The mules stood like statues, patient as time in the blazing sun. The Appenine air shimmered with heat. In the hazed distance of the green and golden vale of the Arno the terracotta roofs and gleaming domes of Florence nestled within their surrounding walls.
Jessica breathed the scented and dusty air and fixed her eyes, narrowed against the brilliant light, upon the distant city.
‘—the view of Florence, with the surrounding hills and the houses dispersed on them, would be counted by many as unparalleled—’
If she had ever doubted, at this moment those doubts were put to rest; so far as she could see, those that would describe it so had been right. In the past three months she had ridden through the flatly fertile fields of Belgium and visited the fairy castles of the Rhein, she had walked the flowery mountains of Switzerland and the verdant tracks of the Austrian Tyrol. She had seen Bruges and Brussels, Strasburg, Munich and Vienna and had wondered at them all. Yet this first sight of the city that she had dreamed about for so long and travelled so far to see could not have struck her with more freshness or force had she been transported here by magic, with no comparisons to make.
The last couple of weeks had been, perhaps, the most tiring of the trip, and for more reasons than the obvious. It had taken eight days to travel the 300 miles from Vienna to Trieste, travelling in a well-sprung but tediously ponderous diligence that had skirted through the foothills of the distant mountain ranges to the shores of the Adriatic Sea. As they had descended the hills into the town she had seen for the first time the lush colours and vegetation of a warmer climate; dark cypress trees and silver-pale olives, fig and peach trees, stony slopes of broad-leafed vines. The Adriatic, a silvered, almost waveless mirror to the blue sky, had startled her as much as anything she had ever seen, so different was it from the rough grey northern seas that were all she knew.
They had stayed a couple of days in the busy commercial town before taking a barque to Venice – a coasting vessel that plied between the two ports carrying goods and, of secondary importance, passengers. The accommodation had been adequate but basic, and the trip made difficult by a sudden squall that had to his chagrin reduced Robert to wretched seasickness. In Venice the weather had been unseasonably cold and by now, with their goal almost in sight they had been anxious, each for their own reasons, to push on. Yet they had been reluctant to bypass such a famous place altogether, so for two days under grey skies, huddled into greatcoats and scarves they had explored the canals and tiny, winding streets, the palaces and churches, were astounded by the almost wanton profusion of precious things the decaying city held – like an old, old woman, Jessica had thought, hoarding her treasures in a dilapidated house where in the darkest corners the brightest masterpieces might be discovered.
On the day they had left the city heading for Padua the fickle sun had reappeared, and had shed its golden southern warmth on the rest of the journey. The voyage across the lagoon from Venice had been leisurely, the cruise up the canal to Padua, the boat now drawn by patiently plodding horses, uneventful. The banks had glided by, picturesque with pretty villages and villas. Bare-legged, brown-skinned children had raced gaily to the riverside to wave. From Padua, using coaches driven by that tough breed of men known as the ‘vetturini’ they had travelled across the flat and fertile valley of the Po via Verona, Mantua and Modena, and thence to Bologna, where the horses had been exchanged for mules and they had set off into the towering and beautiful Appenines for the last stage of their journey. The past night had been spent at a mountain inn famous neither for its food nor its comfort but rather as being the scene of the particularly gruesome murders of several travellers some years before. Annabel Romsey, a travelling companion ever since Vienna, had delightedly declared it quite the most barbarous place she had ever encountered and had chattered about it constantly and with shattering single-mindedness ever since. Standing here on the sunlit heights that overlooked the domes and spires of Florence the subject still engaged her.
‘—one would think, truly, that they might improve such facilities, now that Europe is at peace and so many English are travelling – it’s quite outrageous that civilized people should have to contend with such squalor! Whatever were the French doing all the time they were here, do you think? Quite the least they might have done might have been to make travelling these mountains more agreeable—’
Jessica shut her ears and her mind to the light and pretty voice, as she did to the assenting and solicitous murmur that she knew it would inevitably produce from David, Annabel’s very new, young and besottedly devoted husband. She moved away a little further from the group – Annabel, David and Robert – and to the crumbling edge of the road. From the arid-looking, sunbaked ground tiny-flowered herbs sprang in amazing, shrub-like profusion, perfuming the air. In the still mountain silence the sound of the bees busy at the flowers was loud. No bird sang. The city shimmered, waiting, in the distance.
Behind her the vetturino grumbled in scolding tones to his mules, who shifted a little, and the heavy coach’s wheels cracked on the stones of the road. Over these past weeks she had stood so in many strange places, heard many such sounds, strange to her ears and exciting because of that, seen many such beautiful sights, and had, until Vienna, loved it all.
Until Vienna.
‘—I’m absolutely certain that I’ve been bitten by something beastly. David, darling – is there not a patch on my cheek? I shall be mortified if there is—’
David laughed, indulgently, ‘No, no, my love. Truly not, believe me. Your pretty little face is sweet as ever—’
Jessica flinched. Did they have to talk to each other like characters in one of the worst of Caroline’s insipid romantic novels?
‘Good heavens, Jessica dear—!’ Annabel had raised her voice a little. ‘Whatever are you doing over there and without your parasol? You silly thing! You’ll die of sunstroke! To say nothing at all of ruining your complexion!’
Robert leaned into the coach, then came towards her, neat and elegant as ever despite the intense heat, stepping quietly over the rutted road carrying her parasol. ‘She’s right, Jessie. You really must be careful. This isn’t the sun of a summer’s day in Suffolk.’ His voice was meticulously courteous and sounded, in her ears at least, as distant as the city upon which she gazed. Their fingers did not touch as she took the parasol from his hand. She found herself thinking, briefly, of their laughter on the Dover packet when the wind had taken his hat, of the smothered, childish giggles when in Bruges they had totally mistranslated a menu and had to struggle through an enormous meal they had not intended to order. Oh, yes – there had been laughter at first, and warmth, something more than the careful good manners they now both devotedly employed and which, admirably as it fooled the world, did nothing to disguise for themselves how disastrously their relationship had changed.
Since Vienna.
‘Well—’ David was jocular, ‘—are we going to stand here all day looking at the place or are we going to get on down there?’ He put a hand to his ear in an exaggerated listening pose. ‘I hear the call of a good meal and a very large, very cool bottle of vino!’
‘Oh, you!’ Annabel pushed him, squealing like a child with laughter. ‘What a beast you are! You think of nothing but your stomach! Well—’ she convulsed into sudden giggles almost nothing!’
