Nymph’s thighs. He almost groaned aloud and then remembered the odd little man not far away, still leering at the prints. Judge not, Carlyle told himself, lest ye be judged. He had been reminded of Susannah by a colored engraving of fruit that was suitable for a Methodist’s parlor. He strode away, swiftly putting as much distance as he could between himself and all stimulation.

He finally stopped in a park and sat down on a bench under a tree. Carlyle was beginning to realize that his brains were still addled by his unexpected glimpse of Susannah last night. But why? He was a grown man, not some randy lad, achingly stiff and stupid after just one look at an unclad woman.

And yet the mere sight of her had undone him. He was almost jealous of the damned corset, if it was possible to be jealous of an inanimate object. It was able to encompass her slender waist just as he wished to do with his hands, it had the privilege of cupping her beautiful breasts, it was warmed by her silky skin-he had no doubt that her skin was silky. At his level of amorous expertise, Carlyle was good at guessing such things.

He wanted to caress her with all the skill he possessed, wanted to rain kisses on her bare shoulders, wanted to tease her sensitive nipples, wanted to fondle her glorious rear with both hands, then beg permission to touch her as intimately as she might wish-damn, damn, damn. Right now he wanted to shoot himself more than anything. He could not have her.

Susannah knew that dressing herself would be a bit of a struggle, but she vowed to do it, even if her corset-the corset-ended up going on crooked. She could tighten the crisscrossing back laces before putting it on over her camisole and then take a deep breath and hook it in front somehow. It had lost much of its stiffness since she’d removed the gems. She might even be able to breathe.

She had looked in on Lakshmi, who still slumbered in her narrow bed in the chamber under the eaves, though it was past noon. Susannah had no idea what ailed her, but it seemed that the very least she could do was go out and purchase a tonic from the apothecary or medicinal herbs to make up a posset.

She was thankful that Lakshmi was not suffering from fever, but had no idea what her illness might be. Would an English doctor prescribe the right remedy? Susannah doubted there were any practitioners of Indian medicine in London.

The physic garden could be just the place to find something that would help her, though Mrs. Posey might say something disparaging about Lakshmi again. Susannah resolved to sack her if she did. Unfortunately, she would have to be replaced and there was no shortage of chaperones for hire.

Susannah, who had left Mrs. Posey to her knitting in the front room, began to make a mental list.

First, she had to help Lakshmi. She decided to ask the Rajasthani family they had met-she would have to find them somehow. Or, first she had to talk to a dealer in precious stones-she knew just the fellow, she would write to him today-and have the rubies and sapphires appraised.

She wondered what Carlyle would have done if she’d simply spilled the stones on the table in front of him and asked where they had come from and what they were worth. His face had been close to expressionless when he saw the pink corset. Provoking of him. Perhaps he was a better strategist than she had thought. It all depended on what game he was playing.

Two days later…

Her face hidden under an overlarge bonnet-she had added a veil for good measure at the last minute-Susannah waited on the step for the clerk on the other side of the shop door to unlock it from the inside. Not wanting the servants to know about this confidential errand, she had traveled most of the way here via horse-drawn omnibus, a jolting journey that exhausted her, until she got out in Oxford Street and walked the rest of the way, looking in the shop windows along the way.

This shop’s wares were not shown in the window. Indeed, there was no window and there were no goods sold here-only skill. Rough gemstones were cut, faceted, and polished behind the heavy doors, and sent back to those who had purchased them elsewhere.

The narrow lane was a warren of similar shops, some at street level and some within the taller buildings that loomed over the old ones.

She heard repeated clicks and then the door suddenly swung open. An elderly clerk peered at her doubtfully.

“I am Susannah Fowler,” she said.

“Of course. Mr. De Sola told me you would be coming. My memory-” He tapped the side of his head. “Please enter.” He stepped to one side of the door, peering up and down the empty lane.

She looked where he was looking and thought she saw the shadow of a man melt back into an alley. Had she been followed? The idea was frightening. No one besides Carlyle knew that she had found the stones. She looked again and saw nothing. The clerk was far too frail to deal with ruffians, but she supposed that a watchful eye was better than nothing. There was undoubtedly a burly fellow somewhere on the premises. Anything to do with jewels carried a risk of theft and worse.

