Art and Artifice by Regina Scott Page A

interested him more was the brooch that lay
gleaming on the carpet.
    He swooped down and snatched it up. Gold
filigree setting, a ruby in the center surrounded by pearls. It
couldn’t be.
    “What are you doing?” Emily whispered,
joining him.
    Jamie slipped the brooch into the pocket of
his borrowed jacket. “Completing a task.” He studied the room
again. “Where would you hide in here?”
    Emily glanced around as well, then pointed
toward the far wall. “In the dressing room.”
    Now Jamie noticed a faint vein that cracked
the wallpaper, masking the door. He whirled and put both hands on
Emily’s shoulders. “Stay here. I’ll come back for you.”
    She pushed off his hands. “You said we were
partners!”
    “Not if it puts you in danger,” he promised,
then he turned to run for the dressing room door and yanked it
open.
    “Bow Street!” he declared, glancing in every
direction. “Surrender now!”
    No one moved. Indeed, there didn’t seem to be
space for anyone to so much as breathe. The room was crowded with
drawers and hooks and clothing a gentleman should pretend not to
know about. But the door to the corridor was ajar.
    Jamie ran for it and skidded out onto the
carpet. He just caught sight of a shadow going down the stairs and
started after it.
    Emily’s hand on his arm forced him to
stop.
    “What?” he demanded. “Did you see him
somewhere else?”
    “If I had, I would certainly not tell you,”
she informed him, gaze smoldering. “You are no gentleman, Mr.
Cropper. Our truce is off. I’ll discover Lord Robert’s secret
myself if it’s the last thing I do.” She swept past him for the
stairs before Jamie could tell her that was exactly what he
feared.
     
     

Chapter 9

    Priscilla met Emily on the landing outside
the ballroom, her arm firmly grasped by Lady Minerva. The
chaperon’s foot was tapping against the thick carpet as she looked
down her long nose at Emily.
    “I cannot leave you two alone for a moment,”
she complained. “Did you at least find what you were looking
for?”
    “No,” Emily said with a warning look to
Priscilla.
    Just then James Cropper came down the stairs.
His head was bowed, and he passed them as if he were no more than
any other servant intent on his duty. But as he rounded Lady
Minerva he was so bold as to wink at Emily over her chaperon’s
shoulder. Honestly, the audacity of the man!
    Lady Minerva seemed to find Emily and
Priscilla the more audacious. She was sufficiently put out with
them that she insisted on calling for the coach. Emily longed to
tell Priscilla what she had seen upstairs, but she didn’t want to
confess what had happened between her and the dashing Bow Street
Runner in front of her aunt. Besides, he’d snatched something off
the floor in Lady Skelcroft’s bedchamber, something that had
gleamed before he tucked it away. She didn’t like the thought that
he might be the thief she had named him when she’d first met
him.
    Yet she could think of another explanation. A
theory was beginning to form in her mind about Lord Robert. The
only way to test it was to air it before a critical audience, and
she could not ask for a more critical one than Lady Minerva.
    “Warburton informed us this afternoon that
Mr. Cropper has been investigating the theft of your pearls,” she
said to her aunt as the coach set off across Mayfair.
    For a moment, Lady Minerva merely stared at
her across the coach. Then she raised her chin. “Bow Street was
called, but I am not pleased with Mr. Cropper’s skills. A good
sennight has passed, and he has produced no results.”
    Emily nudged Priscilla, who was seated beside
her, with her foot. “He seems to suspect Lord Robert.”
    Priscilla stiffened, but her aunt snorted.
“Lord Robert? If that is the best you can do by way of a story to
feed your father, gel, you’ll be married in days.”
    “Not necessarily,” Emily insisted. “Think on
it. When we followed him to Bond Street, we saw him enter