Venice

by Lynne Connolly

  “I promise.” We kissed to seal the bargain.

  I slipped out of his arms and went to open the shutters on the other window. Light streamed across the unmade bed. I turned to see him watching me from the middle of the room, golden hair lit by the sun, tousled from sleep, making him look like a knowing putto. I went back to him.

  “I said something once about these bells,” he reminded me, mischief in his voice. “Do you remember?”

  Of course I remembered. It had been in the humble nursemaid’s room at Hareton Abbey. “That you’d like to make love to me in the Venice sun, with the sound of the water outside and the bells. You made me blush.”

  “So I did. Do you think I could make you blush now?” He undid the frogged fastenings at the front of my dressing gown.

  “Without a doubt.” He slipped his hands inside the gown and I let it slide down my arms to the floor.

  He loved me, just as he’d once promised. He kissed my mouth, my throat and went down on one knee to take a nipple into his mouth, running his tongue around the very tip, then the other and then lower still, making me sigh in pleasure. My knees grew weak from his caresses. I gripped his shoulders to keep from falling to the floor and he delved between my legs, kissing and tasting until I thought I might die. But he didn’t let me climax, he withdrew when he had me shivering with need.

  He stood, slid off his robe and lifted me into his arms. He carried me to the bed and lay me down, leaving my legs to hang over the edge before he entered me, fitting as perfectly as a hand fits into a tailored glove, never taking his intent blue gaze from my face. I cried out in joy, at this promise finally fulfilled and I heard his answering groan as I lifted my legs to wrap them around his waist and pull him deeper into me.

  Richard stopped moving and gazed at me, his expression brimful of love. “I wanted to look at you, to remember this moment always, never to forget what we are now, what we feel now. I love you, Rose, I can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be, anything I’d rather be doing. I’ll never stop loving you, never stop wanting you.”

  I could think of nothing adequate to say, nothing could express how I felt at that moment. I reached up a hand to place it on his heart. He caught it and brought it to his mouth, placing tiny kisses on the palm, his eyes never leaving mine. He kissed each fingertip, taking each tip into his mouth to caress it lightly with his tongue. My eyes drifted shut, savouring the moment.

  When I opened them again I said, “I can’t imagine anything I want more than to open my eyes and see you there.” At that moment we were everything to each other, nothing else seemed to exist, only this heat, fading into loving warmth.

  Richard fell to the bed beside me, pulled me to him and held tight. I kissed his mouth, told him I loved him, felt him move, straighten his legs, take me into his arms. I reached up to kiss his neck, felt his answering kiss on my hair and I sighed, feeling drowsy and blissful.

  The knock on the door came as a shocking intrusion, but Richard didn’t let me go, only pulled the sheet up over us and called out, “Yes?”

  The door opened but no one came in, only Carier’s voice, saying, tonelessly, “The gentlemen are here, my lord. Lord Thwaite and the other.”

  Richard grimaced. “Have breakfast served in the dining room. We’ll be there in about half an hour. And her ladyship will require Nichols in attendance.”

  “Yes, my lord.” The door closed on the invisible manservant.

  We turned to each other and then Richard kissed my lips repeatedly. “I forgot completely. You have more powers than the river Lethe, my love. Such sweet oblivion!”

  “Do you think they heard us?”

  He smiled, his lips still next to mine, the touch caressing me. “The people upstairs must have heard us, ma chérie.” He laughed softly. “You see, I told you I could make you blush.” My face burned. He drew me close, while my blushes subsided. “Would you prefer to wait here for me, or come to us in a while?”

  “No. That might make it worse, make it seem as though I was ashamed. Which I’m not,” I added, putting up my face so he could see my blushes had gone. His smile and the look in his eyes almost made them return, but I kissed him and then sat up. “We must get up.”

  He sighed, reaching up a hand to caress me. “Later,” he promised.

