The young clerk at the front counter looked her up and down, taking in her worn dress, her cheap scarf, and her tired face. His lip curled. "The servants' entrance is at the back," he said.
"I am not here to deliver anything," Clara said. "I am here about a box."
She put the iron key on the counter. The clerk glanced at it, then looked again more closely. He picked it up and turned over the little brass tag; his face changed.
"Wait here," he said.
He disappeared through a door. Several minutes passed, then an older man came out: stout, gray-whiskered, wearing spectacles. He held the key in his hand and looked at Clara very carefully.
"I am Mr. Drummond," he said. "May I ask how you came to have this key, miss?"
"It was given to me," said Clara, "by someone who was asked to give it to me."
"This key belongs to a private box," said Mr. Drummond slowly, "a box which was opened here by the late Duke of Ravenshire. Nobody has touched it in more than three years."
"I know," Clara said. "I need to see what is inside it, please. It is very important."
The old banker shook his head, looking almost sorry. "I am afraid that is quite impossible. The Duke left very strict instructions: this box can only be opened by the Duke of Ravenshire himself, or by someone carrying a letter signed in his own hand giving permission." He set the key down on the counter between them. "Do you have such a letter, miss?"
Clara's throat went tight. "No."
"Then I cannot help you." He paused. "And I must tell you, miss, that I am obliged to write to His Grace and inform him that someone has come here with this key."
Clara felt the floor tilt beneath her feet. Write to the Duke? His mother would surely see the letter, and then the Dowager would know where Clara was—the thief, the girl who was to be arrested if she was ever found.
She picked up the key with shaking fingers. "Thank you for your time, sir," she said, and turned and walked out of the bank as fast as she could without running.
That night, Clara sat beside Polly's narrow bed and watched her sleep. Polly's breathing was fast and shallow; every few minutes, the coughing woke her. There was a key, but no door; there was proof, but no way to reach it. And the one man in England who could open that box was about to marry the daughter of the man who had killed her father.
On her way home that evening, Clara had passed a newspaper seller shouting on a corner. She had spent a precious penny on a paper and read it under a streetlamp. It was all there on the second page: a glittering ball at Ravenshire Hall, three hundred guests, champagne and roses, and the Duke of Ravenshire had formally announced his engagement to the beautiful Lady Cecilia Marlowe, who had worn a famous diamond bracelet that had belonged to the Duchesses of Ravenshire for two hundred years.