One Knight In Venice

Still scanning the interior, Francis shook his head. “Nay, tis an angel, methinks, and one that I long to see soon again.” Never was he in more need of Jessica’s healing touch than now. His heart beat faster.

Jobe lifted his dark brows. “A woman?” he asked with surprise.

Francis stepped into the yawning nave. “Aye, but more than that. You will understand when you meet her. Ah! There she is!” He spied a slim cloaked figure at a side door.

He broke into a trot across the undulating, uneven floor. If she managed to slip away before he could reach her, he would lose her among the holiday crowd in the piazza. “Signorina Jessica,” he called softly as soon as he dared.

The woman turned. Her white-painted mask shone starkly from the folds of her dark hood. Francis called her again. “Signorina Leonardo? I crave a word or two.”

Placing her hand on the large brass doorknob, she paused like a startled deer in a wooded glen.

Francis drew to her side. Jobe lingered in the shadow of one of the stone pillars.

“Donna Jessica?” Francis asked again, though he was sure it was she. Her perfume enveloped him with its enchantment.

“Messere,” she murmured, drawing her hood lower over her hidden visage. Her hand trembled. “I hope you are feeling better this morning.”

He placed his hand on his chest. “In body yes, but my heart is broken in twain.”

She stepped closer to the door. “Pray do not jest with me. It is not seemly to play trifling games inside God’s house.” She turned to go.

Francis touched her arm. “Forgive me. I do not sport with you, Donna Jessica. I have just learned that my grandfather is dead. Do you have a healing potion for a grieving heart?”

She looked up at him. Her eyes shimmered behind the mask. “Your pardon, messere, I mistook,” she whispered. “You have my deepest condolences.”

Francis took her hand in his. “May I escort you back to your home? Just hearing your voice is balm to my sorrow.”

Her trembling increased. “It is already daylight outside and I am late. I beg your pardon, Lord Bardolph, but I must hurry away.”

He refused to relinquish her hand. “Then I shall attach wings to my feet and fly with you.”

“Like Mercury?” A half smile brightened her lips below the mask. “But it is not possible. You are a great personage and I am a nobody. We should not be seen together. My company demeans you.”

“Never,” he protested. He longed to shed the disguise of his garish clothing and his pretense of nobility. “I swear upon yon Holy Cross that all my wealth runs in my veins, not in my purse or position.”

She lowered her head so that he could not see her eyes. “You speak in riddles that I do not understand. Pray, let me go now. I must be away from here. There are too many prying eyes and wagging tongues.” She glanced up at him. “For your loss, I am sorry, and I will remember your grandfather in my prayers. What was his name?”

“Thomas,” he replied softly.

She nodded. “A fine name. I will remember him—and you,” she added. She glanced over to the pillar. “I see you are attended by a friend and so I will leave you with better company than I. Good day, messere, until tomorrow.”

Francis looked over his shoulder at Jobe. “Sì,” he answered with feeling, “he is a wealth of friends rolled into one, but you—” When he turned again, he found that she had slipped away without a sound.

Jobe stepped out of the shadows. “You spoke the truth,” he remarked, putting his hand on Francis’s shoulder. “The maid is a very pearl among the swine of Venice.”

“She seemed afraid of me, yet I meant her no harm. Did you hear the music of her voice? Oh! She is sweet and brings a ray of sunshine into the cold vault of my heart.”

“Tread softly lest you lose her forever,” Jobe whispered.

Francis gave him a penetrating look. “What do you see in the mists of the future? Do you see her?”

Jobe stared beyond Francis, past the bright candles and the holy statues into the dark recesses of his inner vision. “Aye, I do, but tis murky. That little one will save you or she will condemn you. She carries joy in one hand and sorrow in the other. Because of her, you will die, be reborn and new baptized.”

Chapter Four

Sophia looked up from her kettle of thick soup as Jessica entered the tiny kitchen at the back of the house. The savory aroma of simmering chicken and onions comforted the young woman. Still out of breath from her dash through the maze of alleyways and squares between the great piazza and the safety of her little home north of the Rialto Bridge, Jessica sank onto a short-legged wooden stool. Tossing back her hood, she plucked the mask from her face.

Sophia planted a hand on her ample hip. “How now? I thought you went to church?”

“I did,” Jessica replied. Her heart still raced within her bosom.

“Then why have you returned looking as if you were pursued by a demon?”

Drawing in a deep breath, Jessica leaned back against the cool plaster wall. “He was at Saint Mark’s.”

The little woman’s eyes widened. “Who? Il diavolo in a house of God? Tell me, does he truly have horns and cloven feet?”

Despite her recent fright, Jessica smiled. “No, Sophia. I speak of the English lord from yesterday.” She sat up straighter. “He was there and he stopped me as I was leaving.”

“And?” Sophia cocked her head like one of Venice’s gray-feathered pigeons.

Jessica twisted her fingers in her lap. “How did he know I would be there?” she whispered. “Unless he had me watched. Did he station a man outside my door to see if I consorted with Jews? Perchance he hopes to trap me, to prove that I am not a good Christian woman.”

“Mayhap he expects you to fly over the rooftops on a broomstick,” Sophia remarked wryly. “Or invite nine or ten alley cats to a dance.”

Jessica glared at her. “Tis no laughing matter. Why do I feel that I tread upon eggshells when Lord Bardolph is near? He frightens me.”

Sophia snorted. “Only that? Are you sure there is nothing else he does to you when he is standing next to you?”

Closing her eyes, Jessica allowed herself to explore the myriad unfamiliar feelings that had assailed her when Sir Francis had held her hand. Though he had worn gloves, she felt his heat penetrate her skin. Setting her blood afire. Leaving her breathless. Making her giddy with a strange emotion that she had never experienced.

“He is not like other men,” she responded lamely.

Sophia turned back to the soup that threatened to bubble over into the fire. “Agreed. He is as tall as a ship’s mast.”

Jessica rolled her eyes. Sophia could be so annoying at times. “I mean he is not like the others who have sought my help. I know how to slip away from the searching hands of those Lotharios old and young who seek to press their advantage upon me. They laugh and shrug and tell me that there will be another day. And I know how to listen to those sad-faced men who complain of their aches and pains when it is really their wives and their dull marriages that make them feel ill. They leave happier and call me sweet names that they will not remember by the time they reach the canal. But this man…”

Shivering, she hugged herself as she recalled his low gentle voice and the infinite beauty of his face. “He is so different. He dresses as if he had not a care in the world, yet he bears a weight inside of him greater than all the henpecked husbands of Venice.” She caught Sophia’s gaze. “He told me this morning that he had just learned of his grandfather’s death.”

The little woman paused in her soup stirring and sketched a hasty sign of the cross. “Poor man!”

Jessica stared at the glowing red coals in the hearth. “And I think that is the truth, yet he was sad yesterday when he did not know of his grandfather’s passing. Is he sad because he must disguise his true self? Sophia, I cannot banish the fear that he is really a secret agent of the Holy Office.”

Sophia tasted her concoction and added a pinch of salt. “And yet?”

Jessica massaged her temples. “I swear I must be going mad for I cannot wait until he returns here tomorrow. Just thinking about him makes my heart pound. Do you suppose I am coming down with a fever?”

Sophia turned slowly around and surveyed Jessica. She crossed her arms over her breasts with an odd gleeful look in her eye. “Just so, cara mia. I think you have been bitten by a strange malady that usually comes in the springtime.”