A Duke for Christmas (23 page)

She jumped, startled, but did not utter a sound. Turning, she saw Clarence Knox sitting on a straight-backed chair just out of sight of the open door. He’d rocked the chair back on its rear legs to rest against the wall while he pared his nails with a wicked-looking clasp knife. He wore a buff waistcoat, a none-too-clean white shirt, and riding breeches with a piece missing from the knee. A black leather satchel lay on the floor, two or three familiar papers disgorging from it.

“I thought I saw you yesterday,” she replied, not wishing to give him any further evidence of consternation. Impossible to imagine being afraid of Clarence Knox—short, not in condition, and with those pale blue, almost childlike, eyes.

“Did you? And you didn’t say hello?”

“You disappeared so quickly, I wasn’t even certain I’d seen you go into the Royal Oak.”

“Ah, yes. The Ferraras are very good sort of girls but they simply refused to bring me anything drinkable. It seems it’s acceptable to steal food, but not wine; Well, when bitten by such a thirst, what risks will not a man take?” He lowered the front legs of the chair. “Whom did you tell about seeing me?”

“No one.”

“No one?” He stood up, keeping the knife open in his hand. “Why don’t I believe you? You’d best do better than that. I have so many questions, and I don’t like it when people lie.”

“Questions? Regarding what?” Sophie did not want Clarence Knox to come any closer. Not because she was afraid, but he looked... unclean.

“Sicily? Specifically, Bronte in Sicily. Broderick found something there.”

“How do you know?”

“How do I know?” he asked with a giggle, pointing the knife toward himself. “I was there. How do you know?” The knife turned toward her, the light playing along the sharp edge.

“I don’t know anything.”

He came a step nearer. “Lying again, Sophie. No, don’t run. Stand very still.”

Something in his voice, some giggling menace, told her to obey—for the moment.

“You’re so pretty,” he said. “When I first saw you, I thought that Broderick was blind not to see how pretty you are. He talked a lot about your soul; he was always talking about souls.”

In a small voice, Sophie asked a question. “How did he die? It wasn’t an accident, was it?”

“Clever girl. Of course, they all believed it. He’d been so sick. What was a sick man doing tramping through such dangerous places? Easy to believe he’d lost his head and fallen, and if there was one more head wound than was obvious, well, that would be my cleverness against their stupidity.”

“So clever,” Sophie said evenly, nearly sick at this casual confession. “Yet he found it, not you.”

“That wasn’t cleverness,” Clarence Knox said, saliva spraying. “That was luck. One day when we were out scrambling over those filthy roads, it started to look like rain. Great black clouds blocking the sky. I wanted to go back. I hate thunder. He went on, leaving me to walk back by myself. That’s when he found it. He took shelter in a cave and there it was.”

“What? What did he find?”

“Treasure.” Clarence Knox’s eyes glittered as he remembered, glittered like the knife he balanced on his forefinger, a dirty bandage wrapped around the nail. “He showed me one thing, a broken thumb from a saint’s hand, as big as a real one. It was pure gold with an opal set in the nail. He said that the rest of the hand was there and that it was the least of all the treasure. I sold it to pay my passage for an eighth of its value. I’ll do better next time.”

“He showed you where the treasure was?” Sophie felt as if she stood trembling on the point of a compass needle. If it swung, if Clarence Knox’s mood changed, she’d fall.

“No, curse him. Curse him. He fell ill from getting soaked through. He said the cave was cold. He fell ill, fever burning him up. He talked, babbling of heaven and miracles and gold. The patron of the inn wanted to turn him out.
I
tended him;
I
sat by his bedside and listened.”

“You were his friend,” Sophie said softly, but he went on as if he hadn’t heard her.

“When he recovered, I asked him questions, but he pretended not to know what I meant. Even when I showed him the thumb, he pretended that he’d forgotten, that the fever had burned it out of his head. I knew he hadn’t. When he got better and started to walk around again, I followed him everywhere. One day, he went to a cave. I thought he’d led me to the treasure at last. I imagined what it must look like. All that gold. All those jewels. On the way back, I... he fell.”

She knew what he meant. “It was the wrong cave,” she said.

