The Italian’s Cinderella Bride

CHAPTER ELEVEN

SUDDENLY Ruth’s heart was thundering, although with what feeling she couldn’t be sure. It should have been delight, but it felt more like dread.

Gino had returned. He was here, advancing on her.

He looked just as he had last year, the black brocade costume, the mask that concealed most of his face, and she froze as he grew nearer. Then he spoke.

‘Ruth, what’s the matter?’

It was Pietro’s voice. She let out a long gasp and steadied herself against the wall.

‘You!’ she exclaimed.

‘Of course it’s me.’ He looked closely at her face. ‘Who did you think it was?’

‘Gino. I saw him in that costume last year. For a moment I thought-’

‘So that’s it. I guess he borrowed it because of this.’ Pietro indicated the Bagnelli crest on the sleeves. ‘Part of his impersonation. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.’

‘No, I’m just being silly. It’s only that I was thinking of him just before-something he told me, about masks, and people not being allowed to wear them except at Carnival.’

‘Because you can get away with so much behind a mask,’ Pietro supplied. ‘That about sums up the Venetian attitude-get away with what you can, and worry about the consequences when you’re caught, which you probably won’t be as long as you keep your mask on.’

His light tone had its effect, and she relaxed.

‘So while I’m masked I can have the time of my life,’ she riposted.

‘That’s the spirit.’

She twirled around so that her magnificent skirts flared out.

‘Will I do?’

‘You’ll be the belle of the ball.’

‘Don’t let Serafina hear you say that.’

He laughed, but inwardly he was cursing Gino. He wished he hadn’t witnessed her face when she first caught sight of himself down the corridor, but he had, plus a lot of things that had dismayed him. He’d seen her shock, the way she’d stood still, holding on to the wall, shattered by the sight of the man who still dominated her thoughts and feelings.

She’d recovered, laughing, putting a brave face on it as she always did. But from now on everytime she looked at him she would see Gino as well, or perhaps only Gino.

Tonight was going to be a test of endurance.

But there was no time to brood over this. Down below the guests were beginning to arrive, ushered in by Franco’s stewards who carried away their gorgeous cloaks. From the far end of the corridor Serafina appeared on Franco’s arm, simpering at the sight of Pietro, then leaving Franco behind to hurry forward and give a deep curtsey that displayed her advantages to the full.

‘Are you going to take me in to the ball?’ she wittered.

Franco, realising that he was going to be deserted, bowed low to Ruth and offered her his arm.

‘Dear lady, I don’t know who you are, but I know you are beautiful,’ he declaimed.

Realising that he hadn’t recognised her, Ruth curtseyed and took his arm. Pietro, forestalled in his attempt to escape Serafina, yielded to the inevitable and offered her his own arm.

In this way the four of them proceeded down the grand staircase into the glittering ballroom, now filled with guests in various styles of costume. There were a few clowns, but most of them had spent a fortune on eighteenth-century garb, glittering with jewels. The men were in knee breeches, the women in crinolines, and many wore powdered wigs.

Ruth was glad that Pietro had decided not to wear a wig, hiding his dark hair. It would have spoilt him somehow, whereas now, among all these pretty creatures, his masculinity was emphasised.

There were some flashes of light as they left the last step, and Ruth realised that Serafina had invited photographers. No wonder she wanted to be seen in Pietro’s company.

The music swelled, Pietro bowed and led her into the waltz. Franco and Ruth followed, then all the others.

She discovered that she’d been right about enjoying a new identity. After Franco came more men, flirting, admiring, and she danced with them all, in the spirit of Carnival.

Some of the dancing was eighteenth-century style, which alarmed her until she realised how simple it was. The man and woman stood side by side, arms outstretched, hand in hand, advancing, retreating, circling each other in stately fashion. When her partners realised that she was new to this they guided her, and she soon relaxed. After that she danced every dance.

‘When will it be my turn?’ Pietro demanded when their paths happened to cross.

‘When il conte has done his duty,’ she riposted.

‘You’re supposed to be chaperoning me, saving me from Serafina and her sisters under the skin.’

