The Silver Devil (50 page)

But
there was no greed in the almost ascetic face, nothing in the beautiful voice
but a faint sharpening of excitement, and the overbright eyes burned with
eagerness rather than rapacity. Amerighi was too adult, too controlled, to be
betrayed by open boasting, but his exhilaration was that of a child showing its
prized possessions to other children. He had been too much alone, I thought
compassionately. The duke's excitement thrilled from him, lending a curious
waiting atmosphere to the meal, but I had the oddest feeling that no one was
really listening to what was being said—that the stream of words itself counted
for more than its import.

At
last, when the meal was over, Amerighi sat back in his chair, his eyes brightly
mocking.

"You
have been very patient with a man obsessed." He smiled faintly. "To
hear of my collection is nothing—the pleasure is all mine in the recounting—but
if you saw some part of it, you might understand my passion better."

"We
have eyes, Cousin. The fruits of your labors are all around us."

Amerighi
snapped his fingers. "This is paltry stuff, I promise you! What I prize
most, I do not keep in common sight. In the next room, for example, is locked
the thing I value more than anything I have told you of till now, and no man
knows I have it—not even those it most concerns to know."

"What,
have you stolen someone else's treasure?" There was a veiled insult in
Domenico's voice.

"Who,
I?" The back of Amerighi's hand went to his mouth, and I saw him bite his
knuckles, but he still smiled. "No, I guard it against thieves I know would
steal it if they could. But you shall see it and judge if my care is not
warranted."

"You
honor me." Domenico yawned. "But I am a poor judge. I can see
beauty" — his eyes lingered on my face—"only in one thing at a
time."

Amerighi's
curving brows lifted. "I do not ask you to judge its beauty, cousin, only
its value. You said earlier, as I remember, that only that which is prized to
the full has any true value—I would like your confirmation that this treasure
of mine is worth the store I set by it."

Domenico
shrugged. "As you will."

"Then,
lady," Amerighi turned to me, "will you go with my cousin into the
gallery there? The servants should have set everything in readiness—I will
bring my treasure to you there. I crave your pardon if I am an unpracticed host,"
he added dryly, "but I am a creature of habit, and my solitude has been a
long habit."

I
rose to my feet and murmured something as his lips, dry and warm, lingered on
the palms of my hands. As he straightened, Amerighi's eyes traveled past me and
widened slightly; but before I could turn, Domenico had come up behind me and
his fingers gripped mine hard.

"Felicia,
come."

Unaccountably
I shivered and saw a smile, half-sly, half-amused, settle on Amerighi's face.

"Felicia?
Is that what Marcello is called when he is not Marcello?"

I
looked back from the archway, and his expression was grave again. "Yes,
Your Grace."

He
nodded. "It fits you," he said quietly and vanished out of the circle
of candlelight.

There
were lamps, silver and glass, burning the whole length of the gallery, making
it nearly as bright as day. The moment we were out of the duke's earshot,
Domenico gripped me by the shoulders and spun me around to face him.

"You
are grown great with my monkish cousin."

I
answered in a tight voice, "Why, should I spurn his courtesy? Heaven help
your embassy, then!"

"Take
care it does not go beyond courtesy," he retorted and released me with a
brutal little shake.

I
clutched savagely at the edges of the blue cloak. I knew that this was only a
spurt of the anger he had had to hide from Amerighi, but the grimness on his
face was frightening. I said hesitantly, "Your Grace..." but he cut
me short.

"You
cannot call me that any longer. I am not Duke of Cabria until I have won Cabria
back again. You must force your stubborn tongue around the syllables of my name
or else leave me nameless as well as all the rest."

"I
cannot call you by anything but your title!"

"You
must learn. I am not the only duke here, remember— unless you call me by my
name, I and my cousin will answer you in a perpetual chorus."

"Your
Grace..."

"Domenico.
The word is not poisoned. Say it."

I
shook my head. I was trembling, and I stared at the floor to avoid his gaze,
fiercely studying the black and white slabs at my feet.

At
last he said dangerously, "Would you rather beg the freedom of my cousin,
then? He would be glad to have you so familiar, I do not doubt, and spare you
this confusion."

"I
could not even if I wished to—I do not know his name, except his surname."

"It
is Niccolo," a grave voice said from the doorway, "and I beg you to
make use of it if it pleases you. I, too, have been wondering how to avoid this
throng of graces. Do you dislike my cousin's name, lady?"

"No.
But it would be wrong for me to use it." I could not say that uttering his
name would be the symbol of my last defeat, an admission of the love he would
despise if he knew it. Instead I said, "Or yours either, Your Grace. What
is fitting that I could call you?"

He
came forward, his charming smile lighting his cadaverous face. "You can
'my lord' me if you wish," he responded dryly. "I think my
consequence will bear it."

I
laughed, and beside me Domenico drew a sharp breath. After a moment he said
lightly, "Is that the treasure you spoke of, Cousin?"

"Yes."
Niccolo Amerighi's fingertips caressed the carved surface of the silver casket
he held. "In a moment I will show it to you—forgive me your poor
entertainment this evening." His gaze swept the empty gallery. "It
compares but ill with all I hear of the revels at Fidena. You must blame my
monkishness."

Domenico's
fingers flexed slightly, but he made no other movement; the elder man watched
him a moment and then laughed.

"I
will tease you no longer. Will you hear my decision on the request you made to
me?"

The
bright head came up sharply, and a hiss like a cat's broke from Domenico.

For
an instant Amerighi gazed as though hypnotized at the blazing beauty
confronting him, then he said in an unemotional voice, "I find I am
strangely loath to do you favors; I will not lend you my army out of love, but
I will give you the chance to win it from me. What will you hazard for
it?"

