by Megan Chance
I said, “Your atonement is between yourself and God and none of my concern.”
“You see, Samuel? Not everyone is so judgmental. My cousin had a bit of the puritan about her sometimes, though I did my best to rub it out. Does no one believe in redemption these days?”
Who understood better than I, whose own mistake threatened to demand a lifetime of repentance? “I do,” I said fervently. “I believe in redemption.”
His gaze met mine, quick interest flaring in his, curiosity, and I realized I’d spoken too intently, and glanced away only to see that Samuel was watching me as if I’d given something away.
Nero Basilio said softly, “Ah, an ally at last. So you won’t believe the stories my aunt tells of me?”
“I will at least allow you to tell me your side,” I said.
“I had never hoped to find an understanding ear. You will forgive me, won’t you, if I bend it too often?”
“She won’t have time for all your stories,” Samuel said abruptly. “She’s too busy tending me.”
I glanced again at the invitation and said to Samuel, “I hate to leave you alone. I’ll give you some valerian while I’m gone, so you’ll sleep.”
Mr. Basilio pulled away from the wall. “As it’s on my account you must go, I offer myself as Samuel’s nursemaid.”
I had not anticipated this, and it made me nervous. “You must have other things to do.”
“As it happens, no. Unless you wish for me to show you more of Venice’s beauties”—here a look that reminded me of the purple rio, the snow in his hair—“I have little else to occupy me today.”
“He should be resting after his bath.”
“I’m right here, you know,” Samuel snapped. “The two of you make me feel like a child. You don’t need to guard me so well, Elena.”
I couldn’t explain the real reasons for my objection, at least not with Nero Basilio in the room. It was impressive that, after all their time together, Samuel had managed to keep his affliction from his friend.
I frowned at Samuel. “I would feel better—”
“I’ll be fine,” he said firmly. “Go to tea. I’ll be in good hands.”
I turned to Mr. Basilio. “He must have no laudanum and no liquor of any kind. No coffee or tea. Nothing spicy. And please no . . . nothing to excite. No talk of . . . of debaucheries or . . . or anything like that.”
“You blush charmingly,” he said with a grin. He flicked his fingers at his own high cheekbones. “A very delicate pink. No Italian woman blushes so sweetly.”
“No Italian woman blushes at all, that I’ve seen,” Samuel said.
“You see only whores, so how would you know?” Mr. Basilio teased. “But I do know, and I promise you I’ve never seen anything so delightful.”
“At least it keeps her warm,” Samuel said. “Which is more than I can say for anything else in this place.”
I knew I was not delicately pink. I felt as if I were lobster red. I could not even look at Nero Basilio. But it seemed he understood that his compliments embarrassed me, because he adroitly followed Samuel’s lead, giving me time to recover. “Better than the summer, amìgo, when you’d be eaten alive by mosquitos and suffocated by the stink.”
They talked back and forth, ignoring me for the moment, for which I was grateful, and then Mr. Basilio took his leave with a final word to me. “You will want to hang yourself before tea is over, but I promise it won’t last beyond an hour. Impatience is a Basilio trait.”
“I’ll remember that,” I said, unable to help my smile as he gave me that quaint little bow.
“Ciao, then. Until later.”
When he was gone, Samuel sighed. I heard in it the whole of his warnings.
“I haven’t forgotten anything you said,” I told him.
He said sourly, “He’s already got his tongue halfway down your throat.”
Distracted again. But it wasn’t Samuel I was thinking of as I dressed in the striped silk I’d worn the day I’d come to the Basilio and went to meet Madame Basilio for tea. I was thinking instead of the things Nero Basilio had said, the warnings about his aunt, and when I was shown into her salon, I was already bristling with the urge to defend him, with righteous indignation—I think you misunderstand him. Do you not believe that men can change? He has been nothing but kind to me. I remembered the last time I’d seen her, staring down at us with disapproval from the balcony, and the time before that, the dislike I’d seen for her nephew.
But I saw no signs of either now. Her greeting was polite, if stiff, as disconcerting as always. She rose from a table that had been set with coffee and a plate of sugar-dusted fritters and another of honey-colored nougat, and said, “Mademoiselle Spira, thank you for accepting my invitation. Please, sit. I hope these things please you. It is not often I have company.”
I sat in the chair opposite hers, and she moved with grace to her own and poured the coffee, asking me if I preferred it with milk.
I took the tiny cup of coffee, so black and strong it looked syrupy, and undoubtedly as bitter as her nephew had predicted.
“Mandorlato?” she asked, nudging the plate of nougat toward me, and politely I took a piece and nibbled upon it. It tasted of honey and was studded with almonds.
“Thank you for inviting me,” I said, sipping at the too strong coffee and putting the delicious candy aside.
A thin smile. “I am not used to having guests. It’s been many years since my husband died, and I have been perhaps a bit too content in the silence he left behind.”
I had no idea what to make of that, and so I said nothing.
“And I have had no wish for company since my daughter’s death,” she went on. “But M’sieur Farber’s arrival—and yours—has been a . . . change.”
I could not tell if she found that a good or bad thing.
“How does your patient?” she asked.
