Chapter Sixteen
H eloise might have been irked by how easily they fell back into their roles after a week’s separation, had she not been so grateful for Peter’s company. His companionship, and his sincere interest in her work, was pathetically gratifying. She settled back in her chair and met his attentive gaze.
“I believe, by now, I understand attraction.” A wicked, self-satisfied smile spread over Peter’s face, and Heloise felt her cheeks grow warm. “But, what next? How do people decide to choose each other?”
Peter blew out a long breath. “I’m not sure I know.”
“Of course not. By your own admission, you keep your romantic encounters brief and impersonal.”
Peter winced. “I’d have said ‘spontaneous’ and ‘casual,’ but I take your point. Might I add that I at least venture out into society? That’s more than I can say for some.”
Heloise gave a wounded huff. Peter laughed, reached across the table, and took her hand. It was no doubt intended as a casual gesture, but she clung to him. He squeezed back, his strong fingers, warm and comforting.
“If we put our shortcomings together,” Peter said, “perhaps they’ll add up to one sensible person.”
“I’m not sure it works that way.”
“Never mind.” He pursed his lips thoughtfully, which Heloise found extremely distracting. “What you need is a dramatic device, to force a reckoning between Marie and Francois.”
They sat quietly, each lost in their own thoughts. The clock on the mantle ticked, and Peter’s top hat sat in the corner of the table, out of place in the low company of open books and ink-stained pages.
“I have it.” Peter spread out his hands like a magician about to conjure a rose from thin air. “A marriage proposal.”
Heloise raised a brow. “Francois proposes to Marie?”
“No! A wealthy merchant spots Marie at the market. He’s smitten and makes her an offer right then and there.”
“Oh!” Heloise considered this while Peter sat vibrating with excitement. “She would have comfort and security. She must weigh those practical concerns against her attachment to Francois.”
“Exactly!” Peter stood and began to expound on the benefits of this idea. As he spoke, his hands formed incomprehensible symbols which she nonetheless understood perfectly. She watched him, joy fizzing in her chest like champagne froth.
“It has merit,” she admitted when Peter collapsed back in his chair.
In response, he snatched up her quill and offered it to her, handle-first, like a fencing saber.
Once Heloise began to write, she didn’t look up again for quite some time. She finished the page, dusted it with powder, set it atop the pile, and began a new one. When she finally did glance up, Peter was still sitting across from her. He was slouched in his chair, heels propped up on the table, thumbing through the libretto of Tristan und Isolde .
“You needn’t stay,” Heloise said.
Peter’s eyes flicked to the mantlepiece clock. “There’s time.” When she continued to stare at him, he gave her a wink. She jumped, heart thumping, and huddled back into her writing.
Heloise completed more pages and added them to the stack. The next time she looked up, Peter was gone. She swallowed down her disappointment, reminding herself that he had an appointment to keep. But he was back ten minutes later bearing a plate of sandwiches, two green apples tucked under his arm.
They talked as they ate lunch. Heloise wondered why so many great romances ended badly; one would hardly wish for an outcome like Antony and Cleopatra’s, or Arthur and Guinevere’s. Peter recounted some of his own experiences; the blushing debutant who kissed him backstage after a lecture, the wealthy widow who sent him an invitation on a lilac-scented card, the governess who asked him to recite poetry while she removed her dress. His tone was wistful, as though these ladies were mysterious, unknowable figures, appearing and disappearing from his life at random. Heloise suspected that, had he granted them time and opportunity, they might have become more real.
By late afternoon, Heloise was approaching the end of the scene. Shadows appeared in the corners of the library, and the light shifted from white to gold. She was stiff, and sore; when she stretched, her spine gave a resentful crunch. Then there was a rustle behind her, and Peter’s warm hands were on her shoulders. He squeezed gently, rubbing the tight muscles of her neck and back.
“Oh, my God.” Heloise slumped into a puddle on the table while Peter pressed the heels of his hands into her aching flesh. “Don’t stop.”
“I won’t stop until you tell me to.”
“Then we’ll both die here.” There was a dark chuckle from above, but he kept kneading and stroking, drawing away tension that she hadn’t known was there.
The sun was setting, the library dim, as she wrote the final lines of the scene. Peter went around lighting the lamps, their orange glow soaking into dark wood and leather. Heloise squared away her stack of pages and looked up to find Peter standing beside her.
“May I read it?” He held out a hand, just as on the first day of their acquaintance.
“Now?” Handing over her manuscript felt more intimate than kissing. But she passed it to him, nonetheless.
They went to the window seat and settled on the cushions facing each other. Peter stretched out his legs, patting his thighs in an encouraging fashion. After a moment’s confusion, Heloise placed her feet in his lap. He rested a hand on her ankle, toying lightly with the ribbons on her slippers.
