Читать книгу Silent in the Sanctuary - Deanna Raybourn, Deanna Raybourn - Страница 5

THE FIRST CHAPTER

Italy, 1887

Travelers must be content. —AS YOU LIKE IT

“Well, I suppose that settles it. Either we all go home to England for Christmas or we hurl ourselves into Lake Como to atone for our sins.”

I threw my elder brother a repressive look. “Do not be so morose, Plum. Father’s only really angry with Lysander,” I pointed out, brandishing the letter from England with my fingertips. The paper fairly scorched my skin. Father’s temper was a force of nature. Unable to rant at Lysander directly, he had applied himself to written chastisement with great vigour.

“The rest of us can go home easily enough,” I said. “Just think of it—Christmas in England! Plum pudding and snapdragon, mistletoe and wassail—”

“Chilblains and damp beds, fogs so thick you cannot set foot out of doors,” Plum put in, his expression sour. “Someone sobbing in the linen cupboard, Father locking himself in the study after threatening to drown the lot of us in the moat.”

“I know,” I said, my excitement rising. “Won’t it be wonderful?”

Plum’s face cracked into a thin, wistful smile. “It will, actually. I have rather missed the old pile—and the family, as well. But I shall be sorry to leave Italy. It has been an adventure I shall not soon forget.”

On that point we were in complete agreement. Italy had been a balm to me, soothing and stimulating at once. I had joined two of my brothers, Lysander and Eglamour—Plum to the family—after suffering the loss of my husband and later my home, and very nearly my own life. I had arrived in Italy with my health almost broken and my spirit in a sorrier state. Four months in a warm, sunny clime with the company of my brothers had restored me. And though the weather had lately grown chill and the seasons were turning inward, I had no wish to leave Italy yet. Still, the lure of family and home, particularly at Christmas, was strong.

“Well, who is to say we must return permanently? Italy shall always be here. We can go to England for Christmas and still be back in Venice in time for Carnevale.”

Plum’s smile deepened. “That is terribly cunning of you, Julia. I think living among Italians has developed a latent talent in you for intrigue.”

It was a jest, but the barb struck too close to home, and I lowered my head over my needlework. I had engaged in an intrigue in England although I had never discussed it with my brothers. There had been an investigation into my husband’s death, a private investigation conducted by an inquiry agent. I had assisted him and unmasked the killer myself. It had been dangerous, nasty work, and I told myself I was happy to be done with it.

But even as I plunged my needle into the canvas, trailing a train of luscious scarlet silk behind it, I felt a pang of regret—regret that my days were occupied with nothing more purposeful than those of any other lady of society. I had had a glimpse of what it meant to be useful, and it stung now to be merely decorative. I longed for something more important than the embroidering of cushions or the pouring of tea to sustain me.

Of my other regrets, I would not let myself think. I yanked at the needle, snarling the thread.

“Blast,” I muttered, rummaging in my work basket for my scissors.

“We are a deceptively domestic pair,” Plum said suddenly.

I snapped the threads loose and peered at him. “Whatever do you mean?”

He waved a hand. “This lovely villa, the fireside, both of us in slippers. I, reading my paper from England whilst you ply your needle. We might be any couple, by any fireside, placidly whiling away the darkening hours of an autumn eve.”

I glanced about. The rented villa was comfortably, even luxuriously appointed. The long windows of the drawing room overlooked Lake Como, although the heavy velvet draperies had long since been drawn against the gathering dark. “I suppose, but—”

What I had been about to say next was lost. Morag, my maid, entered the drawing room to announce a visitor.

“The Count of Four-not-cheese.”

I gave her an evil look and tossed my needlework aside. Plum dashed his newspaper to the floor and jumped to his feet.

“Alessandro!” he cried. “You are a welcome sight! We did not expect you until Saturday.”

Morag did not move, and our visitor stepped neatly around her, doffing his hat and cape. They were speckled with raindrops that glittered in the firelight. He held them out to Morag who looked at him as though he had just offered her a dead animal. I rushed to take them.