‘Don’t be such a spoilsport. Surely Cinderella is allowed to enjoy the ball too?’

‘As long as it’s understood that when you leave, I leave.’

‘But I’m enjoying myself far too much to leave.’

She glided away, taking a hand that was held out to her, with only the vaguest idea whose it was.

‘Be careful-’ Pietro started to say, but found himself talking to empty air.

Supper was lavishly served on long tables with fine china and crystal glasses. At the head of the table Pietro played the perfect host, seeming to give the guests all his attention while managing to search for Ruth at the same time. She didn’t eat at the table but drifted around among other guests who were wandering through the palazzo, and Pietro’s glimpses of her were infrequent.

But then he caught a glimpse of something that drove everything else out of his head.

He could have sworn he saw Toni’s face peering through a doorway. Someone immediately passed in front and when they had gone there was no sign of Toni, but a moment later he saw the dog again.

Evidently he’d slipped out while Minna wasn’t looking. Pietro decided he should be rounded up and sent back without delay, and he rose from the table, excusing himself to his guests.

But when he went out into the corridor there was no sign of Toni. Nor was anyone else around.

Then, from somewhere he heard the whispered words, ‘Come with me, my darling. I’m waiting for you.’

Entranced, he followed the voice, so full of beauty and mystery that he felt it could lead him anywhere. It came again.

‘This way, my darling.’

The corridor led to another, narrower, less grand, one where few people went. He followed, seeking he knew not what.

‘Come with me-come with me-’

In the heart of the building lay a small garden, surrounded on all sides, and reached by a long staircase that went around three inner sides. The cool air on his face told him he was nearing this sanctuary, and then he was out on the staircase, and the mystery was explained.

At the foot of the stair, as he’d half expected, was a figure in ivory brocade, her face masked, her air as enticing as her words. But it was not himself, or any man, that she was trying to entice. She was calling Toni, who was slowly descending the stairs to the garden, following the sweet call of that voice, as was his master.

‘Poor Toni,’ she cooed. ‘Did everyone forget about your walk? And you’re desperate to spend a penny, aren’t you? Come along, there’s a nice little flower bed down here that’ll do you nicely. And don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone.’

Pietro stood back in the shadows, watching as Toni went down to her and took her advice, nestling against her afterwards as she produced a biscuit.

Pietro regarded her with fascinated disbelief. Behind them was a ballroom full of men eager to dance and flirt with her, and they might not have existed for all the notice she took. The disgraceful mutt had all her attention, and clearly considered that it was his right.

‘Come on,’ she said at last. ‘I’ll take you back to bed-oh, Minna, there you are.’

The housekeeper had bustled out from under the arches that surrounded the garden, and took charge of the dog.

‘I’m sorry. I don’t know how he got out,’ she fussed.

‘It doesn’t matter. He’ll be all right now.’

Minna vanished with Toni, and Pietro waited for the ivory clad figure to mount the stairs. Instead she leaned back against the wall, gazing up to the stars. Pietro thought a little smile hovered on her lips, but he couldn’t be sure.

And if it were there, for whom was it meant? Behind that mask were her eyes open or closed, and, if closed, who filled her dreams?

Adjusting his mask over his face, he went quietly down a few steps until he was standing just above her. She heard him and turned her head, but now he could just discern that her eyes were still closed.

‘It’s only me,’ he said, leaving ‘me’ unspecified. ‘I wondered why a woman leaves the ballroom where she’s enjoying such a triumph.’

She gave a soft, knowing laugh that made him clutch a stone ledge beside him.

‘And why should the host leave a ball where the triumph is his?’ she teased.

‘He came in search of her.’

‘But perhaps she wanted to be alone,’ Ruth objected.

‘Then she must resign herself to not having her wish. A beautiful woman will never be allowed solitude.’

‘But maybe she isn’t beautiful beneath the mask. How can he tell?’

‘He doesn’t need to see her face, because he knows that her heart is gentle and loving, and no vulnerable creature has ever turned to her in vain.’

‘That’s charming, but what does it have to do with beauty?’

