Stealing Athena

by Karen Essex

  “I might have sold the entire collection at any time I was imprisoned in France,” Elgin said stiffly. “God knows that many offers were made, some of them quite extravagant. I believe that is why Napoleon kept me confined for so long. It is no secret that he has an obsession with obtaining the treasures yielded by the Parthenon.”

  Elgin looked at Knight with venom. “I do not think that Bonaparte would be obsessed with obtaining fakes! His team of one hundred sixty-nine scholars would know better—better than one man who has never seen the pieces.”

  He turned away from Knight, forcing Lord Grenville to pay attention to him. “Bonaparte thought that if he kept me locked up long enough, I would betray my country and capitulate. But I did not, sir! No, I did not. I have only and ever wished to serve my country and improve upon the condition of its Fine Arts.”

  Lord Grenville indulged Elgin by briefly—far too briefly for Mary’s taste—expounding on his excellent service to the Crown. Then he quickly turned the conversation in a different direction.

  Later, when the men went to the parlor for brandy and the ladies rested upstairs, Mary hoped that Elgin would get somewhere in a discussion of monies owed him, at least for the food and supplies he had sent to His Majesty’s army in Egypt. Mary knew that diplomacy was a rich man’s game, and that she had been expected to supplement Elgin’s ambassadorial expenses. But she had not known that the patriot was expected to feed the military as well.

  “Not a sou.” Elgin was glum on the ride home. “That is my reward for all that I have done.”

  “Did he mention a specific amount in connection with the marbles?” Mary asked.

  “He did not, only that the intention was to purchase them from me at a time opportune for both parties. And he made it clear that the time was not the present. He must have no idea of the magnitude of the collection, and that imbecile Knight did not help us by saying they were fake!”

  “Is there the slightest possibility?”

  “Of course not! You were there, Mary. How can you even ask? Knight is one of nature’s freaks. The man made his reputation writing a treatise on phallus worship, and another condemning Christianity. I’m sure he has some hidden plan of his own, some personal gain he hopes for, by discrediting my collection. These rival collectors always seek to undermine their competitors.”

  Mary was afraid that if Elgin continued in this angry vein, his already fragile health would suffer. He looked as if he was on the verge of a seizure. He turned to his wife with wild eyes. “That is why we must put all our efforts into a grand exhibition. If they could see the marbles all together, displayed properly and in a proper setting, they would realize what I am offering!”

  “But how are we to pay for such a thing?” she began before he cut her off.

  “Do not be a shortsighted female, Mary. Do not worry over petty expenditures at this crucial juncture. We must prepare for an exhibition.”

  She knew that it was not smart to address her concerns about money directly, for men despised women who confronted them in this way. She knew that the smart wife, especially one no longer willing to parlay sexual favors, would find a way to bring up unpleasant matters sweetly, pouring honey all over the problem before showing it to the husband. But she was out of patience.

  “Elgin, I have not said one unpleasant thing to you since you have returned. It is time we discussed the very real problems before us.”

  “You have avoided me in the bedroom, madam,” he said coolly. “That is unpleasant enough.”

  “That should be the least of your concerns! Do you have any idea of what I have done for you in your absence?” She sat back in the carriage, trying to rein in the shrillness in her voice. She would try to be calm. “Do you have any idea how bad your financial condition is?”

  “You have done what a wife should do!” he said. “I should have hoped that you would have outgrown your adolescent need to feel special by now.”

  She had misjudged him. He was not going to play along nicely with her arrangement. He was going to do what he had always done—demand that she serve him until every drop of her blood and every dime of her money were spent. But this time, Elgin had come home to a very different woman. She would have to make him see that.

  “Lord Elgin, you are outrageously ungrateful,” she said. “Another woman might have fallen apart under my circumstances! Instead, I have gotten a firm hold on our finances. How did I do this? By what means have I made up for your reckless spending? By selling off all the beautiful things given me that I should have had surrounding me all the years of my life and then passing on to our children. I had to turn my face away from the selling agent who came to collect the things for auction so that he would not see my tears and my shame!”

  “You always claimed to have been indifferent to extravagance,” he said, sneering at her.

  “Along with all of the treasures I sold went all of my lovely memories of our time in the East and of the many friends we made. Do you think I am indifferent to those things too? Unlike you, I am a practical person. Do you think that any woman could have survived all the pregnancies and deliveries and health crises and plagues and travels that I have endured since I have been married to you? Do you think that any woman could have recovered her will to live after burying her favorite child?”

  “What were your choices, Mary? To take poison?” He was treating her as if she were ridiculous. She would not let him get away with it.

  “I have put your affairs in order, Elgin, even though the bankers thought it impossible. If not for me, you would still be in prison in France, where you would have remained for many more years. And if you were ever released, you would have gone straight from French prison into debtors’ prison. I used every stitch of my charm and every last resource on your behalf. I have worked to exhaustion to bring us to a place where we might live without fear and chaos. And all you can think to do is spend yet more money on your marbles, which no one even wants! You always knew that diplomacy was a rich man’s game, and yet you pursued it, because you knew that I would pay and pay and pay where you could not. You knew that I would pay for the collecting and shipping and salvaging of your tons of marble. But how you think we will afford an extravagant exhibition is beyond me!”