“Alessandro, how lovely to see you.” I thrust the cape and hat at Morag. “Take these and brush them well,” I instructed. “And his name is Fornacci,” I hissed at her.

She gave me a shrug and a curl of the lip and departed, dragging the tail of Alessandro’s beautiful coat on the marble floor as she went.

I turned to him, smiling brightly. “Do come in and get warm by the fire. It has turned beastly out there and you must be chilled to the bone.”

He gave me a look rich with gratitude, and something rather more as well. Plum and I bustled about, plumping cushions and making him comfortable with a chair by the fire and a glass of good Irish whiskey. Alessandro had never tasted whiskey until making the acquaintance of my brothers, but had become something of a connoisseur in the months he had known them. To begin with, he no longer made the mistake of tossing his head back and drinking the entire glass at one gulp.

After a few minutes by the fire he had thawed sufficiently to speak. “It is so good to see you again,” he said, careful to look at Plum as well as myself when he spoke. “I am very much looking forward to spending Christmas with you here.” His English was terribly fluent, very much better than my Italian, but there was a formality that lingered in his speech. I found it charming.

Plum, who had poured himself a steady glass of spirits, took a deep draught. “I am afraid there has been a change in plans, old man.”

“Old man” was his favourite nickname for Alessandro, no doubt for its incongruity. Alessandro was younger than either of us by some years.

The young man’s face clouded a little and he looked from Plum to me, his silky dark brows knitting in concern. “I am not invited for Christmas? Shall I return to Firenze then?”

I slapped Plum lightly on the knee. “Don’t be vile. You have made Alessandro feel unwelcome.” It had been arranged that Alessandro would come to us in November, and we would all spend the holiday together before making a leisurely journey to Venice in time for Carnevale. There was no hope of such a scheme now. I turned to Alessandro, admiring for a moment the way the firelight licked at his hair. I had thought it black, but his curls shone amber and copper in their depths. I wondered how difficult it would be to persuade Plum to paint him.

“You see, Alessandro,” I explained, “we have received a letter from our father, the Earl March. He is displeased with our brother Lysander and wishes us all to return to England at once. We shall spend Christmas there.”

“Ah. How can one argue with the call of family? If you must return, my friends, you must return. But know that you will always carry with you the highest regard of Alessandro Fornacci.”

This handsome speech was accompanied by a courtly little bow from the neck and a noble, if pained, expression that would have done a Caesar proud.

“I have a better idea, and a very good notion it is,” Plum said slowly. “What if we bring Alessandro with us?”

I had just taken a sip of my own whiskey and I choked lightly. “I beg your pardon, Plum?”

Alessandro raised his hands in a gesture I had seen many Italians employ, as if warding something off. “No, my friend, I must not. If your father is truly angry, he will not welcome an intruder at this time.”

“Are you mad? This is precisely the time to bring someone outside the family into the fold. It will keep him from killing Lysander outright. He will behave himself if we cart you back to England with us. The old man has peculiar ideas, but he is appallingly hospitable.”

“Plum, kindly do not refer to Father as ‘the old man’. It is disrespectful,” I admonished.

Alessandro was shaking his head. “But I have not been invited. It would be a great discourtesy.”

“It would be a far greater discourtesy for Father to kill his own son,” Plum pointed out tartly. “And you have been invited. By us. Now I must warn you, the family seat is rather old-fashioned. Father doesn’t hold with new ideas, at least not for country houses. You’ll find no steam heat or even gaslights. I’m afraid it’s all coal fires and candles, but it really is a rather special old place. You always said you wanted to see England, and Bellmont Abbey is as English as it gets, dear boy.”

Alessandro hesitated. “If I may be so bold, why is his lordship so angry with Lysander? Surely it is not—”

“It is,” Plum and I chorused.

