by Juliana Gray
“Because she feared his reaction. She feared he might harm the boy, or her.”
At last Markham turned away, gazing out the small window of the cab with an inscrutable expression. “Then she doesn’t know him.”
Roland made an astonished noise. “Bollocks, young man. You of all people should know what Somerton’s capable of. You of all people . . .”
The young man flashed back to Roland’s face. “He wouldn’t strike her! Nor the boy!”
Roland leaned forward. “Not physically, perhaps. But there are worse things a man can do.”
Markham’s lips parted, drew in a little breath, and paused.
Roland sat back. “You see what I mean. And I warn you, Markham, that if so much as a particle of harm comes to Lady Somerton or her son, I shall hold the two of you directly responsible. I shall make no allowances for your youth.”
“The boy is perfectly fine,” Markham said sharply. “I left him smiling and content, not an hour ago.”
“You saw him? When? Where?” Roland’s hand fisted around the strap, biting painfully into the leather. The air inside the hackney had grown warm and stale; it pressed like clay against his face and neck.
“Upon his arrival in town. A fine boy. He was delighted to see his father. I was quite moved.”
Roland rotated the words in his mind, attempting to assess their sincerity. Markham’s face had resumed its impassive stillness; his words hadn’t conveyed any particular emotion. “And her ladyship?” he asked at last.
Markham’s eyes seemed to harden, in the rectangle of sunlight penetrating the window. “Her ladyship is in perfect health.”
“Then how was she persuaded to write this note herself?” Roland patted his jacket pocket. “It could only have been by force, moral if not physical. And I swear to you . . .”
“I don’t know anything about that.” Markham spoke sharply.
Roland considered him. “Is she with Philip?” he asked.
An instant’s hesitation, and then: “They are both at the Palazzo.”
Roland looked out the window. The hackney was slowing, tilting upward as it climbed the sloping road. The Palazzo Angelini, he knew, sat atop one of the low hills along the river, to the east of town; to his right, the hillside dropped away in a succession of green terraces, overflowing with the bounty of summer. At the bottom, the gray yellow city clustered around the river, the bridges like long, gnarled fingers spanning its width, the great red bowl of the Duomo shimmering above everything like the sun. Already Florence looked quite distant, quite remote. He’d managed to drop a message at the front desk for Beadle, but even if it found his colleague, he could expect no help for at least an hour or two. He was on his own.
He turned back to Markham and spoke in a quiet voice. “Come now, young man. You must know he’s in the wrong. You must know what he’s done. A beast of a husband, a damned incompetent father.”
“He loves his son.”
Roland shrugged. “As one might love a dog, perhaps. Or a valuable painting in his gallery. Tell me, how long have you been in the earl’s employ?”
“Something over a year.”
“Have you, at any time, seen Lord Somerton embrace his son? Show him the slightest sign of affection?”
Another slight hesitation. “He’s not a demonstrative man, it’s true . . .”
“He’s a coldhearted corpse, and you know it!” Roland slid his hand from his jacket and pounded the hard seat next to him. “That boy has the most open heart in the world; he’d do anything for a mere crumb of affection from his father, and he’s had nothing but rebuffs and shouting and coldness, when he’s been noticed at all. Thank God, thank God his mother is the most loving angel on God’s earth!”
Markham’s dark eyes flashed anger at last. “Oh, indeed! A most loving angel! One who fled the country, into the arms of her lover? One who introduced her own son into that illicit . . .”
His voice ended in a choke. Roland had reached across the space between them and gathered up Markham’s pristine white shirt and neat wool lapels into his single fist. “Do not,” he whispered, “profane Lady Somerton’s name again.”
Markham’s eyes grew into large brown saucers.
“I will not,” Roland continued, in an icy voice, “betray her confidence with a recitation of Somerton’s crimes against her. It should suffice that he has betrayed her a thousandfold more, and long before she entertained so much as a disloyal thought in her head.” He released Markham’s shirt and let his hand fall back in his lap. “She owes him nothing. Not her fidelity, not her loyalty, and certainly not her love.”