Jessica turned away abruptly. If only – if only! – they had never met these two! If only they had never gone near Vienna!
She clambered into the close atmosphere of the rocking coach, hampered by her long, clinging skirt, suddenly aware of the oppressive heat and of the sweat that uncomfortably slicked her body. As she settled into her corner the sun glinted through the drawn blind, striking into her eyes, dazzling her with a rainbow prism of colour. She closed her eyes, drawing a long breath. No. To blame these two was not fair. If it had not been Annabel and David Romsey, it would have been, sooner or later, someone else. If it had not happened in Vienna, it would have happened, sooner or later, somewhere else. Why hadn’t she known that?
Giggling and teasing, Annabel and David settled themselves opposite her, their hands linked upon the seat between them. Robert, having seen everyone and everything safely stowed aboard, neatly followed them, slammed the door crisply shut and settled collectedly in the other corner, as far from Jessica as space would allow.
The driver yelled, the whip cracked, and the coach, lurching, started down the mountain road.
They had met the Romseys on the famous rampart walk of Vienna, and the meeting at first had seemed fortuitous to them all. The month had been June, and the weather had been kind. Jessica and Robert had found themselves enchanted both by the city and by its people. The journey until then had been every bit as exciting and as pleasurable as they had dared to hope. They planned now to stop for a week, or perhaps two, to catch their breath and to experience the pleasures of a city that could well be counted as one of the gayest in Europe. Their guesthouse was situated in a small square not far from the ramparts. In the tree-shaded platz a tiny, elaborate bandstand stood, and each evening the promenaders were treated to the light and lilting music of Vienna. As in every other square and boulevard of the city there were pavement cafes serving coffee and chocolate as well as more intoxicating beverages, and specializing in the creamiest and most delicious confections that Jessica had ever seen, let alone tasted. They visited the inevitable museums and art galleries, they strolled the boulevards and parks, and each day, late in the afternoon, they walked the ramparts, as did most of the rest of Vienna, enjoying the cooling breezes and admiring from the high vantage point the splendid buildings and neatly patterned, colourful gardens of the city.
It was on one such walk that Robert, with commendable presence of mind, trapped a gaily-flowered straw hat that was bowling at a merry pace towards the steep drop of the rampart wall.
‘I say! Thanks awfully! I’d never have got to it!’
They both turned in surprise at the pleasant and extremely English tones.
‘Er – vielen dank—’ the young man stammered, grinning. He was tall and fairish with regular features, flushed now with the exertion of chasing the hat. His clothes were well-cut and he carried a gold-topped cane. Hurrying behind him came an extremely pretty girl, trim in pink and white muslin, her dark head hatless and her equally dark eyes alight with laughter.
‘Oh, how priceless! I knew I should have put a pin in it! Thank you!’ she directed a sparkling smile at Robert. ‘I’m afraid I don’t know the words in German,’ she added with blithe and somehow endearingly absurd honesty.
Robert smiled, and bowed, handing the hat. ‘Think nothing of it. Neither do I.’
They stared at him. Jessica giggled. The girl in pink lifted an astonished and laughingly accusing finger, ‘You’re English!’
‘—as boiled mutton,’ Robert agreed, solemnly.
The young man thought about that for a moment, then threw back his head in laughter. ‘You’ve been to France—’
‘Belgium, actually.’
‘—where everyone thinks—’
‘—that the English eat nothing but boiled mutton—’
‘—and drink nothing but bad beer!’
‘Quite.’
Smiling, each pair looked at the other for a moment, delighting in the unexpected and slightly silly pleasure of the moment. Then the young man bowed a little, gracefully. ‘David Romsey,’ he said. ‘And this—’ disarmingly he blushed faintly, and the girl, nibbling her lip in sudden shyness, dropped her eyes, ‘—is my wife, Annabel.’ As he said it his eyes were drawn as if by a magnet to the flower-face that lifted smiling to his. Unexpectedly Jessica, watching them, felt an odd tightening in her chest, a strange small stab of something remarkably like physical pain, that constricted her heart and interrupted the rhythm of her breathing. She had never seen two people look at each other so openly and unreservedly. They exuded love, it tangled them like the gay ribbons of the Maypole, its bright patterns weaving about them in some way that was like a magic shield against the rest of the world. For no good reason she found the warm intimacy of that look painfully disturbing. She slipped a hand through Robert’s arm.
‘I’m Robert FitzBolton,’ Robert said. ‘This is my wife, Jessica.’
They murmured their ‘How d’ye do’s’. Then, ‘You’re staying in Vienna?’ David asked.
Robert nodded. ‘At the Brathoven Guesthouse.’ He pointed to where the roof could be seen through the trees, ‘Over there, in the Konigsplatz.’
Annabel, in the graceful act of putting on her retrieved bonnet, let out a small shriek of astonishment. ‘I don’t believe it!’
‘We’re there, too,’ David said. ‘What an amazing coincidence!’
‘It couldn’t be—’ Jessica asked, laughing, ‘that you’re following Mr Blenkinsop’s excellent itinerary from Travels in Euxope?’
‘The very same!’
They all laughed.
‘The mystery is solved,’ Robert said. ‘Who could travel Europe without trusty Blenkinsop?’
‘David calls it “The Honey-Moon Book”,’ Annabel confided, giggling infectiously, ‘for truly we’ve met so many other newly-wedded couples in the hotels we’ve stayed at—’ She stopped and looked, innocent-eyed, from Robert to Jessica.
Laughing, Jessica nodded, satisfying the other girl’s artless curiosity, ‘You’ve just met another.’
‘Oh, how splendid!’ Annabel clapped her hands like a child. ‘We must see more of each other! The wind has ordained it! It blew my hat right into Robert’s hand, just so that we should meet! Now – to start right away – why don’t we go to that wonderful little cafe on the Baumstrasse – have you discovered it yet? – and have some of that perfectly wicked kasetorte and a cup of chocolate? I vow—’ she added confidentially into Jessica’sear, slipping her hand into the crook of her arm, ‘—that I am becoming quite addicted to the wretched stuff!’
And that was the beginning. Within a day the two young couples had become inseparable; strolling together, shopping together, taking their meals together. It came as some mild surprise to Jessica that vivacious Annabel seemed eager to be her friend. ‘David’s such a dear, and I do adore him so – but oh, how I miss my sisters and my friends! Do you not?’ Perhaps fortunately giving Jessica no opportunity to reply she chattered on. ‘—Men are quite wonderful creatures, I know, and I would never dispute it, but truly even the best of them can sometimes be so deadly dull, don’t you think? My mama says it’s because they have never learned the art of gossip—’ she giggled happily ‘—and do you know I believe that she’s right? Oh, how I’ve missed my dear gossips!’