Just at that moment, sounds of a quarrel began to echo from upstairs. There was a shout and the unmistakable crash of breaking crockery.

“But the earl, he cannot object to Lysander’s marriage to so noble and lovely a lady as Violante,” Alessandro put in, quite diplomatically I thought.

Something landed with a great thud on the floor, shivering the ceiling and causing the chandelier above our heads to sway gently.

“Do you suppose that was one of them?” Plum inquired lightly.

“Don’t jest. If it was, we shall have to deal with the body,” I reminded him. Violante began to shriek, punctuating her words with tiny stamps of her heel from the sound of it.

“I wonder what she is calling him. It cannot be very nice,” I mused.

Alessandro gave an elegant shrug. “I regret, my understanding of Napolitana, it is imperfect.” He dropped his eyes, and I wondered if he understood more than politeness would allow him to admit.

“Probably for the best,” Plum remarked, draining the last of his whiskey.

“Do not finish off the decanter,” I warned him. “Lysander will want a glass or two when they have finished for the evening.”

“Or seven,” Plum countered with a twitch of his lip. I gave him a disapproving look. Lysander’s marital woes were not a source of amusement to me. I had endured enough of my own connubial difficulties to be sympathetic. Plum, however, wore a bachelor’s indifference. He had never said so, but I suspected his favourite brother’s defection to the married state had rankled him. They had travelled the Continent together for years, roaming wherever their interests and their acquaintance had directed them, exploring museums and opera houses and ruined castles. They wrote poetry and concertos and painted murals on the walls of ancient abbeys. They had been the staunchest companions until Lysander, having left his thirtieth birthday some years past, had spotted Violante sitting serenely in her uncle’s box at La Fenice. It was, as the Tuscans say, un colpo di fulmine, a bolt of lightning.

It was also a bit misleading. Upon further investigation, Lysander discovered Violante was Neapolitan, not Venetian, and there was quite simply nothing about her that was serene. She carried in her blood all the warmth and passion and raw-boned energy of her native city. Violante was Naples, and for a cool-blooded, cool-headed Englishman like Lysander the effect was intoxicating. He married her within a month, and presented Plum and me with a fait accompli, a sister-in-law who smothered us in kisses and heady jasmine perfumes. For my part, I found her charming, wholly unaffected if somewhat exhausting. Plum, on the other hand, was perfectly cordial and cordially perfect. Whenever Violante stepped from a carriage or shivered from the cold, Plum would offer her a hand or his greatcoat, bowing and murmuring a graciously phrased response to her effusive thanks. And yet always he watched her with the cool detachment one usually reserves for specimens at the zoological garden. I often thought there might be real fondness there if he could unbend a little and forgive her for coming so precipitously into our lives.

But Plum was nothing if not stubborn, and I knew a straightforward approach would only cause him to dig his heels into the ground like a recalcitrant pony. So I endeavoured to distract him with little whims and treats, cajoling him into good temper in spite of himself.

And then we met Alessandro, or to be accurate, I met Alessandro, for he was a friend of my brothers of some years’ duration. Rome had been too hot, too noisy, altogether too much for my delicate state when I first arrived in Italy. My brothers immediately decided to quit the city and embark on a leisurely tour to the north, lingering for a few days or even weeks in any particularly engaging spot, but always pushing on toward Florence. We settled comfortably in a tiny palazzo there, and I began to recover. My fire-roughened voice smoothed again, never quite as it had been, but not noticeably damaged. My lungs were strengthened and my spirits raised. Lysander felt comfortable enough to leave us to accept an invitation for a brief trip to Venice to celebrate the private debut of a friend’s opera. Plum pledged to watch over me, and Lysander departed, to return a month later after endless delays and a secret wedding, his voluble bride in tow.

