and their mercenaries, who looted, burned and killed, enslaving any who survived. One pious man had snatched the silver from the temple, just ahead of the invading army, and had hastily buried it in his farmhouse cellar.
There it had stayed until the tombaroli hired by Lady Riverton dug it up for her own selfish pleasure, her own hidden collection of precious, stolen antiquities. Complete sets of temple silver from the Hellenistic period were rare indeed, and these pieces and their story had high symbolic value. A heritage of beauty and culture, smashed by an invading army.Yet another piece of Italy’s past, lost.
He sat down at the desk, reaching for his inkwell. It was a tale that had to be told. Yet how very much more powerful it would be to have the silver itself! It would inspire others to join their cause.
Marco had spent nearly all his adult life dedicated to the glorious past, and to Italy’s future. To retrieving lost artefacts, lost history. He would find the silver, too, no matter what it took.
And if only the memory of Thalia Chase’s all-seeing eyes would cease to haunt him!
Chapter Three
It was the crowded hour for the Pump Room, ten o’clock in the morning, when Thalia and Calliope stepped from the Abbey churchyard under the pillared colonnade and into the throngs of people.
The vast white space, bathed in pale grey light from the cloudy day outside, echoed with laughter and animated conversation. Snatches of words floated to the ceiling and dispersed. That hat—the height of vulgarity! Could hardly breathe in the assembly, it was absurd. The doctor says I must…
‘And this is supposed to be conducive to reviving one’s health and spirits?’ Calliope said doubtfully, dodging a dowager’s Bath chair as it rolled past. ‘All these crowds with their nonsensical chatter? We might as well have stayed in London!’
Thalia took her sister’s arm, drawing her close as Calliope leaned on her. Cameron had gone to sign the book, agreeing to meet them by the pump itself. If they could safely cross the room.
Thalia was not tall, but she did know how to get her way when needed. She edged the gossiping hordes aside with her blue silk-clad arm, giving any who stood in her way a calm stare until they hastened to clear a path.
‘The air in London was not good for you,’ she said, taking their place in line for glasses of water. ‘Nor for Psyche. Here you can rest and recover, with no demands on your time at all. NoAntiquities Society, no LadiesArtistic Society, all those unending societies…’
‘Lady Westwood? Miss Chase?’ a voice said, and Thalia and Calliope turned to see Lord Grimsby, a friend of their father’s from the Antiquities Society, standing behind them, leaning heavily on his walking stick.
‘Lord Grimsby!’ Calliope said. ‘What a delightful surprise to see you here.’
‘You cannot possibly be as surprised as we were to hear of your father’s marriage to Lady Rushworth!’he said, chortling. ‘But Sir Walter wrote to us that you might be visiting Bath soon. My wife and daughter will be so pleased to hear you have arrived. Society has been so sparse in Bath.’
Thalia glanced around at the jostling crowds. ‘I can see that!’
‘You must come to the next meeting of the Classical Society, of course. We are not as numerous as the Antiquities Society in London, but we do have lectures and debates quite often, as well as excursions to see the Roman artefacts. There are so many Roman sites to be seen around Bath, y’know!’
‘It all sounds most delightful, Lord Grimsby,’ Calliope said. ‘We were just wondering what we should do without our various societies.’
‘We must keep up standards, Lady Westwood, even in Bath. Such a treat to have some of the Chase gels in our midst. You will come to our meeting next week?’
‘We would enjoy that,’ said Thalia. ‘But I fear my sister is under very strict orders to rest.’
Lord Grimsby chortled again, his old-fashioned wig trembling. ‘Aren’t we all, Miss Chase? What else is Bath for but to rest? That doesn’t mean we should rest our minds, as I’m sure your father would agree. Our meetings are very quiet, pleasant affairs. I will have Lady Grimsby call on you tomorrow. Until then!’
As Lord Grimsby limped away, Calliope gave their coins to the attendant and accepted two glasses of the water. ‘No demands on our time, eh?’ she whispered.
Thalia laughed. ‘I forgot Father has friends everywhere. We could probably set up camp on a mountaintop and someone would come along with an invitation to a lecture.’
‘Well, since Cam has joined forces with the blasted doctors and forbidden dancing, I must take my amusement where I can find it,’ Calliope said. She took a sip of water, and wrinkled her nose.
‘Drink it all, Cal,’ Thalia said, taking a suspicious sniff of her own glass. ‘Sulphur and iron, delicious!’
Calliope laughed, too. ‘Not exactly French champagne, is it?’
‘It is Bath champagne, and will make you strong again.’
Calliope raised her glass. ‘Here is a toast. May we all be well enough to travel to Italy next year.’
‘I will certainly drink to that.’ As Thalia clicked her glass with her sister’s, she couldn’t help remembering a pair of dark eyes, a wide, merry grin. A man who seemed a very part of the warmth and freedom of Italy. Part of the exhilaration of life, of real life, messy and complicated and beautiful.
Not this pallid reflection of existence. Not the constant hollow loneliness of feeling adrift in the world.
She took a drink of her water, and it was just as flat and stale as everything else had been since she had left Sicily and Count Marco di Fabrizzi. Grey. She gazed over the glass rim at the room beyond, at the constantly shifting crowd.
And suddenly she was tired. Tired of herself, her moping ways ever since she had returned to England. Moping never got anyone anywhere, she knew that well.
‘You know, Cal,’she said, ‘if we cannot get to Italy now, we must make Italy come to us.’
Calliope, who had been frowning into her glass, brightened. ‘How so, sister?’
‘We shall have a party, just as you wanted. Our own Venetian ridotto.’
‘In our little drawing room?’ Calliope said with a laugh.
‘A miniature ridotto, then. With music, wine, games.You can wear a fine new gown, and preside over the festivities from a regal chaise. That should make the doctors happy. And I will perform scenes from—from The Merchant of Venice! And Venice Preserved.’
‘How delightful! I do want a new gown to show off the fact that I once again have a waist. Who shall we invite?’
Thalia surveyed the room again. ‘Oh, dear. I fear it shall be a rather sedate ridotto. We must be some of the very few people under the age of fifty here!’
‘No matter. A party is a party.’ Calliope set about doing what she did best—organising.
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