Page 89 of The Art of Theft
All the electric lights blinked out. Livia gasped aloud.
“Keep walking. You studied the architectural plans. You know the way. We are already along the wall, and there aren’t any major obstacles in our way.”
The art thieves currently on the premises had no reason to cut the electricity—greater chaos did them no favor when they didn’t even know where the paintings were. She couldn’t think of a reason Moriarty’s people wanted the lights gone—they were already using explosives; too late for any subtlety to their endeavor.
This would be Madame Desrosiers’s loyalists then, trying to slow down Moriarty’s progress. There wasn’t much else they could do when faced with invaders who deployed bombs as if they were throwing rice at a wedding.
The entire company headed for the coat check. The night was bitterly cold and they were all dressed for a heated interior, with hundreds of vigorously dancing guests. Unlike the night of the reception, for which the château had provided omnibuses to and from the nearest railway station, the ball had too many guests and its hours were too inconvenient for public transportation.
The guests, most of whom had arrived in private carriages, had been dropped off by the bridge, where their coaches turned around to find a place outside the château. She’d heard from late-arriving guests that the line of carriages stretched more than half a mile either way along the country lane.
Had the ball proceeded normally, they would now be just done with supper, with much more dancing to come. In other words, it was too early for any carriages to have come back onto the grounds. And they would need to walk for least fifteen to twenty minutes in the frigid December air, if not more, before they reached their carriages.
Coats and cloaks, then, were an exceedingly good idea, especially for ladies with exposed shoulders and bosoms.
The fireworks were still going off, providing flashes of light for them to see their way down the grand staircase. The coat-checkers weren’t at their stations. The gentlemen of the company kicked down the door and grabbed mantles for everyone.
Mr. Marbleton handed one to Livia and smiled at her. Charlotte, watching them, was filled with an unhappy premonition. She had told Livia—and Mrs. Watson and Lord Ingram—that Stephen Marbleton could be Moriarty’s son. But when she had asked him, point-blank, about his parentage during the past summer he’d answered with ease and certainty that his father was Mr. Crispin Marbleton.
Then, she’d assumed that he preferred not to speak of the truth. But he’d since turned out to be the sort of man who did speak the truth, often at the cost of convenience, at least to those important to him. And yet he’d never mentioned to Livia that he was Moriarty’s son.
And now they were on the same premises as Moriarty, albeit alongside hundreds of others, and in the middle of pandemonium.
The fireworks ended abruptly. Charlotte exhaled, feeling cold in the greater darkness.
The bulk of the guests, having made it out of the ballroom, were now coming down the grand staircase to the entry hall. They struck matches to light their way. Shouts ofBe careful!andDon’t push! Don’t push!echoed against marble walls.
“Why are we just standing here?” whispered Livia vehemently. “People will get ahead of us!”
“Stay close to the walls,” Charlotte warned. “And stay where you are.”
The tide of guests flowed past them. The front hall, a wide, cavernous space, was now packed to the gills. Those with matches must be conserving them; the place was almost unnaturally dark.
Light appeared, causing a stir among the guests. At least a dozen men, holding torches, came down double-returned the staircase. Theywere not in evening attire, and their suits were covered with dust. Except for the man at the very center, surrounded by torchbearers. His clothes, while worn and too informal, were at least clean.
And his face—his face was so similar to Mr. Marbleton’s that Charlotte had to look away.
Mr. Marbleton had turned his body in such a way that he blocked Livia’s view of Moriarty. Or was he shielding her from the latter’s gaze?
He’d already seen Moriarty, hadn’t he?
The guests were loudly complaining that at last someone had thought of torches. For God’s sake, why had it taken them so long? And what was the matter with the electrical plant, anyway?
But they fell silent as the men approached and parted them like the Red Sea. Charlotte had the sense that Moriarty was looking for someone. Madame Desrosiers? Or the thieves who had opened his safe and taken his hard-gathered hoard of evidence?
Cold air rushed in—someone had opened the front doors.
“What’s this? Why is this gate locked?” came the angry shouts of the would-be escapees in the courtyard, at the very front.
“We are looking for a portly blond man with a full beard. He may be wearing a teal jacket.”
Ah, so it would seem that the guards upstairs had already been questioned.
“Do any of us look portly to you?”
“You may be slim, Monsieur, but please remain put for a minute or go back inside the château, where you’ll be warmer.”
“And what, be struck by falling chandeliers? Who are you, and why are you keeping us at this dangerous place?”
