Count Valieri's Prisoner

And let herself slide gently down into a soft, welcoming cloud of darkness.

Her first conscious thought was that the car had stopped moving at last, and she no longer felt as if she was being shaken to bits.

Her next—that she was no longer simply sitting down, but lying flat as if she was on a couch. Or even a bed.

With a supreme effort, she lifted her heavy lids and discovered that she was indeed in a bed.

Oh God, I must have been taken ill, she thought, forcing herself to sit up. And I’m back at the hotel.

But just one glance round the room disabused her of that notion.

For one thing, the bed she was lying in, though just as wide and comfortable as the one in Room 205, was clearly very much older with an elegant headboard in some dark wood, and a sumptuous crimson brocade coverlet.

For another, there seemed to be doors everywhere, she realised in bewilderment as she tried desperately to focus. Doors next to each other, in some impossible way, in every wall all round the large square room. Doors painted in shades of green, blue and pink, and interspersed with shuttered windows.

I’m not awake, she thought, falling limply back against the pillows. I can’t be because this is obviously some weird dream.

She wasn’t even wearing her own white lawn nightdress, but some astonishing garment in heavy sapphire silk with narrow straps and a deeply plunging neckline. And it was the faint shiver of the expensive fabric against her skin that finally convinced her that she wasn’t dreaming. And that she hadn’t fallen down a rabbit hole like Alice either.

The bed and this extraordinary door-filled room were not Wonderland at all, but total, if puzzling, reality.

Go back to your first conclusion, she told herself. You became ill in the Count’s car, and you were brought here to recover. That’s the only feasible explanation, even if you don’t remember feeling unwell—just terribly sleepy.

And you’ve been looked after, although a room liable to give one hallucinations was perhaps not the best choice in the circumstances.

Thinking back, she seemed to remember a phrase which described this kind of décor. Trompe l’oeil, she thought. That was it. She’d come across it during some of her preliminary research on the Ligurian region, but had decided it was irrelevant.

However, it occurred to her that she was growing a little tired of mysteries and enigmas, whether verbal or visual, and would relish a little straight talking from here on in.

She would also prefer to get dressed, she thought, if only she knew where her clothes were.

She wondered too what time it was—and that was when she realised, with shock, that not only was she no longer wearing her wristwatch, but that, even more alarmingly, her engagement ring was also missing.

And it’s not just my clothes, she thought frantically, as she shot bolt upright, suddenly wide awake as she stared round the room. Where’s my bag? My money, passport, credit cards, mobile phone, tape recorder—everything?

Suddenly, the fact that she was next door to naked in a strange bed, in a strange house in the middle of God only knew where, took on a new and frightening significance.

And even if there was a perfectly innocent explanation, the noble Count Valieri was going to have some serious explaining to do—when they finally met.

The next moment, Maddie heard a key rattle, and a section of the wall opposite the bed swung open, revealing that, in this case, it was a real door and not a pretence.

But it was not the man in the portrait, her expected elderly host who entered. Her visitor was male but younger, tall, lean, olive-skinned and, in some strange way, familiar. Yet how could that be? she asked herself, perplexed, when she was quite certain that she’d never seen that starkly chiselled, arrogant face before in her life, or those amazing golden brown eyes, currently flicking over her with something very near disdain.

‘So you have woken at last.’

It was the voice that jogged her memory. The cool, peremptory tones she’d last heard ordering her into the Count’s car outside the opera house. Only now, instead of the chauffeur’s tunic and peaked cap of their previous encounter, he was wearing chinos and a black polo shirt, unbuttoned at his tanned throat, this casual dress emphasising the width of his shoulders, the narrowness of his hips and his long legs. He looked strong and tough without an ounce of excess weight.

A factor that only served to increase her unease, which she knew she must be careful not to show.

However, realising how much of her the sapphire nightgown was revealing in turn, she made a belated snatch at the embroidered linen sheet.

‘Obviously,’ she returned with a snap, angrily aware of a faintly derisive smile curling his hard mouth. She paused, taking a deep, calming breath. ‘You’re the Count’s driver, so presumably you brought me here.’ Wherever here is.

‘Sì, signorina.’

‘The problem is I can’t quite remember what happened. Have I been ill? And how long have I been asleep?’

He shrugged. ‘About twelve hours.’

‘Twelve hours?’ Maddie repeated. Then, her voice rising, ‘That long?

That’s impossible.’

‘You fell asleep in the car. And you were still morta—sleeping like the dead when we arrived.’

‘Then how did I get here—like this?’

‘I carried you,’ he said. Adding, ‘And you continued to sleep quite happily in my arms as I did so.’

Her mouth went dry as she assimilated that. ‘I don’t believe you,’ she said hoarsely. ‘There must have been something—in the coffee. Or that water in the car. You drugged me.’

His mouth tightened. ‘Now you are being absurd,’ he stated coldly.

She waved an impatient hand. ‘Well—maybe. But I don’t understand why you didn’t take me back to my hotel.’

‘Because the Count wished you to be brought here.’

‘Well, that was kind of him—I suppose. But I prefer to stick to my own arrangements. Perhaps you would thank him and tell him I’d like to leave.’

‘That will not be possible. You are going nowhere, signorina. You will remain here until arrangements for your release have been concluded with your family in Britain.’

There was a taut silence, then Maddie said unevenly, ‘Are you telling me that I’ve been kidnapped?’

‘Yes,’ he said, adding laconically, ‘I regret the necessity.’

‘Oh you’re going to have regrets all right,’ she said, her voice shaking. ‘When you find yourself in court. And don’t think a plea of insanity will spare you.’

‘I would not think of offering one, even if there were to be a court case—which I guarantee there will not.’ He paused. ‘And I am completely rational, I assure you.’

‘In which case,’ Maddie said stormily, ‘you can prove it by returning my belongings and arranging for that other man—Camillo—to take me to Trimontano for the rest. Instantly.’

‘That is not going to happen. Your possessions have already been collected from the hotel and brought here.’

Maddie gasped. ‘Who decided this?’

‘I did.’

‘Then here’s a decision that I’ve made,’ she said icily. ‘I came to Italy to interview a woman who was once a singer called Floria Bartrando. I don’t suppose you’ve heard of her.’