and literacy, but that was hardly sufficient. She didn’t have the lush beauty of someone like Francesca; not even close. So . . . it would be out in the dark on a nasty night again, and there was an end to it.
Lodovico came in, rubbing his hands and looking worried. “What did you think of Lord Calenti’s visit, cara mia?”
Kat bit her lip. She could hardly tell her grandfather that she thought the man had too high an opinion of himself, and that she’d always thought there was something vaguely slimy about Calenti. Although she allowed that, other than being so obviously vain, he had been pleasant enough. A surprising visitor, but pleasant withal. Alessandra had been in an absolute fury when she’d discovered that one of Venice’s most eligible bachelors had come on a private call on Milord Montescue—and not one involving her.
“I don’t understand why he came, Grandpapa.” Calenti had been perfunctorily polite to Kat, nothing more. So he certainly hadn’t come to see about her.
Or had he?
Kat hadn’t considered that possibility, she suddenly realized. Casa Calenti had plenty of money, but they were not really Case Vecchie. For them, a dowry would not be as important as the social advance­ment involved in marrying a girl from what was still, despite their current misfortune, one of Venice’s handful of most prestigious families.
Lodovico pulled a face. “I don’t know how to tell you this . . .”
Kat waited, blood draining to the pit of her stomach.
Lodovico continued. “He wanted a small parcel of documents transported to Constantinople.”
Kat, her hasty assumptions knocked asunder, could only manage to shake her head. “Him?”
Lodovico Montescue nodded. “He offered me a great deal of money for it.”
Kat sighed. “I wish you hadn’t, Grandpapa.”
Her grandfather hugged her, smiling. “Katerina. I didn’t accept it. In fact, I rather indignantly refused. Does the man think me a fool? It’s either spying,