The Reply That Never Arrived
Their next meeting did not come nearly as soon as either of them might have expected.
This time he had planned it properly and sent a letter, yet days passed with no answer.
When the servant brought him the sorted post, Cesare scanned it quickly and asked,
"Is this everything addressed to me?"
"Yes, sir. Is there a letter you're waiting for? Tell me and I'll bring it the moment it arrives."
"No... never mind."
Already the heat of high summer pressed against the window. He rolled his sleeves to the elbows and threw the casement open; hotter air rushed in at once.
Only her letter was missing. The other envelopes bearing his name made a thick stack. He drew the topmost document free. Work would not hold his attention, yet he forced himself to it. While the pen scratched across the page, thoughts kept racing through his mind without pause.
"Hah..."
With a heavy sigh he sank into the chair behind his desk.
In the silence of no reply, a thousand possibilities chased one another through Cesare's head. Each time he replayed that day, his own mistakes stood out more sharply.
I was too rough with her.
Halfway through she had begged him to stop, and still he had not been able to hold back. Cesare's fist closed of its own accord. The breathless air of that afternoon, the way her eyes had lifted to him while she trembled—memory of it sent a sharp tingle through his fingertips.
"Damn."
He had left the pen motionless too long; a dark blot of ink was spreading across the paper.
Perhaps I should rest a little.
While he still hesitated, rough footsteps sounded from the far end of the corridor. A moment later the door burst open with a bang.
Only one person ever entered his study that way.
"Hey, friend—it's been an age."
Lucio, whom he had not seen for several days because their schedules never matched, greeted him at full volume. The man looked so pleased with himself that Cesare set his own worries aside for the moment and asked after the matter that had been giving Lucio such headaches.
"So the talk with the head of the Gayardo house went well, I take it."
At Cesare's words Lucio shook his head vigorously and dropped onto the leather sofa opposite him.
"Never even met the man."
"...You look remarkably cheerful for someone who failed."
"Don't tell me you haven't heard?"
Lucio tipped his head back and locked eyes with Cesare. Only then did Cesare lay the pen down.
Apart from a single distant glimpse, he had never had any dealings with the Gayardo young lady. Whatever Lucio meant, it had to be something else entirely.
"Heard what?"
"The major investor in this venture has changed."
"Not the Gayardos?"
"The Pignatellis."
A familiar name.
"...Pignatelli?"
"That's right."
"The madam is putting up the money?"
Lucio shook his head again, as if that guess too were wrong.
"No—the young lady. She's the one investing."
"The young lady?"
"Yes! Apparently it was a field she'd already been watching with interest!"
Cesare's expression must have been entertaining; Lucio delivered the news in an exaggerated boom.
"...When..."
"The day you abandoned me because you suddenly had an appointment."
There had been only one such day.
The day I went to buy fish.
When he saw Delphina the very next morning she had not breathed a single word about Lucio. Questions about where they had met, how the conversation had gone, what exactly had been said, crowded so thickly behind his teeth that they nearly spilled out.
"...I see. That's good news."
"Isn't it splendid? If I'd known she was this keen on investing I might never have had to play the suitor at all! Even now..."
Lucio's eyes sparkled; the young lady had clearly made a strong impression. Cesare, already reading the next words on his friend's tongue, cut him off mid-sentence.
"We ought to keep quiet about the national project, don't you think?"
Left unchecked, Lucio would have dropped the pretence entirely and gone straight to her to beg her to sell him the mansion. At Cesare's warning Lucio's face fell and his lips pushed out in a pout.
"Ahh. True enough. Building trust with the investment first wouldn't be a bad idea either."
The abacus was already clacking inside Lucio's head. Selling the house cheaply while increasing her share of the investment so as to bind her more tightly seemed, to him, an entirely acceptable trade.
"...Yes."
The wind was plainly blowing in a favourable direction.
Then why...
Why did his mood remain so low? Cesare's jaw stood out as though he were biting something back.
"At least I no longer have to dance attendance on that young lady. That's a relief."
"...Is it."
Utterly oblivious to Cesare's feelings, Lucio popped one of the cookies from the table into his mouth and began outlining the days ahead.
"Not that I'm free, mind you. Instead I have to go and report on the state of the business at the polo match coming up."
"You've arranged to meet her there?"
"Of course. This isn't small change we're talking about."
"...Right."
"You in a foul mood?"
"...No."
"Ah—!"
"......."
Lucio clapped his hands as though he had just solved a riddle and fixed Cesare with a knowing look.
"This meeting isn't as a suitor, so it won't count against the number of visits."
The attempt at reassurance only soured Cesare's temper further.
"One of these days."
"Hm?"
"I think I should go with you."
He had spoken without thinking, yet once the words were out they did not seem a bad idea at all.
"It's in three days."
"Three days. I'll keep my calendar clear."
If still no word had come by then, the match would give him a natural chance to see her and ask. Only then did his spirits lift a fraction.
"What's gotten into you?"
"What happened to 'let's go everywhere together'?"
Lucio looked startled by the uncharacteristic offer, yet he nodded without real suspicion.
"Fair enough. And now's the time to press the advantage a little harder."
"Summer has only just begun."
"Father says he means to visit Toulouse soon—and he'll bring my one and only younger sibling with him."
Lucio spoke as though the prospect already wearied him. At the news Cesare's own face hardened.
The physician who had just finished his examination spoke in a bored, put-upon voice, as though he had been summoned for nothing of consequence.
"The change of seasons has weakened you further, it seems."
The day after her meeting with Cesare, Delphina had collapsed in the corridor. For several days afterward she had been so ill she could scarcely keep her wits about her.
"Is that all?"
She asked again, but the answer did not change.
"You make it sound as though I misdiagnosed you, my lady."
Faced with the doctor's rising temper, Delphina simply looked away.
The room was warm enough that everyone else was sweating, yet she alone shivered as though she had been plunged into ice water.
He's one of them too.
She had trusted him for years as the family physician, yet in the end he too was in league with Lady Pignatelli.
"I understand you're more sensitive because you're unwell."
At the doctor's sarcasm she could feel the servants behind him stifling their laughter.
"So it seems. I should like to rest a little."
A heavy weariness rolled over her.
"I brought some soup. Won't you have any?"
Lady Pignatelli asked, glancing at the bowl on the trolley she had wheeled in herself.
"...I have no appetite."
After she had already vomited blood, the woman still meant to feed her poison. Delphina looked at Lady Pignatelli and saw a monster.
Lady Pignatelli patted her shoulder with tender affection.
"Whenever you wish, my dear."
"...Thank you. I should like to rest now, if that is all right."
"Of course. I shan't disturb you."
She dismissed everyone and left Delphina alone; yet the door never quite shut, and the voices in the corridor carried clearly into the room.
"Perhaps it's because I come from common stock, but when a child is ill I want to cook for her with my own hands. It may be meddlesome of me... and Delphina does not care for it either, I suppose."
Most of the servants were common-born. Her words found their mark with ease.
"Oh, no, my lady. How cold of the young miss not to appreciate your kindness."
In the looking-glass of the dressing table at the far end of the room, Delphina's own face stared back at her.
Cheeks drained of colour, hair losing its lustre. When she lowered her gaze she saw how thin her wrists had grown.
A cough tore free, then another. She dragged a shallow breath into her lungs and pressed a handkerchief to her lips. Thin blood was already seeping into the fabric.
"Change of seasons, he says."
She could not even laugh.
This was poison. Of that she had no doubt.