“Tell me, what would I find if I looked in your purse? The marquis’s gold, his jewels, his silver?”
“You misjudge me.”
“So prove me wrong.”
They looked at each other solemnly. She wished she could unburden herself of her secret, but the viscount was a Spaniard in Ossuna’s and Bedmar’s service. Why should she imagine that their brief time together would overcome his devotion to duty? Surely catching a thief in the ambassador’s quarters would be a coup for him. She stole a glance at the sword hanging at his side, the dagger secure in his belt. And there’s another weapon, she remembered, a stiletto concealed in his sleeve.
“I cannot.”
“What will you do when the ambassador discovers your crime?” he asked, his voice low, confidential.
“There is nothing to discover.”
“Your lack of fear will be your death.”
She couldn’t tell if his words were a warning or a threat. Unexpectedly, Antonio stood aside and opened the door for her. “I’d take the back stairs, if I were you.”
Chapter Seventeen
IN THE CLEAR, early morning sunlight, against a backdrop of verdant garden and glistening lagoon, Andrew Kent stood half bent with hands on knees, breathing raggedly. He’d reached the end of the Riva fully six strides ahead of Claire—but then he was considerably taller than she was, and his Nike running shorts revealed well-defined legs, the sign of a dedicated runner. Still, when he had first appeared alongside her as she was bounding up the steps of the Ponte dei Greci, she’d imagined that she could leave him behind. At least, she had thought as she picked up her pace, he would get the idea that she’d rather jog alone. Instead, he’d run right past her.
The gauntlet had clearly been thrown, so Claire turned on the juice and dashed ahead of Andrew Kent. That was all it took to ignite a flat-out race, one that didn’t end until the Riva did, at the edge of the public gardens.
Andrew was clearly winded, but Claire wasn’t doing much better. She wondered if the confetti-like spots she saw when she closed her eyes meant that she should sit down, but damn if she would let him see her falter. The man was just too competitive. When he finally raised his head and opened his mouth to speak, she was fully expecting him to gloat.
Instead, he said:
“Pirates?”
“Pirates?” Claire repeated, surprised.
“Pirates.” He paused for a few deep breaths. “You said…you were working…on Adriatic…pirates.”
“And your point?”
“Yesterday I asked to see the Rossetti Letter”—he was breathing more normally now—“and I was told that you have it.”
“You were checking up on me?”
“No, I simply wanted to see it again. But in doing so I reached the inescapable conclusion that you are also researching the Spanish Conspiracy. Why you felt compelled to lie about it I can’t possibly begin to imagine, and I don’t really care, but I would like to see the letter.”
“You want to see the letter.”
“Not for long. I just need to check something.”
“I’ll trade you, then—the letter for the diary.”
“Alessandra’s diary?”
“Of course.”
“I haven’t finished with it yet. I’m leaving Venice on Saturday, though, so you can look at it next week.”
“I’m leaving on Saturday, too.”
“In that case, I suppose we could trade for a half hour.”
“Half an hour? How extraordinarily generous of you.”
“I’m not fully awake yet, but I believe I detect a strong note of sarcasm in your voice.”
“I can’t read the entire diary in half an hour.”
“That’s the most I can offer. I’m under a lot of pressure to produce a book outline by next month, and I haven’t been having an easy time of it; in fact, it’s not going very well at all.”
For a moment, Andrew Kent looked the way he had prior to his lecture: unsure of himself, even vulnerable. Maybe, Claire considered, he was human after all.
“The truth is,” he went on, “I have book offers, but what I don’t have is a book. I don’t know what the problem is; maybe it’s because I haven’t written on Venetian history before, or maybe it’s the sophomore curse, or maybe it’s”—he stopped short, suddenly self-conscious. The kinder, gentler Andrew disappeared as quickly as he had appeared, and the one who invariably raised her hackles returned in full force. “The thing is, that diary could provide the key to—well, to everything, and I can’t just hand it over to you indefinitely. My work is too important.”
“You really are a fondamentum equi, aren’t you?”
He looked at her as if a second head had suddenly sprouted from her shoulders. “Did you just call me a horse’s ass in Latin?”
“I can say it in Greek, if you prefer.”
“I don’t understand why I deserved that.”
“Because it didn’t once occur to you that perhaps my work is important, too. Maybe I don’t have publishers waiting breathlessly for every word I write, or prize committees lining up to give me awards, but I can assure you that my work is just as important to me as yours is to you. For you, it’s just another book, but this is my dissertation. Everything else that happens in my life depends on this one thing. So unless you’re willing to loan me the diary for a day, I don’t think I’ll show you the letter.”
“First of all, there’s no such thing as ‘just another book,’ as you shall quickly discover should you ever attempt to write one. And second, I only want to see it for a moment.”
“No deal.”
“That’s just unbelievable,” Andrew sputtered. “You’re ridiculously competitive.”
“I’m competitive? I’m not the one who nearly gave myself a coronary trying to outrun a girl.”
“I didn’t try to outrun you, I did outrun you. By at least twenty meters.”
“Twenty meters? I don’t think so.”
