Read The Diamond of Drury Lane for Free Online Page B

Gimcrack rubbish the lot of them. The feather’s worth more than they are put together . . . all the way from Africa, would you believe it! So mind you see that no harm comes to it if you don’t want a second beating!’ Her nearsighted eyes glared a warning at him in the mirror as she fixed a single pearl earring in his lobe.
    Pedro nodded, sending the ostrich feather into a swaying dance.
    ‘Mind you, you rarely see the real thing, Cat,’added Sarah, arranging the folds of the turban. ‘When the ladies sit in the boxes with ropes of pearls and diamonds around their necks, you know they’re mostly fake. There’s many a duchess with her jools laid up in lavender, if the rumours be true.’
    ‘Laid up in lavender?’ I asked.
    ‘At the pawnbrokers, dear,’ explained Mrs Reid, ‘to pay gambling debts usually. So think about that if ever you are tempted to try your luck at the card table.’ She gave Sarah and me a cautionary look over the top of her glasses.
    I was very unlikely to face that temptation. No one could possible think I had money to lose in a card game, let alone jewels. But perhaps Mrs Reid could help me with the mystery of Mr Sheridan’s diamond.
    ‘Mrs Reid,’ I began, passing her the tape measure that had fallen to the floor, ‘if you had a real jewel, where would you keep it for safety?’
    ‘Locked in a big iron chest in the Tower of London, guards on the door day and night,’ she chuckled. ‘If only . . .’
    ‘Forget the chest,’ said Sarah, throwing a shovelfull of sea-coal on to the fire. ‘Just give me the guards, six foot tall and ’andsome as can be.’ She stood up and mimed flouncing across the hearthrug like a fine lady, swinging a jewel on the end of a chain around her neck.
    ‘You bold madam!’ laughed Mrs Reid. ‘You’ll come to no good, you will, if you carry on like that. Now, young man, take off your finery and Cat can show you where to get something to eat before the show starts. You’ve not got long.’
    Grabbing some small beer, cold meat, bread and sweet wrinkled apples from the table laid out in the Green Room, Pedro and I made our picnic in my favourite hideaway of the manager’s box. Already the early arrivals were taking their seats in the Pit and a number of servants were lounging in the galleries, saving places for their masters and mistresses. The stage was empty . . . the balloon (now repaired) was well hidden in the flies so that it could descend unheralded to the amazement of the crowd. Pedro had a lot to play against if he was to make his mark tonight.
    ‘I’ll watch you from here if Mr Sheridan letsme,’ I told him. He had gone very quiet and I suspected that nerves were beginning to have an effect on him. ‘Are you nervous?’
    Pedro shook his head, the pearl earring that he had not taken off glinting in the candlelight. ‘No, I’m not nervous. I was just thinking about all the other theatres I’ve performed in. This one is undoubtedly the grandest.’ He looked about him, taking in the raked seating capable of accommodating thousands of London’s finest citizens . . . as well as some of her worst. ‘You really live here?’
    ‘All my life,’ I replied simply. ‘And you?’
    He shrugged. ‘I don’t remember much about the early years except . . .’ He paused, thinking back, ‘. . . friendly faces and a hot sun.’
    ‘So how did you get to drizzly, cold London?’ I asked, encouraging this new mood for shared confidences.
    Pedro’s face took on a hardened, embittered expression.
    ‘When I was still an infant, my people were sold by our enemies to the slavers. We were split up. Igot lucky, I suppose you would say, for on the voyage to the colonies I caught the eye of a gentleman, a Mr Hawkins. He saw me playing on a sailor’s pipe one day . . . I’d managed to get out of the hell below decks by entertaining the crew. He bought me and spent a few years training me up as a violinist. Then he got some of his money back by sending me