During the days that followed she certainly, and to Jessica’s amusement, made up for their lack. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever known anyone talk so much!’ she said, ruefully to Robert one night as they prepared for bed. As was their invariable custom she was undressing in the bedroom, whilst Robert used the dressing room that adjoined, though the door stood open between them. ‘Yet she’s so charming – I just can’t help liking her.’ She buttoned her nightgown to her throat and climbed into the huge bed, burrowing comfortably into the feather mattress.
Robert, somehow managing to look more dapper in his striped nightshirt than most men appeared in full dress, came to the doorway, smiling. ‘Me too. She ought to be tiresome, but somehow she isn’t.’ He moved about the room, turning out the lamps one by one, and lighting the night candle that stood upon the table. In its uncertain light Jessica saw him cross the room and slip with no sound and barely any disturbance into his side of the bed.
She turned her head, looking at him. ‘Good night.’
He lifted himself upon one elbow, leaned to her. She felt the soft, cool brush of his lips on her forehead. ‘Good night. Sleep well.’ He made to turn from her. This was the pattern of their nights. He slept, still and quiet as death, with his back to her on the far side of the bed, never moving, never touching her. On impulse now as he drew back she slipped her hand into his and brought it very softly to her lips in the darkness. ‘Thank you, Robert.’
The hand rested in hers for a quiet moment, then was gently removed. ‘For what?’ The words were as gentle and as careful as the movement.
‘Oh – I don’t know. Just thank you.’ Restless, she tossed on her side, then turned on her back again. Her eyes were used now to the gloom and the night candle cast dark, steady shadows upon the ceiling. She could see a rabbit with rather short ears, and a castle with a dragon flying towards it. She closed her eyes, opened them again. They simply refused to stay shut. She studied the shadows again. The rabbit was not a rabbit. It was a camel with two big humps. ‘Robert—?’ she whispered, quietly, ‘—are you asleep?’
He did not reply. As always his breathing was deep, even and peaceful. Yet, oddly, she was certain that he too was awake. She resisted the sudden urge to shake him. The floorboards of the room above creaked. David and Annabel were preparing for bed.
Jessica shut her eyes, tried to wipe her brain free of thought.
Something thumped on the ceiling. Jessica could almost hear Annabel’s irrepressible giggle. The guesthouse was old, and soundly built, but yet noise travelled, particularly down through the floorboards. ‘You have the room beneath us, don’t you?’ Annabel had asked, amused and confidential over their kasetorte that afternoon whilst the young men had been deep in discussion of Mr Windham Saddler’s feat of crossing the St George’s Channel in a balloon. ‘Thank goodness for that, anyway!’ She spluttered with shameless laughter, ducking her head and covering her mouth with her small hand, mischief in her eyes. ‘At least I don’t suppose we disturb you – I mean—’ she stopped.
Jessica looked down into the creamy froth of her chocolate. ‘Disturb us?’
Annabel suddenly blushed a fiery red. ‘Don’t tease, Jessica! You know what I mean!’ She exploded again into laughter. ‘That wretched bed squeaks like an ungreased cartwheel!’
Jessica smiled woodenly. Annabel, convulsed at her own daring and with a wary eye on her more conventional spouse, had leaned forward and pitched her voice for her friend’s ear alone, ‘I don’t think it will ever be a problem for anyone else – David says the hotel’s likely to need a new bed by the time we’re finished with that one—!’
Jessica now, alone beside her apparently sleeping husband, determinedly closed her eyes again. They had today visited the Augarten, an elaborate public pleasure garden that had been laid out by the Emperor Joseph II in 1775 and that Robert had said was much like the gardens of Vauxhall in London—
Silence now, broken only by Robert’s quiet breathing. She relaxed a little, then tensed again. Above her head it had started, as she had known it would, and had prayed it would not; faintly at first, the very echo of movement, delicate, rhythmic, horribly and shamingly disturbing.
Robert did not stir.
Grimly she forced her eyes shut, turning her mind back to the gardens, to the peace and the birdsong as they had walked beneath the linden trees that had spread their green canopy between them and the brilliance of the sky—
‘—honestly!’ Annabel had giggled as they had strolled in the dappled shade ‘—aren’t men beasts really? David simply cannot resist – well, you know! I must look an absolute wreck! I’m getting absolutely no sleep!’
She did not look a wreck. In fact she looked radiant, and she must have known it. What she did not know was the humiliating depths of Jessica’s ignorance.
The noises from the room above were stronger, more urgent. Jessica slipped her hands carefully from beneath the covers and pushed her fingers into her ears, as she had done as a child when she had wished to cut herself off from a disagreeable world. Yet through the booming rush of sound it produced in her head she felt it, felt the ruthless, rhythmic energy that seemed to pulse through her with her blood. There was a strange heat in her body. She clenched her fists and lay as rigid as death, staring into darkness as she listened to the sounds of their lovemaking.
It seemed an age before the noise stopped, leaving in its wake an unquiet silence that rang with echoes. Jessica lay quite still, the terrible and somehow obscurely shameful excitement that those sounds produced in her, night after night, raging at the very core of her body, burning in some part of her that she had barely known existed. Her breathing was quick and shallow, as if she had run a distance, and her heart pounded. With enormous effort she relaxed, filling her lungs slowly and carefully. Upstairs someone walked across the floor and clearly she heard Annabel’s murmuring voice, sleepy and tender.
With an abrupt movement Jessica turned on her side and buried her head beneath the feather counterpane.
Robert breathed gently on.
The next day she surprised Robert at breakfast by asking, more brusquely than she had intended, ‘Don’t you think it’s time we started to think about moving on? We’ve still a fair way to travel.’
He glanced in mild astonishment from his engrossed study of a month-old English newspaper left by some previous traveller. ‘Leave Vienna? But I thought you liked it here?’
‘I did – do—’ she corrected herself hastily. ‘It’s just – as I say – we still have a long way to go. We can’t afford to stop here much longer, can we, if we’re to get to Florence before the real heat starts?’
‘Oh, there’s plenty of time.’ His eyes had drifted back to the paper. ‘David and I were talking about it yesterday. He agreed that if we leave next week we can stop in Venice for a couple of days and still make Florence by mid-July.’
