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father is the one who dislodged it from the strata.”
    â€œ
My
father, Carl van Buren, helped to find that mine, yet Julien keeps the mine for himself.”
    â€œI can hardly believe you know where it is, Katie. You must be dreaming.”
    â€œDreaming of escape and freedom, yes”—she took hold of his arm—“and desperate enough to take what is mine. I know where the diamond is. We can get it and be on our way to Isandlwana at once. I—I will share with you whatever price the diamond brings on the London market, fifty-fifty.”
    â€œIt will need to be sold on the smuggling market. London, maybe. Russia, France—the Vatican …”
    â€œBut we need money now to get us to England!”
    He regarded her, the flicker of condescension clear in his eyes. “If we are going to steal the Black Diamond, my dear, then we might as well help ourselves to anything else we need. In moderation, of course.” He laughed and took hold of her arms, pulling her toward him. “We belong together, Katie love. What scoundrels we both are.”
    She wrenched free. “Speak for yourself, Cousin. I am not a thief.”
    â€œNo? Dear Julien will come to quite a different conclusion, even though he’s the real thief. Not that it matters to me. Evidently, it doesn’t to you, either.”
    It did matter. She could imagine her father frowning in sadness if he could see her now. She could remember him reading the Commandments to her when she was a little girl. “Thou shalt not steal … Thou shalt not—”
    But all that was behind her now. She had grown up isolated from the religious instruction that had meant so much to her father and thevan Buren family of Afrikaners. She would do whatever she must to be free. And to have her daughter restored to her. Surely her father would understand that?
    She fixed her gaze on Henry. “Well? Do we have a bargain?”
    In the moonlight she saw his mouth turn into a slender smile beneath his mustache. “We have a bargain, Katie. Now suppose you tell me where the Black Diamond is hidden.”
    For just a moment she could not escape the sensation that she was a fool to trust him—then, feeling his fingers enclose her arm and a tide of warm strength surge through her, she pushed the notion aside. She must take this chance.
    â€œI will take you there. We must do this—together. Its in the library. Come.”
    â€œYou are certain Julien’s gone to Kimberly?”
    She was as certain as she could be, and yet … there
was
that uneasy sensation that she was being watched. “I saw him ride away earlier this afternoon, but when it comes to your stepbrother, who can be sure of anything?”
    â€œHere, leave your bag in that brush until we come back for the horses.”

    Henry was still holding Katie’s arm as they came silently up the back porch steps. The door remained ajar from when she had fled. She reached for the knob.
    The kitchen was in darkness as they entered, except for the stream of moonlight coming through the high window above the pantry cabinet. Katie stooped and picked up the candle she had dropped earlier. She went to the oven to relight the wick on coals banked in the oven for the morning cook.
    Henry knew the house layout perhaps as well as she. He had come here from England several times with his father and Lyle. When his father had married Julien’s widowed mother, there had been a timewhen Henry and Lyle had lived in Cape House. That, of course, was long before trouble developed between Henry and Julien. Lyle had been the silent one, the one who had made friends with Julien and married into the Brewsters.
    When Katie turned around with the candle flaring, Cousin Henry was gone. She gasped, looking around. Had he abandoned her? No, she would have heard him if he’d opened the back door and gone out. She went into the hall. No sight of him. He must be in