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A Tarnished Canvas (Lady Darby Mysteries, Band 13) - Softcover

Buch 13 von 14: A Lady Darby Mystery

Huber, Anna Lee

 
9780593639436: A Tarnished Canvas (Lady Darby Mysteries, Band 13)
Softcover
ISBN 10: 059363943X ISBN 13: 9780593639436
Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group, 2025

Inhaltsangabe

Lady Kiera Darby had planned to spend the winter practicing her painting, but instead, she must find the flaw in a killer’s masterpiece when an art auction results in one participant’s final bid.…

March 1833. Kiera and her husband, Sebastian Gage, have decided to settle in Edinburgh for the winter with their infant daughter. This also allows Kiera to enjoy long hours painting in her studio, making progress on the portraits she soon hopes to unveil in her own exhibit. She’s thrilled when she receives an invitation to the auction of the late Lord Eldin’s coveted art collection, and she and Gage eagerly accept. When the floor collapses beneath the gathering, killing one of their fellow bidders, Kiera and Gage are lucky to escape with their lives.

Within days it becomes apparent that what at first seemed to be a terrible accident is actually something far more nefarious. Someone deliberately compromised the integrity of the structure, though the police are unsure of the culprit’s aim. Sergeant Maclean requests Kiera and Gage’s assistance in figuring out who would wish to harm the bidders. As they dig deeper, it becomes increasingly apparent that the victim was not the killer’s intended target . . . and that Kiera was lured to the auction deliberately. Kiera and Gage must utilize all their resources to unveil a monster willing to risk the lives of dozens of bystanders to achieve their ends. But they’re on the verge of making a dire miscalculation. For one of the cleverest tricks in a painter’s repertoire is the art of misdirection, and their eyes have been drawn far from the gravest danger.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Anna Lee Huber is the Daphne Award–winning author of the national bestselling Lady Darby Mysteries and the Verity Kent Mysteries. She is a summa cum laude graduate of Lipscomb University in Nashville, Tennessee, where she majored in music and minored in psychology. She currently resides in Indiana with her family and is hard at work on her next novel.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter 1

Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied.

-William Shakespeare

March 1833

Edinburgh, Scotland

I could count on one hand the number of times I'd witnessed a gentleman hanging out of a window, and most of those had been the result of some foolish wager. I trusted my husband's current predicament wasn't due to such idiocy. Though one could never be sure.

Regardless, it was a precarious enough position to give me heart palpitations when I ventured into the nursery to discover whether the odd thwacking sound I'd been hearing was coming from within. It had been loud enough and repetitive enough to pull me from my concentration on the latest portrait I was finishing in my studio at the opposite end of the corridor. I'd dropped the brush I'd been wielding into a jar of linseed oil and set aside my palette, picking up an old paint-splattered rag to wipe off my hands as I went in search of the source of the noise. The sight that had met my eyes upon opening the nursery door had silenced my query before I could even utter it.

Mrs. Mackay, our nanny, stood holding my eleven-month-old daughter as they both stared wide-eyed in the direction of the window. If their expressions hadn't been sufficient to alert me, then Mrs. Mackay's uncharacteristic silence would have. It seemed the only time the good-natured nurse wasn't talking was when she or her charge was asleep.

From this angle, all I could see was Gage's lower extremities spread wide to anchor himself against the frame as he leaned perilously far out the window. I gasped and hastened forward even as the thwacking noise which had drawn me to the nursery in the first place continued.

"What are you doing?" I demanded, wanting to grab hold of him, but fearful that my touch might inadvertently cause his already unstable grip to slip.

"Just trying . . . to dislodge . . . this branch," he communicated between grunts, even as he wielded some sort of boat hook or fireplace poker, thrusting it outward, presumably toward the offending bunch of twigs. It thwacked against the stone edifice of our town house on Albyn Place, ringing with a more metallic clang than I'd been able to detect at a farther distance. His left elbow, I noted, was braced heavily against the stone ledge, and I could only pray the masonry held.

"Just a little . . . farther," he groaned, hooking his right leg around the frame and inching his left hip out.

I lurched forward, grasping onto his pelvis, propriety be dashed.

"Almost . . . there." He gave one last lunge like a fencer, before exclaiming in apparent victory.

A small crowd which had gathered below backed away as the branch tumbled toward the pavement. "Apologies," Gage called with a lift of the poker.

I tugged at the waist of his trousers, eager to have him back inside the window before he issued any other proclamations. "Mind your head," I urged as he ducked under the sash, slithering back into the room.