While Peter read, Heloise watched the garden. The red bricks and glossy leaves grew dull in the fading light, and birds retreated to the safety of hedges and nests. With a start, Heloise realized that Peter had spent the entire day with her. He had not gone to his appointment, not met whomever it was that he had dressed so smartly for. She looked at him, the question rising in her throat.
Across from her, Peter’s lips were parted in quiet concentration. His carefully combed hair had become disheveled; a few soft pieces fell over his eyes, which were set intently on the pages of her writing. Heloise decided not to disturb him. Beyond the window, the sky was ablaze, pink, purple, and fiery red bleeding through the heavy clouds.
When Peter had read the final page, he set the manuscript aside and stared blankly at the wall. Heloise peered at him, trying to catch his attention. After a few unsuccessful attempts, she blurted out, “Well?”
He turned to her, his eyes shining with affection. “Have you any idea how extraordinary you are?”
“Of course. But I don’t object to being reminded.”
His low, musical laugh was like a caress. “I thought Marie might choose the merchant, for a moment,” he said. “But she doesn’t. How did you come up with her beautiful speech to Francois? You said you’ve never been in love.”
“But I can imagine it, thanks to you.” When his face registered shock, she hastily added, “Because of our lessons, I mean.”
Peter stared at her, and her heart knocked clumsily in her chest. She could hear his breathing, quick and shallow. He looked uncertain, as if there were a question between them that he couldn’t puzzle out. She waited patiently, knowing there was nothing he could ask that she wouldn’t answer, nothing he might want that she wouldn’t happily give. But in the end, he only let out a ragged sigh and kissed her.
His kiss was shy, as if it were the first time, as if they had not spent the last month kissing each other senseless on every surface in the library. His lips brushed hers, soft and tentative. She put a hand on his cheek, and he leaned into her touch. He kissed the corner of her mouth, then pulled away, his face still cradled in her palm.
“Will you do something for me?” His voice was hushed as he reached out to touch the twisted knot of her hair. “Take out the pins?”
Heloise sat up and pulled the hairpins from her coiffure while Peter watched, hypnotized. Her hair was nothing special, stick-straight and a light shade of brown. She let it fall down her back and shoulders, a little self-conscious at the showy gesture. Peter reached out and gathered it up, letting the locks slide between his fingers as if they were raw silk. He looked at her, his hands full of her hair, his face a portrait of naked longing.
“You’re so beautiful.” He touched her hair to his lips.
It wasn’t true, but she could tell he believed it. It was in his heavy-lidded eyes, his choked voice, his careful, reverent touch. He was different tonight, vulnerable somehow, and she didn’t know whether to be gratified or concerned. She took his dear, handsome face in her hands, set her thumbs along his ridiculous cheekbones, and kissed him.
Peter seemed to forget some of his timidity and reached for her over the mountain of cushions. They struggled to draw closer, pushing aside blue and white striped pillows, and tangling in Heloise’s voluminous skirts. When she shifted to put her arms around him, Heloise’s knee connected solidly with Peter’s ribs. He let out a soft ‘oof,’ curling around her and gasping a laugh into her shoulder. Then Peter took her hands and tugged her down beside him. He laid them face to face, her back to the window, his to the open library. His arm came to rest on her shoulder, heavy and warm. Their chests and bellies pressed together, their breaths mingling. Heloise’s hair drifted over them like a gentle sheet of summer rain. They kissed lazily, lashes occasionally tickling the other’s face.
“Is it always like this?” Heloise kept her voice to a whisper. She propped her head against her arm, breath puffing over Peter’s chin. “With others, I mean.”
She was trying to determine how foolish she was being. She had no basis of comparison or experience on which to draw. She only knew that she felt changed in body and soul. His kisses had brought her to life, awakening desire like flowers bursting through winter soil. His company made her wonder, for the first time in years, if she were truly better off alone.
Peter didn’t answer, only rubbed slow circles on her back. To him, this was likely a commonplace affair, something to be enjoyed and then left behind. But she knew that once he was gone, she would see him everywhere; the vacant window box, the empty chair across from her, on every unwritten page in all the years ahead. Somehow, despite all of her careful notes and years of scholarship, she had fallen into the oldest trap in the world. He would haunt her forever, and she would be glad of it.
Heloise felt the overwhelming need to be as near to him as possible. She slung her leg over his hip, scooting closer until there was no space between them at all. She closed her eyes, and Peter dropped feather-light kisses on the trembling lids. She buried her face in his neck, inhaling the scent of shaving soap and whatever it was that made him smell like himself.
Peter stroked her hair, and she grew drowsy. The cushions were soft against her back, and she couldn’t remember ever being so content as she was at that moment, held against Peter’s chest with her fingers tangled in his shirt. She felt safe, and cared for, and known. Peter murmured something, her name, perhaps, but she was already dozing. They fell asleep in each other’s arms on the reading bench, and that was how Fulbert found them the next morning.