Silent In The Grave (38 page)

But still the dead came to me. I dreamed of them, nearly every night, waking shivering and alone, and often weeping. Morag brought me warm drinks and bathed my brow, but we both knew it was time for me to move on.

“I shall speak to Mr. Aquinas about packing,” she said one night, after a particularly unspeakable nightmare. “It is time to go.”

I nodded, and between the two of them, they made all the arrangements. My father helped, and it was soon settled. My clothes had been replaced, thanks to Portia and the Riche brothers, and some new things ordered, suitable for travel.

“You will go to your brothers,” Father advised me. “Ly writes that they are most concerned for you and would be happy to meet you in Florence.”

I nodded, listlessly. “That will do.”

He talked on, detailing things I did not care to know, before he reached down suddenly and took my hand.

“Julia, listen to me.” I looked up and saw him, really saw him for the first time in days. “You have suffered a terrible blow, but you shall recover. You are young and strong, and you will feel this pain acutely because as yet in your life you have not suffered much. But you must believe me when I tell you that this will be blunted, the edge will not cut so deep after a while. You will enjoy life again, and you will laugh and love and weep for others.”

He held me then and I wept against his shoulder, sobbing out an entire marriage worth of betrayal and pain and despair into his jacket. He simply held me, stroking my hair until I had finished. Then he pulled back and smiled at me.

“A good wet weep is always just the thing. You will feel better soon. Not just yet, but soon. And when you do, enjoy it. Life is too uncertain, my dear. You must seize happiness where you find it.”

I nodded, and after he left, I thought for a long time on what he had said. But I was still not ready to face Brisbane. He had not written to me, or attempted to call upon me, and I woke the morning of my departure feeling grateful for it. I did not think I would have the strength to go if I saw him just then. How could I tell him that when I saw Grey House, blazing up into the evening sky, my regrets were for him, for what would never be between us? I had not mourned Edward then, or Simon. I had mourned him.

But there was time now to sort my feelings, and understand myself better, to ponder questions still unanswered. I still did not know quite where I stood in Brisbane’s estimation, or for that matter, he in mine. Italy would be a new beginning for me, I thought exultantly. A renaissance in the land of rebirth, I decided as I walked out of March House, into the warm June sunshine. I had just stepped to the open door of Father’s carriage when a messenger ran up, panting and holding a hand to his side.

“Lady Julia Grey,” he gasped out. I motioned to him.

“I am Lady Julia.”

He extended his grubby hand, bearing a small package, wrapped in brown paper and scrolled with my name. I gestured to Morag to give him a coin and settled into the carriage, glancing out the window as I did so. Across the square, barely visible through the leafy shade, I saw an old man, twisty-legged and very still, with a stout white cat with a plumed tail perched quietly on his shoulder. A breeze tossed the leaves, blocking my view, and by the time they had blown back again, the spot was empty.

I sat back and thumped the roof of the carriage with the end of my parasol.

The driver sprang the horses and we were off, Aquinas mounted with the driver, Morag seated opposite me. We would take Father’s carriage to the station, then the train to the coast. We were sailing to Italy, through the Strait of Gibraltar, and I was very nearly numb with anticipation. Morag busied herself taking inventory of our reticules and boxes, certain that we had forgotten something. I waited until her attention was engaged before I unwrapped the little package. There was a box inside, but no message. Just a bit of soft cotton wool and a thin silver pendant, struck with the head of Medusa, strung on a black silk cord.

I turned it over, running my finger over the new engraving, freshly incised onto the reverse of the gorgon head. It was a series of letters and numbers, a code, but perfectly decipherable to one who had been fed Shakespeare with mother’s milk.
2HVIIIIii
362. No child of Hector March could mistake that attribution. It was from
The Second Part of Henry VI,
the third act, the second scene, line 362.

For where thou art, there is the world itself.

I threaded the cord under my collar, tucking the coin into the hollow of my throat, where it had lain so often on him. As I did so, Morag looked at me suspiciously.

“What was that, my lady?”

I passed the wrappings to her.

“A going-away present,” I remarked lightly. I settled back against the cushion, anticipating my year away and the sharp pleasures that might await me at the end of it.

Of course, I did not realize it at the time, but it was to be nothing like a year before I came home again. I did not know when I would see Brisbane again, but I knew that I would. Someday.

And indeed I did. That is when we found the body in the chapel. But that is a tale for another time.

“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 in Venice in time for
Carnevale.
”

Plum’s smile deepened. “That is terribly cunning of you, Julia. I think living amongst 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 above our heads, 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 traveled 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 rawboned 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 I 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 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
piazzi,
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.