Vella nodded as if he understood.
Cordelia was thinking quickly.
“I will go back to the house now. It is unlikely that anyone will be awake. I will give you what money I have and my jewellery to sell. When you have done that and found out all you can in the Harbour regarding Captain Stanton’s movements, come and tell me – what arrangements you have made.”
“I will do that, Mistress.”
There was a note in Vella’s quiet voice and the way he spoke that told Cordelia she could trust him.
*
It was after midnight when Cordelia finally left the Count’s house and everyone, she was sure, was fast asleep after the agitations and anxieties of the day.
The Count himself was hoarse with tiredness, as he told his wife, from arguing in the Magisterial Palace and attempting to put the Maltese point o
