100. A Rose In Jeopardy (16 page)

She could hardly speak, as Algernon seemed to be doing his best to crush the breath from her body.

“Oh yes, you did!” he cried and then he whispered into Rosella’s ear, “and if you had not been so foolish as to write to the gardener’s boy, of all the ridiculous things, telling him that you were in Venice, you might have got away with breaking your promise – you wicked girl!”

“
Vergogna
!” shrilled the Contessa, stabbing at the floor with her walking stick. “Are you not very ashamed of yourself – that you allowed me to go to all the trouble of holding a
Ballo in Maschera
for you, when all the time you have a fiancé?”

Algernon clasped Rosella to him.

“Ah, Contessa, if you had not, I would never have found her again. I knew that she was in Venice – but not exactly where – and at your ball here last night, I thought I recognised her golden hair. And now, this morning, when I see her without the mask, of course, it’s my sweetheart!”

He lavished more kisses on top of Rosella’s head, which was all he could reach, as she kept her face turned down away from him.

“Please do stop! I will never marry you,” Rosella screamed out in utter despair. “I cannot!”

The Contessa gave a squeal of anger and attacked Algernon with her stick, driving him away from Rosella.

For a blissful moment, Rosella’s heart swelled with the hope that the Contessa was trying to protect her, but then the old woman seized a handful of Rosella’s hair and pulled it painfully.

“What are you saying, girl?” she hissed. “This man tells me you promised to marry him and now you would go back on your word. I will not have such behaviour under my roof. Out of my house! Now!”

She gave Rosella’s hair another fierce tug, dragging her towards the door.

“What are you doing, Contessa?” Algernon cried, staring at her in alarm and holding his bitten finger high in the air so that drops of blood ran down into his cuff.

“Silence!” the Contessa yelled. “What kind of man are you that you let your promised wife run away from you so easily? You must be a fool!”

“Well – charming!” Algernon stuttered. “You quite clearly have no better manners than that disgusting parrot!”

If Rosella had not been in such pain from her pulled hair and in such fear as to what might happen next, she might have laughed at him because he was a most pathetic and comical sight.

The Contessa shoved Rosella towards the staircase.

“Out of my house!” she demanded her voice icy cold. “Don’t even think of coming back.”

“But my things – ” Rosella began.

“Out!” the Contessa shouted.

It was no use, Rosella would have to leave – right away – without even collecting her carpet bag.

She longed to run to a window and look down onto the opposite bank of the Canal, for she was sure that, just a moment ago, she had glimpsed a familiar figure there, clad in a long dark cloak and a wide hat.

But she did not dare to hesitate any longer and she ran down the stairs and found her way to the side door of the Palazzo.

The statue of the man in the turban was still there, but today his smile seemed only to mock and the waters of the Grand Canal that she had once found so cool and fresh seemed stagnant and noxious.

Rosella stood, tears stinging her eyes, not knowing what she should do and then she heard a low whistle above her head.

Mimi was leaning out of a window with the carpet bag in her hand. As Rosella looked up, she let go of it, so that it fell down into her arms.

Then Mimi held her finger to her lips and pointed to further down the Canal.

The carved prow of Giovanni’s large gondola was inching silently through the water towards Rosella.

As he drew nearer, Giovanni raised his finger to his lips in the same gesture that Mimi had just used.

“Quick,
Signorina
,” he whispered, “jump!”

As the gondola slid past her, Rosella leapt from the steps of the Palazzo and landed on the velvet cushions.

The slender craft swayed in the water, but such was Giovanni’s skill that he held it steady and then lifted his oar to push it swiftly and soundlessly forward.

Something small and white then caught Rosella’s eye floating past her in the water of the Grand Canal. She must have dropped her handkerchief as she jumped.

She reached down to catch it.

But it was not her white silk handkerchief. It was a piece of thick writing paper that had been torn in half.

The two halves were stuck together, one of top of the other, so that they floated on the surface of the canal like a little raft.

