“Bainbridge, when will you learn?” Colin asked. “Toying with the ladies always gets you in trouble.”
“So it does, Hargreaves, so it does. But it’s so bloody much fun. Pardon my language. I didn’t realize you had other guests.” He flung his hat onto a nearby table and grinned.
Ivy, rising to her duties as hostess, introduced our American friends. The good duke, as was his habit when he met a potential new conquest, lingered over Callie’s hand, but she pulled it away before he could kiss it.
“You shan’t tempt me with any aristocratic charms, Mr. Sheffield.”
“It would be your grace, actually,” Jeremy said. “But you’ll wound me if you refuse to call me by my given name.”
Callie beetled her brows. “Then prepare to be wounded. I despise the aristocracy.” Her words were harsh, but her dancing hazel eyes cast a different tone.
“I shall make it my life’s work to convince you to admit that at least one among us is undeserving of your scorn.” Jeremy was standing dangerously close to her now, but I was happy to see it. It had been too long since I’d seen him flirt so outrageously. Heartbreak has a tendency to remove the joy from a great many things. Heartbreak that comes from a once-beloved fiancée trying to murder one is even more unpleasant. Four years had passed since Jeremy had suffered these horrors, and his recovery from the blow had come slow. A grin spread across his face as he bantered with the American. “None of which is to say I don’t deserve a great deal of scorn, but all of it derives from my actions, not my birth.”
“Is that so?” Callie asked, making no attempt to hide the fact she was taking measure of his appearance and feeling great satisfaction with what she found. “Perhaps, then, I shan’t consider you entirely beneath my notice.”
“Callie, dear, what were you working on today?” Benjamin asked, his attempt to disrupt his sister’s flirtation clumsy and obvious. “We’ve been so distracted with this other business that we haven’t spoken of anything else all evening. Did you finish with the trench you were digging?”
“My dear brother, don’t bother,” she said, a wicked grin on her face. “I’m certain his grace is even less interested in trenches than you are.”
The veins in Benjamin’s neck bulged. “Callie, I only—”
Ivy stepped forward, her voice soft. “Jeremy, of course you’re welcome here and may stay as long as you want. I’ll have a room made ready. Are you hungry? We’ve eaten, but I can have Cook put together a cold plate for you.” She crossed to him and expertly drew him away from Callie without ruffling any feathers. I wouldn’t have been able to do it so well. Perhaps I ought to have paid better attention to some—if only a very few—of my mother’s lessons. “We must bring you up to date on everything happening here. Colin, naturally, is investigating a mysterious crime. Callie is an archaeologist and, if you are very well behaved, I’ll persuade her to take you on a tour of the ruins. Benjamin, her brother, is an artist, and though he doesn’t yet know it, I’m counting on him to help me stage a Roman banquet in the ancient style. He’ll be able to paint frescoes that would have delighted Nero himself. But before anything else, do tell me about the girl you abandoned in Rome. Is she English? I can only assume her mother’s dearest hope is to see her married to a duke.”
“Too right, Ivy, too right. It’s a blasted curse, this title.”
Callie all but howled. “Marriage is bad enough in and of itself. Add a title to the mix, and it goes beyond unpalatable.”
“You object to marriage?” I asked.
“Absolutely. It’s nothing more than a glittering jail, minded by men who think all women care about are baubles and babies. No one could tempt me down such a ludicrous path.”
“Is that so?” Jeremy asked, scrutinizing Callie, albeit more subtly than she had him. “How very interesting.”
I knew then we were in for a great deal of trouble.
AD 79
6
Even now, as I look back on the past with the benefit of age and wisdom (admittedly, more wisdom than age, as only two years have elapsed since the events at the beginning of my story), I cannot quite understand how Silvanus misled me. Perhaps it was not his intention, but a man of his experience knew what a slave girl would expect from someone like him, and I can assure you it was not poetry.