Domenico's
tautness relaxed and he shrugged, the smile on his lips a sneer of
self-mockery. "Cousin, I am indebted to you for the clothes I stand up
in!"

"And
it irks you to be indebted to me."

Domenico
gave a small, choking laugh. "Faith, yes!"

"So
you will not go to hazard to regain what you have lost?"

"What
will you take?" The lips smiled, but the black eyes were bitter. "My
stable? Or the Great Seal of Cabria? I have nothing else of value."

"You
underestimate your worth."

"I
know your army to be worth more than my whole estate." Domenico's voice
frayed, and I saw the tight rein he was keeping on his temper. "Must I be
plainer?"

"But
what is worth, my dear cousin? I might ask half your dukedom as a stake or set
my army against a piece of silk ribbon. The army would be unchanged. But it
would be worth as much, or as little, as I would demand and you could give.
Suppose I set a value on something of yours that would counterpoise the worth
of my army?"

Domenico
took a step forward, and I saw him start to draw off his ring.

"I
propose that we each stake what the other deems most valuable." Amerighi's
face was judicially calm. "In your case you will require me to stake my
army; in my case—what pleases me."

"And
on what are we to hazard?"

"On
a game of chess." I had to bite my lips to contain my hysterical laughter
as Amerighi answered. "Black against white, a game of subtle strategy not
unlike the one we are playing now. It should appeal to you, Cousin—you were
taught to play when you were a child, were you not?"

Domenico
nodded. There was a white look around his mouth, and Amerighi smiled.

"I
thought so. And for my part, I have played whenever I had the means and the
opponents, since I was a boy. I played against my sisters until they married
and left my father's palace— but no matter. You are agreed that chess shall be
our game?"

A
little of the nightmare look faded. "It will serve."

"Good."
An expression—it might have been triumph—flickered over Amerighi's face and
left it calm again, faintly cunning, intent. "Then you Will play for my
soldiers, to win back your dukedom for you. And I..."he broke off.

"Well?"
It was curt with a boy's impatience.

"I
will play you for your mistress. She is yours, I take it?"

I
thought the silence would last forever; I know I swayed where I stood. When
Domenico spoke at last there was a queer tremor of laughter in his voice.

"Certainly,
Cousin! What should she be else? I bought her from her fat hog of a brother for
thirty pieces of silver. It seemed apt," he added sardonically.

"A
bargain." Amerighi's hazel-green gaze ran over me.

"A
very fair bargain. I got her for the price of the brother's deafness when my
men brought her away, and his dumbness thereafter. Either he did not know what
a treasure he possessed, or being her brother, could find no use for her this
side of damnation."

The
light, cruel words jerked Amerighi's speculative gaze away from me with a look
that was furtive, almost alarmed. "Then you are content to stake
her?"

"Content,
no, but I will do it." The white hand flashed out with the speed of a
snake striking and gripped Amerighi's pale fingers. "Now I cannot change
my mind without perdition."

"True,
you cannot." Amerighi looked down at the clasped hands. "And neither
can I."

I
was not listening as they talked quietly together; my thoughts were circling
with a sickened, dazed fascination around the abominable fact that I had been
bought. Bought like a heifer or a mare to fill the Duke of Cabria's bed. No
wonder Antonio had not searched for me when I disappeared. No wonder he had
seemed to be asking my forgiveness the night he was brought to the Palazzo
della Raffaelle—he must have thought I knew then, my loving brother who told me
he had made a fine profit in his bargain with the stranger.

And
now it was too late for the knowledge to make any difference, for Domenico was
weary enough to let me go. I might have held him for a night or two longer, but
the Duke of Ferrenza's private army was more important to him now than any
woman, and all I could do for him was to acquiesce and let the luck of a game
decide my future—whether I stayed with him on sufferance until he married his
Savoyard duchess or lay with the Duke of Ferrenza for his sake and kept his
bargain for him.

Amerighi
had put down the silver casket on a writing desk by the wall and was scribbling
rapidly on a piece of paper. Domenico's fair head was bent, watching him, but
as I looked, his eyes lifted to my face, and I caught a glimpse of an
extraordinary blaze in them. The white lids drooped again swiftly, but I was
shaking as though I had seen into hell.

Niccolo
straightened and smiled his charming smile as though he had done nothing out of
the ordinary. "My deed of gift, Cousin; yours, if you win the game. It
gives you the command of all my forces, to be maintained at my cost, until you
are reseated in Cabria. Does this suffice you?"

"Amply."
The fair face was like a mask. "Do you also require a deed of gift?"

"I
will trust your promise. The lady is here: If I beat you, I have only to reach
out and take—the White Queen." He finished with an odd note in his voice.

"Well,
it is done!" Domenico turned sharply away. "Let us make an end of
this quickly."

"Wait!"
Amerighi's thin hand checked him. "I have not yet shown you my treasure of
treasures."

Domenico
halted, curiosity warring with impatience in his face. "Later, good
Cousin. I would be done with this folly."

"I
will not play until you have seen this." Amerighi picked up the casket and
put it into Domenico's hands.

With
tightened lips, Domenico flicked the catch, put back the lid, and drew out the
casket's contents. It was a sheaf of papers, slightly yellowing, the corners
dog-eared as though it had been much read, closely written in a cramped,
somehow hasty hand.

Amerighi's
voice quivered when he spoke. "You do not recognize the hand?"

Domenico
shook his head, scanning the lines. "No." "Read on, then, and
you will."

The
silver-fair head bent as Domenico's eyes ran cursorily over the writing, and
suddenly he froze, expression draining from his face, leaving it blank as a
dead man's. Then slowly, as though he feared the movement might break some
spell, he raised his head and looked unbelievingly into Amerighi's fanatically
bright eyes.