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'But not to me! I am weary of having the virtuous Alessandra flung in my face at every turn. I suspect you do it to provoke me, but have a care you don't succeed and find the consequence more than you bargained for. I have never been known for my patience, Deborah Beaumont, and you strain it at every point, so have a care! I may hurt you without meaning to, and we would both be sorry for that, so let's hear no more of the sainted Alessandra!'

If his words were quelling, the look in his eyes was infinitely more so. Deborah swallowed. 'I'm not afraid of anything you can do to me!' she challenged him, flinging back her head to show him how little she cared.

He ran his finger down her nose. 'Then you should be!' He said something more in Italian of which she understood only the words
bella ragazza
and, because nobody would have called Alessandra a beautiful girl, she took it for granted that he was talking about herself.

'I'm not really beautiful,' she denied.

'Did I say you were?'

'I thought you did!'

'I did not. I said for two pins I would kiss you into a better frame of mind!
Pretty
girls '

'That would have been in the plural!' she countered indignantly. 'You said
ragazza
—singular!—I heard you!'

'Naturelmente
. A girl always hears what she wants to hear!'

'It wasn't a very good disguise, was it?' she said. 'Michael knew who I was at once.'

Domenico lifted her hat clean off her head. 'He found you unchanged?'

She tried to take it back from him, but he resisted the attempt, watching the quick-change expressions flitting across her face.

'Did he find you the same Deborah he had always known?' he repeated the question.

She didn't know. All she knew was how much she had found Michael changed from the person she had thought she had known.

'He
was different,' she said.

Domenico looked well satisfied. 'So are you, with or without your hat.' He put his head on one side, considering her. 'I think I prefer you without,' he said at length. 'We'll leave it in the car and let your hair blow free. Does that suit you,
mia bella ragazza?'

She couldn't have answered him to save her life. There was no doubt that that
bella ragazza
applied to her, and he had said it with a deliberation that did the funniest things to her breathing and sent the blood racing through her veins. She touched "her short hair in a shy gesture that was very appealing.

'Am I very different?' she asked. 'Not just the way I look ' She broke off. 'I'm not fishing for compliments !' she rushed on before he could accuse her of it. 'Only it was so strange seeing Michael like that and not really knowing him at all. We've been friends for ages!'

He took her hand in his, leading her through the church and out into the uncertain sunshine in the courtyard in front. Only then, when he held the door of the car open for her to get in, did he bend his head towards her, his eyes alight with laughter.

'I like the difference!' he said in her ear.

She smiled with pleasure. 'Michael didn't seem to notice.' She settled herself more comfortably in her seat. 'I wonder what he thought of those gorgeous alabaster windows?'

'Didn't you ask him?'

She shook her head, intent on her own thoughts. 'I'm worried about him!' she announced. She turned impulsively towards Domenico. 'Do you think I ought to go after him and find out what's wrong?' She thought for a moment. 'I could give him back that cheque. Perhaps he hasn't any money.'

Domenico tapped her sharply on the knuckles. 'That is not your concern, Deborah. You are better off without him!'

'Am I?' she said wearily, rubbing her hand. 'How do you know? I don't trust you either, if you want to know!'

'I'm glad to hear it!' His smile seared her spirits, but the excitement was still there, refusing to leave her no matter how unkind he was. 'But you are still my prisoner, little one, and you have no choice but to come with me. Michael will have to do without you!'

She stared straight ahead of her, maintaining an icy silence all the way across the city to the Roman Forum. There was some difficulty in parking the car, and once this had been achieved and she had her first glimpse of the ruined centre of the world, she forgot her wrath and chagrin in the immediate satisfaction of a long and dearly held ambition to see this place for herself.

Ignoring her pleased recognition of Trajan's Arch, Domenico bought their entrance tickets and then, taking her firmly by the arm, led her down the steps to the lower level of the city as it had been all those centuries before.

