in Leona’s smile. ‘Of course. And to finally be respected. Treated as an equal to the male scholars there … it’s a heady thing, Ruby. I truly recommend it.’
I smiled back at her, brushing the sweaty curls from my face. It was rapidly growing dark as the sun sank low in the December sky, casting long dramatic shadows across the herringbone floor. Mr Owen had likely already arrived at our host’s home and begun holding court around the fire with a bottle of Scotch if I knew him.11
A ripple of nervous silence spread across the room like waves surging upon the shore. I turned to see the source of the disturbance. My blood stilled as any thought for Mr Owen evaporated into the ether.
It was a man.
In the Artemis Club.
Men were never allowed past the front reception. And it was not just any man who’d breached the gates of our veritable feminine sanctuary – it was my very own solicitor. ‘Christ on a cracker, it’s Hari!’ Mercifully he’d not spotted me yet, caught up in conversation with a woman at the front entrance. I heard her – whoever she was – laugh, a sign that the stubborn man had employed his considerable charm to reach this inner sanctum rather than employing the law for his aims.
Without a thought, I took Leona by the hand, dragging her across the floor and into the far corridor leading to the changing rooms.
‘Hari Anand?’ she squeaked. ‘You’ve taken up with Hari Anand? Please tell me he’s the reason your fencing has become abysmal!’
‘He is not,’ I grumbled, rushing the pair of us down the corridor. ‘And I have not.’
‘Oh, Ruby, I’ve always adored Hari, ever since he first came to the hospital! I haven’t seen him in years.’
I let out an exasperated sigh, pausing alongside a fragrant glass jar holding branches of wintersweet, its papery yellow flowers catching in the fading sun. ‘Keep your voice down! I’ve not taken up with Hari – he’s my solicitor, for goodness’ sake!’ And truthfully, the man was more of a brother to me than anything else. He’d been badly wounded when I first met him in Amiens, but the two of us struck up an easy friendship that endured long after the war.
Hand in hand with Leona, I stormed down the darkened hallway before shoving her bodily into our private dressing room and slamming the door, locking it behind us.12
The walls inside the dressing room were covered in a pale pink patterned fabric that muted the sound of our voices. Likewise, all the furniture was soft and plush and various shades of the hue, giving me the amusing image of being wrapped in bunting. We weren’t, of course, but there was something delightfully absurd about the room – at once utterly darling and not at all suited to me, for I was anything but darling.
‘If he’s not your distraction then why, may I ask, are you hiding from the man like he’s unexpectedly seen you in your knickers?’ She laughed, slumping into a sumptuous porcine-coloured velvet armchair, and began tugging at her shoes, one by one.
‘It isn’t Hari the man that I am avoiding. It’s Hari the solicitor.’ I finished with the fastenings of my jacket and tossed it over an ornamental screen before stepping behind it and slipping out of my pants. ‘Hari the man is perfectly agreeable.’
‘You’re not in trouble, are you?’ She nervously folded her long fingers into her lap. ‘If you were – I know I don’t have much money, or much else for that matter – I’d help you if I could.’
My high-necked indigo evening gown hung on a hook behind me. I slipped it off the wooden hanger and stepped into the dress, tugging it up over the fresh scar on my breast before peeking my head back out from around the floral screen. ‘It’s nothing like that. It’s a legal matter, that’s all. I don’t want to deal with it before Christmas.’
‘So that’s why you came to the Ashmolean today.’
‘Partly …’ I admitted, struggling with the tiny pearl-studded buttons up the back. ‘My housekeeper, Mrs Penrose, told me that Hari intended to call upon me this afternoon – I needed some air … I needed …’ My pulse thundered in my ears as I debated whether to speak aloud the true ghost that had been haunting my days. The reason I’d lost sleep, the reason for my increasing nightmares and for dodging poor Hari like a bridegroom at the altar. ‘You see, there’s another imposter.’13
Leona sucked in a sharp breath, the words hanging between us for several seconds.
An imposter. A fraud. Yet another charlatan pretending to be my dead mother. I swallowed hard as the awkward silence stretched on.
‘Oh, Ruby, that’s terrible. Another? I thought they’d finally stopped coming after the war.’
As had I. It had been years since another crept from the shadows to plague me. ‘It’s fine. Truly. I’d hoped to put off the conversation until January. I’m not overly sentimental about Christmas, but there’s something about this time of year that makes me rather melancholy. Perhaps it’s the greenery. The fig pudding. Who even likes fig pudding?’
‘Or the fact that everyone is with their families and yours is dead?’
‘There is that …’ I wrinkled my nose. ‘But I have a cat, as well as a meddling octogenarian who has taken up the mantle of paternal duties with aplomb.’
She reached out, taking me by the arms, lips pressed into a firm line. ‘Darling, of course you’re bound to be sad. Anyone with a heart would be sad. I miss my family terribly in winter and they’re simply in Egypt. The nights are dreadfully long. It’s dark. Cold. It isn’t the holidays that are causing it, it’s the weather that makes a body lonely!’ Leona enveloped me in a warm hug, the scent of her jasmine perfume filling my nose.
