Free Daughters of the Silk Road: A beautiful and epic novel of family, love and the secrets of a Ming Vase by Debbie Rix Page B

something.’ And he took out from his doublet pocket a delicate lace handkerchief.
    ‘It is Bruges lace, my lady. I hope you will accept it.’
    ‘My sister cannot accept any gift from a stranger.’ Daniele spoke loudly and clearly and now inserted himself between Andrea and the blond stranger. ‘She is a lady and you show her no respect.’
    ‘I assure you, I wish the lady no harm, nor do I mean her any insult.’ The young blond man seemed utterly self-assured and stood his ground. He was a good head taller than either Andrea or Daniele, and Maria had the impression that he was mildly amused at the young men’s attempts to protect her reputation.
    ‘Thank you,’ she spoke at last. ‘I would be delighted to accept your gift; it is beautiful. I have never seen such fine work before.’
    Daniele cast her an angry glance, and Andrea stood back dejectedly.
    ‘The lace-makers of Bruges are famous for the delicacy of their workmanship,’ said the young man. ‘You will not find a finer example anywhere in Venice. I import it myself. I have the monopoly.’
    ‘Then I am grateful to you,’ said Maria, tucking the handkerchief into the pocket of her gown.
    ‘May I know your name?’ she asked the young man.
    ‘Peter,’ he replied, ‘Peter Haas. And yours?’
    ‘Maria dei Conti. My father is Niccolò dei Conti – merchant and traveller. We are recently returned from the East.’
    ‘I am honoured to make your acquaintance,’ said Peter, as he bowed low.
    ‘I think we should leave now,’ said Daniele anxiously.
    ‘May I call on you?’ asked the young blond man.
    ‘You may…’
    ‘Maria,’ interjected her brother.
    ‘Please do, but when my father has returned. I think you know where we live,’ Maria continued.
    And with that she shepherded her brother and Andrea out of the cantina and home.

Chapter Six
Peter Haas
    P eter Haas was twenty-seven years of age and had lived in Venice for nine years. He was the son of a well-respected German merchant, Franck Haas from Nuremberg, and Beatrix van der Beke. Her family were merchants in Bruges and their marriage, and consequent unification of their two businesses, had enabled the family to dominate trade in a significant belt stretching from Bruges in the north – with its monopoly of the northern sea routes, through Nuremberg, at the centre of twelve of the major trade routes in Europe – to Venice in the south, with its firm grip on trade to the East.
    Peter had spent his young life travelling between Bruges, where his mother’s brother Tobias ran the family business, and his father’s home city of Nuremberg. Linens, paper, ironwork, brass, armour and printing were that city’s major exports. Together, the family prided themselves that the extent of their mercantile territory, which also stretched from Venice to the English Channel, was unsurpassed by any other German merchant. They were ambitious, industrious and courageous. They were prepared to take financial as well as physical risks. Peter in particular was a young man of huge determination and with a strong sense of adventure. He had two brothers who had remained in the north: one based in Nuremberg with their father and the other working with Tobias, who had no sons of his own.
    Peter had first come to Venice aged just eighteen, to trade on behalf of his family business. Having spent time in Bruges he was familiar with canal life and felt at home instantly in his adopted city. Germans had traded and lived in Venice for hundreds of years, and his native tongue was widely spoken, or at least understood amongst the merchant class. But Peter was bright and enthusiastic and determined to mix fully in his adopted city, and soon mastered Italian. He lived in the German fondaco – the lodging house reserved for German merchants – and revelled in the freedom of being away from his family. He was a young man with a fondness for beer and wine, in a town filled with ladies of uncertain virtue, and he took full