The Emperor (31 page)

They helped each other undress. There was no embarrassment between them; it was almost as if they were comrades-in-arms, and had done this before, in a thousand camps and bivouacs. When she was naked but for her hair,
her slender white body small as a child's, she shivered a little
and he stepped close and felt their flesh start into warmth at each other's touch. He kissed the warm place behind her ear where the true scent of her was, and ran his hands down her
back and caught her by the hollow of her waist.

‘James,' she whispered hesitantly, 'I – I don't –’

‘What is it, my darling? Don't be afraid.'

‘I am not afraid, not with you,' she said truthfully. 'But I do not know very much. My husband – I am not very experienced, you see.’

He kissed her lips to silence, and turned towards the bed.
‘Nor am I, Marmoset, not in love. We'll find our way
together.’

*

He spoke truer than he knew. These were new lands, dark,
mysterious, uncharted, wonderful. Time seemed suspended;
the night held its breath. Tenderly he touched and kissed
her, led her step by step through a country unknown to him; until, dazzled with sensation, he was as helpless as she, and
they clung together, lost, drowning. He cried out with his
unendurable love, and she answered him in a dark and
animal tongue; the stars turned slowly and they went spin
ning together resistlessly outward through the void to some
airless, timeless place where there was no thought or
sensation, only a perfect knowledge, a completed, unbreakable circle.

Later, much later, he lay with his head on her breast, her
arms folded about him, and she kissed his brow in wordless
content.

‘I did not understand before,' she said softly into the darkness. 'I did not know. How can this be wrong?'

‘It can't be,' he said. 'I love you Marmoset. I will never, never leave you again.’

He felt her arms tighten in reply, heard the smile in her
voice as she said drowsily, 'Hove you, too,
mon âme.
I am
so happy.’

Her breast rose and fell beneath his cheek with her
peaceful breathing. I am happy too, he said, but he had
already drifted too far into sleep to say the words aloud.

Book 2

Swan Displayed

She walks in beauty, like the night,

Of cloudless climes and starry skies;

And all that's best of dark and bright

Meet in her aspect and her eyes:

Thus mellow'd to that tender light

Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

Lord Byron:
She Walks in Beauty

 
They woke before dawn, that first waking together of lovers
which no apprehension can diminish, and nothing ever afterwards can equal. They woke, and looked at each other, and smiled, remembering every moment of shared bliss, knowing it was all to come again. She crept closer into his arms, and placed her lips against his, and they lay breathing in each other's scent, drifting and drowsing while the day broadened and strengthened outside, filling in its faintly-sketched outlines with stronger sounds and colours.

They heard the servants get up.

‘They won't disturb us,' James whispered. He kissed her lips and the tip of her nose, and ran his hands luxuriously
over her body. To be with her, unfettered, undisturbed,
licensed to touch, kiss, speak as he pleased, was wealth beyond counting. Shyly she touched him, tried the effect of
stroking his smooth shoulder, ran her fingertips along the
line of his jaw.

‘
You are very beautiful,' she murmured. 'I was never able
to tell you that before, my James, but you are beautiful like — like a star!’

He laughed exultantly, rolling over onto his elbows to
hang above her, looking down into her dark and serious,
glad and laughing, beautiful sad-monkey Stuart face. 'And you, my Marmoset, you are — '

‘
Not beautiful,' she interposed anxiously. 'You cannot
say that.'

‘Better than that — you are unparallelled, inimitable,
unique!' He punctuated the sentence with kisses, and the
last extended itself luxuriously until he was thoroughly
roused and wanting her again. 'Shall l?' he stopped kissing her long enough to ask.

‘
Oh yes,' she said, with a
childlike emphasis which made
him laugh 'I want
everything!’

Afterwards, when they were curled contentedly in each
others' arms again, he said, 'I remember once before you
promised me that when we were married, we should have
everything.
I had no idea, then, how much it would be.'

‘
It seems to me a very agreeable arrangement of God's,' she said, at her most French, 'that when one loves another,
there should be so much one can do about it.' She remem
bered with momentary wonder her married life: how could
something which had seemed to her then so dreadful have
become a source of such joy?

‘
You think it is from God, then?' he asked, and was
immediately sorry, fearing it would break her mood. But she
only said, 'Oh yes, surely it must be?’

Some time later there was a scratching at the door, and
Durban came in with a tray. James, appreciating the tact
with which he had elected to make the first approach
himself, rather than risk Marie's sensibilities, sat up in bed
and grinned at his old friend. Durban was impassive,
managing to place the tray on his master's knees without by
so much as a glance betraying awareness of the presence of Héloïse, who, in confusion and nakedness, had retreated so
far under the sheets that only the tangled crown of her head
was visible.

‘
What's this? Tea?' James cried. 'Durban, my friend, you
are a genius, and deserve to be knighted. I'm thirsty as the
d - as a man can be, I should say. And hungry, too!'