Loneliness? I chewed on the word for several seconds. Perhaps that was all it was. A logical, reasonable little thing. She stepped back, holding me at arm’s length, appraising me from head to toe. ‘Enough of that, you have a horde of antiquarians to entertain.’
I let out a wet laugh, wiping at the moisture that had strangely gathered beneath my eyes. Perhaps I did have a functioning heart after all.
‘That colour suits you. One might even confuse you for a lady.’14
I laughed, grateful for her change in subject, as she stepped back. I flopped onto an absurdly puffed-up rose-coloured ottoman and began rolling my stockings up my leg, affixing them with an old velvet garter. ‘One might be mistaken on that score.’ I glanced to the closed door. ‘Do you think you could occupy Hari until I can make my escape?’
Leona raised a brow, looking from me to the ground-floor window behind me. ‘You do realise that’s a five-foot drop to the street.’
I wet my lips and nodded. ‘Perhaps I’d better wait to put my shoes on once I land then, hmm?’
Leona laughed. ‘Very well, I can buy you a few moments, I suppose. For old times’ sake. But first …’ She stood and came closer, tucking an errant curl behind my ear. ‘There. You look beautiful. Even if you are still rather damp from fencing.’
I grinned, pressing a gentle kiss to her cheek. ‘You are a darling. Same time tomorrow morning as usual?’
Again, a strange expression crossed her face. Precisely as it had when I last mentioned the museum. She gave her head a slight shake. ‘I don’t think tomorrow would be a good idea.’
I gathered up my beaded handbag, fastening it. ‘Whyever not? We meet here every morning. I know they’ve been keeping you busy, but surely you don’t have to be at the museum at dawn.’
She stared at the snowflakes falling outside the large leaded glass window, her fingers running absently on the wooden sash. ‘It’s nothing. It’s only Reaver has this project that’s consuming him, and he insisted I be at his side all day tomorrow.’
I stared at her unblinking. ‘Frederick Reaver … You work for the Frederick Reaver?’ The words came out as a squeak. How on earth had she omitted that tiny fact? The man was a legend among Mr Owen’s set. Universally adored by the papers as one of the great minds of our age. ‘Why didn’t you mention that before? Leona, that’s a boon! No wonder you’re happy at the museum.’15
‘I’m s-sorry. It must have slipped my mind,’ she murmured, picking at the cuticle of her left thumb.
This sudden reticence worried me. I took a step closer, laying a hand on her shoulder. ‘Is everything all right?’
She rubbed her left eye and shook her head. ‘I’m fine, Ruby. Truly. It’s only a headache. It’s come on all of a sudden.’ Her voice cracked and she flashed me a small smile. ‘Off with you. I’ll keep Hari occupied. Maybe even have him buy me supper somewhere expensive. He can certainly afford it if he’s having to keep you out of trouble.’
Leona was behaving strangely, but I hadn’t time to parse out what it meant. Perhaps it was only a headache as she said, or perhaps she simply wasn’t as happy at the museum as she’d implied. After all, I knew how hard she’d fought to be taken seriously by the academy. And for her to have a permanent position at the Ashmolean – one of the most respected, if not the preeminent museum in Britain – and under Frederick Reaver? It was everything she’d ever dreamed of.
The heavy wooden sash groaned as I lifted it. A gust of wind sent a maelstrom of wet snow inside, striking the side of my face. My fancy shoes in my left hand, I threw my legs over the side, balancing there – half in, half out. ‘With your headache, shouldn’t you fix yourself some tea and go to bed? I’m sure Hari won’t mind.’ I’d meant the words kindly, and yet Leona stiffened as if struck.
But whatever it was would have to wait until the morning, I was already late for supper with the antiquarians, and that would never do.
Chapter Two
The Prodigal Protégé
The snowstorm raged outside the thick walls of Emmanuel Laurent’s stately townhouse. I’d been here for over an hour now and yet my stockings had scarcely dried from where I landed on the snowy street outside the club. I stretched my toes in my shoes. Every so often, the very walls of the home would groan as a stiff gale whipped down the winding narrow street between the tall yellow-stone buildings. Oxford was a lovely town, with the University the beating heart of it. Ever since arriving here, I could not go two steps without running into someone who was connected to the place. Even our kindly host Emmanuel Laurent, who was currently angling to be the next Member of Parliament for Oxford itself, was a former professor – having taught anthropology for decades before turning his attention to politics. The University connection was how Mr Owen first became acquainted with the fellow, and how I ended up nursing a glass of champagne alone on a settee feeling utterly sorry for myself – at half past eight o’clock on a Tuesday. Or was it Wednesday? I tilted my glass to one side – the days had turned into a blur. An endless morass punctuated by random pangs of guilt for how I’d left things with Ruan.
I nearly groaned. Ruan Kivell and my confounding feelings for the man were a constant plague upon my thoughts. I took another 17drink, staring at the fine rug beneath my shoes in a desperate attempt to think of something other than the intriguing folk healer I’d met in Cornwall last August. It must be Oxford itself that kept him so close to mind, as he’d been a student here before the war. Granted, almost everything made me think of Ruan as of late. The man managed to capture my bitter heart in a way I’d not expected. Running from my feelings for the dreadful man was half the reason I so readily agreed to join Mr Owen in Oxford. I thought being away from home would give me time to forget my wretched inaction in Scotland. The man laid his feelings for me bare, and I’d … I’d said nothing. I let him walk away – entirely unaware of how deeply I cared for him. I swallowed that unwelcome memory along with the dregs of my champagne, setting the glass on the ornately carved cherry occasional table beside me.