“When I reached the end, you were way back there.” He pointed to a spot farther back on the Riva, then began walking toward it. Claire followed him.
“I wasn’t there,” she insisted, “I was over here.”
“I distinctly recall that when I turned around, you were right here, by this bench.”
An elderly, black-clad widow slowly hobbled past, and briefly considered the strangeness of foreigners. She was of the opinion that all of them were lunatics of one sort or another, but these two were more barking mad than most: each was yelling at the other and pointing quite vigorously to a spot on the ground.
“…lessons with the music master Signor Alberigo proceed apace. He says I must practice much more if I am to learn Spinacino’s Ricercai…”
Claire looked up from Alessandra’s diary, put down her pen, and briefly rubbed her eyes as Gwen appeared at her side and hopped up to sit on the edge of the reading-room table.
“In a chair, please,” Claire said automatically.
“Francesca is so cool,” she said as soon as she was properly seated. “She just taught me a whole bunch of Italian swear words.”
“Told you this would be an educational trip.”
“And a couple of gestures, too.”
“So you can offend the hearing impaired as well?”
“I don’t think you have to be deaf to understand them,” Gwen said earnestly. She scrunched her eyes as she considered further. “Or even Italian. She also told me how to get to that store with all the fake designer stuff.”
“Hmmm,” mumbled Claire, turning her attention back to the diary.
“Don’t you want to buy something new to wear on your date with Giancarlo?”
“Maybe.”
“Oh, come on. You can’t wear the same clothes you’ve been wearing.”
“If I get done with this early enough, we’ll go.”
“Cool. So where is he taking you?”
“I don’t know yet. He’s going to leave a message at the hotel.”
“What did he say last night? Did he tell you he’s not engaged anymore?”
“All he said was that he wanted to explain and he asked me to have dinner with him. It was nice of Stefania to invite you to the movies so that we could go out,” she added.
“Yeah, she’s really nice. So when are you going to be finished with this?”
“Gwen—”
“Sorry. I know I’m not supposed to bug you, but I don’t have anything to do, and Francesca just left for lunch.”
“Isn’t there something in that backpack of yours to keep you occupied?”
“I left my iPod at the hotel. So what’s that you’re writing?”
“I’m translating this diary.”
“That’s the courtesan’s diary?”
“Yes.”
“Weird. It looks a lot like my diary. It’s the same color leather and it’s all beat up and stuff. She wrote this letter, too, right?” Gwen picked up the Rossetti Letter.
“Don’t touch that.”
“Sorry.” Gwen peered over Claire’s shoulder and read aloud from her notebook. “…I have mastered many of the works of Canova da Milano, which Signor Alberigo says are more appropriate for performance by the fair sex. Apparently they do not rouse the senses as do Spinacino’s compositions…” Gwen paused, puzzled. “Why doesn’t she write about something interesting, like her friends or her boyfriends or something?” she asked.
“I’ve been wondering that myself.” Claire sighed, feeling frustrated. The diaries seemed to be leading nowhere, and the Italian edition of Fazzini she’d had such high hopes for was not to be had. As soon as Claire had come into the library that morning, she’d requested it, and Francesca had given her the bad news: Fazzini’s Diary had been destroyed in a flood. That’s why, the librarian explained, she’d given Claire the English version in the first place; they no longer had the Italian edition. Francesca thought there might be another copy in a library in Rome, but the Marciana hadn’t had one since 1993. They’d lost a lot of books that winter, she’d said sadly.
“What does this have to do with the conspiracy thing?” Gwen asked, still reading Claire’s notebook.
“Nothing directly, but I was hoping it would tell me more about the kind of person Alessandra was. Then I might be able to figure out if she was acting on her own, or if she was spying on the Spanish for the Venetians.”
“I thought the English guy said that the Spanish didn’t do anything.”
“So you were listening.”
“Not by choice.”
“Yes, that’s what he said, but I think he’s wrong. Although I’m not going to prove it with this,” she said, shutting the diary. Claire swiveled around in her chair. Andrew Kent had his nose buried in some ancient tome, and his table was stacked with books that hadn’t been there the day before. What was he on to? She noticed with irritation that he wasn’t reading Alessandra’s second diary.
“Can’t spare it for more than a half hour,” she muttered, turning around again. “He’s probably ignoring it just to annoy me.”
“What’s the problem?” Gwen asked.
“Andrew Kent has Alessandra’s other diary. That’s the one I really need.”
“Oh, that reminds me. Francesca said something about that. I was supposed to ask you if you were using your…” Gwen thought hard for a moment, then said, “feminine power.”
“Not in the way she envisioned, I’m sure,” Claire admitted glumly.
Gwen glanced at the diary in front of them, then looked over at Andrew Kent’s table. “You need the little book that looks just like this one?”
“Yes.”
“Do you really want it?”
“Yes, I really want it, but he’s never going to give it to me, not now.”
“We could liberate it.” Gwen’s eyes had a curious sparkle to them.
“Are you suggesting that we steal it?”
“No, just borrow it for a while. If we switch it with this one, he won’t even know that it’s gone.”
“I beg to differ.”
“I beg to differ?”
