She stepped away from the counter. She did not want to leave. She was almost certain the young man had something he wished to say. She began to find fault with the ribbons of her bonnet. She untied them, smoothed them out, retied them. She drew off her gloves and studied their buttons before pulling them back on.
Still the girls were chattering over the earrings like a pair of magpies…
Dido began to look about her as if she were waiting for someone to join her.
At last the girls were leaving the counter – without having spent sixpence between them.
‘I beg your pardon, madam,’ said the young man behind the counter.
‘Yes?’ Dido stepped back.
‘I beg your pardon, madam,’ he said eagerly, his wide pale eyes blinking rapidly, ‘I could not help but hear you describe the emerald necklace and I wondered – has the other lady changed her mind?’
She stared at him. ‘I am sorry, I do not quite understand you.’
His face blushed red, but he stumbled on. ‘The other lady who came in this morning asking about just such a necklace – has she changed her mind? Does she wish us to make one for her after all?’
‘There has been another lady asking about a necklace like mine?’
‘Yes madam. Not two hours ago. Is she… Is she a friend of yours?’
‘I do not know. What was she like?’
‘Quite tall,’ he said, ‘and brown-haired and…’ he hesitated.
‘And?’
‘And rather plainly dressed.’
‘No.’ Dido shook her head. ‘I cannot think who she might be. Our asking about a similar piece of jewellery must be no more than a coincidence.’
‘Oh.’ He sounded disappointed. ‘I hoped maybe…’ He stopped and smiled shyly, his cheeks still glowing. ‘The poor lady seemed so very worried about it,’ he said. ‘I was sorry we could not help her.’
‘Did you tell her that you could not make such a necklace?’
‘Oh no madam. We could make it. But unfortunately, when I told the lady the price she found that it was more than she could afford.’
…Well, Eliza, I have been at my needlework all morning – and so have had a great deal of time in which to consider matters. And, by the by, it occurs to me that there is more danger in sewing than most people suppose. Moralists, I believe, quite mistake the matter when they advise against novel reading in young women as a disturber of the mind and a creator of wild imaginings; they would do better to consider fancy-work. For I do believe that by only occupying a woman’s hands and leaving her mind free to wander where it chooses, sewing is a great disturber of the imagination.
Not that I would have you believe that my imagination has been disturbed this morning. My musings have, naturally, been entirely rational.
To begin with – and this subject took me all around the hem of a handkerchief – there is the matter of the emeralds. It is so very strange that another woman should enquire about an identical necklace… Of course, it might really be no more than a coincidence. If you were here with me you would probably seek to assure me that it was.
But is it so very fanciful to think that someone has tried to replace the necklace? For certainly someone has lost it – and has no chance of recovering it now that Mr Lansdale has shut it away with his aunt’s jewels. For that is what I understand has happened to it by the account which Mr Morgan was giving at Brooke. And if it was important to its owner, might she not seek a replacement?
I should perhaps add that Mr Lansdale is certain that the necklace had been taken by the thieves from another house and fortuitously dropped in his drawing room in the heat of the chase. He has informed the constable who has made enquiries, but as yet no one has claimed it. Nor do I think they will. For I cannot anywise approve Mr Lansdale’s idea. I cannot believe thieves to be so very careless. I confess that I have no personal acquaintance within the profession, but it seems to me that they must guard more closely the plunder which they have risked their lives to obtain. Do you not think so?
There have been no other reports of burglary in Richmond; and if one of our neighbours has indeed lost the necklace, then why should she hesitate to reclaim it?
What the solution to this puzzle may be, I cannot tell. I find myself repeating again and again the description that the boy gave of the lady who spoke to him, and every time that I do it, I feel there is something missing. I feel as if he told me something else… Something which I have forgotten… Or something which I did not quite understand.
Why I should think it I cannot tell, for his account seems remarkably unenlightening – a tall, brown-haired woman, shabbily dressed. There are I am sure hundreds of such women within range of Sackville Street. Though the only one of my acquaintance who could be so described, is Miss Clara Neville…
Miss Clara Neville. I was thinking of her all through the sewing of the first two flowers of my pattern! Have you noticed, Eliza, how all my enquiries seem to bring me back to Miss Clara? Do you suppose the emeralds could be hers? A gift perhaps from Mrs Lansdale? Or does she have some reserve of wealth of which we know nothing?
I am quite sure that it is Miss Neville who must be investigated if any part of this mystery is to be resolved. And so I have determined to call upon her mother again as soon as I may. I think I shall do as she wishes and accompany her upon a walk. I cannot suppose that Jenny will have the courage to oppose me: after all, her charge will be accompanied and I will undertake to ensure that no harm comes to her. It would certainly be an act of humanity to the poor woman! And, if she does indeed have something to tell, maybe she will communicate it when she is certain of not being overheard.
I shall call upon her as early as I may; but before I do so I shall pay another visit to Miss Merryweather at the circulating library.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The lady readers of Richmond were not, it seemed, particularly fond of William Shakespeare: there were very few of his plays to be found upon the library shelves. However, among those few was Romeo and Juliet: unhappy lovers no doubt appealing more to the literary tastes of the neighbourhood than murdered kings or Roman history.
Having secured the volume, Dido was reluctant to return home. This morning Maria Carrisbrook had come very early to the house and she and Flora were now deep in discussions over a musical party which was soon to be given at Brooke and, if Dido returned, she would, no doubt, be obliged to give her opinion upon the arranging of the dining table and the hiring of violin players.
So she walked on past the inn and the chestnut trees and came to a favourite place of hers where there was a walk deeply shaded by lime trees and a few green benches set against the wall of the royal park. Here, she had found, she could sit in tolerable retirement and yet watch over one of the busiest parts of Richmond.
She read rapidly and with mounting interest, distracted only by the sight of Mr Vane riding past importantly on his grey horse and once by three little boys whose ball had rolled under her seat. Warmed by the sun, beguiled by Shakespeare and very deep in her own thoughts, she became insensible of the scene around her and read on until she had almost finished the play…
‘Here’s to my love,’ cried Romeo as he drank poison in Juliet’s tomb. ‘Oh true apothecary: thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.’
It was at this point – and when she had a tear in her eye – that the little boys came running again to retrieve their ball and, upon consulting her watch, she discovered that it was eleven o’clock and time to make her visit. She put the book into her reticule and set off for Mrs Neville’s house, very deep in thought. For the lines that had appeared in her letter were certainly there in Shakespeare’s story, but they were included in such a way as to give them quite a different meaning from the one she had expected.
It was all very strange indeed…