Where was Mr Owen? I scanned the room, before spotting him holding court alongside the great carved-stone mantelpiece at the far end of the room, decorated with a cheerful garland of braided ivy. I recognised some of his compatriots as men I’d seen at the bookshop, but there were other people here too, ones I was less familiar with – those who’d known him when he was Viscount Hawick, a fact I had only recently learned myself. Mr Owen still was the viscount of course, but he’d gone so long by his nom de guerre that he tended to prefer it to the title he’d been born to.
‘Do you suppose we will be snowed in here?’
I jerked my head around to the voice, lost in my own festive display of self-pity, to find our host standing beside me with two coupe glasses of champagne in his hands. Emmanuel Laurent was a remarkably handsome gentleman, a decade or two younger than Mr Owen, with dark grey eyes that put me in mind of the slate quarries I’d seen back in the mountains of New York when I was a young girl, long before scandal sent me away to Britain.18
My hesitation to answer must have worried him as he quickly changed the subject. ‘Are you enjoying yourself this evening, Miss Vaughn?’
If one considered reciting one’s greatest failures enjoyment, I supposed I was. The edge of my mouth curved up into a ghost of a smile. ‘A bit.’
‘I should hope more than a bit, my dear. It’s nearly Christmas after all.’ He held a glass out to me, the pale effervescence from the liquid catching in the electric lights.
I reached up accepting it, murmuring my thanks. Mr Laurent sank down into the chair opposite me, thoughtfully twisting his own glass.
‘More than a bit,’ I conceded. ‘You have a lovely home.’ The statement was not at all polite conversation. Emmanuel Laurent had an exceptionally elegant drawing room. Each of the pieces carefully curated and positioned to use the room to its maximum efficiency. There were no awkwardly placed settees, nor any stacks of wayward tomes with forgotten teacups balanced precariously on top here. The man had impeccable taste and style, that extended past his drawing room to the person himself. Mr Laurent was clean-shaven, with a warm, kindly affect. He wore his hair short and slicked back as was the fashion, the ebony strands warring with the silver at his temples giving him a learned air, which was to be expected since he’d spent most of his life lecturing on anthropology here at the University.
I glanced past him to the heavily-frosted windowpane. ‘You might be right about the snow.’ Almost at command, the glass rattled again in its wooden casing. ‘I haven’t seen a storm like this since I left New York.’
He gave me a sympathetic frown, sipping his champagne at the mention of my past life – it was no secret that I’d been sent to Britain under a cloud of scandal at the ripe age of sixteen. No one spoke much of it any more, but mention of my life in America 19was oft met with similarly polite nods. That poor Vaughn girl.
‘You must be terribly bored tonight, all anyone wants to discuss is either bookbinding or Julius Harker’s mysterious disappearance. I confess, I cannot decide which is more loathsome.’
I laughed at the serious expression upon his face. ‘You mean the fellow running the curiosity museum in town?’ The city and the antiquarians both had been abuzz for the last two days regarding the elusive Julius Harker. I’d not paid much attention to it, for I knew all about those sorts of curiosity museums and the type of people who ran them – the ones who would wire a cat skeleton to a salmon and call it a mermaid all for a few coins.
Laurent made a low sound in his chest as he finished his champagne. ‘The same. The fellow was invited by none other than Frederick Reaver to present a lecture at the Ashmolean some three days ago. Though why a man like Reaver would lower himself to entertain a scoundrel like Julius Harker, I certainly don’t know. Regardless, in typical form Harker did not appear, and no one has seen hide nor hair of him since. Rumours are swirling whether he’ll even appear for this grand unveiling of his Napoleonic cache tomorrow night.’
I worried my lower lip as the fire popped merrily in the hearth. ‘How very strange.’
Laurent let out an exasperated sigh, his eyes warm upon my own. ‘The two men have been at odds for years. It would not surprise me if Professor Reaver had invited him to speak with the intention of embarrassing the fellow, and Harker simply one-upped him by not attending.’
‘That’s a great deal of effort for a simple rivalry.’
‘You’ve not met many true academics then. You cannot challenge the ego of a genius without facing repercussions of some sort. The pair of them are like tomcats circling one another. Always have been.’
Laurent must have misread my expression, for he quickly 20continued. ‘Oh no, my dear. That’s not to say that Frederick Reaver is all bad, we have been trying for years to have him join our antiquarian society, but the museum takes up all his time. It’s even worse now that Carter found that new tomb. Fielding newspaper interviews, and requests for lectures. I’d be surprised if he doesn’t pack his bags and disappear back to Egypt before long.’ He gave me a sympathetic smile, his palm resting lightly on the table beside me.
I glanced behind me to Mr Owen, who still boisterously held court near the fireplace with a half dozen of his comrades, all of whom were deep in their cups and flushed. ‘I am sorry I’m not a better conversationalist tonight. You’ve likely escaped a riveting debate about dust mites. And now here you are discussing long-dead pharaohs and academic grievances.’