  He brought my robe over to me. I put it on and went through to my dressing room, where Nichols waited for me. I could choose what I wanted to wear today, no disguise needed. While I washed, I decided to wear a white silk gown sprigged with tiny flowers. Together with a quilted petticoat and my pearls, that seemed to echo my festive mood. I was glad to think Mrs. Locke wouldn’t have approved. The stomacher was a froth of ribbon bows and lace, all white, very frivolous and when I finally went into the dining room, I was pleased to see the reaction I received. All three men stood and bowed and suddenly I didn’t feel quite so shy, even though I knew they must have heard something of our connubial bliss earlier. Richard was right when he said clothes could make a difference.

  The man I didn’t know was introduced to me as Signor Verdi, but his English was so perfect I suspected him of starting life as Mr. Green. It proved to be so when I asked him where he had learned his English.

  “At home in Kent. I’m a clergyman’s son, my lady, well educated but with nothing to support it. Since I find it difficult to apply myself to study, I was left with two choices; highwayman or to make my living more or less honestly on the tables.” He smiled and took up his coffee cup. “For many years I travelled Europe, playing the tables and I learned many tricks on the way. I’ll teach you some of them today. When I made money, I put half of it away and reinvested the other half in my own skill and so you see me as I am now. I no longer have any need of the tricks I learned. I gave up playing two years ago to play for fatter game on the stock exchanges. The memory of me has been lost and I am now generally regarded as respectable.” He sipped at his coffee.

  I regarded him thoughtfully as I ate. He was a slender man, average height and dark eyes in a thin, clever face that seemed keen to smile. I noticed an air of nervousness about him, perhaps he was highly strung, or perhaps from some underlying health concern. Whatever it was it made for a slight feeling of uneasiness in his presence.

  Richard chatted affably to Freddy, letting me get to know our tutor, but occasionally he would glance in my direction and smile and I would smile back.

  “Do you know this man, Ravens?” I asked.

  “Oh yes, my lady,” said Signor Verdi. “He’s been around for some time now, but I’ve never known him take on this much of a deception. Fortunately, he doesn’t know me, so I may take part in your scheme if my lord should wish it. He has always played the tables and I have set forward enquiries to see if he has made a great deal of money from somewhere recently. I would guess he has had a windfall and he’s decided to reinvest in a larger scheme.”

  “I wouldn’t have thought the expenditure to be worth the returns.”

  Signor Verdi smiled. “This is only the beginning, my lady. If my reasoning is right, he plans to draw you into his scheme and use you for some time to come. Your husband, in his persona as a wine merchant, will meet several illustrious people in the course of his work and he could draw quite a few people into the Ravens’ orbit. The man may even be thinking of setting up a respectable gaming house with fair play, but once a cheat always a cheat.”

  “Even you?” I said, smiling.

  “Yes indeed, even me. But in the markets I play, it’s not considered cheating until it crosses the line into fraud. I can satisfy my wish to have an unfair advantage over my opponent without breaking the law.”

  “But Ravens can’t call himself Lord Strang forever, can he? We may go to London in the autumn and then the world will know our whereabouts.”

  The man nodded, spearing a piece of bacon from his plate and chewing thoughtfully before he replied. “He’ll quietly let it drop over the summer, my lady. Your livery will be modified to become the livery of the house and he’ll
be well established to take advantage of the fresh marks coming his way in the autumn.”

  “Marks?”

  “Another word for coney, my lady. Coney, mark, pigeon, they all mean the same thing.”

  I smiled over my coffee cup. “A fool?”

  His answer surprised me. “Oh no, my lady, not a fool. That’s a mistake many people make. The best marks are people who think they’re up to all the games, but who are consumed by greed and superiority. They think they can get the better of their opponent right up to the last minute, but their greed blinds them to the truth.”

  I bit my lip in thought and decided that what he said made sense. Many things can blind people. I was blinded by love when I first met Richard, but I went ahead anyway, so if it had been greed and not love that had consumed me, I might well have taken that risk. “So you want someone rich and greedy?”

  He smiled and his eyes glazed over, as though he was thinking of triumphs in his past. “Or influential. I think Ravens is looking to your husband less for money than for the custom he will bring. He will try to break him first and then try to draw him in.”