My father had a tiny cubiculum of his own in the back of the house, near the small secondary kitchen, but I slept on the floor of Lepida’s room, which opened onto a narrow corridor leading to the open court of the atrium. Frequently, as my mistress slumbered, I lay awake, but after that first private meeting with her betrothed, I developed the habit of slipping out of the chamber and sitting in the atrium, staring at the stars above me. Soon I began taking a wax tablet and stylus and wrote poetry inspired by the heavens, complicated tales of impossible love. For I had convinced myself that I loved Silvanus.
He had asked for me the next time he visited Lepida. We retired to the same room as before, and again he did not touch me, only demanded more poetry. I tried Virgil on him, but he objected, insisting on something written by my humble self. I refused and gave him Ovid, but nothing too amorous.
“You would do well to obey me, Kassandra,” he said, standing intoxicatingly close. “A poem, one of your own.”
I stared into his dark eyes as I recited one that had come to me a few nights earlier on a moonlit excursion to the atrium. He listened intently and nodded when I had finished.
“Good girl,” he said. “Will you write it down for me? Then I’ll be able to read it whenever I want.” He lifted his hand to my cheek, stopping before he touched it. I ached to feel his skin against mine and knew then that I could refuse him nothing.
The following morning, when Lepida was off somewhere with her mother, I went to the library and asked my father for blank papyrus. He gave it to me almost without noticing, so absorbed was he in his own work, repairing a damaged scroll from Livy’s monumental history of Rome, Ab Urbe Condita Libri. With great care, I sat down and copied out the words of my poem from the tablet upon which I’d originally scrawled them. I rolled up the papyrus, tied it with a piece of twine, and, unsure what to do with it—I had no private space of my own—hid it in the library’s Latin room, in the back of a box that contained volumes of Seneca’s philosophical writings. Plautus kept a complete library and, hence, included the works of the Stoics, but, as an Epicurean, was unlikely to come looking for them. My little scroll would be safe there until Silvanus fetched it.
For that was my oh-so-clever idea. I would not give it to him, but tell him where to find it, hoping that by making it a game, a hunt, he would find me more alluring.
As I left the library I was fairly floating, lost in my fantasies. Lost, that is, until I saw Lepida, who was sitting on a bench in the peristyle, swathed in a red silk tunic fastened at the shoulders with gold brooches. She called to me, asking that I join her.
“Look what Silvanus has sent,” she said, holding out her hand to show me a pair of pearl earrings. “He is the best among men, is he not? I will be fortunate to have him as a husband.”
A sickening feeling crept through me. Until that moment, I had not thought Lepida had given Silvanus much consideration. Oh, I knew she believed him handsome; that was clear from the first day we saw him. But she had never expressed any particular interest in him. Girls like her did not expect much out of marriage, at least not in terms of affection. A husband would provide for her. He would respect her, trust her to manage his household and bear him children. But he would not love her, not with the sort of passion to be found in the myths of old. Marriage was about duty and loyalty. Love was something else altogether.
Or so I had believed. But I knew Lepida as well as I knew myself, and I recognized the look in her eyes as she fingered the dangling pearls in her hand. She was in love with Silvanus. As a slave in her household—for I assumed her father would let me go with her when she was married—she could not object to her husband taking a physical interest in me, but as
her friend, I could not welcome the attention. Not in my heart. Not anywhere. I must do what he wanted, but I would have to learn to guard my emotions. I could not let myself crave and nurture a passion for the man who had won her love.
1902
7
Before I got out of bed the following morning, my husband brought me the longest telegram I had ever seen. I cringed at the thought of what it must have cost, knowing that we would be footing the bill.
“I asked The New York Times to send the full text of the Walker’s articles about Pompeii and the election. Unless I’m missing something, I can’t see anything that might catalyze a murder.”
“Nor do I,” I said after reading the first. “This is well written and engaging, certain to inspire tourists to visit the ruins, but there is nothing else to it. What about his piece on the Camorra?”