His dark grey eyes sparkled in the dim electric lights as he leaned closer to me. The spicy scent of his cologne tickled my nose. ‘I never regret abandoning the mites for a new acquaintance, my dear girl. Tell me, do you care for archaeology as much as Owen does?’ He inclined his head in Mr Owen’s direction. ‘You seemed terribly interested when I mentioned Professor Reaver.’
I was grateful for the discreet change of subject. ‘Far too much if you ask Mr Owen.’
‘Does he not care for scientific discovery?’ The older fellow’s brows rose comically.
‘Oh, Mr Owen cares a great deal just as long as said discovery does not discommode him. It’s why I wasn’t allowed to join Howard Carter’s expedition to the Valley of the Kings earlier this year. He needed me at the bookshop, not off gallivanting with archaeologists – or so he claimed.’
‘Not allowed?’ Laurent wore an endearing look of affront on his face that Mr Owen would disallow his employee to do anything.
‘He had a half dozen jobs for me to do instead, and as 21frustrating as he can be, I am fond of the old man. So I told my dear friend Mr Carter that I could not go.’
Laurent let out a low sound of appreciation and rose from his chair, holding out his arm indicating I should join him. ‘Though I must say, to have been part of Carter’s most recent discovery would have been a feather in your cap. While I don’t have the glories of the Nile here in Oxford, I might have something else you will enjoy all the same. Perhaps it will cheer you this evening. Though I suspect the weather does not help.’
‘No, it does not. I am getting cold even thinking of the long walk home. I may see if we can catch a car back this evening, even though it isn’t terribly far.’ I laughed, standing and scooping up my glass. I rather liked Emmanuel Laurent, even if he was a politician. He had an affability about him, a way of listening that made you feel truly heard. Understood. It was a dizzying thing, or perhaps it was the three glasses of champagne I’d had on an empty stomach. I laid my palm on his wool-jacketed arm and allowed him to lead me away from the rest of the group, down a quiet corridor and to a great door at the end of the hall with a lovely silver knob in the shape of a lion’s head.
‘It certainly isn’t as thrilling as Mr Carter’s discovery, but I hope it will lift your spirits for one evening.’ He paused for emphasis before placing his hand in the mouth of the silver lion, and turned, pushing the door in.
I peered into the well-lit library and could scarcely believe what I saw. For such a small townhouse, Professor Laurent had created a veritable museum of early British archaeology inside his library. The room itself had been combined with another to double its size, and it was lined with floor-to-ceiling cases. Over the years he’d lovingly affixed old, mismatched, glass curio cases to the walls, until the room was essentially one giant collection. Some of the boxes were open to the air displaying large fossils, while others were sealed shut to protect more delicate contents 22from the elements. There was a cobbled-together grace to the whole thing – a studied disarray, unlike the rest of the home – that made it all the more welcoming and warm. I pored over the shelves, uncertain where to begin.
‘You can start wherever you wish. There is no beginning and no end. I tried to go thematically rather than chronologically. Likely not the best interpretive choice, but as it’s my personal library, I make the rules.’ He smiled broadly but I was already hooked.
This room bore none of the holiday decorations from the more public areas of the house. It smelled clean and crisp, of old wood and leather soap. I took a step further into the room and paused at the first case, taking in a small collection of four intricately twisted golden torcs.
‘That set was a particularly lucky acquisition,’ he said with pride.
‘It’s extraordinary …’ I whispered, moving on to the next case, which housed intriguing, old, beaded jewellery. I flitted from case to case, stretching up on the tips of my toes, greedily absorbing it all. Everything from broken bits of pottery to Bronze Age tools and even a recovered bit of Roman mosaic that he had carefully preserved and affixed to a section of wall.
‘That tilework was one of my earliest pieces. It was found at a site not far from here sixty years ago.’ He gestured to the mosaic. ‘It had been mostly consumed by the woods. That section is all that remains. Sometimes I like to sit here and think of the hands that made the tile, the ones who laid the pieces – all of it nearly two thousand years ago. It’s awe-inspiring, is it not?’
‘It truly is.’ I wet my lips, strangely moved by the humanness of the notion. The unending need of man to leave a mark upon the world behind him. ‘Do you ever pause to think of all the myriad lives that have been lived in its presence? I wonder sometimes if the pieces can recall what came before, and all the 23people that have appreciated them over the years.’
‘You are like him …’ He smiled fondly at me before checking his watch. ‘It’s uncanny.’
‘Like whom?’
A cloud covered his expression, like a storm across a summer field. Sudden and sharp. ‘My dear son … Ernst. I lost him during the war, but he would say those very things from the time he could form sentences. Come crawl onto my lap in this room. Papa, do you ever wonder …?’ He gave his head a shake. ‘It’s been years. Do not mind me, it’s an old man’s reverie. I suppose it’s the season making me miss him all the more. He did love the holidays. The sweets, the colours.’
My own heart ached. ‘I am sorry.’
‘It is nothing. A memory, that’s all, and memories can’t harm us.’ Laurent cleared his throat, turning back to his collection. ‘I thought this room might buoy your spirits. You looked quite sad earlier in the drawing room.’
I gave him a faint smile, stunned that I’d been so easy to read.
