His Rags-to-Riches Contessa

by Marguerite Kaye

  ‘It sounds grotesque.’

  ‘It is meant to be. The intention behind many of the masks is to frighten as well as disguise identity. The bauta disguises the voice to an extent, as well as the face, because of the shape.’

  ‘Why does Don Sarti wear this particular style?’

  Luca laughed sardonically. ‘In the days of the Republic, the bauta and a certain type of black hat, the tricorno, and a red or black cloak were worn by all citizens entitled to vote, in order to keep ballots secret. Don Sarti’s Carnevale costume is his little jibe at our oppressors.’

  ‘But if many wear that style, how will we know we have our man?’

  ‘We will have to make sure that the Queen of Coins is an irresistible challenge for him. He likes to play deep. We will have to ensure that the stakes are suitably high.’

  ‘Luca, I’ve been thinking about that. If what you said about the ridotti opening in a week’s time is true, then the Queen of Coins, by starting small, can build a significant stake and accumulate some experience at the same time.’

  ‘That is a very good idea.’

  ‘It is.’ Becky beamed. ‘And it gets better. She’ll not only be building her experience, but something even more important. A reputation for being unbeatable.’

  Luca clapped his hands together. ‘Of course! Don Sarti will be unable to resist such a challenge!’

  ‘And when of the Queen of Coins defeats him, what will keep him coming back for more?’

  ‘His arrogance,’ Luca said, whistling. ‘And the more he loses, the more recklessly he will gamble. We will uses his weakness to relieve him of the money that rightly belongs to Venice. I think you might be a genius.’

  ‘Let’s not get too carried away yet. It’s a good plan, but before we can get our fish on the hook, we not only have to establish the Queen of Coins as a player, we have to get Don Sarti interested. Society needs to talk, in Don Sarti’s hearing, of the invincible card player, a woman no less, who has never been defeated.’

  ‘My mother could help us with this. Thanks to my father, she is extremely well connected.’

  ‘I think that would be a mistake,’ Becky said after a moment’s hesitation, for Isabel would indeed be ideally placed to help them. ‘You know that she doesn’t approve of what you are doing. She’d help you, because you’re her son and she’d do anything you asked of her but...’

  ‘You think I would be putting her in an invidious position?’

  ‘I do.’

  He considered this, frowning down at his hand, which was drumming a tattoo on his thigh. ‘I don’t understand her reservations, but I know she has them. It would be unfair of me. You’re right.’

  ‘I am?’

  ‘Astonishingly, since it means that I must therefore be wrong.’

  Becky chuckled. ‘I promise, it will be our secret.’

  ‘Che bella,’ Luca muttered. ‘Do you have any idea what you do to me when you laugh like that?’ He leaned over, brushing her hair away from her cheek. ‘But I must remind myself that there are any number of rooftops overlooking this one, and that it is almost December and that cold such as this is not conducive to lovemaking.’ He kissed her softly, then he released her with a theatrical sigh. ‘Tell me instead your thoughts on your disguise as the Queen of Coins. I think you said you had some preliminary sketches?’

  ‘I did. I do.’ Becky floundered about for her sketchbook. It had fallen on to the ground. She bent to retrieve it, taking the opportunity to take a couple of deep, calming breaths. Save that they didn’t calm her. It was as well that Luca had demonstrated restraint, as she wasn’t sure how she would have reacted had he not. She was strung tight as a bow as she sat back down, her fingers fumbling with the pages of the little book. ‘The Queen of Coins,’ she said, forcing herself to focus on the first, tentative drawing, turning the page for Luca to see. ‘My starting point was the way she’s depicted on the cards, obviously, but then I began to think. What is it that we want people to see, what is it that makes her stand out—because we want her to be distinctive, don’t we?’

  It was working. As she turned the page to the next sketch, she could see that she’d caught Luca’s interest. ‘We want her to be everything that Cousin Rebecca isn’t. Arrogant. Regal. Seductive. But the one thing she has in common with Cousin Rebecca is that no one dare touch her.’ She turned the page to the final sketch, watching with satisfaction as Luca’s smile dawned. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I cannot imagine anything more perfect.’

