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She sighed. 'I'll stay with you if you like,' she said aloud, 'but I won't marry you! I won't have it said my father sold me to you to gain a better deal for Beaumont International in Italy. Why, he's even discussed it with
your mother!'

Domenico actually laughed. 'I doubt she understood what he was talking about,' he reassured her. '
She
had a far more interesting piece of information to impart to me,
piccina
! Something I wonder you didn't think fit to tell me yourself!'

She put her hand over his, opening his fingers one by one until she could stand away from him. So intent was she on what she was doing that she missed the tightening of his mouth as he watched her until he gave her a little shake to make her look up.

'I have been very patient with you,' he warned her, 'and not only because you are destined to be the latest item in the Manzu collection, but you will marry me just the same,
cara
, whatever foolish ideas your father has sown in your beautiful head. And do you know why you will marry me?' She shook her head, fascinated by the way his mouth moved when he talked. 'You will marry me because that is the only way I can be happy. You would not have me unhappy, would you?'

'Alessandra '

'I forbid you to mention her name again! Alessandra will fulfil her ambition of giving herself to God and will be much happier than she ever could be with me. Whereas you, my little prisoner, will give yourself to me!'

'Will I?' Her voice trembled a little. 'Oh, Domenico, you can't want to marry me! We talked about it before and we decided against it '

'When did we talk about it?' he demanded.

'Before,' she repeated. 'You explained about how you would have to leave me behind when you went to the Vatican '

'Because I thought you were a Protestant like your father, but you are not, are you? Or so my mother tells me! Why didn't you tell me that? Did you think it would be of no interest to me?'

'I didn't know. I thought it was because I'm
me!'

'Why should that make any difference?'

She found it hard to look him in the eyes. 'You have a name and traditions. Your mother '

'My mother,' he cut her off, 'was worried at first that you were the product of a broken marriage, but only be-

cause she was afraid it might have fashioned your attitude to being married yourself. She asked many questions about your mother and you told her enough for her to know that your mother had never considered marrying again as your father had. She took it upon herself to ask your father why this was so. It was he who told her she was a Catholic, and it seemed likely, if your mother is Catholic so are you!'

Deborah pursed up her lips. 'That doesn't make me any more suitable as a wife for you!' she declared.

'No,' he agreed with a promptness that nettled her, 'but you have to admit it has its conveniences. There will be no arguments as to how the children are brought up, and the only reason I had for delaying the date of our wedding has now been removed. I would not have wished you to marry a Catholic knowing nothing of our faith, but now I can marry you with a clear conscience! You know all the drawbacks already and we have nothing else to wait for!'

'But, Domenico ' She felt quite breathless at the possibility he held out before her. 'Domenico, don't say any more unless you mean it!'

His hands were very gentle. 'You have your witnesses all about you,' he told her. 'We both know you'll marry me in the end. Won't you tell me so now?'

With a full heart she gave him the victory. 'Yes, please, I'll marry you,' she said, and she reached up and kissed him on the lips. 'I'll even accept my father's dowry if you say I must '

'Certainly not! You bring me the talents of your hands and the gift of yourself, what more could I want,
carissima
? You may safely leave your father to me. He and I understand one another very well. I have already told him it is
you
I am marrying and not your family '

'He wouldn't like that! Did he say he'd stay for the wedding?' She made a face at her own thoughts. 'Has he asked Agnes to come along?'

'We were agreed that Agnes would be decidedly
de trop
in the next few days. She has nothing to do with you!'

Deborah looked at him with awed respect. 'And you told Father so?'

'I did not have to,' Domenico replied, bending the truth without a moment's hesitation. 'Your mother will be arriving tomorrow and you are not to worry about her either. They will manage very well together, and so shall we. They are here as your parents, and as your parents they will be welcome, but our wedding day will be your day and for once they will both have to play second fiddle to you. This is your wedding, my love, and nobody is going to take it away from you,' He smiled and the light in his eyes made her gasp. 'Make the most of it,
mia moglie
, for afterwards you will be my prisoner for life, and what is mine I keep!'