Alessandro had kept us company while Lysander was away, guiding us to hidden piazze, revealing secret gardens and galleries no tourists ever crowded. He drove us to Fiesole in a beribboned pony cart, stopping to point out the most breathtaking views in that enchanted hilltop town, and introduced us to inns in whose flower-drenched courtyards we were served food so delicious it must have been bewitched. Plum always seemed to wander off, sketchbook in hand to capture a row of cypresses, stalwart and straight as a regiment, or the elegant curve of a signorina’s cheek, distinctive as a goddess out of myth. Alessandro did not seem to mind. He talked to me of history and culture and we practiced our languages with each other, learning to speak of everything and nothing at all.

They were the most peaceful and serene weeks of my life, and they ended only when Lysander returned with Violante, bursting with pride, his chin held a trifle higher from defiance as much as happiness. With his native courtesy, Alessandro withdrew at once, leaving us to our privacy as a newly re-formed family. There were flinty discussions verging on quarrels, where we all went quite white about the lips and I could feel the heat rising in my face. Lysander had no wish to inform Father of his marriage, thinking instead to make a trip to England sometime in the summer, bringing his surprise bride with him then. Plum and I argued forcefully against this, reminding him of his duty, his obligation, his name. And more to the point, his allowance. If Father was made to look foolish, angered too far, he could easily slash Ly’s allowance to ribbons or halt it altogether. Lysander was an accomplished musician, but he was a conductor manqué, a dabbler. He had no serious reputation upon which to build a career, and without a formal education, without proper connections, his situation was impossible. He relented finally, with bad grace, and Plum penned the letter to Father, writing in Lysander’s name to tell him there was a new addition to the family.

The reaction had been swift—a summons to Lysander to bring his bride home at once. Lysander, in a too-typical gambit of avoidance, rented the villa at Lake Como, insisting we could not go home before Carnevale season and that we might as well spend Christmas in the lake country. But he had underestimated Father. The second letter had been forceful, specific, and brutal. We were expected, all of us now, to return home immediately. Lysander had masked his dread with defiance, dropping the letter on the mantelpiece and shrugging before stalking from the room. Violante had followed him, accusing him of being embarrassed of her, if I translated correctly. The Napolitana dialect had defeated me almost entirely from the beginning, and I think our inability to understand one another most of the time explained why Violante and I had learned to get on so well.

Suddenly, Plum cocked his head. “Listen to the silence. Do you suppose one of them has finally done the other a mischief?”

“Your slang is appalling,” I told him, taking up my needlework again. “And no, I do not think one of them has done murder. I think they have decided to discuss the matter rationally, in a mature, adult fashion.”

Plum snorted, and Alessandro pretended not to notice, sipping quietly at his whiskey. “Adult? Mature? My dear girl, you have lived with them some weeks now. Have you ever seen them discuss anything in a mature, adult fashion? No, and they will not, not so long as they both enjoy the fillip of excitement that a brisk argument lends to a marriage.”

I blinked at him. “They are newlyweds. They are in love. I hardly think they need to hurl plates at one another’s heads to enjoy themselves.”

“Don’t you? Our dear Violante is a southerner, who doubtless took in screaming with her mother’s milk. And Lysander is a fool who has read too much poetry. He mistakes the volume of a raised voice for true depth of feeling. I despair of him.”

“Do not worry, Lady Julia,” Alessandro put in gently. Giulia, he said, drawing out the syllables like poetry. “To speak loudly, it is simply the way of the southerners. They are very different from those of us bred in the north. We are cooler and more temperate, like the climate.”

He flashed me a dazzling smile, and I made a feeble effort to return it. “Still, it has gone too quiet,” I commented. “Do you suppose they have made it up?”

“They have not,” came Ly’s voice, thick with bitterness. He was standing in the doorway, his hair untidy, his colour high with righteous anger, his back stiff with resentment. It was a familiar posture for him these days. “Violante is insisting we obey Father’s summons. She wants to see England and to ‘meet her dear papa’, she says.” He flung himself into the chair next to Plum’s, his expression sour. “Hullo, Alessandro. Sorry you had to hear all of that,” he added with a glance toward the ceiling.