‘
There will be breakfast, sir, whenever you care to
descend. Stephen has been up to the farm, and the young
woman has made bread.'

‘
Nothing else would tempt me out of bed, I must say,'
James grinned, 'but the thought of new bread and - '
Another thought crossed his mind, and he frowned. 'I
haven't so much as a clean shirt, to say nothing of a razor.'
He ran his hand over his bristly jaw, and then cast a curious
look at his servant. 'I notice that you are looking damnably
smooth about the chin, Durban. How do you manage it?’

Durban gave a faint smile. 'Stephen's razor, sir. I have
cleaned it and resharpened it for your use. I'm afraid there's
nothing I can do just yet about a shirt, but I will bring up hot
water in five minutes, if that will suit you, sir?’

When the door had closed noiselessly behind his servant,
James pulled the sheet back from Héloïse's face, and found
that she had curled up tightly and closed her eyes as an extra
precaution. 'Tea, my darling?' he inquired genially. 'You
can come out now - it's quite safe.’

She opened a cautious eye, and then sat up, rather red in
the face, to take the cup he had poured for her. 'Did he say
anything?' she asked, sipping.

James was amused. 'He was discretion itself, my mouse-
like creature, but you must know that he knows all about us.
You will have to get used to that.'

‘
I know, I am very silly,' she said apologetically. 'It was
just that I was not expecting it. I shall be all right now, very
correct.'

‘
Hot water in five minutes,' James informed her cheer
fully, 'and breakfast as soon as we go downstairs. What
would you like to do today, my dearest? Should you like to
go driving in your phaeton?'

‘
Will you not have to go back?' she asked in a small
voice.

‘Back?'

‘
To Morland Place. To explain. They will not even know
where you are.'

‘
They'll know where I went yesterday. And I don't think,
since I did not return last night, that there will be any need
of explanation,' James said with grim humour.

‘To collect some clean clothes, then,' she said, even more hesitantly. He met her eyes.

‘
I don't want to go back there, ever. I don't want to leave
you for an instant; and also, I'm afraid.'

‘Afraid that if you go there, they will make you stay?'

‘
Exactly so. I shall not take the risk: Durban shall go on
horseback, bring back a valise with some essentials, and
have everything else packed and sent by carrier. Everything, you see - I shall not be going back.' She was not yet smiling.
‘What is it, my heart?'

‘
Must Durban explain for us? Is it not cowardly to make
him face the trouble for us?'

‘
Not cowardly, just wise. He will not mind it, I promise
you. There can be no blame attached to him, and he will
simply give them his blankest face, and their words will fall off him like water rolling off a duck's feathers. I shall write
him a letter to take to my mother, to explain and apologize,'
he added at last, and she nodded, and gave a tremulous
smile.

‘
Oh, James,' she said, and he leaned across to kiss her.
‘Don't worry, everything will be all right.'

‘They will be angry.'

‘
For a while, but they'll get over it. I have not been of
very much use to any of my family over the past few years, and they will be glad, in the end, that I have gone.’

*

By the time they went downstairs, James had such an
appetite as he did not remember since his childhood.
Durban and Marie – the latter looking by far more apprehensive than disapproving – laid the table with new bread, jam and honey, and the good things Charlock's farm had provided, fresh butter, eggs, bacon, pork chops, kidneys, smoked trout, and fat burnished sausages; and James and
Héloïse ate with as healthy appetites as if they had been out
in the fresh air since dawn.

‘It just shews you,' James said, spreading butter lavishly on a warm crust, 'what hard work love is!’

At length Durban came in with the refilled coffee-pot,
and said, 'If I could persuade you to write the letter, sir, I could be off. The day is already somewhat advanced – '

‘
Yes, damnit, very well. I'll do it now. My love, have you
any letter-paper, and a pen?'

‘In my desk,' Héloïse said, looking grave, and getting to her feet, but James laid his hand on hers and said, 'There's no occasion for you to stir. I shall be back in a moment.’

He called Durban with a glance, and they went together into Héloïse's study. There Durban stood impassively by James's side as he wrote the letter to his mother, hurriedly, before he lost his nerve. He sanded and folded it, sealed it
with a wafer, and handed it to Durban saying, 'There. I
don't know that it is particularly coherent, but it is the best I
can manage.'

‘Yes, sir.’

James gave him a curious look. ‘Do you think I'm mad,
 
Durban? Or a villain?'

‘It isn't for me to say, sir.'

‘Come, my friend – for if you aren't my friend, I haven't one – give me your true opinion, just once. Am I mad?'

‘
I don't think there was anything else you could have
done, sir,' Durban said at length, and, meeting his eyes,
James realized that the answer was not unequivocal, was all
he deserved, in fact.