‘It is the only beauty that counts,’ he said softly.

She was disconcerted, but recovered herself to say, ‘Why, what a thing to say at Carnival!’

‘True. We should think only of the most fleeting kind of beauty, shouldn’t we? But hers will never fade. Even when she looks-’ a smile of remembrance touched his mouth ‘-like a drowned rat, her true loveliness is always there for the man who can appreciate it-if she chooses to show it to him.’

‘You mean-perhaps she doesn’t?’

‘There might be barriers between them that he can’t tear down alone, only with her help.’

‘And you think she would refuse to give it?’ Ruth asked with soft urgency.

‘Who knows? Her mind and heart are hidden from him, perhaps even from herself.’

‘That’s true,’ she murmured.

‘When she understands the truth-who knows what that truth will be? Or if there will be only one truth?’

She could have continued this all night. To be standing here in the moonlight, fencing with him, seeming to talk lightly yet touching the subjects that haunted them, then dancing away before danger threatened, this filled her with a kind of ecstasy. She felt he was letting her look into his heart while gently questioning her own.

From above them came the sound of music from the ballroom, faintly, then louder as the orchestra struck up a new tune. The sudden awareness broke the spell and made them move slightly away from each other.

‘You should return to your guests,’ she said.

‘We’ll return together.’

He held out his hand and she placed hers in it so that he could lead her up the stairs into the corridor. The music, closer now, seemed to enclose them.

He stopped to listen, then put out his hand, sliding it determinedly about her waist, drawing her close into a waltz.

‘A man must take his chances while he can,’ he murmured provocatively.

She laughed, and felt him tense as her breath brushed his face. They were close now, as they had been on the night they had so nearly made love, before he had rejected her. But this time they were not themselves, although neither could have said with certainty who they were.

Who knows what the truth will be? he had said.

Moving dream-like in his arms, Ruth felt that only one truth could ever matter again.

But there was danger in that. The world would intrude. Even now she heard it from the far end of the corridor. Doors were flung open, revellers poured out, laughing and singing, shattering the dream. She must escape.

Pietro, forced back to being a good host, hailed the other guests as politely as he could manage, and saw them go scurrying away, seeking dark corners where they could be alone. With a sigh of relief he turned back to Ruth.

But she had gone. He was alone in the dark corridor, wondering if it had all been a dream.

When he returned to the ball she was dancing with another man.

The festivities went on into the small hours, and to him every moment was interminable. Serafina dragged out the goodbyes for ever, but finally the last guest was gone, and even she fell silent, eyeing Franco balefully. For once his attention wasn’t on her, but on ‘the mystery woman’ who’d vanished but lingered in his thoughts.

‘I just wish I knew who she was,’ he sighed.

‘It was Ruth,’ Pietro informed him coldly. ‘The wig and the mask concealed her identity very well.’

‘Ruth?’ Serafina echoed in disgust. ‘But she’s only a-’

With Pietro’s eyes on her she was suddenly afraid.

‘Pure Carnival,’ Franco said ecstatically.

A mystery woman, Pietro mused. That was exactly what she was, and it was driving him mad.

Smiling determinedly, he escorted Franco and Serafina upstairs to their rooms, pretended not to hear their hints about staying a few more days, bid them goodnight and returned thankfully to his own little corner.

To his relief he found Ruth there, having discarded the glorious dress and donned shirt and trousers to eat a prosaic dish of pasta. She bore no resemblance to the vision in satin brocade who had tormented him, and for a moment he even wondered. But only for a moment.

‘Where did you vanish to?’ he demanded.

‘Oh, here and there. You saw me around.’ She sighed happily. ‘I wouldn’t have thought there were so many attractive men in the world. At least, I think they were attractive. Once the mask came off-who knows?’

Her shrug was eloquent.

‘I believe a few masks were removed at the end of the evening,’ he said.

‘It might be better if they hadn’t been. Better to enjoy the dream than face the reality.’

He turned on her swiftly. ‘Do you really mean that?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. How should I know what I mean after an evening like that? It’s Carnival, and, like a good Venetian, I’m making the most of it, because it’ll be my last.’