Her lips trembled into a smile. 'I know that!' she dared to tease him a little. Hadn't he said before,
I saw you, I wanted you, and I took you. Isn't that enough for you?
And she had loved him then and longed for it to be true, and now it was. 'That's all I want too,' she said.

He cupped her face in his hand. 'I never thought you'd admit it,' he said. 'Was it so difficult?'

She wanted to tell him that there had never been any doubt about her feelings for him, that it wasn't that at all, but that she still didn't know what to do about her father and the use he would try to make of her as soon as she was Domenico's wife. Somehow she was going to have to prevent that, and she hadn't the first idea as to how she was going to do it.

Mary came forward and kissed Deborah warmly on the cheek. 'Good for you!' she congratulated her. 'And now that that's all settled, are you coming home with us?'

Deborah met her laughing eyes bravely. 'I'm going with Domenico,' she said, and she didn't mind their knowing laughter one bit. 'He may be a bully,' she added, 'but I like him '

'Like him!' Mary exclaimed. 'You're head over heels in love with him!'

Deborah smiled a secret smile and put her hand back into the Mouth of Truth. 'Yes, I love him,' she said, and she buried her face in his neck, joining in his gentle laughter at her expense. 'Do you love me?' she asked, spreading her hand along his arm.

By way of answer he put his hand into the Mouth above hers. 'Yes, I love you,
ragazza mia.
Do you believe me now?'

She nodded her head, the colour storming up her cheeks. 'But I have loved you longer,' she confessed with a shy dignity that delighted him. 'I loved you from that very first evening. I knew I would never escape you then—even if I never saw you again.'

'What happened?' Mary inquired, much interested.

Deborah found herself laughing. 'He kissed me,' she said, and wondered a little that that was all it amounted to. 'I fell into his arms trying to get out of the bedroom window—and he kissed me!'

'Hmm,' said Mary, 'it sounds to me as though you were asking for trouble! You'd better go with him now before he changes his mind!' And she gathered up her John with a loving look and led Patty and Jerry firmly out of the church. 'Don't forget to let us know when the wedding is!' she added over her shoulder to Domenico. 'We shall all want to be there!'

'I shall tell you myself,' he promised.

'Good.' Mary smiled and winked at him. 'Perhaps Patty and I will get to kiss the groom?'

'Why not?' Domenico indulged her, his eyes on Deborah. 'It will be my pleasure.'

'And Deborah's?' Patty put in dryly.

Deborah threaded her fingers through Domenico's. 'Why not?' she shrugged. 'I shall have John and Jerry to kiss me, won't I?'

Domenico's fingers tightened on hers. 'Make the most of it,
cava
, for after that you will owe all your kisses to me!'

'A jealous husband,' Patty remarked with disapproval, 'is always the worst kind.'

But Deborah only laughed. It wasn't Domenico's jealousy she was afraid of, in fact she found it rather reassuring that he should guard her so closely. She had no fears on that score, for she would be as proud of his ancient name as ever he could be. No, she was frightened that the one thing he would not be able to forgive was anybody else making use of that name for their own purposes. Alessandra would be justified in her worst fears that Deborah could only bring disgrace to Domenico in the eyes of his friends.

When her friends had gone, she turned towards him, her eyes dark with emotion. 'Domenico, my father '

'Hush, my love,' he answered her. 'Your father is your father and there is nothing more to be said about him. Don't you trust me to look after you?'

Of course she trusted
him
! It wasn't that at all! But how did one begin to explain that it was one's own father one didn't trust? And she didn't trust him at all!

'You don't understand!' she sighed. 'I suppose he has to stay in Rome for the wedding?'

