Lessons of Desire (20 page)

Heat shimmered off Naples's buildings. The sun raised malodorous mists on the distant bay. July was not the best month to visit the jewel of the Mediterranean.

Phaedra held a scented handkerchief to her nose as the carriage rolled through Capo di monte. The coachman slopped the vehicle at an especially unsavory crossroad. He barked a guttural exchange with a man walking by. It began as a greeting, but she heard the tone turn more serious.

Elliot's gaze rose from his book lo listen. His expression firmed with concern. He turned, opened the trapdoor, and joined the conversation.

"I hope it is not a revolution," she said. Elliot turned back to her. "There has been a malaria outbreak. It is common in Naples in summer. You cannot return to the Spanish Quarter."

"Signora Cirillo's apartments are airy and—" "We will go to the Palazzo Calabritto at once. The clerks al the British legation there will know of healthier rooms to let."

He spoke in the confident, firm tone of a man who had set his course and knew it to be a sound one. It was not a tone that encouraged debate. It was also not a tone that she was accustomed to hearing. Although on occasion in bed she heard something similar, just quieter and more gentle, but carrying similar assumptions of control.

He had not really wanted to return to Naples so soon. She anticipated a scold about how her impatience had led them into peril from this disease. Instead he only waited a short while for her to argue and. when she did not, he returned to his book.

The Riviera de Chiaia seemed depopulated. Either the malaria or the heat kept strollers from the promenade and the park bordering the sea. Their coach turned and passed through the high, broad arch of the Palazzo Calabritto and came to a stop in its courtyard.

"I will wait here," she said. "My presence at your side will only delay you, and will be awkward anyway"

"It will not be awkward. I will not have you think that way." The scold had come, just not on the subject she expected. He caught himself. He continued more reasonably. "If I go in alone there is less chance of this turning into a social call, so I will not expect you to accompany me"

He did not intend to sound like a husband today, she was very sure. Nor did she believe he took for granted that he had the right to think like one. She suspected that this manner was his reaction to the ambiguities that entered their affair with their return to this city.

She would not remind him now that she was not a woman who accepted direction or needed coddling. It was natural, after all, to want to hold on to the sweet fantasy of a passion that bore no costs and in which there was no past or future. He might be gripping too tightly right now, but he would eventually let go.

She would too, soon. Right now the nostalgia squeezing her heart left her too weak to draw any lines or indulge in philosophical resentments.

He was gone longer than she expected. She did not mind. The high stone building kept the courtyard in shade and a breeze off the bay funneled through the arched entry.

His expression when he stepped back into the coach would be inscrutable to anyone else, but she had come to know this man very well. She noted the distraction floating beneath his smile and attention. She saw complex emotions in the depths of his eyes.

"Most of society has left the city. They have gone to their country villas or to the islands," he said. "I have been directed to apartments just vacated by a Spanish family. It should suit for the few days we will be here."

Few days.
Yes, that was part of what she saw and heard in him today. A resigned resolve tightened his jaw, like a captain who must carry out orders even if he does not agree with them.

"Where are these apartments? Not outside the city. I hope."

"They are right here on the Chiaia. I was told they are chambers fit for a queen."

"I thought that you spoke metaphorically when you said it was fit for a queen."

Phaedra strolled along the bank of tall windows looking out to the bay. The long grand salon of the Villa Maresche provided magnificent prospects. "If it suited our last queen during her scandalous visit here, you should know that it is too grand for me."

"It was available, grand or not. This district is less crowded and the malaria has not affected it."

All that was true, but the clerk at the legation had provided other good addresses besides the one where Queen Caroline had lived during her visit to Naples when she was a princess.

Having Phaedra in this villa appealed to him, however. She had known little luxury in her life and he had not showered much on her the last weeks. He liked seeing her here, holding her own in this long chamber full of silk drapery, damask cushions, and gilded candelabras.

"There is a large garden in back, off the dining room," he said.

"A garden. So it is not so different from our recent lodgings."

Not so different from the inns where they dined alfresco in the dusk before making love on clean but simple linens. Still, different enough in ways that had nothing to do with silks and views. It waited between them, the ways how it would be different.

A paper in his frock coat pocket reminded him of those differences. A letter from Christian had come in the diplomatic pouch that arrived on a ship last week. The clerk at the legation who handed it over did not think it odd that Easterbrook had been allowed to make use of that courier service. A marquess has his privileges.

Elliot sensed the letter flat against his body. It included nothing of note. No news of significance and not even an allusion lo the family mission that had brought Elliot to Naples. There was no real reason for Christian to have written al all, to judge from the contents.

Except he had written. It would be like Christian to guess how this was going and to decide a nudge might be in order. Christian had an uncanny ability to sense things that one did not want him lo know.

Phaedra removed her hat and set it on an inlaid table. He took that to mean she had agreed to live here. She sat on a pale rose sofa. The hue of the fabric made the black of her dress look even darker. He wished they would be here long enough for him to cajole her into ordering some new dresses and gowns.

He needed to convince her that being the mistress of the son of a marquess had its advantages. She would never marry, and he would not either, so this affair could continue indefinitely. As long as they wanted each other. There was no logical reason for the weight that had lodged in his chest the last few days. No reason at all for the damnable sense of loss that cloaked them like a mist.

