‘One of me,’ he answered briefly. ‘I’m surprised to find you still in Venice. I thought you’d have gone yesterday.’

‘You know I didn’t because you heard me knocking on your door last night.’ She added quietly, ‘I knocked for a long time before I went away.’

‘It wasn’t a good moment,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t have known what to say, especially in that place.’ His eyes challenged her with memories of the few happy days they’d spent in the little apartment. Then he looked away and began to pace his office, never getting too close to her. ‘But I’m glad you came to see me.’

‘You are?’ she asked hopefully.

‘Yes, it’s right that we should say goodbye properly.’

His coolly dismissive tone annoyed her. ‘I’ll say goodbye when I’m good’n ready, not when you tell me to. There’s a lot more to be said first.’ In a softer tone she added, ‘I listened to you when you were making your excuses yesterday.’ She added, ‘And that’s not all I listened to you saying.’

She regretted the words at once. If his face wasn’t closed against her before it was now. She’d reminded him of what he didn’t want to remember.

‘It wasn’t kind of you to bring that up,’ he said. ‘You should have laughed over your victory in private, not to my face.’

‘Laugh over-? What are you saying? I’m not laughing. I never meant any of this to happen.’

‘You never meant? Excuse me, I understood that you came to Venice deliberately, for a purpose.’

‘But it had nothing to do with you,’ she cried.

‘Ah, yes, I’d forgotten. You came to deceive and ruin my friend, not me, which of course makes everything all right.’

‘I came to protect Jenny from a fortune hunter.’

‘And how could you be so sure he was a fortune hunter? Your information was hardly brilliant since you confused him with me.’

‘The information was lousy,’ she admitted. ‘It came from Roscoe. But the idea was to find out if he was right.’

‘He’d made up his mind before you started.’

‘He had, I hadn’t.’

He stopped pacing and spoke angrily, ‘For pity’s sake, what kind of woman does this? Is it how you get your kicks?’

‘No, I do it to eat. I’ve got nothing. Roscoe paid for everything.’

He regarded her with what might almost have been a smile. ‘Like a theatrical performance, really. Set and costumes courtesy of Roscoe Harrison, and script by-who? Did you cook it up between you?’

‘It wasn’t like that-’

‘Answer me,’ he said sternly. There was no trace in him now of the light-hearted young man who’d enchanted her. There was something grim in his manner that she wouldn’t have believed without seeing it. ‘Answer me,’ he commanded again. ‘How much of what happened between us was planned?’

‘I came to seek out Federico. I thought it was you because of the picture.’ She showed him the snapshot. ‘Yes, I was looking for your face, but when I found you, you were wearing his shirt, with his name on it-’

‘And how did you happen to find me?’

‘I was searching for you,’ she admitted.

He raised his eyebrows sardonically. ‘So our very meeting wasn’t the accident I thought. And that touching moment when your sandal fell at my feet in the gondola?’

The moment he’d called Fate, with shining eyes, full of love.

‘I threw it,’ she admitted in despair. ‘I stood on the bridge hoping you’d look up, and when you didn’t I tossed my sandal.’

She flinched, watching him. She no longer knew how this man would react to anything.

For the moment there was no reaction at all. Then abruptly he broke into laughter, that filled her with relief, until she heard the disturbing edge to the sound, not like real amusement at all.

‘That’s hilarious,’ he said at last. ‘You calculated the whole thing, down to the last detail, and the poor sap fell for it, hook, line and sinker. He even burbled something stupid about it being Fate. Or did he? Remind me. No, on second thoughts, don’t remind me. There are some mistakes a man should be able to forget in peace.’

‘But it wasn’t just me, was it?’ she said indignantly. ‘When I saw the name on your shirt you could have said, “I’m not Fede, just a rich playboy, fooling about in a boat”. Why didn’t you?’

‘I forget,’ he said stonily.

‘I don’t think that’s a truthful answer. You could have stopped everything right there and then. Why didn’t you?’

