Lost Love Found (28 page)

“Thank you, Nelda,” Valentina said. “This is Lord Burke, Nelda, and this gentleman is the Earl of Kempe.”

Nelda curtsied.

“Where is Nan?” demanded Padraic. “And who is this pretty wench?”

“Nan fears the sea and does not have the stomach for it. This is her youngest child, Nelda, who is to serve me in Nan’s place,” replied Valentina. She shed her fur-lined cape and handed it to the girl. “Be sure to brush it well,” she said as the girl hurried off with the garment.

Young Geoff’s eyes followed Nelda admiringly. Then, suddenly aware of his position, he swallowed hard and said, “This is the ship’s day room. Usually it is the captain’s domain, and he and his officers dine here. The captain says ye are to consider it yers while you are aboard
Archangel
, though he and his officers must, of necessity, continue to take their meals here. Ye are, of course, invited to join them each evening for dinner.” Stopping to catch his breath, Geoff flushed slightly, for he had never before felt so important. “
Archangel
is a very special ship,” he continued. “She has been built to carry passengers as well as cargo. Consequently, yer accommodations will be quite comfortable. Cousin Valentina … my lady … yer sleeping cabin is through that door. Yer servant will sleep on a trundle beneath yer bed. My father’s cabin is next to yers. My lord earl, ye will have the cabin on the other side of this room, and Uncle Padraic, ye will be next to the earl. My father, the captain, hopes ye will be quite comfortable.” He bowed politely. “I must be about my other duties now. Ye will be out of the way here until we clear the pool.” He strode briskly through the door.

The day was bright for January, the sky clear blue, the sun almost warm. There was a good breeze coming up that rattled ever so faintly at the small panes of glass in the great bow window. The gentlemen went topside immediately, but Valentina preferred to remain snugly ensconced in the window seat of the bow window, a fur rug about her for warmth. She watched London disappear behind her and the river begin to widen as they passed Greenwich. She was leaving England and everything she knew, all that was familiar. Suddenly, she was blindingly aware of the incredible chance she was taking. Javid Khan and Sultan Murad were both dead. Who was left who could tell her if she was the daughter of either of those men unless, perhaps, she looked like one of them or one of their relatives? How could they know? Would she ever learn the truth? Aye! She would. There had to be
someone
who could help her unravel the mystery that haunted her.

At least one worry had been lifted from her shoulders. She had twice suffered her flux since that wonderful night with Padraic. Now each day she took a carefully measured dose of her aunt’s special potion. She had a good supply, and Nelda had both the recipe and the herbs necessary to make it. Valentina did not intend to be caught again! True, Padraic’s behavior had been most circumspect afterwards, but still. She smiled to herself. Bless him! Though she would never tell him! Had he not made love to her that night, she would have never known just how very sweet love could be.

What a fool she had been, Valentina thought. She had been so distressed that she could not find love within her that she had really believed that such love did not exist for her. Why had she not stopped to consider that she had never been attracted to a man enough to pursue a relationship with him. What a revelation she had faced in the arms of both Padraic Burke and Tom Ashburne.

Suddenly she felt the
Archangel
dip and swoop, and her heart leaped. She looked out the window again. The sea! They had reached the sea! They had sailed through the mouth of the Thames, the ship cutting neatly through the waves. There would be no turning back.

The weather held for the three ships as they made their way down the English Channel and out into the Atlantic. The Bay of Biscay, usually rough and stormy, was pleasant, the air hinting of balminess as they sailed across it. Occasionally they saw other ships, though never closely enough to identify any. The O’Malley-Small ships flew, from their topmost masts, flags that guaranteed them safe passage through the waters controlled by the Ottoman Empire and the Dey of Algiers. Ships without these pennants ran the risk of being captured by Ottoman ships. Capture meant confiscation of the cargo and, worse, slavery for the crew and passengers.

They passed through the Strait of Gibraltar, past its great mountain and into the azure Mediterranean Sea. It had been arranged that they would stop at the duchy of San Lorenzo where they would take on fresh water and food.

“There is but one town in San Lorenzo, its capital, Arcobaleno,” said Murrough O’Flaherty. “It’s a charming place, and we will anchor there for a few days to provision the ships.”

“Arcobaleno,” said Valentina. “That means
rainbow
in Italian, doesn’t it?”