'I'm afraid you'll get your feet wet,' he remarked as they gained the bottom of the steps.

'But worth it!' she said at once. She remembered belatedly that he had paid for them and what they had cost. 'I'll try to keep out of the worst of the puddles,' she added. 'I don't think they'll stain.'

'I was thinking of your comfort, my dear Deborah. Those shoes are pretty, but not very substantial. Perhaps we should have bought you some Wellington boots!'

She resisted the impulse to ask him whether Alessandra, that arch admirer of the Emperor Napoleon, ever wore such things. Alessandra, she reminded herself, was a banned topic of conversation between them, and he probably wouldn't have appreciated the joke anyway.

'Tell me about the Vestal Virgins,' she said instead. 'Didn't they have their temple here?'

'Yes, it's that round building over there. Their house is just beside it.'

And there it was, the fine brickwork stripped of most of its marble, but still quite recognisable in shape and layout. Deborah almost ran in her eagerness to examine the statues that lined the edges of the pool where once these important ladies had bathed and relaxed together.

'Why were they so important?' she asked Domenico, striving to hide the fact that she was really rather disappointed by the few, mostly headless, torsos that remained.

'I daresay politics
had a lot to do with it,' he answered. 'And fire has always been a potent symbolism. To begin with, the Romans were far less inclined to personalise their gods than were the Greeks. We preferred impersonal spirits and powers, and Vesta probably began life as a
numen
in the traditional Roman manner. Ovid declared her to be "nothing but a living flame". But we soon came under the influence of the Greeks and began to identify our own deities with theirs, taking over their mythology and genealogies as well as their humanised personalities. Somehow Vesta, despite her essentially impersonal quality, was associated with Hestia, the Greek goddess of the hearth. This was the hearth of Rome and, because the flame was never allowed to fail and go out, lest the power of Rome flickered and died with it, there had to be attendants to keep watch over the flame, and these were the Vestal Virgins. Gradually, all sorts of important things were left in their care, from Julius Caesar's will to the sacred Palladium, an effigy of Pallas Athene, known to the Romans as Minerva, which had been rescued from the flames of Troy by Aeneas and brought here to Italy.'

'Did they look after it well?' Deborah asked.

'It's impossible to tell. No one was allowed to see these sacred symbols except the Virgins and the Chief Priest. There was one awful moment when the Emperor Elagabalus, who came from Syria, wanted to make his own god the principal divinity of Rome. He decided to marry Vesta off to his own god, but, worse still, he wanted to carry off the sacred fire and the jar that held the Palladium as well. The Vestal Virgins claimed later that they had tricked the Emperor by handing over an empty jar, but it may have been just a face-saving move based on the current belief that they kept two jars in the Storehouse to confuse possible thieves.'

'But you think they were guarding nothing in the first place?'

'Not the flame. That was the central symbol of Rome, but I doubt there ever was a Sacred Palladium. Its importance lay entirely in building up the prestige of the Virgins themselves as its guardians.'

Deborah digested this in silence. Then she laughed, her good intentions all forgotten.

'Is that why you think Alessandra would have made a good candidate?' she asked, her eyes bright with the thought. 'Do you think her sacred family name as empty of value as the urn was empty of the Palladium?'

As soon as she had spoken, she knew her mistake. She knew it by the sudden stiffening of his back and his deliberately expressionless face. They might as well have been alone in Rome, for there was no one else to be seen anywhere in the Forum. His hands shot out and gathered her up against his chest.

'I warned you, sweet Deborah,' he said through clenched teeth. 'Why can't you forget Alessandra? Must you drag her into everything? And if it isn't her, it's Michael Doyle!'

'I'm sorry. Domenico, please, I've said I'm sorry!'

It wasn't anger she saw in his face, but she was afraid all the same. She was afraid of him, but she was even more afraid of the leaping joy within her that exulted in his touch whatever the cause.