She cleared away her dish, taking it into the kitchen. When she returned Pietro had removed the elegant black coat and the long waistcoat that went beneath it.

‘You don’t know it’ll be your last,’ he said.

‘Yes, I do. I’ve been making plans, and it’s time I was leaving.’

There was a businesslike note in her voice that was unfamiliar to him.

‘What about Gino?’ he asked curiously.

‘He’s not coming back. It’s time I banished him from my life and managed without him. There’s got to be a new life somewhere, away from him-away from you.’

She said the last words softly and he gave her a sharp look.

‘You’re going now?’ He filled the last word with meaning. ‘After tonight?’

‘Tonight didn’t really happen.’

‘Are you still blaming me for the other evening?’ he demanded.

‘When you wouldn’t make love to me? It’s not blame. It’s just that I’ve finally started to see things straight. The dream was lovely, but the reality has to be faced. I’m sorry I gave you so much trouble about that, Pietro.’

‘I don’t quite understand you.’

‘Don’t you? It’s plain enough. I did something stupid. I fell in love with you. There, I’ve admitted it. I’m free of Gino. He only matters for the things he can tell me. The one I love is you. Couldn’t you tell-tonight?’

‘Then that really was you?’ he said with a touch of relief. ‘For a moment-’

‘Yes, it was me-one of me. All the others are being very sensible because they have to be, now. Don’t be embarrassed. I know I must leave. I won’t intrude on your marriage.’

‘Since my wife is dead, what marriage?’

‘The marriage that still fills your life because she’s the only one you can love. It’s all right, I’ve finally faced that. All you want is to shut yourself up in this mausoleum with Lisetta, because that way you can pretend she isn’t dead.’

‘You know nothing about it.’

‘I know you’re dying inside, and you’re letting it happen. You’re glad for it to happen because you think you can be with her again. But you can’t, Pietro, you can’t. She’s dead and you can’t bring her back.’

His eyes seemed to burn in their sockets. ‘I don’t need to bring her back,’ he raged. ‘She isn’t dead. She’s here, everywhere, all the time. Every door I open, I know she’s on the other side. She’s in every room I enter. When I dream, she’s there. When I awake, she’s there. In my last moment, as I fall asleep, she whispers that she’s there.’

‘And you can’t wait to find her,’ she challenged.

‘I don’t have to find her, she finds me. She always will.’

‘Was she there tonight?’ she flashed, and had her answer in the tension in his face.

‘Yes,’ he said hoarsely.

‘But must you always give in to it?’ she cried. ‘Is there nothing for us?’

His face softened. ‘There could have been everything for us-if things had been different. Do you want me to say that I love you? Is that what you’re waiting for, to hear the words?’

‘Can you say them?’ she asked, hardly breathing.

‘I-’ For a long moment he stood there, his face distraught, his whole being on the edge of words that tortured him, while she watched, knowing that her life depended on the next few moments. Then-

‘No!’ The word burst from him almost as an explosion. ‘No, I don’t love you.’

But suddenly her heart leapt and she looked at him with shining eyes. He loved her. By the very vehemence of his denial she knew the truth.

‘I think you do,’ she said simply. ‘Is it so hard to say it?’

‘It’s impossible. It can’t be true. It mustn’t be true.’

‘But she’s dead. You’re free now.’

‘Free?’ The word was like a knife. ‘I’ll never be free, and do you know why? Because she’s dead. Because I killed her. There’s no escape from that prison, and nor should there be. Why should I escape? I killed her.’

The words shocked her to silence. Whatever she’d expected, it wasn’t this.

‘But that can’t be true,’ she choked at last. ‘She died in childbirth.’

‘She died bearing a child, a child she should never have been asked to bear. She wasn’t strong enough, but she pretended that she was, and I pretended to believe her. I wanted that child. The terrible truth is that I wanted it more than I wanted her, and she knew it.

‘She never considered herself for a moment. Everything was for me. There was nothing she wouldn’t have done to please me, because she knew-’ He paused and shuddered so violently that Ruth could feel it. ‘She knew that I didn’t love her.’