Domenico frowned, his mouth settling into a stubborn line. 'He is your father and our guest,
cara
, and you will treat him as such.' His expression softened as he looked at her. 'He will not be here for ever,
piccina!
Come, it's time we were going home to relieve my mother's mind that I have you safely back in my care! Parents have the right to worry about their children's happiness, though sometimes one might wish they would do it more quietly! My mother is very fond of you and she was in tears when she thought you were gone. I think she knows you hold my heart in your hands and would wish you to be careful of it! Shall we go and reassure her?'

Deborah said nothing, but she followed him out of the portico of the church and back into the street, her hand held close in his. It seemed to matter not at all to Domenico that it was raining again and that they would be drenched before they had gone a few yards.

'You should have brought an umbrella with you,' she smiled up at him, putting her worries firmly behind her.

'I should have done, but I had other things on my mind!' he retorted. 'If I have you back what can a little rain do to me?'

'It can ruin your clothes,' she reproved him. 'And mine too!'

She shied away from the look in his eyes, her heart thumping against her ribs. She was shocked by the speed of her reaction to him and how little control she had over her own emotions. It was worse still when he looked her over, enjoying the way the downpour had made her dress cling to her shape.

'I can always buy you more,' he suggested, sounding positively brazen to her embarrassed ears. 'Many, many more, for you to walk in the rain by my side and make muddy when I woo you in the Forum!'

She was breathless and tried to pretend to herself it was the pace he had set. 'It would be better if I learned to look after the clothes I have,' she said primly.

He grinned at her, suddenly young and carefree. 'Better for whom?' he teased her.

Mrs Beaumont fitted into life at the palace like a hand into a well-worn glove. She and Signora Manzu might have known each other for years, so closely did they agree about all the essentials of life. Deborah was proud of her.

'I wish Father would relax more,' she said to her mother. 'He's like a cat on hot bricks.'

'You're not much better yourself,' her mother said frankly. 'You are sure you're doing the right thing in marrying Domenico, aren't you?'

Deborah hoped she looked less desperate than she felt. 'I can't
not
marry him! But '

'Yes? But?'

'I wish I had more to offer him!' Deborah burst out.

'And your father a little less?' Mrs Beaumont suggested with more shrewdness than her daughter had known she possessed. 'I shouldn't worry about it, dear. At the moment he has enough to think about because I have been made so welcome here and he suspects— thought he'd die sooner than admit it!—that Agnes would be rather less welcome. Poor love, he can't understand it!' And she giggled like a young girl. 'I wonder if he was always so pompous?'

'Always!' Deborah said with feeling.

Her mother looked amused. 'Try to like him a little bit, darling,' she urged. 'You've always been as prickly as a hedgehog where he's concerned and, when he thinks about it, he's rather fond of his eldest daughter.'

'Mother! He doesn't care a row of pins about me! All he wants is to use me to further his own ends! If he'd been fond of me he would have taken some interest in my final show at the art college.
You
did!'

'But I might have gone along anyway,' her mother told her. 'Your father has never willingly looked at a statue or an original picture in his life!'

This time it was Deborah who laughed. 'Nor has Agnes! I'm sure she thinks it's slightly disreputable to be involved in anything artistic '

'Ah yes, Agnes,' Mrs Beaumont said on a harder note. 'The immaculate Agnes with never a hair out of place.' She shook herself. 'How glad I am not to be her!'

'Heaven forbid!' Deborah agreed irreverently.

'Yes, well, she's nothing to us. And, talking about that last show of yours, I brought one of your pieces with me. I thought you might like to give it to Domenico. Of course, I didn't know then you were planning to do a bust of him. What do you think, dear?'

She opened her suitcase and rummaged about inside it, bringing out a small abstract shape that Deborah had done in her last year at the school. Deborah took it from her, balancing it on her hand. It had been carved out of a piece of wood and, with one's eyes half shut, it could have been a person standing, waiting, or it could have been an outsize wave breaking on the shore, or it could have been a tree bent by the wind but determined to survive.