Chapter 57

Fury shut the drawer and walked slowly across the floor. Then she returned and yanked the drawer open.

The last four days had been hectic. A whirlwind in fact. But in all the mad preparation the to-ing and fro-ing to the pawn shop, which Lady Margaret had been expectedly sticky about--how could my son possibly clear off for Rome without settling with his creditors?--the procuring of seats on a coach to Turin because Fury was unable with the repeated bouts of morning sickness to travel by sea, and the packing up of what she owned she'd still been certain of one thing. The book her book, her precious book--was in the drawer. The drawer she sometimes kept it in, in lieu of the safe that was behind Messalina's hanging.

What was more, it could not possibly have left either without her knowledge. And it wasn't in the safe. She'd tried there first.

"Susan, have you seen my book?"

"Your book, madam?" Susan squinted at her across the top of a pile of freshly laundered chemises.