“Yes, curse him. What business had he leading me to the wrong cave? Him and his wild ideas. He wanted to give the treasure to the people of the island. He didn’t want to be like Elgin, raping treasures away from the people. The people? Peasants, living like pigs. What good will any of it do them? It will be mine. I will live like a god.”

The knife, carelessly toyed with, became a living thing, charged with malice. Clarence Knox pointed it at her. “You know where they are.”

“No. I don’t.”

“I searched his luggage. I searched the house he shared with that strumpet. I searched your house. Only afterward did I realize that the answer must be in the poems. He wrote no letters after he was ill. It must be in the poems.”

“But you have the poems. The ones that didn’t make it to the post.”

He looked surprised, drawn out of his obsession with the treasure. “You discovered that? Bet you don’t know how I got them. Why, my dear little wife brought them to me. You didn’t know I married Angelina while still at Rome, did you?”

Sophie shook her head. Would she have time to turn and run down the stairs? Could she open the front door before he could catch her? He seemed terribly comfortable with that knife. Could he throw it? All too paralyzing to picture the blade in her back and her life leaking away with her blood. And she would never see Dominic again, not even for one instant to tell him all that she felt.

The thought of Dominic drove the fear out that held her impotent. Though now certain that the Ferrara girls were somewhere in the house, Sophie didn’t know where they were. Would they stop her? Did they know Clarence Knox had been driven mad by greed? Did they care?

Clarence Knox took another step toward her. “I’ve read the poems, Sophie. Broderick couldn’t write a decent line, but he was clever. There must be some secret hidden in the poems. A code. You’re going to tell me what it is.”

“I don’t know ... wait! There was one thing that struck me as odd.”

“Yes? Yes?”

“I can’t explain. I shall have to show you. Do you have the poems here?”

He couldn’t help himself. He turned his head a fraction to look at the satchel beside his chair.

Instantly, Sophie ran and jumped onto the banister, praying to the gods of fools and children that she’d lost none of her old skill. She felt the wind pulling at her hair as she rode down, unable to restrain a whoop of triumph. As she landed, she stumbled, losing a precious second. She ran to the door, fumbling at the locks.

She’d opened it, pulling it with all her strength when Clarence Knox threw himself against it, slamming it closed when she’d been only inches from freedom. He seized her hair in his fist and banged her head hard on the oaken panel. Dazed from the second blow in less than twelve hours, Sophie felt her bones dissolve as she slid down to the floor.

She did not lose consciousness. She could see through the shadows before her eyes and hear despite the buzzing in her ears, but she couldn’t make her body
respond to any command. The Ferrara sisters came running in, curious about the noise. Though they spoke
Italian, Sophie heard it as if in English.

“What have you done, you madman?” Lucia demanded, throwing herself down beside Sophie.

“Don’t talk to him like that,” Angelina said. She turned to her husband with a warm smile, touching him caressingly. “Are you all right, my darling?”

“Shut up,” he said, throwing off her hand. “She’s not hurt,” he said, panting like a man who’d run a long way.

“No?” Lucia spread open the fingers of the hand that had been exploring the back of Sophie’s head. “What do you call this? Marinara sauce?”

“Oh, the poor lady. We’ll take care of her.”

“So he can put her to the question? You’re as crazy as he is. Don’t you think they’ll be looking for her?”

“They won’t find her before she tells me what I want to know. Wake her up,” Clarence ordered.

Angelina looked at her husband with great love shining in her beautiful dark eyes. “You should rest. I’ll make gnocchi. You like my gnocchi; it’s the best in Rome. You haven’t had a bite since last night.”

“I don’t want anything. Leave me alone.” He hardly looked at her, staring constantly at Sophie, watching for any sign of life. Angelina shook her head and went to kneel down beside her sister.

“She doesn’t look so good. I don’t like her color,” Lucia whispered.

Angelina propped Sophie against her shoulder. Sophie moaned when she was moved and the pain seemed to bring her back to her senses. She blinked against the light that seemed so bright.

“Is she awake?” Clarence came closer, standing over them.

“She’s coming around. Lucia, get some water.”

“Yes, bring the bucket. Some water sloshed over her will wake her up,” Clarence said eagerly.

Lucia stood up. “You’re both crazy,” she said, but went off to do as she was told.

