Thief of Hearts (20 page)

May 28, 1862 Rome

"There's no need to come down; we can say good-bye to you here."

"No, Aiden, I want to. Just let me get my shawl. I... excuse me." Brodie was between her and the chair; she sidled around him nervously, glancing only for a second into his still, watchful face. She got her lace mantle from the back of the chair and then went ahead of him, O'Dunne, and Billy Flowers down the staircase to the ground floor of Casa Rosa, their new Roman villa. At the door to the dark, cobblestoned courtyard she paused. The
diligence
they'd hired stood ready by the gates, the big horses stamping. Rather than engage a coachman, the three men would take turns driving it themselves. It was nearly midnight. Barring mishaps, they would arrive in Naples the day after tomorrow.

"Well, Anna," said O'Dunne, taking her hands and smiling down at her. "We'll see you on Friday. Early in the morning, I should think. Enjoy Rome while we're gone, won't you?"

"Yes, I will." But she knew she would stay right here, waiting and worrying. Everything had been said; there was nothing left to do but kiss Aiden on the cheek and wish him godspeed. "You'll be careful, won't you? Not that anything's going to happen, but—"

"Yes, of course. Nothing will happen, and we'll take good care of ourselves. Now we'd best be off."

"Cheer-o, Mrs. Balfour," said Billy, making her a sort of bow. "Don't you worry about nuffing, I'll tyke care o' these two."

"Thank you, Mr. Flowers." Impulsively she reached for his hand. He muttered "Gor" or something like it, and blushed to the roots of his sandy hair.

Anna gazed into space for a second or two, empty-headed, composing her features. Then she faced Brodie. "Good-bye," she said levelly. Again she extended her hand. The sudden hard pressure of his fingers forced her to stop staring at his necktie and look into his eyes. They searched her face, and she grew afraid that he would see too much. And yet she didn't know herself what she was feeling at that moment.

"It doesn't do any good to worry," he said softly. "We'll find what we find."

"I'm not worried. You'll find nothing."

She watched the corners of his mouth curl in a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "My brother was a lucky son of a bitch," he murmured, for her ears only. "Good-bye, Annie." He let go of her hand and walked away.

The three men climbed into the coach, Aiden in the driver's seat, and a second later the heavy, ungainly-looking vehicle clattered out of the gate in the high stone wall. A stoop-shouldered footman closed the iron doors behind them. Anna waited in the doorway until she could hear nothing but midnight silence. Then she turned and climbed the stairs to the villa.

The drawing room on the main floor, the
piano nobile
, was so richly furnished, it was difficult to feel comfortable among all the objects d'art, antique furniture, the priceless paintings and tapestries. The house cost a fortune to lease, but Aiden had taken it anyway, canceling the rooms in the public pensione Nicholas had reserved in the Piazza di Spagna, because of the villa's walled privacy. Here there was no one but discreet and well-paid servants to wonder why these inglesi newlyweds had brought a friend along on their honeymoon, or why the groom shared quarters with a hulking cockney instead of his bride.

Anna sat down beside a beaded, tasseled lamp and took up her book. Sleep, she knew, was impossible. After a few minutes, she knew reading was too. She'd told Brodie she wasn't worried, but if he believed that he was a fool. They'd been in Rome for three days, dining in trattorie, sightseeing, looking at pictures in galleries, pretending to be lovers, but always shadowed or accompanied by Aiden Or Billy Flowers. As the time drew closer for Brodie's meeting with the mysterious "Greeley," her nerves had stretched tighter and tighter. She'd demanded, wheedled, and finally begged Alden to let her go with them, but he was immovable. Nicholas wouldn't have taken her, he insisted; he'd have left her in Rome, saying he had some sort of business in Naples, and kept her as far away from Greeley and the
Morning Star
as he possibly could. Anna's answer, of course, was that it was all nonsense, that all his precautions were pointless because there was no meeting planned, no Jourdaine cruiser anchored outside the bay, and no illegal transfer of money and warship in the offing. O'Dunne had agreed that she was undoubtedly right, and gone right along with his plans.

She closed the book and held it against her chest, staring into space. Magdalena, the middle-aged woman who kept house for the absent conte who lived here during the season, poked her head in the door. "Permesso, signora, osso aiutarla?"

