“Not there. We cannot distress Mrs. Reekie,” James said urgently. “She should not be disturbed.”

Livia flicked a contemptuous glance upwards to his pale face. “She will not be distressed,” she promised him. “Why should she care if your marriage is challenged? It’s not as if she could ever be a wife for you?”

He flinched from the contempt in her tone. “I don’t want to trespass on her time,” he said weakly.

“The justice of the peace in our parish is Mr. Peter Lucas, a member of the City Corporation,” Sarah suggested.

“Send for him,” Lady Eliot told Alys Stoney.

Alys raised an eyebrow at being ordered by a stranger. “Aye,” was all she said.

* * *

The only room in the warehouse large enough to accommodate the magistrate, Alinor’s family, the wedding party, Captain Shore, and Felipe was the counting house, with the doors thrown open to the storeroom. Everyone could see, at the back of the store, the newly unloaded crated antiquities, each clearly labeled “Nobildonna da Ricci” in Sarah’s writing, as if to declare, before anyone had even spoken, that Livia was Rob’s wife doing business under his name. Carlotta, holding a sleeping Matteo, stood near them, uncertain what was taking place.

Johnnie, summoned from his work, hugged his sister tightly and whispered: “Glad you’re back!” He took in the assembly, the many strangers in the warehouse where visitors were a rarity, and gentry had never come. “What’s going on? I just got a message from Ma that you were home, that you’d brought Rob with you, and that I was to come at once. I thought we would be celebrating!”

She squeezed his arm. “You’ll see. It’s all right.”

She meant that there was nothing here that would hurt their mother or grandmother and he was reassured. “And you? Are you well?” he asked quickly, and was surprised at the radiance of her sudden smile. “Wait a minute! What’s happened?”

“Tell you later,” she whispered, and pushed him towards the clerk’s stool beside the magistrate, Mr. Lucas, who was already poised behind the tall counting desk. The portly City merchant pushed pen and paper to Johnnie. “You’ll write down what’s said when I give you the word,” he ordered. “Write neat, so we don’t have to make a fair copy after.”

Alinor had come downstairs to be with her son, and she stood, her arm in Rob’s, leaning slightly against him, as if she wanted to be sure that he was truly there, in reality, and not a dream. “I always knew you were alive,” she said to him quietly. “And here you are. Nothing matters more than this. Whatever they say here, nothing matters more than that you are alive and have come home to us.”

“Nothing matters more,” he agreed. “But Ma—she has to answer to this: that she should have imposed on you… that she should have said I was drowned… and…” He lowered his voice. “What’s happened to Alys? She looks so ill? Is it Livia? Did she rob her?”

Alinor looked across the warehouse at her daughter’s closed expression, and the hard line of her mouth. “I think Livia betrayed her,” she said.

“The antiquities? Did she make Alys pay for the shipping? Is she in debt?”

“Yes,” Alinor said, knowing that there was so much more.

James came quietly before them. “May I speak with you?” he asked Alinor, ignoring Alys, who stepped forwards, as if she would protect her mother.

“You can,” Alinor said. She did not move from Rob’s supporting arm and James had to speak before the three of them.

“I wanted to say that I am very sorry,” he said quietly. “I have been a fool, I have been played for a fool and now I am shown as a fool in front of you, the one woman in the world whose opinion I care for. I hoped that she would help you, I gave her money to help you, I only went along with all of this—the shipping of the antiques, their sale at my house—to help you. I wanted to make your life better, I wanted you to be able to afford medicines. I wanted you to live in a better house, a healthier situation, I wanted you to have a garden again…” He trailed off. “I thought I was helping you, through her. And then… like a fool… I was compromised…”

“It doesn’t matter,” Alinor spoke with genuine indifference to his shame. “All that matters to me is that my son is alive and has come back to us.”

“I’m glad for that,” Sir James said with a swift glance at Rob. “But Alinor…”

Rob tightened his grip on his mother’s arm. “I don’t think you should speak, sir,” he said quietly. “I don’t think you should speak to my mother.”

“I wanted to make…” He was lost for words. “I wanted to make reparation.”

“I want nothing from you,” Alinor said firmly. “We never did.”

Sir James bowed his head as a man who accepts a life sentence and stepped back in silence. Livia, at the side of the warehouse beside her looming wrapped antiquities, regarded them all with tepid interest, as if they were a theater performance that might start at any moment. The only person she did not watch was Felipe; as if she were confident that he would say no more.

“Right,” said the magistrate. “Gentlemen, if you’re ready, let’s get started.”

They drew closer to circle the desk, the gentry putting themselves forward as always, as the most important people in any room. Lady Eliot was beside Sir George with Sir James on his right. Livia came forward to stand beside her new husband, her hand tucked confidently into his sleeve, her other hand holding her posy of primroses to her face. Alys, Alinor, Rob, and Sarah faced them on the other side of the circle. Captain Shore stood a little behind Alys, Felipe beside him, immediately behind Sarah. The minister from the church, silently wishing he was elsewhere, stood beside the magistrate and Johnnie at the desk.

“This is a preliminary inquiry by me, justice of the peace of this parish of St. Olave’s, into an allegation of bigamy against Nobildonna Livia Reekie or, in her married name, Lady Avery.” He nudged Johnnie. “Write that down.”

“Da Ricci,” Livia remarked. “Or Peachey, as it is sometimes pronounced.”

The magistrate nodded. “Now, evidence…”

Rob stepped a little forward and explained that he had come to Venice as a newly qualified doctor and been appointed to the elderly Signor Fiori and so met his beautiful wife, the Nobildonna. Livia, sniffing the primroses, apparently uninterested in the retelling of her story, released Sir James from her grasp, and strolled again to the back of the warehouse where the antiquities were crated up, as if the silent shrouded stones were of more interest to her than the two men who had married her, the three men who had loved her, and the silent Alys. Rob concluded his statement saying that since he was alive, Livia was his wife, and this marriage to Sir James was bigamous.

“Is this true?” the magistrate asked her. “Madam? Would you reply to this charge?” He looked up from overseeing Johnnie’s notes and saw that Livia had strolled away. He repeated more irritably: “Madam! We are waiting for you! These are most serious charges.”

Confidently, she turned and walked towards the desk, her heels tapping on the floor as they had tapped down the church aisle just two hours before, her dark blue gown brushing the dusty floor. She smiled at the magistrate, conscious of her own beauty.