Robin Hardy Online

Road of Vanishing: Book Four of the Latter Annals of Lystra
From the back cover:
Thirteen-year-old Chatain Henry has disappeared. Fearing that he regrets abdicating the throne to his guardian, Surchatain Ares, Commander Thom wants to place a bounty on his head.

But when Thom captures a slave trader who claims to have sold Henry, Ares takes it upon himself to go look for him. And the road he must travel is rumored to end at a portal that takes travelers to unknown realms. Because his young wife Nicole is the only one who can see the portal, she must go with him.

While Nicole and Ares are gone, the Chataine Renée finds ample opportunity to wreak mischief with their five-year-old twin daughters, as well as with her husband, the Counselor Carmine, who is desperately trying to stay sober. For Carmine knows something about the portal that no one else has guessed.

CHAPTER ONE

"Where is he?"

 "In Gretchen's room, in the lower corridor."

 "Oh, well, then--" the Steward Giles began to advance in the direction of said corridor when the other shot out a hand to grip his upper arm firmly, despite the plush layers of velvet and satin that swaddled it. Startled, Giles protested, "Commander, really! The coat is Lord Preus' handiwork, and if you rip it, you shall certainly recompense me for it!"

 The muscular hand did not release Giles' arm or coat. "He gave orders not to be disturbed. When he comes out, you shall have his ear after I do."

  "Hmmpf!" Shrugging out of the grip (which would have been impossible had the Commander not relaxed it) Giles indignantly rearranged the sumptuous folds to regain his unruffled state. Unfortunately, the wild fringe of kinky brown hair that ringed his bald head seriously detracted from the polished appearance he endeavored to project. Glancing in lingering offense at the Commander, his gaze swept the other's hard blue eyes and short, bristly beard. Lips pursed in disapproval, Giles noted, "You looked much more courtly without that bush on your face, Thom."

 The Commander might have smiled--it was hard to tell with that bush on his face--and replied, "I don't aim to look courtly, Steward. And if you dislike it, then I have met my aim."

 They remained in a silent standoff within view of the entrance to the lower corridor from the palace foyer while the hurly-burly of a normal business day in Westford coursed around them. It was early summer, a bright morning, and the great palace doors stood open, making the pitiful, half-starved fire in the massive foyer fireplace appear unnecessary and unwelcome. But it was always kept burning, year-round, night and day.

 After a quarter-hour of waiting, during which time the Commander received two messengers who whispered in his ear and the Steward none, Giles finally threw up his hands--accentuating the gold dagging on his sleeves--and stepped toward the corridor. Thom stopped him with a battering-ram of a hand to the chest. Giles coughed and sputtered, "This is ridiculous! It was only a servant, and I have important matters to attend!"

 "No one disturbs him. That was his word to me, which I will certainly carry out," Thom uttered.   

 While Giles was groaning and fretting, a little girl in a plain brown dress pushed her way through the stream of bodies in the foyer to stand beside Thom. He looked down at her, but Giles did not notice her. She was five, with thick chestnut hair gathered back in an untidy ponytail. Her green eyes large and serious, she addressed the Commander: "Where is Papa?"

 "In Gretchen's room, Chataine," Thom nodded toward the corridor.

 Seeing her, Giles offered a cloying smile. "Hello, Chataine Sophie. Are you looking for your father? We are waiting for him, too, dearest, and you need to wait your turn." With a glance at him, Sophie tossed her ponytail and turned to run down the corridor. Neither man attempted to stop her. 

 Coming to a closed door, she reached up to pull hard on the handle, straining with all her might to open the heavy wooden door, and succeeding. A masculine figure in black sat in an old rocker facing the opposite wall. The head was bowed, but at the sound of the door, it raised slightly, turning barely. Those who knew him well froze at such slight, deliberate movements, for they signaled serious displeasure.

 Heedless, the child went directly to him and clambered up on his lap. He folded muscular arms around her, shifting her so that she sat more comfortably, and laid his cheek on the top of her head. She nestled deep in his black brocade jacket, closing her eyes.

 After a few minutes, she murmured, "I'm sorry Gretchen died."

 "Me, too," he whispered, kissing the top of her head.

 She raised up to look in his face. "Will you miss her because she was good at cleaning our clothes?"

