Fever Quest: A Clean Historical Mystery set in England and India (The Isabella Rockwell Trilogy Book 2) Read Online Free

glass.
    “I was supposed to marry his son, but he died of the
cholera and left his father with no heirs. I am to provide some more. Or so I understand.”
There was silence. Rose took Livia’s hand. “Mama keeps me under lock and key so
I’m delivered safely.” There was another pause. “I’m worth a lot of money.”
Livia’s face was bleak, all the prettiness drained from it, and Isabella had a
premonition of what she might look like after a life in India, married to an
old man, her infant children buried in the unforgiving Indian ground. Isabella
shivered.
    “Look out, now.”
    Midge’s urgent mutter brought her attention back to the
table. Lady Denier stood next to them, stately like the figurehead of a ship.
    “Bedtime, Livia.”
    Livia flushed again with embarrassment and Isabella’s
heart went out to her. She and Rose left the table. The whole room stopped to
watch as they did so.
    Isabella and Midge stayed playing until the candles burnt
down. The wind outside had dropped and the orange shadows grew longer as the
flames guttered in the lanterns. Isabella pushed her chair back and stretched.
The conversation on the table behind washed over her. It was a moment before
she realised the men were speaking Hindi. They sounded drunk.
    “Go on then, man. Show it to us.”
    “Shhhh.”
    There was a smothered laugh and Isabella nudged Midge’s
foot with her own and inclined her head backwards. Midge pushed himself up so
he could see over the crimson rim of her high-backed chair and she peered
around its edge.
    “Go on.” There was more laughter. “Give it to me.” There
was a gasp and the sound of a small object rolling on the polished floor and
then Isabella felt something come to rest against her shoe. As she bent to pick
it up it was as if the world around her receded. Her fingers closed around the
object’s heavy coolness, felt its weight as it sat, entirely satisfying; a
perfect fit in her closed fist.
    She brought her hand close to the lantern so she could
have a closer look, but she’d known what it was from the moment she’d set eyes
on it.
    It was a diamond.
    A sparkling teardrop of such beauty Isabella couldn’t tear
her eyes away. The light from the lantern played through it, causing tiny
spectrums to reflect onto Midge’s face, catching his eyes then the gold in his
hair as if a thousand fairies had stamped their feet in a vigorous tattoo.
    “Gaw lummy. Is that what I think it is?” Isabella could
only nod. “Can I see it?”
    Isabella’s hand unclasped like the shell of an oyster
opening on a pearl. Midge’s eyes were round with wonder. A shower of sparks
shot from the fire and landed on his shoe. A burst of light came through the
window from far away, so the roofs of the port were visible for a split second,
like a distant jumble of gravestones. Midge lifted the diamond to his face and
peered through it. His whole face was lit by its glow and time shrank back and
he was once again the little boy she’d met on the streets of London one year
before. Midge looked at her, the diamond still cupped next to his face, and he
smiled. He handed it back to her.
    “I think it would be better if you gave it back.” The
voice behind them spoke English and belonged to a tall figure in the white
uniform of the Madras Cavalry. To Isabella he looked insubstantial, as if the
light passed right through him, but that may have been because his skin was so
white and his eyes so pale a blue, they too looked white. Isabella blinked and
held the diamond out to him.
    “Of course. Sorry.” She dropped it into the man’s hand,
feeling her fingers reluctantly uncurling and the sudden emptiness.
    “It’s cursed, that diamond.” Midge’s voice was funny,
strained, and he was frowning.
    “Why do you say that, young man?” The tall man turned his
pale eyes on Midge, but Midge seemed to recover himself and looked as if he
wished he hadn’t spoken. A soft-footed waiter cleared the table in front of
them, and