Page 67 of Vengeance in Venice
Greeting the Englishman effusively, he bore him off to the study rather than to the drawing room and his wife.
“My wife told me you called yesterday,” he said. “I was so annoyed to have missed you. I would have come to you, only I don’t like to intrude when your wife is ill.”
“I believe she is mending, although we had a serious fright.” Grey sat in the comfortable chair Premarin indicated.
Premarin decided to do him a favor. “You should know,” he said confidentially, “that words likepoisonare being bandied about.”
“Indeed,” Grey said without obvious surprise. He met Premarin’s serious gaze with cool, clear, dark eyes.
It gave Premarin pause, that look, reminding him that Grey was not a man to trifle with. He had not achieved what he had by stupidity or even luck. He was a polite, elegant force of nature.
Grey added, “We believe the poison to have been in her wine glass at the reception, for she ate nothing.”
Premarin felt the blood drain from his face. “But…you cannot think… I poured her wine from a fresh, open bottle, but I drank the same wine myself. So did you!” He had to control the panic before his voice gave him away. There was too much at stake here.
“I know,” Grey replied, much to Premarin’s relief. “You might even have saved her by diluting the poison that was already in her glass. The trouble is, we cannot tell when or by whom the poison was placed there.”
“But my dear fellow…! I cannot conceive… This is truly shocking, utterly dreadful.”
“It is,” Grey agreed, unblinking. “Have the police not asked you what you witnessed?”
Premarin shook his head. “No. I know of no one who has been questioned, in fact, which is why I did not believe the rumors could be true. Perhaps the authorities were satisfied after talking to the consulate staff.”
But how could they be satisfied without a culprit? As far as he knew, they did not have one. And yet they hadn’t spoken to himself or Giusti, or anyone else he knew who had been there.
Clearly this had already occurred to Grey. Premarin, doing his best for his countrymen, said, “I suppose, since your wife recovered, they have gone back to the murder of poor Savelli.”
“Don’t they believe the matters are related?”
Premarin shrugged. “Who knows what they believe?” He hesitated, searching Grey’s face, which, now he looked more carefully, was all suppressed anger and nigh-intolerable anxiety. He didn’t even try to hide it. Premarin, veteran of a thousand successful negotiations, found himself hurrying into unplanned speech. “It is difficult. Everything is difficult now. I know for a fact the government wants the murderer found, but the attack on your wife could easily become a diplomatic incident. If they find Savelli’s killer, then presumably they have your wife’s poisoner too, and justice will be served. Though I myself see no obvious connection.”
Grey lifted his brows in blatant disbelief, and Premarin could have kicked himself.
“Don’t you?” Grey said. “My wife and I have been asking questions, at first because we were once under suspicion ourselves. But we don’t like to leave such matters unsolved, and I owe Giusti—another suspect—a debt of gratitude. I don’t believe he killed Savelli.”
“I find it hard to believe too.” Premarin spread his hands. “Anything I can do to help you,” he said with sincerity, “I will.”
Grey held his gaze, and pounced. “Did you know that your wife has been seen late at night outside the Palazzo Savelli? Including on the night of the murder.”
Premarin closed his eyes as though that could shut out this suddenly relentless man and his own burning shame. And Bianca’s. He had to say something, make some kind of defense.
Then he remembered quite suddenly whom he was dealing with. Premarin was good at reading men. He’d had to be. And he had already assessed Solomon Grey as a clever, driven, but basically honest man. He was not unkind, but he would not tolerate deceit.
And so Premarin’s defense, like any future negotiations—and he refused to give up on those even now—depended on his own honesty. And on Grey’s goodwill and understanding. He had to risk it.
He opened his eyes in time to catch the hint of pity in Grey’s, quickly veiled. But there would be no quarter. The man wanted,needed, an answer.
“I was not aware she had been seen,” Premarin said with what dignity he could muster. “But I know she was there. So was I.”
Grey’s brow twitched, ever so slightly, his only betrayal of surprise. “You were? No one told me that.”
He was not here for blame or accusations, Premarin saw with considerable relief, just truth. So that was what he would give him, since he had no choice now.
“I am an ageing man, Signor Grey, with a young wife. I married her when she was but eighteen, mainly as a mother for my children. It did not enter my head that she was little more than a child herself. To me, it was a matter of convenience. To her…a girl has the right to expect some romance in her life.” He shrugged. “But I work too hard, I make assumptions, and while I am never unkind, I certainly make few allowances for her youth. For anything. Until I saw her slipping out of the house one night.”
With a self-deprecating smile, he mocked himself. “Now I notice. My honor is at stake. I think she has a lover, so I follow her. She does not go far. She just stands in the shadows outside the Palazzo Savelli and waits for him to appear at a window. Henever acknowledged her. I don’t believe he ever noticed her, but that first time I waited. I too saw him at a window. When he had gone, when the last light was doused, she left, and again I followed. She returned straight home.”
Saying it all was ridiculously easy. The earth did not swallow him up. No monster ate him. Grey did not even look at him with scorn, just those steady, unblinking eyes, taking in every nuance of his face and voice.