She looked at him, frowning a little. ‘We?’ she asked, carefully.
He nodded, turning a page. ‘Didn’t you know? They’re heading for Florence as well – only staying for a couple of weeks, but we thought it would make the journey more agreeable if we travelled together.’
The sudden, convulsive grip of her fingers upon the handle of her teacup spilled some of the hot liquid into the saucer. ‘You didn’t mention it to me.’
‘I didn’t think it necessary. You like them, don’t you?’ His voice was faintly and reasonably surprised, ‘I thought that you and Annabel got on so well? It must surely be pleasant for you to have female companionship?’
‘Yes – yes, of course – it’s just—’ she stopped.
For the first time he lifted his head and looked directly at her, his brows drawn to a dark, puzzled line. ‘What? Jessica – is something wrong?’
Miserably she shook her head.
‘Don’t you like Annabel? Has she done something to upset you?’ He was truly concerned.
‘No – no! Of course not! I suppose – I was just looking forward to being on our own again.’ Even in her own ears that sounded lame.
He laughed a little. ‘We’ve got the rest of our lives for that.’
She swallowed. The tea slopped in her saucer again.
‘Good Lord, what a mess you’ve made!’ Robert laughed good-naturedly, ‘I’ll call the waiter. You need a clean cup—’
The day was warm, close and thundery. They lunched, the four of them as always, at an open-air cafe in the park, served by waiters and waitresses in Tyrolean national costume that the unrepentantly amused Annabel said made them look like the clockwork dolls they had seen in the tourist shops. ‘David, darling, you really must buy a pair of those little leather trousers before we leave. They’ll show off your wonderful legs to perfection! And one of those dinky green hats! Good Lord, they do look like – what are those little Irish fairies called?’
David smiled indulgently, though the irreverent mention of his legs had brought a slight blush of colour to his fair skin. ‘Leprechauns, I think.’
‘Of course.’ Annabel fanned herself vigorously. ‘My goodness, it’s hot! Why don’t we go to the ramparts? It’s bound to be cooler there.’
They strolled, as they habitually did, with the two girls in front, Annabel’s small hand tucked firmly into Jessica’s crooked arm, the young men behind. Jessica could hear their voices, deep and pleasant, in idle conversation.
‘—so why Florence?’ David was asking, ‘I don’t pretend to be any kind of expert – far from it – but it’s hardly the centre of the musical world, is it? Why not Venice? Or Rome?’
‘Jessica particularly wanted to go to Florence. And it happens that there’s a teacher there with whom I should like to study. Signor Donatti – Pietro Donatti. He was one of Rossini’s tutors at Bologna. He retired a couple of years ago, to Florence, where he was born. He only takes a few pupils – mostly English—’
‘Oh? Why’s that?’
Robert laughed, quietly and self-deprecatingly. ‘Signor Donatti has a passion of his own. English Literature. Which just happens to be what I studied at Oxford – so he didn’t enquire too deeply into my musical accomplishments—’
‘Jessica, I declare! You aren’t listening to a word I say!’
‘I’m sorry.’ Jessica smiled at the mildly indignant Annabel, who smiled swiftly back and leaned her head conspiratorily close.
‘I wanted to ask you something.’
‘Oh?’
Annabel nodded, her face suddenly solemn. ‘It’s very – personal. I hope you won’t be offended?’
Jessica laughed, intrigued. ‘I shouldn’t think so.’
‘It’s—’ Annabel fiddled self-consciously with the lace trimmings at the shoulder of Jessica’s dress. ‘It’s not something that a lady is supposed to talk about – but – I am most abysmally ignorant of such things and I just thought that you might be able to help me—?’
‘If I can.’ Jessica was astounded. What in the world could this gay and confident creature not know that she, Jessica, might?
‘It’s—’ Clearly the other girl was uncomfortable. She glanced over her shoulder to where David and Robert followed, deep in, their own conversation. ‘I just wondered – oh, dear, I really don’t know how to say it!’
Jessica waited.
‘You and Robert—’ Annabel began afresh, ‘you’ve been travelling for some months?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you mean to stay in Florence for some considerable time?’
‘Yes.’
‘So—’ Delicately she picked at the lace again, ‘You aren’t – anxious to start a family yet?’ The last words came out in a self-conscious rush.
Jessica could not have been more taken aback had the other girl grown fangs and bitten her. ‘Er – no,’ she said. ‘I suppose not.’
‘I just wondered if you knew – that is, just before I came away a friend told me there were ways – you know – to prevent—’ she mumbled to a stop, and then, as if finally impatient with her own embarrassment, lifted her face and looked Jessica full in the eye, ‘—to prevent conception,’ she said, clearly and softly. ‘I’m afraid of becoming pregnant whilst we’re travelling. Two of my cousins died in childbirth, you see, and the thought frightens me no matter how hard I try. Why – just before we left England poor Princess Charlotte died – and she was the king’s favourite daughter! If it could happen to her—’ She sucked in her lip. ‘Well – out here – anything could happen, couldn’t it? Even if we tried to get home – well, who knows what that might bring on? Mama had three miscarriages in two years, and she travelled no further than Richmond! I attempted to speak with her about it before we left home – oh, Lord above, you just should have seen her face—!’ Despite her embarrassment the merriment that always seemed to hover just below the surface broke through and glimmered in her eyes, ‘—and all she would say was that if I were lucky – lucky, mind! – David would be gentleman enough to abstain from the “animal desires” that might – well, you know – cause such a thing to happen. As if poor David were the only one to have anything to do with it! I didn’t know then what monstrous rubbish she was talking, of course – I wasn’t yet married, and didn’t understand. But I declare she spoke of the thing as something to be avoided or endured, like toothache or the ague! It truly frightened me at the time – but then – David, dear David showed me differently—’ her eyes softened and she squeezed Jessica’s arm hard, ‘Oh, Jessica, is it not marvellous to be loved? Did you know – could you guess – that it would be such a wonder?’
Dumbly Jessica shook her head.
‘I know it’s considered unladylike – though why it should be I really can’t imagine, for after all here we all are, and we all came by the same road, did we not? Why should it be right for men to find pleasure in the act and not women? Whoever started the nonsense that it is only the men who enjoy it?’ The spark of mischief was back in her face, that died a little at recollection of her dilemma. ‘But, oh Jessica, it’s the women who have the babies, and I’m frightened of that. Aren’t you?’
‘I – haven’t actually thought about it.’
The other girl’s eyes widened. ‘You mean that? It truly doesn’t worry you? The thought of it happening far from home – far from your family—?’