  He looked at her with exasperation, as if he too were weary of suppressing something that simply must be said, something so tedious and obvious that he did not deign to utter the words. And finally he said it. “You know how we will afford it, Mary. You will pay for it. You will pay for it out of your father’s immense fortune, all of which he is leaving to you since you have no brothers or sisters. You will pay for it because it is your duty to me as my wife.”

  “Is it? Is it my duty to race through my own money as you have raced through yours? Then where shall we be, Elgin? Debtors’ prison? I have let you lead me all over the globe, but that is one place where I refuse to follow you.”

  “Your fortune is unlimited, Mary. Why do you insist on withholding it from me, whom you declare you are devoted to? Why do you allow your father to keep the control out of my hands? Every decent woman allows the control of her money to pass from father to husband. It is only right and proper. You and your father keep me in this humiliating position of appealing to you for money all the time, money that is rightfully mine.”

  After all the years of suspecting it and suppressing the horrible thought, she allowed it to come fully to the surface and express itself. “You married me for my father’s money.”

  He looked at her as if she had just said something so nonsensical that he should not condescend to reply to it. But reply he did. “You were the prettiest and the cleverest of the wealthy girls.”

  Did he mean for it to be a compliment?

  “I will not negotiate with my wife for the money to do the things I must do. I will not stoop so low again. You will speak to your father and explain that we are going to exhibit the marbles in order to display them to those who will be offering on them. This is a practical matter
, Mary. I forbid you to question me on it. You must cease challenging my judgment. It is undignified.”

  What was she to do? This was her husband. This was the path she’d chosen over the objection of her father. This was the sire of her four children. It was too late to change the past. Elgin was her present and her future, and she would make the most of it. But she would get what she needed too.

  “As long as we are listing our demands, what do you say to my terms, Elgin? I can speak to my father and get you the money to display your marbles, if that is what it will take to keep the peace between us. But I too am decided upon a course for our future. You did not answer my letters. Perhaps you thought that I was merely reacting to the present circumstances, but I am emphatically decided. I will not suffer again. I will not bear more children.”

  He did not even take a moment to ponder, but looked her dead in the eye. “I trust that you are aware that as my wife, you cannot deny me the privileges of the marriage bed, which include its logical conclusion and ultimate purpose, procreation. It is not simply my purpose, but that of God.”

  He had obviously read her letters and considered what she proposed. This was his response, and it sounded as immovable as her resolve to the contrary. She knew enough about Elgin to know that he would not renege. His voice was firm as he spoke, as solid and cold as ice.

  “If you cannot agree to my terms for marriage, then I cannot agree to yours.” She hoped that she sounded as firm and as frigid as he had.

  In the country of Scotland, July to December, 1806

  THE CHILDREN HAD SPENT much of their time apart from their parents at Archerfield, so they were immediately at home on their grandparents’ estate. They had been away from their father most of their lives, and the separation from him caused them no grief. They were told that Lord Elgin had duties he needed to fulfill in London, and would see them when he returned. Mary had little to do now but spend her days playing with them in the same gardens she had played in as a child, and walking with them along the same beaches, where the firth opened into the North Sea, collecting shells, and going into the water when the weather permitted. Owing to long walks with his mother and his grandfather, Bruce was becoming adept at identifying the coastal birds, and went into blue mood for an entire day when he saw a stout, black great skua devour a small, defenseless puffin. But being a little gentleman, he hid the reason from his sisters. “They might have bad dreams if they knew, Mother,” he told Mary when she went into his room to bring him tea and to comfort him. “Little girls love little birds.”

  The girls were sensitive creatures, but they loved their fun. Mary loved to watch them laugh hysterically as the lady’s maids put them into the laundry baskets atop the fresh unfolded linen sheets and swung them in the air. They could be alternately playful and terribly serious, as when they were at work on their stitching or creating elaborate scenarios with their dollies. As long as the children were around her, Mary had enough happiness to face the long days and the uncertainty ahead. She had no idea what would happen between her and Elgin; at the moment, she was content simply to be at home with her children, trying to make up for the long years of separation, and away from their father and his ever-pressing demands upon her money and her body.

  She knew that Robert Ferguson was once again in her vicinity. He had won his bid for Parliament, and he had settled at Raith in order to execute his duties. Upon hearing that she was at Archerfield and alone, he began to petition to visit her.

  The Nisbets were not pleased.

  “We did not like his visits in London, Mary. He knew that you were another man’s wife, and under the pretext of helping your husband, he took advantage of your situation to remain in your company unsupervised and late into the evenings.” Her mother’s voice took on the same quality that she used with her grandchildren when they displeased her. Mary had not heard quite so admonishing a tone directed at her since she was a child.

  “But, Mother, he did help Elgin. If Mr. Ferguson had not persuaded Sir Joseph Banks and other influential men to act on our behalf, Elgin would still be in France. Why must I endure criticism, even from my own mother, when all I tried to do was get my husband home?”

