Read Masques of Gold for Free Online Page B

the evening meal?”
    It was so logical and her voice was so indifferent that Justin did not know whether to accept what she said as simple truth or credit her with even more skill at hiding her emotions than he had first thought. “You were very fond of your husband,” Justin stated, his voice carefully neutral.
    â€œNo, I cannot say that,” Lissa replied frankly, “but I respected him. He had been kind to me from the day we were betrothed, and his manner was no different when he left the house that morning. Nor had I given him any reason to wish to hurt me.”
    Her color rose a little over the last few words. Justin took that to mean that she had not refused her husband’s sexual advances. The idea made him slightly uncomfortable, which was ridiculous. With one out of every three women dying in childbed and older men being best able to support a wife, there were many young wives with much older husbands. Still, Justin did not like to think of Peter de Flael, with his wrinkled skin, his few wisps of gray hair straggling over a shiny skull, his swollen, flabby legs, mounting this fresh-faced girl.
    That thought brought Justin’s eyes up from his plate, where they had been fixed unseeing on the graceful arcs of the design. Her wholesomeness was what was so attractive about her. She was no striking beauty—a pleasant, ordinary face surrounded by soft brown hair. But her eyes were remarkable, not only for their changeable color but for an aliveness, an eagerness of spirit, that looked out of them even when they were also full of fear. Her mouth was pretty too. She shifted on her stool suddenly and dropped her eyes, her color deepening further, and Justin realized he had been staring at her without speaking for far too long. He cleared his throat.
    â€œNonetheless,” he said, “we cannot discount the possibility that Master Peter’s son might have been aware of something you were not and merely described his father’s intention in the way most likely to hurt you. It is possible, for example, that your husband visited this woman to retrieve something he had given her, or money he had lent her, and that he intended to be home for his evening meal but was killed there? Do you know the woman’s name, Madame Heloise?”
    â€œI never thought of that.” She looked up at him again, her eyes wide with a stronger emotion than Justin felt was reasonable, but he could not read the emotion in her face. “I am sorry,” she went on. “I do not know her name or anything about her. Peter never mentioned any woman except, once or twice, his late wife. The first I knew of any leman was when young Peter spoke of her. Oh, wait! Binge mentioned her also. Binge might know.”
    She was now eager for him to find the woman. Because she thought he would be glad to lay the blame on someone poor and helpless? Justin reached for the goblet, more to give himself time to think than because he was thirsty, but it was empty. He put it down, and she filled it, smiling at him suddenly and adding, “Would you do me the kindness of calling me Lissa? Only my father calls me Heloise, and I have never cared for the name.”
    Now that was interesting, Justin thought, as he drank. Her voice was entirely different when she spoke of her husband and in that last sentence when she spoke of her father. The cold distaste with which she mentioned her father was unmistakable, while her voice was pleasant if dispassionate when she spoke of Master Peter. A strong indication that she preferred Peter to William Bowles, but not proof that she would not like best of all to be a widow with control of her own dower. Nonetheless, Justin smiled back at her as he put down the goblet, but before he could answer her request, they heard a pounding on the door.

Chapter 3
    â€œWho—” Lissa gasped, then relaxed. “It must be the priest,” she said. “I suppose he did not wish to come in