And even the wisest, do the best they can,
Have moments, hours, and days, so unprepared,
That you might ‘brain them with their
lady’s fan;’
And sometimes ladies hit exceeding hard,
And fans turn into falchions in fair hands,
And why and wherefore no one understands.
Lord Byron
Don Juan, Canto the First
James wasn’t as easily finished with the business as he was with Piero. The governor kept him at the Ducal Palace past dawn, dotting every i and crossing every t.
James would have returned to Bonnard’s place even at that indecent hour, but he was too conscious of the combined stench of Piero’s unwashed body and whatever noxious fumes the swine had acquired from the prison, all of which clung to James’s clothes.
He went back to the Ca’ Munetti instead. His servants being up and about by this time, he had not long to wait for a bath. After this, he gave Zeggio and Sedgewick a brief summary of his interview with Piero.
Then James went to bed, telling himself that once his head was clear, he’d find a way through the present difficulty.
He slept for only a short time, because of a dream. It started out splendidly, with Bonnard naked and hurtling herself at him, wrapping her arms about his neck and pressing her luscious body against his. Then Lurenze appeared, and she pushed James away and threw herself at the prince instead.
James woke abruptly, aware he wasn’t alone.
He hauled himself up to a sitting position. Sedgewick and Zeggio stood in the doorway, wearing matching worried expressions.
“What?” James said. “What?”
“You was yelling, sir,” said Sedgewick apologetically. “Which you never does, as I was telling Mr. Zeggio here. But it was in Italian, and I couldn’t make it out.”
“I tell him, all you say is, ‘Come back here, you she-devil,’” said Zeggio. “I tell him this is no cause for alarm. It is a dream, nothing more.”
“But you was at them posies last night, sir, and—”
“Pozzi,” Zeggio corrected. “The prisons, very deep in the ground, like wells.”
“It give you the heebie-jeebies is what I reckoned, sir. On account of that time you was in Paris in that hellhole—the one where them filthy frogs tortured you. Which is why I said we oughter wake you up. But you woke up on your own.”
James had spent nearly a year recovering from the French interrogation. It was a long time ago: ten years. Pain was easy to forget but every other grim detail remained etched in his memory.
He wasn’t the only one who’d been betrayed, but he was one of the lucky ones. Two of his associates had been tortured to death. His scars—the visible ones—had faded. His nails had grown back. And he’d gone back to work, determined to settle scores. But he’d been so much younger then. Now, it would take him years to recover—if he did recover, which was by no means certain. Now he understood, too, that the trail of betrayal was not simply tangled but endless.
I’m getting too old for this, he thought.
“Find me something to wear,” he told Sedgewick. “And get my shaving things.”
He shaved and dressed quickly, as always. Lingering over his toilette was not in his style.
He was halfway through his breakfast when Zeggio, who’d been sent to ready the gondola, reappeared with a small parcel.
“A maid brings it,” he said. “From Signora Bonnard, she says.”
James stared at the elegantly wrapped parcel.
He set down his coffee, took it, and unwrapped it.
He recognized the shape of the box.
Grimly he opened it.
He didn’t need to look up to be aware of Sedgewick and Zeggio, who’d crept closer. They looked down at the contents, then at his face.
He did not throw the elegant box across the room. Peridots were not pearls, diamonds, or emeralds, true. On the other hand, good specimens did not come cheap. Royalty wore peridots, he knew, and this set, the well-cut stones bordered with brilliants, was worthy of a queen. He simply sat, staring at it, seething, though he had no reason—no sane reason—to be angry.
This was a taunt, nothing more. The wager didn’t signify to her. The price of the peridots was laughable. That was the message he read in it. He’d been merely a diversion to her, a game to while away the journey—at the end of which she had more important prey.
When he could control his voice, he said, “A little wager, that’s all. Mrs. Bonnard certainly pays promptly. She must have had her servant waiting at the shop door for it to open.”
“Very fine articles, those are, sir,” said Sedgewick.
“Indeed they are,” James said. “Most sporting of her. I must thank her. Personally. Zeggio, I thought you were readying the gondola.”
Though he spoke calmly and quietly there was something in his tone that made Zeggio hurry from the room.
The something made Sedgewick’s brow furrow. “Sir,” he began.
James held up his hand. “I’ll deal with this,” he said.
“Yes, sir,” Sedgewick said.
“At least I’ve learned one thing,” James said.
“Yes, sir. It were a robbery, nothing to do with—”
“I now understand why Elphick divorced her,” James said. “What I don’t understand is why he didn’t strangle her.”
Palazzo Neroni, a short time later
Francesca was naked.
Or so, at least, would respectable persons describe her—for there was, they would scold, far too much of her on view.
