The Captain and the Theatrical

by Catherine Curzon

  Even Orsini was forced to admit that everyone in the room showed their acting talent then. She was a theatrical, after all, a fallen woman who had lain with Ambrose Pendleton, and here she was too shy to take a maid?

  The thought of lying with Ambrose Pendleton was a distracting one, though, and he remembered that night in the courtesan’s chambers, the strength of Ambrose’s body pressed to his through the night, recalling memories of the Italian ocean and long, drowsy afternoons.

  If only Cosima were real.

  Orsini blinked away the thought as Tarbottom told him, “My wife’s and daughter’s attendants have been with them for many years, they are as sober and Godfearing as Mrs. Tarbottom herself. You need not be shy.”

  “Grazie.” Orsini nodded gently, then looked to Harriet. “I should go to my bed, I think.”

  Harriet smiled kindly on her, as if they had been particular friends since girlhood. “Come along, Contessina.”

  “You are very kind,” Orsini told her as they made their way along the hallway. Perhaps Harriet was as much a pawn of her own father as Ambrose was of his, for all her glittering jewels and rustling silks. Maybe she too was being pressed into a marriage for which she had no enthusiasm. Many was the girl who knew about that. “I am glad that we can be friends.”

  “Oh, yes, excellent friends.” But there was something brittle in Harriet’s tone, and her grip had grown so tight as to be almost a pinch. Perhaps she was unwell, quite apart from Orsini’s pretended swoon.

  “Are you quite well, miss?” Orsini asked as they reached the foot of the stairs. He rested his hand on the banister, peering into Harriet’s large eyes. She was pretty, there was no denying it, but she had a curious mix of her mother’s stern countenance and her father’s thin-lipped appearance that gave her an almost angry look.

  Furious, in fact, Orsini realized as it hit him that he wasn’t Orsini at the moment, but her rival if she was a willing participant in the betrothal. Perhaps we won’t be friends after all.

  “You shan’t have him,” Harriet hissed in a whisper. “You shan’t. I won’t let you take him from me. He’s mine—not yours. He’s supposed to be mine.”

  Her petulant, bratty tone made it sound as if she was talking about a fought-over toy, not a human being. Orsini knew that he had two choices now. The first was to let her know that Cosima was a force to be reckoned with, but no general showed his enemy the full extent of his Army before the battle. Instead he asked with wide-eyed concern, “Miss Tarbottom, is that decision not for the capitano to make?”

  “Yes, and of course he’ll choose me!” Harriet accompanied her arrogant claim with a stamp of her delicate foot. “He won’t want a trollop for a wife! And besides, he won’t be able to resist Papa’s money!”

  “You are as charming as you are kind,” Orsini told Harriet, giving a firm tug that released his arm from her grip. “I shall go to my room now, Miss Tarbottom, if you will excuse me.”

  Harriet stepped away from Cosima, her face transformed into a scowling mask of hate. “Pack your trunk, you Haymarket harlot! You’re not wanted here!”

  “Harlot?” The word stung. Orsini had been called far worse in his day, for what gentleman with his proclivities could escape the occasional barb, but Cosima was no harlot, not by any standard. She had fallen in love with Ambrose Pendleton, just as hopelessly as Amadeo Orsini had.

  “You theatricals are all the same—that’s what Mama tells me!” Harriet poked her nose into the air. “Enjoy your lie-down—and thank you so much for leaving Captain Pendleton to me.”

  With a smile of triumph, Harriet curtseyed, then hurried back to the drawing room at frankly unladylike speed. Her speed, however, was nothing next to that of Amadeo Orsini, who dashed upstairs and along the hallways to the pretty room that had been allocated to him by Mrs. Pendleton. He closed the door and turned the key, then pressed his back to it and drew in a deep, shaking breath. Every insult that had been hurled his way in childhood came flooding back, every cry of culattone from his youthful peers. How cruel they had been when they’d learned of his mother’s operatic past, calling her baldracca, and how he had wept more bitterly for that than the beatings they doled out whenever they decided the piccola among them needed to be taught what it was to be a man. Harriet Tarbottom might not share their gender, but how well she would have fit in among them, with her sneers and her insults. And how he would enjoy keeping Ambrose Pendleton from her talons.