  “But instead, we’ll draw him in?”

  Richard broke in. “Something like that. I want to punish him a little for what he has done and what he tried to do. If I hadn’t seen to it, he would be running up bills all over Venice in my name—our name,” he corrected himself with a smile.

  I smiled back and returned to my breakfast.

  After the meal, we went to the music room where several small tables had been set out and Signor Verdi began to teach us how to cheat.

  “He asked us if we played piquet,” Richard said.

  The Signor brightened. “Then he wishes to demonstrate a skill. Since all thirty-two used are visible by the end of the game, cards cannot be introduced to the hand from elsewhere.” Without appearing to move his hand, suddenly there was a card in it, the Queen of Diamonds. He bowed his head, accepting our applause, then pushed back the lace at the wrist and showed us a device hidden there. By manipulating a small muscle in his wrist, a spring was activated, which pushed a card up into his hand to use in the pack.

  “How do you lose the extra card?” Freddy asked, leaning forward to examine the device. Signor Verdi obligingly untied the tapes and handed the device over for him to look at more closely.

  “I could find a use for that,” said Richard thoughtfully. I couldn’t imagine what he would want it for.

  “I can show you how it is made, my lord, then you can get your own done. Meantime, please accept this one as a gift.” Richard thanked him. Signor Verdi continued to show us how he could slip unwanted cards in a pocket, a coat cuff or a secret compartment stitched into the seam of a coat or waistcoat. “In the lady’s case the same principle applies, but the folds of the skirt can prove very useful.”

  “There are lady card sharps?” I said, surprised and then caught myself up. “Of course there must be, how stupid of me!”

  Richard, glanced up from the device in his hand. “Not stupid, merely innocent. I feel we are corrupting you, my love, but you must say if you don’t want this to go any further.”

  I laughed. “Oh no, do you think provincial life is so sinless? We have our share of rogues, you may be sure. Just not the best rogues, that’s all.” They laughed too and I went on, “To be honest, I haven’t enjoyed myself so much for a long time. I would really like to be a part of this, as much as I can.”

  Freddy pursed his lips before saying, “’Fore God, Richard, if you hadn’t discovered her first, I might well have made a push for your wife myself.”

  “She has a great deal of spirit,” he agreed, smiling.

  I laughed to receive such foolish compliments and we turned back to attend to Signor Verdi.

  “In piquet, the deal is all,” he said, “but there is some skill involved. A good player can win a partie with a poor set of cards, if the talon is good and a skilled card sharp can give an opponent hope, only to take it away again.”

  He picked up one of several packs of cards that lay on a table and broke the seal. We watched him sort the cards for piquet, the sevens up and discard the lower numbers, leaving a pack of thirty-eight and then we watched him shuffle them. I tried to see if he was cheating, but I could see nothing amiss.

  Signor Verdi gave it to me to cut. Then he proceeded to deal, face up, two hands of twelve and the talon, the central reserve both players use in the initial part of the game to replace part of their hands. He exchanged five from the dealer’s hand, three to the other and sat back while we looked at the result.

  It was obvious the dealer won. The dealer usually had the advantage, but since the dealer alternated over a partie of six hands, the advantage usually evened out.

  “Pique and repique,” breathed Freddy, enthralled. One hand was replete with court cards and hearts to give long points, sequences and sets, all high scoring and the other had one court card to avoid the carte blanche and very little else.

  “Shuffling is a more difficult trick than palming,” Signor Verdi warned us. “You must work very hard to achieve it. Were you hoping to learn it for tomorrow?”

  Richard shook his head. “No. Tomorrow we’re being set up. We will win, I’m sure.”

  The Signor beamed. “Bene. Then we have more time.”

  Freddy looked up from the cards. “But you can only win three times in a partie with this and it’s damned suspicious.”

  Signor Verdi beamed, picked up the cards, riffled through them quickly and gave them to Freddy. “If you would care to deal, my lord?”