Jessica shook her head. Desperately she prayed for an interruption to this uncomfortable conversation. In the sultry air she felt a runnel of sweat trickle unpleasantly down her back.
Annabel’s mouth had dropped a little in disappointment. ‘So – you don’t know of anything? Anything to – prevent it happening?’
Jessica shook her head again.
The other girl straightened up, sighing philosophically. ‘Oh well. I’ll just have to hope for the best, I suppose.’
‘Couldn’t you—’ Jessica ventured, and stopped, clearing her throat.
‘What?’
‘Couldn’t you – take your mother’s advice? I mean – if David knew how you felt—’
‘What?’ Annabel squealed with incredulous laughter, ‘Oh, Jessica, don’t tease! I’m serious!’
Jessica smiled weakly.
Annabel regarded her, faint astonishment in the candid dark eyes. ‘Could you?’
Jessica was once more reduced to a wordless headshake.
‘Can you imagine it? Goodness, they’d have to lock me up! It’s dreadful of me, isn’t it?’ She was suddenly uncharacteristically serious, ‘But, oh Jessica – if he touches me – looks at me – I’m wild for him. Isn’t it disgraceful?’
‘Of course not.’ Jessica’s voice was gentle. Beneath the other girl’s gay bravado she sensed a true anxiety. Brought up to believe the joys of the body to be a purely male preserve Annabel’s awakening had not, Jessica suspected, been without the penalty of guilt.
‘I wonder if it will always be like this?’ The pretty voice was pensive, ‘I mean – when we’re old? I pray so. I truly do.’
Jessica said nothing.
Faintly in the distance, thunder rolled.
‘I think there’s going to be a storm,’ Annabel said.
Against her will she found herself watching them. She watched the touch of their hands, the almost unconscious movement of their bodies towards each other, the warm secrets in their eyes when their glances met. She watched the teasingly provocative way that Annabel lifted her face to her husband, small teeth glimmering in a smile that brought answering laughter to his eyes – laughter, and something else, a strangely dangerous gleam of excitement and of challenge. She sensed Annabel’s suppressed excitement when her young husband took her hand, or touched her cheek. Sensed it and, she realized with something of a shock, envied it deeply.
‘You’re very quiet?’ It was early evening. They had dined and were about to set out for their evening stroll around the Konigsplatz. The band was already playing, liltingly light and pretty music that floated upon the warm air like brightly coloured bubbles.
‘I’m all right.’
Robert shook his head. ‘It’s the weather. It will storm, I think. A walk in the air will do you good. Ah – here come the others—’
She took his arm and they joined Annabel and David under the trees. A small, too-warm breath of air shivered the leaves and was still. Jessica was suddenly and somehow shockingly aware of the warmth of Robert’s arm through the thin material of his lightweight coat. Her shoulder rubbed his. She leaned to him a little.
Annabel was laughing at something he had said. David had an arm about her waist. The band struck up again. A passing couple nodded, smiling, and the man courteously lifted his hat.
Jessica slipped her hand more firmly into the crook of Robert’s elbow. She turned her head to look at him. The neat dark hair curled a very little into the nape of his slender neck. The line of his jaw was sharp and fragile. She could see a small pulse beating softly beneath the skin.
David was talking. ‘—and so I said to the fellow – “Good God, man, what do you take me for? A Lord of the Realm? Two guineas, you say—?”’
‘And he got it for one.’ Annabel cut in pertly, obviously heading off a lengthy story she had heard often before. ‘Wasn’t that clever of him?’ She lifted a hand and tweaked his nose. He growled and pretended to bite her finger.
Robert laughed softly. The flat, handsome planes of his face were lit and shaded by the coloured lanterns that were strung in the trees. Suddenly a flood of tenderness lifted in Jessica, so unexpected and so intense that it brought an absurd sting of tears to her eyes, an awkward lump to her throat. She wanted to lay her head upon his shoulder, to trace the delicate lines of his face with tender fingers, as she had seen Annabel do with David.
‘Well—’ David had stopped, swinging Annabel close to him and dropping a light kiss upon her cheek, ‘anyone for a nightcap?’
Robert glanced at the bemusedly silent Jessica and shook his head. ‘I think not tonight. Jessica is tired, I believe. An early night will do her no harm.’
Annabel pulled a droll face and chuckled a little.
‘It’s the weather,’ Jessica said. ‘I have a headache.’
‘Of course. Off you go, children.’ Annabel beamed, making no pretence at belief. ‘We’ll see you tomorrow. Darling David – are you going to treat me to just one of those wonderful chocolate cakies—?’
‘You’ll get fat, you little pig,’ he said.
‘All the more to cuddle!’
They walked off, squabbling fondly, and crossed the square that was still busy with people. With Robert’s hand on her elbow Jessica climbed the steps to the guesthouse and then the single flight of wide stairs to their room, which was large and comfortably furnished and looked out onto the square. The atmosphere was very close. Robert opened the curtains and threw open the double doors onto the balcony. Music and a babble of talk and laughter rose. The ceiling was gay with coloured light. ‘Is that too noisy for you?’ He was solicitous, as always.
She shook her head. ‘No.’
‘Would you like me to get you something? A glass of water, perhaps?’
‘That would be nice. Thank you.’
He left the room. She walked restlessly to the window and stood looking down into the square. She could see Annabel and David sitting at a table in the shadow of a tree, their chairs drawn close together. As she watched Annabel broke off a small piece of the cake she was eating and lifted it to her husband’s mouth. He took the cake with his lips, nibbled her fingers, kissed the palm of her hand.
Jessica turned away.
She took off her hat and gloves and tossed them on to a chair. Kicked off her slippers, not caring where they landed.
The door opened and Robert came in carrying a glass which he put on the table by the bed. She watched him in silence, watched the neat, graceful movements, the turn of the small, handsome head.
‘Would you help me with my buttons?’ She turned her back to him, looking over her shoulder.
‘I’ll ring for the maid.’
‘Oh, no – please don’t. It’s so embarrassing to be waited upon by someone who doesn’t understand a word you say. Please – won’t you do it ?’ Despite her best efforts her voice was forlornly cajoling, the voice of a child begging a favour from an adult.
‘Of course.’ He was as always unfailingly courteous. She felt his fingers, light and competent and totally impersonal upon the small buttons that fastened the back of her dress. ‘There.’
‘Thank you.’
Light from the swinging lanterns danced upon the wall.
