Rose in the Bud (12 page)

“And Bridget—Arlette!—is half Irish, too, but she has none of your strange, elusive charm, and she does not look at one with those great big wondering, slightly puzzled eyes.” He touched her cheek, as his sister had done.
“
Carissima
,
in a short while now our guests will arrive, and we shall not be able to talk, but I want you to know ... indeed, you must already be perfectly well aware that I find you utterly distracting and enchanting!” His voice was growing a little thick, and he moved nearer to her. “Never in all my life have I felt the—the pull of so much sweetness, such naturalness
...”

“I think your guests are already arriving,” Cathleen said quickly, as she watched the dark shape of a gondola leave the main stream of the canal and turn towards the
palazzo
.

Count Paul said something impatiently in Italian, and she rather gathered that it was not an appreciative utterance. He was, in fact, swearing uncontrollably
.

“It is early,” he exclaimed, almost furiously. “In Italy no one likes to be the first guest to arrive, and we have only just finished dinner—”

“It’s eleven o’clock,” Cathleen observed with a touch of complacency. “In England we would consider that late.”

Paul made a slightly pettish gesture.

“But you are not in England now, little one. And you must have heard the adage: When in Rome, do as the Romans do!”

“Or the Venetians,” she murmured, feeling a certain amount of amusement because he was so plainly frustrated.

They stood watching the long, sleek shape of the gondola approaching the landing-stage. But for the lantern high in its prow it might have been a ship of sable, and for the first time it struck Cathleen that nearly all the gondolas seen on Venetian canals are black. She remarked on this to her host, largely for something to say.

He explained. In the fifteenth century an edict was passed to the effect that all gondolas should go into mourning, and in mourning they have remained ever since. Ostensibly this was to check extravagance and put an end to rivalry where decoration was concerned, but in actual fact it was to favour political intrigue.

In an age of violence a black gondola on a dark night was an ideal means of escaping undetected if one wished to shake off an arch-enemy, and only ambassadorial craft were permitted gilding. This also enabled them to be identified as ambassadors’ gondolas, and apart from bestowing prestige it meant that they could always be kept under observation.

Also, of course, for political reasons.

Cathleen was quite fascinated by this explanation, and as she watched the first of the Count’s guests disembarking below her she wondered how many times a similar sinister shape had tied up at the di Rini landing stage since the edict was first put into force.

And then her interest in these abstract matters was terminated somewhat rudely as she recognised the first male guest to arrive as Edouard Moroc. And beside him, in the gondola, before the gondolier assisted them to land, she tried vainly to recognise the exquisitely gowned figure of a woman who looked up at him with laughing, provocative, eyes, and had a positive aureole of bright red-gold hair framing her piquant face that was also so lovely that Cathleen felt inclined to gasp.

She had seen some lovely women in Italy, but this one was in a class apart, and so unique in fact that even Paul seemed temporarily diverted by the sight of her.

“So Nicola Brent has returned to Venice,” he exclaimed. “The last time she was here she created an uproar by threatening to run off with a most unsuitable young man, although I always suspected she had a weakness for Edouard. I wonder where he ran into her, and how long she is staying?” He moved closer to the balcony rail as if he could barely contain his interest. “Did you ever see anything as perfect as she is?” he exclaimed admiringly.

Cathleen looked downwards and experienced a sharp sensation like acute dismay.

“
She seems to me to be very beautiful,” she observed without enthusiasm. “Who is she?” she added.

“An American girl with enough money to make a man’s mouth water, quite apart from looking like that,” Paul replied a trifle incautiously. He turned swiftly to leave the balcony. “Pardon me,
cara
,
but I must give my sister some support. When our guests arrive she expects me to be at her side.”

And Cathleen found herself alone on the starlit balcony, with the sound of laughter coming up to her from the landing-stage, and a girl’s clear, amused, almost impish voice rising above the welcoming voices of her host and hostess, and Edouard’s quieter tones making themselves heard occasionally.

“I ran into Nicky in Paris. She has come back to plague you all for a time.”

“I like that!” the girl exclaimed.
“
He
ran into
me
!
He made it his business to dig me out, and absolutely insisted that I return to Venice with him. I told him I was tired of wandering on the Continent, and was going home to America, but he just turned a deaf ear ... and here I am!”

In the clear light Cathleen quite plainly saw Bianca embracing the girl.

“But this is wonderful!” she declared. “Nicola, you cannot mean that you are staying at an hotel? You must come here!”

“Naturally I’d love to come here,” Nicky answered cheerfully.

“Then where are your things? We will collect them in the morning—”

“At the Danieli. But Edouard is insisting that I allow him to paint me this time, so if I stay here it will be much more convenient..
.”

The voices died away, were swallowed up by the vast interior of the marble-floored entrance hall, and then Cathleen had to wait for a while before she heard them again, and this time they were like the chattering voices of magpies as they advanced towards her over the floor of the
salon
.
Only Edouard’s was low, deep and amused, and as the one responsible for so much excitement he plainly decided that he could remain aloof and outside it for the time being. Cathleen heard him say:

“I thought I saw something feminine on the balcony just now! What new charmer are you concealing, Paul? Or do I know her?”

He stepped briskly out on to the balcony, and Cathleen retreated until she felt the hard edge of the balustrade pressing into her back. Edouard’s shapely black eyebrows went upwards the instant he caught sight of her, and she didn’t need the surprise in his voice to convince her that he was mildly startled. “You!” he exclaimed.