He patted me on the shoulder. ‘It seems I have found a kindred spirit here amongst the antiquarians. I shall leave you for a moment to explore. Take all the time you wish. Dinner will be delayed a bit longer as I am awaiting our final guest – an old pupil of mine whom I haven’t seen in an age. One of the most extraordinary lads I’d ever had the privilege of teaching. I’ve not seen him since before the war, but he had been a dear friend to my darling Ernst.’
The deep pain of regret echoed in his words. A sentiment I keenly knew.
‘Don’t worry about me. I am perfectly content here. Please return to your guests. I think I might enjoy some peace with the artefacts after all.’
‘I thought you might.’ He gave me a conspiratorial wink, the shadow of melancholy lingering at the edges of his eyes. ‘If you’d 24like, I can ask that your supper be brought here. It is no bother.’
The large leather sofa in the centre of the room was appealing. Just a few moments alone wouldn’t be too terribly selfish. ‘I shouldn’t. Mr Owen would be very cross with me.’
‘You need some quiet, my dear girl. It is written all over your face. Sit. I’ll make your excuses. Owen will have to answer to me if he objects.’
I ran my fingers over the edge of the sofa, weighing the options. ‘You know, I think a little quiet might be nice.’
Laurent flashed me an answering smile before dipping out the door and into the darkened corridor beyond. He was right, of course. A little quiet would do me a world of good.
Chapter Three
Amiable Lord Amberley
I woke the next morning fully determined to spend most of the day as horizontal as possible with the serial novel I’d picked up at the bookshop on Broad Street three days before. Preferably curled up with a plate of Mrs Penrose’s saffron buns and my substantial black cat, Fiachna, purring at my side. Leona’s peculiarities at the mention of her employer, Frederick Reaver, weighed upon me. How was it that she worked for the most important man in the field of Egyptology, save for Howard Carter himself, and she failed to mention it to me? That was not the sort of thing one ignored. It was almost as if she didn’t want me to know. I didn’t know why the thought bothered me as much as it did. Perhaps it was simply that Reaver was at the forefront of my mind, thanks to my conversation last night with Laurent. After supper when I had rejoined the antiquarians, the conflict between Reaver and Julius Harker, the enigma who had been cast out of Oxford under a shadow of scandal, was all anyone could speak of. The men were two sides of a coin. One utterly respected, the other similarly despised. Purportedly, the disreputable Julius Harker had even once taught alongside Reaver and Laurent at the University before being unceremoniously thrown out on his ear.
No one spoke of what Julius Harker had done, but whatever it was had been bad enough that he could not return to polite society. 26People visited his curiosity museum, but few publicly associated with him. Which again raised more questions than answers, but I was done with my lady-sleuthing days. No more investigations. No more crimes. No more murder.
However, my dreams of saffron buns and literary assignations were short-lived, as just ten minutes after waking, Mr Owen had come upstairs with another request, and I’d been foisted once more unto the breach of inspecting ancient tomes.
Today’s quarry was Lord Amberley’s copy of Copernicus’s De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. An exceptionally fine piece, with no surprises and few imperfections. I had a sneaking suspicion that Mr Owen wanted the book for his private collection and had no intention of putting it in the shop at all. Amberley was yet another of Mr Owen’s antiquarian friends that I’d become acquainted with since arriving in Oxford.
Once we said our goodbyes and with book in hand, the two of us stepped out onto the pavement and began the long walk home. The snow clouds from the night before had given way to a brilliant golden sun that made the already gold-hued town appear even more gilded. Piles of snow that had been cleared from the street this morning lay melting along the kerbstones. ‘I do hope it doesn’t snow again tonight,’ Mr Owen grumbled to himself, tugging his long woollen coat tighter.
‘Why should it matter if it does?’ I tucked the carefully wrapped tome more securely against my body, cautious not to catch any errant melting ice from the eaves. ‘I, for one, fully intend to return to my own book now that this business is over. It’s my Christmas present to myself. And you did promise me a holiday, yet for the last week I’ve been so busy that I have not been able to read one single sentence for my own amusement. I deserve a plate of ginger biscuits, a bottle of wine, and my book, Mr Owen. I daresay I need it after the year we’ve had.’
Mr Owen let out a harrumph. ‘About that, my love …’27
I paused, turning to him as a motorcar rumbled past on the cobbles, the heft of the book solid against my belly. ‘About what exactly, Mr Owen?’
‘It’s only I have a pair of tickets for tonight …’ His dear wizened face was downcast, hiding his expression behind the wide brim of his grey homburg hat. ‘I thought you’d be pleased …’
I racked my brain for what Mr Owen might have procured tickets for. We often went to the opera, an occasional play from time to time, though usually those were at my insistence, not his. He had a penchant for motion pictures, but we had just been to the theatre three weeks ago. Brow raised, I shifted the book in my arms. ‘What have you committed me to now?’
‘Nothing terrible, lass.’ Mr Owen let out a dry laugh. ‘Last night while you were rusticating off only the gods know where in Laurent’s townhouse, I promised a few of the fellows we’d go with them to the exhibition.’