Words were written on the writing paper in a bold, masculine hand in blue ink, words that were fast becoming illegible from the water.

Rosella prised the two damp pieces of paper apart and peered at the writing.

“My dearest love, for that is what you are.

There has never been another, nor will there ever be –

So many of the words were blurred and smudged by the water that it was hard to read, but it seemed to be a love letter.

I could not bear to leave – your words tore me apart – still I love you – but you must know that I too have a past
–

Even while she gazed at them, the sentences were melting into a pool of watery blue ink.

My father – utterly thoughtless and without scruple – I cannot
–

What could it mean? The very last words at the bottom of one of the pieces of paper, gave her heart a jolt that almost caused her to faint.

Please, please – I must see you again – if you can only forgive my name, which must be utterly hateful to you and understand – that I am most truly – and forever
,

yours
–

Lord Lyndon Brockley
.”

Lord Lyndon
Brockley
? Were these words penned by a relation of the hateful Lord Brockley? By his
son
, even!

And was it possible that this letter was intended for her? She stared at the words and read them over and over, until at last she understood. It was Lord Lyndon Brockley she had danced with last night.

Her mind whirled round with a thousand confusing and conflicting emotions. She had given away her secret to the son of the very man who had threatened her happiness!

Yet she could not forget how they had seemed like two halves of the same being, as they both flew across the ballroom together.

And did he not say in this letter something about his father being without scruple and thoughtless?

She stared at the pieces of paper once again, but the words had vanished, melting into a sea of indistinguishable blue marks.

“
Signorina
,” Giovanni was calling her name softly. “Don’t be sad,
Signorina
. You will be safe. I take you to Mamma and you will see, all will be good!”

But Rosella did not care too much where he was taking her.

Everything was ruined and broken.

The man who said he loved her was the son of her enemy and her benefactor, the Contessa, had cast her out.

Even her beloved parrot, the last link with the old kind world she once knew was lost forever in this City that now seemed alien and hostile to her.

But worst of all was the realisation that her vision of the ballroom and the illusion of the young man in the painting had been false and dangerous mirages that had led her astray.

Giovanni brought the gondola to a halt at the edge of the City. He leapt onto the shore and tapped Rosella on the shoulder.

“
Signorina
, come. My friend take you onwards. It is long way and I must go back or the Contessa will – ”

He mimed drawing a sharp knife across his throat.

Rosella stumbled to her feet. Next to the gondola was an old rowing boat filled with sacks with an old man at the helm.

She clambered aboard and sat down on one of the sacks, brushing aside the dry onions and withered carrots that lay there.

The old man grunted and pulled on the oars with his wiry arms and the boat moved slowly out into the wide waters of the Lagoon.

Rosella blinked at the glare of the bright sunshine on the pearly water, as the little boat passed by the familiar island of Murano and made its way toward the hazy blue horizon.

Giovanni was right.

They had a long way to travel.

*

Someone was tapping at Lyndon’s window, calling to him in an odd croaky voice,

“Hello! Hello!”

He sat up in his bed and rubbed his eyes. Who the hell was trying to wake him up?

It was very dark in the room as Lyndon had kept the shutters closed against the bright summer sun and also against the smell of the stagnant canal water that drifted up in the heat.

How could he ever have thought that Venice was a beautiful place?

It was August now, several weeks since the night of the
Ballo in Maschera
and the sun beat down relentlessly over the City.

Even at night it was too hot and the brick walls of the buildings seemed to give back into the darkness all the heat of the sunshine they had absorbed through the day.

Everything that had once seemed to him mysterious and exciting – the dark alleyways, the deep green water of the canals – now seemed sinister and unpleasant.

“Hello! Hello!”

The strange cry came again and the shutter rattled.

Lyndon then reluctantly staggered out of bed. He had spent long enough hiding in this room, he thought, as he padded across in his bare feet to open the window.