Not only had she failed to don a proper morning gown but she wasn’t even wearing decent night-clothes.
Instead of the frumpy cotton nightdress virtuous women wore to bed, she’d donned a shift of exquisite pale yellow silk. Pink silk ribbons tied the deep neckline closed. A pink silk ribbon drawstring tied under her breasts. Over the nightdress she wore a silk dressing gown of a paler shade, closer to the color of cream. In contrast to the simple shift, this was trimmed with miles of ruffles and lace and shimmering embroidery dotted with seed pearls.
As she entered the Putti Inferno, she regretted not having ordered breakfast served in the intimacy of the room adjoining her boudoir.
Well, too late. She must shock the plaster and painted children.
Ignoring them and the pudgy little fingers pointing at the great whore in the room, she directed her gaze to Lurenze, who’d risen, his face lighting up, at the sound of her footsteps. Then his eyes opened very wide, and his mouth fell open. He put his hand to his heart. He murmured something in his own language.
“Good morning,” she said, with a small, intimate smile.
Arnaldo was there to pull out her chair, luckily, for his highness was temporarily non compos mentis.
After a moment’s delay and more murmuring to himself, he strung some English together. “You look like—like a—a froth,” he said. “Never have I seen anything so beautiful. In my country, the women do not dress so—so—so showing of their beauties.”
“They don’t do it in my country, either,” she said.
“I am glad we are not in your country or in my country,” he said.
Francesca became aware of distant sounds, coming from the portego. Arnaldo poured her coffee and went out.
She sipped her coffee. She nibbled on a pastry, then put it down because her hands were shaking.
Her heart was beating hard but she went on bestowing sleepy smiles upon Lurenze while she dropped a few innuendoes that went over his golden head.
Arnaldo returned. “Signor Cordier has arrived, signora,” he said. “Do you wish I tell him to come another time?” The servant did not so much as glance at Lurenze when he said this.
“No, send him up,” she said. She did not add, I’ve been expecting him.
Arnaldo went out.
“I’ll wager…” She began. Then she paused, her smile widening. She couldn’t help it. She’d lost the wager, but Cordier would learn what sort of gamester he played with. “I daresay,” she continued, “Mr. Cordier has come to tell us what transpired last night with the man who was captured.”
“I wondered when word would come,” said Lurenze. “So long it takes. Almost I am thinking it is time to send a servant to him for the explanation.”
“Legal matters always take a ridiculous amount of time,” she said. “Rules and regulations. Papers to sign.”
“So true it is,” said Lurenze. “Sometimes, the signing of the papers makes me like a wild man. So many rules. Then all the protocols, to talk to this one, that one. To listen while this one complains and another one wishes to make me do this or that. But when I rule Gilenia, only worse it becomes. I must study madame, who is so patient and gracious.”
“You bring out the best in me,” she said.
He flushed with pleasure.
How easy it was to please him!
She reached across the little table and laid her hand over his. “You are so good,” she said. “I don’t know how you came to be that way, but please don’t change.”
“Good?” he said with a laugh. “But I did not come to Venice to be good.”
“You came to be naughty,” she said. “I quite understand. But one might be naughty and still”—she stroked his hand—“keep goodness in one’s heart.”
Arnaldo came in. “Signor Cordier,” he said.
Close behind, like a great, ominous shadow, loomed Lord Westwood’s troublesome son. He strode in, carrying the parcel she’d sent.
A dangerous glitter came into his blue eyes as his gaze went from her to Lurenze’s flushed and happy face, then to her hand, resting on the prince’s.
She’s a professional, James reminded himself while he said the polite thing and she said the polite thing and the ecstatic Lurenze was all princely cordiality.
You’re a professional, Jemmy, he told himself. Act like one.
And so the question naturally arose, What would be the most professional way to kill Lurenze?
Slowly Bonnard withdrew her hand from the prince’s. “We’ve only started breakfast, Mr. Cordier. Won’t you join us?”
It must be noon at least, probably past it. James had not bothered to consult a clock before he left his house, but the sun told him it was midday. He told himself not to imagine what they’d been doing since he left them…not to imagine how they’d spent the night…not to picture the pair of them, tangled among the bedclothes, lazing in bed as the morning sun poured through the windows.
It was hard not to imagine, given the fluffy lot of nothing she was wearing.
Arnaldo brought a chair to the small, intimate table…set for two. He set another place.
James sat.
Bonnard gave Lurenze a sultry smile. The prince smiled back at her, thoroughly pleased with himself.
And why shouldn’t he be? Last night, James had done all the hard work of getting her heated up. All his highness had to do was finish the job.
James became aware of his fingers tightly clutching the parcel in his hand. He laid it on the table.
