as to how you should go on. Have I told you about the time—I was just a young girl, I believe—that Uncle Max wrangled us an audience with the Pope?”
“His Holiness!” Allegra had exclaimed, much impressed. “I once sang a solo for the Bishop of Bologna, but it is not the same, is it?”
Yes, there were many lessons, but there were just as many stories, and just as many shared reminiscences between the new friends, quite a few of them having to do with the at-times-almost-bizarre courtship of Candice Murphy by Mark Antony Betancourt, Seventh Marquess of Coniston. The Marquess, it seemed, had until his marriage been known all over London as Mister Overnite: a carefree, heartbreakingly handsome man who supposedly had held the modern-day British record for dallying the whole night long in more society matrons’ beds than half the husbands in the Upper Ten Thousand.
It hadn’t been easy for Tony to understand that his bachelor days were effectively over from the first moment he’d clapped eyes on the mischievous Miss Murphy, but—as Candie, blushing, told Allegra—he had lived to give proof to the adage that reformed rakes make the very best of husbands.
As for Allegra’s singing career, it had been left to Valerian to explain to her that this, alas, was over, finally and completely. It was not to be mentioned in company, it was not to be considered as a viable part of her future—it simply was not to be thought of, ever again!
Only the quick-witted Tony had been able to save Valerian from Allegra’s employment of a particularly vile Italian curse, which he did by quickly pointing out that there was nothing wrong with Allegra considering herself a talented amateur.
“Why, as a matter of fact,” he had interjected cleverly, winking at his appreciative wife, “Prinny himself is quite a devotee of Italian opera. You’re bound to be the sensation of the age, Allegra, once you sing for him, for many of his guests perform at the Marine Pavilion after one of his Highness’s hours-long dinner parties.”
“Yes, the dinner parties,” Valerian had added, knowing by now where to aim his darts where Allegra was concerned. “I heard it said that there are often two dozen main dishes served in one evening,” he slid in, watching as Allegra’s sapphire eyes opened wide. “That’s not to mention the many side dishes, cakes, puddings, pastries, and the rest. Although I have not yet had the pleasure, Duggy is one of Old Swellfoot’s cronies, signorina, so you are sure to be invited, if you can just learn to behave yourself.”
All in all, Allegra had become not only resigned to leaving Italy but anxious to reach England and her mother’s birthplace, although it was with tears in her eyes that she waved good-bye to the Betancourts as the ship pulled away from the pier, her newly obtained passport safely in Valerian’s possession.
Then, suddenly, all her new finery to one side and her more refined English forgotten, she pointed to the dock, hopping on one slippered foot as she exclaimed, “Impossible! It is that terrible Bernardo—here, in Napoli! How has he found me? Again he shows up unwanted, come un cane nella chiesa— like a dog in a church!”
As Bernardo ran to the very edge of the pier, tears streaming down his handsome face and looking for all the world as if he was about to throw himself into the water in order to swim out to the ship, Allegra struck her right arm straight out in front of her, tucked her middle two fingers beneath her thumb, and shouted dramatically, “Si rompe il corno!”
Immediately Bernardo stepped back as if stunned, clutching his chest.
“You’re going to break his horns?” Valerian asked from beside her, watching bemusedly as her small but voluptuous figure was shown to advantage by her antics. “Why don’t I believe that is some sort of quaint Italian farewell?”
Allegra threw back her head, her long black hair blowing in the wind, since she had shunned Candie’s suggestion that she wear one of the new bonnets Valerian’s money had bought her. “I wished evil on him, signore. Great evil such as only another Italian can imagine!”
“Oh, you did, did you? And now you will kindly take it off again,” Valerian commanded, shaking his head. “Otherwise the lovesick fool will be on my conscience forevermore. You’re leaving Italy, signorina, so you can afford to be magnanimous. Bernardo Timoteo and his cohorts can no longer harm you.”
Allegra turned to Valerian, her face alight with glee. “Magnifico, signore! You are right! I, Allegra Crispino, will be magnanimous!” She leaned over the railing, waving a white handkerchief at the openly sobbing Bernardo. “Addio, caro Bernardo addio!” she called brightly, until the handsome young man on the pier heard her and began waving in return.
Valerian, well pleased with himself, smiled and waved to Bernardo as well, hardly believing he was actually on his way to Brighton at last, to achieve the long-awaited removal of the mercurial Allegra Crispino from his guardianship.
An odd, unrecognizable sensation in his stomach at the thought of depositing Allegra with Lord Dugdale and then walking away prompted him to turn his head and look down at the strange young girl.
“Allegra!” he was startled into saying, for she was gripping the rail with both hands, huge, crystalline tears running down her wind-reddened cheeks. “Why are you crying? Surely you’re not going to miss having the Timoteo dogs barking at your heels?”
“I shall never see my beloved Italia again, Valerian,” she answered in a small voice, her gaze still intent on the rapidly disappearing shoreline as she gave out with a shuddering sigh. “My madre, my papà they live in that earth. They are lost to me forever; all of what is home to me is now gone, while I sail away to an uncertain future with a grandfather I don’t know. I didn’t know how much it would hurt, Valerian, or how very much frightened I would feel.”
Before he could think, before he could weigh the right or the wrong of it, Valerian gathered Allegra’s small frame close against his chest, where she remained, her arms wrapped tightly around his waist, as, together, they watched the only homeland she had ever known fade from sight.
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