“It’s mostly true,” she said judiciously. She turned to Rob. “One thing I should say, and you should know. I did not denounce you, my dear. That was Felipe. I loved you then, as a wife can love a husband who has brought her more happiness than she ever knew. I would never have hurt you or betrayed you. I would have died first.”

She bent her head to the posy of primroses as if to see if Felipe would argue, and when he remained silent she looked up, like a beautiful actress timing her lines. She smiled tenderly at Rob as if they were alone together in the room. “All our sorrows came from Felipe,” she said softly. “He ruined our lives. He controlled me completely for years, he trapped me into working for him when I was married to the Conte—yes—he ruined my happiness there too. I was bound to him by a hundred secrets, and I should have known he would never let me go. When you found out about his business, he wanted to be rid of you. It was not I.” Meltingly she looked at him. “Never would it have been me. You know that I loved you. I would never, never have denounced you. But when he arrested you, I did see my chance to escape him. I did leave Venice, I did run away. I was afraid…” She lowered her voice. “You know how much I was afraid of him. This was a man who murdered my first husband and had my second imprisoned! I was terrified of him, and I was all alone without protection. Of course I ran away.”

“Murdered your first husband!” the magistrate exclaimed, looking from her serene face to Felipe.

Livia did not trouble herself to answer, she turned to Alys. “And of course I came to you. You know how unhappy I was when I first came here,” she said softly. “You know how deep was my grief at the loss of Roberto, your brother. You know how much I loved him. You will remember me crying in the night, crying till our pillow was wet with my tears. You know how you comforted me.”

Alys’s face was flinty. “Aye,” was all she said.

“You know how you comforted me,” Livia repeated. “You held me, you dried my tears, you took me in your arms.”

Alys nodded, still saying nothing.

“No one will ever know how good you were to me,” Livia said. “That tenderness will always be just between us, our secret.”

Alys’s mouth was shut in a hard line.

“And now I am pledged in all honor to Sir James and married to him.” Livia turned back to Rob. “My dear, I thought you were dead. Felipe assured me you were dead and there was no possibility of my ever seeing you again. Of course I told your family that you were drowned! I could not have borne to tell them that you were arrested and executed for the murder of my husband! I would never have shamed your name like that. I was trying to make a new life, and to love those that you loved. I was comforting them and supporting them.” She glanced back at Alys. “My dearest Alys will witness for me that I have been a good daughter to this house and a most loving sister to her. No one has ever loved you more—have they, my dear?”

Alys said nothing.

“But this was not a valid marriage,” the minister interrupted quietly. “Whatever your reasons for leaving Venice, you cannot be married to Sir James as you have a previous husband still alive. Since you have a living husband, the service of marriage which I have just undertaken was invalid and will be annulled.”

“Annulled?” Sir James inquired.

“As if it never happened,” the minister confirmed.

Livia made a little gesture with her hand, as if she were waving away something unimportant, as if she alone had the power to decide. She looked around the circle of rapt faces and saw no one who could oppose her.

“No,” she said simply. “It is not going to be annulled.”

Johnnie’s pen paused and he looked up to watch her. She exchanged one long pointed glance with him as if to remind him that he too was indebted to her, that he too had secrets with her. She held the attention of the room, as she ignored the minister and spoke directly to the magistrate. “Not so.”

She stepped a little closer to the desk so that she was standing halfway between the two parties, center stage, the complete focus of their attention. Johnnie could smell her perfume of roses. She gave him a warm confiding smile.

“It was my marriage in Venice that was not valid,” she explained slowly to the magistrate, speaking in her clear low voice. “I understood this, when this good man Mr. Rogers”—she gestured to the minister, who blinked and swallowed convulsively—“undertook my spiritual instruction, and admitted me into the Protestant Church. Then, only then, did I realize all that had to be done to make a valid marriage.

“My marriage in Venice to Rob was recited in English, which I did not then understand, a language that was foreign to me. So it was not valid on those grounds alone. It was in the Protestant Church in Venice where I was not a communicant. I had never been there before. I had no pew, I had no fellow parishioners. I was then a Roman Catholic, a communicant and confirmed member of the Roman Catholic Church. So it was not valid for that reason too.

“Of course, my church does not recognize your services, it does not recognize your ministers. In the eyes of my church it was never a marriage. And since I did not speak the language, and was not a communicant, it was not a valid marriage service in your church either. My marriage to Roberto Reekie”—she paused to smile tenderly at him—“my beloved Roberto—was invalid from start to finish.”

Johnnie had ceased to write anything, his pen suspended over the page, a blot of ink forming slowly on the nib. The minister looked blank, the magistrate was silent.

Livia turned to Rob. “I am so sorry, Roberto. But we did not know. We were young and so much in love! How should we know? The minister of your church should have told us, and baptized me, so that we might truly marry. He should have prepared me and confirmed me into his congregation in your church, as this good man has so carefully done. I would have done that for you! You know that I would have done anything for you. But he failed us, and since I was not a member of your church, since I did not understand my vows, the service was invalid. We were never married.”

The magistrate turned to Rob. “Is this true, Dr. Reekie?”

“Yes,” Rob replied hesitantly. “It’s true that we married in my church… I didn’t know…”

“If the couple are of different faiths the marriage is invalid,” the minister confirmed. “If she was not prepared for communion in our church and did not understand the vows then it is true: you were not married. All this time you were living in sin, God forgive you both. And the child…”

“Good Lord,” Lady Eliot said, truly shocked. “What has she said? Will she make her own child a bastard?”

Everyone turned to look at Matteo, who had woken and was struggling to get down from Carlotta’s arms to crawl on the floor.

“Oh, the child is mine,” Felipe spoke up.

Rob turned on him.

Sarah watched him give a little shrug as if he did not care what the admission might cost him. “The boy is mine.”

“Heavens save us!” Lady Eliot said, and gave a little stagger.

Livia shot one fierce glance at Felipe. “The child has been baptized and is the son and heir of Sir James Avery,” she stated. “Nobody else can claim him.” She stepped towards James and slid her hand into his arm. “He is our son,” she said. “Matthew Avery.”