Lurenze stared at it. “You bring a gift for madame, I see.”
“Not exactly,” James said.
“What’s wrong, Mr. Cordier?” she said. “Is it not what you asked for: the perfect gift for your betrothed?”
“You are betrothed?” Lurenze said. “I congratulate you!”
“I am not betrothed,” James said.
“Not yet,” said Bonnard. “But he wishes to be prepared.”
Lurenze nodded. “For me, all is prepared. Soon I shall be betrothed. The girl is not yet decided. One of my cousins, perhaps. Or else a girl of a great family of Italy or Russia or Hungary or one of those places. Half the world they want the alliance with my country, but the Russians plague me most. I wish they would leave me in peace but it cannot be. Alas, the man of my position cannot marry where is his heart.”
He gazed soulfully at Bonnard.
She gazed soulfully back at him.
Excuse me while I vomit, James thought. He rose.
“Well, then, good-bye,” he said.
The Cleopatra eyes widened.
Ah, she wasn’t prepared for that. She thought she could torment him for as long as she liked.
Sorry, cara. I’ve been tortured by experts.
“But you haven’t touched your breakfast,” she said.
“But what of the man who is captured?” said Lurenze. “Did you not come to report of this, to put madame’s mind at the ease, I hope?”
Damnation. James had forgotten about Piero. He’d forgotten everything he was supposed to remember.
It all went out of his head at the sight of Lurenze’s classically handsome, beaming countenance…those guileless grey eyes, which had scarcely seen the world, let alone beheld any of its treacheries and horrors…his pure happiness at having the woman he wanted…his pleasure, untouched by doubt or painful experiences, by betrayals…
And she, stroking his hand, encouraging his delusions…
No excuses, Jemmy. You’re letting your cock do your thinking for you.
“I didn’t want to spoil your breakfast with unpleasant subjects,” he said.
“On the contrary,” she said. “My appetite is bound to improve, if any progress has been made in this matter.”
She gestured for him to sit down.
James remained standing. He would not stay a minute longer than necessary. He needed to get away and repair his brain.
“The man in custody is the one who rowed the boat,” he said. “He confessed. They were after your jewelry. But the other one, apparently, thought it would be fun to rape you as well. His accomplice claims he was not trying to strangle you, only to keep you quiet.”
Her hand went to her throat, involuntarily, he could tell. It was as instinctive a reaction as the color washing out of her face.
James’s reaction was instinctive, too. He caught her as she began to slump. He lifted her from the chair and carried her to the sofa.
Lurenze, startled, took a moment to react. But before he could shout for servants, James said, “Excellency, pray dip a napkin in water.”
The prince quickly did as he was told and hurried to the sofa, where James sat, his hip against hers. He took the wet cloth and dabbed her forehead, her temples, her cheeks.
Her eyes fluttered open. She stared at him. In the noontime light, he could make out the flecks of gold in her green eyes.
“Good grief,” she said. “Did I faint?”
“Perhaps, madame, this was too much excitement for you, so soon after rising from the bed,” Lurenze said. “I am so stupid. Why do I not think wisely, to tell Mr. Cordier to wait until you have something to eat? All you have is one small piece of pastry, and only two bites from this do you take.”
“Perhaps you’re right,” she said. “But how embarrassing! I’ve never fainted before.”
“Mi dispiace,” James said. “I do apologize.”
Imbecille, he rebuked himself. Idiota.
He had no conscience, true. The trouble was, he’d let his emotions rule his brain, on about a dozen counts.
He’d been callous, deliberately so.
He’d been there. He’d seen what she’d endured, how shocked and frightened she was. Now, in the bright light of day, he could see the faint marks on her neck.
The trouble was, he could see Lurenze, too, almost visibly floating on his cloud of post-coital bliss.
“But this is good news, yes?” Lurenze said. “One man is found. He is in the prison. The other one, too, they will find soon, unless he is dead and the sea has carried him away. You must be comforted, madame. No one will allow you to come to harm. I keep the guard in the night, and here is Mr. Cordier to take my place.”
James blinked and looked up at him. “Take your place?”
“But here are you, and what is it more important for you to do?” said his highness. “Me, I would not leave madame alone, but my life is not mine to live as I wish. I must give the audience to these Russians who plague me. I do not mind to keep them to wait some hours, but I must appear to them before the time of dinner, when I have the engagement, also impossible to avoid. The Bavarians make a great dinner in my honor, where I must show myself. I must have clothes fresh and my face to be shaved.” He rubbed his jaw. “Madame is so patient. She makes no grievance. But the pricks of the beard are not agreeable to the ladies, I know.”
A short while later—after he’d reminded James several times to make sure madame ate properly—his highness departed.
