Temptation and Surrender (31 page)

They both stepped nearer; standing side by side at the foot of the tomb, they stared as with his cuff—now beyond redemption anyway—he wiped the letters free of dust.

The words cleared. Em traced them—just to make sure. ‘ “Here lies the future of the Colytons.’”

“Very neat,” Jonas murmured. “Anyone who didn’t know about the rhyme and the treasure would imagine that refers to an infant’s burial, perhaps a miscarriage, given there are no dates and this is a private crypt.”

“It might have referred to her.” Em nodded at her ancestor. “It might be thought to mean that she was the future of the Colytons, and she’d died before her time.”

“True.” Jonas nudged her aside. “But we—we think—know better. So let’s see.”

Gripping the sides of the box, he braced, steadily pulled, and the box inched forward.

Em peered into the widening gap at the effigy’s feet. “It’s on carved runners.”

Jonas grunted. He wriggled the box side to side, then pulled again, and it slid slowly forward, then came more easily. He stopped before it came totally free, glanced around. “Stand back.” He braced, pulled the box off the tomb, took its weight—nearly staggered, but managed to swing around and set it down heavily on the flat top of a later tomb. “Gads—it’s heavy!”

Filing and Henry heard the thump and looked up.

Em waved. “We think we’ve found it.”

Pent-up excitement had sent her voice up several octaves. She felt like jigging, yet her stomach was churning. What if there was nothing but rocks in the box? Or worse, bones?

She pushed the disturbing thought from her mind, dragged in a huge breath as Henry and Filing rushed up.

While they exclaimed over the box, and where it had lain, she felt Jonas’s steady gaze on her. She met it. When he quirked a brow, she managed a weak smile, mouthed, “I’m all right.”

Folding her arms, she rubbed them. She wasn’t cold, but…she turned her attention back to the box. “Can we open it, do you think?”

All three males poked and prodded, shifting the lantern so it cast better light first on this face, then that.

“There’s a sort of catch here.” Henry picked at one of the longer sides. “It’s made of stone—set into the stone. Like one of those Chinese puzzles.”

None of the others could see, but then a click sounded, and Henry straightened. “That’s it.” He glanced at Em.

She nodded. “Go on—open it.”

Easier said than done; although unlocked, the heavy lid’s hinges seemed stuck. Jonas and Filing tried to help, but no amount of pulling with fingers worked.

Filing stepped back. “The encrustation of the ages.”

“It’ll open,” Jonas said. “But we’ll need a crowbar to lever it up.”

He looked at Em, to see her frowning at the edge of the lid. “It did lift, just a little.” She raised her gaze to his face; hers seemed a trifle pale. “Do we have anything we can jam in the gap?”

Henry, Filing, and Jonas checked their pockets; the only thing they had that might work was the ring on which the crypt key dangled; it had a thinned edge.

Filing handed it to Em. “We’ll lift—you slide it in.”

Together with Filing and Henry, Jonas grabbed hold of the lid; at his nod, they pulled in unison. Peering at the edge, Em wedged the thin iron in the gap, wiggled it. “I’ve got it.”

She turned to grab the lantern. Releasing the lid, the men came around to look.

Henry was beside her as she crouched before the box. Eyes level with the thin slit of an opening they’d managed to create, she directed the lantern light in…

“Gold!” Henry said.

After a moment of shifting the light this way and that, all Em could manage was a weak “Oh, my.” She looked up and found Jonas watching her. “Jewels.” She paused to clear her throat. “They have to be jewels—blues and reds and greens. And pearls. Gold coins, and other gold things, too.”

Excitement was building, strengthening her voice, carrying her away on an euphoric tide.

A slow smile spread across Jonas’s face. “It looks like you Colytons have found your family treasure.”

T
hey had. They’d actually done it—and there really was a treasure. A
real
treasure. Em could barely take it in.

Getting the box up and into the light brought her back to earth. It was so heavy, and so hard to keep a good grip on, that Jonas and Filing together could only manage to shift it a few feet at a time.

Maneuvering it up the steps to the crypt was a major undertaking even with all four of them lending a hand, in fact two. Managing the last flight up to the church was equally difficult.

Sitting it on a nearby pew, they stopped to catch their breath.

At the front of the church, Hadley looked up from his sketching. Filing saw and waved him over. “Just what we need—more hands.”

Setting aside his pencils, Hadley rose and walked over. “What is it?” he asked, looking at the box.

