Page 23 of Vengeance in Venice (Murder in Moonlight #6)

C onstance had fallen asleep again, her water glass, drained, on the bedside table.

For a moment, Solomon stood looking down at her.

A year ago, he had never even spoken to her, and yet now, she was everything.

A fresh surge of fear washed over him, for she was so weak, he knew he could still lose her.

It was not the first time she had been hurt in the course of one of their investigations.

She had been hit on the head, almost burned alive…

but he would not think of that. Because, always, she bounced back, going blithely on with the investigation, approaching the next with excitement and the same vital curiosity that had first drawn him to her. It was something they shared.

Part of him was still screaming that it was madness to expose her to these dangers, whatever risks he took on his own account. Of course, it was Constance’s decision, not his, and she had made it clear he had no right to dictate to her, only to discuss. Theirs was a partnership.

Not now. Since they had married, he had every right to rule her. Though he could just imagine her reaction if he tried to do so. Laughter surged into his throat, catching at his breath, and turned abruptly into tears.

“Oh, Constance,” he whispered, sinking down on the bed. “Why are you so impossible, so wonderful, so necessary …”

A knock sounded at the door, and he hastily dashed his sleeve across his face. Rossi was right—he should change his clothes, though the matter seemed the least important in the world right now.

“ Avanti, ” he called, and Maria came in with the doctor.

Disturbed, Constance woke again and was given more to drink from Donati’s own hand. Watching him almost as closely as he watched Constance, Solomon found his hopes rose, for there was a definite spark of approval in the doctor’s eyes.

He asked her questions, listened to her heart, then sent her to the privy with Maria’s support. It broke Solomon’s heart to see her walking like an old woman.

“Is the danger past?” he asked when he and Donati were alone.

“No,” said the doctor, “but I would say it is definitely reduced. Her body is shocked and severely weakened and will take some time and care to recover. But she is a healthy young woman. And a lucky one. I would guess she ingested very little of the poison.”

“Do you have any idea what the poison was?”

Donati sighed. “I cannot be sure. It could be one of several.” Deliberately, he met Solomon’s gaze. “I reported the incident to the police.”

Solomon nodded. “I am surprised they have not called.”

“They may be suspicious of you, Signor Grey,” Donati said bluntly.

Solomon nodded. He had expected that, and it scarcely mattered.

Constance returned and answered a few more probing questions from the doctor, while he pushed the glass back into her hands and gestured to her to drink.

“No food until tomorrow,” he said at last.

Constance gave a tired smile. “That will be no hardship.”

“And then only the lightest gruel, or thinned soup,” Donati instructed her, rising to his feet. “I will speak to your cook on my way out.”

Maria went with him to show him the way.

Constance leaned her head back against the pillows and reached for Solomon’s hand. “I feel as if I’ve marched for miles across London, and I only walked a few yards to the next room and back.”

“They are big rooms,” he said encouragingly.

She laughed, and it sounded to him like the finest music. Then she said, “Will you open the curtains and the window, let me see the city? I don’t want to waste this time.”

He rose and obeyed, letting the light flood in. The afternoon sun was still shining on the water and the bridges and streets, the old and beautiful buildings, the passing boats. Somewhere close by, a blackbird sang, and in the distance, he could make out a gondolier’s song.

He returned to the bed and kicked off his shoes so that he could stretch out beside Constance. She leaned against him, and he put his arm around her. She had always felt surprisingly delicate in his hold, but now she felt fragile like glass. Very thin, fine glass. Foolish imagination, of course.

She said, “How was it done, Solomon? I only had one glass of wine.”

“Premarin topped it up.”

She turned her face up to his, her eyes wide. “So he did. And it was just after that I began to feel ill. Within a few minutes.”

“Would it have acted quite so quickly, though? Let’s try to follow your glass and work out when it could have happened without either of us or anyone else seeing it.

Simons gave us each a glass from a tray.

It must have been a random choice, for other people were taking glasses at the same time.

In those first minutes, there was only you and me and Simons. And then Mrs. Hargreaves.”

“What with her skirts and mine, we never got very close to each other.” Her brow twitched. “She said the police here were secret police, spies of the kind that read letters and listen to conversations. Especially Lampl.”