  It was the thought of waving her off at the door that slowed Orsini’s breathing and stilled his trembling limbs. He was a boy no longer, curled in a ball on a dusty ground as his playmates kicked him into submission, but La Cosima, the toast of the continental stage, a noblewoman who had turned notoriety into devotion among her audiences and an actress who could play any role. Amadeo Orsini had been a middling sort of thespian, a handsome lead in a few worthless plays, but La Cosima had a grace and charm that he did not. Let Amadeo be the impresario and Cosima be the star and all would be well. Tonight, however, even Amadeo must play his part.

  Orsini tugged at the door handle once more, just to be certain of his security, then began preparing the room. Eventually he had made a passable Cosima of pillows to give the impression of a figure sleeping beneath the covers should anyone find a key and think to check that all was well. It was a trick in which he was well-practiced, having used it whenever the traveling players arrived in the village. As little Amadeo had clambered down from his window, his pillow-self had slept on, undiscovered by any in the household. He washed away the makeup that made him Cosima and tied his hair in its familiar queue then dressed once more in his male clothes, resplendent as ever in a suit of rich midnight-blue velvet and silk, the waistcoat embroidered with shimmering, colorful hummingbirds and blossoms.

  Then he need only wait for night to fall. Wait for night to fall and pray he didn’t snap his neck or the trailing ivy beneath his window on the journey from bedroom to solid ground.

  Chapter Nine

  On the pretext of looking for a piano score, Ambrose had managed to escape the drawing room and the post-dinner hell of music and tedious conversation. He wandered through the vast house with one aim in mind, but knew very well that aim could not be realized.

  Although Orsini was in one of the many guest rooms, only up the stairs, Ambrose could not go to him. Propriety would not allow it. And as he wandered into the hall and sat on one of the chaises that were never used in that drafty chamber, he realized he could not linger long or he would risk being accused of paying court to the swooning Cosima.

  But he snatched a few moments more away from the Tarbottoms, away from perfect, sparkling, nauseating Harriet and the specter of a future he most certainly did not want. Yet Cosima had vacated the field of battle and he knew not why. All Ambrose could see was their common enemy advancing, threatening to overwhelm his defenses with every mention of her father’s fortune and every sparkle of her diamonds and pearls. Barnaby Pendleton was a man of business and in Harriet Tarbottom and her accursed family, he saw all his ambitions realized.

  Ambrose was startled from his reverie by an almighty hammering on the front door, loud enough to wake the dead in their tombs, if the family chapel and its crypt had not been too new to contain any.

  Surely a servant would appear at any moment to answer it, but the loud, thunderous knocking grated on Ambrose’s nerves and his hand trembled again. He shoved it into his pocket and strode to the huge oak door.

  “What is the meaning of this?” he bellowed.

  “Release my sister, you fornicating beast!” Amadeo Orsini stepped out of the darkness and seized Ambrose’s lapels. Though easily the more slight of the two men, Orsini’s momentum carried them both backward into the entrance hall and he howled in fury, “Devil, rogue, stronzo!”

  Ambrose’s eyes widened at the spectacle of this enraged embodiment of Orsini. He had never seen the fellow in such an ill humor before and was taken quite by surprise. He rather liked this firebrand Italian.
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br />   But there was a scheme to play out, he reminded himself.

  “Release her, you madman?” Ambrose’s voice echoed through the corridors, audible, he was sure, to the sitters in the drawing room. “She came here of her own accord! And she has taken to her bed—though heaven knows by now you must have woken her, as you have no doubt woken all the hounds of hell!”

  “Shall we settle this in a duel, sir?” Orsini’s dark eyes blazed and Ambrose was reminded once again that this was the man who had enjoyed no success on the stage until he donned rouge and gown. What were audiences thinking? “Like men?”

  “You stand here in my father’s house and challenge me—a former captain of His Majesty’s Army—to a duel, sirrah?” Ambrose threw back his head and laughed. “No harm has come to your sister, you blackguard!”

  Footsteps were hurrying along the corridors now and Ambrose knew an audience would soon appear. Orsini responded by hurling him back into the wall, finally releasing Ambrose’s lapels. He strode to the center of the hall and tipped back his head, calling out, “Where is the father of this base creature? I demand reparations for my sister’s lost honor!”

  Ambrose was impressed by Orsini’s strength and grinned giddily at him. Then he sharply changed his expression to one of dismay as his father’s quick, short steps sounded over the marble floors.