Alessandro murmured a greeting in return as I studied my brothers, feeling a sudden rush of emotion for the pair of them. Handsome and feckless, they were remarkably similar in appearance, sharing both the striking green eyes of the Marches and the dark hair and pale complexion that had marked our family for centuries. But although their features were similar, their clothes stamped them as very different men. Plum took great pains to search out the most outlandish costumes he could find, outfitting himself in velvet frock coats a hundred years out of fashion, or silk caps that made him look like a rather dashing mushroom.

Lysander, on the other hand, was a devotee of the spare elegance of Brummell. He never wore any colours other than white or black, and every garment he owned had been fitted a dozen times. He was particular as a pasha, and carried himself with imperious grace. When the pair of them went out together they always attracted attention, doubtless the effect they hoped for. They had a gift for making friends easily, and more times than I could count since my arrival in Italy, we had entered a restaurant or hotel or theatre box only to have my brothers greeted by name and kissed heartily, food and drink pressed upon us as though we were minor royalty. They could be puckishly charming when they wished, and delightful company. Until they were bored or thwarted. Then they were capable of horrifying mischief, although they had behaved themselves well enough since I had joined them.

I flicked a glance at Alessandro from under my lashes. He was still placidly sipping his drink, savoring it slowly, his trousers perfectly creased in spite of the filthy weather. He was an elegant, composed young gentleman, and I thought that with a little more time he might have been a noble influence on my scapegrace brothers.

I smoothed my skirts and cleared my throat.

“My dear,” I told Lysander, “I think it is quite clear we must return to England, and you must face Father. Now, we can sit up half the night and argue like thieves, but we will talk you round eventually, so you might as well capitulate now and let us get on with planning our journey.”

Lysander looked wonderingly from me to Plum. “When did Julia become brisk? She has never been brisk. Or bossy. Julia, I do not think I much care for this new side of you. You are beginning to sound like our sisters, and I do not like our sisters.”

I said nothing, but fixed him with a patient, pleasant look of expectation. After a long moment, he groaned. “Pax, I beg you. I am powerless against a determined woman.” I thought of his tempestuous bride, and wondered if I ought to share with her the power of a few minutes of very pregnant silence. But there was work at hand, and I made a note to myself to speak with Violante later.

“Then we are agreed,” I said. I rose and went to the desk, seating myself and arranging writing materials. There was a portfolio of scarlet morocco, stamped in gold with my initials, and filled with the creamiest Florentine writing-paper. I dipped my pen and gave my brothers a purposeful look, the tip of my pen poised over the luscious paper. “Now, we have also had a letter from Aunt Hermia, and I have managed to make out that she is intending to hold a sort of house party over Christmas. We must not arrive without gifts.”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Lysander muttered. Plum had brightened considerably, thoroughly enjoying our brother’s discomfiture. Clearly the return of the prodigal son as bridegroom was not going to be a quiet affair. Knowing Aunt Hermia, I suspected she had invited the entire family—a not-inconsequential thing in a family of ten children—and half the village of Blessingstoke as well.

“Come on, old thing,” Plum said. “It won’t be so bad. The more people there, gobbling the food and drinking the wine, the less likely Father is to cut off your allowance. You know how much he loves to play lord of the manor.”

“He is the lord of the manor,” I reminded Plum. “Now, I thought some of that lovely marzipan. A selection of the sweetest little fruits and birds, boxed up and tied with ribbons. I saw just the thing in Milan, and we can stop en route to the train station. That will do nicely for the ladies. And those darling little bottles of rosewater. I bought dozens of them in Florence.”

I scribbled a few notes, including a reminder to instruct Morag to find the engraving of Byron I had purchased in Siena. It would make a perfect Christmas present for Father. He would enjoy throwing darts at it immensely.

Suddenly, I looked up to find my brothers staring at me with identical expressions of bemusement.