It was time to move on. Perhaps to somewhere like Switzerland, to the clean bright mountains.

He was still half asleep, so it was not until he was about to pull open the shutters that he remembered that his room was on the fourth floor of the building.

His heart skipped a beat.

Was he going quite mad after so long cooped up in this place? Or had some lunatic climbed all the way up the side of the house to pester him?

Lyndon peered through one of the narrow slits in the wooden shutters and a round eye with a black pupil and a pale gold rim stared back at him.

This was no human eye. It seemed to belong to some kind of little imp, some supernatural manifestation of this uncanny City.

Lyndon was about to run out of his room and rush down the stairs to shout for Fabio, who lived below him, when the imp spoke again.

“
Good Morning
!” it piped up in a perfect English accent.

Lyndon paused and opened the shutter a crack.

There, sitting on the windowsill was the grey parrot that he had first met in London by the River Thames.

It had to be the same one! For had he not seen a grey bird with a bright red tail, flying away from the Ca’ degli Angeli on that terrible morning when he had tried to deliver his letter to the girl of his dreams –

Lyndon brushed the memory of that awful moment out of his mind. There was nothing to do but put it all behind him.

No doubt she was happily in the arms of Algernon Merriman by now. Perhaps they were even married. He must not think about her again.

Rosella. That was her name. He knew it now as all of Venice had been talking of her disappearance after the ball.

He shook his head to banish the painful thoughts.

But what should he do with this bird?

It was looking rather bedraggled and one of its tail feathers was broken and bent sideways.

He opened the window and then the parrot climbed clumsily in. It flew across the room and sat on the back of the chair by his desk.

“
Is it time for tea
?” the bird asked him in a polite tone and then added, “
may I have a nut
?”

Lyndon found himself smiling for the first time since the morning after the ball.

“I shall have some sent up for us, if you like,” he joked. “English tea and a plate of walnuts, what do you say?”

“
Good afternoon, Pickle
!” the bird replied and flew across to sit on his shoulder.

Now Lyndon was laughing.

Pickle! That was the bird’s name, he remembered.

He reached up to stroke the bird’s head.

“So, Pickle, she has deserted you too. But we shall not think about her any more, shall we? We must forget her and get on with our lives. What do you say to that?”

“
You’re a very naughty boy
!” Pickle replied, but he seemed to like Lyndon, as he nibbled gently on his finger and seemed happy to stay sitting on his shoulder.

*

Rosella and Mimi sat quietly in the shade of a vine, shelling peas into a large china bowl.

The garden where they sat was heavenly, Rosella thought. It was so luscious and so abundant with the green leaves of the vine hanging over their head and everywhere she looked vegetables were growing – pumpkins, tomatoes and cucumbers – everything bursting with life and energy.

Through the leaves she could see the sun shining on the wide waters of the Lagoon.

“You and Giovanni were very lucky to grow up here,” she said to Mimi. “It’s like Paradise.”

Mimi nodded.

Just after the Contessa had thrown Rosella out, the maid had left her position at the Ca’ degli Angeli and come home to this green island on the far side of the Lagoon, where lush kitchen gardens supplied the markets of Venice with produce.

“It’s my home,” she replied. “I am always happy here with Mamma.”

“It is so kind of your family to take me in,” Rosella said, hurriedly opening a few more pea pods, as Giovanni was due to visit them and Mamma was cooking a risotto with peas and artichokes.

She had already called out from the kitchen in the house several times for the girls to hurry up.

Mimi shrugged in her expressive Italian way.

“It was nothing. You are angel, Mamma says. And for me, you are
mia sorella
– my sister! I have always wanted a sister.”

“I wish that you had not had to lose your job – ”

“I did not,” Mimi interrupted her. “I left! I did not want to stay and work for the Contessa anymore, after she was so unkind to you.”

“But – ”

“
Signorina
, you must not speak of this again. If I want to work, there are many families in Venice who will take me. But I am so happy here – we have everything we need.”