Poor girl. Her older brother, Antonio, was allowed all the liberties the son of a prince could ask for, but Elena was destined from cradle to grave for a life of royal imprisonment, sheltered and pampered and married off in a few years for the sake of alliance, never having known the richness of life outside palace gates and golden carriages.
“Come along, then,” she found herself saying before she could regain her common sense. “But stick close to me,” she added, gesturing for her sister to precede her up the ladder. “The last thing I need is for you to get lost.”
“You’ll think I’m your shadow,” Elena promised, and paused at the top of the wall, straddling it. “How do I get down?”
“Just sit there for a minute.” Lucia moved the ladder over a few feet, climbed up, and hiked her skirts up above her knees to do as Elena had done. Then she hauled up the ladder and lowered it on the other side. After descending to the alley below, she beckoned to Elena to follow and stripped off her velvet night robe to reveal the peasant clothes she wore beneath.
“The first thing we have to do is get you a costume,” she said as she unraveled her long braid of dark hair to let it hang down her back. “And a mask,” she added, pulling a black-satin mask from her pocket and putting it across her eyes. She fastened the ties at the back of her head, wrapped a red kerchief around her hair, and started out of the alley. “Wait here.”
With some of the money she’d been hoarding, Lucia was able to procure a costume and mask similar to her own for Elena from one of the many street vendors who provided such last-minute necessities to those unprepared for Carnival. True to her word, Elena stayed on her heels as they slipped out of the alley and began winding their way through the raucous streets of Bolgheri.
Carnival was always an impressive spectacle. The balconies and windows were swathed in colorful draperies, the carriages and wagons were laden with harlequins, dominoes, and jesters, boisterous crowds roamed the streets, and music, fireworks, and confetti filled the air. Lucia and Elena spent a few hours watching the entertainments of mimes, acrobats, minstrels, and jugglers. Street vendors tried to tempt them into games of chance, but Lucia refused, smiling. She wasn’t such a fool to risk her few precious coins on games she knew she couldn’t win.
Elena did not say much, but as she stared in wonder at the sights all around them, the smile of delight on her face spoke volumes. Her joy at being free, even if only for a night, was obvious and heartfelt, and Lucia was so glad she’d brought the younger girl along. When Elena was back inside the prison of the palace, she would have a memory that would always make her smile.
As they paused to watch a performance of the Commedia dell’Arte in the center of a square, Lucia noticed a cart and oxen pull up beside them. In the back were two young men dressed as Neapolitan harvesters. The driver braked the cart as the pair waved and called to them to gain their attention.
“Look, Elena, we have a pair of admirers.”
Her half sister followed her glance, smiled shyly at the men, then looked away again. “How boldly they stare at us.”
“They are tall and strong,” Lucia said with approval. “A pity we cannot see their faces behind those masks to know if they are handsome. Ah, well.” Lucia smiled at the pair of men and blew them a flirtatious kiss.
The taller one gestured to her to pull off her mask and kerchief. Still smiling, she shook her head in refusal and watched him put a hand over his heart as if devastated. Laughing, she waved good-bye and turned to Elena. “Come. I want a coffee.”
Elena followed as Lucia merged into the midst of the crowded piazza, making her way toward the coffeehouses and bakeries on the opposite side. By the sheerest luck, they managed to gain a table at an outdoor café and ordered coffee. As they waited for it to be brought, Lucia pulled her tobacco and papers out of her pocket and began rolling a cigarette with the ease of long practice.
Elena stared at her in amazement. “You are going to smoke?”
“Don’t look so horrified,” Lucia answered, amused. “At least it’s not hashish. Want one?”
“Women aren’t supposed to smoke.”
Lucia reached for the candle on their table.
“Exactly,” she said, and lit her cigarette, then leaned back in her chair, smiling at Elena’s shocked face.