  “I was not criticizing you, dear, but Mr. Ferguson. His feelings for you are most obvious. Even your father, who notices nothing if it isn’t livestock or banknotes, has commented on it. Ferguson is a good but dangerous man. He knows no social boundaries, and he has always been one to seduce married women!”

  “I assure you that nothing untoward passed between myself and Mr. Ferguson in London. We were heavily engaged in aiding Elgin’s release, and in disposing of my property to pay my husband’s debts.”

  “Besides,” her mother added, “I do not think that Mr. Nisbet would like to see him here, what with your present circumstances undecided.” Clearly her parents had discussed the matter between themselves. Mary had seen Mr. Nisbet’s frown when the letter addressed to Mary arrived from Raith, with Robert’s insignia. Mary needed her parents more than ever. Initially they had been upset that she’d left Elgin, but when the full range of his crimes against her and disregard for her was revealed, they had promised their complete support.

  “You are quite correct, Mother,” Mary said. “We do not need Mr. Ferguson’s passionate and controversial presence complicating our lives.”

  She wrote him a polite letter thanking him for his generous help in the past, but firmly saying that she did not think it advisable for them to meet at the present time.

  IN SEPTEMBER, WITH THE weather turning cool and crisp and the cultural season commencing, Mary decided to spend a fortnight in Edinburgh. Mrs. Nisbet wanted to accompany her daughter into the city, but Mary longed for time alone. She would see some city acquaintances, attend the theater, and buy fabrics to have winter clothing made for herself and her growing brood. Bruce, especially, appeared as if he would take after his father and grow tall. His woolen breeches, put away since the spring, no longer covered his knobby knees.

  Mary declined invitations to stay with friends at their city homes and checked into Fortune and Blackwell’s Hotel. When she came downstairs to the dining room for her supper, she was seated at a table next to Robert Ferguson, who was eating alone. He did not look surprised to see her.

  “Lady Elgin, may I join you?” he said.

  “Of course, Mr. Ferguson. Please sit down,” she said.

  He left his food on the table and sat down with her, bringing with him only his glass of wine, which sloshed over the rim in his rush to arrive at her side. He looked so anxious that she allowed herself to laugh, despite her promises to herself to retain the utmost semblance of propriety should she ever run into him in the cosseted nest of Edinburgh society.

  “How well you look, Mr. Ferguson,” she said slyly. At the moment, he did not look well at all. He was wiping droplets of red wine from the bottom of his glass with the tablecloth and flinging the rest of the spilt liquid from his jacket sleeve. “What a great coincidence to see you here.”

  A waiter interrupted them. “Sir, shall I bring your supper?”

  “No, no, I am finished,” Robert said. The waiter looked at the barely touched roast beef on the plate and shook his head at the waste. He took the plate away, probably intending, Mary thought, to have it straightaway for himself.

  “Mary, it is not a coincidence at all,” Robert said. “Surely you know that. I have been watching as best I can your movements for the last four months. I have been mad to see you. Why will you not receive me?”

  “What, no small talk, Mr. Ferguson? Should you not ask how things are at Archerfield and listen patiently while I tell you of the children’s growth and my father’s gout?”

  “Dear God, I am a member of Parliament now. Do you not think that I have had my fill of small talk these many months? The joy of our friendship has always been the depth of our communication. I have missed it greatly,” he said, taking the liberty of leaning closer to her.

  She laughed. “Perhaps you should
have eaten your dinner. You look as if you are about to devour me.” She knew that she shouldn’t be flirting and teasing with him, but she had done nothing in months but play with children—she, who had attended suppers and balls with the most powerful people in the world, and who had been the toast of every society she had entered. She was lonely for the attention of fascinating men like Robert.

  “I must speak with you, Mary. I won’t be put off. May I see you in your room?”

  “Are you mad?” she said, whispering. “This is Edinburgh, where we are both well known. I will not be the subject of gossip so close to home.”

  “Then I shall take a room on your floor. And I shall come to you this evening at nine o’clock. Hear me out, Mary. You shan’t be sorry.”

  “No, you mustn’t. I am going to the theater tonight,” she replied, flustered. She had thought that she’d prepared herself, should she encounter him in public, but he had found this ingenious way to talk to her alone so that she could not hide behind politeness.

  “Then I shall arrive at eleven.”

  She started to object, but he stood. “It has been a pleasure to see you, Lady Elgin.”

  He picked up his hat from the table where he had left it, and before she could reply, he was gone.

  Mary was filled with anxiety when she took her seat at the theater. How on earth would she be able to concentrate these two and a half hours? She’d been wanting to see the play, a comedy by the Irishman Oliver Goldsmith, about a woman of wealth who poses as a serving girl to seduce the man she wants to marry. But as the play progressed, she found herself not laughing at all. Her friend Catherine sat on one side of her, fanning herself repeatedly after overheating her face and bosom with laughter. Catherine’s husband sat on Mary’s left, and Mary watched his big belly convulse throughout the play. But Mary found herself increasingly annoyed. Why did women have to dissemble to gain a man’s love? If she agreed to disguise her true self, as this character was doing, and agreed to behave exactly as Elgin wanted—as a servant—she would once again have his love.