“I’m sure some of them are. Austria has a vast and seething empire of discontent to keep together. What happened in 1848 gave the government a huge fright.”

“It’s hard to reconcile that the government of this charming city is the same one Dragan Tizsa fought against.”

Dragan Tizsa, the revolutionary Hungarian husband of a duke’s daughter. Both had attended Constance and Solomon’s wedding back in what seemed like another lifetime, and both were quite gifted amateur sleuths.

Solomon said, “It is definitely worth remembering.”

But Constance had moved on. “Are they trying to cover up the truth of Savelli’s murder?” she said, doubt in her voice. “Are we getting too close to a culprit they don’t want accused?”

“We don’t seem to be very close to anything at all,” Solomon said wryly. “And I very much doubt the police would go about poisoning prominent foreign citizens.”

“Bad for business,” Constance said.

“Precisely. Whom did you speak to after Mrs. Hargreaves? And did you put your glass down anywhere during this time?”

“No, I don’t think I did. I spoke to a few people—well, listened, mostly—but no one came too close. And then I bumped into Mrs. Hargreaves again. That was when she more or less told me Lampl was a secret policeman. And then I went up to Kellar…”

“Now there is an interesting man. Do you think he really does know your mother?”

He passed her the glass of water, and she sat with it in her hand for a moment, frowning, before she raised it to her lips.

“Do you mean he lied? Used it as an excuse to speak to me? But I approached him , and I could swear he was…taken aback. Unprepared. Almost alarmed. Ha! Maybe he does know her after all.” She took another sip of water, then added with some difficulty, “I wondered, you know, just for a moment, if he could be my father. And I really think he was wondering the same thing, because apparently I look very much like her as she was then. But it has been thirty years since he saw her.”

“I wonder,” Solomon said, distracted from his main concern, “if she was respectable then?”

“ Juliet? ”

“Think about it. Would he have been so interested in the daughter of a whore? Would he even have remembered her, let alone brought her into conversation in respectable Society? Your mother taught you to read and write. How many other girls did you meet in your early years who could do so?”

“None. I made money out of it.” She spoke absently, clearly still mulling over this different view of her outrageous parent that she had never considered before.

Of course, children tended to accept their parents with all their peculiarities—criticizing, perhaps, but not questioning.

“You mean, Juliet could be a fallen lady, like Elizabeth Maule?”

Discussing Elizabeth, whom Constance had saved from the streets and then from a murder charge, was too far removed from the urgency in Solomon’s mind.

“That is for later,” he said firmly. “When I saw you with Kellar, he was quite close to you, although whether or not he could have dropped something in your glass without your noticing—”

“He grasped it,” Constance interrupted, staring at him.

“When he said, I knew your mother, I was so stunned that I almost dropped the glass, and he grabbed my hand to steady it. I was so distracted… If he was quick, he could have dropped something in then. I would never have seen. But why would he? He brought up the subject of Juliet, after all, not I…”

“A roving diplomat,” Solomon said thoughtfully. “Perhaps it does not suit the British government to have us asking questions about someone.”

“Nationalists. The British support the cause of Italian nationalism and unity.”

“But would they murder their own people to prevent a little scandal in the camp?”

“I am not dead,” Constance pointed out, and Solomon’s blood chilled all over again at how close she had come.

He had to force his mind onward. “Well, let us allow that Kellar had an opportunity. What happened then?”

“You joined us.” Her free hand plucked at the bedclothes. “And when I turned away from Kellar, I almost bumped into Giusti.”

“Or he bumped into you,” Solomon said slowly. “Deliberately? I couldn’t see your glass at the time, but when I stepped around you, your wine seemed in danger of spilling over the side. Could Giusti have done it?”

Constance sighed. “I suppose he could have. Again, if he was quick and prepared. But why? Everyone suspects him of Savelli’s murder.”

“Apart from those who think it was Elena. I took the glass from you and put it on the table.” He shook his head in annoyance. “I never even glanced at it after that. Anyone could have passed and dropped the poison in, and I wouldn’t even have noticed.”

“Neither would I. We were too busy talking to Giusti, and then to Lampl, and trying not to be embarrassed by Lampl’s reaction to Foscolo’s presence. But I don’t remember anyone coming close to the table. Until you picked it up again for me when we went to join Premarin.”