He ran his fingers through her short hair, pulling her closer still. She swallowed hard. 'Domenico, I've said I'm sorry,' she repeated. Her voice trembled dangerously, betraying her outwardly calm appearance.

'Why are you sorry?' he murmured. 'Don't you know I've been wanting this all day?'

'But not with me!' she said.

'Why not with you? Did you suppose I wouldn't answer the challenge you are constantly offering me? Isn't that why you couldn't resist mentioning Alessandra just once more, to see what I would do?'

'
No!
Truly, it wasn't! I'd forgotten '

'Deborah,
cara mia
, I don't believe a word of it!'

'But you
must
!' She gazed at him, her eyes darkened by the strength of the emotions doing battle within her. 'I won't ever mention her name again!' she promised rashly.

His lips touched hers fleetingly, his breath warm against her cheek. 'And Michael?'

'Michael?'

'Your
Michael,' he insisted ruthlessly. 'Don't sound as though you've never heard of him!'

Deborah found it increasingly difficult to concentrate on anything but the closeness of his face to hers. The smell of his skin filled her nostrils, intoxicating her further. She shut her eyes, alarmed by the ease with which he could seduce her senses, but her will refused to answer her signal of distress, preferring a new and much more exciting master. When he finally kissed her, it was a shattering experience and her response was absolute. His arms tightened about her willing body and if she had not been clinging to him with her arms looped around his neck, she would have fallen, such was the weakness of her knees. 'Well?'

She made no attempt to answer him. She wanted him to kiss her again. She arched her body closer still to his, seeking a reassurance he was not prepared to give her. His hair felt rough and essentially masculine beneath her fingers. It was strange to think that she had never touched Michael's hair—had no idea of how he smelt or tasted either. Her whole world was filled by Domenico Manzu and, for the moment, she was more than happy to have it so. But, she remembered belatedly, it wouldn't do!

'Please,
don't
!' The words didn't seem to come from her at all.

'No? Don't you like me to touch you—to kiss you?'

Her only answer was a soft murmur of protest against his neck. His hands imprisoned her face, making it more freely available for his kisses.

'Little fraud! You like this as much as I do!'

She opened her eyes and stared at him. 'That doesn't make it any better!' she said. 'Besides, you're creasing my coat!'

'Damn your coat!'

'Domenico, it isn't right!' she protested.

He swore with a facility that startled her. 'Spare me your maidenly reservations! It's too late for that, Deborah Beaumont. It's far too late for you to pretend that this is some novel thrill for you, or that you and Michael Doyle have never shared such moments together! I'm sorry if you don't like it, for I have every intention of kissing you again and, as my prisoner,
carissima
, you must expect to suffer a little!'

She struggled in earnest then. 'Let me go!'

'Where will you go? Michael won't let you run to him!'

She pounded her fists against his chest. '
Domenico,
be sensible '

He let her go too suddenly for her to retain her balance and she slipped on the wet ground, tumbling painfully at his feet.

'Now look what you've done!'

He was on his knees beside her in an instant. 'Deborah,
piccola
, have I hurt you?'

She was too honest to claim injury when the only part of her that was smarting was her pride. 'No,' she said grudgingly. 'But you've
ruined
my new clothes! It would serve you right if I made you pay to have them cleaned!'

He grinned, his hands warm as they clasped her through the material of her dress. 'Your face is splashed with mud,' he told her, 'and I should probably have paid for the cleaning anyway.' He cupped her face in one hand. 'You look very young and innocent with a dirty face. It suits you.'

It seemed she could never be angry with him for long. 'I am young and innocent '

'Are you?'

He asked it as if he had some right to know, as if in some way she were his property and it was only good husbandry to check her over in any way he liked.

'Of course!' She cleared her throat with difficulty. 'Let me up!' she commanded in slightly stronger tones.

'I like you the way you are,' he retorted, making no move at all,

'Yes, but '

He frowned. 'Deborah, are you playing with me?'