“I beg to differ.”
“I don’t even know what that means, ‘I beg to differ.’”
“It means I disagree with you.”
“Then why didn’t you just say, ‘I disagree with you’?”
“Because I said ‘I beg to differ.’”
“No one says that.”
“I say that.”
“No one normal says that.”
“Be that as it may, Andrew Kent is most definitely going to notice that we took that diary.”
“Okay, but maybe not right away. In the meantime, you can read it. And if he does figure out that he’s got the wrong book, you just tell him that it was a mistake.” Gwen looked at her with enthusiasm, which Claire hoped sprang from a sincere desire to be helpful rather than from kleptomania. “It really does work,” Gwen added.
Claire sighed. She had only two more days in Venice, after all. “So what do we do?”
“You have to distract him. Stand on the far side of the table and talk to him, and I’ll switch the books.”
“Come on, then, before I lose my nerve.”
“Not so fast. You need to be a little more distracting.” Gwen rummaged in her backpack and took out a lipstick. “Put this on. And let me fix your hair. That braid thing is a little too Heidi, if you know what I mean.” She took the tie off the end of Claire’s braid and fluffed her hair around her shoulders. “And this.” She unbuttoned the top button on Claire’s blouse.
“What the hell are you doing?” Claire protested.
“Making you look more distracting. Be sure to bend over really low when you pick up stuff off the floor.”
“What’s going to be on the floor?”
“Everything.”
Chapter Eighteen
SHE COULDN’T AFFORD a new pair of shoes, too, Claire thought wistfully, gazing through the boutique window at an array of strappy high heels. Not to mention that she didn’t have any more time to shop before her date with Giancarlo. Evening shadows were slowly settling into the charming cobblestone lane where she stood; from somewhere nearby, unseen within the maze of tiny streets of San Marco, a church bell marked the half hour. It was a shame, because the black evening shoes on the left would be perfect with her new dress. She shifted her focus from the footwear displayed inside the store to her reflection in the glass and adjusted a spaghetti-thin shoulder strap. The dress was slinky, formfitting, and undeniably sexy: a bold, warm red, with simple lines and a stunning effect. She never would have bought it without Gwen’s prompting. In fact, it had been Gwen who’d spotted it in the window of the store that Francesca had told them about.
“I don’t look good in red,” Claire had said.
“My mom says that all women look good in red,” Gwen replied. “It just has to be the right red.”
When Claire had stepped out of the dressing room, she could tell from Gwen’s expression that it was the right red; in fact, it was the right everything. The teenager pronounced it a “killer” dress, which Claire was made to understand was a positive endorsement. Even the shop assistant had been bountiful with her praise. But there hadn’t been time to buy shoes before going back to the hotel so that Gwen could meet Stefania.
Claire looked down at her worn-at-the-heel pumps. She really should replace them, as they undermined the whole effect. Of course, considering what she was wearing, it was entirely possible that Giancarlo would never look at her feet. She still had another twenty minutes or so before she had to meet him at the restaurant; she could at least pop inside the boutique and ask the price.
“Did you think I wouldn’t notice?”
Startled, Claire turned around. Andrew Kent stood before her.
“Have you ever thought about beginning a conversation by simply saying hello?” she asked, exasperated.
“Hello. Did you think I wouldn’t notice?”
“Notice what?”
“You know ve
ry well what—that you switched the two diaries. You and your young accomplice. Was it really necessary for her to knock all of my books off the table?”
“She’s fourteen. It’s an awkward age.”
“Humph. In case you’re unaware of this, stealing historical documents belonging to the Italian government is a crime punishable by very steep fines and a rather lengthy imprisonment, which I don’t think you would much enjoy. I suspect that it wouldn’t be good for your academic career, either.”
“Don’t you think you’re overreacting? We didn’t steal the diary, we just borrowed it for a while. If it bothered you so much, why didn’t you say something this afternoon?”
“I didn’t realize what you’d done until a couple of hours later, and by then it was almost time for me to go.”
Claire remembered how surprised they’d been by his early departure. They’d raced up to the librarian’s desk, where Gwen had just managed to exchange the diaries before Francesca placed Andrew’s stack of books behind the counter. “All of this could have been avoided if you’d simply agreed to let me read it,” she said.
“The point is that you don’t have the right to take things from people whenever you feel like it.”
“You don’t have the right to hold on to books that you aren’t even using.”
“I do, as a matter of fact, as do you. I noticed that you had a few things on your desk that you didn’t even glance at all day long. You were clearly too busy working with mine.”
“You were watching me?”
“I wasn’t watching you. You just happened to be in my line of sight occasionally. So tell me, did that additional bit of slapstick at the librarian’s desk mean that you replaced my diary?”
“Your diary?”
“By that I mean the one that happens to be checked out in my name, and for which I am responsible.”
“Yes, we put it back.”
“Thank you.” He was about to say something else, but then was silent. Andrew Kent seemed different this evening. Maybe it was the well-tailored dark suit and white dress shirt. No tie, but still he gave the impression of being dressed to the nines; he looked elegant, even dashing. He cleared his throat. “You look very—,” he began.
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