She drew in a breath that tasted of damp stone and candle smoke and turned into a side chapel, intending to sit and think. Instead, she stopped short.
Someone was already kneeling before the small Madonna, shouldersshaking, a lace veil quivering with each ragged breath. The faint sound she’d heard on entering—the muffled, desperate sobbing—resolved into words in Italian, half prayer, half wail.
Sofia.
Venetia’s first instinct was to turn on her heel and retreat. The girl had used her.
You’ve some nerve, Signorina Morosini.
She took a careful step back, knocking against a pew, and the kneeling figure jerked round.
“Miss Playford!”
So much for a graceful exit.
Venetia lifted her chin. “Signorina Morosini.”
Sofia scrambled to her feet, clutching her rosary. She looked smaller in a plain dark gown, her hair scraped back under the veil, which she raised to look at Venetia.
“So, you do not wish to speak to me? All of Venice must be sneering,” Sofia said with a brittle little laugh. Her face was blotchy and shiny with tears. “Have you come to gloat, Miss Playford? To tell me that you and your translator have triumphed, while I am to be sold to Count Bembo and his breath of old fish?”
“No,” Venetia said quietly. “I came to think. I didn’t know you were here.”
Sofia’s mouth trembled. “Then go. I have nothing to say to you.”
Was there shame and contrition in addition to the misery? She could see no sign.
Venetia hesitated, then moved a little closer. The candle flames threw gold across the painted Madonna and caught the wet tracks on Sofia’s cheeks. “Edward told me what you confessed.”
Sofia’s fingers froze on the rosary. Then she shrugged. “Did he? I wondered if he would, but what does it matter? There is no proof—Besides, what does it matter to me since happiness isbeyond my reach now?”
“But what about the rest of us? There is the maid, Griselda,” Venetia cut in, her own anger flaring at last. “You and your Paolo enlisted Griselda to steal the contessa’s emeralds. You had her slip them into my tiara in the mending room. You set in motion everything that followed. You may not havemeantfor me to be accused… but that’s what happened, and now I am a prisoner in Venice and might, quite possibly, lose my inheritance as a result of whatyouhave done. Does that not trouble your conscience?”
The words rang more sharply than she’d intended in the small chapel, and she lowered her voice. “So, while you weep at being forced to marry a man you do not love, I am branded a thief in the eyes of the world and the manIlove. A man I, too, may never have because of… you.”
Sofia flinched. Then she recovered her spirit. “You have your English friends. And a man who is fighting for your reputation. You say you are in mortal peril, but you have money. Another country to flee to. I have only here. Only Grandpapa. Only the marriage he chooses.”
“And Paolo,” Venetia said, not unkindly. “You have Paolo. And because of what you both have done, I stand to lose everything.”
Sofia sank back onto the narrow prayer bench with a sigh. “I decided,” she said dully, “that if I did not seize happiness now, I would never have it at all. I was willing to try anything.”
She twisted the rosary around her fingers, then sent a curious glance up at Venetia. “You despise me, but I think I am braver than you and the man you love. Signor Rothbury? He returns your love, so what is there standing between you? You have free choice. A privilege I will never have. I think you are the most fortunate—most stupid—pair of lovers I have ever heard of. No, I do not regret what I did for love. At least I tried.” Her voice softened as she added, “And I would die trying.”
Her words found their mark, but Venetia was not going to take the bait. Edward would see matters the same way as Venetia did.Wouldn’t he?
“If you don’t care about me, what about Griselda, whom you say Paolo approached? What’s become of her?” Venetia asked angrily. “And your grandfather? What will he say when your crime is revealed?”
Sofia’s shoulders slumped, and she wiped her tear-stained cheek.
“All right! I am sorry for it all! If I am to marry Bembo, I will confess to Grandfather. And Bembo.” A thoughtful smile curved her lips. “Perhaps the scandal will be such that Count Bembo will no longer wish for this betrothal.”
Venetia nodded. “That is true,” she conceded.
There was silence for a long moment. Perhaps the same kernel of thought was making its way through Sofia’s mind. After all, it was she who’d said it.
But now it was Venetia who said, “Your betrothal to Bembo is to be announced in five days’ time at thegrand ascensionyour grandfather is organizing?”
Sofia nodded. “Grandpapa and the marchese are planning it as if I were some heroine from one of their Waverley romances. A magnificent balloon is to rise from thepiazzettaand float over the lagoon while fireworks blaze and everyone cheers the happy couple.” Her mouth twisted. “I am to wave like a prize hen in a basket while Bembo wheezes beside me.”