‘Shall I close the shutters?’
‘Oh, no! It’s so very hot – so very close—’ She turned. He had not moved. She stood not a foot from him, her head tilted to look into his face. ‘Robert—?’ she whispered, her voice almost lost in the music and laughter of the world outside.
Infinitesimally the sharp lines of his face tautened further. He did not move.
‘—please – couldn’t we – couldn’t we try?’ She could not believe what she was saying, nor the sudden fierce note of pleading in her voice. With no thought she let the dress slip from her shoulders to the floor and stood before him in her petticoat, flimsy for the heat, the fine material, damp with perspiration, clinging to her breasts and hips. ‘Couldn’t we – shouldn’t we – just try?’
He stepped back from her, putting out a hand as if to ward her off. She caught it in both of hers, carrying it fiercely to her lips. ‘Robert – please! I’m your wife—!’ She fought the rise of tears.
He had frozen where he stood, his hand taut and still in hers. Very slowly she drew it to her breast. He did not move. The involuntary brush of his curled fingers against her nipple made her tremble. The teat hardened, standing against the damp cloth of her petticoat. She moved instinctively, arching her back, rubbing the small, sharp, sensitive point of her breast against his hand. Pulsing warmth flooded her belly and the secret places of her body moistened. She made a small sound.
‘Christ!’ The agonized violence of the word pierced her consciousness like a needle. He snatched his hand from hers.
‘Robert—!’ Hands outstretched, she stepped towards him.
‘No!’ He pushed her, violently, the action almost a blow, one arm crooked before his face as if to ward off the very sight of her. ‘No!’ His face was convulsed. ‘She did that! She made me do that! God in heaven – I should have known it! You’re no better than she was! None of you are! She made me touch her—!’
As she staggered from him she stumbled upon the hem of her petticoat, dragging it from her shoulders, baring her breasts. She recovered her footing and swung to face him. The revulsion in his face, lit by the demonic lantern light, stopped her like a flung stone. Yet she stood, and in pride would make no move to cover her nakedness. ‘What are you talking about?’ she asked.
His face was rigid with disgust. He lifted a finger, pointing. ‘Slut,’ he said. ‘She was a slut, and you are too. I thought you were different, but you aren’t. You’re the same as all of them. A slut—!’ His voice was trembling uncontrollably.
‘Who? Robert – who are you talking about?’ She was desperately confused.
‘Who?’ His eyes gleamed in the light, his voice was suddenly soft. ‘Why the girl – the woman – who made me suck her dugs before she would give me my supper. An eight-year-old boy. The woman who would make me take down my breeches for the birch and then—’ he could not go on. His face had turned sickly pale.
She crossed her arms over her bared breasts, staring at him. ‘A – a nursemaid? Did that?’
‘And more. Do you want to hear more?’ He was beside himself with rage and revulsion. She could see his trembling from where she stood. ‘She’d make me put my fingers in her. Wet, and hot! Disgusting. Disgusting!’ He retched. She took a step towards him. He backed away from her, his eyes wild.
‘Robert, stop it,’ she said, the calmness of desperation in her voice. ‘This is nothing like that. I’m not her. I’m Jessica. Your wife.’
He had calmed a little, but his voice still shook. ‘You’re all the same. All of you.’
She made her voice gentle. ‘You don’t mean that.’ Very slowly she reached a hand towards him. He jerked back.
‘Get away from me. Get away!’ He knocked her hand aside, violently.
The violence frightened her, but she hid it, trying to keepin her voice. ‘We should try, Robert – we should! For both our sakes.’
‘No.’
‘Please!’ She was surprised to discover that tears were sliding unchecked down her cheeks.
‘No!’ He tried to brush past her, making for the refuge of the dressing room. Without thought she caught at his arm. With a sudden savage movement he tore himself free of her, and as he did so, whether by ill luck or design she could not tell, his hand caught her sharply on the side of her jaw, knocking her head back painfully and sending her spinning from him to land on hands and knees by the bed. He cried out, in anger and despair. She heard his swiftly-moving footsteps and the slam of the dressing room door. Heard the turning of the key in the lock.
She lifted her head. ‘Robert? Robert!’
Silence.
She staggered to her feet and ran to the door. ‘Robert!’
‘Go away,’ he said. ‘Please, just get away from me.’
‘Robert—!’
He did not speak again. Half an hour later, exhausted, she gave up her tearful pleading, left the door and stumbled to the bed. Outside the music played, cruelly gay. There was no sound from the dressing room. She crawled into the bed like an injured animal crawling into its lair, and there she lay, the silent tears shining on her face whilst beyond the open windows the world danced and laughed and took its pleasure.
In the distance the thunder rumbled, but the storm stubbornly refused to break.
The custom-house by the city gate was an officious and fly-specked shambles, a vexation after the lovely drive down through the terraced vineyards of the mountains with the tantalizing vision of the spires and roofs of Florence growing closer at every turn. A swarm of slovenly-uniformed police, soldiers and officials presided over the chaos, that seemed rather more designed to prevent the flow of traffic into the city than to facilitate it.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ David’s fair face was flushed with exasperation and the heat of the afternoon, ‘We’ll be here till next week at this rate!’
Robert put his hand into his pocket and Jessica saw the gleam of silver. ‘Wait here a moment.’
A scant half-hour later a hired carriage, lighter and blessedly cooler than the heavy coach in which they had travelled from Bologna, was bowling down the Via St Gallo towards the centre of the city. The road was wide, straight and smoothly paved with the huge flat stones which graced almost all of the main streets of Florence and which made travelling in the city less of a penance than the cobblestones most city-dwellers were used to. Impressive buildings lined the way, façades by Michelangelo and Raphael jostling shoulder to shoulder with the more ancient frontages of the early medieval city. So much had Jessica read of this place, so often had she studied its layout, with its Roman grid of straight streets, its piazzas, its palaces, its numerous churches, that she felt an odd but reassuring sense of recognition, as if, far from being a stranger in a strange city, she were returning to a familiar and much-loved place.
‘Look – oh, look! The cathedral! Isn’t it splendid? – And the baptistry! Oh, Annabel, do look—!’ Jessica breathed. The mass of buildings gleamed in the light, the brilliance of their colourful marble façades blinding in the sunlight. The slender campanile towered to a flawless blue sky. Enthralled, Jessica twisted in her seat, leaning through the window as they passed through the great square. ‘Just look at the gates of the baptistry! Even from here you can see how wonderful they are—!’ She drew her head in and turned back to Annabel. ‘They’re by Ghiberti – I knew someone once who said they were one of the wonders of the artistic world—’
Annabel smiled wanly. She was hot, she was extremely tired, and she had seen enough cathedrals, baptistries and campaniles over the past weeks to last her a long lifetime.