‘I would like to point out one cannot rusticate inside a townhouse. I was simply enjoying a moment of peace admiring Laurent’s collection.’ The familiar pinch of a headache formed between my brows. One caused by a meddling octogenarian bookseller. ‘And please tell me this exhibition doesn’t have to do with that Julius Harker fellow.’ My heart sank. The exhibition was supposed to be tonight, and this Harker person was all any of the antiquarians could speak of. ‘It is the exhibition … isn’t it?’
Mr Owen coughed, starting off down the street with a speed that only confirmed my worst suspicions.
I hurried off after his sturdy form. ‘Mr Owen …’
‘Aye, lass?’
‘I take it we are going to Harker’s exhibition.’ I met him step for step, shifting the weight of the book in my arms.
He made a grunt in the affirmative.
I blew my hair from my eyes. ‘Do you even know this Harker fellow?’28
Mr Owen dodged around a paperboy and continued at his breakneck speed. For a man well over eighty, he hadn’t started to slow down one bit – that is, unless his gout flared up. He glanced back over his shoulder to be sure I was still following.
‘No, my lamb. But I mean to. After all, he’s quite possibly the most interesting man in Oxford and that makes him someone I’d dearly like to meet. Besides, it’s going to be quite the spectacle. He’s unveiling a cache of Egyptian antiquities stolen by Napoleon himself. Can you imagine?’
I let out a very Mr Owen-sounding harrumph. I could indeed imagine the scene, and despite my desperation to join Howard Carter on his excavation of the Valley of the Kings, there was a darker side to archaeology. One that led to the wholesale looting of graves performed by many purported scientists, and it was that sort of thing that made me ill at ease.
Standing there in the wide entrance of Harker’s Curiosity Museum that evening I immediately knew I’d made a terrible mistake. Dread clawed up my throat as the room before me opened into a sea of people. The warmth from their bodies combined with the radiant heat gave the wide-open main exhibition room a claustrophobic feel. I stretched up on my toes searching for Mr Owen’s fluffy white hair, but he was nowhere to be found. I had sent him along to the exhibition ahead of me, as I was running late – as usual – but he ought to have been here by now.
Palms sweating, I moved quickly through the main room towards a quiet corner as a sudden peculiar sensation fluttered in my chest. My palm found its way to the spot, resting over the hidden scar on my breast. I drew in a shaky breath, then a second, before swallowing hard and moving deeper into the museum, only to be besieged by cloying perfume and a cacophony of voices springing up around me. The hard walls and exhibit cases created a world of discordant echoes, making it difficult to focus 29on anything at all beyond the voices rising up around me.
‘Do you think he’ll show?’
‘Where is he?’
‘You know he’s likely drunk, or worse.’
‘Could be in a gutter, knowing him.’
It was no wonder Mr Owen had insisted on attending. He’d never been one to pass up a scene and, judging from the people already here, tonight would be quite the show.
Moonlight filtered in through the open metal and glass of the domed ceiling, helpless to compete with the old-fashioned gaslight flames burning nakedly overhead. Something about the scene – the excitement, the scent of the gaslight, the nearness of other bodies – reminded me of the travelling curiosity exhibits of my childhood. My father thought them silly but Mother adored them. Utterly captivated by the possibility of what could be, and she insisted on taking me along with her. I tended to walk a line between my parents, never fully taken in by the spectacle and never fully sceptical. I was a pragmatic, sensible girl – if terribly trusting and naïve. But despite all that, I still found an almost childlike wonder in the unknown. The inexplicable that drew me in against all good judgment.
Which was likely how I ended up working with Mr Owen dealing in rare, arcane, and occasionally illegal books. My curiosity about the unknown was likely also the reason I remained stubbornly captivated by Ruan. Not that that mattered any more. He was unfortunately consigned to my past.
The main exhibition room broke off into smaller wings, each devoted to a different era: prehistory, the natural world, the unnatural world – whatever that might be – antiquity, and lastly the industrial world. The museum grew hotter by the moment, the bodice of my gown dampening with sweat.
Desperate for a breeze, and perhaps an inch or two of space amidst the crowd, I sidled past the great stage already set for 30tonight’s spectacle. The dais was shrouded by a deep jade velvet curtain rigged up like some sort of macabre holiday package. On each of the four corners were large flaming torches. Edging around the flames, lest I knock one over and send us all to perdition, I hurried back outside and down the twelve steps onto the pavement. Lazy snowflakes drifted down from the wispy clouds overhead and landed on my dark hair. More snow. Poor Mr Owen. He always did detest the stuff.
I leaned against the wall of the museum, tilting my face up to the moonlight. The icy wind pricked my exposed skin. Yesterday’s snow had only begun to melt, and now it was refreezing, leaving the ground around me slick with ice. Perhaps we’d hire a car home. Better than walking at any rate.
I rummaged in my pocket for my silver cigarette case, opened it, and pulled one out before putting it to my lips and lighting it. I drew the smoke into my lungs and blew it out again into the night air.
‘Good evening.’
I flicked the ashes into the gutter before looking up. A strikingly handsome gentleman stood before me. He wasn’t much taller than me, with ashen strands laced through his sandy hair. He wore a clever houndstooth suit that fit his athletic form a bit too snugly for current fashion. There was a carelessness to his dress, presumably intended to be alluring, but the effect struck me as a bit too studied. I took another drag from the cigarette rather than answering. I was used to fellows like that.
