Father Miguel whistled and made kissing noises, and all three animals trotted over to the fence. He fished small apples out of pockets in his robe and gave one to each of the mules, then shooed them away. He stretched up to scratch the horse behind his ears and fed him an apple. “This is Tesoro Escondido,” he proudly announced. “That is his name. Tesoro.”
“What?” Hornsby shouted, his face and ears flushing red.
Nick let out a bark of laughter. “The hidden treasure Adam didn’t want me to have is an elderly horse named Hidden Treasure?” He turned in a circle, taking in the winery, the stables, and back to the horse and priest, and laughed harder, longer, his voice getting louder as he tipped his head back, laughing at the most amusing joke he’d ever heard.
“This?” Marlow demanded, practically spitting in fury. “This is the hidden treasure I traveled across three countries, an ocean, and twelve hundred miles to find? This broken-down old nag?”
Nick whooped and slapped his leg with his hat, laughing so hard Harriet became concerned his head injury was worse than she’d originally thought. He stepped back from the fence and sat down on the grass, then lay back with his hat over his face. His shoulders shook with laughter, now muted.
Harriet stared at the horse, her heart sinking. She barely had the strength to remain standing. So much for her dowry. Gabriel’s future. Paying the quarterly mortgage. After she paid Nick back her half of the expenses to get here and back to England, her share of the horse’s value likely wouldn’t even buy her coach fare home. Might not even cover her half of the expenses.
Tears sprang to her eyes. She refused to let them fall, forced herself to stand upright.
“Nice fella,” Zach said. He stroked the horse’s neck and watched him munch the apple.
Now silent, Nick slowly climbed to his feet and put his hat back on, watching Zach intently.
Tesoro was as tall or even taller than Harriet’s huge rented grey gelding. His dark coat, possibly glossy black in his youth, was dull with age or illness. The hair around his mouth had turned grey, like the muzzle of Max, the black dog Harriet had had as a child. Father had given them the mongrel just before he went to sea for the first time without them. Max had accompanied Harriet on errands into the village, romped with Gabriel, and protected them from monsters under the bed until, his muzzle entirely grey by then, he had died of old age during the night while curled up in his usual spot at the foot of Harriet’s bed.
She swallowed a lump in her throat. The horse’s head collar had cracked leather and dull pewter instead of shiny silver hardware and was even missing a piece of metal. The poor horse probably wouldn’t survive the strain of the journey back to England.
Nick wrapped an arm around her shoulders and squeezed. She leaned against him, grateful for his strength, trying to remember that he must be disappointed as well.
“Well, I suppose I could sell him to the knackers,” Marlow said slowly. “Get back my travel expenses at least.”
“You misunderstand, Señor,” Father Miguel said. “As I was trying to tell you outside the pressing room, the maps only served for his owners to find me and Tesoro. In order to claim him, you must have the keys.”
“I have the bloody keys!” Marlow dug in his pockets and held up a ring of keys Harriet recognized as her housekeeper’s ring, followed by loose keys—to the pantry, the desk drawers in her father’s study, her music box, even the spare front door key they kept in a pot of chives growing just outside the kitchen door. “It’s got to be one of these!”
“You stole those from my house!” Harriet tried to snatch them back, but Marlow jerked his hand out of her reach.
Father Miguel shook his head and waved Marlow’s hand away. “Not those kinds of keys.”
“Then what the hell— Beg your pardon, Father,” Hornsby said. “Then what kind of keys?”
“Viscount Sheffield and Señor Chase would know, as they set the keys.”
“Well, that doesn’t help us a whole he— heck of a lot then, does it, seeing as how they’re dead!” Ruford fumed.
Harriet felt Nick’s sudden intake of breath.
“Keys to their future?” Nick said.
Father Miguel gave him a gentle smile, as to a child who had just answered a question correctly in Sunday school. “Si.”
Nick nudged her. “Your pendant,” he said quietly.
Harriet reached inside her shirt and pulled out the silver H on its chain. “My father said this was the key to my future. He sent it in the same letter as the map.” She pointed an accusing finger at Marlow. “The map he stole.”
“May I?”
Harriet opened the chain and dropped the pendant into the priest’s outstretched hand before putting the chain back around her neck.
Father Miguel offered Tesoro another apple, and while the horse was busy munching, the priest clipped the H into place on the head collar.
Harriet felt her mouth fall open in surprise. She snapped her jaw shut.
“Well done, m’dear,” Zach said, beaming.
