by Alma Katsu
Jonathan and I exchanged cautious looks: we hadn’t yet agreed on a story for Pisa. I assumed we would continue the fiction we’d constructed for the voyage over.
“Is it your honeymoon?” the countess asked.
“Yes,” I said at the same moment Jonathan said “No.”
“Let me guess,” Byron said, warming to the subject. “Are you wayward lovers on the run? If that is the case, you may rest easy for you are in like company, as Teresa and I are living in disgrace here. I am properly divorced, at least, but Teresa has run away from her husband, poor fellow.” The countess’s doll-like face took on an expression of horror both at his ready disclosure of their delicate situation and his expression of sympathy for her husband. He hurried to explain. “Oh, everyone in town knows of our circumstances, mine and Teresa’s. Better you hear it from us. As for the count . . . he is not a bad chap, but not exciting enough to keep the countess’s interest, I’m afraid. That’s what he gets for marrying a much younger woman.” He tipped the glass in his lover’s direction before taking a healthy swallow.
“George,” she replied archly. “You mustn’t tease me like that in front of our guests. They are not acquainted with your wit or your poetic temperament. They do not know how you joke.” I got the impression that, far from being the type to disguise his meaning with humor, Byron was unusually forthright, as though it wasn’t in his nature to keep from making his opinions known, no matter the topic.
“Of course, my dear,” Byron said, rushing to placate her. “Surely, our guests know that I am teasing. All they have to do is take one look at you to know that it would be impossible for any man not to fall truly, deeply in love with you.” I squirmed; I did not want to provide an evening’s diversion for the couple and wished to hear neither their squabbling nor their fawning.
“So, did you say . . . how you two . . . ?” Byron prompted, pointing first at me and then at Jonathan.
“Yes, yes, you’ve found us out,” I rushed to answer, lest Jonathan contradict me again. By confessing that we were also disgraced and living outside polite society, we endeared ourselves to the poet, and even the countess warmed a bit. Over dinner, Byron elaborated on his tale, explaining that he’d been exiled from his homeland, although he didn’t fully explain why. He only hinted of his accomplishments as a poet, perhaps expecting us to already be familiar with his work, and was visibly disappointed when Jonathan confessed that he’d never found much enjoyment in reading.
We stayed at the villa late into the evening, listening to Byron’s tales of his tumultuous life, his adventures with other young English poets, and the stories got bawdier as the evening wore on. How Jonathan and I would’ve liked to tell Byron a story of our own adventures, but we held our tongues and played the role of dull rustics from America.
As we left, agreeing to rejoin our hosts the following evening, I noticed the expression on Byron’s face as he looked at Jonathan. It was a look I would see directed at Jonathan from certain men many times in the years to follow (and, if I was truthful, it was a look I’d seen from select men in the village of St. Andrew): a combination of admiration and longing, with a touch of hostility, too, as though they were jealous of what they saw in Jonathan. I wouldn’t fully understand until later that Jonathan’s intense beauty stirred up longings and fears in some people, who then projected their expectations or resentments onto him. It was a burden he was doomed to carry his entire life.
There, in Byron’s curious gaze, I saw that look again: the one that said the British lord wished to know Jonathan in a more intimate way. Because Jonathan never showed any inclination toward men, I worried that one of his admirers might someday seek to destroy what he could not possess. Once I learned more about the infamous Byron—which I did in short order from the gossip-loving residents of the town—I would understand that it was the look of an old desire rekindled, and that Byron was all the things alleged of him.
When I brought up my suspicions to Jonathan that evening, his response was that these were fancies: Byron was a poet and therefore an intense man, but I should not imagine that he harbored some proprietary interest in us. His response made me wonder if he didn’t welcome this attention. It might’ve been simply that he was happy to have someone for companionship besides me, or he might’ve been impressed by Byron’s title and privilege, and I pushed the darker thoughts from my mind.