  * * *

  Cousin Rebecca accompanied her aunt to Contessa Benzon’s salon the following evening. As they entered the room, which was stifling hot and bustling, Becky was assailed by a wave of boredom. Most of the faces looked familiar, some from Contessa Albrizzi’s salon, but most from the many calls Rebecca had paid with her aunt Isabel in the intervening ten days. Calls when she had drunk endless cups of insipid tea, for the Venetians could not understand that the leaves must be given time to infuse. She had smiled endless vapid smiles, listening to endless tedious conversations. She tried, when she returned from these excursions, to recall what had been discussed, but it was all a jumble of who was wearing what and tittle-tattle. None of Isabel’s acquaintances seemed to do anything, save pay calls and gossip endlessly. This life of leisure and luxury, which would have been beyond her own wildest dreams only a month ago, Becky was finding not only wearisome but inexplicable.

  ‘Don’t they mind that they serve no purpose?’ she’d asked Isabel earlier, as Chiara pattered to and fro with a selection of gowns for Cousin Rebecca to choose from for the coming evening.

  Isabel’s brittle laugh made her realise how insulting she had been. ‘I didn’t mean you,’ Becky had added swiftly.

  ‘But you make a valid point, Rebecca. Another thing I shall endeavour to change when you are no longer with me.’

  Which had brought a lump to Becky’s throat. When she was with the Contessa, she increasingly forgot her own sordid history and felt herself truly to be Isabel’s friend. She was deluding herself. Though the regal woman in whose wake she was currently trailing was not her friend Isabel, but Contessa del Pietro. ‘Contessa Benzon, it has been too long,’ she was saying to the statuesque woman who must be their hostess. ‘May I introduce you to my niece from England, Signorina Rebecca Wickes.’

  Contessa Maria Querini Benzon had once been a famous beauty renowned for courting scandal. She had, Isabel had informed Becky earlier, danced virtually naked around the Tree of Liberty, wearing only a brief Roman-style tunic during the fall of the Republic. A song inspired by this outrageous act was still a favourite with the gondoliers twenty years later. Her latest scandal had been to marry her lover after thirty years together, but her notoriety had more to do with her passion for food than for her husband. The Contessa, a true Venetian, loved polenta so much that she would not leave her palazzo without a slice of it tucked into her bosom. The gondoliers called her The Steaming Lady.

  As the introductions were made, it struck Becky yet again what a topsy-turvy tangle were the rules and the morals by which these upper-class Venetians lived. A bride must be a virgin, yet a wife was expected to take a lover. Fidelity, that most fundamental virtue in her eyes, meant nothing here. She, who had been true in every way to the man she’d thought she loved, would be perceived as a fallen women by these people, simply because she’d given herself without a formal blessing. Making Cousin Rebecca’s curtsy, Becky felt more than ever that she did not belong here.

  ‘I have heard a great deal about you, Signorina Wickes,’ Contessa Benzon said with an engaging and refreshingly genuine smile which made Becky’s prepared platitudes die on her lips. ‘Isabel’s little English niece, who dreams of marrying a man of the church just like her papa, do I have that right?’

  ‘Perfectly,’ Cousin Rebecca replied, disappointed to see no giveaway trail of steam rising from her hostess’s g
own. Was that scepticism in the Contessa’s voice, or the more usual scorn?

  ‘I confess, Isabel, I was most surprised to hear this story. A niece of yours to marry a man of the cloth! When one would have thought her a perfect match for your son. Oh, I know you will say that she is too close in blood, but we all know that is a rule which can be waived when it is convenient.’

  ‘Rebecca has very modest ambitions,’ Isabel replied. ‘I would not dream of trying to redirect them.’

  ‘Wisely said, Isabel, but there is one who I think could do so easily, if he chose? What do you say to that, Conte del Pietro?’

  ‘My cousin’s mind is quite made-up on the matter.’

  ‘Such a modest young woman, with such modest ambitions, yet she has a will of iron it seems,’ Contessa Benzon mused. ‘For I find it very difficult to believe she could be immune to your charms, Conte del Pietro. Perhaps he has not tried hard enough. What do you say, Signorina Wickes?’

