“Should anything happen to me, Mr. Mayne, I ask you kindly to please hand these papers yourself to Lady Beatrice in Vienna, or wherever she may be,” he implored his superior.

“I beg your consideration, Mr. Harranby, but should you not engage solicitors for such a task?” Richard asked, with utmost seriousness, given his own knowledge of the law.

“I would sir, but this is beyond the law, in some respects,” Mr Harranby answered quietly, with a strong undercurrent of worry evident in his voice.

“I see,” Richard responded after a minute, as he extended his hand and accepted the sealed envelopes, misreading Edward’s intentions. “It must be a matter of the heart, then. And given that she is a married woman …”

He smiled at his right-hand man with sympathy.

In his confusion, Edward frowned slightly, not understanding Mr. Mayne’s change in tone, and was about to correct Mr. Mayne, then realized it would be better for the moment if his superior misunderstood his intentions.

As she accepted the papers from Mr. Mayne, after he’d finished telling her the story of how Edward Harranby met a violent end, Lady Beatrice’s hands trembled slightly, and she was ashen-faced. She swallowed hard against the dry edge of her throat, and felt acid rising from her stomach. When she’d read about Mr. Harranby’s death in the papers, she’d assumed that John, her brother, would be the one he would try to reach, from beyond the grave, as it were, to guide John as to what to do about the gold that she’d helped to steal.

But, contrary to her expectations, it wasn’t John who he trusted for this; it was clearly her that Edward Harranby entrusted with this most important matter.

Her head was spinning, as she took inventory of the status of people involved: Edward was dead, and meanwhile, Jack, John’s friend, had died also from wounds sustained from a drunken duel with one of his artist friends over a woman that both claimed to be in love with. So it was now just her and John left to deal with the gold.  Nobody had told her it could end like this!

“Lady Beatrice, you do not look well!” Richard Mayne hovered over her at first, and then bent over to look at her more closely. She looked like she’d seen a ghost.