“Our family’s treasure!” Henry could barely stand still. “We always knew it was somewhere here, and today we found it. It was in the family crypt.”

“Is that so?” Smiling easily, Hadley nodded to Em, then looked at Jonas and Filing. “What are you planning on doing with it now?”

“We need to take the box back to the inn. We’ll need tools to open it—the lid’s jammed.” Jonas looked at Henry. “Thompson’s working at the Grange today, but Oscar should be around the forge. Why don’t you run and see if you can roust him out and bring him here?”

Henry nodded and took off, racing out of the door and all but leaping down the path to the lych-gate. His hands had proved too small, his arms too weak, for him to support the box even with Jonas or Filing on the other end.

“So what’s in it?” Hadley nodded at the box.

“We’re not sure yet,” Em answered. “Most likely gold and jewels, but we need to open it to see.”

“How did it come to be there?” Hadley asked.

While they waited for Henry to return, Em briefly related the tale of the treasure and the rhyme.

Hadley grinned. “Quite an adventure, then, leaving your uncle’s house and coming all this way, searching for it, and then finding it.”

“Indeed.” Em smiled as Henry bounced back into the church, Oscar stumping along behind him. Oscar, too, had to hear the story, but he was perfectly willing to listen as he and Hadley spelled Jonas and Joshua as they carried the box, one at each end, down the path to the lych-gate, then followed the lane to the road and the Red Bells.

By the time they reached the inn’s front yard, they’d gathered an audience, an increasingly excited one as the story of the treasure spread.

Hadley halted. “I need to go back and pack up my sketches.”

John Ostler promptly took his place.

“Thank you,” Em called.

Hadley saluted, then turned and jogged back up the lane.

They wrestled the box—which only seemed to grow heavier—into the inn and let it thump down onto one of the tables near the bar.

Edgar pulled Jonas and Filing a pint while John Ostler went to fetch a crowbar from his tack room.

Henry fetched Issy and the twins. Like Em, Issy had difficulty absorbing that their hunt was finally over. That the treasure sat before them, albeit sealed in a stone box.

The twins had no such difficulty. They danced and jigged and exclaimed.

Thompson came in with John Ostler, the crowbar already in his hamlike hand. He looked at Em for permission.

“Please.” She waved him to the box.

Henry released the stone catch again, held it open while Jonas directed and Thompson carefully inserted, then wriggled and pushed the end of his bar into the box…with a long, low groan, the lid eased up, then swung up to reveal…

Enough gold coins, jewels—sapphires, rubies, and the white fire of diamonds winking amid the jumbled mass—ropes of pearls and jewel-encrusted gold goblets to satisfy anyone’s version of what a buccaneer’s treasure should be like.

“Oh. My. God.” Hands to her face, Em stared.

Beside her, Issy was speechless.

Even the twins were reduced to round-eyed “Ooohs” as they peered into the box.

Silence held the inn for a finite instant, then someone cheered—and everyone took it up. The name “Colyton” shook the rafters.

Em suddenly felt weak, giddy, dizzy.

“Here—sit down.” Jonas’s hand closed on her shoulder. She felt the edge of a chair behind her knees; she all but fell into it.

Filing had Issy in hand, sitting her beside Em at the table on which the fabulous treasure lay.

Em glanced up, found Jonas by her shoulder, raised her hand to cover his, looked up into his face. “Thank you.”

His smile was confident and proud. He squeezed her hand, then looked up, across the table. “Ah—just the man we need.”

Lucifer stood looking down at the treasure, then he looked at Em and smiled. “Congratulations.”

“Thank you.” Em waved at the hoard. “Now we have it, I confess I’m overwhelmed. I don’t know what to do with all this.” A thought struck. She sat up and peered at the sparkling pile. “Is it even real?”

“Oh, I think so.” Smiling, Lucifer raised a brow at her. “May I?”

She waved her assent. Under cover of continued exclamations and untold conversations and speculations about the newfound treasure, Lucifer trawled through the mass, long fingers turning over coins, picking out bright jewels and holding them up to the light. Setting one particularly bright gem back in the box, he grunted, then ran a long rope of pearls through his fingers.

Phyllida came up beside him. “Stop performing. They’re real, aren’t they?”

Lucifer looked at Em. His lips curved; dark blue eyes bright, he nodded. “Very real. These are some of the finest rubies I’ve seen in a long time, and the sapphires are flawless. The emeralds have excellent color, and I can’t recall ever seeing ropes of pearls with such perfect sizing. They must be old.”

