A Rather Curious Engagement (38 page)

The nurse opened her mouth as if she were about to protest, but when she saw the look on Kurt’s face, and then ours, she shut her mouth tightly and did not speak. Wordlessly, she took the Lion into the house.

The suspense,” Jeremy said, “is killing me.”

We were standing in the back garden outside the castle, overlooking Lake Como. Kurt told us he’d call us the moment the X-rays were ready.

We gazed out at the rippling lake, which was far below us but still seemed to fill up the view, rising to meet the sky. We could watch, but not hear, the little speedboats chugging by, leaving visible white wakes as they sliced against the blue water.

Under a fine old chestnut tree, there was a wooden table near a bench. Pepi’s sister had packed up our sandwiches for us in a wicker picnic hamper. We sat down and ate.

“Jeremy, look down there!” I said, pointing across the lake. “Isn’t that the Isola Comacina where we had that great lunch? Where your mum used to take you as a boy?”

“Yes, it certainly is,” Jeremy said, and there was something in his tone that made me slide over to sit closer to him.

“Want mustard?” I asked, teasingly.

He grinned, and said, “Penny. I just want to say, I’m sorry for all that kerfuffle with Lydia and the whole London crowd.”

“Don’t even speak of it,” I said, “don’t even mention her name, or she’ll turn up again.”

“No, she won’t,” he promised. “Not anymore.”

“Are you sure?” I asked with mock skepticism.

“Absolutely. You see, the final straw was when she came clomping onto our boat in those wretched high heels,” Jeremy declared. “Did you happen to notice all the little holes she made on that priceless deck? I thought Claude was going to cry. It looked as if she’d jumped up and down on a pogo stick all over the bloody deck.”

“To tell you the truth,” I said dryly, “I didn’t notice. I was too busy watching her make lipstick marks on your collar.”

“Well, she very nearly ruined
Penelope’s Dream
,” Jeremy said. “We can’t have that sort of thing in our lives. No, sir.”

“What about all your posh friends?” I asked.

“Not a problem,” he added ruefully, “because they know this time it’s the real thing.”

I glanced up at him quickly. “You see,” he said slowly, “blockhead that I am, I finally figured out why I was willing to keep letting Lydia disrupt our lives.”

“You felt guilty about the divorce,” I said promptly.

“No,” Jeremy said, “I felt guilty because I never loved her.” He said this with genuine sadness, and there wasn’t a trace of a put-down; he wasn’t acting like a guy who was dismissing one woman to placate another. I could tell that it was something truly painful for him.

“And that’s why,” he said softly, “I couldn’t face it until now. Nor tell her outright to leave us alone. I knew I’d caused her pain without even realizing why. I was just too stupid to understand. I must have deceived myself, too; sometimes you just persist in believing you can straighten things out without looking too closely at them.

I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong. But it wasn’t until you came back into my life that I could even begin to comprehend what it feels like to honestly be in love with someone, for keeps.”

I had an unusual, joyous sensation of something very calming, very peaceful, very eternal, descending on me like a feather-light but protective cloak. I have never felt so serene and quiet in my entire life. I felt strong enough to reach out and embrace the entire world.

“Then,” I said gently, “there’s room for all your friends.”

Jeremy looked at me with gratitude. But what he said teasingly was, “Well, of course, they’re all utterly aware that I’ve got my hands full with this one particular woman of mine, who is more than enough for any mortal man.”

“Humph,” I said. “That makes me sound like a little trouble-maker. Like one of those dizzy dames.”

“Not at all,” Jeremy assured me. “It would be a most noble job to look after Penny-the-heiress, and I am willing to devote the entire rest of my life to it. Anyone can see what a full-time occupation this will be. It’s bad enough that, already, I’ve had to fend off a Russian oligarch, a young French gendarme, a German count’s son . . . Not to mention countless future suitors,” Jeremy continued. “I can see it all now: a Swiss ski instructor, a Japanese international play-boy, an Australian tennis pro . . . all chasing after the famed American heiress with the copper-colored hair.”

“You’ll be my bodyguard?” I inquired, deliberately misunderstanding. “I rather thought you were heading in a different direction, ” I said, “what with that serious tone and all.”