‘I’ve forgotten,’ he repeated. ‘All right, maybe I’ve only forgotten because I want to. Believe what you like, but most of all believe that it’s best if you go away from here and never come back.’

‘I’m not ready to give up and go yet.’

‘That’s a pity because I don’t think Venice is big enough to hold both of us.’

The door was thrown open abruptly by a middle-aged woman, full of excitement, who gabbled something Dulcie didn’t understand. Guido gave her a brief smile and replied tersely. The next moment she surged into the room, followed by two young girls, their arms filled with masks.

‘No,’ Guido started to say, but his protest was lost in the hubbub. He shrugged and gave up. ‘Our new line,’ he said to Dulcie, sounding harassed. ‘We’ve been waiting for them, but this isn’t the moment-oh, be damned to it!’

The masks were magnificent, not merely painted cardboard like the ones on his walls, but covered in satin and sequins, many with gorgeous feathers.

Guido admired them and spoke kindly to his employees, but managed to shoo them out of the room fairly quickly.

‘Harlequin,’ Dulcie said, holding up a creation in scarlet satin with multi-coloured feathers on top. ‘And this one-’ she lifted a long-nosed mask in purple satin, ‘Pantalone, the merchant. I remember what you told me.’

‘But there were other things I didn’t have time to tell you,’ Guido mused. ‘About Columbine, for instance.’

‘You said she was sensible, but sharp and witty, and could see the funny side of life.’

‘I also said she’s a deceiver. She teases and beguiles Harlequin, leads him into her traps, while all the while laughing up her sleeve because he’s fool enough to believe in her. He, poor clown, ends up wondering what’s hit him.’

He spoke lightly but she had a sensation of his pain that was almost tangible. She guessed that he wasn’t used to unhappiness, his life had contained so little of it. Now he was floundering. She longed to reach out to him, but didn’t dare.

‘You told me I wasn’t like Columbine,’ she reminded him.

He smiled sadly. ‘I was wrong. You think I’m unfair because we both deceived each other, but your deception was planned before you ever came here. That’s what I can’t get past. Mine was an impulse that I yielded to-stupidly perhaps, but on the spur of the moment because-well, no matter.’

‘Tell me,’ she begged. It was suddenly terribly important.

But he shook his head. ‘It doesn’t make any difference now. I wish it did. Go away, Dulcie. There’s nothing so dead as a dead love.’ His face contracted suddenly. ‘For pity’s sake, go,’ he said harshly.

If she could have thought of any way of moving him she would have tried, even then, but there was about him a kind of wintry stubbornness that she couldn’t fight. He’d grown older since yesterday.

His phone shrilled and he made a grab for it with a mutter of impatience. Dulcie turned to go, wondering if the end could really come like this. But she turned as Guido barked, ‘Fede!’

‘What is it?’ she asked with a feeling of foreboding.

He was talking in Venetian. Dulcie caught the word ‘Jenny,’ then Fede’s name repeated several times as though Guido was trying to calm him down. Dulcie could just make out the tinny sound of a voice from the phone, and it sounded as though Fede was in a rare panic.

‘What is it?’ she said as Guido hung up.

He was snatching his jacket down from a hook. ‘Come on,’ he said, grasping her arm. ‘We’ve got to hurry.’

They were out of the factory and by the waterside before she had breath enough to ask, ‘What’s happened?’

A motor boat was waiting with a man at the wheel. Guido helped her down into it and then they were roaring away across the lagoon, feeling the spray in their faces. He had to shout above the noise of the engine.

‘Your employer has arrived.’

‘My-you mean Roscoe?’

‘Right. Jenny’s Poppa. She managed to call Fede and he called me. We have to do something fast to stop him taking her back to England.’

‘You promised Fede you’d think up a plan.’

‘I’m thinking of one now. First we have to walk into the hotel together.’

‘And say what?’

‘I’m trying to work that out,’ he said tensely. ‘We must put this man straight about the facts, and for that I need you there.’

‘So sometimes Harlequin needs Columbine’s help?’

‘Sometimes he can’t do without her, even if he doesn’t like it. It’s time to make up your mind whose side you’re on.’