Markham lifted his hand and brushed at his collar. “I take your point.”
Roland folded his arms and regarded the young man: his expression, which had fallen into sullen lines; the slope of his shoulders; the slow movements of his hand. “Tell me, old man,” he said, in the Penhallow drawl, “do you happen to know his lordship’s plans here today?”
Markham cast him an upward glance. “As it happens, I don’t.”
“Do you know, I think I believe you,” Roland said. The hackney was crawling now, edging around a corner. A stone gatepost glided past the window. “I believe you’ve no more notion of what’s in Somerton’s head than I do. And I suspect you rather resent me for it. Heigh-ho. We’re in this together, it seems.”
Markham straightened his shoulders and lifted his torso. He spoke coldly, even scornfully. “We are not, your lordship, in this together, as you put it. The telling difference is this.” The hackney lurched to a stop; he put his hand on the door handle. “I am Somerton’s trusted aide, and you”—he swung the door open, hopped outside, and turned back to glare at Roland—“are merely his wife’s lover.” His eyes traveled up and down Roland’s body, and he smiled. “Though not, I expect, any longer.”
He strode away, across the graveled courtyard.
Roland eased thoughtfully out of the cab and turned to pay the driver. “Attendere l’angolo,” he said, sliding an extra ten-lire note into the man’s hand.
“Grazie, signore,” the driver said, eyes wide, tipping his cap. He snapped his whip and the horse moved smartly, across the courtyard and back out the open gate into the road, the wheels crunching the gravel as they went.
Roland turned. Markham stood waiting for him at the entrance of the square Palladian building, his feet slightly apart, his hands behind his back. Odd sort of chap, Markham. Not a bad fellow at heart, clearly, and yet devoted to that rotter Somerton, and not particularly enamored of Lilibet. What sort of hold did the earl have over the boy?
For an instant, Roland allowed his eyes to slide over the windows of the facade, wondering whether Lilibet or Philip were behind one of them, staring down at him. He began walking across the courtyard to Markham, taking in every possible detail, in case of later need: the height of the windows, the distance to the nearby trees, the composition of the high stone walls surrounding the property, the direction in which it faced.
At the door, Markham stood aside and allowed him to enter first. He passed through the doorway into a soaring entrance hall, beautifully proportioned and quite empty. His eyes flashed about the creamy walls, the doors, the curving staircase, and the row of French doors at the rear, bright with sunshine and the hint of a broad stone terrace beyond. His ears picked up the crisp echo of his own boots on the old marble tiles and nothing else.
He stopped, folded his arms behind him, and turned to Markham. “So?” he inquired. “You’ve brought me here. Where, my good man, is Lord Somerton?”
And more importantly, where the devil was Lilibet?
TWENTY-ONE
Two hours earlier
Lilibet sat in her chair, in the center of the room, on the second floor of the Palazzo Angelini, and waited for the Earl of Somerton.
The ritual was not en
tirely unfamiliar to her. Early in the evening of the last night before Lilibet had left her husband, Lord Somerton’s private secretary, Mr. Markham, had knocked on the door of the nursery, where she was reading Philip his bedtime story. “His lordship requests the honor of an interview in his study,” he’d said, in that quiet voice of his, eyes dark and emotionless. Or something like that, anyway; something formal and correct, that somehow managed to convey a world of foreboding behind its commonplace words.
She’d gone to the study, and found it empty. She hadn’t been surprised; he’d always done that, kept people waiting for interviews, sweating and shifting in the chair before the desk, until he entered at last to deliver some rapier thrust. So she’d settled in the chair in question, arranged her skirts, folded her hands in her lap, and concentrated on keeping her pulse at a slow, even pace. On loosening the thread of alarm that wound through her chest and belly; on remembering that she was a countess, a lady, a woman of dignity and virtue. That she had nothing to fear.
