Mother Margarita’s lips quirked. She asked a question. His employer bobbed her head back and forth between Jamie and the nun in confusion.
“Don’t jump your guns,” he whispered in English. “She wants to know more about you.”
“I need to ask her about Isabella,” Nora insisted.
“In due time,” he said and returned his attention to Mother Margarita with a charming smile.
“Mrs. Haley is a widow,” he began in Italian. “She lived until recently with her father in—” He bent toward Nora and asked in English, “Dorset was it?”
The wren nodded, but a fierce frown twisted her features. She obviously didn’t wish to discuss family. If she bit her lip any harder, she would draw blood.
“Her father is a vicar.” Jamie reverted to Italian.
“Protestant?” Mother Margarita asked.
“Yes. Certainly.”
The Reverend Mother looked troubled, but whether it was for the salvation of Mrs. Haley’s soul or for the complications it meant regarding the child’s care, he couldn’t say. In fact, he had run out of things to say.
He watched the two women, both tiny in stature but strong in will, take each other’s measure. His employer didn’t shrink. She stiffened her spine, put on what appeared to be a righteous confidence like a cloak, and let Mother Margarita observe her.Good for you, Nora Haley. Stand your ground, he thought.Just don’t attack.He had known hardened soldiers with less backbone than the wren.
“You wish to see your niece again tomorrow?” Reverend Motherasked finally. Jamie translated, his jaw tense.If the wren wrecks this encounter, she might not get back in.
His employer’s fierce expression when she answered yes would have quelled a regiment. There was no need to translate. “And every day,” she added.
Mother Margarita launched into a convoluted explanation about prayer schedules, schoolroom demands, and children’s naps. Jamie managed to keep up.
“Visits may take place at three for the time being,” Mother Margarita decided. Jamie translated.The wren ought to accept that,he thought.
“Three? Every day?” the wren demanded to know, red blotches warring with white on her face.
“Certainly,” the tiny nun agreed. Mother Margarita didn’t say how long the arrangement would last. Robert Beaumont’s days had to be few. “For one hour.”
“Two!” the wren demanded. Jamie groaned.
“Don’t press your luck,” he said in English. “That will be acceptable, thank you,” he told the nun in Italian.
Nora Haley bit back whatever else she wanted to say. Jamie relaxed his shoulders.Good tactic. Save the heavy artillery until you need it.He began to realize that his dainty little employer had sense as well as bottom.
“And who, exactly, are you?” the mother superior demanded.
Damn! A surprise attack just when I let down my guard.The woman who confronted him gave no quarter.
“Major James Bently,” he said with a slight bow. “Mrs. Haley’s interpreter, her employee.” He tried, but failed, to look at her directly when he said it. When he glanced back down the diminutive nun’s penetrating look, assessing and weighing him, made his knees weak.
The Reverend Mother seemed to choose her next words carefully.
“The Count di Castellimonte wishes to see Isabella. He requeststhat she be taken to Palazzo di Savoia in the morning. That is, of course, impossible.” Mother Margarita spoke directly to Nora in Italian. Jamie had to squash his panic in order to keep up. “It will not do because of the child’s schooling. He will see her here. Tomorrow.”
“But I thought this count lived in Sardinia!” the wren exclaimed grabbing his arm.
“Piedmont.” Jamie corrected her without taking his eyes off Mother Margarita.Castellimonte here? I won’t come near the place.
“Pardon?” the wren asked.
“His holdings are in the Piedmont, but he has a home here also.” Jamie’s stomach clenched.Home? It’s a damn palace in the center of Rome.
Palazzo di Savoia lay close to the papacy, close to diplomatic circles, and close to European intelligence networks. Too damned close. What a mess!