 His answering smile was rather wan. The lines in his face, particularly the lines of sadness around his eyes, seemed to lessen the severity of the deep, jagged scar that ran from his eyebrow to his jaw. Sophie had only lately learned that the scar was not the distinguishing mark of a Surchatain--it was the result of an assassin's attempt on his life when he was a child himself. He replied to her question, "I will miss her because she was loyal and faithful in everything she did. Had she not tended you and your sister so well after you were born, when your mother was so weak, you might not have survived--"

 "I'm the firstborn," Sophie informed him gravely.

 "And even that information we owe to her. I owed her much . . . but never thanked her. Your mother was the only one who thanked her." He glanced at the dinner gown hung reverently on the wall above the sleeping pallet. Sophie's mother Nicole had innocently caused a palace uproar when she gifted several favored servants--Gretchen among them--with formal gowns.

 Sophie snuggled back down in his lap. "Mama was looking for you."

 He blinked, a shadow crossing his face. "I know."

 Several quiet minutes drifted by as he rocked her, eyes partly closed. Sophie, growing troubled, twisted to look in his face again. His eyes were uncharacteristically moist. She did not know that he was waiting for them to clear completely before showing his face to the palace again. "You were sad like this when old Dr. Wigzell died," she observed.

 "Yes," he sighed, feeling another quarter-hour added to his waiting. "I am very selfish. I cannot bear it when the Lord reclaims good people He has loaned to me."

 She laced her little arms around his neck. "Will you cry when I die?" she asked leadingly.

 "No," he said stonily. "I will be the first to greet you to our Father's house. But you may be a trifle put out when I die." She giggled at the unreality of the proposition. Other men died--not her father. Not the Surchatain of Lystra. In the role of the Surchatain, he asked, "And why are you here, and not at your lessons?"

 "Aunt Renée took Bonnie out for a fitting, so I left, too," she said defiantly, lifting her chin.

 Eyes suddenly clear, Surchatain Ares stood with his daughter. "We shall return you and your sister to your lessons, and remind Aunt Renée that she does not interrupt to have Bonnie try on dresses." He opened the door and carried the child up the corridor toward the foyer.

 Sophie's lips curled in disdain. "Why do Aunt Renée and Bonnie make such a fuss over dresses? It's silly. It doesn't make her prettier than me. We look just the same."

 "That is a very good question which I cannot answer, dear one," Ares said tightly. Vindicated once again by her adored father, the man everyone else bowed to, Sophie kissed his torn cheek and cuddled his neck.

 As they emerged into the foyer, Giles bowed flamboyantly and Thom straightened, opening his mouth. Before he could utter a sound, the Steward said breathlessly, "Surchatain, I implore a brief word with you." Thom shut his mouth, eyes glazing over.

 "One moment, Steward," Ares said, lowering Sophie to the floor. He made eye contact with a nearby sentry, who hastened over. Ares instructed him, "The Chataine Sophie wishes to return to her lessons in the library. You will locate the Chataine Bonnie and likewise return her to the library. You will then request that the Chataine Renée favor me with an audience," he finished dryly. 

 "Yes, Surchatain." The sentry knew to salute him, not bow. He then inclined his head to the royal daughter. "Chataine, if you will," he said, extending his hand toward the broad staircase across the foyer. She indifferently headed for the staircase while he glanced back at her father, who watched with grave approval. 

 Ares turned to Giles. "What concerns you, Steward?"

 Caught off guard, Giles paused. "May I speak with you in private, Surchatain?" The tumult of the foyer was not the best place to confer.

 Ares jerked his head toward the lower corridor. In the instant before he turned down it, he flicked his eyes in Thom's direction without actually looking at him. Thom then knew to unobtrusively follow them far enough down the corridor to remain within earshot.

 In the middle of the quiet corridor, Ares turned to Giles (who had his back to Thom) and repeated, "Yes, Steward?" Apart from his rank, Ares' physical presence was daunting enough, reminding Giles to collect himself before speaking. At the ancient age of forty, the Surchatain had apparently lost none of the iron from his frame. He was as taut and strong as ever, only more deliberate about proving it and deadly when he did.

 "Surchatain, I trust that I performed adequately as overseer in Crescent Hollow?" Giles began his practiced speech.

 Ares visibly hesitated before replying, "Yes, overall."