With her mind so occupied, it had taken her several minutes to realize that the elegant gilt jewel box in the center of her husband’s desk belonged to her. And while she was still contemplating this fact, and before she’d begun to feel more than a dawning sense of outrage that it had been taken from her room, had been opened without her permission, and now sat on Somerton’s broad gleaming mahogany desk with its lid hanging ajar, her husband had entered the room.
She knew, therefore, that her presence in the Palazzo Angelini was all part of Somerton’s plan. Every detail around her had been arranged with care, from the moment she’d seen Markham’s face emerge from the crowd of tourists clustered around the Ponte Vecchio.
This large, empty room, devoid of any furniture, except for an armchair, an escritoire, and the tall straight-backed chair in which she now sat.
The lamp, the pen, the sheet of writing paper lying upon the escritoire.
The sound of small running feet, of muffled voices, of occasional laughter, of scattering blocks and thumping objects, coming from the room directly above.
The windows, shut and locked, allowing not a breath of fresh hilltop breeze to disturb the mounting heat in the room, as the afternoon sunlight pressed full force against the many-paned glass.
The clock now ticking above the mantel.
Just as she had that evening, many months ago, she now maintained her posture with care. Her back remained straight, her muscles steady. She could wait, too. She had time. She had power.
After all, she wasn’t without wits. She’d anticipated this possibility. Lying with Mssrs. Bellwether and Knobbs this minute was a piece of paper listing every liaison in which Somerton had taken part, every foul encounter, every shady association, with instructions to submit the information to the Queen’s own secretary should Philip set foot in England in the earl’s company. She had compiled it with painstaking care over the past year. She’d followed Somerton and noted everything. She’d kept track of every man who entered his study; she’d bribed a footman at his club to disclose the names of his companions. Ammunition: She’d been stockpiling it for some time.
This time, she would win.
By the time Roland tracked her down, she’d have Somerton’s signed agreement to accept the divorce.
Why, then, did her pulse continue to throb in her throat?
She stared at the ceiling, where Philip’s little feet raced just a few feet away, and tried not to count the loud scratches of the clock as it ticked through the minutes. Every particle in her body longed to dash up the stairs, to capture Philip and cover him with kisses, to carry him out and away with her. Away from this cold, symmetrical villa and back to the dear Castel sant’Agata baking in the June sun, and to Roland’s waiting arms.
But she couldn’t allow herself that luxury. She had to settle with Somerton first. She had to end this.
A bead of sweat made its way between her shoulders and her back. She could try to unlock one of the windows and push it open, but they were enormous: twelve panes over twelve, as tall as a man. Besides, the very act would betray her nervousness. Better to sit here calmly and perspire.
A slight pause interrupted the flow of noise above her, and in the gap she felt a vibration through the floorboards, strong and regular.
Footsteps.
She drew in a deep breath, filling her lungs with the hot, musty smell of sunbaked plaster and old wood. For an instant she closed her eyes, trying to determine the source and direction of the disturbance. Thump, thump. She could hear them now, heavy booted feet, striking the marble staircase with purpose and deliberation.
Louder, now. Unmistakable.
At the last instant, she leaned back in her chair, laid her elbows upon the armrest, and turned her gaze to the window, where a long line of cypress marched across the glass, each tree exactly identical to the other.
The door made a low creak as it opened, and a smart crack as it closed again.
“My dear Lady Somerton,” said a familiar voice. “You’re looking very well indeed. Italy appears to agree with you.”
Lilibet counted off a second, two seconds, three, and turned her head to the doorway. “I find it agrees with me very well indeed, sir. Thank you.”
He hadn’t changed, not by so much as a turned hair. Tall, broad, massive, black-haired, black-eyed, he stood before her like a block of granite, on which a sneer had been carved with utmost precision.
He walked toward her, stopped, reached out his hand, and tipped up her chin. “Remarkable,” he said. “I hadn’t thought it possible your beauty could be improved. Yet so it is.” He tilted his head and regarded her from another angle. “Yes, remarkable. Pity it’s all thrown away on that ass Penhallow, of course, but your tastes always tended to the common side.”