  Freddy shuffled and then, after letting the Signor cut, dealt face up again. The results were similar, but this time the best cards were with the person dealt to. Freddy and I clapped our hands in delight. It was thrilling to see a skill well executed, however nefarious. Richard studied the cards, his hand to his chin.

  “It is more difficult,” the Signor said, “but it can be done. I shuffled before I gave you the cards and I cut them. I can either substitute them for a deck of my own, or practise the greater skill of pre-shuffling.”

  “With the second method, you’re far less likely to be caught,” Richard said.

  “Precisely,” the man replied. “Shall we begin? I should like to see you all play a few hands, if you please, to see how you handle the cards. If the methods here are to work, they must look as natural as possible.”

  We obliged him, taking turns to play a single partie. Our teacher watched intently, the way we sat, the way we held the cards, how we sorted them. I had to sort and resort my cards, Freddy did it once and Richard never sorted at all, leaning back, legs crossed, long fingers playing negligently over the backs of the cards. The signor insisted we keep score and I was delighted when I beat both the gentlemen, although the luck was with me rather than the skill.

  “You play well,” Signor Verdi told me with inclination of his head.

  I smiled in return. “An unmis-spent youth. Spent with the old tabbies in the card rooms rather than in the ballroom.”

  Signor Verdi threw up his hands. “The worst of opponents! You think you are safe with them, but they have probably learned more tricks in a lifetime than you have in a few years. I have been fleeced myself by such a one, who had been skinning conies all her life, almost gaining respectability in the process. I didn’t expect it, you see.”

  He proceeded to teach us how to shuffle to our advantage. We had to learn the fundamentals first and then try to conceal what we were doing after we had mastered the skill. To my chagrin, I couldn’t master it, however hard I tried. At one point, Signor Verdi took my hand and examined it.

  “A small palm and long fingers,” he said thoughtfully. “It may be, my lady, the cards are too large for your hands. A pity. But keep trying.”

  I looked ruefully at my hands, good for music, but not for cheating. Richard had long fingers too, but his palms were larger and after a while he achieved some success.

  Freddy could have been born to it. He only had
to be showed the trick it seemed, to master it. “Oh, marvellous!” he exclaimed after a while. “Something I’m good at, at last. Such a shame I can’t show it off!”

  “It would amuse the ladies,” Richard said, concentrating on clandestinely sliding one card behind another.

  “And who would play cards with me after that?” demanded his lordship.

  Signor Verdi sighed. “I’m afraid, my lord, there is always someone who thinks they can outdo you.”

  I gave up after a while, my fingers aching with effort and went to arrange some refreshment instead.

  It occurred to me that I hadn’t yet taken up any of the duties expected of a wife—except one—and I called Carier to attend me in the salon. Together we arranged a suitable dinner and I asked him to send the cook to me to arrange it every day, but I found since we shared the kitchens with the other occupants of the building, we had no cook. “I think we should find one, don’t you? I should like my husband to have what he wishes for in the way of food.”

  Carier seemed to concur and promised to find a cook the next day. “It will have to be a Thompson’s cook my lady. We have very special people here.”

  “You mean all the staff here are from the Box?” I referred to the special box Carier or Richard always carried with them, which held the names of the staff with particular skills who could be relied upon to fulfil special duties.

  Carier said it was true. “His lordship won’t take any risks where you’re concerned, my lady. This place is as secure as the Tower of London.”

  I went back to the music room, a little awed by the ruthless way I was being looked after. I wasn’t used to being thought of as quite so precious.

  We spent the rest of the day in practice, at least Richard and Freddy did. I couldn’t do it unobtrusively, I wouldn’t have deceived a child. I gave up after a while and played the harpsichord for them. I tried to keep it light, but the usual thing happened and in my concentration, I forgot there was anyone else there. Richard had provided a great deal of sheet music for me to work from and I found a piece by Vivaldi I had never seen before. I began to work on it while they practised and by the time dinner was announced, I had fairly mastered it and I played it through once for them, while they sat back and listened.