"No, grazie, Magdalena, I'm fine. Go to bed, why don't you. It's late."

"Si, signora, for you too. Good night."

"Buona sera."

They smiled at each other. Each knew only a little of the other's language, but between them they managed to communicate very well.

Anna heaved a sigh and dropped her head back against the chair. She kept her eyes open, because so often when she closed them she saw Brodie's face. He'd been true to his promise, he'd kept his distance since the night of the Middaughs' visit. She thought of the moment when he'd told her of his intention, and of the bewildering flood of disappointment that had been her first reaction. Reason had returned since then, thank God; now she felt nothing but relief that he'd chosen to treat her the way a gentleman treats a lady. But honesty wouldn't let her hide forever from the truth that, at least for that one evening, she'd wanted very much for him to treat her the way a man treats a woman.

She stood and began to pace the Turkish carpet in front of a huge rococo desk. How foolish! How dangerous! Not to mention indecent, and against everything she'd been reared to believe was right and proper. More selfishly, she was afraid of the pain that some hasty, furtive entanglement with Mr. Brodie would cause after he went away, which he would do, no matter what happened in Naples, in a matter of days. For although he might enter into such a liaison easily, she would not, and she would suffer for it for the rest of her life. Thus she was grateful to him for putting things right, back into an honorable perspective. It was something she wasn't sure she, as extraordinary as it seemed, would have been able to do.

But what an odd and shocking business it was. She, Anna Jourdaine Balfour, actually in danger of losing control of emotions she'd always kept in such tight check, indeed, emotions she hadn't even known she could feel, or at least not with this intensity. But here honesty had its limits; with unconscious haste she drew a curtain between herself and the possibilities this acknowledgment threatened to uncover.
Nicholas
had been her lover. The only one she would ever have. Thoughts of his brother dishonored him, dishonored her. It was futile and stupid and perverse to allow unchaste fantasies to cloud the clarity of her judgment. She renounced them. She stood still in the center of the room, hands clenched at her sides, and made a vow. She would wait for Aiden and Billy and Brodie to return with their empty news. After that she would say good-bye to Mr. Brodie, and she would never think of him again.

Eight bells. Midnight. He would be late, if there was anything to be late for. The hollow sound of another pair of footsteps came to him through the fog. Brodie tensed, but the slight figure that materialized out of the mist was only that of a prostitute. He shook his head at her suggestion, shook her sharp fingers off his arm, and kept walking. The lights were dim and infrequent on the ships, yachts, launches, and steamers docked in the berths to his right. To his left were the same dark, dingy warehouses and shuttered harbor offices that lined the wharves of every port he'd ever been in. Up ahead he could hear singing; seconds later a knot of drunken seamen wove harmlessly around him. Lights twinkled on the oily water close to the dock; farther out it was all swirling gray mist. He passed Pier 11 and slowed his steps. O'Dunne had said whoever was to meet him at midnight would be waiting at the twelfth.

The slip was dark. And empty. No, now he could see a dinghy tied up, ludicrously small in the wide berth. Brodie took out his tobacco and rolled a cigarette. If anybody asks, he thought dryly, Nick just took it up. Marriage drove him to it.

He blew smoke into the fog and thought of his brother's widow. If Nick turned out to have been a thief, he wondered who it would hurt more, himself or her. Ah, Annie, Annie. The game they were playing was almost over. Would she come with them when O'Dunne took him back to England, back to prison? Or would she stay in Italy and follow later, alone? Either way, only days remained of the time given to him to be with her. He crushed his cigarette out under his boot heel. How would they say he…Nick had died? A fever? That was vague enough. They'd "buried" him in a Roman cemetery. The grieving widow would go home to the comfort of her loving family. But she wouldn't stay a widow for long, he'd wager. If her loveliness didn't snare a new husband quickly, her money would. Which of them had snared Nick?

Footsteps sounded behind him. He whirled. Two men, sailors. Moving quietly, unagressively.

Brodie kept his hands in the open.

"Waiting for someone?" The accent was American.

He said one word. "Greeley."

The sailor nodded, satisfied, and began to untie the dinghy.

So it was all true. Brodie closed his eyes just for a second and let it wash over him, all the anger and regret.