‘Professor Frederick Reaver.’ He tried again with a game smile.
My pulse stilled. Or perhaps not fellows like that.
The man had uttered the only three words in the English language to catch my attention this evening. Professor Frederick Reaver – the Keeper of the Egyptology collection at the Ashmolean Museum. In the flesh, the man was nothing at all like I’d expected. Instead of a pinched and thin academic in a tired jumper, this 31man could have stepped straight from the pages of a men’s fashion advertisement. Not to mention the way his jacket stretched at his shoulders – he was muscle upon muscle. How very curious.
I toyed with the paper of the cigarette with my thumbnail.
‘And you … if I do not miss my guess, are Ruby Vaughn.’
‘You do not miss.’ I barely concealed my surprise. ‘Though I must confess I’m curious how you knew.’
‘You have an unusual face.’ His smile melted away as he mirrored my frank inspection before checking his watch and glancing over his shoulder at the rapidly emptying streets of Oxford. Nearly half the city had crammed itself inside the museum wondering if Julius Harker would truly arrive, and doubly curious how this Reaver fellow would react to the exhibition.
‘I’ve read all about your adventures this year. You’re becoming a bit of a celebrity on these shores with your knack for finding trouble.’
His jab about my previous exploits was nothing I did not already know. I did not relish the fame that had been following me these past few months thanks to an irritating journalist … V. E. Devereaux. The man had made a point of sensationalising my every move. If I ever met him … I would certainly give him a piece of my mind. For the whole reason I’d settled in Exeter in the first place was to avoid the notoriety that came along with being that scandalous Vaughn girl. Little good that did me. My life with Mr Owen proved to be a greater scandal than the one that sent me fleeing America.
Reaver’s expression faltered, revealing a deep dimple in one cheek. ‘I apologise. I am often told my manner is too brusque for polite company and that I belong up to my knees in dirt in the field – not in these hallowed halls with my coarse manners.’ He tilted his head down the street in the direction of the Ashmolean. The museum itself was not visible at night, but I could make out the shadowy gothic spire of the Martyrs’ Memorial from here, 32even in the darkness. ‘It is only that Miss Abernathy told me you were in town and that you spend your mornings together before she comes in, and I’ve learned that a friend of hers is well worth knowing.’
She might have told him about me, but she’d scarcely mentioned him at all. In truth, when he came up yesterday afternoon, she skirted the subject. ‘Is she here tonight?’
Something shuttered in his expression. ‘I doubt it. Miss Abernathy was occupied with her research when I left her at the museum.’ Professor Reaver watched a group of young men coming down the street before training his attention upon me. ‘Care to join me to watch the spectacle, Miss Vaughn? I daresay it will be quite the show.’
He was acting the perfect gentleman, but something about him gave me pause. I hesitated before laying my palm on the fine wool of his jacket. He tilted his head in acknowledgment to the young men now flanking him and one of them hurried ahead to open the door for us. The roar of sound from inside Harker’s Curiosity Museum flooded out into the street as I returned to the maw of the beast, wholly unprepared for the spectacle soon to unfold.
Chapter Four
Harker’s Final Show
In the handful of minutes I’d been outside the museum with Frederick Reaver, dozens more people had joined the throng of onlookers, making it difficult to navigate between the bodies. All the discordant sounds from their hundreds of conversations made my pulse thunder in my veins. Raw, unbridled panic began to surge through me.
I hated crowds.
Had loathed them ever since my misadventures in Lothlel Green this past summer. I could scarcely be in a room with twenty people or more without becoming rabbity, but this – this new sensation was nigh on unbearable. My head began to ache as I thought of my days in that godforsaken hamlet. Was this what Ruan had meant when he’d refer to his uncomfortable ability to hear people’s thoughts? He’d told me once that it was akin to a train station … a sense of something coming. If so, it was no wonder the man remained in his remote Cornish village most of the time. I’d shun society as well if I could hear their every waking thought.
Good God, why could I not get him out of my head? He was a plague and a pestilence. If only I could forget what had come between us. What had almost happened. Of course, my attempts to forget were stymied by the fact I’d invited him to join us in Oxford in a gin-fuelled missive, apologising for the way I’d left 34things. But he’d not deigned to come, instead he’d sent a response that was all of two words.
i see. r
Five damnable letters. One period and no indication whether he forgave me or not.
That was my answer, I supposed. Our would-be romance was over before it had even begun. My fingers itched for the flask that was once my dearest companion, but I’d left it at home. Hiding in the bottom of a bottle of gin was yet another habit I needed to break – regardless of the status of my wounded heart.
Across the room by the shrouded dais, Lord Amberley – whom I’d seen earlier today – was speaking with his son, gesturing at the flaming torches by the curtains. At least I presumed the fellow with him was his son, as the two might have been twins, albeit ones separated by a good forty years. Amberley waved me over with a broad smile. He was a man of about Mr Owen’s years, with a balding pate and a gentle face.
‘I’d been waiting for you, dear girl. Owen was here a moment ago asking for you.’ Amberley strained, craning his neck looking around for Mr Owen before giving up with an affectionate sigh. ‘I must confess I do not even know why I’ve come tonight. I’ve always found this sort of display vulgar.’