I hesitated, uncertain what to tell her. “He’s progressing daily.”
“Not well, then.”
“He is healing. His parents expect him back in New York in January, and so we won’t be impinging on your hospitality for long.”
“January?” She seemed surprised. “So soon?”
“He’s due to be wed.”
Madame Basilio sipped her coffee, that black gaze as uncomfortable as ever. “Is he still having nightmares? Sleepwalking? Does he see things?”
“Less so now,” I assured her, which was an overt lie, though it seemed best to prepare the ground for an explanation in the event I needed it. “But I don’t think such things are gone for good. His head injury was significant.”
She nodded thoughtfully, putting a fritter onto a plate with a pair of silver tongs. She passed it to me. “My nephew felt M’sieur Farber might find the Basilio restful. It seems he does not find it the least bit so. A pity.”
“It’s a beautiful home.” It was partially the truth.
“It is a ruin,” she said with a shrug. “And it can be uncomfortable. M’sieur Farber is in one of the best rooms in the house, which is all I could do. It was my daughter’s when we moved to the upper floor for the summer months. Fortunately, many of her things were still there.”
Carefully, I said, “Yes. I heard she died. I’m so sorry.”
“It was devastating,” she said simply. “But I still feel her here, and so am loath to leave. Her spirit lingers in the hallways. Sometimes I fancy I can hear her voice. Do you believe in such things, mademoiselle?”
“I have never thought much about it.”
“Venice is full of ghosts. A whisper in your ear that comes from nowhere. A cold breeze where there should be none. Furniture that moves without agency.”
Her voice had lowered, raising a shiver that was as much from her tone as her words. I found myself thinking of the icy cold, the scent of iris and vanilla.
But, a ghost? No, I didn’t believe that. It was only this house: drafts from nowhere, a perfume that still lingered in a room that had belonged to her, Samuel’s hallucinations feeding my own imagination.
“There is a chair in Laura’s room that moves, though I have no maid and Giulia claims not to have done it. I must believe her, as no one goes there but me. At least, no one did until M’sieur Farber. Do you know it? The blue one near the window?”
“I haven’t seen it move.”
“Ah, I wondered. Perhaps he has seen it do so?”
“He’s never said anything of it.”
“She liked to sit on the balcony and look at the changing colors in the water from the dyer. You’ve seen the colors, I believe?”
She knew I had. She had been watching. “Yes. Very beautiful.”
“The water was red the day she died,” Madame said, her gaze going briefly distant, then a blink and back to me. “She loved the Venetian scarlet best. She could not keep away. It was an accident. The balcony was slick from the rain, and the rail too low. She slipped and . . . Ah, you must forgive a grieving mother her stories. I think sometimes I want her back so badly I have conjured her. Perhaps the voice I hear is only my longing. Perhaps the chair moving is a mirage born of grief.”
“It must be a comfort to know she is with God now.”
“But then I know it is not my imagination,” she went on as if she hadn’t heard me. “I know these are messages from her. I know there is something she wishes to tell me, but she hasn’t the strength to come to me.”
Her eyes glittered. Such talk as this, such grieving. I knew where it could lead if not relieved. I’d seen it too often in the asylum.
I said quietly, “Perhaps a doctor could help you.”
“A doctor?”
“Or perhaps the church—”
She laughed bitterly. “The church believes ghosts can only be evil. My daughter is not a demon.”
“Of course not. I’m certain she is with God, and content. You should think of that. It would give you some measure of peace.”
“She is an angel. She is trying to show us the truth.”
God’s truth, no doubt. Madame Basilio had the look of one who attended mass daily. “Yes, of course.”
She seemed to crumple before me, her proud expression sagging, the steel of her spine bending. She looked defeated, exhausted, even ill.
“Madame, are you all right?”
She rose. “I think it is time that you return to your patient.”
What had I said? I set down the coffee and the fritter. “As you wish.”
She followed me to the doorway, nostrils flaring, high points of red on her pallid, sallow cheeks, and then snapped out “Giulia!” and the housekeeper emerged from another room so quickly I suspected she’d been eavesdropping.
“Show Mademoiselle Spira to the door.”
An impudent, smug smile crossed Giulia’s lips, and she gestured to the receiving hall. “This way, mamzelle.”
“I can find my own way out.” I turned to Madame Basilio, still uncertain, feeling I should apologize and not knowing why. “Thank you for the coffee, Madame.”
She only waved her hand at me and turned away. I felt I’d insulted her, though I had no idea how.
When I stepped out, the outside was somehow warmer than the sala had been, though still cold and wet. The snow from yesterday was already mostly gone; the sky was overcast, but it wasn’t raining. I hurried up the stairs, wanting to speak to Mr. Basilio about the things his aunt had said. He had said she wanted only to impugn his character, but she had not done that at all. What had been the reason for this tea? To talk of ghosts? To speak of Samuel’s well-being?
I reached the third floor and opened the door. Inside, it was quiet; I heard no talk or laughter, which I’d expected. Perhaps Samuel had fallen asleep. I immediately quieted my own steps, not wanting to wake him, and headed toward his bedroom, thinking to peek in, expecting to see Mr. Basilio sitting in a chair at his bedside, perhaps reading.