 Dismayed by his hesitation, Giles nevertheless plunged ahead: "Then frankly I must protest your naming this upstart Vogelsong a Counselor before myself, when he was a mere copyist and I have had so many years of service and Carmine is--" Ares' eyes went hard--"somewhat--incapacitated," Giles stumbled to a finish.

 Ares' face smoothed. "I am sorry that it appears to be a slight to yourself, Steward," he said thoughtfully. "When the fact of the matter is, I cannot afford to name you Counselor because I cannot replace you as Steward. A Counselor traffics in mere words, as you noted, but who else is honest and competent enough to handle the number of accounts and sums of money that pass through your hands?"

 "Well--that is true--" Giles stuttered.

 "I desire your indulgence to let me use you where I need you most. Have you not been well compensated?" Ares asked, glancing at the outfit that rivaled any of Renée's for sheer cost.

 "Well--somewhat--" Giles admitted, passing a jeweled hand over the gold brocade coat. It was certainly splendid in comparison to the dull black brocade that the Surchatain wore adnauseam. As a matter of fact, the mere action of comparing his clothing to that of the Surchatain's, and the illusion it produced of who cut the finer figure, was enough to soothe his ruffled vanity. While Ares watched, Giles arrived at a conclusion. "Since you put it that way, Surchatain, that's actually satisfactory. If you will excuse me, I have a number of accounts to audit."

 "Thank you, Steward," Ares nodded. With a bow, Giles departed, turning up his nose at Thom's dull military attire on his way to the foyer.    

 Ares watched Giles depart with a half-smile, then turned his attention to his Commander. Thom quietly relayed, "We're ready to launch the strike against the slavers' camp, Surchatain."

 Ares' eyes lit up. "Ah. Good. Let me--"

 "No, Surchatain," Thom said tightly, and Ares looked at him in surprise. "You shall not lead this strike. If I have to draw blood to prevent your going, I will."

 Eye to eye with him, Ares coolly regarded his implacable face. There was a moment of palpable tension, then Thom sagged, whispering, "After what happened a month ago, how am I to face the Surchataine if we bring you back on a pallet? I might as well hang myself in the courtyard."

 Ares glanced down guiltily. A month ago he had been leading a similar raid on a small slavers' camp on the Scyllan border--it should have been so simple! But his horse had stumbled going down a ravine. The animal flipped hooves skyward and Ares had been pitched onto the rocks, striking his head. The minutes that he was unconscious created consternation among his men--the raid was called off in confusion and a rider sent off in utmost haste to summon young doctor Savary from Westford, hours away.

 Then the slavers, having been alerted to their presence, attacked, so the raiding party was forced to fight a desperate defensive battle while their Surchatain lay at the narrow bottom of the twisted ravine, half submerged in a shallow stream. That whole time his page, Ben, had bent over him, holding Ares' head on his lap while sitting in the cold stream, making sure his lord's face stayed clear of the water. But as long as the fighting raged above them on the edge of the ravine, Ben kept him as much concealed as possible in the stream, even pulling sedge over them both. Ares had awakened, groaning, while the fighting was at its peak. But at Ben's insistence he lay still, his dark brown hair swirling in the water, watching what he could see of the battle above.

 It went on like that for several hours. By the time Thom and his men had killed the last of the slavers, Ares' head had cleared enough so that he could sit up. He stripped off most of his cold, wet clothes to watch the slaves released and salvage gathered. By the time those tasks had been completed, Ares felt well enough to ride--slowly. They had met up with the doctor on their way back, and upon their arrival at Westford that evening, found the Surchataine Nicole waiting with smoldering fire in her green eyes.

 Despite Ares' studied disavowals, she knew he had been hurt. (As Ares remembered nothing of his fall, his men recounted it to him in detail.) The doctor had ordered bed rest, which Ares ignored. But Nicole had gone privately to Thom to inform him that the Surchatain would not ride out to fight again unless it was a matter of life or death. Thom had agreed. Ares had not tested these restraints . . . until today. Sullenly, he told Thom, "Report to me immediately upon your return." The Commander saluted and went away satisfied.

 Entering the foyer, Ares encountered the sentry he had sent off with Sophie. The young sentry saluted and said, "Surchatain, the Chataine Renée has granted you audience in her chambers." Ares nodded, turning toward the broad stone staircase. Another sentry approached--one Ares didn't recognize. Thom rotated them so much, Ares didn't have a chance to get to know all the new ones.