In coloring, they were not unlike—both of them had the dark eyes and dark, curly hair of their father, but that was where the similarity ended. Elena was delicate, sweet, and painfully idealistic, everything Lucia was not. Perhaps that was why she had grown so fond of the girl during the three months she’d lived here. Though Elena participated in all royal functions and Lucia was kept out of sight at the opposite end of the palace, the two had managed to meet. Lonely and isolated from others, they had become secret friends.
“I didn’t want to like you, you know,” Lucia blurted out, blowing smoke into the air overhead.
“You didn’t?”
“No. I came here fully prepared to hate you.”
To her surprise, Elena began to laugh. “I didn’t want to like you either,” she confessed. “When we met, and you told me that you were Papa’s bastard, I hated you. I didn’t know he had any other daughter but me.”
Lucia made a sound of derision. “That’s no surprise. No one knows about me.”
“I meant what I said before. I have had so much fun since you came. Hearing your stories, knowing all the outrageous things you’ve done, things I would never dare to do—”
“Listening to other people talk about life is no good, Elena,” she interrupted. “Life is rich and sweet and very short. One has to live it, not watch it from a palace balcony.”
Elena frowned, looking doubtful. But then she reached out her hand toward the cigarette. “Let me try this.”
“If you’ve never smoked before, you won’t like it,” she said as she complied with the girl’s request. “Just inhale a little bit,” she added in warning, but it was too late.
In a fit of coughing, Elena waved away smoke and handed back the cigarette as quickly as possible. “That,” she said with a shudder, “is one experience I am content to avoid. It’s horrid!”
“It is rather,” Lucia agreed.
“Why do you do it?”
“Because I’m not allowed to, I suppose.”
“What else have you done that you’re not allowed to do?”
“Nearly everything,” she admitted, not sure if she should be proud of that fact or not.
“Doesn’t your mother mind?”
“Mamma?” Lucia smiled, remembering Francesca’s visits to her in boarding school, thinking of the dithery charm her mother possessed that captivated everyone. Lucia herself was not immune. She adored her mother. “It’s hard to tell what Mamma really thinks about anything.”
“Tell me more of the things you’ve done.” Without waiting for an answer, she went on, “Have you ever kissed a man?”
“Of course.”
Elena’s eyes widened with all the eager curiosity of any seventeen-year-old girl with no experience. “What was it like?”
Lucia told her the truth. “Wonderful. I can’t explain why, but it is.”
“Who did you kiss?” Elena asked. “Who was he?”
Lucia’s mind flashed back to a summer three years before, and she was surprised to discover it no longer hurt to think of it. “His name was Armand. He was the blacksmith in the village by Madame Tournay’s Academy. I was madly in love with him.”
“A blacksmith? How did you meet him?”
“One day, I was in the village on an errand, and I saw him. He was standing over his anvil, pounding away. He had no shirt on, and sweat was running down his chest. I just stopped and stared at him. I’d never seen a man’s bare chest before. He looked up and caught me staring. He smiled at me, and I fell in love with him. It was as simple as that. I started sneaking out at night to meet him. Armand made me feel beautiful and desirable for the first time in my life. It was the most glorious, wonderful thing that
had ever happened to me.”
Elena sighed and rested her elbow on the table, chin in her hand. “What happened?”
“Cesare found out, Armand married someone else, and I got sent to a convent.”
“What?” Elena sat up in her chair, looking outraged. “I thought you were going to tell me some tragic tale of how he died of love for you.”
“What romantic ideas you have, Elena.”
“He was a cad! If he loved you, and…and kissed you, he should have married you, not some other girl!”
She could be philosophical about it now. “These things happen.”
“I don’t suppose you could have married a blacksmith anyway. Papa would never have consented.”
Lucia knew she would have married Armand if he had loved her enough to defy her father. He’d taken Cesare’s bribe of money and a merchant’s daughter instead, and he’d broken her heart. That, she vowed, would never happen again. “When I wed,” she told Elena, “it will be to a man who loves me so madly, so passionately, that nothing else matters to him. Otherwise, marriage is a trap, and a woman is a prisoner.”