His voice was full of bleak despair as he said the final words, and then a deadly silence fell, as though the end of the world had come, and there was nothing left.

‘Surely you must have loved her a little,’ she said. ‘You married her.’

‘I had a kind of fondness for her. She was sweet and gentle and I’d known her most of my life. I showed you the pictures of us as children.’

‘The dice game,’ she said. ‘Yes, I remember.’

‘When she grew up I danced with her, always feeling like her brother because I’d known her for so long. It never occurred to me that she-’

He broke off awkwardly.

Ruth didn’t need to hear him say all the words to be able to follow the progress. It had started with childish hero-worship, turned into a teenage crush, and then into womanly love. And he, with fairly typical male blindness, had been aware of it only distantly without seeing the implications or the danger.

‘When I started to notice girls in a big way, I went a little mad,’ Pietro resumed. ‘I was the son of Count Bagnelli. I could indulge myself with any girl I liked. Don’t ever let anyone tell you that aristocracy doesn’t matter in the modern world. It counts as much as it ever did.’

Ruth thought of Franco and Serafina, and knew he was right.

‘A title, or just the prospect of one, gives you a freedom no other man has,’ Pietro continued. ‘I won’t go into details about how badly I behaved. Let’s just say that I took what was offered, accepting it as my right. I’m not proud of that.’

She remembered Jessica saying, ‘He only slept with the best, very stylish ladies. But they had to be outstanding, not just beautiful, but with a certain “something extra”, to make him proud.’

And even Mario had wistfully implied that Pietro could take his pick.

But while Pietro connected his sexual success with his title she knew that his personal attractions must have played a big part. The title was a bonus, but it was the man himself who would make a woman’s heart beat faster.

‘So you had a colourful life,’ she said gently. ‘So do millions of young men with no money or title. You must have slowed down in the end.’

‘My father had a heart attack. I was away at the time and it was Lisetta who called me. Against all the odds he survived and returned home, and she volunteered to come and look after him. He was fond of her and she seemed able to make him relax. I was grateful to her.

‘But although he made a sort of recovery, we knew he didn’t have very long. He said that before he died he wanted to see me “decently married”, as he put it. He wanted to be at my wedding, and to know that at least there was a child on the way. He thought it was time I “chose a suitable bride”, as though we were still in the nineteenth century.

‘It didn’t seem so strange to me. His own marriage to my mother had been arranged this way. They were civil, but not madly in love, and to me that was normal.

‘He was dying, and I couldn’t bear to deny him his last wish, so I agreed. It was he who suggested Lisetta. We knew each other well, I liked her, and thought she liked me. At that time I had no idea that her feelings went deeper.’

‘Didn’t it come out when you asked her to marry you?’

‘No. I spoke of our friendship, our affection, but I didn’t pretend to a love I didn’t feel because it would have been dishonest, and that would have insulted her. She’d have seen through every word and despised me as a liar. And it seemed the best way because she was very cheerful, agreed with me about our marriage.’

‘Poor Lisetta,’ Ruth mused. ‘I suppose she concealed her feelings, afraid of frightening you off. She must have thought, when you were married, she could win your love.’

‘Yes, I finally realised that,’ he groaned. ‘I don’t know how I could have been so blind.’

‘Because she meant you to be. She was fighting for something she wanted, and she knew the way to do it. Good for her.’

He looked at her strangely.

‘You’re forgetting how badly it ended for her.’

‘No, I’m not. The future is always a mystery. You can only take the step you see ahead, and deal with the consequences as they happen. She sounds like a lady with a lot of courage.’

‘Courage?’

‘Think of the risk she took. How old was she then?’

‘About twenty-five.’

‘Then she’d waited for you, played high stakes to win the only prize she cared about because nothing less would do. That took real courage.’

In his mind he saw Lisetta again, docile, yielding, eager to please, but sadly without the magic that could have caught his attention. It took an effort to see her through Ruth’s eyes, daring, ready to risk everything and smile if she lost.