“My grandmother told me they were taken from a Spanish galleon in the late fourteen hundreds,” Em said.

Lucifer nodded. “That would explain the gold doubloons, which, I might add, are also in excellent condition and on their own”—he lowered his voice—“are worth a not inconsiderable fortune. Add them to all the rest and…” He gestured to the treasure. “Your family treasure is literally worth a king’s ransom.” He caught Em’s gaze. “It’s a very good thing you pursued it and found it. Or at some point in time, someone else would have.”

“Good God!”

The exclamation came from behind Em. She swiveled in her chair to see Harold a few feet away, goggling, slack-jawed, at the treasure.

His mouth worked, then he managed to utter, “
That’s
the Colyton treasure? Well, my word—I always thought it was just a silly story, a fairytale made up to entertain children.”

“Clearly not.” Jonas’s clipped accents were a warning, one Harold didn’t seem to hear.

“No, indeed.” His eyes gleamed avariciously. He licked his lips; eyes fixed on the treasure, he rubbed his hands together.

It was blatantly obvious to everyone watching that he was considering ways to get his hands on the treasure. Gradually the excited chatter faded, then died. A rather oppressive silence descended.

Harold remained oblivious.

Jonas sighed. “Potheridge—I believe you should leave.”

“Heh?” Jerked from his contemplation of the treasure, it nevertheless took Harold a moment to transfer his uncomprehending gaze to Jonas’s face.

What he saw there brought him to himself. He noticed the silence, quickly glanced around—finally registered the suppressed animosity directed his way.

He humphed. Looked at Em, opened his mouth, then abruptly closed it, swung on his heel, and stalked out.

“Good riddance, I say.” Thompson bent to lean his crowbar against the front of the bar. “Less we all see of that one, the better.”

A dark murmur of agreement circled the room.

Jonas exchanged a glance with Lucifer, then caught Edgar’s eye. “Call drinks on the house.” As Edgar did, Jonas looked down at Em and smiled. “My treat, while we decide what to do with this.”

She nodded and looked at the treasure, a great deal more sober after what Lucifer had said.

Jonas pulled up a chair beside her; Phyllida and Lucifer pulled a bench to the other side of the table and joined them.

Em glanced from Jonas to Lucifer. “I’ve never had anything like this to deal with before. Can you advise me?”

Lucifer nodded. “I can appraise it for you—that will give you a much better idea of its worth. After that…to be blunt, I would urge you to sell it, at least a good portion of it.”

Em wrinkled her nose. “It’s what the inscription says it is—the future of the Colytons. It was placed there to help us when we were in need. If it’s really as valuable as you say, then we’d only want to take what we need—enough to set Henry up properly, as is due the Colyton name, and portions for us, his sisters—and leave the rest for the next generation of needy Colytons.”

Lucifer nodded. “A laudable aim, but you can’t put the treasure back, not where it was. And regardless, I’d strongly urge you to sell it all and convert what you want to leave for future generations into investments. Jonas and I can help you with that—so that the next generation of needy Colytons don’t have to embark on any wild treasure hunt fueled only by belief in a family tale.”

Em smiled. “Thank you—although I have to point out that Colytons actually enjoy treasure hunts.”

“Perhaps so,” Filing said, “but with this much at stake, it simply wouldn’t be safe.”

“No, indeed.” Em stared at the treasure. What lay before her, gleaming and winking, far exceeded her wildest dreams. She was still having difficulty believing it, absorbing it. Truly grasping that her quest was over, and all her prayers for her family had been answered—comprehensively.

She looked at Issy, still stunned, still staring, then at Henry. He was smiling, but kept shaking his head every now and then, as if he, too, was having trouble taking it in.

Only the twins, bright-eyed and focused intently on the treasure, seemed to have accepted the entirety of it without the slightest quibble. They, she suspected, had believed without doubt, unconditionally trusting in the tale, and by their easy acceptance must have always imagined the treasure would be as magnificent as it was.

Now…she glanced at Jonas, then looked at Lucifer. “Now it’s here, and we can see what it is, where can we safely store it?”

“I know just the place.” Jonas caught her gaze as she turned to him; to her surprise he raised his voice so the inn’s patrons all around could hear. “We’ll put the treasure in the cells below the inn. No prisoner has ever escaped them—and no one has ever broken into them, either.”