I put aside my ruminations as we reached the Belvedere undetected. The dogs leapt on us with lolling tongues as soon as we entered. Harry fended them off as I closed the door and lit a pair of lamps.
“Here, madam, be a little kind, I beg you,” he said to an exuberant Vespertine, who stood on her hind legs, front paws braced on either of his shoulders. She was sniffing his face with a wary intensity.
“Harry, stop playing with the dog,” I ordered.
“I am hardly playing,” he protested. “I think she has designs upon me.” He pushed her gently away, and she dropped to all fours with a low grumble.
He came to stand at my side as I surveyed the Belvedere. It had been built as a freestanding ballroom more than a century before, a Georgian pleasure pavilion with a staircase leading to the encircling gallery above. The gallery, with its alcoves and vantage points, had served as a suitable place for seducers and chaperones alike, I suspected. A gentleman might whisk a partner behind a bit of drapery for an illicit embrace even as a cluster of spinster aunts perched on gilt chairs to survey the dancers below. After the ballroom had fallen into disuse, a previous earl had enclosed one of the alcoves and installed a proper water closet in order to use the Belvedere as a sort of retreat away from his domineering countess. He was the first to store the London contributions to the Rosemorran Collection in the Belvedere, while the present earl was the one who had ordered the various other Rosemorran acquisitions brought from their country properties. It was stacked with trunks, crates, and portmanteaux of every description, to say nothing of the statues, paintings, cases, and pieces of furniture that crammed every corner.
Harry gave a soundless whistle. “Thank heaven we do not have to search every inch of this place. We would have been here until the crack of doom,” he said.
I gave him a narrow look. “Is that why you did not avail yourself of the chance to find the diamond whilst we were in chains?”
“I am hurt that you should suspect me still,” he said in an aggrieved voice. “But I will admit, if I had been tempted, the very thought of locating the diamond here brings to mind adages about needles and haystacks.”
Without further discussion, I made directly for the thylacine, pausing only to take up one of Stoker’s scalpels as I went. I tested the blade on my thumb, drawing a bright bead of crimson blood from the pad.
“Hold this.” I thrust a lamp into Harry’s hands. “I must have good light if I am to do this without damaging his tiger.”
“He put the Eye of the Dawn into an animal?”
I was not surprised at his tone. When Stoker had whispered its location to me, my own reaction had been one of astonishment. But it made its own kind of logic, I had reflected. Few people had Stoker’s enthusiasm for dead things, and it would be easily overlooked in such a place. Of course, its location also accounted for his reluctance for anyone except me to retrieve it. He would never have trusted Isabel or Göran with his beloved thylacine; his confidence in me was shaky at best.
But I merely shrugged at Harry and applied myself to the task at hand.
“Can you think of a place that might be better?”
Together we wedged ourselves under the trophy—somewhat awkwardly—as the dogs gathered around. Nut, apparently sulking that Harry had been absent for the better part of the day, was pointedly ignoring him whilst Vespertine resumed her examinations, snuffling at Harry as he tried to twist away.
“For heaven’s sake, hold still,” I scolded. “I nearly took off a finger.”
“I am trying,” he said in a strangled voice. “This creature is making me exceedingly nervous. I much prefer cats, you know. They are entirely indifferent to one’s presence.”
He broke off with a sort of strangled sound as Vespertine gave a breathy sigh and butted her enormous head into his stomach. The lamp swung wildly, but I had just broken the last stitch and the precision work was finished. I slid my hand into the pouch of the thylacine and my fingers closed instantly over a small parcel. The parcel was a piece of oilskin tied around a nest of cotton wool. I opened it and what lay inside sparkled in the lamplight. Harry struggled to look past Vespertine’s head, but she was proving difficult to dislodge. I waved it at him and wrapped it up at once, knotting the string several times to hold it fast.
“Come on,” I said, pushing myself to my feet with an audible groan. “We must get back.”
“Not so fast,” he said, putting a hand to my wrist.
“What are you doing?” I demanded, my gaze flying to his even as I clutched the parcel to my chest.
“Trying to take care of you,” he said in a tone of mild injury. “Whilst you were sleeping, I studied the timetable. The next train does not leave for another hour. You have a few minutes to change your clothes and bathe the blood from your face. You will be more comfortable,” he pointed out. “You should also take a little food. Something to sustain you. It will be a long night.” He nodded towards the parcel. “Take the jewel with you while you get fresh clothes. I will find food.”
“I have clothes upstairs in the snuggery,” I said.
“Good. Go. I will keep watch of the time.”
I looked at my bloodied hands and ruined gown and nodded. “You are right, of course. Thank you, Harry.”
His mouth curved into a ghost of a smile. “You might take that dog with you before her attentions turn unpleasant.”
I snapped my fingers at Vespertine, and she trotted obediently at my heels as I made my way up to the snuggery. I stripped out of my ruined clothes and washed, gingerly, removing the worst of the blood but revealing the blossoming bruises. I replaced my elegant ribbon corset with one meant for athletic activity. It fastened in the front, permitting a lady to dress without the assistance of a maid, and the support provided immediate relief from the pain in my ribs. I pulled on a fresh white shirtwaist and my spare hunting costume, this one of dark green tweed tabbed in dark leather. With my long boots under my skirt, I felt much more myself. I buttoned the parcel into my pocket and descended after only ten minutes.
Harry was sitting, feet propped on my desk and crossed at the ankle, dangerously close to the box of Pamphilj cameos. He was devouring fruitcake straight out of the tin. “Ambrosial,” he pronounced through a mouthful of cake.
I swatted at his foot. “Take your feet down before you damage those cameos,” I ordered. “And give me some of that cake.”
He settled his feet to the floor and handed me a slice, thick with currants and dried peel and sticky sharp with brandy flavored cherries. I ate it quickly, without tasting. It was coal for my engine, I reflected, and nothing more. I gave him a dark look and he leapt to his feet.
“We can go now,” he said obligingly. We doused the lamps and left the way we had come, slipping out the back gate of Bishop’s Folly and into the darkened streets. This time we had no luck in securing a hansom and made our way on foot, arriving at the station with just enough time to board before the train left in a cloud of steam and smoke.