 The youngster started to bow but then remembered to salute, which resulted in his saluting the floor. Ares, careful not to smile, watched him. "Surchatain, I have come from the Surchataine in the orchard, who requests that you remember your promise to her." The Surchatain acknowledged this without replying, then trotted up the stairs.

 On the second floor, he turned down the Surchatain's wing and stopped at the entrance to the Surchataine's apartments, then shook his head at his error. Renée had been occupying these quarters until very recently, when it was determined that Surchataine Nicole needed them to entertain visitors and store dresses. But she did not sleep here--she slept with Ares, still, every night.

 After constructing the rooftop reservoir and diverting part of the underground stream that ran through Ares' first-floor quarters, his engineers were able to provide running water to the garderobes in the Surchatain's wing and the kitchen beneath it. Only then had Ares been persuaded to move to the Surchatain's spacious apartments, leaving Thom to snap up his previous quarters, and displacing Renée to the Surchataine's suite. Twins Bonnie and Sophie occupied the remaining set of rooms in the wing, while Renée suddenly decided that she preferred her old quarters in the opposite wing. Accordingly, she set to having a nice large window carved out of the stone of her sleeping chambers and set with exquisite colored glass--not the cheap greenish glass that were in the windows of the Surchataine's rooms. So Ares turned on his heel to cross the second-story landing toward her present chambers.

 Arriving at her door, Ares nodded at the sentry to announce his presence to the Chataine Renée. Being the granddaughter of the usurper who had taken the throne of Lystra by murder, Renée's title was, at this point, a generous fiction. She retained it, as her half-brother Henry retained his title of Chatain, due to kindness and affection on Ares' part.

 He was granted entrance into her opulent receiving room. While waiting for her to appear from the bedchamber, Ares glanced around the room in grim satisfaction, cluttered as it was with fantastically expensive knickknacks and furnishings. Upon annexing the province of Calle Valley, Ares had given the palace at Crescent Hollow to his friend and counselor Carmine, Renée's husband, and had given Renée the task of renovating it. After she had spent thousands of royals bringing the palace up to her exacting standards, she lived there for exactly three weeks before deciding to come home to Westford. Here, she had persevered in her practice of dropping outrageous sums on whatever caught her fancy, laughing at anyone's attempts to restrain her. Giles suffered acutely over the losses to the treasury, but Ares was reluctant to deal harshly with the Chataine.

 Then Nicole--beautiful, resourceful Nicole--had hit upon a plan. Whenever Renée bought a new gown, Nicole would sneak into her wardrobe and remove an old one that Renée obviously no longer cared for, and take it to the treasury. If Renée bought new jewelry, Nicole removed some old pieces; if knickknacks or art, Nicole carefully dug out dusty objects from Renée's apartments that had long been obscured by newer pieces--all of which were taken to the treasury. Any fears that Renée would discover the subterfuge were quelled long ago, as this had been going on for over two years now.

 Ares turned when Renée entered from her bedchamber and extended her hand. He bent to kiss it; as he straightened, she leaned forward to kiss his cheek, holding his hand against her chest. "What is it, Ares?" she whispered, confident in her beauty.

 He gently withdrew his hand. Yes, with her golden hair and perfect features, Renée was a beauty, but . . . less so now that the years of self-indulgence had begun to take their toll. At twenty-five, she was only two years older than his dove, Nicole, but--her face was getting rather puffy, and the makeup she once used sparingly was now applied so thickly as to resemble a mask. Ares found it frankly revolting. He got right to the point: "Chataine, I have asked you before not to disturb Bonnie at her lessons. You have many hours during the week to play with her and dress her up, but you must respect the time that she is with her tutors."

 Renée gave a clear, ringing laugh, at which he straightened slightly. "Oh, Ares, you will go on so! She's a child! Why should she be burdened with lessons?"

 "Because I am her father, and I wish it," he said in a low voice.

 "But I am her aunt," Renée countered (a relationship in spirit only). Brighter: "Besides, I am a tutor, too! I am teaching her the finer art of charm. Dearest Sophie would do well to attend, occasionally," she said, turning to a golden pitcher of spring wine. She filled two golden cups, one of which she offered to him.

 He took it, then set it untasted on a table with inlaid mother-of-pearl. "Your lessons must not take precedence over reading and writing." 