  “Would you shout such a thing abroad, Amadeo?” Ambrose gasped in shock. “Accuse me of such villainous acts and besmirch your own sister?”

  “What on earth is to do?” Mr. Pendleton demanded. The women had, of course, remained in the drawing room, though whether they could resist the temptation to peek out at who was making all the noise, Ambrose couldn’t be sure. There was Theodore Tarbottom though, his lips slightly parted, his eyes narrowed as he took in the scene. Mr. Pendleton tutted and asked, “Come now, who’s hollering and bawling when we’ve a sickly lass upstairs?”

  “Sickly?” Orsini’s head flicked round and his gaze settled on Mr. Pendleton. When he spoke again, his voice was low with menace. “Are you the father of this seducer?”

  “I am Mr. Barnaby Pendleton, of Pendleton’s Coal.” He nodded, gripping his lapels. “And this is my fine son, Captain Ambrose Pendleton, who you may have heard of due to his fine showing at Waterloo. I will not have my boy shouted at by a common caller at the door!”

  “A common caller? I am Amadeo, nobile dei conti d’Orsini, and I will speak to this false friend however I so choose!”

  “I am not false, Amadeo!” Ambrose ran his hand back through his disordered hair. “I cannot help it if your sister and I are in love—such a tender, sweet love as I have never known before. And you, my friend—you would run me through for the crime of adoring the beautiful contessina!”

  “Now just one moment!” Mr. Pendleton frowned and hopped from one foot to the other as he considered his next move. “That letter can’t have arrived already. It only went off this afternoon?”

  “Letter?” Orsini demanded. “There is a letter?”

  “I wrote to you—on my father’s urging—to ask you here because…” Ambrose bowed his head before Orsini like a penitent. “For I dearly wish to wed your sister, and without a father to approve, and with the contessa out of reach, there was only you whom I could ask.”

  That seemed to pull Orsini up short and he blinked, then shook his head.

  “Alas,” Mr. Tarbottom spoke up, as though this house was his to command. “Would that it were so simple as all that. Come, sir, you must be tired from the road. Join us in the drawing room for a refreshment?”

  “So you are the father?” Orsini gave a pantomime of confusion, raising his hands as if in surrender. “Who is the master in this house?”

  “The bloody parrot,” Ambrose distinctly heard his father murmur. Then he said more clearly, “I am the master of this house, sir, but Mr. Tarbottom is merely trying to calm your continental fire. No need to throw any coal on you, eh?”

  For a moment, as Orsini’s dark gaze landed on his father, Ambrose actually felt himself tense. There was such anger in his friend’s face, such barely controlled rage, that he allowed himself to forget that this was Amadeo, the most kind-hearted soul he had ever known. This was Cosima, for heaven’s sake, and Cosima would never strike a little fellow like his father.

  Then, like the sun breaking through a storm cloud, Orsini laughed. He strode toward Mr. Pendleton, placed his hands on the Yorkshireman’s shoulders and kissed him first on one cheek, then the other. Then he said, “To the drawing room, as your Mr. Tarred-Bottom says, and I shall meet your wife. Your son and I though, we have unfinished business.”

  Ambrose swallowed. “I have long wished to introduce you to my mama, Orsini—would that it were under happier circumstances. Do understand—please—I would move the earth and all the heavens to marry Cosima.”

  “We shall talk later.” Orsini, his arm still around Mr. Pendleton, pointed at the three men. “But for now, women!”

  As they headed back to the drawing room, spirited along by Orsini’s boundless energy, Ambrose mumbled an awkward introduction. “Father, Mr. Tarbottom, may I introduce my good friend Amadeo d’Orsini. And Orsini—may I introduce my father, and his…erm…business acquaintance, Mr. Tarbottom?”

  “Sirs.” Orsini dropped into a flamboyant bow, twirling one hand ornately. “I am honored to know you.”

  A rustle of skirts by the drawing room door signaled that while the women had not ventured from the room, they had ventured from their chairs. Mrs. Pendleton was flushed, her cap askew once again, and sat half on the edge of her armchair as if she had only that second dropped into it. Pagolo sat at her shoulder again, his head inclined very slightly toward hers.