“He’s worth a thousand of you.”
Somerton laughed. “How gallant! Really, my dear, you’re terribly amusing. Almost as if you thought I cared for your good opinion.”
“Generally, husbands do.”
“Ah, but you no longer consider me your husband, do you? You wish to divorce me.” He said the word divorce with a keen sharpness, like the crack of a whip, leaning forward as he did so.
She did not flinch. “Yes, I do.”
He smiled, or rather sneered, and turned to settle himself in the armchair a few feet away. “Very well, then, my dear. I’ve no objection to a divorce.” He crossed his legs and draped his arms over the armrests. “What are your terms?”
She stared at him in astonishment. “My terms?”
“I’m more than prepared to meet any reasonable request. An allowance, of course. A house. You’re quite welcome to take the boy, though I shall expect regular updates on his progress, and perhaps an annual visit. You look amazed.”
“I confess, I am.” Her back, damp with perspiration, was beginning to stick to the chair. She lifted herself upward, out of her indolent pose. “I thought you meant to contest me.”
“Never in life. Why on earth should I wish to remain married to a woman who shares another man’s bed?” He said the words with cold deliberation, while his eyes bored into hers, without so much as a blink.
Heat prickled in her cheeks and at the tip of her nose. “If I have, it’s because you drove me there. You’ve sinned a thousand times more than I have, ten thousand.”
“Have I? I’ve enjoyed a greater variety, perhaps, but the relative quantity of sin is a matter of question.”
“That’s not true! I never . . . He was never my lover. Not until . . .”
“Come, my dear,” he said, in soothing tones. “Let’s not waste time on meaningless denials. His photograph in your jewel box, all these years.” He leaned forward and placed his spread hands, spiderlike, on his knees. His voice darkened and intensified. “In your jewel box.”
Lilibet blinked her eyes, hard. She hated
the way he could make her weep, with just a few words in that cutting voice of his, a single menacing look from his black eyes. With enormous mental effort, she brought her jumping nerves under control. “You know Roland and I admired each other, once. It was common knowledge. Then I became your wife, as God willed. But I never betrayed you, Somerton. Not in word or in deed, not until after I left England. Not until chance brought him my way again . . .”
A dry chuckle escaped Somerton’s lips, and he leaned back in his chair. “Chance! Oh, my dear! Chance!”
“Chance!” she said fiercely. “I had no idea he was in Italy, no idea he was bound for the same castle! We answered an advertisement in the Times, for heaven’s sake!”
“I saw no such advertisement.”
“Then call it an act of God. Of destiny.” She gripped the armrests, straining her fingers around the carved wood. “All this time I denied myself, Somerton. I tried so hard to be a good wife. I wanted so much to love you, to forget the past, to forget my lost dreams. To make new ones with you. But you raised your fist and you crushed them, just like that, with your deceit and your infidelity, your women without number, your temper and your coldness. And so I lived six years in winter, six years in bitterness and solitude, with only Philip to bring the slightest warmth to my heart. I lived like a nun, like a penitent for your sins, until that last night, that dreadful night, the night you accused me of adultery. Me! Of consorting with a man I’d given up for you, a man I hadn’t seen in years.”
He rose from his chair in an abrupt movement and strode to the window. With a single heave he opened it, letting the afternoon breeze flood into the room. “His photograph, my dear! Among your jewels!”
“I’d put it there long ago,” she said quietly, watching him. “I never disturbed it. It only gave me comfort, to know it was there.”
He stood there by the window, drawing in the air. “Among your jewels,” he said again, almost inaudible, the breeze snatching away the words.
“I never betrayed you.”
A bird began to sing outside the window, eloquent and exuberant, perched somewhere in that row of identical trees along the garden border. The smell of outdoors, of spicy cypress and sweet flowers, of sunshine baking into green leaves, swirled around them both.
