“What makes you think so?” Constance asked.
“Because Caterina told me. That was why she decided to end the affair with Darrow.”
“Was Montague threatening her?” Solomon leaned across the table to take the cup and saucer from her and passed it to Constance.
“I don’t believe so.” Marianne concentrated on pouring a second cup. “He is not that kind of man. It was her own decision. She could not bear to hurt him.”
Constance frowned. “Then why did she begin the affair in the first place?”
Marianne gave Solomon his tea and poured some for herself. “Impulse. The same reason she did most things. And attraction. Carl is a handsome young man, and she loved his music. A slice of cake, Mrs. Grey?”
“Thank you.” Constance accepted the plate and helped herself. “Then in her mind, at least, if her husband didn’t know, she wasn’t hurting him?”
“Something like that,” Marianne said.
“You disapprove,” Constance remarked, “and yet you allowed them to meet here.”
Marianne stirred sugar into her tea. “I was her friend and I knew her. She would have met Carl anyway, one way or another, no doubt recklessly and causing massive scandal as well as a public breach with her husband. Here, they were as safe as they could be until the affair had run its course.”
“You assumed it would end?” Solomon said. “Was there no chance that Caterina would come to prefer Darrow?”
“No, I don’t believe so. Her husband was her rock. If it came to a choice, she would always choose him. Carl knew that.”
Solomon sipped his tea. “When did Montague find out?”
“About a fortnight ago. Or, at least, that’s when Caterina learned that he knew.”
“How did she find that out?” Constance asked. “Did he tell her in so many words? Or did she confess to him?”
“No, I think he told her that he knew. According to Caterina, she assured him passionately of her love and promised to end the affair.”
“When?” Solomon asked. “When exactly did she do that?”
“That,” Marianne said carefully, “is really what is bothering me, and why I wanted to talk to you. She told me a couple of weeks ago that she would end it that very day when she met Carl—which I had already helped her arrange for Monday the twenty-seventh of June. I offered to stay here for moral support while she delivered his congé, but she insisted she would be better alone, so I went out. And then,only a couple of days later, she asked me to arrange another meeting, for Tuesday, the fifth of July.”
Solomon set down his cup. “Then she didn’t end it after all?”
“I don’t know. She told me she had, but that there was some ‘difficulty’ she needed to resolve.”
“And she met him again on that Tuesday?”
“I assume so. I went out as usual to give them privacy, but I never saw her again.”
“Were there no signs that they had been here?” Constance asked.
Marianne met her gaze frankly. “The spare bed had not been used. Nor was it on the previous occasion. She was keeping her word.”
“And did you discover what the ‘difficulty’ was that meant she had to see Darrow in private again?”
“No. But by all accounts and my own observation, her performance at the opera was spectacular on Tuesday evening, and especially so on Wednesday. She was happy. I would say she had somehow solved the difficulty.”
Constance leaned back against the cushions. “Or,” she said slowly, “she had arranged to run away with Darrow.”
*
The Covent Gardenshop bearing the signCuriosities and Antiques, prop. J. Silverwas closed.
Kellar was not surprised. It was Sunday, after all. Since he had never in his passing surveillance seen Juliet leave the premises after the shop was locked up for the night, he presumed she lived in the rooms above it. He had seen lights up there yesterday evening, but it had not been the right time to call.
