The Lost Jewels - Kirsty Manning Page 0,1

was sitting at her desk in the library of her unrenovated Boston brownstone, sipping hot chocolate sprinkled with cinnamon and shivering under a grey woollen blanket with a heater blasting at her feet. Technically, her parents still owned the house—it had been in the family for four generations—but no-one wanted to live with the draughts and the damp, musty smells of yesteryear.

No-one except Kate.

The study was her favourite room—and the only one she’d sealed and finished. It was grand, but comfortable, with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lining three walls, her great-grandfather’s desk and a peacock-blue sofa that Kate slept on far more often than she cared to admit.

On the wall opposite her desk was a framed bill of sale for the first steamer her great-grandparents had bought back in 1914: the SS Esther Rose, named for her great-grandmother, Essie. On the desk itself sat a framed photograph of her glorious three-year-old niece, Emma, squeezing her King Charles Spaniel, Mercutio—terrible name for a dog, but Molly had insisted. (Kate’s sister had very strong feelings about secondary characters in Shakespeare’s plays.) Beside the photo was a journal Kate had begun four years before. She didn’t write in the journal anymore; she hadn’t, in fact, after the first nine months. But she couldn’t bring herself to throw it away either, or to put it in a box with other keepsakes from that year.

Now this call. ‘Can you be in London next Monday for a huge investigative feature? We’d need you there for at least a week, I think. I realise it’s short notice …’ Jane’s voice was all East Coast vowels and courtesy, but there was a hint of a plea.

‘What’s the job?’

‘It’s the Cheapside jewels.’

Kate’s skin started to tingle. ‘Finally! Who’d you bribe?’

‘I promised the cover and both gatefolds in exchange for the exclusive. We want to cover this before Time, Vogue or Vanity Fair get to it. The Museum of London just finished re-cataloguing and some restoration of the jewels last week. It will be the final chance to access this collection before the museum relocates to West Smithfield in a year or so. Advertisers are already bidding. De Beers, Cartier … the lot.’ She paused, delicately it seemed. ‘There’s, ah, a ton of interest and cash this side of the Atlantic—our competitors will be livid. The CEO and chairman are tripping over themselves—they’re sure this series will bring people back to the print magazine. Gemstones look so much better in print than onscreen.’

It was true. A beautifully lit photo printed on good-quality stock was the next best thing to actually touching the jewels. But the method of reproduction was only a secondary concern for Kate. It was the story itself that compelled her; the urge to deep-dive into history and pluck something original from all the facts that had been overlooked—or forgotten.

‘Now, I’m about to go into a meeting, so is it a yes or no?’ pushed Jane. ‘I have a big budget, and I don’t need to tell you how rare that is these days. But for this series I’ve been authorised to cover any travel required.’

‘You mean in addition to London?’

‘Well, I take it the jewels didn’t start their life there. So diamond mines, for a start.’

‘I get it,’ said Kate. ‘I could really cover some ground.’

Jane chuckled. ‘Thought you’d appreciate that.’

‘Thanks. And thank you for thinking of me.’

There was an awkward pause.

‘Well, the suits upstairs were actually pushing for the Smithsonian’s Jocelyn Cassidy, but the Museum of London weren’t keen on that idea … and I understand you know the museum’s current director, Professor Wright, from Oxford?’

‘Of course.’

‘She tells me your research in this area is unparalleled. And the last piece you did for me—on Bulgari—was excellent. It was an unusual angle, but I liked that. It was quirky.’

‘The artistic director would only agree to be interviewed over lunch. Ridiculously long lunches. It was actually my duty to eat pasta and drink a carafe of Chianti every day for a week.’

‘Can’t promise food this time, I’m afraid! Just priceless jewels. So, what do you say? We need to move quickly on this.’

Priceless jewels … and the Museum of London, Kate thought to herself. ‘I have a few things on my plate at the moment,’ she hedged. ‘Let me take a look at my calendar and call you back.’ They finished the call, with Jane promising to forward what information she had on the collection.

Kate leaned back in her chair and gathered her curls into a ponytail, tugged the blanket