“She needs more than convent school. Her father wishes more for her,” Nora insisted.
“Robert Beaumont is a fool. We permitted his marriage to my sister’s daughter because his business prospered and she lacked a dowry. She, too, was a willful woman like her mother before her. Beaumont, though a good man, stupidly contracted a disease at so young an age!” the count declared.
As if poor Robert could help it!
“He wants Isabella to have a family, Excellency.” She spoke quietly, but no one would mistake the steel in her voice.
The count stared down his aquiline nose. “You have courage. That speaks well for the child’s blood. However, you have neither wealth nor breeding. You have no husband. Robert Beaumont’sfather is a heretic preacher. It is unthinkable. She will remain at Santo Spirito.” He made a gesture as if to dismiss her.
Nora would not be dismissed. She shook off the major’s hand and rose to her feet.
“My great uncle is Viscount Stansbury. My parents were both English gentry. Robert and I may not have the pedigree you wish, Count, but Isabella, as you say, is of our blood also, and we will not be excluded from her life.”
The count glared at her. At last he gave a nod so slight it was almost imperceptible. “We shall see, Mrs. Haley, how strong you are. We shall see.”
“You’re a foolish woman,”Jamie told her after the count swept out with his courtiers.
Foolish but magnificent. Did I see her as a wren? This woman, who sails, head high, across the audience chamber, is an eagle.
“Are you really Stansbury’s niece?” he asked, skipping to keep up. He shuddered at the thought that Stansbury, a disgusting old roué, might be related to Nora. Jamie had seen him more than once in some of London’s most disreputable gaming hells, places Jamie himself wouldn’t admit to visiting.
“Yes, to my shame.” She bit her lip.
The count might not know what a worthless and debauched lecher the old viscount was, but Nora clearly did. Jamie didn’t like to think about how she knew.No wonder she despises aristocrats.
“Should I be impressed?” Jamie goaded.
They passed a liveried footman and moved through double doors into the grand foyer with its vaulted ceiling and regal pavement of parquet tiles.
“The count is the fool if he weighs Stansbury in my favor,” she said tartly, when they were safely past.
“He has no right!” Nora seethed under her breath. Her slipper-clad steps on the tiles were soft, even in her anger.
“Perhaps no right, but he has a great deal of power,” Jamie told her.
“This is not Piedmont. This is Rome. What is Sardinia?” she asked rhetorically.
“A powerful state,” he answered, “the most influential on the Italian peninsula, and an ally of England.”
Jamie felt his breath catch from the exertion of keeping up. He climbed down the steps behind her, almost tripping when she suddenly turned.
“He said she was ‘Savoy.’ You mentioned it before,” she said. “They are a ruling family? Does he mean she is royalty?”
She really doesn’t know? She never let on during the confrontation.
“The House of Savoy is the Sardinian ruling family. They are related to the House of Stuart, though I don’t remember the genealogy. Isabella is probably descended from Charles I.”Damn it. Nora, these people have way more power than your disreputable English viscount uncle.
“Stuart? Like Prince Charlie? The Jacobites?” She wrinkled her nose.
“Exactly like the Jacobites. The current king, Victor Emanuel, is, in fact,” he explained, “next in line to the Jacobite claims, such as they are. Neither the king nor his brother before him has given any indication they would actually make any such claims. They probably view the throne of England as inferior to that of Sardinia. That doesn’t stop lunatics back home from making claims on their behalf. England watches them closely.”
She grimaced and, just as suddenly as she had turned to face him, swung around to walk down the stairs and into the light. They crossed an immaculate courtyard and left through iron gates that loomed over the watchful eyes of two disdainful guards in the colors of Savoy.
They were far down the road, instinctively headed to the convent and to Isabella, before she spoke again.
“No one owns another human being,” she suddenly spat out. “Titles and pedigrees don’t give them the right!”
Jamie felt his mouth quirk in the shadow of a smile and just as quickly sobered.Some titles may be worthless—mine, for example—but power wins in the end every time.