“It’s no more enlightening. He was writing in general about elections abroad and only makes the barest reference to the results in Naples.”
“So we’re nowhere.”
“More or less. No clues, no hint of motive, looks from every angle to be a hopeless business. A perfect challenge.” His eyes brightened. He’d devoted his life to serving crown and country and was always happiest when his missions proved intellectually stimulating. As was I. But that was not all the job entailed. The physical effects of his work troubled me as much as they thrilled him. I wished he’d never had cause to learn how to treat bullet wounds and that I’d never again find a new scar on his skin. He’d had a brief respite from danger, serving the king at home rather than running about the Continent in pursuit of unnamed threats to the empire, but it would not last. Protection duty did not suit him. For now, though, I rejoiced at us being able to work side by side, reasonably confident that he would come to no harm.
After dressing, we made our way to the terrace, having settled into a routine of taking breakfast there. Why spend time anywhere else when one had such a view? Looking at the Bay of Naples, deep blue with diamonds of sunlight dancing upon it, it was easy to see why the ancients had built their villas here. Ivy poured us tea while Jeremy, kitted out in an elegantly tailored linen suit and slouching with his usual air of studied ennui, filled a plate with cheese and olives.
“I’ve decided to entirely embrace Italian culture at the exclusion of all others,” he said. “I shall fire my cook, replace her with one from here, cancel my account with Fortnum’s and insist that every morsel of food that comes into the house is directly imported. I never knew olives could taste like this. And the coffee. Oh, the coffee! What is wrong with the English? I shall never take tea again.”
“And next month, when you go to France, you’ll claim a lifelong devotion to their cuisine,” I said. “You’ll never fire your cook, she’s the only one who looked after you when you were a child.”
“Nanny was horrid. You know that.” He pulled a face and glowered at me. “I admit to a certain tendency toward getting carried away when I travel, but don’t you think it a rather charming eccentricity? I’ve devoted years to cultivating it.”
“You’re an inspiration to us all,” Ivy said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
Ah, the mundane ways in which we occupy ourselves in the moments before something—or someone—crashes in and unalterably changes our lives! No morning could have been more ordinary, no conversation more banal. And then, the maid announced a visitor; innocuous enough. But when she spoke the person’s name, I was so taken aback that I, who refuse on principle to faint, grew lightheaded. Katharina von Lange? Surely I had heard her wrong. I remembered—all too well—Kristiana von Lange, but she’d been dead for a decade. My confusion only increased when a young lady, dressed in a smart walking suit, stepped onto the terrace.
Years before we met, Colin had forged a close working relationship with Kristiana, the Countess von Lange, one of his counterparts in Vienna. She was more than a colleague, however. They had shared a long and passionate affection for each other that was severed after she refused Colin’s proposal of marriage. She went on to wed a count, and, so far as I knew, that was the end of their personal connection.
I became acquainted with her ten years ago, a few months before Colin and I married, when I found myself embroiled in a case that took me to Vienna, and though my then-fiancé never gave me the slightest cause to doubt his fidelity, in the shadow of the countess, I always felt unsophisticated and awkward. She was stunningly beautiful, with dark hair and glittering emerald eyes, elegant, intelligent, capable, and cosmopolitan, while I was an extremely young lady of extremely limited experience.
During the investigation, I uncovered a political intrigue of great import to the Austrian government. As one of their most trusted agents, the countess’s expertise was required, and, in the course of her successful efforts to rectify a situation that could have had a catastrophic effect on her entire country and beyond, she was killed.
The news of her death affected Colin like nothing I had seen before. Gone were his stiff upper lip and stoic reserve. He mourned her, the woman he had loved, and I understood his grief. We all carry our pasts with us, and his relationship with the countess had helped form him into the gentleman I adored above all others. Still, one cannot help but wish one’s husband’s former lover was more unattractive crone and less enchanting goddess.