Cathleen felt as if her voice had deserted her. There was one moment when a gleam of something like actual pleasure seemed to invade his eyes, and then they alighted on the necklace and the bracelet of rubies that showed up so brilliantly against her pale skin. And as he looked her up and down, and she knew he was taking in the elegance of her expensive dress, she thought that his whole face hardened and his square jaw appeared to
s
et.

“Well, well!” he exclaimed. “This is a surprise I was not prepared for!”

Bianca came out on to the balcony, looking like a cat that had lapped up an extra large saucer of cream.

“Of course, you two know one another, don’t you?” she purred, as if it had only just occurred to her that they knew one another. “Miss Brown was finally persuaded to leave her hotel and come and stay with us, and I must say we’re absolutely delighted to have her. I was beginning to wonder what had happened to you, Edouard, but if you’ve been paying a flying visit to Paris then I think you’re very lucky. It’s some time since I visited Paris myself, but I’ve a feeling I shall be going there very soon, to do some shopping
!”

And she turned and affectionately pinched Cathleen’s cheek.

“That’s quite an idea, isn’t it,
cara
?
You and I going to Paris to do some shopping!”

Cathleen merely stared at her as if she was talking in riddles, but Edouard spoke coldly.

“If Miss Brown has never seen Paris then she will enjoy it with you, I’m sure, Bianca. You’re the ideal guide, philosopher and—friend,” after the very briefest of pauses.

Bianca smiled at him in an extraordinarily brilliant fashion.

“How kind of you to say so,
cherie
,”
she murmured with dulcet sweetness.

Other guests were arriving, and Nicola Brent came out to join them on the balcony. She seemed surprised by the sight of Cathleen, but once the necessary introductions had been made she shook hands casually
... casually, but with a gleam of interest in her eyes.

“So you’re English!” she exclaimed. “Edouard was telling me he’d met a new little English girl lately.” She glanced, half laughing, half provocative, at Edouard, but his expression was so grim that she abandoned the attempt to tease him. Instead, she went up to him, slipped a hand inside his arm, rested her cheek against the cloth of his sleeve for a moment, and then addressed him soothingly. “All right,
Edouard darling, I’m not going to give you away! We all know your passion for painting lovely ladies, and this time you’re going to paint me, aren’t
you
?
”

“If you want me to do so,” he replied a little stiffly.

“You know perfectly well that it’s the only reason I’ve returned to Venice.”

“Then we’d better begin sittings straight away
... to-morrow morning?”

“To-night, if you like,” and the beautiful eyes sparkled with something like glee. “But perhaps the light isn’t good enough at night?”

Bianca shook her head at her. There was a satisfied curve to her full lips.

“Don’t provoke him, Nicky,” she advised. “Edouard doesn’t rise to the bait like other men.” And she turned her back on all three of them as if the arrival of fresh guests was of paramount importance just then.

Cathleen had no clear idea how the evening passed, but she knew that it was very late—or rather, early in the morning—when the first guests took their departure.

A kind of running buffet had been fixed up in the dining-room, and there was champagne on ice, and other more stimulating drinks. Nicola Brent drank vodka, and was plainly the type of pampered, wealthy young woman who drifted about the world attaching herself to various Continental sets, and tempting quite a few young men with her jewels and her beauty. She never stopped flirting rather outrageously with some man or other, but whenever she could she attached herself to Edouard, and it was fairly obvious to Cathleen that they were very good friends, if not something deserving of a more intimate title.

She and Bianca also seemed to get on very well,
and from the rapturous manner in which Bianca had welcomed her arrival she couldn’t be more pleased to have her as a guest
... indeed, she had said so. And yet, as the evening progressed, and Cathleen—who more than once found herself alone in a
corner
of the room—watched them closely, she decided there was a kind of self-hypnosis about their friendship, and that although they probably did like one another well enough Edouard Moroc was a kind of bone of contention between them.

Whether or not Bianca had prior claim to his attentions she couldn’t tell, but it certainly seemed to her that Nicola, for the time being, at least, was smugly conscious of being in a superior position to Bianca where the attractive Frenchman was concerned, and was inclined to wish to prove to everyone present that he was, for the moment, her property.

The deduction caused Cathleen to feel a little sick, and she also despised herself for her weakness in letting him kiss her, and entertaining, for a very brief while, the ridiculous delusion that he had fallen in love with her.

Every time she met his eyes, while the evening lasted, he barely seemed to recognise her, and not once did he cross the room and attempt to speak to her. There were lots of other women to whom he talked—old as well as young—and it was true that he had very little time to spare for her, but the knowledge that he could treat her so cavalierly made her long to escape after a time.

She couldn’t escape on to the balcony, because it was always occupied, so she found her way to the little-used library, where at least she thought she could be alone for a while. It was an exceptionally warm and oppressive night, and all the other rooms, smelling strongly of perfume, were also growing terribly stuffy, despite their marble floors and lofty ceilings. The library, on the other hand, was as cool as the sheltered
corner
of a quiet garden, and it was full of comfortable couches on which weary limbs could recline.

Cathleen, who had been teetering about on high heels all evening, and was feeling curiously weighed down by the costly quality of her rabies, seized the opportunity to kick off her shoes when she had established herself on one of the brocaded couches, and she was about to put up her hands and remove the stones from her neck when a man’s voice spoke quietly, very near to her, and she realised that it was Edouard who had come in through the open window.

“I wouldn’t do that, if I were you,” he said lazily. “They look very pretty.”