  Thinking sardonically that Luca had barely had to try at all, Becky was forced to look up. ‘I do not aspire to such lofty heights,’ she said drily.

  ‘But you would like to, no? Who would not?’

  Contessa Benzon fluttered her eyelashes meaningfully at Luca, whose manful struggle to conceal his shock at the very obvious suggestion was too much for Becky. She gave a snort of laughter, and though she quickly turned it into a cough, her hostess was not fooled.

  ‘I advise you to look a little more closely at your cousin, Conte del Pietro,’ she said with a gleeful smile. ‘Appearances can be most deceptive. But I have detained you enough,’ she continued, sparing any of them the need to respond. ‘Isabel, I see your coterie have gathered over in the corner, you will wish to join them with your niece. Conte del Pietro, my salon is at your disposal. You will excuse me, I have newly arrived guests to greet.’

  * * *

  The evening continued as all such evenings did, Luca was discovering, with the conversation largely consisting of veiled hints as to his matrimonial prospects, discreet scrutiny of the chances of him following his father into the heart of the city’s administration and subtle probing from some as to his inclinations to attend their various societies and clubs. Politics could not be discussed overtly, that much he understood, for the Austrians had spies everywhere, but he was beginning to find the Venetian habit of making an unnecessary mystery of every subject tedious.

  Luca had never been much interested in politics, preferring action to words. It was why the navy had suited him, and why he wanted to build ships. What he would do with his fleet was another matter. He had assumed that he would sail with them, but all of Venice expected Conte del Pietro to remain in the city, not absent himself for months, possibly years at a time. He had always known he belonged to Venice, it was in the del Pietro blood that he serve his city, but until his father’s life was taken, the date had always been deferred to some mythical point in the future. That was another crime to add to the list committed by Don Sarti. He had stolen Luca’s freedom from him.

  The man with whom he had been conversing was looking at him expectantly. Luca couldn’t even remember his name, let alone what they’d been talking about. Spotting Becky out of the corner of his eye, seated beside his mother and looking as bored as he felt, he made his bow and an apology. ‘Mi scusi, signor, I think my cousin wishes to speak to me.’

  He had to suppress a smile, for Becky almost forgot she was Cousin Rebecca in her hurry to get to her feet when he suggested they get some fresh air. ‘Grazie, Cousin Luca,’ she said, ‘it is true, I am suffocating. From the heat, that is, of course, not from the company, which is as diverting and delightful as always. Meno male,’ she added for his ears alone as he led her away. ‘I thought you would never come and rescue me. Didn’t you promise to find a way to let me watch some card playing?’

  ‘It is taking place in another room. We can use the terrace to observe the game. Try looking a little less happy to escape and a little more as if you are about to faint.’

  She responded to her cue immediately, and with no questions. Luca watched, fascinated, as Cousin Rebecca’s already pale complexion seemed to go grey. Her lids drooped. Her knees began to give way. ‘Cousin Luca,’ she whispered in a perfect stage aside, ‘I fear I am quite overcome.’

  She took a tottering step towards the window and Luca, waving aside an offer to help, put a cousinly arm around her waist. ‘Some air, that is all she needs.’

  ‘Oh, yes, thank you, just a little air,’ Cousin Rebecca said plaintively. The curtain was obligingly held aside, the tall windows on to the terrace opened. ‘I am so embarrassed, please excuse—My cousin will take care of me,’ Cousin Rebecca implored, and the concerned guest obligingly retreated.

  As soon as the curtains fell back together, Becky straightened up. ‘Which way? Oh, Luca, what if the curtains to the room are drawn?’

  ‘They are not. They were, but I remedied that.’

  ‘Excellent. Are you sure we won’t be spotted from inside?’

  ‘If anyone looks up, you can faint into my arms.’

  ‘Magari,’ Becky said with an impish grin, using one of Chiara’s favourite words. ‘I wish!’

  ‘Not as much as I do,’ Luca muttered under his breath, following in her wake as she crept light-footed along the narrow balcony, past the second set of windows belonging to Contessa Benzon’s grand drawing room, to the light streaming from the card room, where she stopped short.

  ‘This is perfect,’ she whispered as he stopped beside her. ‘Both tables closest to the window are playing Trappola. You don’t have to watch. Just keep a lookout for me, and be prepared to catch me if required.’