He leaned closer to me, and took my hand in his.

“You fool,” he said sternly. “I am trying to tell you, in my own torturous way, that I think it’s time we made this rather
personal
engagement of ours official.”

“Hmmm,” I said playfully. “I can certainly see why
you
need
me
. What other woman could possibly put up with such a grumpy—albeit sexy—Englishman like you, for all eternity?”

I cocked my head, pretending to consider all my options. “Should I actually agree to a return engagement with you . . . when, after all, as you’ve pointed out, I now have all these interesting, tempting men at my doorstep . . . ? Hmmm . . .” I said, gazing skyward.

“You really have no choice,” Jeremy warned. “You’ll never get rid of me now. Wherever you go, I shall follow you, just like a bloodhound. If necessary, I shall hire a skywriter declaring that you are mine. If need be, I will have the police stop all cars and planes and boats, and put out a dragnet, and I will haul you in like a big fish.”

“You still haven’t quite said it,” I noted. “Not in so many words. Not really. Therefore, I’m not really sure what you have in mind.”

He put his hand in his jacket pocket, and he pulled out a little dark blue velvet box.

“Ordinarily,” he said, “I wouldn’t dare go out on a limb and try to make a purchase of this magnitude for a woman who clearly has her own personal tastes in fashion. But, you see, this ruby has been in my family, on my mum’s side, for years. Her mum gave it to her when she was sixteen. It was a pendant, and she said her mum made her keep it in a vault, so she hardly ever got to wear it. She’d almost forgotten about it. For some odd reason, she gave it to me when we were at her place in London. I can’t imagine why, can you? So, I had it made into a ring for you. If you want it.”

I opened the box with slightly shaking fingers. Inside was a beautiful glowing ruby, surrounded by sparkling diamonds and set in that lovely antique gold which has the look of endless time.

“Jeremy,” I said, too choked up to say what I really wanted to. “When did you do this?”

“In Frankfurt,” he said. “I’ve been hanging on to it ever since then, waiting for the proper moment. Because it really does have to be a proper moment, doesn’t it? The very second that you pointed to the Isola Comacina, I felt my life had come full circle, and that, when I was a boy, sitting there gazing across the lake this way, you were the one I was waiting for. You and I are a team, in work and life, and wherever you go I want to be there with you.”

Now my eyes did fill up with tears, which I tried to wink away. Jeremy saw them, and said, “Penny!” and hugged me tightly, and kissed the tears away. “Will you marry me?” he asked.

“Yes,” I whispered. “Oh, yes.”

“Excellent,” he said.

And as we sat there, the mysterious winds of Lake Como began to shift, stirring the blossoms in the trees to carry the bewitching fragrance of jasmine and roses to us. It was a soft, sweet wind, and it made us breathe deeply as I leaned my head against Jeremy’s shoulder, watching the tide ripple in response.

“When the
breva
and the
tivà
winds shift like that,” I told him, “legend says we must each make a silent wish.”

“Who told you that ‘old legend’?” Jeremy asked tenderly.

“Nobody,” I said. “The wind just told me herself.”

I can’t say how long it was that we sat in the Count’s enchanted garden. I can only tell you that the sun descended beyond the darkening Alps, and the stars woke up and rubbed their eyes and peered down at the twinkling gems on my finger.

Then we heard a distinct
Boom!
coming from the window of the Count’s study in the castle. Jeremy and I just looked at each other.

“Cocktail hour!” said Jeremy.

A few moments later, Kurt came walking toward us, smiling knowingly and a trifle apologetically. “Pardon me,” he said, “Father was hoping to have your professional opinion on these X-rays. It is all really quite astonishing, and we are not sure what to think.”

The entire household was waiting for us in the Count’s study. And, spread out on a light-table before him, was the X-ray of the Lion.

“We can have an expert try to authenticate it,” Kurt was telling us. “But Father is fairly certain that this is, indeed, the Lion he’s been looking for. He thinks there is something very surprising inside it. Take a look.”

My first impression was that the X-ray of the Lion made it look like an elaborate, very elegant piggy-bank.

