Tested by Fate (7 page)

Besides memory and inner fears, there was the futile attempt to avoid discomfort on the coach, which bucked and rattled across roads too rough for its springs. Stops were frequent, the cacophony of languages barely comprehensible even to Gifford, who spoke them. This left Emma and her mother adrift and helpless when he was absent, seemingly intent on searching every church, monastic building, or nearby chateau for a work of art. The simplest request without him, the water to wash, a pan to warm a bed, drink, food, gave cause for an elaborate mime. Emma, never having feared the need to perform, overcame this, and by the time they reached the Italian border she excelled in her ability to garner proper attention without a word being exchanged.

The smells were not all foreign: the odour of an open sewer, a French barnyard or cow stall was the same as it was in England,
likewise
rain on grass, though the further south they travelled the more that turned to the unfamiliar smell of baked earth. Mary Cadogan, not deeply religious, maintained that the locals, all the way from Picardy to Calabria, gave off the stench of Papist heathens. Every inn they stopped at on the well-travelled route saw a battle over price and what was provided for coin expended, clean linen, always at a premium—especially in the Italian inns—and some way of
dealing
with the fleas that infested the horsehair mattresses.

Emma found the sights astounding: Paris, with its teeming
narrow
streets and rookeries cheek by jowl with the great aristocratic hotels; the vast expanse of Versailles, teeming with those dependent
on the King’s favour; great cathedrals in towns that seemed too small for their towering campaniles. The vineyards of Burgundy, stretching away on red-soiled hillsides, became real villages with real people instead of half-remembered names from some dusty bottle on Greville’s table. In this part of the world towns, even a city like Lyon, were built on the tops of hills, what buildings stood now, Gifford explained, resting on what had once been the great hill forts of a Celtic France subdued by Julius Caesar. They rose to the Alpine pass at Mont Cenis in tolerable heat, alongside a rushing torrent of icy water that could be gathered to cool the brow and spent nights in inns where the air was crisp and clear. There was ample snow still left at the peak of the route, which had the whole coach party engaged in a snowball fight.

Little pleasure was afforded in the steep drop down to the Lombardy plain, a cauldron even in the late spring that left the party near ill with heat exhaustion. Turin heralded a two-day delay while Gifford, with Emma on his arm, scoured the ducal palaces, likewise in Genoa, Lucca, Parma, and the Medici fortresses in Florence, she turning heads with the radiance of her beauty and her smile.

Gifford left them in Rome, and Emma and her mother, now seasoned travellers, continued south on their own, staying in inns on the Via Latina where the level of filth increased as the latitude fell. A full month of travel in a coach gives such an existence an air of permanence: it comes to seem like a natural state instead of an uncommon one. Beside that was the notion that it was here in Naples that Emma risked the kind of gaffe that, reported to Greville, might alter their relationship. Was Sir William Hamilton her friend, as he had appeared in London, or an uncle so conscious of his nephew’s wishes that he would act for him, not her? As a consequence of these thoughts Emma had mixed feelings when the end of the journey arrived.

Sir William was there with his servants to greet them as the coach, having struggled up the steep hill, turned into the open gates of the
Palazzo Sessa, his handsome face and kind smile helping to wash away some of the recent, less pleasant memories. The sunlight, till then a glare to be avoided, mellowed to a welcome choice between heat and shadow.

“My dear Emma,” he said, in his familiar baritone, as he bent to kiss her hand, “welcome to my meagre lodgings.”

Mary Cadogan was forced to mind her manners when he turned to greet her, realising that the look on her face was less than friendly—a fact attested to by the alteration in Sir William’s own expression. After near six weeks of speculation she found herself looking at their host as if the answer to all her disquiet lay in his face. A curtsy took that out of view, and it was a countenance of due deference that appeared as he raised her up. “Mrs Cadogan, how good of you to accompany your daughter. I know only too well the discomforts of the journey. Allow me to commend you for being so intrepid as to undertake it.”

Greeted with such easy familiarity Emma felt herself relax. How could good, kind Sir William ever be a threat to her position with Greville? He took her hand and escorted her up the broad staircase to his first-floor apartments, a spacious residence full of light and shade, littered with vases, ampoules, and archaic statues set off by motes of dust hanging in the sunbeams. The floors shone with the beeswax, and the view from the windows, across the Bay of Naples to the distant offshore islands, took Emma’s breath away.