  She turned her attention back to the room, and was immediately rapt with concentration. Two floors below, Luca could hear the rush of the waters of the Grand Canal that told him the tide was on the turn. He would not build his ships at the old docks, he would build a new dockyard, modelled on the one on the River Clyde in Glasgow, where they constricted ocean-going clippers, faster than any other. He would send his fleet across the world to trade in silks and in tea, in spices and tobacco, bringing trade back to his city and much-needed work. In the cool night of the last days of November, Luca leaned on the low edge of the balcony and gazed out to sea, indulging himself in his dreams.

  ‘I hope you employed someone more attentive to act as lookout when you were at sea.’ Becky’s voice in his ear startled him from his reverie. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, flashing him a smile, ‘no one has come in search of us, but I think we’d better return to the drawing room before they do.’

  ‘Was it helpful, even though they were playing for pleasure, not money?’

  ‘Yes. The two ladies in particular were very skilful players. Do you think you can persuade your mother to leave now? I don’t think I can bear...’

  ‘Not yet,’ Luca said curtly, ushering her through the still-open window. ‘Look over there. Don Sarti has arrived with his family.’

  ‘Luca...’

  ‘I am more prepared this time,’ he told her with a grim smile. As he propelled Cousin Rebecca towards the Sarti family, his stomach was clenched in a tight ball, but his fists were determinedly unfurled, even though every instinct urged him to grab the man by the throat and throttle the life out of him.

  ‘Luca.’ Don Sarti held out his hand. ‘I was saying to my wife, when we saw you at the opera the other night, how good it was to see your mother back in circulation. I believe the credit belongs to this young lady, her niece?’

  ‘Allow me to introduce Signorina Wickes,’ Luca said, discovering that he was loathe to do so.

  ‘Signorina Wickes, it is a pleasure. I confess, I was not aware of your existence until you arrived in Venice. May I introduce you to my wife, and to my daughter, Beatrice.’

  ‘I hope your aunt will bring you to tea, Signorina Wickes,’ Donna Sarti said, after Becky made her curtsy. ‘Beatri
ce will be happy to have a new acquaintance, won’t you, my dear?’

  ‘Indeed, Mama,’ her daughter murmured, looking, to Luca’s eye, every bit as demure and colourless as Cousin Rebecca, and on the face of it, a perfect match.

  It was not a friendship he wished to encourage, though he could think of no way to curb it without raising suspicion. He would have a word with his mother about it. He couldn’t risk Becky being too much in Don Sarti’s company. Only then did it occur to him to wonder how much of Donna Sarti’s company his mother usually kept. Were the two women friends? He was about to find out.

  ‘Anna. And Beatrice. How lovely to see you.’

  He watched his mother greet both Sarti women warmly, and he had his answer. It surprised him, for his mother had not alluded to any such friendship, though it was natural enough, he supposed, for the wives of two old friends to be on good terms.

  ‘Don Sarti, good evening.’

  His mother’s greeting was significantly cooler, but the Don didn’t appear to consider this unusual. ‘Contessa.’

  Was Sarti looking ill at ease? Was his conscience bothering him in the slightest? Luca couldn’t decide.

  ‘I will leave you to catch up with Isabel,’ Don Sarti was saying now to his wife. ‘I believe there are cards underway in the other salon. No,’ he added swiftly, as his wife’s face fell. ‘Of course, I am not going to play, my dear. What is the fun in playing without a stake to risk?’

  As he excused himself, making for the connecting door, Luca saw Donna Sarti’s eyes following her husband, her mouth pursed into a tight line.

  Chapter Eight

  The sky was gunmetal grey and lowering two days later, when Luca took Cousin Rebecca out on the pretext of another sightseeing trip, though the real reason for their expedition was to visit the mask-maker. Once again, they were in the open gondola with Luca taking the oar himself. Becky, swathed in a woollen hooded cloak, sat once again in the seat facing him rather than the direction in which he was rowing. They headed away from the Grand Canal, through a confusing network of tributary canals which gave her a completely different impression of the city. Although some of the buildings were clad in gaily painted stucco, all were decrepit and in varying states of decay.