“What?” I demanded. “Have you thought of something I ought to have?”

“You have become efficient,” Lysander said brutally. “You are making a list. I always thought you the most normal of my sisters, and yet here you are, organising, just like the rest of them. I wager you could arrange a military campaign to shame Napoléon if you had a mind to.”

I shrugged. “At least I would not have forgotten the greatcoats on the Russian front. Now, Plum has proposed Alessandro join us in England.”

Lysander sat bolt upright, grasping Alessandro’s hand in his own. “My friend, is this true? You would come to England with us?”

Alessandro looked from Lysander to me, his expression nonplussed. “As I already expressed to your kind brother and sister, I am reluctant, my friend. Your father, the Lord March, he has not invited me himself. And this is a time of great delicacy.”

“There is no better time,” Lysander insisted. “You heard Julia. Father and Aunt Hermia are planning some bloody great house party.”

“Language, Lysander,” I murmured.

Naturally he ignored me. “Alessandro, our family home is a converted abbey. There is room for a dozen regiments if we wished to invite them. And do not trouble yourself about Father. Plum has invited you, and so have I. And I am sure Julia wishes it as well.”

Alessandro looked past Lysander to where I sat, his gaze, warm and dark as chestnut honey, catching my own. “This is true, my lady? You wish me to come also?”

I thought of the weeks I had spent in Alessandro’s company, long sunlit days perfumed with the heady scent of rosemary and punctuated with serene silences broken only by the sleepy drone of bees. I thought of his hand, warm on the curve of my back as he helped me scramble over stone walls to a field where we picnicked on cold slices of chicken and drank sharp white wine so icy it numbed my cheeks. And I thought of what he had told me about his longing to travel, to see something of the world before he grew too comfortable, too settled to leave Florence.

“Of course,” I said, with a firmness that surprised me. “I think you would like England very much, Alessandro. And you would be very welcome at Bellmont Abbey.”

He nodded slowly. “Then I come,” he said at last, his eyes lingering on me.

Lysander whooped and Plum poured out another splash of whiskey into their glasses, calling for a toast to our travels. I returned to my notes, penning a reminder to myself to send out for a timetable. As my hand moved across the page, it shivered a little, marring the creamy expanse with a spot of ink. I drew a deep breath and blotted it, writing on until the page was filled and I reached for another.

At length, the gentlemen left me, Plum to show Alessandro to his room, Lysander to tell Violante the news of our imminent departure. I was alone with the slow ticking of the mantel clock and the crisp, rustling taffeta sounds of the fire as it burned down to ash. My pen scratched away the minutes, jotting notes to extend our regrets to invitations, requests for accommodation, orders for hampers to be filled with provisions for the journey.

So immersed was I in my task, I did not hear Morag’s approach—a sure sign of my preoccupation for Morag moves with all the grace of a draught horse.

“So, we’re for England then,” she said, her chin tipped up smugly.

“Yes, we are,” I returned, not looking up from my writing paper. “And knowing how little love you have for Italy, I suppose you are pleased at the prospect.”

She snorted. “I am pleased at the prospect of a decent meal, I am. There is no finer kitchen in England than that at Bellmont Abbey,” she finished loyally.

“I would not put the matter so strongly, but the food is good,” I conceded. It was plain cooking, for Father refused to employ a French chef. But the food was hearty and well prepared and one never went hungry at the Abbey. Unlike Italy. While I had revelled in the rich, exotic new flavors, Morag had barely subsisted on boiled chicken and rice.

I returned to my writing and she idled about the room, poking up the fire and plumping the occasional cushion. Finally, I threw down my pen.

“What do you wish to say, Morag? I can hear you thinking.”

She looked at me with an affectedly wounded expression. “I was merely being helpful. The drawing room is untidy.”

“We have maids for that,” I reminded her. “And a porter to answer the door. Why did you admit Count Fornacci this evening?”

“I was at hand,” she said loftily.