Amberley’s son was tense, glancing around the room. A faint sheen of perspiration glistened on his brow. I couldn’t fault him for his discomfort, the crowd was unbearable. He blotted at his brow with a handkerchief.
‘As do I.’ I laughed, struggling to focus on Amberley’s face amidst the irrational unease that grew in my chest from the closing-in crowd. ‘It must be our mutual affection for Mr Owen that makes us do these things. They do so bring him joy.’
‘That and a dash of morbid curiosity – most certainly.’ Amberley’s rheumy eyes sparkled. ‘Don’t let anyone persuade 35you otherwise. Half of Oxford has been wagering whether that cur Harker will even bother to appear tonight after shunning the Ashmolean as he did … Did you know he’s not been seen in days? It’s a bit of a surprise as much as the man adores being the centre of attention.’ A trace of acidity laced his tone as he spotted the distinctive figure of Professor Reaver on the far side of the room surrounded by a half dozen young bucks vying for his ear. ‘Dear me, even Reaver is here with his army of acolytes. The business with Harker at the Ashmolean must have truly set him off.’ He clapped his hands in delight. ‘This will be a show. Reaver’s a cold one, more likely to ice a fellow out than to show up and challenge him directly.’
Reaver’s fair head was bowed as he listened to one of them. There were five of them surrounding him, each of the young men even wearing their hair in the same style as Reaver’s, having modelled themselves upon the fellow down to his sartorial choices.
Amberley leaned closer. ‘He is constantly trailed by that passel of pups from the University. All of them jockeying to claim the title of his prized pupil. Every year since he returned from the war, he selects one lad to be his pet for the year. It’s all nonsense if you ask me, but what fellow of that age has any sense?’
‘Was he teaching here before the war?’
‘For a time, but he’d been away from the University for several years before the Germans marched on Belgium. By that time, he was already in Egypt, making a name for himself in the field. Then the war came, of course. Terrible business, that.’ Amberley gestured to the shrouded dais before us. ‘If Harker had an ounce of good sense, he’d have accepted Reaver’s offer to speak at the museum the other night, played by the rules, and smoothed over the scandal once and for all. But oh no, far be it from Julius Harker to choose the safe course and mend fences.’
I started to ask him about the scandal at the University, as no one else had been able to tell me why Harker had been abruptly 36cast out, but any concern I had for Julius Harker disappeared when I spotted Leona – not ten feet away from Professor Reaver. Her long dark hair was braided much as it had been the previous afternoon and hung loose over her shoulder. Her expression drawn with panic as she scoured the faces of the room. She was searching for someone. A frisson of worry climbed up my spine.
She wore a crisp white blouse, and a half-unbuttoned waistcoat. Her shirtsleeves were rolled up and even from this distance I could see the careless stains of ink upon her forearms. A few tendrils of hair had come loose from her braid, giving the impression she’d run the quarter mile here. Reaver said he’d left her at the museum – doubted she would come, and yet here she was. Leona’s disarray stood out in stark contrast to the other attendees who were dressed for an evening out on the town.
‘If you’d excuse me …’ I murmured to Lord Amberley, slipping away from the fellow. There would be time enough to puzzle out what he knew of Julius Harker’s scandal later. Something was terribly wrong if Leona was here. She detested these sorts of affairs. I squeezed between bodies, murmuring apologies as I headed in her direction. My own fears warring with logic.
This was an exhibition in her field of study, after all. And she was Egyptian, having been raised in Cairo by her grandfather and aunt after her mother died. Her father had been a British officer, if I recalled correctly, but Leona seldom spoke of him. I wondered, sometimes, why she settled this far from her family, but never asked. It wasn’t my business, and she scarcely spoke of the why.
It shouldn’t have been unusual for Leona to be here at Harker’s exhibition – and yet I knew it was. It was in her dress. The look on her face. Leona was always so meticulous about her own appearance and how she was perceived by others. She knew, unjust as it was, that to be taken seriously in a man’s world she had to be twice as clever. Twice as perfect. Utterly flawless. And it was that small detail that had every warning bell in my body ringing. 37If Leona had come here out of scholarly interest, she would be dressed like the rest of the audience who had paid good money to attend. Whatever brought her here was more important to her than her scholarly reputation – and that concerned me a great deal.
I lost sight of her for a moment, before spotting her again, this time on the far side of the dais. Within seconds I was at her side and touched her elbow. ‘Darling, are you all right?’
She jumped at the contact. Confusion and fear flickered across her face. ‘R-Ruby, what are you doing here?’
I cocked my head to the side. ‘I presume what the better half of Oxford is doing: waiting for the exhibition. I didn’t know you were coming tonight, or I’d have come with you. I scarcely know a soul here.’
‘I didn’t … I mean I wasn’t … I came to find someone … it’s important. I need to—’ Leona’s expression grew stricken as she strained up on the tips of her toes. She was a good three inches shorter than me, making it difficult for her to see over the tops of the heads of others.
‘Are you looking for Professor Reaver? I ran into him earlier. I can show you—’
Her eyes widened and she swore. ‘He’s here? Where? He cannot see me here … He cannot know I’ve come.’