 Renée waved him off. "How tiresome you are! You cannot expect a girl that age to pay any mind to books!" Sipping her wine, she watched his discomfort with amusement. She thought she had struck a salient point, while in reality, he could not forget that he had served under her father and grandfather. The office of Surchatain, however attained, demanded respect. Then she added, "Besides, Bonnie is mine."

 His brows elevated slightly, and she persisted, "It's true, you know. She loves me more than her own mother." Ares' face smoothed as it did whenever he wished to make himself inscrutable. "Oh, Ares!" She put her goblet on the table to draw close to him. "You and I were meant to be together from the beginning. You know it."

 Years ago, when he was madly in love with her, he would have died of happiness to hear these words from her lips. She had teased him and kissed him and laughed in his face at his earnest declaration of love. It was all a game to her. Studying her now, he accurately perceived that it was all still a game. "Chataine, the old toy is rusted and broken. Leave it and go on to a new one." Then he left her chambers while she grinned wickedly after him.

 He went on down the corridor, where Carmine, Henry, Vogelsong, and Giles had their quarters. On the way, yet another sentry apprehended him: "Surchatain, the Trade Council is ready to meet."

 Absently, Ares said, "Have Lord Faguy preside today. He knows what I want done." As that sentry saluted and moved off, Ares approached the closed door of the library, where Sophie and Bonnie took lessons with their reading tutor. Addressing the sentry across the hall, Ares asked, "Are the Chataines within?"

 "Yes, Surchatain," he affirmed.

 "Good. From now on, when they are here, the Chataine Renée is not permitted to take either child out. If you have any--difficulties in carrying out my command, you may summon me or the Surchataine, and we will deal with whichever Chataine does not wish to cooperate."

 The sentry kept a straight face as he acknowledged, "Understood, Surchatain."       From there, Ares went to stand before Carmine's door. There was more than reluctance, there was pain on Ares' face as he laid his hand on the door latch and drew it open. 

 The room was bathed in a soft glow of red, yellow, and blue as the morning light shone through the colored glass in Carmine's window. In recent years, panes of glass (mostly uncolored but for a faint greenish cast) had been installed in many of the palace windows, but Carmine was the first to use it. The furnishings of his room were luxurious, if dusty, for Carmine could no longer abide servants coming in to clean, and there was a mildly repugnant odor laying about the stuffy room--the odor of a neglected body.

 Ares approached the figure slouched in the richly upholstered chair. The once-coifed hair was matted and stringy; the elegant fingers trembly. Kneeling before the chair, Ares righted several empty bottles and cups littering the carpeted floor. The figure grunted and shifted, rousing slightly out of a perpetual haze. Ares regarded his friend's bloated face that sprouted occasional, irrational hairs. Looking back at him with bloodshot eyes, Carmine exerted his old gift of acuity and chuckled, "I haven't shaved for weeks. Can't tell, can you?" Ares opened his mouth, but Carmine added, "We're both eunuchs, now, eh?"

 Ares shut his mouth again. While serving under Renée's father, Carmine had been found out as her lover. As punishment, he had been castrated. It was only after Ares had ascended the throne that Renée and Carmine were permitted to marry. But by then . . . much water had passed under the bridge. "Strange that the lovely Nicole has had no more babies, eh? But then, it was a hard birth. A hard, hard birth. . . ." Carmine lay his head back where there was already a dark grease stain on the upholstery, and closed his eyes.  

 "Carmine," Ares whispered. "I need you. You are too valuable to kill yourself."

 Carmine's eyes barely opened. "What have I to live for?" he mumbled. "Day after day, day after day. . . ."

 "I will allow you to divorce Renée," Ares said suddenly. Once Carmine absorbed that, he pushed himself up in the chair a bit. "If, I say IF, you drink no more wine but at dinner. Show me my old Counselor, sober and useful, and by the end of this month I will grant you a divorce from her."

 As Carmine stared at him, some of the cloudiness dissipated from his eyes. He gathered his wrinkled, soiled robe about him and unsteadily stood. Making his way to the door, he opened it to gesture to the sentry. "You! Come. This room stinks. Get someone in here to clean it up. And have sent up a wash tub with water, and a servant to assist. I have duties that wait. Go on!" He shut the door emphatically and turned back to Ares, who was now standing.

 "It will not be easy, Carmine," Ares said. "And for the damage it will do to Renée, I will permit no backsliding. Your life hangs on your obedience."