We went back the next evening, and more evenings than not for the next two weeks, until even Teresa’s chill began to thaw. The couple held small dinner parties to introduce us to important townspeople, at least those whose reputations could withstand association with the notorious Byron. I must admit, however, that the best evenings were spent alone with the pair, as the sole recipients of Byron’s wit.
I felt that we four were destined for an unorthodox intimacy, our fate driven by Byron (for he seemed compelled to take every aspect of his life to the extreme) as the rest of us simply followed his lead. It started the evening of a terrible summer storm that broke out just as Jonathan and I were leaving their home. Within minutes, the downpour turned roads into rivers and wind lashed the trees until they sounded like a shaman’s rattle, attempting to drive out evil spirits. Being considerate hosts, Byron and the countess insisted we stay the night and somehow—the amount of wine probably was to blame—all four of us ended up in Teresa’s chambers, where we lounged on the bed and listened as Byron told more stories and recited verse from memory.
I woke in Jonathan’s arms as though he’d guarded my virtue all night, while Byron and his mistress were asleep on the pillows. Obviously, the courtship phase of our friendship was over, and Byron invited us to leave the tumbledown inn and stay at the villa for as long as we wished. We moved that very day.
By the end of summer, Pisan society seemed to have forgiven the four of us—two pairs of illicit lovers living in one household—or perhaps we were too delicious an object of speculation to ignore, and we were again invited to parties and the like. These events reminded me all over again what it was like to be in public with Jonathan, for at each event he was relentlessly hounded by gorgeous, dark-eyed Italian women. They flirted with him behind fans, boldly engaged him in conversation when he stopped at the punch bowl, and dragged him onto dance floors. Even the shiest trailed in his wake like baby chicks, and I wasn’t the only one to notice.
We were at one such party when Teresa meandered beside me to watch Jonathan’s blessing and curse play itself out once again. “My dear, my heart goes out to you,” she murmured to me behind her fan. “The brazenness of those women. . . . It is not as though we are in Venice or Rome, where women can behave quite appallingly, as bad as any man.” She exhaled in resignation; there was something that she felt compelled to share with me. “You see, I have been subject to the very same disrespectfulness. It is hard living with George, you understand. He naturally commands great interest wherever he goes. But there are always women who seek him out, women without the slightest interest in his poetry. Poor, confused things, drawn to his brilliance like moths to a flame, though they don’t understand why.
“With Jonathan, their interest is not so mysterious.” She gave me the smile with which I had become familiar, which I now saw was a smile of pain. “Women see a beautiful man. They have their husbands and their families, but still, they wish to know what it would be like to spend one night with him. One night is all they want, a memory to keep them warm when they are old and ugly and their old, ugly husbands are still chasing young girls,” she said.
Her words made me wonder if that’s why she was with Byron, so that she could one day find comfort in her memories of when she had been loved by a legendary poet. “We are destined to share the same sorrow, Lanore,” she continued. “We are not to blame; we don’t choose with whom we’ll fall in love. And these men, they know what they are doing. . . . I didn’t ask to fall in love with George. He wooed me even though I was married. He saw I was unhappy, yes, but also . . . it is his way. He must have someone close who
adores him, someone to witness his every triumph and comfort him at every slight. Without this, he cannot be happy.” It wasn’t until Teresa lowered her fan that I saw she was crying.
Teresa’s sorrows struck so close to my own that I was seized with anger on her behalf, and frustration for myself. How did we come to find ourselves in this same impossible situation? Mine seemed worse, for Jonathan and I were bound to each other for more than just love or companionship, as we had no idea what to expect from the infinite future that stretched before us, and feared the terrible reckoning that was sure to come with Adair.
Weakened, I was ready to quit the party and hide in the safe solitude of my bedchamber, but of course I could not. I had to wait until the others were ready to return home, trying not to follow Jonathan’s activity from afar, for it would only cause me further hurt. At one point Byron found me by myself, turned away from the gay crowd, and ushered me onto the dance floor. “You look so sad, my dear. You mustn’t let Teresa dampen your spirits; I saw you speaking with her earlier. She is rather good at making others feel whatever unhappiness has seized her at the moment. I do hope you haven’t let her get under your skin.”
