said instantly. Then he stopped, as if he had committed himself too quickly. "At least, he is the last man I would have thought it of."
She could not let this opportunity slip by. "What other reason do you think Justinian could have had for killing Bessarion? Did he hate him? Was there a rivalry between them? Or money?"
"No," he said quickly, pushing aside the tray that held his food. "There was no rivalry or hate, at least on Justinian's part. And no money. Justinian was a wealthy man, and prospering more each year. Every reason I know of says he would wish Bessarion alive. He was profoundly against the union and supported Bessarion in his work against it. At times I thought he did the more work of the two."
"Against the union?"
"Of course." Constantine shook his head. "I cannot believe Justinian would work for Rome. He was an honorable man, of more courage and decisiveness than Bessarion, I think. That is why I spoke for him to the emperor in plea that the sentence be commuted to exile. It was certainly his boat that was used to dispose of the body, but it might have been without his knowledge. Antoninus confessed, but he did not implicate Justinian."
"What do you think was the truth?" She could not leave it now. She touched on the subject ugliest in her mind. "Could it not have been personal? To do with Helena?"
"I do not believe Justinian had any feelings for Helena, most certainly not of that kind."
"She is beautiful," Anna pointed out.
Constantine looked slightly surprised. "I suppose so. There is no modesty in her, no humility."
"True," Anna conceded, "but those are not always qualities that men look for."
Constantine shifted a little in the bed, as if he were uncomfortable. "Justinian told me that Helena had once made it very clear that she wished him to lie with her, and he had refused. He told me that he still loved his wife, who had died not long before, and he could not yet think of another woman, least of all Helena." Constantine smoothed his hands over the rumpled sheet. "He showed me a painting of his wife, very small, only a couple of inches square, so that he could carry it with him. She looked very beautiful to me, a gentle face, intelligent. Her name was Catalina. The way Justinian said it made me believe everything he said."
Anna took the tray from the side of the bed and rose to put them on a table at the far side of the room. It gave her a chance to compose herself. His words, the story of Justinian and Catalina's portrait, brought their presence so sharply to her mind that the loss was almost like a physical pain.
She put down the tray and turned back to Constantine. "Then he would have wanted Bessarion alive, wouldn't he?" she asked. "Both to lead the struggle against the union and to excuse him from having to justify his refusal of Helena?"
"That is another reason I pleaded for his exile," Constantine said sadly.
"Then who did help kill Bessarion? Could we not prove it, and have Justinian freed?" She saw the surprise in his face. "Would it not be our holy duty?" she amended quickly. "Added to which, of course, he could return and continue in the struggle against Rome."
"I don't know who helped kill Bessarion," he said, spreading his hands in a gesture of helplessness. "If I did, don't you think I would already have told the emperor?"
His tone had changed. She was convinced he was lying, but it was impossible to challenge him. She should retreat now, before she antagonized him or aroused his suspicion as to why she should care so much.
"I suppose it was some other friend of Antoninus," she said as lightly as she could. "Why did he kill him, anyway?"
"I don't know that, either." Constantine sighed.
Again she was certain he was lying.
"I'm glad you liked the soup," she said with a slight smile.
"Thank you." He smiled back. "Now I think I will go to sleep for a while."
Sixteen
GIULIANO DANDOLO STOOD ON THE STEPS OF THE LANDING stage and watched the water of the canal rippling in the torchlight. He smiled in spite of the faint sense of unrest he felt. One moment the wavelets were crested with glittering ribbons of light, the next they were shadowed and as dense as if he could walk out over them and they would bear his weight. Everything was shifting,