 "For the first time in my life, I understand that, Ares," he said, and from the clarity of his voice, Ares believed him.

 Ares exited his quarters, thinking about when, and how, he should broach the topic with Renée. But then he looked up and his heart stopped--there, in the corridor, eyeing him, was Nicole. Fresh from the orchard, she was dressed in the simple cotton frock she wore when working in the gardens, which she loved to do. While he stood there dumb, she came up to him, her glossy chestnut hair tousled, her cheeks flushed, her lips parted.

 "You promised, my lord," she murmured with the vaguest smile.

 "Nicole," he breathed out. "I . . . cannot. It was--too hard, to go through that. I cannot go through that again."

 "Oh. Was their birth harder on you than me, my lord? But I have healed. I think you should have healed, too," she observed, drawing close to him. "And you promised." She leisurely unbuttoned his black jacket, parting the white frilled shirt to press her lips to his chest, while he stood there stricken.

 Then, eyeing him, she loosened the lacing of her bodice until it suddenly fell open. Ares came to himself with a start, grasping the gaping bodice and glancing around wildly. "Lady! Have you lost your mind? Don't--"

 "You promised," she said in a harder voice. "And you will keep your promise--right here, if need be." She shrugged so that the drooping bodice fell off one white shoulder. A sentry advancing from the staircase took one look at the scene unfolding in the corridor and made a sharp about-face.

 Almost panicky, Ares hustled her down the corridor to a storeroom and tossed her inside. But he followed her in, and when he had turned around from securing the door, saw her sitting on a pile of blankets, legs spread, dress half off. The room was dim and slightly musty, ventilated only by the crack at the bottom of the door. He found himself standing over her while she raised her eyes to him, running a hand up his leg. He dropped on top of her, yanking fabric out of the way, and she threw her head back in readiness.

 He pressed his lips to her breasts, her neck, her face, and she gasped at the force with which he made himself her husband again. He stifled her laughing moan with his mouth, grunting, "Shh! Do you--wish to make known--that--unh--that the Surchatain--lays his wife--in a--in a--storage closet--? Oh . . . Nicole. . . ." And she smiled into his shoulder, vindicated.

 In the corridor outside, the sentry and two maids were crouched with their ears to the door, grinning and hushing each other with wordless gestures.

 All the rest of that day, Ares was more relaxed and cheerful than he had been in a long time, and everyone in the palace knew the reason for it.

 When the bell tolled eight that evening, dinner at Westford commenced. Long tables were pulled together in the great hall to seat upwards of sixty people nightly, illumined by beeswax tapers on the tables and hanging chandeliers fitted with hundreds of candles. The food was always delectable, the wine clear and sweet, but most important, Ares was a gracious, tolerant host. He did not impose his own will on trivial matters, nor did he take offense at inadvertent slights. True, he was often quiet and preoccupied, but if he gave someone leave to address him, he paid attention.

 Tonight, before Ares and Nicole were seated, the guests took their places as usual from the foot of the table up; high-ranking administrators who sat at the head were announced by Georges, the dinner master. They stood behind their chairs to wait--no one was seated until the Surchatain and Surchataine arrived. Doctor Savary, Counselor Vogelsong, Steward Giles and his wife Genevieve entered, then Thom's wife Deirdre and Rhode's wife Soucie were escorted in by servants, as their husbands' places would remain vacant until they returned from their mission. (Since the death of Oswald following the Battle of the Crossroads with the Qarqarians, Rhode had been promoted to Thom's Second.) Lord Faguy graciously escorted in Lady Vivian (Renée's mother); after which Georges announced, "The Chataine Renée."

 She swept in on Georges' arm, stunning as always, and the table bowed to her, as always. Taking her place to the left of the head of the table, she blinked at the place across from her. That chair--the only seat higher than herself, other than the Surchatain and his wife--had been empty for a long time due to Carmine's incapacitation. But tonight the place was set with pewter dishes, awaiting an occupant. (While gold dishes were available, Ares seldom gave permission for their use, considering them ostentatious.)

 "Who is sitting there?" Renée demanded. Giles, who was to sit next to the mystery guest, was intensely interested to know, too. He had been denied that seat when Carmine stopped showing up for dinner.

 Then Georges announced, "Counselor Carmine," and Renée's whole side of the table turned to look.

copyright 2006 Robin Hardy

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