Once he was through the aperture with his feet planted firmly on the floor, he straightened, closing the window with a satisfied snick. Flush with victory, he pivoted to face us, still brandishing the poker like a saber.

"What were you thinking?" I snapped; my hand pressed to my chest as I sought to slow my racing heart.

"Well, I was . . ." His words petered out as he seemed to note all of our goggle-eyed expressions for the first time. He slowly lowered the poker to his side as he sought to explain. "Mrs. Mackay told me a tree branch had become wedged in the corner of the ledge. It must have blown there during the storm two days ago. That it kept tapping the corner of the far windowpane over the stairwell whenever the wind blew." His gaze flickered toward our daughter, still cradled in the nanny's arms. "That it was disturbing Emma."

That might have been so, but I was quite certain Mrs. Mackay hadn't informed him of this so that he would take it upon himself to immediately remedy the situation by dangling out the window with a fireplace poker. She'd undoubtedly expected him to order our butler to arrange for the nuisance to be taken care of in a safer and more dignified manner.

However, I didn't say any of this. I didn't need to. I could tell from Gage's sheepish expression that he'd already realized this.

Instead, I inhaled a steadying breath and turned to Mrs. Mackay. "Time for a nap?"

"Aye," the nanny confirmed.

Though whether our daughter would settle after the excitement of the past few minutes was anybody's guess.

I offered Emma a reassuring smile and moved close to press a kiss to her cherubic cheek, her golden curls tickling the bridge of my nose.

"It's nearly time for tea," I told my husband as I moved toward the door. "Give me a few minutes to clean up. Then I'll join you in the drawing room."

Where we could continue our discussion of his startling behavior in private.

I hadn't intended to stop painting yet, but Gage's reckless conduct concerned me. I'd known he was feeling a bit at loose ends, but his near obliviousness to the danger he'd just put himself in suggested a problem that ran deeper than mere boredom.

After ensuring my pigments and supplies were sealed and secured, I scraped and cleaned my palette and hung my smock on the hook by the door. The room was cool from the March chill, but I made no move to close the cracked window, knowing the air needed to circulate about the room to not only help the paint dry but also clear some of the caustic fumes. Then I closed and locked the studio door-a precaution I'd first begun taking when I'd lived with my sister and her family after my first husband's death. I'd feared that my nephew or one of my nieces, or a member of the staff, might enter and unwittingly poison themselves from handling some of the toxic substances that comprised my pigments. Now that I had a child of my own, as well as a staff to care for, I'd decided it was best to continue the safeguard.

After a swift detour to the washroom to ensure no stray streaks of paint marked my features, I made my way down to the drawing room. I found my husband, Sebastian Gage, standing before the large window flanked by sage green damask drapes which overlooked Albyn Place, his hands clasped behind his back. He had put his deep blue frock coat back on and repaired his tousled golden hair, presenting a respectable appearance again. Truth be told, I preferred him a bit disheveled, a bit undone. Perhaps because he was so rarely less than perfectly put together, and only in private. But not when that disheveling was the result of him dangling out a window.

He turned as I entered, crossing to meet me before the walnut sofa upholstered in daffodil silk. "Kiera, I apologize," he said as he grasped hold of my hands. His pale blue gaze was earnest. "I never meant to cause you or Emma or Mrs. Mackay alarm." He lifted a hand to rub the back of his neck. "To be honest, I'm not entirely sure what I was thinking."

I coaxed him to sit, though I didn't immediately speak, as Jeffers, our butler, had entered with the tea tray. Ever efficient, he must have been waiting for me to arrive. He set the tray on the low table centered on the Axminster carpet before the sofa and then, sensing we desired privacy, withdrew without a word.

"I am," I declared once the door was shut behind him.

Gage appeared slightly startled by this pronouncement.

"You've been at sixes and sevens for weeks," I continued as I began to pour our tea. "Wandering the house, at a loss for something to do." I noticed a smudge of yellow ochre I'd missed on the underside of my right wrist as I added a dash of cream to his cup. "I take it Lady Pinmore's stolen brooch proved to be not much of a challenge."

For the better part of the last decade, Gage had acted as a gentleman inquiry...

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Verlag
Penguin Publishing Group
Erscheinungsdatum
2025
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
059363943X
ISBN 13 
9780593639436
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
401
Kontakt zum Hersteller
BERKLEY
https://www.penguin.com/?s=BERKLEY

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