"Is he back in the city?" she asked. "Jonathan Merriweather. Has he returned from Cyprus?"

Her question came like a ruthless response to his thoughts.
Actually, Elliot, there are some reasons. For example, we have not yet decided which of as will repudiate a family obligation, a promise, and a duty.

"I do not know why you refused to come in with me, since you knew every move I would make."

"I did not want my presence to keep you from your purpose there"

"I went for advice on finding chambers."

And he had, although the rest could not be avoided. The obligation to take up his duty had shadowed his contentment the last few days, and especially on the brief journey here from Portici. She knew it, of course. The spiritual intrusions did not only go one way.

"Yes, he is back in the city."

"Perhaps he will be amenable to your request."

"I am certain he will be. I have asked him to receive me tomorrow. We will have that nonsense out of the way soon enough.

There was understanding in the smile she gave him. A little sympathy too. Much had changed since they had left this city, but not his promise to protect the family name.

Bold lights, the ones that made him a fool, entered her eyes. "Tomorrow, you say. Whatever will we do with ourselves until then?"

The Palazzo Calabritto, designed by the architect Vanvitelli, was a massive building with three high stories and classical detailing. Built in the last century, it now served as the home of all things specifically British in Naples. Even the Church of England held its services here since the king permitted no non-Catholic churches to be built.

Merriweather was a very English-looking Englishman. Blond, tall, ruddy, and portly, he could be a portrait of a wealthy country squire approaching his middle years. He so contrasted with the people of Naples that he must have been visible from a mile away on the promenades.

He received Elliot in a study in the palazzo's private wing. They had met before, as all sons of the aristocracy eventually do in England. The coffee that he offered indicated that he thought this was a social call.

"I am told that you sought me out while I was in Cyprus." Merriweather said, once they sat on two sofas in the study. "I am sorry I was not here. The summers in Naples do not afford the best society but I could have been of some assistance. Are you visiting because of your historical interests?"

"That is one reason."

"I assume that you have been well received on those matters. If I can help in any way, however, let me know. Ah, here is the coffee. Tell me about your brother's wedding, and how Easterbrook fares."

"Easterbrook is much the same, and Hayden's wedding was a joy to the whole family."

Merriweather possessed a soft, malleable, pale face. As a diplomat he had learned to tame its expressions, but a hint of humor flexed through it anyway. Whether he reacted to Easterbrook's much the sameness or Hayden*s quick, private wedding was not clear.

"I am here for my historical work, but I also am addressing a family matter. It is the latter on which you may be able to help me."

"Pray, tell me how and I will use my influence any way that I can."

"I believe that you had an acquaintance with Richard Drury, who passed away last winter."

Merriweather chuckled. "A passing acquaintance at best. He accrued influence in the Commons despite his radical politics, and insinuated himself into Foreign Ministry decisions."

"Before he died, Mr. Drury wrote his memoirs."

"Did he, now? That should be interesting to read." Merriwether’s smile did not alter a whit, which was a good sign.

"I hear that they are lengthy and detailed. The publisher who holds them plans to print them unexpurgated, unless evidence is given that proves a passage to be wrong. Since the events are often private ones, such proof will be difficult for anyone to muster."

"I expect that could prove discomfiting for some people. Memoirs often do. I hope the book makes its way here. We like good gossip as much as the next person."

"Regrettably, Merriweather, as the memoirs now read, you are one of the people who will be the subject of that gossip."

"Me?" His face folded into hills and valleys of consternation. "I barely—"

"A dinner. A private one years ago with Drury and Artemis Blair, after you returned from the Cape Colony." The man appeared truly dismayed. "It appears that Dairy's memory failed him. If you did not attend such a dinner, or spoke of little of interest when you did, an error was made."

Merriweather frowned harder, in confusion and denial. Then his face fell. After one hooded, sidelong glance at Elliot, he averted his eyes.

Silence stretched. Elliot waited. That weight in his chest unaccountably got heavier. No, it was not a weight, but instead an emptiness, a void.

"My family—Easterbrook in particular—are concerned with the interpretations that might be made of the dinner conversation that Drury describes."

Merriweather snorted. "As well you might be."

That was not the response Elliot expected. Time slowed for a long moment while he absorbed the surprise. For all intents and purposes, Merriweather had not repudiated the memoirs. He had instead just confirmed them.

"What does Drury write about that dinner?" Merriweather asked.

Elliot reported what Phaedra had told him.

Merriweather shook his head. "Hell. I am named, you say? You are sure?"

"Yes. Only you, as I understand it. Not the officer who died and not the one who was suspected. And not any member of my family. However
..."

He looked very concerned now. Almost desperate. "If it is published that I was indiscreet—" He glanced around the room, taking inventory of the environment that was in jeopardy along with his reputation.

Elliot let the man weigh his dilemma, the facts of that conversation had been confirmed, but that only increased his determination that they must not come to light. As to whether the implications regarding his father were true—the possibility sickened him.

He tried to push that horrible speculation aside. Instead it lodged in his mind, a dark shadow with an accusing voice.
You knew. Of course you did. She told you, after all.

"As I said, the publisher is prepared to remove that part of the memoir if you say that Drury's memory was faulty."

"'Has
Easterbrook
paid the publisher for this generous option?"