  “Another guest? My, we are popular!” Mrs. Pendleton grinned at the apparently new arrival. At the sight of Orsini Pagolo opened his vast wings wide and squawked a merry Italian song of greeting which, Ambrose suspected, might be obscene.

  Ambrose made the introductions, and Mrs. Tarbottom and her daughter smiled at Orsini. Again they received the flamboyant bow and again, when Orsini glanced toward Ambrose, his expression grew momentarily fierce.

  “What a pleasure to make your acquaintance.” Harriet grinned. “I am already a firm friend of your sweet sister.”

  “Two sweet young ladies together,” he told her smoothly, winning another grin for his efforts. Then he addressed Mrs. Tarbottom and Mrs. Pendleton, adding, “And two ladies whose acquaintance it is my pleasure to make, one of you squired by our good Pagolo. Buonasera, Pagolo!”

  “Buonasera,” Pagola replied, hopping over to Mrs. Pendleton’s shoulder and fluttering his wings again. “Buonasera!”

  “Madame, I must apologize for my sister’s parrot.” Just as Cosima had earlier, Orsini moved to correct the cap, but he paused at the last. “Forgive me, madame, I almost handled your person. Pagolo has spoiled your attitude. Might I be permitted to correct it?”

  “Oh, how very kind of you!” Mrs. Pendleton blushed a shade redder. “And please don’t apologize on the parrot’s behalf. Pagolo is a dear little fellow!”

  “Mamma,” Pagolo pronounced. With an approving smile Orsini straightened Mrs. Pendleton’s cap, pinning it in place. Ambrose couldn’t help the swell of affection in his breast at the sweet gesture as he watched his friend’s gentle movements. He cared not for the jewels and silks of Harriet Tarbottom nor the pious gold cross and subtle diamonds of her mother, his eyes were only on that misbehaving cap.

  “Thank you, kind sir! Will you take a drink, or refreshment? Do you wish for something to eat? Do take a seat.” Mrs. Pendleton gestured to the various empty chairs dotted about the room. “Your sister took to her bed, should you wish to see her. She came over in a swoon, poor girl. She said she wanted rest and that no one should disturb her, but I’m sure she’d be glad of a visit from her brother.”

  “I shall see her in the morning, Madame,” Orsini decided, descending into a seat in a rustle of silk and a cloud of perfume. “Forgive me my ejaculation
s on entrance. I am known for my hot-blooded passions.”

  “Oh? I didn’t hear—we didn’t hear, did we? Mrs. Tarbottom, Miss? Not a thing. What was that about your entrance, good sir?” Mrs. Pendleton was not a convincing actress and Ambrose briefly turned to face the mantelpiece in order to hide his rising amusement.

  “No, we didn’t hear a sound,” Mrs. Tarbottom remarked. Orsini glanced to her and smiled, inclining his head in thanks. Then he knitted his hands in his lap and looked around the room in clear appreciation

  “I trust La Cosima is not proving any trouble?” he asked, looking now at Ambrose. “She has always been impressionable. You can well imagine my late father, God rest him, and my mother when Cosima told them of her wish to perform. She is fortunate indeed not to be residing in a distant convent as we speak.”

  “Your English is impeccable,” Mr. Tarbottom commented. “As is your sister’s.”

  “We are known for our nimble tongue,” Orsini told him innocently. “It is an Italian talent.”

  Mrs. Pendleton giggled and nodded toward her son. “You have the most charming friend, Amby! And as for Cosima—no, Orsini, she is no trouble at all. Save for…well.”

  Mrs. Pendleton shot her husband a Gorgon stare. Everything she could have said on the subject of potential daughters-in-law was bound up in that one expression. Orsini followed her gaze then turned to Mr. Tarbottom once more and said, “Mr. Tarred-Bottom, from whence do you hale?”

  “Philadelphia, sir,” he replied proudly. “As does my good lady. We hope to show our good city to Captain Pendleton, for I believe he is considering returning with us. Isn’t that right, sir?”

  “Indeed it is,” Mr. Pendleton said quickly. “But that is part of a conversation we gentlemen shall have elsewhere.”

  “Oh, is it indeed, Husband?” Mrs. Pendleton sniffed. “I think perhaps that Mr. Orsini might be involved in your discussions, considering that his unhappy sister will meet with great disappointment if you persist in your plan. And as for the gentleman whose hand—and future—is at stake, does he not have a say either?