“This,” Sir William said, “will be your private drawing room. There is a comfortable apartment for you, Mrs Cadogan, which adjoins the music room. The bedchamber I have made ready for Emma is across from that, likewise overlooking the bay.”

If he knew how closely Mary Cadogan was examining him, he gave no sign, and it was a moot point as to whether the thoughts she harboured would have pleased or disturbed him. Now there was a solicitous air about the Chevalier quite at odds with his previous persona. He seemed too much the supplicant. Perhaps it was the charge of being host instead of guest, or even Emma’s mood. She
had mentioned Greville when they came through the gates and her mother wondered, for all her daughter’s smiles and gracious
acceptance
, if that thought was still with her.

“You will find much to occupy you, my dear,” Sir William continued, addressing Emma. “I have engaged both a music and a singing teacher to continue the lessons you had in London. Since you are to be here for some time I have also taken the liberty of asking a few of my friends to converse with you in the language. That, I find, is the best way to learn.”

“I must write to Charles, to tell him of our arrival,” said Emma, brightly.

Sir William seemed rather crestfallen as he pointed to a set of double doors and said, “The materials you require are on the escritoire in the music room.”

“Thank you.”

Emma headed for the doors, which were opened and closed behind her by one of the servants. Only then did Sir William give Mary Cadogan any real attention. And when he spoke to her, the tenderness he had shown Emma slipped somewhat, to be replaced by a hurt tone. “A letter to Charles could surely wait awhile.”

“Not for a second, Sir William. Scarce an hour has passed since we departed London that he was not mentioned.”

He waved a hand towards the large windows, and the Bay of Naples beyond, gleaming in the sunlight. “This generally gives people pause. Their arrival in Naples and first sight of the view is held to be an occasion to remember.”

“There’s little doubt she would rather spend any occasion with your nephew than here, pretty aspects notwithstanding.”

The expression on the Chevalier’s face was a mixture of perplexity and disappointment. Quite clearly he had built up to the moment of arrival, only to find his hopes dashed by Emma’s behaviour. But that only lasted a second or two, his cheery air returning, although it was probably a mask. His hands waved elegantly once more towards the blue bay. “She will come to love those pretty aspects, Mrs Cadogan, as much as I do, I am sure of it.”

The temptation to issue a challenge, a demand to be let into whatever was going on, was as strong as it had been when she had talked to Greville. But Mary Cadogan resisted it. Happen it would emerge naturally. If not, she would ask in time, once Emma had settled in and she had her own feet well under the table. She had noticed that the Chevalier’s servants spoke good English. Quizzing them might produce something. Servants always knew what was going on.

Sir William Hamilton was an easy man to admire. He knew that Emma thrived in company, and made every effort to ensure that she was never without it. Into the apartments came an endless stream of visitors to add to the teachers. Count This and Baron That, visitors from home as well as half the countries of Europe, courtiers,
doctors
, writers, scientific thinkers, and artists, who begged to be allowed to paint her. All, whatever their speciality, paid court to her, which was hardly surprising since her radiant beauty was enhanced by the sunlight and warmth of the city, yet never did anyone go beyond the bounds of proper behaviour, for which Emma was grateful.

Then there was the Chevalier himself, dancing on her as much attendance as his duties would allow. The residence of the King was close to the Palazzo Sessa; a short walk away the Palazzo Reale hugged the shoreline. The journey there and back was one he made several times a day, so ensuring that his beautiful guest was rarely, if ever, alone.

Being an ambassador required frequent attendance on the King, even more upon his wife, Queen Maria Carolina. She was the daughter of the formidable Maria Theresa of Austria, sister to the French Queen Marie Antoinette. Ferdinand, her husband, was a simple oaf, though in truth his lack of dignity was not entirely his fault. When his eldest brother had gone mad it was decided that education of any sort might have a deleterious effect on the unformed mind of this future sovereign. So, instead of being taught those things necessary to run a kingdom, martial skills, financial acumen, shrewd evaluation of advice given, and a degree of manners, he had been
left to his own devices and passions. The centre of these was hunting, both wild animals and ladies of the court, closely followed by an appetite that bordered on gluttony.