They were in the narrow via Calzaioli now in the old, crowded part of the city and moving towards the river. The Romseys’ hotel was on the far side of the river, by the Pitti Palace, whilst the apartment that the young FitzBoltons had rented was in the via Condotta, not far from the ancient piazza del Gran Duca, where stood possibly the most famous and most certainly the most pictured place of Florence, the Palazzo Vecchio. Most of the FitzBoltons’ luggage had been sent on and hopefully awaited them at the apartment. The trunk that had travelled with them through Europe had been left at the custom-house for later collection, for both had decided, to their travelling-companions’ amazement, that their first approach to their new home should be afoot. They consequently took their leave of Annabel and David at the city end of the Ponte Vecchio, promising to meet at the Romseys’ hotel for dinner a couple of evenings later. Jessica stepped from the carriage into the dusty heat of the afternoon, raised her parasol against the sun’s glare. The greenish-brown river moved sluggishly beneath the ancient bridge, slapping softly against the stone pillars that supported the structure and its huddled fringe of picturesquely dilapidated houses. A dog chased in the shallows, where a woman with tired, rhythmic movements slapped the garments she was washing against a stone, and in the centre of the wide river, summer-low, a boy waded, the water no higher than his thighs. The midden-smell of it assaulted Jessica’s nostrils. In an alleyway running down to the river washing hung like dispirited flags, unstirring in the hot air. She hardly noticed as the carriage drew away, with Annabel waving bravely and very slightly tearfully from the window.
Frowning a little Robert studied the map he carried, then pointed. ‘There, I think. It isn’t very far.’
She nodded. Since Vienna conversation between them had not been easy. She could not look at him without remembering with a flush of almost unendurable humiliation the bitter shame of that night. It had never been mentioned between them, but they had been like strangers since, polite travelling companions who shared nothing but the accident of travel. It was a relief, she discovered now, to be free of the company of the Romseys, for at least that meant that they were free too from the need for pretence. She laid her fingers lightly upon the arm he courteously proffered, barely touching him, and from habit neither spoke as they walked into the shaded canyon of the via por Santa Maria, for neither had a thought to share with the other.
Until they walked, unsuspecting, from the short, darkly-shadowed street into the wide and sunlit space of the piazza del Gran Duca.
As one they stopped, staring. On the far side of the L-shaped square the bulk of the great, fortress-like Palazzio Vecchio, square-built and imposing, dominated the place, its incongruously slender, crenellated tower, strangely elegant, reaching like a pointed finger into the blaze of the sunlit sky. Two colossal sculptures stood before the palace and more glorious statuary adorned the great ornamented Loggia which stood at right angles to the ancient palace. A huge white fountain, one of the few in this city where public fountains were oddly rare, played in the square. But even at this distance one object drew the eye and stopped the breath. Michelangelo’s David, one of the master’s greatest works, stood gleaming in the sun before the palace – huge, the stone smooth as a boy’s skin, unbelievably and beautifully lifelike.
With no word they both moved towards it, drawn as if by a magnet, Jessica folding her parasol as she went. At the statue’s foot they stopped, looking up in awe at the smoothly sculptured muscle and bone, the gallantly lovely face. Enormous as it was it would have been no surprise had the figure moved and breathed, lowered the sling it carried, stretched, smiling, in the sunshine. Danny had spoken of it in such terms to Jessica. And she, in innocence, had believed he exaggerated.
‘It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,’ she said.
Robert nodded, blinking.
‘How – how can it be so huge, and yet so lifelike? So utterly perfect?’ Faced with this shared wonder, all constraint between them had fallen away. She spoke not to the man who had refused and shamed her but to the boy, the friend of a lifetime with whom she had shared so much.
‘Genius is beyond the bounds of the normal,’ Robert said. ‘That’s what genius is. Like Mozart. Or Haydn. Genius is – has to be – larger than life.’
An odd catch in his voice made her glance at him. The sharp glitter of tears in his eyes made her turn hastily from him. They stood for a very long time, looking at the statue, studying in thoughtful silence every last lovely detail of the figure. Through her fingers Jessica could feel the strung tension of Robert’s body. The slender arm she touched was taut as steel beneath the elegance of his lightweight coat.
‘Jessica,’ he said at last, his eyes still upon the statue, ‘we have to talk.’
Panic rose. She shook her head.
‘I hurt you.’ He spoke with difficulty. ‘I’m sorry. I wouldn’t do that for the world.’
‘I know.’
‘It was unforgivable.’
She said nothing.
It was – you took me by surprise—’
‘It doesn’t matter.’ Her voice was high, threaded faintly with nerves. ‘Don’t talk about it.’
‘We have to. We can’t go on like this.’
She remained silent for a moment. Then, ‘How else?’ she asked, her voice bleak.
Still he did not look at her. His pleasant voice was controlled now, quiet and firm. He might have been discussing still the genius that had produced the masterpiece that stood before them, beautiful, perfectly formed, and as far removed from the paltry emotions and troubles of man as it was possible to be.
‘I’m sorry – but I have to say it – you knew, before we married, how I felt about—’ he paused, cleared his throat, ‘—about physical love.’
‘Yes.’
‘But you didn’t understand. And that was my fault.’
She shrugged, wearily. Despite the sun she felt suddenly chilled. ‘Robert – please – I truly can’t see there’s anything to be gained by talking about it—’
‘There’s everything to be gained.’ He swung to face her, took her by the shoulders, forcing her to look at him.
She lifted her head, looked him in the eyes, asked the question that had haunted her since that night. ‘What you said – about the woman – the nursemaid – it was really true?’
She felt the tremor that ran through his body in the hands that held her. ‘Yes.’
‘I’m sorry. It must have been horrible for you. Couldn’t you – couldn’t you stop her? Couldn’t you tell anyone?’
He laughed, a dry, unpleasant sound. ‘Do you remember being eight?’
She did, all too well. She nodded.
‘Then you’ll remember how easily intimidated you are by an adult. How easily threatened.’
‘Yes.’
‘And—’ he smiled, the familiar, rueful smile, ‘I wasn’t a very brave little boy. I was never like you.’
‘I’m not brave.’