“Aye, it does,” her cousin the captain replied.

“Why is it called rainbow?” Valentina wondered aloud.

“Wait and see,” he told her with a chuckle.

The explanation was immediately obvious from the harbor of Arcobaleno. The town was built on a group of small, steep hills, and the buildings were painted every imaginable color. Red lay next to purple, which was on top of green, followed by blue, pink, orange, yellow, violet, rose, turquoise, and peach. The hills were olive with their winter cover and the brown vineyards lay dormant, although they would soon begin to show new growth. Atop the highest point in the town was the white marble palace of the duke, Sebastian di San Lorenzo III.

“It’s wonderful!” said Valentina, laughing, as
Archangel
and her sister ships were made fast to the quays. “May we go ashore, Murrough? What language do the people speak?”

She was looking particularly lovely today, he thought. Her silk gown was dusky rose and very flattering. Her eyes were sparkling with anticipation. It was obvious that the voyage agreed with Valentina.

“Of course you may go ashore, Val. The language spoken here is Italian, but they understand French as well. The late duchessa was French-speaking. There is a wonderful marketplace at the top of the first hill that you will enjoy very much. Tonight I suspect we will be invited to the palace. The duke is a friend of mine.”

The day was invitingly warm and Valentina, her servant, and her two gallants walked from the quay up the hill to the marketplace of Arcobaleno. Although it was winter, there were flowers tumbling from all of the boxes in all of the windows, and the town’s inhabitants were friendly, smiling at the beautiful
signora
and her two handsome cavaliers.

In the marketplace they found close to a hundred merchants and farmers selling a large variety of merchandise beneath gaily striped awnings. Valentina could not return to the ship without purchasing an armful of fluffy mimosa.

Nelda was positively wide-eyed, for the girl had never before been more than five miles from Pearroc Royal. She gaped open-mouthed at an entertainer who was amusing the crowd with his troupe of six dogs and had to be pulled away by her laughing mistress, for Nelda would have been content to spend the day watching the man.

When they returned to the ship, an invitation had indeed been delivered from the palace requesting their presence that night at dinner. Valentina chased the gentlemen from the large day room and had a tub of warm, fresh water set up so that she might bathe. She luxuriated in the soft, fragrant water. Nelda, carefully instructed by her mother, washed her lady’s hair using a special mixture of soft soap scented with Valentina’s favorite fragrance, lily of the valley.

“This is wonderful!” Valentina sighed as she sat back in the tub. “Wouldn’t you like to bathe with fresh water, too, Nelda?”

“Tonight when yer ladyship’s at the palace, I’ll do so,” Nelda told her. “My old granny said too much bathing wasn’t good for ye, but it don’t seem to hurt ye.”

Valentina laughed. “The gentlemen like it when a lady smells sweet,” she noted.

Bathed, dried, and powdered, Valentina rested in her cabin, drowsily hearing the sounds of the tub being emptied and stored away. A soft breeze came through the cabin’s porthole, lulling her into a restful sleep. When Nelda finally woke her, Valentina stretched and yawned lazily as she rose from her bed to be dressed.

Her gown was of apple-green silk, the brocade underskirt sewn with a design of seashells in gold thread and small pearls. The sleeves were loose and hanging, showing undersleeves made of very sheer, creamy silk edged in lace. The low, square neckline was edged with matching lace and displayed Lady Barrows’s magnificent bosom perfectly. Her jewelry was simple, pearls about her neck and pear-shaped pearls dangling from her ears. A pretty fan of white feathers dangled from the gold ribbon she wore about her slender waist. Her rich dark hair was dressed with gold ribbons and white silk roses.

The gentlemen had chosen to affect the elegant black costume so favored by the Venetians. Both were most appreciative of Valentina’s gown, and as Padraic and Tom leaped forward to offer her their arms, Valentina brushed past them and slipped her hand through Murrough’s arm. Murrough grinned delightedly, his blue eyes laughing.

The sun was setting in a blaze of red and gold as they set off into the hills in the duke’s carriage to the palace. Quickly, so quickly that it surprised the visitors, the Mediterranean night fell, velvet black with thousands of crystal stars. Valentina had never known a night like this, the air seductive with the scent of night-blooming flowers mixed with the pungent, sharp tang of the salt air.