Before I could reply, however, we passed Jonathan, standing beyond the dance floor, trapped by a gaggle of women clustered around him. Lord Byron followed my gaze. “Ahh . . . I see. How tiresome this must be for you, Lanore.” Byron’s voice was low and knowing. “You mustn’t hold it against him. It’s not as though he can do anything about it, save wearing a mask in public,” he said gently.
“I know.” I had told myself this countless times, for all the good it did.
“He doesn’t mean to hurt you.”
“I don’t think he knows of my pain at all. I don’t think he even sees me here, hurting. My feelings mean nothing to him.”
“Oh, surely not. But you must understand that men look at love differently.”
Later, when we returned to the villa, Byron would write these words on the back of my fan, the one that would one day hold court in the Victoria and Albert Museum: Man’s love is of man’s life a thing apart, ’tis woman’s whole existence. “A reminder for a day to come, when I am not standing beside you,” he teased me. I should have seen—as Byron saw; as Teresa understood—that to be with Jonathan, I had to accept that he would never be mine, not entirely. As much as I wished for it, we would never be each other’s complete world, a union of two, protecting and sustaining each other. I wanted to believe it could work between us, that there was a way to change him, as though changing him was all it would take.
“It might be time to take our leave,” I told Jonathan that night before bed. As convenient as it would have been to stay in Pisa, Lord Byron attracted much interest, and sooner or later Adair would hear that the rogue English lord was housing a spectacularly handsome new friend.
“Whatever you wish,” he replied, like a husband who long ago stopped listening to his wife. By his response, I knew Jonathan didn’t wish to leave, and he wouldn’t actively argue with me over the matter: he simply would take no action whatsoever, and in this way we stayed on and on with Byron and Teresa. Most of the time it was easy to be in their company, each day as intoxicating and sweet as wine laced with honey. Byron regaled us with stories of his travels through Mediterranean countries (and I squirreled away all the details, in case Jonathan and I needed to hide there someday). He told us of a stormy summer spent near Lake Geneva with the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley and his wife, Mary, boating during the day with Shelley, evenings spent outdoing each other with improvised tales and poems. Jonathan warned Byron that he’d get no poems from us, for we were not of that mind, and Byron said it didn’t matter, but I wonder now if he wasn’t looking to re-create some aspect of that idyllic summer by taking us in.
Byron’s mood was as changeable as a winter sky, and it was not uncommon for him to suddenly bolt from our company, upset by a perceived slight. Jonathan was rarely to blame, for he tended to be easygoing around other men, and since Byron was our host, I sought no argument with him. His fights were usually with Teresa, and the pair could be counted on to break into a quarrel at some point in the day, twice if it was especially hot or unpleasant. I can’t say it was entirely Teresa’s fault, however, as Byron seemed to need discord and fireworks. He lived life so hard—eating and drinking to excess, then doing something sporting in an attempt to trim his waistline (as much as his clubfoot would allow), writing all morning and then tearing his pages into confetti—that it was inevitable that he’d explode in fits of ill-temper and exhaustion.
Often, after one of his outbursts, Byron wanted only Jonathan for company, and the two would disappear for an afternoon or evening. They might go for a ride under the hot Pisan sun, galloping at breakneck speed until both the riders and horses were bathed in sweat, or sup at an inn where Byron could entertain barmaids and patrons alike with stories from his tempestuous life or recite snippets of his poems aloud, dazzling all with his talent and remarkable memory.
It was this way that Jonathan learned of Byron’s many stormy relationships with women, usually married women who fell madly in love with him and refused to let him go once he’d tired of fighting with them. He told Jonathan about the scandal that drove him from England, the rumored affair with his half sister, which he denied. No, he much preferred the steadier company of men, he professed, and that was the reason he usually traveled with a companion who shared his love of adventure and could provide a respite from his high-strung lovers. I understood immediately that this was what Byron wanted from Jonathan: he meant to make Jonathan his new companion, and take him along when he’d had his last fight with Teresa and decamped for his next adventure.
