Today, it was answered by a woman in a neat overall. He asked for Miss Sansom, and was conducted through the house to a large elaborate conservatory at the rear. Here, among a welter of large and faintly menacing green plants, he found Kit Sansom, tranquilly engaged with some petit point.
She laid it aside when she saw him. ‘Rome, my dear.’ She held out a hand. ‘I didn’t know you were coming. Father didn’t mention it.’
‘He doesn’t know.’ He sat down on one of the cushioned wicker chairs she indicated. ‘I suppose you know why he sent for me originally—what he wanted me to do?’
‘Oh, yes.’ She sighed sadly. ‘He’s quite obsessed, you know. Although, to be fair, they both are.’
Rome leaned forward. ‘How did it start, Aunt Kit?’ he asked quietly. ‘Have you any idea?’
‘Oh, yes.’ Her voice was matter-of-fact. ‘I knew a long time ago—even before Sarah left. My godmother told me everything.’
‘Can you tell me?’
Kit Sansom folded her hands in her lap, her expression reflective. ‘To begin with it was just business rivalry—even healthy competition—although there probably wasn’t much love lost between them even then.
‘But in those days your grandfather had other things on his mind as well, not just making money. He’d fallen passionately in love, and become engaged to this lovely girl. He was planning his wedding—his life with her.
‘He had to go away for a few days on business, and while he was gone his fiancée went to a friend’s birthday party. Where she was introduced to Arnold Grant.’
She smiled sadly. ‘Apparently, it was the kind of encounter you only read about—the genuine coup de foudre. Once they’d met, nothing else existed for either of them. So she broke off her engagement to your grandfather and married Arnold Grant instead.
‘My godmother said Matt was like a crazy man. That he went round vowing all kinds of revenge on them both, but everyone assumed that he’d get over it in time and be reasonable. Only, he never did.’
She sighed again. ‘From that moment on, Arnold Grant was his sworn enemy. At first he wouldn’t retaliate, no matter what your grandfather did, but eventually, inevitably, Matt went too far, and it became mutual—a full-scale feud with no holds barred.’
‘Dio—it’s unbelievable,’ Rome said. ‘To go on bearing a grudge like that—hating for all these years. Filling the house with it. No wonder my mother ran away.’ He paused. ‘Why didn’t it stop when he met my grandmother—found someone else to love?’
Kit shook her head. ‘My father married my mother because he needed a wife, and she was available.’ She spoke without rancour. ‘The problem was he wanted someone to play hostess when he entertained clients, and Mother was basically shy, and rather timid. I take after her, I think. Also, he wanted a son to inherit his business empire, as Arnold had, and she gave him two daughters.
‘I think she loved him,’ she added quietly. ‘But she couldn’t compete with the ghost of the woman he’d loved and lost—Elizabeth Cory. Sarah and I were always aware of—tensions between them. This was never a happy house.’
Rome drew a sharp breath. ‘If he loved Elizabeth so much, how could he contemplate destroying her granddaughter?’ he demanded roughly. ‘Using her as a weapon in this senseless vendetta?’
‘To hurt as he was hurt, perhaps.’ Her voice was grave. ‘It’s all so dark and twisted that it’s difficult to know. Sarah was lucky to escape—to find some happiness.’
He looked at her. ‘Were you never tempted to leave—and not come back?’
‘Oh, yes.’ She smiled a little. ‘So very often. But then he’d have had no one, and somehow I just couldn’t do it.’ She returned his gaze. ‘What are you going to do, Rome?’
‘I’m going to try and stop it,’ he said. ‘Because it’s gone on too long. And I won’t allow it to damage me—or the girl I love. Because I’m going to marry Elizabeth’s granddaughter, Aunt Kit.’
‘Ah, Rome.’ Her voice was tired. ‘Do you really think they’ll let you?’
He smiled at her. ‘I grew up with a gambling man, Aunt Kit. I just have to take that chance.’
There were sudden tears in her eyes. She said, ‘Rome—be careful. Be very careful.’ She paused, looking down at her hands. ‘Was he good to her—the gambling man? Did he make my little sister happy? Please tell me he did.’
Rome said gently, ‘Yes, he adored her. He was kind, laid-back and humorous, and we both thought the world of him.’
‘I’m so glad,’ she said. ‘Glad that she found someone to love her. She hadn’t had much luck up to then—either with her father or yours.’
Rome was very still. He said, ‘Aunt Kit—are you saying you know who my father was?’
‘Oh, yes,’ she said calmly. ‘She needed to confide in someone—but I’d guessed long before. Guessed—and feared for her.’
‘Will you tell me?’
‘If it’s really what you want.’ She saw him nod, and sighed faintly. ‘His name was James Farrar, and he was a business associate of your grandfather. Dark and handsome, but considerably older than she was. I sometimes wondered if that was the attraction. If she was really looking for another father figure. Someone who wasn’t eaten up by his need for revenge. She knew he was married, but he told her he was getting divorced.’
‘And she believed him?’ Rome asked bitterly. ‘My God.’
‘You mustn’t blame her, my dear.’ Her voice was kind. ‘Up to that time she’d led a pretty sheltered life—we both had. When Sarah told him she was pregnant, he went completely to pieces. Begged her not to tell Matt, or he’d be ruined. Said all the money was his wife’s, and she’d throw him out. Offered to pay for an abortion.
‘She told him to go, and never saw him again. But she wouldn’t identify him to Matt.’ She sighed. ‘He stormed at her—called her terrible names—but she was like a rock.
‘He tried to make her have an abortion, too, but she refused. She told me that she might have messed up her life, but some good was going to come out of it. All the same, she wasn’t going to bring her child into a house of hate either—so she ran away.’
There was a silence, the Rome said, ‘What became of—him?’
‘He died about ten years ago. A car accident. He’d started to drink heavily.’ She put a hand on his arm. ‘I wish it was a nicer story.’
‘I can see why she wouldn’t want to remember him.’ Rome’s face was sombre.
‘But she was happy in the end.’ His aunt paused. ‘I’ve kept her secret a long time,’ she said quietly. ‘I hope you’ll continue to respect that.’
‘I’ll tell Cory one day,’ Rome said. ‘But only her. And—thank you.’ He got to his feet. ‘Now I’d better go and talk to my grandfather.’
‘You’ve asked her to marry you, and she’s agreed?’ Matt Sansom released a shout of astonished laughter. ‘Well, that’s fast work by anyone’s standards. You’ve lived up to my expectations, boy, and more.’
He was dressed today, and sitting in a high-backed chair by his bedroom window, a rug over his knees, his face alive with malice.
Rome said coldly, ‘I hope that’s not a compliment, because that’s not all of it. The marriage will be for real. When I return to Italy Cory’s going with me, as my wife.’
Matt was suddenly very still. The calm, Rome thought, before the storm. But when he spoke his voice