‘Oh, yes. You are. You always were. It is what I have always admired most in you. Oh, Jessica, can’t you see? You were always blind. You looked up to me because I was older. But – you were the brave one, always.’
She shook her head. The sun, lowering to the west, gleamed through a tracery of stone and glittered in her eyes.
‘I don’t feel very brave now,’ she said, and turned from him.
In the silence that followed a clock struck, closely followed by another. Somewhere, distantly, a bell tolled.
‘Jessica,’ Robert said. ‘Listen to me. You are my wife. For better or for worse, you are my wife. You agreed to that. I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I am as I am. I’m sorry for what happened. I’m sorry I was weak enough – cowardly enough – to accept the sacrifice you offered when I knew that you didn’t know what would be involved for you. I despise myself.’ It was said evenly, almost unemotionally.
She turned her head, watching him, the wide brim of her hat shading her small face.
‘It’s done,’ he said. ‘But—’ he hesitated, painfully ‘—it can be undone.’
She frowned in question.
His face was like stone in the sunlight, with less of life about it than the blank-eyed David who stood above them. ‘You could have the marriage annulled,’ he said, quietly. ‘No court would deny you.’
She stared at him. ‘You’d – do that?’
He nodded.
‘But – Robert – what would that mean for you? What – what would people think? They’d – they’d be sure to say the most awful things. It would kill you!’
In the silence a pigeon strutted at their feet, pecking crumbs. A gaily-dressed girl, dark hair glossy, olive skin smooth as silk swung past, a basket of flowers on her arm.
Jessica shook her head. Her eyes were bewildered. ‘No!’ she said.
‘Think before you say that. I might not always be so – courageous.’ His mouth twisted bitterly upon the word.
She turned from him, staring at the feet of the statue. ‘No. I couldn’t. I couldn’t!’ Her vehemence surprised herself. She pressed a hand to her forehead.
There was a very small silence. ‘Why not?’ Robert asked, very softly.
‘I – don’t know.’ But she did. Somewhere within her the lump of ice that had been her heart since that night in Vienna was melting. The pain she had locked within that ice flooded her. She almost cried out with the force of it. She knew that to do as he offered would be to hold him up to public ridicule, and possibly worse. The Oxford scandal would be dredged up, and that could destroy him. And that was something she could not – would not – be a part of. He was, after all, still Robert. Still, despite all, her lifelong friend. And for that, still, she could not help but love him.
‘Why not?’ he asked again, gently persistent.
‘Because—’ she struggled, and stopped.
Very gently he turned her again to face him. ‘Because you’re my dear little Jessica,’ he said. ‘My good friend. Sister of my soul.’ He lifted a finger and touched her lips, the tenderest of gestures. She blinked rapidly against the scald of tears. Tiredly she leaned to him and softly he held her.
‘What can we do?’ The words and the tone of her voice were that of a bewildered child.
For a long time he did not answer but stood, his arm about her, his head thrown back as he looked at the sculptured glorious boyhood of innocent David.
‘I don’t know,’ he said, honestly. ‘But – Jessica, life isn’t a child’s puzzle, with one easy answer, that someone else will give you if you can’t find it yourself.’ He turned, smiling a little, and took her hand, drawing it companionably into the crook of his arm – a gesture that a few short hours before she would never have believed possible. ‘Don’t let’s say any more for the moment. For now—’ he smiled down at her, ‘well, at least we’ve broken that beastly silence and are friends again. That will do for now, won’t it?’
Bemusedly she nodded.
He indicated a small street that ran into the square not far from where they stood. ‘Our new home,’ he said, smiling, ‘is somewhere over there if I’m not much mistaken. Shall we go and find it?’
Numero 3D, via Condotta, was a surprise, and a delightful one. Though now much-neglected it had once been the reception rooms of a small palace. Marble-floored, ornately-ceilinged, the rooms, though smaller, were as splendidly proportioned as any in New Hall. As the swarthy, ill-tempered-looking caretaker threw open the vast double-doors that led from a landing at the top of a wide, dark sweep of staircase that must once have seen the grandeur of palatial comings and goings Jessica gaped like a child.
‘Good Lord!’ Robert said.
Tall shuttered windows led to a balcony that overlooked the narrow street. Ornate, fly-specked mirrors reflected, floor to ceiling, the slatted golden shafts of the setting sun. The furniture was ramshackle and barely filled the place, and the sorry curtains hung in ragged holes. In the centre of the gracious but empty reception hall their trunks stood stacked, a small lonely island in a sea of smooth marble.
Robert turned to the man. ‘Thank you, Signor. This will do very well.’
The man grunted but made no move to go.
Jessica cocked an eye at Robert, who reached into his pocket. The gnarled fist closed over a small coin – a paoli – and without thanks the man turned and left.
Jessica, all tiredness forgotten, danced a few steps. ‘Robert – this is magnificent! And at such a rent! We can buy furniture, and curtains, and it will be truly beautiful! And Mama thinks we’re starving in a garret!’
Robert strode to the tall windows and flung them back with a clatter. Slanting golden sunlight streamed into the room. The walls were painted with idyllic hunting scenes, the hunting party in the gay clothes of 300 years before, a palace in the distance, pennants streaming gallantly from its towers. Amongst stylized trees and flowers the stag reared, unafraid, frozen in lordly defiance of the puny hounds that snapped at his heels. The cobweb-hung ceiling was ornately gilded. Jessica clapped her hands. ‘A palace! Our very own palace!’ She turned to him, laughing, and stopped, struck to stillness by the expression on his face.
He reached for her hand, smiling. ‘That’s the first real laughter I’ve heard since Vienna,’ he said.
She flushed. ‘Don’t. Don’t talk about it. We’re here. A new start. We don’t have to talk about it.’ He held her hand a moment longer, studying her face, his eyes serious, then stepped back, letting go her hand.
Jessica ran to the window and looked down into the street. Carts rolled by on the smooth, flat paving. A horseman, bravely dressed in red and blue glanced up, caught her eye and bowed gallantly from the saddle. In her excitement she smiled shyly back, and was rewarded by the gleaming flash of white teeth. Children shrieked along the road, playing some game of battle, the unknown liquid tongue of Tuscany echoing in her, rattling from the high walls and closed shutters of the narrow street. A spired church stood at the corner, ornate and graceful. Florence. She was in Florence at last.
Robert joined her and stood leaning, his narrow hands upon the wrought iron rail of the balcony, looking down. ‘Florence,’ he said. ‘At last.’ And was surprised and pleased at the soft sound of her laughter.