She went in, lifting her veil over the bonnet, and was greeted by another man, white-haired and short, who came out from an inner office. Behind it, she guessed, was the cutters’ room, where rough stones were assessed, sometimes for months, before the final decision to cut was made.

The man who greeted her was soft-spoken and utterly unassuming. But she knew he was Moise De Sola, the man who had cut and faceted the legendary Gulbahar diamond and several of the largest jewels in the royal collection. Still, one might pass him in the street and never remember him. He gave her a kindly smile and clasped her hands in his.

“My dear girl.” His voice had a slight accent. “It is an honor to meet the daughter of Mr. Fowler. You are as lovely as your father said, very like your mother. I cut the diamonds for her wedding ring, you know.”

“I didn’t.” The ring had been buried with Georgina Fowler. She had never seen it.

Mr. De Sola sighed. “So much time has passed. I did not see him often after they left London-before you were born, Miss Fowler. But he sent many stones to me. Your father had an eye for beauty.”

“Yes, he did.” Her voice quavered. It was odd to hear her parents spoken of in a place where they had once been, perhaps standing where she was right now.

“I grieved to hear of his untimely death so far from home. But here you are-” He stopped when he saw an inadvertent tear trickle down her cheek. Susannah dashed it away.

“My apologies. Perhaps I should not have mentioned such sad things. But so many memories came back to me when I received your letter in yesterday’s post-your father was a very interesting man. A rough diamond himself.” He patted her shoulder. “My little joke.”

Susannah composed herself. Though she had never been here, meeting someone who had known her father stirred emotions that she had kept firmly in check.

“Thank you, Mr. De Sola.” She looked about her. The office was as her father had described it. Solid, plain chairs were set around a desk in the center of the room, which held grooved trays covered in black velvet. A jeweler’s loupe rested on one, along with a pair of thin, long-fingered tongs with padded tips.

“What do you have to show me, my dear? I know you are here on business and we will close soon. It is Friday-our Shabbat. I must be home before sundown.”

“I have some stones. I-I am not sure where they come from.” She blinked a bit. The gaslight fixture that hung from the ceiling cast a circle of brilliant white on the desk, leaving the rest of the room in semidarkness.

“Please, sit down,” Mr. De Sola said.

Susannah settled herself in one of the chairs, coming as close to the desk as she could without getting in the light. She took out two bulging envelopes of light paper that she had folded around the rubies and sapphires, and opened them, pouring the stones into a mingled heap.

“Some stones? I would say there are more than a hundred.” He smiled again. The old man put the loupe to his eye and picked up a stone with the slender tongs, separating the rubies from the sapphires, and examining them one by one.

She had seen her father do the same thing many times and knew the process would take awhile. Mr. De Sola said nothing. He set aside the largest stones for a more careful look and arranged the rest in two neat rows of red and blue.

Then he studied the largest, five in all, for several more minutes, holding them carefully in the tongs and turning them this way and that under the light.

“Very interesting,” he said at last. “I have seen these before. I think I cut these two rubies. The flaws and inclusions are where they were on the shank of the stone-where their setting would conceal them.”

“Oh.” Susannah gave him a surprised look. She had not expected him to recognize the stones. But he was well known for his uncanny ability to do so. There simply were not that many large, fine gems in the world.

Mr. De Sola took the loupe from his eye and set down the tongs. “All of them are of the highest quality. The rubies are from Burma-as you can see, they are the color of pigeon’s blood, the most valuable. The sapphires are certainly from Kashmir. That cornflower blue is unmistakable.”

He regarded her with a serious air, his white eyebrows lifted high over his dark eyes. “All of them have minute scratches, Miss Fowler. As if they were pried from their settings and not with care.”

“Ah-I know nothing about their provenance.” Her mind whirled. Carlyle Jameson a thief? It seemed impossible. She reminded herself that she had no proof whatsoever that the stones belonged to him. She had found them in her corset. That was all.