Tall and imposing, with a direct demeanour, he looked at a distance every inch the King. Close to, the corpulence was less impressive, the vacuous look in the eye and the lack of intellect obvious. He was a buffoon, but an amiable one, a combination that had great appeal to his fickle subjects. They saw a man who looked like a monarch and behaved like a peasant, a fellow who was not above relieving himself over the walls of his various palaces, spraying his subjects with a generous dose of royal piss.

Emma was fascinated by the regal goings-on. The Queen was as much an object of interest as her husband: mother of a dozen children, the voice of power on the Royal Council, the real ruler of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. When he spoke of her Sir William praised her sharp mind and deep intellect, her sense of duty and purpose, as well as her devotion to her husband. This not only saw her forever brought to the delivery couch, but extended to ensuring that when he strayed, which he did often, the women she chose for him were either poor and clean, or well born and already
married
, so of no risk to her position.

Emma’s mother watched all of this with an acute eye and, when she was reasonably certain of her suspicions, on a day when Emma was out of the Palazzo Sessa visiting a dressmaker, asked the
Chevalier
if she could have words with him.

T
HE MEETING
took place in Sir William’s apartments, which were crammed with the results of his digging and his purchases. It was difficult to move without knocking over some valuable object or bumping into a case full of antique coinage. Seated, Sir William enquired as to what she required.

“Little, sir, ’cept enlightenment. I would like to know, Sir William, why there’s not a soul in the town who does not, by look and deed, think my Emma your mistress.” Mary Cadogan received a dismissive wave. The air of the professional diplomat was more obvious in this setting: the bland face and slight smile meant to convey friendship without commitment, the slow use of the hands to ward off anything unpleasant. “And I has the further impression that such an opinion has been held since we arrived here three months past.”

“Idle tongues, madam. Neapolitans love to gossip.”

“They were not the source, sir, since I’ve yet to comprehend the
lingua
.”

Sir William responded, in a bluff manner, “Our English visitors are equally afflicted with that particular disease, Mrs Cadogan. They chatter and they write letters home, few of which contain a single grain of truth. It is the bane of my existence mollifying both a court and a ministry that choose to give their ravings credence.”

“I asked for this interview, sir, with the intention of speaking plain. Not gossip or ravings but open, and I wish to know if in doing so I will be indulged with the true state of things.”

He didn’t reply immediately. Instead, he held her gaze for several seconds, wondering whether to allow her to proceed or to point out politely that she did not have the right to challenge him. To open himself to her scrutiny would lead to certain admissions: one
being that things were not proceeding as had been hoped. Could he face that?

Sir William thought Mary Cadogan a good woman, a beauty herself once, though not in comparison with Emma. In any exchanges they had had he had been happy to acknowledge her good sense, as well as the wry wit that never exceeded the bounds of her position. She had even managed to impress his irascible nephew. Here, in his establishment, she had fitted seamlessly into the domestic arrangements, undertaking tasks his own servants were happy to surrender, never interfering in duties that didn’t concern her.

“It would grieve me to be treated as just a stupid woman.”

“And I, madam, would be a fool to do that, for you are very far from it.”

“Then I’d be obliged if you would tell me what is going on, sir, not that I ain’t formed a notion of my own.”

“I’d be interested to hear it.”

“Folk hereabouts have Emma as your mistress. That you make no attempt to deny them leads me to believe that you would wish that was true.”

“She is attached to my nephew.”

“Would that he was attached to her,” she replied briskly. “You don’t see it, ’cause my Emma hides it from you. She writes sometimes more than one letter in a day. In three months not one reply has come from Mr Greville.”

“He is a poor correspondent.”

“He has found time to pen several letters to you.”

A flash of annoyance crossed the Chevalier’s face. The quizzical expression on that of Mary Cadogan was evidence that she had noticed it.

“You get a lot of letters from Greville,” she continued. “Your man was happy to save his legs and let me bring them up.”

“A glass of wine?” said Sir William, standing up quickly. He manoeuvred his slim frame between the statue of a bearded ancient and a large decorated pot, poured from the decanter and returned to present her with the glass. “What is it you want?”

“The truth, sir. I expect you have an arrangement with Mr Greville. What I see is my own girl near to despair sometimes, she loves him so.”

“I doubt you approve.”

She took a deep drink of wine before replying. “I learnt long ago, sir, an’ in a hard school, that the heart don’t often adjoin to the head. Whether I approve of your nephew is neither here nor there. What my Emma suffers because of it is. If she is to be cast out I need to know of it.”

