Like the trained poodles in black vests that Sal had once seen in a street show in Florence, the footmen bent at the same moment to refill the wine—a different one for each course, it looked like—then straightened and circled in a synchronized line.
Sal found himself mesmerized by the light, the platters’ filigreed edges catching the glow of the candelabras, of the three chandeliers and the three roaring fires, of the diamonds and emeralds and sapphires on necks and earlobes and waists. He’d seen rich tourists from all over the world come and go from the pensione in Florence, but nothing like this.
The branches of the Christmas tree had been weighted with garlands and hothouse flowers, velvet bows and gilt packages. At its base, more packages mounded, hundreds of them, together with a painted wooden rocking horse and a white wicker doll carriage, an army of toy soldiers and a doll whose curls spilled from a green bonnet, gloved hands clutching a parasol.
Sal tried not to think of his mother’s face, silver strands of hair spilling back on a ragged green pallet, the stuccoed wall behind her crumbling onto the floor. Shaking his head to rid himself of the image, Sal turned. Perhaps he and Nico should leave, even before the confession. Before hearing where a native like Kerry MacGregor might recommend hiding for outsiders who knew nothing about this valley or the blue range that cradled it. Assuming she was willing to help.
The footmen swirled through the butler’s pantry as Kerry loaded their platters again. Sal’s mind spun over a host of possible hiding places in the village, none of them good.
“Our name,” he said casually from a few yards away. Kerry and the footman waiting for a porcelain tureen of soup both looked up. “Bergamini. Our name. I hope that you will remember our name. If a question is ever asked of yourself—if you ever must wonder.”
Kerry’s head cocked. It made no sense, this strange comment of his, Sal could see. But Kerry MacGregor recalled things. Mulled over them later.
Sal would wait for a chance to say more. But meanwhile, he’d drop a hand on Nico’s shoulder to let his brother know everything was all right.
Which it wasn’t. All too soon Nico would have to know they were hiding again.
“Terrapin soup,” Kerry said over her shoulder. “And then after that, or maybe after the salmon course or the saddle of mutton or the chaudfroid or the quail course, or maybe after the coffee and mocha biscuits and cognac—dear Jesus—maybe then I’ll have thirty seconds to listen. I do want to.”
He could tell she did not. That she dreaded what she might hear. But she’d said it, which was kind. And that kindness was why he’d risked their coming tonight, Nico and him. That kindness might be all that stood against his being separated from Nico again.
With the back of one arm, she pushed hair from her face. “I’m sorry it’s so—”
Suddenly, a racket in the main hall brought the cello and violins to a faltering halt. A man was charging through the front door past a frantic Mrs. Smythe.
His black topcoat dusted in snow, he’d turned up its collar to cover the lower half of his face. His eyebrows worked furiously as he glowered over his shoulder to the housekeeper chasing him. Both hands raised to her shoulders, her mouth was an O of horror at the disturbance.
For a moment, Sal was fixed to his spot behind the crack in the door. His breath stopped.
“I won’t keep Mr. Vanderbilt but a few minutes is all.” Stepping around Mrs. Smythe, who’d thrown herself in his path, Leblanc raised his elbows like spikes on chariot wheels to keep her at a distance.
“But on Christmas Eve, of all the things!”
“Exactly. I’ve spent enough damn time following leads that came to nothing. This time, I’ll not wait for anyone else’s convenience. I’ll have my man.”
From his place in the middle of guests at the banquet table, sitting indignantly quiet, George Vanderbilt rose. “This is rather irregular, surely.”
Mrs. Smythe’s cheeks blazed. “I’d have sent the divvy down the banks, like, but he wouldn’t be stopped.”
The man in the topcoat flashed a badge. “Pinkerton Detective Agency. Perhaps you’ve heard of us.”
The smirk on the intruder’s face said he knew the answer to this: that the Pinkertons were the stuff of legend now. Detectives who’d tracked assassins and bank robbers, who’d quelled strikes and intimidated workers. Investigators who always found what their clients were searching for. “Name’s Leblanc. Hired by a prominent family from New Orleans. To track down a killer.”
Sal did not stay to see Kerry MacGregor half turn at the words New Orleans toward where he stood. But she seemed to miss little. He had no doubt she remembered his mention that day at the cemetery of where he’d once lived. She would already be piecing together his changing his name and his words to her tonight, I have the confession to make, along with more of a picture.
A picture that now included, he knew, the word killer. Coupled with his own face.
Chapter 34
Kerry saw the crack in the door behind her close shut just as the string quartet at the far end of the banquet hall slid into “Silent Night.” She knew without fully turning her head that little Nico would no longer be in the corner. That the Italians had run. Head cocking toward the departing footsteps, Cedric whined and lifted one muddy paw as if to ask a question.
Pinkerton. The word buzzed over the table. The nerve of the man.
You know the Pinkertons stopped Jesse James.
Yes, and we’ve used them ourselves. Sniff out the source of a strike better than any bloodhound.
“Why on earth,” George Vanderbilt asked, “would a Pinkerton man be hunting someone here at Biltmore?”
Kerry did not miss the faces of at least two of the men at Vanderbilt’s table, the flicker of fear, the defensive pushing back from the table. Perhaps that was the nature of the business world these men lived in: Vicious. Omnivorous. A stab that could come from behind any cloak.
Kerry forced herself to stare directly ahead.
The intruder, whose face looked like one of the snarling giants from the twins’ fairy-tale book, stalked forward. “I’ll keep it short, seeing as how you got family here.”
“Another thought would be,” Vanderbilt suggested mildly, “that you come back in two days, after Christmas, and tell me everything at your leisure.”
The Pinkerton man ignored this. “I got my orders to bring in a man I’ve been tracking for years. Got reason to think he’s not only here in these mountains somewhere, but more specifically”—he reared back to deliver this last—“here.”
Ferociously, the man swung his head first left and then right, as if demonstrating the kind of predator’s search he was capable of. Another rumble of comments from the guests rolled over the table.
As Kerry watched from the crack in the door, most of the family appeared more amused than concerned, as if he were providing some needed entertainment in the midst of their meal. Only the two men who’d looked so alarmed at the flash of his badge continued to pull at their collars as if breathing had become suddenly a chore.
Behind her, Cedric leaned harder against his gate. Another whine. Another muddy paw lifted. A plea.
“Be patient,” Kerry whispered. “There’ll be scraps.”