The sailors rowed while he sat aft, watching the wharf recede. No stars tonight. When they were too far from shore to see the lights, one of the sailors lit a lantern and set it in the bottom of the boat, to illuminate the compass he opened and put next to it. Brodie wondered how far they had to row, but didn't ask.

Not far. Out of the mist to the port side soon came the muted dinging of a bell. The sailor who had lit the lantern called out a gruff hello. An answering call, close by, from the direction of the bell. Then he saw lights, and all at once they were alongside the great prow, so close he could see in the flickering lantern glow the faint, painted-over letters, N, R, O, M, as they rowed aft, toward the stern. No more
Morning Star
, then. What would she be in a few days, the
Savannah
? The
Charleston
, the
Baton Rouge
? He spat over the gunwale into the water.

When they were amidships, someone heaved a line down, then a rope ladder. The sailors maneuvered the dinghy close and tied up, knotting the painter through a ring in the big ship's counter. One of them nodded to Brodie, and he groped his way to the ladder and started to climb. They didn't follow. He hoped that meant his stay on board was intended to be short.

He saw that she was a square-rigged cruiser, fast and long, so long they'd only been able to fit her with armor plating amidships and still keep her seaworthy; some eighty feet of her hull at either end was unprotected. Anna had told him she could do thirteen knots, more with her full suit of sails. He swung his legs over the rail and dropped to the deck. Two more seamen were waiting for him. Nobody spoke. He fell in line between them as they hustled him past the quarterdeck toward the main companionway hatch. By lantern light he could see her suns, or some of them. Reckoning quickly, he estimated twenty seven-inch smooth-bore muzzle-loaders, two smaller smooth-bores, and a couple of twenty-pound breech-loaders. The
Morning Star
was one dangerous merchantship.

Down the ladder they went, heels clanging on the iron rails. Single file, they traversed a narrow corridor to a closed door at the end. The seaman in front rapped on it with his knuckles. "Come in!" came from inside. Squeezing past the sailor, Brodie went in, and the door shut behind him.

He was afraid to say, "Hello, Greeley," to the man who got up from his desk and came toward him with an outstretched hand. What if Greeley was only the middleman, or what if he was sick in bed, or dead, and this was his replacement? Then he saw the insignia on the gray uniform, ending his dilemma. "Hello, Captain," he said, shaking hands.

"Mr. Balfour." The captain? Captain Greeley was a young man, younger than Brodie, but with thinning hair and a tired face. He didn't smile and he shook Brodie's hand with a noticeable lack of warmth. "I almost didn't recognize you without the beard."

Another question answered: Nick and this man had met. It must be Greeley. Brodie passed a hand over his bare chin and made a wry expression. "Bride's orders."

"Oh yes, I'd forgotten. You're on your honeymoon, aren't you?" There was an unpleasant barb hidden behind the captain's aristocratic Southern drawl. "Will you have a seat? Something to drink?"

"No, thanks. I'd like to get this over with as soon as possible." Whatever "this" was.

"Yes, I imagine you would." Captain Greeley's lips curled faintly with distaste. He went to his desk and opened a drawer, reached in with both hands, and brought out a heavy canvas sack. "You'll want to count it, I'm sure." He slung the sack to the desk top and moved the lamp closer, then stood back to make room for Brodie.

He went forward slowly, dreading what he would find. But he already knew. He loosened the drawstring and shook the contents bundled Italian bank notes, thousands of them onto the top of the desk. For a long time he just stared. Ah, Nick, he thought. He felt like crying. Damn you to hell. Why did you go and do this? He began to stuff the money back into the bag.

"Aren't you going to count it?"

"No." He pulled the string tight and turned to face the surprised captain. "Anything else?" he asked coldly.

Greeley sent him a narrow look, as if he were reevaluating some preconception. "I guess not," he conceded finally. "But I'm surprised—I thought you'd want to celebrate."

"Celebrate?"

"Like the last time. When we closed the bargain."

"Ah. Maybe another time."

"I doubt that there'll be another time."

"Why not?"

"We only got out of Majorca by the skin of our teeth, for one thing."

Majorca. So that's where they'd outfitted the
Morning Star
and turned her into an armored frigate. It was one of the things O'Dunne had wanted him to find out without asking.