Sir William helped himself to a glass of wine and sat down again. “There is no intention to cast her out, I do assure you. She’ll always have my protection, should she want it.”

“The question is sir, does she need it?”

Again, he had the temptation to dismiss her, to say that what she was asking might be her business but she was being above herself in demanding to know. But he had a nagging thought that would not go away: matters were stalled with no sign of a way to break the deadlock. Was the key to that sitting before him? The natural diplomat in him rebelled at revelation; the frustrated suitor in him demanded that something happen.

“Would I be allowed to tell you a story, Mrs Cadogan?”

“I judge it to be a long one, so I’d be obliged to see my glass recharged.”

That made him laugh and he rose to accommodate the request. There was a moment when their hands touched, as he took her glass, a moment when he thought he saw the woman she had once been, the lively eyes that could hold humour so easily, the notion that in her mind there was judgement, but rarely condemnation.

“Your Emma is quite remarkable, but so are you. You’ll be aware of my nephew’s prospects, but I doubt you’ve any inkling of his inability to indulge in decisions that would materially advance them.”

“He always seems in a stew about money, that I do know.”

“The solution lies within him. There are people who esteem his gifts, not least those who’d help him to achieve office within the ministry. Opposition can lead to advancement too, yet Charles
dithers, says that he cannot support either Fox and the Prince of Wales or Pitt and the King.”

“I thought he had it in mind to marry well.”

“In his mind, yes, Mrs Cadogan,” Sir William growled. “But his aim is so inept that if he were a hunter needing to live off his kill he’d starve. But you must let me tell you what happened in England or, to be more precise, in Wales.”

He paused for a moment to gather his thoughts. “It’s no secret that I had tender feelings for my late wife, attachments based on those most solid foundations, trust and esteem. In short, Mrs Cadogan, though not accomplished in any startling way, my late wife was a good woman.”

“Everyone below stairs says so, sir.”

“They talk too much below stairs,” he snapped.

“Funny that, Sir William,” Mary Cadogan replied, dipping her head to her glass. “That’s what folk attending usually say about those they serve.”

“Something tells me that I have just been humbugged,” Sir William admitted, before continuing. “My late wife’s estates, bequeathed to my nephew, will ease his burdens. But, being Charles Greville, he will not come out and say so. He’s a schemer even when such behaviour is unnecessary. He seeks to tie me to what my
inclinations
direct me towards, notwithstanding the fact that I may, at some future date, decide to marry again.”

Mary Cadogan smiled. “It would be a lucky woman who got you, sir.”

“Thank you for that,” he replied, genuinely touched. “I have named Charles as my heir and that makes him happy, though the notion that I might take another wife renders him anxious. Matters came to a head on my return to Naples. I travelled part of the way with the widowed Lady Clarges. In a moment of madness, in Rome, after a good supper and much wine, I let my tongue slip enough to emit what might have been construed as a proposal of marriage.”

The Chevalier told a good story, describing both the supper and the conversation, his face animated enough to convey the depth
of the shock at his own stupidity, plus the nature of the farce that had followed.

“Luckily the lady either missed the nature of the allusion or chose to ignore it. I wrote to Charles recounting this vignette in the most light-hearted vein, presenting myself as a buffoon who had, by sheer serendipity, managed a narrow escape. I need hardly tell you of the effect on him.”

“He offered you Emma?”

“Quite,” he responded, uncomfortable again at being so rudely reminded of the point. “I doubt to a woman of your sagacity that much more explanation is required. The regard I have for your daughter’s beauty must be plain to the dimmest eye. I made no secret of it in London, though she, besotted with my nephew, chose to see it as mere gallantry.”

“Understand, sir, she receives that kind of attention all the time.”

“Don’t I know it!” Sir William replied. He stood up suddenly and fingered the motif around the rim of a tall Roman vase. It was sad to see his shoulders sag a little and his voice, though not weak, was melancholy. “You forget, Mrs Cadogan, that I have been out on the town with her. It has been my duty to confound the attentions of those who know both my nephew and Emma, even the Prince of Wales himself. I also confess myself flattered that those who did not know her thought her attached to me. And I can assure you that delivering her back to Charles Greville was often the occasion for a sad reflection on the burden of age.”