To her amazement, Elena nodded in agreement. “I am not yet married, but already I am trapped.” Her pretty face took on an unhappy expression. “I have to wed some Austrian duke. His mother is English. It was all arranged by the British and Austrian ambassadors.”
“I know. I heard all about it.”
“I don’t love him. I’ve never even met him, but I have to marry him. Papa insists on the match.”
“Defy Cesare.”
“I can’t! It’s all arranged. The treaties have been signed. Dowries paid. The Congress of Vienna will be preserved, we will have peace with Austria, and Bolgheri will have alliance with England. There is nothing I can do to stop it. It is my duty.”
Lucia wished there was something she could say to comfort her half sister, but there was nothing comforting about being forced to marry a man you did not love. She diverted the conversation. “At least when you feel trapped, you don’t go off doing wild things and driving Cesare insane.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Elena said with a rueful smile. “I’m here with you, aren’t I? Though I suppose it’s the only time I’ll ever have the chance to do something wild.” She paused, and her expression became thoughtful as she studied Lucia. “Why do you always defy Papa? Do things that are forbidden?”
Lucia opened her mouth to answer, then realized she didn’t know the answer. She fell silent, thinking it out before she spoke. “I like excitement, and there is a certain excitement in breaking the rules,” she said after a moment. “Also, I love a challenge. Telling me what I can’t do makes me want to do it.”
“And when you break the rules, Papa has to remember you exist.”
Lucia stiffened at her sister’s words. For a sheltered, naive girl who didn’t know much about life, Elena was very perceptive. “That, too,” she admitted, and took a pull on her cigarette. Blowing out smoke, she added, “Why should he be allowed to pretend I was never born?”
“He shouldn’t.”
Lucia looked away from the compassion in her sister’s face. That was ironic, since only a few hours earlier, it had been she pitying the younger girl. “It doesn’t matter,” she said, her voice brittle to her own ears. “I don’t care.”
“Yes, you do. But if it’s any consolation to you, Papa forgets I exist most of the time. Antonio is allowed to do whatever he wants, but I cannot go anywhere, or do anything. Papa won’t even let me attend a ball until I am eighteen. Before you came, there were times when I thought I’d go mad.”
“I’m only in the palace because Cesare didn’t know what else to do with me. His plan was for his palace guards to keep me under control.” She paused to cast a meaningful glance around, then gave Elena a grin. “Do you think it’s working?”
Elena grinned back at her. “I’m afraid not.”
“I won’t be controlled as if I am a puppet.” Turning in her chair, she dropped the stub of her cigarette to the cobblestones. As she crushed it beneath her heel, Lucia spied the cart and oxen they’d seen earlier. It was circling the piazza, and the two men were standing in the back, scanning the crowd. “Don’t turn your head,” she ordered, “but I see those two men again. I think they are searching for us.”
“Why should they be? They don’t even know us.”
“What does that matter? Men always want women, especially those who smile and laugh and flirt with them.” She watched as the taller one turned in her direction. When he caught sight of her, he blew her a kiss, his answer to the one she’d given him, and she laughed, appreciating this sort of male attention for exactly what it was and enjoying it.
“They’ve seen us,” she told Elena as her admirer turned to his companion and pointed in their direction. “They are coming this way.”
“Oh!” Elena’s eyes widened with excitement. “What if they want to talk to us?”
“Maybe we’ll let them.” Lucia leaned back in her chair with a casual air. “Or maybe,” she added with a shrug, “we won’t.”
The cart pulled up beside the café where they sat, and a bouquet flew through the air to land in Lucia’s lap. She looked down at the violets, then glanced at the man. After a moment, she picked up the bouquet and smiled at her admirer.
“What do the flowers mean?” Elena asked, glancing at the cart and back again.
“He wishes to make my acquaintance.” The bouquet in her hand, she pushed back her chair and rose. “Let’s go.”
Without looking at the men, she turned and started in the opposite direction.