But as I passed my room, I saw the door was ajar. Which was not so unusual, except . . . I slowed at the sound of rustling from within. Someone was inside.
I heard a quiet bang. A whispered curse. Carefully, I opened the door.
I took it in in a glance. The medicine case was on my bed, opened, bottles and boxes and paper-wrapped bundles scattered over the coverlet. And standing beside it, a bottle of laudanum in his hand, was Samuel.
Chapter 13
“What are you doing?” I demanded.
Samuel jerked around, panic on his face, and then when he saw it was me the expression changed to relief—relief, when I had just caught him in my medicine case; why should it be relief?—and then to pleading. “Elena, please.” His voice was low, almost hoarse. “You don’t know. You couldn’t know. Just a few drops. Please.”
I stepped toward him, holding out my hand. “Give it to me, Samuel.”
He clutched the bottle of laudanum more tightly and stepped back. “Elena, listen to me. It’s only for today. Just today and then I’ll give it up. I promise you I will. My head . . . you don’t know. Please.”
“You know I can’t.”
“I know you won’t.” Resentment and anger. His fingers were white where they gripped the bottle. “But think about it. What could it harm, really? I’m not sleeping. I see things.”
“Where’s Mr. Basilio? I suppose he was part of this plan too?”
“No. I’ve no idea where he is. He never showed up.”
That was one good thing, anyway. “Give it to me, Samuel.”
“I’ll do whatever you want.” His tone changed, wheedling now. “You’ve a half dozen Baedekers here. Choose one and I’ll send you there. Hell, choose all of them. I can give you the money to disappear, to be whatever you want, to do whatever you wish.”
It was as if he saw inside me.
“I’m a rich man,” he whispered, taking a step toward me. “You want more than this. I can give it to you. All for the price of this bottle.”
“Just a few drops. Enough to help me sleep. I’m not mad. You know I’m not. You believe me, don’t you? We’ll run away together. I’ll give you everything you’ve ever wanted.”
The words tangled in my head, the past and the present knotting, trapping me. I looked at Samuel and I saw Joshua. Those same intense eyes. The lies I wanted to believe.
You want more.
Yes, that was the truth. And here he offered it, anything I wanted. Anything at all.
They lie.
My father’s voice. Everything I already knew. Joshua Lockwood’s casket in the middle of the great hall, waiting to be carted away. My mother’s tears.
“No,” I whispered. “Give it to me, Samuel.”
The incipient triumph on his face crumpled. His eyes flashed with sudden rage. He threw the laudanum onto the bed, where it bounced and dropped against the pillow. “Why the hell are you so persistent?”
“Because I made a mistake.” The words flew out before I could stop them.
Samuel stilled. “What mistake?”
It was none of his concern. I did not want him to know more about me than he already did. I felt my vulnerability like a wound—I knew he would see it, that he would poke at it.
“What mistake, Elena?” His rage was banked; still there, but controlled. “One that will take your whole life to redeem? If I have to suffer, at least tell me why.”
“I believed someone I shouldn’t have believed.”
“How did that bring you here?”
I struggled to find a way to call back the words, to unsay them, but it was too late, and I reluctantly realized that he would not forget my indiscretion. He would keep prying and needling until I told him everything. I could not withstand him forever, and perhaps, if I told him now, he would understand
why I wouldn’t walk away and he would stop tormenting me with his bargains and his quid pro quos. Perhaps he would even help me. I clung to that possibility as I told him all of it: Joshua Lockwood, my unwanted marriage, the six months promised me, my hopes to find within that time a way to escape my fate.
He laughed shortly. “My God, the irony is staggering. My forced marriage frees you from yours.”
“I hope so.”
“You feel as trapped as I do.”
I raised my eyes to him, my heart racing with hope of his sympathy. “Yes.”
“But you’d rather ask me to give up my freedom than lose your own. You’ll understand that I don’t feel inclined to make such a sacrifice.”
“It’s not just me,” I whispered. “My father . . . my mistake has cost him. The scandal . . . He was forced from Glen Echo. Your parents have promised him his own asylum. They’ve promised to restore his reputation.”
“I don’t care.”
“But it wasn’t his fault! He didn’t do anything! He’s worked his entire life for a place like Glen Echo. He’s a good superintendent and an excellent doctor—you know this. It’s not fair to take that away from him because I was a fool.”
“He put his trust in you, and you failed him,” Samuel said coolly. “A captain goes down with his ship. A leader never deserts his men. Use any trite saying you like. The end result is that he misplaced his trust. He’s paying for a lack of judgment. That seems deserved to me.”
“Samuel, please!”
He sat heavily on the bed. The bottles and jars rolled into his hip as the mattress sagged beneath his weight. “I think we’re at an impasse, don’t you? I don’t want to go back and neither do you. I’m sorry for your father, but whatever happened had nothing to do with me. I don’t want to pay the price for it.”
“You’d rather we fight one another constantly?”
“That’s not necessary, Elena. We could each have what we want. All you have to do is say yes to what I’m offering.”
I shook my head, my throat tight. “My parents . . .”
“You’d sacrifice your life for them?”