Gather Ye Rosebuds Read Free

the value of gems. In that sixty seconds I had set out on a tour of Italy to study the masters, with Borsini as my guide. Mama and I would hire an Italian villa, and visit Florence, the birthplace of the Renaissance. We would float in a gondola down the Grand Canal in Venice to the Palazzo Borsini.
    Steptoe came and peered closely over my shoulder. He cleared his throat and said, with a sly look, “It looks very much like the necklace Lady Margaret Macintosh reported stolen five years ago, madam.”
    “Stolen! Good God! You mean to say Uncle Barry was a thief!”
    “That would not be for me to say, madam, but it is certainly the same necklace, or one exactly like it.”
     

Chapter Two
     
    I ran downstairs as fast as my legs could carry me, to find Mama waiting impatiently at the tea table. She lifted the pot and began pouring as soon as she saw me. I ran, gasping, and held the necklace out for her to see.
    She blinked in confusion. “What is that, Zoie? Where did you get it? Why, it looks like—diamonds!”
    “It is. Steptoe says it is Lady Margaret Macintosh’s stolen necklace.”
    Mama’s fingers flew to her lips to stifle a gasp. She looked around, to see no spies were listening. “Where did it come from?” She drew back against the sofa cushions, refusing to touch it.
    “It was hidden in Uncle Barry’s dresser. He was a thief, Mama! What shall we do with this?”
    “Are you sure it is hers?”
    “Steptoe says it is. You have a look at it.”
    She steeled herself to touch it then. She turned it this way and that in her fingers, with a troubled frown. “I fear he is right. Steptoe would know. Butlers always know everything. And you recall he worked as head footman at Parham for several years. He would have seen it any number of times.”
    Parham is the estate of our neighbor, Lord Weylin. When he is not at London, he lives there with his widowed mama, a social whale amidst the minnows of the area. Until Lady Margaret’s death a year ago, she also lived at Parham to keep her sister, Lady Weylin, company.
    Five years ago, Lady Margaret’s diamond necklace was stolen. As its loss coincided with my uncle’s arrival at Hernefield, it began to look as though Uncle was nothing else but a thief.
    “I wonder if Barry made a habit of this sort of thing,” Mama said fearfully. “I mean to say, it is odd that he should steal just this one necklace.”
    “Don’t say such things, Mama!” I exclaimed, and sank to the sofa. As soon as I caught my breath, I saw she was right. I was mortally afraid to return to the tower and look in other drawers, but if Uncle Barry was a thief, it was best to know the worst. “I shall go upstairs and search.”
    Mama had drawn out a handkerchief and was fanning herself, as befitted a Fragonard lady. “I shall stay here and catch my breath. Oh dear, whatever shall we do? You know I never had but a waxen head, Zoie. You must decide what is to be done.”
    I gave her hand a reassuring pat and darted back up the two flights of stairs to the octagonal tower. Steptoe had been seized with the same idea as Mama and myself. He had opened all the drawers of both dresser and desk and rooted through them. They stood open and disarranged.
    “There does not appear to be any further booty, madam,” he said, relishing that offensive “booty.”
    “Keep looking. All his jackets and boots—everything will have to be searched. Let me know if you find anything.”
    “Yes, madam.”
    His snuff brown eyes were full of sated spite. He could hardly hold his lips steady as he began unfolding sox and smallclothes, shaking them out. When we were finished, I returned to Mama and told her no more booty had been discovered.
    “Thank goodness. What shall we do with that?” she asked, pointing to the necklace as if it were a dead rat. She had placed it on the far end of the sofa table. “Lady Margaret is dead and gone. Perhaps if we just hid it away in the attic—”
    “Mama! That is no solution. We