Elena hurried to catch up with her. “I don’t understand. Don’t you want to meet him?”
“I haven’t decided.”
“What if they lose us in the crowd?”
“Then I won’t meet him, will I?”
“He’ll think you don’t like him, and he’ll give up.”
“He won’t do that, I promise you.”
As if to prove her words, the men’s teasing voices called to them from close behind, indicating they had abandoned their cart and were following on foot. Within moments, they raced past Lucia and Elena, then turned to block their path through the crowd. Out of breath and laughing, Lucia’s admirer dropped to one knee before her. “Sweet peasant,” he said, “I beg you and your companion to let us walk with you a while.”
“If we do,” she answered, “you must first remove your masks, for I cannot walk with a man who keeps his face hidden from me.”
He stood up. “If we show our faces, will you do the same? We know you must be beauties indeed behind those masks.”
She considered that for a moment, then she consented with a nod. “But we must all unmask at the same time.”
“Agreed.”
Laughing, Lucia pulled off her kerchief and mask, then shook back the long, loose curls of her hair. She looked at the unmasked faces of their admirers and found the two men staring back at her and Elena in utter astonishment. As she studied their faces, Lucia realized their identity, and her laughter faded away.
“Sweet Gesù,” she whispered, suddenly sick. She was staring at a pair of palace guards.
Chapter 1
It was a well-known fact among those in the British diplomatic corps that whenever His Majesty, King William IV, had a sticky situation on his hands, Sir Ian Moore would get the assignment. No one else had a chance.
It was true that Sir Ian, thirty-five years of age, had a successful, decade-long career as a diplomat. It was true that he was unmarried, unfettered, and willing to be a roving ambassador, able to go wherever duty to king and country sent him. Of course it was true that his loyalty and honor were beyond question. But during this time of peace in Europe, truly sticky situations where a diplomat could make his mark were rare, and many of Sir Ian’s colleagues wished His Majesty’s favorite ambassador would retire to his estate in Devonshire and give the rest of them a chance to shine.
The Turks and Greeks were a perfect ex
ample. Those people would test the mettle of any diplomat, so when a minor skirmish between those factions threatened to break into all-out war, no one was surprised when Sir Ian was sent to Anatolia. But everyone was surprised when scarcely a fortnight after his arrival in Constantinople, he was recalled to Gibraltar. Ambitious young diplomats crossed their fingers, hoping that somehow, some way, Ian Moore had finally blotted his copybook.
Ian knew his copybook was still quite satisfactory. As to the reason for his recall from the East, however, even Ian had to confess he was baffled.
“Why fetch me to Gibraltar?” he wondered aloud, sitting in his cabin aboard the Mary Eliza, one of His Britannic Majesty’s finest and fastest ships of the line. As the ship carried him across the Mediterranean, Ian studied the map of Europe spread out on the table before him. “What could it mean?”
His valet, Harper, looked up from the shirt he was mending. “It must be very serious indeed for them to send for you so suddenly. Something big is happening.”
“I cannot imagine what. The Turkish situation is the only thing of significance in this part of the world at present, and they intend to replace me in the middle of it. To what end?”
“All I know is it’s a shame. There we were in Constantinople, just settled in for a good, long stay, and then in the wink of an eye, there’s a change of plan, and we’re sailing off again.” Harper shook his head with a sigh of regret. “Pity, that,” he added. “Mighty fetching, those Turkish ladies looked in those trousers, and those veils of theirs…makes a man wonder what’s underneath. The sultan was going to give you one of his slave girls, you know.”
“Harper, a true British gentleman would never own a slave girl. Barbaric practice.”
“Maybe so, sir, but one of those Turkish girls would have worked on you like a tonic. Not to say you’ve been short-tempered of late, but—”
“That’s absurd,” Ian shot back, nettled. “I have not been short-tempered.”
“If you say so, but you have been working hard for many months and haven’t had any time for ladies.” He paused, then added, “A man needs what he needs, you know.”
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