“You was telling me about Wales.”

“It was there, while we were touring my estates, that Charles first mooted that I might take on responsibility for your daughter.” He ignored Mary’s loud sniff of satisfaction, the certain knowledge that she had been right, and carried on, gently turning the tall vase to admire the artwork. “I believe I had said to him many times that her beauty was so classical. Do you know how often I have seen her face on objects such as this?”

That made Mary Cadogan look more closely at the decorative friezes that adorned the vase he was fingering, at the reclining
beauties holding lyres or grapes. In profile they were, indeed, like Emma.

“From my point of observation,” Sir William continued, “the idea has obvious attractions, as well as uncertainties. To Charles it is all advantage. Don’t think he doesn’t esteem Emma, he does. But love is not an emotion to which his heart is open. My nephew is a man so practical that it is sometimes necessary to wonder if he is actually flesh and blood.”

The look he gave her then, as he turned to face her, was unblinking. “The rest you can guess. If I take on responsibility for Emma, Charles has less to fear in the article of my marrying again. He also offloads the cost of keeping a household for her and, as a
quid
pro
quo,
he has a lever on which he can work to get me, publicly and legally, to name him my heir.”

“You have not done so?”

“No, Mrs Cadogan, I have not!” he replied, the snap back in his voice. “I will not see everything I own entailed by some extravagance, for he would be bound to borrow on his expectations. He plagues me in the letters you deliver to stand surety for a bond, which I will refuse to do. Should he inherit, which is my intention barring the caveats I have already stated, then I want that bequest to be that which was left to me, not the residue of his speculations.”

“One of which is Emma.”

“I’m very fond of her, I hope you acknowledge that.”

“It’s our lot to be used, sir. I had decades of it, and had hoped for better for my only child.”

“That was wounding, madam.”

“Then forgive me for my honesty. And forgive me for observing that I had your nephew as less the rogue than you.”

“I think it a bit high to term him a rogue.”

Mary Cadogan lost some of her reserve then. Her voice was emphatic. “He has sought to profit from Emma since the day he moved her to London. How many times has Romney painted her and how many pictures do you see? Sold, near every one, not kept
to gaze on in admiration. And now that he tires of her he barters her off in order to maintain a grip on your good intentions.”

“It is not as mean-spirited as you make it sound. He observed my attraction to Emma and thought he saw that it was mutual in its potency. And I do not think that he has the capacity to return the level of affection she demonstrates for him.”

“So he’ll break her heart?”

“I seek to mend it.”

“Without success.” That sharp rejoinder caused Sir William to respond with a curt, unhappy nod. “It was the attentions you paid her that caused me to ask for this chance to talk.”

“I am more concerned with what your daughter thinks, Mrs Cadogan.”

“Why, sir, if she notices at all, she ascribes it to kindness, not desire. My Emma does not think of you as a gallant.”

“That is the unkindest cut of all,” he replied, crestfallen. “It is true to say that I am aware of being well past the first flush of youth, but the prospect of never being anything other than an uncle is not one to savour.”

“What would happen if Emma and I were to return to London?”

“The true answer madam is that I have no idea.”

Mary Cadogan suspected that he was lying. If they had discussed Emma coming to Naples, they must also have talked about what would happen if the hoped-for result didn’t materialise. Set against that would be Sir William’s reluctance, having invested so much, to admit to failure. No man would embark on such a deep-laid plan of seduction contemplating outright defeat.

Sir William Hamilton, harbouring that very thought, had been made uncomfortable by Mary Cadogan’s question, the assumption that failure would see Emma and her mother back in Edgware Road. Every time he had mentioned it to his nephew the idea had been swept aside as absurd. He realised just how much Charles had flattered him, playing on his vanity to achieve an object that, in truth, held more advantage for the proposer than it did for the supposed
beneficiary. Had he been alone he might have voiced the thought that there was no fool like an old one.

“The question, sir, is where we go on from here?”

“I confess myself at a stand. I am unable to offer any solid opinion.”

“What would you offer Emma?”

That made him look at her sharply. She dropped her head to examine the back of one of her hands.

“I cannot be certain I know what you are saying, madam.”

She looked at him, her eyes hard. “Then you are not the clever man I think you are, sir. It be simple enough, Sir William. Does my Emma have a better prospect of happiness here than elsewhere?”