And she had lost, he thought remorsefully. She’d gained nothing from her marriage but two dead children and the dutiful affection of a man carrying an increasing burden of guilt. But the guilt had been his own fault. She’d never tried to lay that burden on him.

‘You’re right,’ he said suddenly. ‘She was a brave woman. I meant to be a good husband, and at first things went well. She became pregnant almost at once, and we were happy. I was grateful to her for giving my father hope, and also on my own account.

‘I found that I loved the idea of being a father. That took me by surprise. I’d never thought of it before, but suddenly I wanted it so much, and Lisetta was the woman who was going to give me my heart’s desire. Yes, I think I gave her some happiness then. I hope so, anyway.’

The heavy note in his voice made her ask, ‘What happened?’

‘She lost the child in the sixth month. That would have been bad enough but my father also died. His health had been on a knife edge while he held on to see his grandchild, and the shock of seeing that hope collapse brought on his last heart attack.

‘Lisetta was devastated by what she considered her failure. I tried to reassure her but what could I say? She knew I’d married her for my father’s sake and my child’s, and now they were both dead. That was when I wished I’d told her some polite lies when I proposed. If I’d said then that I loved her, I might have been able to give her some hope when she was in despair. But I was useless-useless.’

He dropped his head into his hands.

When Pietro spoke again his voice was husky.

‘I did my best to console her, but it was a pretty useless best. She kept saying that she was sorry she’d let me down, and she’d have another child soon. With every word I felt like a monster, a man who’d destroyed a woman who loved him for his own convenience.

‘The worst thing was that she was pinning all her hopes on another baby. She didn’t know that the doctor had said she mustn’t try again. She wasn’t strong enough. I delayed telling her because I knew what it would do to her, but in the end I had to.’

‘Poor woman,’ Ruth murmured.

‘Yes, poor woman,’ Pietro said bitterly. ‘She had nothing then. Whatever I could give her wasn’t enough. She turned to her husband for help, and he failed her.’

‘How did she cope?’

‘She wouldn’t accept it. She said she just needed time to regain her strength, and everything would be fine. I didn’t argue because at least it left her some hope, but I had no intention of risking her life with another child. She began taking the pill-’

He broke off and made a helpless gesture, full of despair.

‘She swore that she was taking it-that there was no danger of-I shouldn’t have believed her. I should have taken better care of her.’

‘What happened?’

‘She came off the pill, and I only found out when she told me she was pregnant again. I can still see her face, how delighted she was, looking at me for approval.

‘I tried to make her understand how dangerous it was, but she wouldn’t listen to me or the doctor. He begged her not to go through with it. I told her I’d agree to that, but she wouldn’t listen to either of us.’

‘Of course not,’ Ruth murmured.

‘Of course not,’ he echoed with a bitterness that was aimed at himself. ‘She gave me a love I didn’t deserve, and all she cared about was pleasing me. All through her pregnancy she grew weaker, but she was actually happy. There was a time when we thought she might have a chance to come through, and the baby. But then she collapsed.

‘Our child was born alive, and she held him in her arms just once before she died. I’ll never forget the way she looked at me then, with such joy in her eyes, and such triumph. She’d given me a living child, and that was all she cared about, although she knew her own life was slipping away.

‘But then our baby died too, only a few hours after his mother. Her sacrifice had been for nothing. When she was in her coffin I kissed her and told her how sorry I was. Then I put him in her arms again, and now they’ll lie together always. Now and then I go back to see them, and always I ask for her forgiveness, but it’s too late. I’d give anything to reach her, but I never can.

‘Now do you understand why I feel little better than a murderer? I took her life-for nothing.’

Ruth didn’t answer at first. Pietro’s agony of self-reproach seemed imprinted on the air. She would literally have done anything to heal this wound, and it was dawning on her that, incredibly, she had the power to bring him out of this nightmare. But every step must be taken with care, using her mysterious understanding of Lisetta that had come with her own confusions. One wrong move-she shivered.

It could be done, but only if the dice were thrown exactly right.

Taking a deep breath and sending up a prayer, she tossed them into the unknown.