The earl looked into the frightened eyes and frowned. “The man you sell to,” he said, “is he the same man who apprenticed you to the sweep?”
The eyes grew rounder. The child nodded.
“Who gets the money?” the earl asked.
There was no answer for a while. “Someone,” the boy whispered eventually.
“Your mother, Nicky?”
“Maw’s dead,” the boy said quickly. “I was in the orphanage.”
The earl’s tone was persistent, though not ungentle. “Your mother, Nicky?” he asked again.
The eyes, which were too old for the face, looked back into his. “Paw left,” the child said. “Maw ’ad me an’ Elsie to feed. ’E said we would all ’ave plenty if I done it.”
The earl removed his hand from the child’s chin at last. He leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers against his mouth. The boy stood before him, his head hanging low, one foot scuffing rhythmically against the carpet.
“Nicky,” Lord Lisle said at last, “I will need to know this man’s name and where he may be found.”
The boy shook his head slowly.
The earl sighed. “Your mother’s direction, then,” he said. “She will perhaps be worried about you. I will need to communicate with her. You will tell me where she may be found. Not now. A little later, perhaps. I want to ask you something. Will you look at me?”
Nicky did so at last.
“Do you like her ladyship?” the earl asked.
The child nodded. And since some words seemed to be required of him in response, he said, “She’s pretty.” And when his master still did not say anything, “She smells pretty.”
“Would you want her to know that I found you with the silver top in your hand?” the earl asked.
The child shook his head.
“Neither would I,” the earl said. “We are in entire agreement on that.
What do you think she would do if she knew?”
Nicky swallowed. “She would cry,” he said.
“Yes, she would,” the earl agreed gently. “Very hard and very bitterly.
She will not be told about this, Nicky. But if it happens again, perhaps she would have to know. Perhaps she would be the one to discover you. I don’t want that to happen. Her ladyship is more important to me that anyone or anything else in this life. Do you know what a promise is?”
The child nodded.
“Do you keep your promises?”
Another nod.
“Are you able to look me in the eye and promise me that you will never steal again, no matter how small the object and no matter how little it will be missed?” Lord Lisle looked gravely and steadily back into the child’s eyes when he looked up.
Another nod.
“In words, Nicky, if you please.”
“Yes, guv’nor,” he whispered.
“Good man. You may leave now.” But before the child could turn to go, the earl set a hand on his head and shook it slightly. “I am not angry with you,” he said. “And you must remember that we are now in a conspiracy together to make her ladyship happy.”
He removed his hand, and the child whisked himself from the room without further ado. Lord Lisle stared at the door for a long while.
Estelle was not entirely pleased with the ring when she returned to the jeweler’s to fetch it. It was very beautiful, of course, but she did not think she would have called it the Star of Bethlehem if this had been the one Allan had put on her finger. The diamond no longer looked like a star in a night sky. She did not know why. It was surely no larger or no smaller than the other had been, and yet it looked more prominent. It did not nestle among the sapphires.
But no matter. She had not expected it to look the same, anyway. There could be no real substitute for the original ring. This one would serve its purpose-perhaps. She took it home and packed it away with the rest of her gifts.
The following day the guests would begin to arrive. She would see her parents for the first time in six months. She had missed them. And everyone else would be coming, too, either on the same day or within the few days following. And Christmas would begin.
She was going to enjoy it more than any other Christmas in her life. It might be her last with Allan. The last during which they would be truly husband and wife, anyway. And though panic grabbed at her stomach when she thought of what must happen when the holiday was over and Mama and Papa began to talk about returning home, she would not think of that.
She wanted a Christmas to remember.
The Earl of Lisle was no better pleased with his ring. He knew as soon as he saw it that the original must have had nine sapphires. The arrangement of eight just did not look right. They did not look like a night sky with a single star shining from it.
But it did not matter. Nothing could look quite like the Star of Bethlehem, and this ring was lovely. Perhaps she would know that it was not meant to be a substitute, but something wholly new. Perhaps. He wrapped the little velvet box and carried it about with him wherever he went.
Nicky, in the meanwhile, was feeling somewhat uncomfortable, for several reasons. There was the whole question, for example, of what Mags would do with him if he could get his hands about his throat. And what his new master would do with him if he caught him thieving again. Nicky had the uncomfortable feeling that it would not be a whipping, which would be easy to bear. The governor would force him to look into his eyes for a start, and that would be worse than a beating. He was proving to be not such a soft touch after all.
Then, of course, there was his mother. And Elsie. Were they starving?
Was Mags bothering them? He knew what Mags did to help girls to a living. But Elsie was not old enough yet. Nicky did not know what he would do, short of abandoning his family to their fate. Nothing had been said about any money in this new position of his. Plenty of clothes and food, yes, and very light work.But no money.
There was, of course, the shiny shilling the lady had given him the first night she came to him with a cup of chocolate. Nicky had never seen so much money all at once. But he couldn’t give that to his mother.
He needed it for something else.
And that brought him to the nastiest problem of all. That ring and that diamond almost burned a hole in his stomach every day, pressed between the band of his breeches and his skin as they always were. He couldn’t sell them to Mags now. It would seem like breaking his promise, though the things were already stolen when he had been forced to look into his master’s eyes and make the promise, and though he had never thought of keeping a promise before.
And he couldn’t put them back in the lady’s room, though he had thought of doing so. Because she would tell the governor and he would know the truth. He was a real sharper, he was. And he would not whip or even scold. He would look with those eyes. He might even put a hand on his head again and make him squirm with guilt.
There was only one thing he could think of doing. And that would mean leaving his room again during the night, and the house, after the lady had brought him his chocolate and kissed him and allowed him to breathe in the scent of her. And the governor might catch him and look at him.
And the stupid clothes he would be forced to wear would draw ruffians like bees to a honey pot. And Ned Chandler might refuse to help him at the end of it all and might not believe where he had got the things and what he meant to do with them.
Nicky sighed. Sometimes life was very hard. Sometimes he wished he were all grown up already so that he would know without any difficulty at all what was what. And he was getting used to a warm and comfortable bed and to a full night’s sleep. He did not particularly want to be prancing about the meaner streets of London at an hour when no one would ever hear of him again if he were nabbed.
Ned Chandler had been a jeweler of sorts at one time. He still had the tools of his trade and still mended trinkets for anyone who came to ask and dropped a few coins his way. Nicky, as a very small child, had often crept
