Waving goodbye to Her Highness, her friend and her peacock-blue tunic, Claudia set off to make an inspection of the renovations. Was there no end to the work? Newly whitewashed walls. New tiles on the roof. The wall from the dining hall had been knocked out and replaced with folding doors that opened on to — you've guessed — a newly paved terrace that overlooked the whole estate. Nor was that the end of the list. The old well in the courtyard had been turned into an open pool complete with fountain. Brightly coloured friezes lined the walls of the portico in place of hazy geometries. The gardens were unrecognizable beneath a new planting of plane trees, cypress, peach and cherry, oleander, box and myrtle.
'Your mother-in-law has made many improvements,' murmured a voice in Claudia's ear.
The voice was deep, rich and warm. Like melted honey drizzled on fig cakes. The sort of voice, no doubt, the dead enjoy communing with.
'I am Candace. But then — ' she smiled an equally deep, rich, warm smile which somehow never quite made the journey to her eyes '- I suspect you guessed that.'
So this was what sorceresses looked like? Taller than the average male, with dark, watchful eyes and legs that came up to her armpits, this woman had 'feline' written all over her. Her skin was as smooth and shiny as the ebony that covered her homelands and every bit as black (not Mummy, then), and to highlight her beauty, she'd chosen a gown of fuchsia pink edged with silver and purple. But it wasn't her height, nor her skin, nor even the bold colours of her robe that made Claudia's eyes pop. Black and springy, her hair was cropped short like a soldier's, its scandalous style emphasized by Candace's swan neck, yet there was nothing masculine about this woman. Nothing mannish at all.
'She intends to install a sundial surrounded by roses,' the sorceress continued, 'and add a fishpond down by the paddock.'
'I'm surprised you haven't talked her into putting in a boating lake.'
'Your mother-in-law does not strike me as the type of woman one could talk into anything… '
How true, but that was in the old days. Before dementia kicked at her shins.
'And in any case, it is neither my interest nor concern what renovations she does or does not make. Larentia employs me to cast spells, not act as her decorator.'
Technically, since Larentia had no monies of her own, it was Claudia who was employing her, but she let the point pass. 'Are they working?' she asked innocently.
'All my spells work.'
The edge to Candace's voice was unexpected and Claudia resisted the urge to smile. So then, not quite the confident little cat she made out? Adopting a hopeful expression and wringing her hands as though embarrassed at asking, she hesitantly enquired whether Candace could help her some time… you know, when it was convenient. Her husband, she murmured. Larentia had spoken with him at length, as had Flavia…
'Of course, my dear, but of course,' the sorceress purred, because no self-respecting con artist is going to let an opportunity like that slip by them in a hurry. 'Suppose we say tonight, after dinner?'
'Won't it be too dark?'
When Candace smiled her slow, feline smile, Claudia's skin started to crawl. 'The dead live in the darkness, my dear. They will not come when it's light.' Black hands covered white in a well-rehearsed act of sympathy. 'How you must miss your soul mate, my child.'
Child? The woman could not have been more than thirty herself.
'Candace, you have no idea,' Claudia replied sadly, remembering Gaius's fat, shiny body and foul-smelling breath. 'I am just grateful to be blessed with so many wonderful memories.'
Most of them glittering merrily away in his moneybox, as she recalled.
'Tonight, then,' Candace crooned. 'Tonight husband and wife will be reunited, you have my promise on that.'
Claudia tilted her head in a gesture of coyness. 'I think you are more than a sorceress who casts protective spells,' she said with a simper. 'Look what you've done for Larentia and Darius.'
'Your mother-in-law did not ask me to cast spells for her heart. It is the winged spirits who brought them together on the winds of freedom and fate. The triumph is not mine to take credit for.' Candace leaned forward and transfixed her with her eyes. 'The forces of the supernatural surround each of us, my child. I am merely their instrument.'
As she turned away, the scent of her lingered for a long time in the open portico. Incense. Arabian incense, to be precise. Which struck Claudia as an odd sort of choice. And as she stood with her back to one of the columns, she noticed a young couple down by the wood store. Both dark and hawk-like, with deep olive skins, they performed backward stretches and made bridges of their spines in perfectly synchronized movements. From time to time, they broke off from their gymnastics to converse with foreheads almost touching. Lovers, so close that they mirrored one another's actions? She did not think so. Their noses, their jaw lines, the kinks in their hair. These things were too similar…
'Knew you'd be up here sooner or later, poking your nose where it doesn't belong.'
'Ah, Larentia! Lovely to see you again, too.'
And what a surprise it turned out to be. Far from the modest country woman Claudia remembered, her mother-inlaw's hair had been skilfully dyed, with fine golden fillets woven right through it, a task that would have taken quite literally hours. Her gown was fashionably pleated and flattering, and dear me, was that rouge on her lips?
'If it's the money you're worried about, don't be. Darius has covered the cost of every single item, right down to new bread ovens in the kitchen.'
A tingle of alarm ran down Claudia's spine. 'He's moving in?'
That would explain his buttering up of the mother of a wealthy wine merchant, his generous acts of renovation, his worming his way into her heart. No doubt the old boy saw Larentia as the perfect inheritance for his children and grandchildren, and she couldn't wait to see his reaction when it was pointed out to him that, actually old chap, your bride-to-be owns nothing, not even the clothes she stands up in.
'Move in here?' Larentia snorted. 'Certainly not! Darius is a horse-breeder from the south, with a stud farm ten times the size of this place, and that's where he's taking me once we're wed. And since he's had nothing but coughs since he arrived, he insists the climate will be better for my health, as well.'
Claudia chewed her lip. Horse-breeders live and breathe pedigrees, which meant Doddering Darius would already be apprised of Larentia's financial status, and he seemed more concerned with prolonging her life than shortening it. Claudia's thoughts turned to Orson and Flavia. The way they'd gripped each other's fat, lumpy hands all the way up here from Rome, gazing deep into one other's eyes, regardless of the cart's jolts and jostles. Could it be that Larentia, a woman who could melt glass with one glare and slept upside down in a cave, wasn't senile at all, but had genuinely found love in her twilight years? At sixty-eight, though, she'd be keenly aware of her mortality, at the speed with which time slips away. Could that explain why she'd brought in this Candace? To give her an emotional cushion?
'There's nothing wrong with your health,' she pointed out. In fact, her mother-in-law was radiant and blooming, and looked a full decade younger.
'Then I'll live even longer.' Larentia twisted up her mouth in resignation. 'Suppose you'd better come in.'
Very generous, considering it wasn't her house. But then, much as one would like to, one can't go tossing unwanted mothers-in-law into the middens. Even the most venomous ones.
'No doubt you'll be wanting to give my fiance the onceover.' Larentia sniffed. 'Might as well get that over and done with, too.'
'Dodd- Darius is here now?'
'The sooner I get his feet under my table,' Larentia cackled, 'the sooner I get 'em under my mattress! Oh, for heaven's sake, girl, snap your jaw shut. You look just like Flavia did when I said the same thing to her.'