Sophie wanted the man to go away. His presence was like a suffocating cloud of fear. She couldn’t think clearly and she associated this more with him than with the two blows on her head. She could feel blood trickling onto her neck. “The poems,” she said in a whisper. “The answer is in the poems.”

“Do you hear, Angelina? I was right. What about them? What about the poems?”

“Can’t tell you. Show you.”

“I’ll get them.” He spun around and sprinted for the stairs, taking them in great leaps.

“Let me help you up,” Angelina said in her ear. “Show him what he wants to know. I promise you’ll be safe after that.”

“He’ll kill me.”

“No, no. I won’t let him. We’ll put you back into that nice room and before we leave for Italy, I’ll tell someone where you are.”

“Here’s the water. Where’s the crazy man?” In one hand Lucia carried a heavy oaken bucket, banded with blackened steel. In the other, she held a tin tankard. “Oh, she’s better.”

Sophie still leaned heavily on Angelina. “Help me,” she said. She raised her eyes to Lucia. “Help me, please.” Her gaze traveled down to the bucket.

Clarence Knox came clattering down the steps, still moving fast, holding the satchel in his right hand, the knife in his left. “I keep dropping the damn things.” He looked around and saw a round table against one wall. He dragged it out into the middle of the room, scratching the finish on the wooden floor. He threw back the flap of the satchel and upended it. Pages covered with Sophie’s handwriting cascaded out, some falling on the floor.

Clarence Knox threw aside the satchel and bent, gasping, to pick up the fallen sheets.

Lucia dropped the tankard and started to lift the bucket up in order to throw it. Then she shrieked, dropping the bucket. Water flew everywhere. Lucia stood, staring down as if fascinated by her left hand. The handle of a knife protruded there as if it had appeared by magic. She screamed again, piercingly.

“No tricks,” Clarence Knox snarled. He strode over to her, his breathing loud in the sudden silence. Without hesitation, he jerked the knife from the wound. Lucia sank to her knees, clasping her wrist as blood welled from between her fingers.

“You. Bring her to the table. Show me the answer, Sophie.”

“No!” Angelina left Sophie and ran to her sister. After one glance, she turned on her husband and slapped him before he could come on guard. “You are insane!” Her hands curled into claws and she attacked him, trying to reach his eyes.

He fended her off, seeming to forget about the knife still between two of his fingers. It fell, point downward into the wood. He and Angelina reeled back and forth, slipping in the water, tripping over Lucia.

Sophie, standing but swaying like a sapling in a wind, became aware that someone was pounding on the door. It seemed very far away, but the constant sound began to disturb her with a sense that this was somehow very important. Slowly, still as if her body had to translate every message, she began to work the lock. Either it was very stiff or she was growing weaker.

Even before the door swung open, she knew who she would see.

“Sophie!” He seized her as she began to fall.

“Dominic.” She smiled at him as she would have smiled at a dear memory. “I love you. Did I tell you that already?”

“You’re hurt.”

“Only slightly...”

A shattering shriek rang out, louder than Lucia’s when she’d been wounded, comprised of all the misery and loss in the world. “Clarence! Clarence!”

Angelina, on her knees in her clinging wet dress, pulled at the buff waistcoat of her husband. He lay very still, only his head lolling.

“He’s dead,” Lucia said dully. “He fell on his knife.”

“No, no. It’s there. Look. There’s not a mark on his body.” She pointed with a shaking hand to where the handle lay, snapped from the blade which lay some inches further along. Yet Clarence Knox lay dead.

“Then the evil spirits came for him,” Lucia declared. “You are well out of it. He was bad, that one. A very bad poet.”

* * * *

Sophie awoke in a strangely familiar room. Her hair lay over her shoulder in a neat braid which, oddly enough, ached. The coverlet was drawn to her chin and her arms lay outside it, neatly clad in a white lawn nightdress—as was the rest of her, she assured herself after a peek.

Struggling up, for someone had tucked the sheets in too tight, Sophie reached out for the carafe of water and began to pour herself a glass, but her hand trembled so that she was afraid she’d drown herself.

A lean brown hand reached out and took the carafe. “May I help you with that?”

“Dominic? This is unconventional of you. Alone in my bedroom.” She sipped the water, feeling as though she‘d never tasted it before.