Regardless, I had not thought about Kristiana in years. Yet now, standing on the terrace of our villa, was a young lady who looked the very picture of the Countess von Lange, with one exception. She had the same dark, shining hair, the same refined features, the same elegant figure. But instead of the countess’s striking green eyes, the girl’s dark orbs were a perfect match for my husband’s. She held out her hand to shake Colin’s.
“Mr. Hargreaves, I am Katharina von Lange,” she said, her manner cordial and casual. “Everyone calls me Kat, so you may as well do the same. I thought I ought to come meet you. It turns out you’re my father.” Her voice had an exotic lilt to it, and there was a slight accent to her English. “I understand how you must be feeling in the face of this revelation, as I, too, was unaware of it until recently. My mother—”
“Your mother? Kristiana?” Colin, steady on his feet and showing no sign either of shock or dismay, stood in front of her. She nodded. His voice, low and calm, revealed to no one but me that he was choking back emotion. I searched for a hint of doubt in his eyes and was stunned to find none.
Ivy and Jeremy stared, silent.
The girl continued. “I can’t say we were close. She died when I was eight. I knew nothing about you until her solicitor came to me last week and delivered the news.”
“Please, sit,” Colin said, offering her a chair. “You’ll forgive me if I find myself at a loss for words. This is wholly unexpected.”
“I would imagine so, Father.” She grinned and laughed. “Forgive me, I couldn’t resist. The countess liked her secrets, didn’t she? It’s what made her so good at her job. Not that I knew about any of that until last week, either. After her death, Herr Gruber—the solicitor—informed me of the news and brought me a letter from her. I was away at school in France, in the care of Ursuline nuns. Lovely education, rotten social life, but I’m getting ahead of myself. Apparently, she penned a letter every time she was about to set off on a mission, so that if she was killed, she could explain things to me in her own way. As I was so young, it was rather short on detail, but I understood that she served Austria and lost her life as a result. From then on, Herr Gruber has forwarded to me a letter from her annually on my birthday. He tells me she left one for every year until I reach the age she was when she died.”
The maths were simple enough; the countess’s messages from beyond the grave would go on for close to another twenty years. The thought did not sit well with me. I hoped she hadn’t left any missives for my husband.
“Were you led to believe the Count von Lange was your father?” Colin asked.
“No, no, the count knows nothing about me either,” she said. “I’ve nev
er met him. This year, Herr Gruber brought my birthday letter in person. In it, my mother explained why she kept me a secret. She had refused to marry you because she worried that a man of your occupation—if I may be so crass as to call it that—would be made vulnerable should he choose to have a family. When she found herself with child, she didn’t tell you for the same reason: to protect you. I’m here now because she had instructed her solicitor to reveal your name when I completed my education—including a minimum of two terms at university in Vienna—but only if you already had other children, which, evidently, you do. Not everyone is so concerned with your safety as the countess was.”
She looked directly at me for the first time since she’d entered the room. I blanched at her words and opened my mouth to speak, but could find no appropriate words.
“Truth be told, I find the entire subterfuge rather absurd, but I accept that she thought she was doing what was best for us all,” she continued. “I prefer a more direct approach and would never let myself succumb to such ridiculous fear, but she was of another generation, wasn’t she?” She scowled at me. “I suppose you are, too, but I understand you are considerably younger than she. Well played, Father, well played.”
“I assure you—” Colin started.
“I’m teasing. You’ll learn soon enough that I have a terrible aversion to propriety. It’s what comes from too many years in a convent school. At any rate, here I am, desperate to know you all—you must introduce me to your friends—I observe that I’ve shocked them horribly—but if you don’t offer me some breakfast soon, I may collapse. I’m utterly famished. And then, perhaps, we could all go to the ruins. We can begin to forge a familial bond while looking at the wreckage of other families.”
In the Shadow of Vesuvius Page 4
