Arrive mid Oct with piece for exchange.
Heaviness descended, covering Liliana like a shroud. Price? And it said “piece.” That sounded like more than just information. What had her father gotten involved in? It couldn’t be good, given the secrecy surrounding it and how it turned out—for both men. She glanced up at Geoffrey.
He, too, had finished his letter and was contemplating a message of his own. That there was one was clear, given the grimace lining his mouth and the tired, sad downturn of his eyes.
Liliana’s heart ached for them both.
“What does yours say?” she asked quietly.
His eyes snapped to hers and Liliana tried not to recoil from the pain in them. She suspected he saw similar hurt in her own, as his mouth softened.
“As best I can make out, it says, ‘Authentic corselet, belonged to Cleopatra, emeralds in gold. Exchange for asylum and funds for life. Advise offer.’ ”
Liliana read her message aloud as well, which seemed to follow his. She scrunched her face, her mind reeling. Whatever she’d been expecting, it certainly wasn’t this. “Treasure?”
“Egyptian treasure,” Geoffrey clarified. “It fits my father, at least.”
“But not mine,” Liliana said. “He never showed any interest in such things.” She looked back at her message, staring at the initial T. T would be neither Edmund Wentworth nor Charles Claremont. So who could it be? These letters were the ones her father had written, the ones she’d found amongst Edmund Wentworth’s things. So that meant T was known to her own father, as it seemed he was the one brokering whatever exchange was meant to happen. But her father associated only with other scientists.
Liliana gasped. “When Napoleon invaded Egypt, he took with him one hundred and fifty French scientists. They were called the savants. Napoleon ordered them to catalogue and classify every aspect of the country.”
Geoffrey nodded. “I remember,” he said. With his mind distracted by the mystery, it was as if he forgot his anger with her, and his tone was one of easy intimacy. It caressed Liliana’s battered heart like a lover. “When things got hairy, the coward abandoned them there. They were stranded in Egypt until British troops ‘rescued’ them in 1801. Of course, we relieved them of all of their findings and treasures, including the Rosetta stone, and sent them home empty-handed.”
“Exactly,” Liliana said, excitement and hope finally bubbling through her gloom. “After my mother died, my father stayed in England with me, but before that he traveled extensively throughout the continent, studying and lecturing. He could have easily met and befriended one of those scientists who would later become a savant and…Oh!” she exclaimed, a memory surfacing. “Triste. My father shared rooms with a French scientist named Triste at university. He used to talk of his old friend, when I was little. The T must stand for him.” Without thinking, she grasped Geoffrey’s hand and a bolt of current shot through her, raising gooseflesh.
Geoffrey stiffened at her touch, his face once again going blank. He pulled his hand away and stood, the wooden chair scraping against the stone floor.
Liliana’s throat tightened, tears once again stinging her eyes. Her hand still burned where she’d touched him, but Geoffrey had gone cold. He paced beside the desk, one hand gripping the vellum he still held and the one she’d touched balled into a fist.
“So what if Triste was a savant,” he said, his voice equally cool, “and was able to retain this…corselet? He’d have returned to France in an upheaval, with Napoleon about to declare himself emperor and gathering all wealth to himself.”
Liliana stood as well, unable to keep her seat. She tried to make her voice sound as impersonal as his so he wouldn’t see how his rebuff stung. “Yes, and Triste would no doubt be bitter over being abandoned in Egypt for those long years and might think the treasure should be his alone—”
“So he gets in touch with his old friend.” Geoffrey stopped before her.
“My father.” Liliana nodded.
“And asks him to find someone in England who would be willing to purchase the piece so he can start a new life here,” Geoffrey finished. He raked his fingers through his black hair and blew out a breath. “It’s thin.”
“It’s reasonable, given what we know,” Liliana countered. She pulled one of the bundles of letters to her. “Now we need to decode the rest and see if we’re right.”
Geoffrey narrowed his eyes and Liliana held her breath. She resumed her seat, determined to remain until the mystery was solved. She wouldn’t leave, even if he ordered her to. Even if he tried to physically toss her out on her bottom. But she prayed he wouldn’t.
He dropped into the chair next to her. “Fine.” He snatched the letters she held but thrust another stack forward. “However, I will decode the ones from your father, and you, mine. That way, neither of us is able to hide anything from the other.”
Liliana swallowed, knowing by neither he meant her. She accepted it, knowing he didn’t trust her. Might never trust her again. She was only grateful he hadn’t fought her staying, because she’d known very well when she’d given him all of her evidence that he could have her tossed off of the estate. It had been a risk she’d been willing to take, showing her trust in him. Whether he would ever see it that way was yet to be determined. She nodded her head and set to work.
Long minutes passed, each of them scribbling furiously. An odd peace stole over Liliana. Their savant theory grew more and more feasible with every message she decoded, and while she still was unsure what had gone so terribly wrong that it had ended with her father’s death and possibly Geoffrey’s father’s, too, just knowing she’d been right to pursue her instinct acted as a balm on her ragged, conflicted feelings.
There was no clue as to how Charles Claremont and Edmund Wentworth met, as by the time they started using coded letters to communicate, it was clear their scheme was already afoot. As Liliana read on, bits and pieces of the story unfolded. A price agreed to, a plan for T to bring the piece to England himself. A date set. Then, a snag. T being watched, unable to escape France. Scrambling for another plan. Agreement to pay a bribe to one of Napoleon’s government officials for safe passage of the piece to a university in Belgium, where it would be sent on to her father, hidden amongst scientific papers, with T to follow at a later date.
And then…
Liliana’s breath caught as she stared at the next decoded message.
HVARRNGDFORSONTODLVRPKGASHEPASSESBRDR
Have arranged for son to deliver package as he passes border.
She put the letter down, her hand shaking. When she glanced over at Geoffrey, he watched her intently, likely drawn by her gasp. Yet his usual robust coloring had washed pale, and she knew he must be reading similar messages from her father’s side of the communication.
“Did you know you were paying a bribe?” she whispered.
Black lashes dropped, even as Geoffrey shook his head in a slow denial. He looked as if he were going to be sick. “Father asked me deliver a vase, told me it was a priceless antique he wished a friend of his in France to have, but because of the war, he couldn’t send it through normal channels. The bribe money must have been inside, but I never knew it.”