‘I’m on Jenny’s side. You heard me tell them I’ll help.’

Instead of answering he yelled something to the boatman, and their speed increased, so that further talk became impossible. Soon they’d reached the Grand Canal, and had to slow down dramatically.

‘Can’t we go any faster?’ Dulcie asked.

‘No, it’s the law. There’s the hotel.’ As he handed her out of the boat he said, ‘We’re going to have to put on a rare performance.’

‘But what’s the script?’ she asked frantically.

‘Play it by ear.’ He was sweeping her through the lobby to the lift.

‘But suppose we’re using different ears?’ she demanded as they reached the top floor.

‘You’re the one that’s good at this.’

‘Don’t give me that. I’m an amateur. You could give me lessons.’

‘All right, how’s this? You know this man and I don’t. You lead, I’ll follow. Do it for Jenny. Do it for Fede whose life you tried to ruin.’

There was no time to answer. The lift door was opening. Ahead were the double doors of the suite, and from behind them came the sound of voices, Jenny’s distraught, Fede’s frantic.

Guido was looking at her expectantly.

‘Here we go,’ she said, throwing open the doors.

As entrances went, it was splendid. The three inside stared at them. Then Jenny rushed to her in appeal, Fede rushed to shake Guido’s hand, babbling in Venetian. Dulcie fixed her eyes on Roscoe, who was red-faced and shouting, ‘I don’t know who this man is-’ jabbing a finger at Fede.

‘It’s Fede,’ Jenny protested.

‘The hell he is!’ Roscoe snapped.

‘The hell he isn’t!’ This, from Guido.

‘You-’ Roscoe swung around to him ‘-you’re the one who’s caused all this trouble.’

For the first minute Dulcie’s mind had been a blank, but now suddenly the clouds parted. She pulled herself together and spoke with apparent confidence.

‘Mr Harrison,’ she said, ‘allow me to introduce Signor Guido Calvani, nephew of Count Calvani, a family that I’ve now discovered was once well acquainted with my own.’

The mention of Dulcie’s family made Roscoe pause, as she’d hoped. It gave her time to rush on, ‘It was only after I arrived here that I realised the significance of the name Calvani. It turns out that my great-aunt, Lady Harriet, knew Guido’s uncle very well, if you know what I mean,’ she managed a coy simper, ‘and the count welcomed me most warmly when I visited his palazzo yesterday.’

She was laying it on with a trowel, stressing the words that would send signals to Roscoe’s snobbery, and every one of them was hitting the bull’s eye, she was glad to see.

True to his promise to follow her lead Guido wrung Roscoe’s hand and said all the right things at length. Then he said them again at even greater length. Roscoe managed a reasonably civilised reply, but then became himself again.

‘But you’re in that picture making up to my daughter.’

‘But only under the eye of her true love,’ Guido said quickly, drawing Fede forward. ‘I gather you’ve already met my friend, Federico Lucci, who’s been fortunate enough to win Jenny’s affection.’

‘Now wait,’ Roscoe blustered, ‘what were you doing in that outfit? That’s why I thought you were Fede-’

‘He’s Fede,’ Guido said. ‘I’m Guido.’

‘Count Guido?’

‘Not while my uncle lives, which hopefully will be many years yet.’

‘But you-’ Roscoe looked from Guido to Fede and from Fede to Dulcie ‘-you-no, wait-’

Then inspiration came to Dulcie in a blinding flash.

‘Mr Harrison, pretty soon you and I need to discuss this fiasco,’ she said, sounding slightly truculent. ‘How am I supposed to do a decent job of work when your briefing to me was so inaccurate?’

He gaped. ‘I-’

‘Look at this picture.’ She produced the snapshot. ‘You assured me that the man with the mandolin was Federico Lucci. On that basis I allocated you a portion of my time which, let me remind you, doesn’t come cheap. And after a week when I’ve given you my best efforts, I discover that “Fede” was really the other man, and I’ve been on a wild-goose chase.’