“You can see various plugs and marks visible in the X-ray, and not to the naked eye when gazing upon the finished figure,” Kurt said. “All this is perfectly normal.”

“But,” interjected the Count, sounding excited, “it appears to contain an unusual cylindrical
something
. That is not a joint or a supporting rod. I cannot say what it is. And, believe me, I have looked at so many of these. I have never seen anything like it.” His words were understated, compared to his tone.

“What do you think it is?” I asked. The Count looked up at me, his blue eyes sparkling.

“I don’t know, exactly, but it may be a tube with something in it,” he said excitedly.

“Ohmigosh,” I said, catching my breath. “It can’t be . . . can it?”

“The fragment of the missing autograph?” Jeremy had to say it aloud to even consider it. “The long-lost ‘Eroica’ original?”

But the Lion didn’t yield its secrets right away. It took weeks for Jeremy to get those experts from Frankfurt—the ones who actually knew how to do the complicated process of making aquamanilia—to come to Lake Como. They were eager to try to “operate” on the Lion, but Jeremy had to do some convincing to make them bring their tools and do the deed at the Count’s castle, because the Count emphatically was not going to let the Lion out of his sight.

Meanwhile, I had to get hold of Diamanta so that she could come and witness the event. At this point, all the legal stuff kicked in, about who owned it, and where it would be kept. That took more time and wrangling, but we finally got both sides of this remarkable family to agree that the Lion would spend six months each year at a museum in Lake Como, and six months at a museum in Corsica. Donaldson’s little museum in London would conduct the sale of it, so that various cultural institutions in Corsica and Como could put in their bids. Donaldson would therefore get a one-time, one-month premiere exhibition. The money from its sale would be split up between the two families, after the payment of legal fees . . . plus a fee for the firm of Nichols & Laidley (which meant Rollo would get his finder’s fee from us.) But first, of course, the Lion must be opened, and its value established.

Finally, the Big Day dawned. Word got out about the Lion, so select members of the press were invited to attend. Including our photographer-friend Clive, whom we didn’t tell until the last minute for fear he’d spill the beans again. And a famous Beethoven scholar attended, accompanied by a world-renowned concert pianist who parked himself on stand-by in the Count’s castle at his grand piano, ready to play whatever music might be on any fragment discovered inside.

It turned into such a big deal that we all agreed to televise the event. Out of all the news organizations vying for the assignment, one production company who submitted a proposal was selected to do this great big-budget TV special.

That’s right. You guessed it. Pentathlon Productions.

“This could really put us back on the documentary map,” Bruce said to me ecstatically, as we all assembled at the Count’s castle. Bruce went off to check in with the sound-man.

Erik rolled his eyes and said, “Now you’ve done it! You’ll drive us all into the poorhouse if Bruce makes the changeover from drama to doc. No sets to design! Are you crazy?”

“Why should she care?” Tim asked. “She’s stinking rich.”

“Not to worry,” I said. “Bruce’s wife told me that the world will always want those bio-pics, so she’ll keep writing them and she’ll make sure that Pentathlon keeps shooting them.”

I must have been gesturing, because Tim seized my left hand.

“What is THAT?” he cried. I hadn’t told anybody yet. I’d wanted to keep it to myself a little bit. But Erik whooped so loudly that the whole crew heard him. Then he picked me up and slung me over his shoulder and carried me around and wouldn’t put me down until I promised to let him help me plan the wedding.

“Okay, okay!” I cried.

"Excuse me,” Bruce said in a strained tone. “Might I interrupt to say, ROLL ’EM??”

The opening of the Beethoven Lion took place in a garage on the castle grounds, just beyond the stables. "Garage” was hardly the word for such a grand structure; it was a carriage house, built in the days when the transition from horse to auto meant that the car simply went where the carriage had been parked. It was a big stone and stucco affair, with a mechanic’s windowed office, and an upstairs apartment with a potbellied stove. Bruce converted the mechanic’s office into a control room. The aquamanilia artisans from Frankfurt used the rest of the entire first floor to set up their metalworking shop, and they even made use of a stone oven/barbecue area in the nearby side garden. Amid much clanging and banging, the highly delicate operation on the Beethoven Lion was now about to begin.