During these times when Jonathan and Byron were away and Teresa took to her chamber to nap through the brutal afternoon heat, I snuck into Byron’s study to read the new pages of poetry he’d written in the morning. I did this both for pleasure and to look for clues to his possible intentions. I handled the pages gingerly, careful not to smudge ink or mislay them, not wanting Byron to know what I was doing. He was working on Don Juan, which was to become one of his masterworks, but aside from finding a passing familiarity between the story’s hero and my Jonathan—though I think Byron, the egoist, styled the character after himself—there were no indications of the English lord’s intentions.
So I badgered Jonathan, asking him to tell me what he and Byron spoke about during their times away. I suppose I was jealous in a small way, too, for I found the English lord to be fascinating company, so much more fun than Teresa. Finally, one night as we prepared for bed, he seemed ready to relent. He tried at first to brush my questions aside, as though I’d touched on something he meant to hide.
“You didn’t tell him the truth about us?” I asked, my alarm growing.
He gave me a dirty look as he pulled his shirt over his head, baring his chest. “What can I say, Lanny? I may have spoken a word here or there about our troubles—nothing of Adair and his bags of tricks; I wouldn’t know what to say without making us seem mad. No, I’ve only told him a few stories about my childhood, of my family and growing up in St. Andrew. That is all.”
“And what did you tell him about St. Andrew?” It was such a quaint town, I could hardly believe it would be of much interest to the worldly Byron, but these were threads he’d given Byron, threads that led back to our true identities.
“We talk about . . . oh, the sorts of things that interest men and . . . he admitted that he was curious about my first sexual encounter.” He shook his head at recalling the conversation. “I was near drunk and perhaps I wanted to impress a man as worldly as Byron, for against my better judgment, I told him—” And then he stopped.
“Told him what, for God’s sake? It can’t be as serious as that. . . .”
He gave me an aggrieved look; how he hated to be prodded. “It was Joanna Kilpatrick, a friend of my mother and frequent visitor to our house, who was my first lover. Oh, Lanny, do not look at me that way. Do not hold me in suc
h contempt before you have heard the rest of the story, for you will have reason enough to despise me then.”
I was shocked into silence. I’d always believed Jonathan had spent his virginity on a similarly inexperienced girl his own age, but this wasn’t the case, Jonathan explained as he took my hand. He was very young when it happened, thick into puberty, not yet accustomed to the tricks his body played on him. He’d been sent to carry a few things over to the Kilpatricks’ house and the lady had seduced him, even as her husband worked in the fields outside their house. Mrs. Kilpatrick had walked right up to him and put a hand on his cock, which had unsettled him.
“She had decided in advance how she would put me in her service, and was determined to secure what she desired,” he said, blushing. He ended up on his back on the floor as Mrs. Kilpatrick straddled him, her bodice undone and her skirts gathered around her hips as she rode him. Jonathan had barely buttoned and arranged his clothing and was headed out the door when he ran into Mr. Kilpatrick returning from the fields. Seeing the flushed cheeks of his wife and the boy, and not being a total fool, Mr. Kilpatrick accused his wife of mischief, which she denied. Without proof, the husband reluctantly retreated from his accusations and Jonathan was allowed to make his escape.
I stared at Jonathan, unable to find words. What an unromantic indoctrination into the mysteries of love, to be simply petted to arousal and used like a hook on the wall for Joanna Kilpatrick to scratch her back. I recalled the Kilpatrick woman; she had possessed a strong character and had bullied her way to a position of respectability in the village. It took a determined soul to argue against Mrs. Kilpatrick when her mind was made up. That didn’t give her the right, nonetheless, to seduce a young boy, and surely the fieryhaired housewife had taken advantage of other young men as well. My stomach became quite unwell the longer I thought about his confession; Kilpatrick had her pick of the axmen, all living without their wives or sweethearts and grateful for female attention. Why had she turned to Jonathan?