To Deceive a Duke Read Online Free Page A

can attend, if you like.’
    ‘Perhaps she would let me participate in the theatricals,’ Thalia said, pouring herself more chocolate. ‘I would like to try out some of my Antigone lines on an audience. I am not sure my delivery is quite correct. It all sounds very well inthe amphitheatre, but then anything would be terribly dramatic there! I do want it to be right.’
    ‘Have you yet found anyone for the role of Haemon?’ Clio asked.
    Thalia shook her head. ‘All the Sicilians speak so little English, and all the Englishmen lack passion! I don’t know what to do. Perform it all in Greek? Everyone seems to speak it around here.’
    ‘Lady Riverton will be able to help, I’m sure, Thalia dear,’ Sir Walter said. ‘She does appear to know absolutely everyone.’
    ‘And she’s a terrible busybody,’ Thalia answered. ‘I don’t want her taking over my play! But I will certainly call on her to ask about the theatricals. Will you come with me, Clio?’
    Clio glanced again out the window, where the sky seemed even darker. She hurriedly gulped the last of her tea and said, ‘If you go this afternoon, I can come with you. But I must run an errand this morning. If you will excuse me, Father?’
    Sir Walter nodded distractedly as he read another invitation. He was quite accustomed to Clio dashing away at all hours now, which was how she liked it. Even the time she had gone off with the Darbys to see the temple at Agrigento with only a day’s notice had not caused him to bat an eye.
    As Clio hurried from the breakfast room, she heard her sister Cory say plaintively, ‘May I go to Lady Riverton’s, too? Please? I have been to no parties at all since we came here, and I am nearly fifteen.’
    ‘That is because until October you are still only fourteen ,’ Thalia answered. ‘You are not out yet, and you should feel lucky for that. You have no social obligations at all, and can do what you please!’
    Clio paused at the front door to change to her sturdy boots.If she ran, surely she could stay ahead of the rain and return in plenty of time to call on Lady Riverton. She dashed out the door and down the narrow lane that skirted past the cathedral and into the main square of Santa Lucia.
    The village was just stirring to life for the day, fruit, vegetable and fish sellers setting up their booths, the bakery and patisserie opening their doors in a flood of sweet-sugar smells. Maids were fetching water from the fountain, gossiping and laughing. The great carved doors of the cathedral were still closed for morning mass, but soon they would open, letting out the prosperous matrons and pretty maidens of the town. The darkly dangerous-looking men were lounging in the shadows.
    The day was still cool, but later the warm sun would bring out the smells of all this life, the salty fish and pungent herbs, the sweet cakes, the earthiness of the horses and dogs. The cathedral bells would ring out, crowds would flood forth to do their marketing, and the English tourists would dash away to view the ancient temples, and the day of Santa Lucia would begin in earnest. The wider politics of the world, King Ferdinand, the ruler of the Kingdom of Two Sicilies, far away in Naples with his young Sicilian bride, the collapse of the Sicilian feudal system after the withdrawal of the English forces—none of it mattered here. Not yet, not now. There was shopping and cooking to be done.
    Marie, the baker’s wife, leaned from the window to hand her a fresh roll as she dashed by. ‘It will rain, signorina ! You should stay inside this morning.’
    Clio dashed past Lady Riverton’s grand palazzo. The windows were still shuttered, but when they were opened Lady Riverton could spy on all that happened in Santa Lucia—which was surely just as the youngish widow wanted it.
    Clio never really minded attending gatherings there. They were certainly dull enough, to be sure, especially when she had studies of her own to attend to and was forced instead to