“Ha. At hand because you strong-armed the porter, I’ll warrant. Whatever you are contemplating, do not. I will not tolerate your meddling.”

Morag drew herself up to her rather impressively bony height. “I was at hand.” She could be a stubborn creature, as I had often had occasion to notice. I sighed and waved her away, taking up my pen again.

“Of course,” she said slowly, “I could not help but notice that his excellency, Count Four-not-cheese, is coming back to England with us.”

“Fornacci, Fornacci,” I told her again, knowing even as I did so I might as well try to teach a dog to sing. “And yes, he is coming to England with us. He wishes to travel, and it is a perfect opportunity for him to spend time in a proper English home. My brothers invited him.”

“And you did not encourage him?” she demanded, her eyes slyly triumphant.

“Well, naturally I had to approve the invitation, as it were. It would have been rude not to do so.”

I scrawled out a list of details that must not be forgotten before our departure. The heel of my scarlet evening slipper required mending, and I had left Plum’s favourite little travelling clock with the watchmaker to have the hour hand repaired and the glass replaced. Violante had thrown it at Lysander and dented the hands badly.

Morag continued to loom over the desk, contented as a cat. I could almost see the canary feathers trailing from her lips.

“Morag, if you have something to say, do so. If not, leave me in peace. I am in no mood to be trifled with.”

“I have nothing to say, nothing to say at all,” she said, moving slowly to the door. She paused, her hand on the knob. “Although, if I were to say something, I would probably ask you how you think Mr. Brisbane will like the notion of you coming home with that young man.”

A pause, no longer than a quickened heartbeat.

“Morag, Mr. Brisbane’s feelings are no concern of mine, nor of yours. I shall retire in a quarter of an hour. See that the bed is warmed. It was chilly last night, and I shall blame you if I take a cold.”

She made a harrumphing noise and left me then, thudding along the marble floors in her heavily soled shoes. I waited until she was out of earshot before folding my arms on the desk and dropping my head onto them. Nicholas Brisbane. The private inquiry agent who had investigated my husband’s death. I had not thought of him in months.

Or, to be entirely accurate, I had suppressed any thought of him ruthlessly. I had smothered any thoughts of him stillborn, not permitting myself the indulgence of even the memory of him. There had been something between us, something indefinable, but there, I had been certain of it. But nearly five months had passed without word from him, and I had begun to think I had imagined it, had imagined the moments that had flashed between us like an electrical current, had imagined the one searing moment on Hampstead Heath when we had both of us reached beyond ourselves and clung to one another feverishly. There was only the memory of that endless kiss to comfort me, and the pendant coin he had sent me by messenger the day I had left England.

I drew the pendant from the depths of my gown, turning it over in my palm, firelight burnishing the silver to something altogether richer. It was warm from where it had lain against my skin all these months, a talisman against loneliness. I ran a finger over the head of Medusa and her serpent locks, marvelling at the elegance of the workmanship. The coin was old and thin, but the engraving was sharp, so sharp I could imagine her about to speak from those rounded lips. I turned it over and touched the row of letters and numbers he had had incised as a code only I would decipher. I had felt a rush of emotion when I had first read it, certain then that someday, in some fashion I could not yet predict, we would find our way back to each other. For where thou art, there is the world itself.

And yet. Here I was, five months on, without a single word from him, his pendant now cold comfort for his indifference. I laid my head back down on my arms and gave one, great, shuddering sob. Then I rose and carefully placed the pen into its holder and closed the inkwell. I tamped the pages of my notes together and laid them on the blotter. I opened the morocco portfolio and dropped the pendant into it. Medusa stared up at me, expectant and poised to speak. I closed the portfolio, snapping the closure with all the finality of graveyard dirt being shoveled onto a coffin. Whatever had sparked between Nicholas Brisbane and I was over; a quick, ephemeral thing, it had not lasted out the year.

No matter, I told myself firmly. I was going home. And I was not going alone.