“Did you not take the opportunity to bathe, gentlemen?” she questioned them, trying to take her mind off her body, which seemed unusually sensitive in this climate. The silk of her gown rubbed against her nipples with each breath. “I had a magnificent tub of fresh water this afternoon.”

“Murrough took us to a Turkish bath here in Arcobaleno,” Lord Burke said. “Mother had told me about such places, but I have never been in one before. ’Twas most refreshing, was it not, Tom?”

“Aye,” agreed the earl. “I cannot remember ever having been so clean in my life. They begin by wetting you down and then they scrape the dirt off with a little tool, rinse it away, put you in an incredibly hot room filled with steam, where you—forgive me, Val—sweat. Then they rinse you again, soap you all over, and rinse you a final time before massaging your body with sweet oils. I think I liked that part the best,” he concluded with a grin.

“I should have liked it better if the women massaging us had been younger and prettier.” Murrough chuckled.

The duke’s carriage reached its destination. Awaiting them on the palace steps was the duke himself. Murrough leaped from the vehicle before it had stopped, then wrapped the ruler of San Lorenzo in a bear hug.

“Sebastian! How are ye? Have ye found a new wife yet?”

The duke laughed. He was a tall, handsome man with night-dark hair and amber eyes. “There is time enough for me to marry again, old friend! My boys are both healthy, praise God! For now I far prefer to imitate nature and, like the honeybee, buzz from one sweet flower to another.”

Murrough laughed heartily, his blue eyes twinkling. Turning back to the open coach, he helped his beautiful cousin from the vehicle. “Highness, may I present my cousin Valentina, Lady Barrows,” he said.

“She is much better looking than you have ever been, old friend,” the duke observed wryly.

Valentina held out her hand to the duke. To her surprise, and she hoped it did not show, his touch was unsettling.

The duke kissed the slender white hand warmly, perhaps a trifle too warmly. And his golden-brown eyes never left her. “Madonna, you grace my small kingdom. It is suddenly a thousand times more beautiful!” he avowed passionately in a low, seductive voice.

“I do not see how that is possible, Highness,” Valentina replied, her cheeks growing warm with his extravagant compliment. “What I have seen of San Lorenzo is pure perfection.”

“Then it is only fair that perfect beauty be here in my palace tonight, is it not, madonna?” the duke murmured, his eyes openly caressing her décolletage admiringly.

“If you can tear yer eyes away from Valentina’s bosom a moment, Sebastian,” Murrough teased the duke, “I will present ye to my younger brother Padraic, Lord Burke, and our friend, Thomas Ashburne, the Earl of Kempe, who is traveling with us.” Murrough O’Flaherty waggled his eyebrows warningly at the two young men, who were glowering fiercely at the handsome duke. Murrough was having a very difficult time keeping his composure, for it was a delicious situation, one that his mother would particularly appreciate.

The duke turned to greet his guests with warm, sincere words of welcome. The two gentlemen found themselves liking the duke in spite of themselves, even when, with amazing finesse, Sebastian di San Lorenzo turned once again and, tucking Valentina’s hand through his arm, led them into his palace.

They dined outdoors on a large, wide marble terrace that seemed to hang suspended over the sea. There were fragrant white rose trees in great yellow porcelain tubs set on the black-and-white-tiled floor. On a small raised dais a quartet of musicians played a virginal, a harp, and strings. Tall, footed lamps cast a subtle golden light over the scene.

The meal was magnificent, lavish, a marvelous change after the simple ship’s fare. There was a whole fresh fish, a Mediterranean mullet, dressed with lemon, white wine, and tarragon. On another platter were dainty ortolans, small game birds, roasted to a golden hue, each stuffed with half an apricot rolled around an almond and sitting on a bed of risotto, bright with bits of green onions. There was a whole baby lamb, flavored with rosemary and garlic; a small pig roasted until its skin was black; goose with plum sauce; and a turkey stuffed with oysters and chestnuts. Artichokes swam in delicate olive oil and red wine vinegar.

When the main course had finally been cleared away, the servants came to each diner bearing a silver basin of scented water and a towel so that they might wash away all evidence of their gluttony. Afterward, desserts were placed on the table, and Valentina’s sweet tooth was tempted with apricot cakes soaked in sweet wine; creamy custards with cherry sauce; marzipan confections dipped in honey; candied angelica, violets, and rose petals; and delicate sugar wafers.