By this time, madame had fully recovered. She left the sofa and walked with Lurenze as far as the door to the portego, where she gave him a kiss on the cheek. He reddened with pleasure. Then he took her hand and kissed it, not like a boy but like a royal and a man of the world.
Then, finally, he was gone.
She did not return to the breakfast table but sauntered past James to the window.
The noonday light made the seed pearls shimmer. The light also rendered her garments—such as they were—nearly transparent.
Though the dressing gown glimmered in the light, and the ruffles danced with the slightest movement, he could clearly discern the shape of her breasts. His hands cupped involuntarily, recalling the way they fit his hands, their smoothness, their firmness. He had no trouble remembering the warm scent of her skin. If he’d been a dog, his nose would have quivered. As it was his brain was closing the thinking door and preparing to hang the “Closed” sign on it.
He tried to look away but his gaze helplessly slid lower. He could discern the outline of her hips, her long legs.
“What are the chances of their finding the other one?” she said.
“The other one?”
James dragged his attention upward, to her profile. She was looking out of the window.
“The other criminal,” she said.
“Bonnard, put some clothes on,” he said.
“No,” she said.
“You’re doing this on purpose,” he said.
“Yes,” she said.
“To punish me,” he said.
“Yes.”
“You knew I’d come.”
“Yes.”
“That’s why you sent the peridots.”
“Yes.”
“And you bedded him for spite.”
She turned her head then, and looked at him. “Oh, no,” she said. “I never bed anyone for spite. I’m a businesswoman.”
“He doesn’t know that! He’s over head and ears in love with you!”
“Ah, yes. First love. There’s nothing quite like it. What does Byron say? ‘But sweeter still than this, than these, than all,/Is first and passionate love—it stands alone,/Like Adam’s recollection of his fall;/The tree of knowledge has been pluck’d—all’s known—’”
“‘And life yields nothing further to recall,’” he continued, “‘Worthy of this ambrosial sin, so shown,/No doubt in fable, as the unforgiven/Fire which Prometheus filch’d for us from heaven.’”
While he quoted the lines from Don Juan, her expression changed, and the color came and went in her cheeks.
“Is that how it was with you the first time you loved?” he said. “Sweet? And because you had a rude awakening are you compelled to pass the favor—and the poison—on to the next innocent?”
“How tender your heart’s become on his account,” she said. “Your brain must be tender, too, if you take me for an idiot. You don’t give a damn about him. You’re only vexed because you tried to play games with me and lost. I know games you never dreamed of, Cordier. And I always play to win. I tossed the bait and you chased it, the way a dog chases a stick.”
In an angry swirl of ruffles, she swung away from the window and strode to the table. She picked up the jewelry box and threw it at him. Reflexively he caught it.
“But now I’m bored with this game,” she said. “Go home, little dog, and take your toys with you.”
He looked down at the box in his hand. He looked up at her haughty face.
Francesca held her breath.
She’d gone too far. He’d throw her through the window. He was strong enough to do it.
And she wasn’t sure she could blame him.
She braced herself for she knew not what: if not strangulation or a trip through the window into the canal, then another flaying from that cold, cutting tongue of his.
He couldn’t know how deeply he’d cut with his remarks about her first love. Or perhaps he did know.
Very slowly, he set down the jewelry box on the table.
She thought of edging toward the bell, to summon help.
He started toward her.
She froze.
“You,” he said. “You.” Then he stopped, and put his hand to his head. His shoulders began to shake.
He let out a great crack of laughter, sudden and sharp as a pistol shot.
She jumped.
He laughed, turning away from her.
She only stood where she was, staring.
“Diavolo,” he said. He shook his head. “I’m going now.” He walked to the portego door, still shaking his head. “Addio,” he said.
And out he went, taking the jewelry box with him, and leaving her still staring after him.
She stood for a moment, clenching and unclenching her hands. Then, “You conceited, arrogant beast,” she said. She marched to the door and through it into the portego.
She’d had enough. This was the last time he’d turn his back on her, the last time he’d walk out on her.
She knew ways to stop men in their tracks, and he—
She stopped in her tracks.
Two men stood not twenty paces away. At the sound of her angry footfall, both turned and looked at her.
One was Cordier.
The other was a few inches shorter, and about three decades older.
“Madame,” came a voice to her right. Belatedly she noticed Arnaldo. She must have walked straight past him as he was coming to announce the new visitor. He cleared his throat. “The comte de Magny,” he announced.
“Ma foi, Francesca,” said the count. “Have you taken leave of your senses, child, to run about these drafty corridors naked? Go put some clothes on.”
“Monsieur,” she began.
“Run along, run along.” He waved his hand. “I will entertain your friend.”