Chapter 15 #2
Too amused to hide it, he spoke quickly before she could get her back up at his laughter.
“I think that interpretation is possible, but it stretches the meaning of the text. The poet describes someone who isn’t the beloved of Aphrodite, but not necessarily someone who hasn’t been the lover of Aphrodite.
Of course, a person who is the beloved of Aphrodite would be aware of the arts of love and the sensual delights.
That would be true, in this context, regardless of whether or not the person learned them from Aphrodite herself. ”
He wondered if he had gone too far when her blush deepened. They were on dangerous ground. She swallowed, and—God help him—wet her lips with her tongue.
“So ‘the one whom Aphrodite does not love’ is best.” She seemed to seek his approval. “I think I understand the words so far, but the final line confuses me completely. When I look at it, I wonder about the entire poem. She talks about flowers and roses.”
“There is no ambiguity about the literal meaning of the words. They—the ones Aphrodite doesn’t love— ‘can’t tell what sort of flowers these roses are.’”
“She doesn’t mean it literally, though, does she? She says, ‘Nossis declares...’ What does she declare? That ‘anyone who is not the beloved of Aphrodite’—or isn’t Aphrodite’s beloved—‘can’t tell what kind of flowers roses are’? I don’t think she means it as a treatise on gardening.”
“No, certainly not. Nossis is obviously making a serious declaration about herself.”
“Is it about her life or her work?”
“Excellent question, Georgie. What do you think?”
She glared at him. “Teacher’s trick–putting it back to me. I take it you don’t know either.”
“Partner. My partner is as capable of reasoning that out as I am.”
She shot him a scathing look of disapproval but continued her analysis. “If she is making a statement about her work, then the ‘roses’ would be her poems?”
“Brilliant. Yes, they certainly could be. If you read ‘roses’ as her epigrams, what is she saying?”
“Unless someone is or has been loved by Aphrodite, they cannot understand what sort of poems she has written.” She frowned thoughtfully, and suddenly he saw her face light up. Georgiana, excited by new insights, captivated him. Her passion enchanted him.
“The beloved of Aphrodite would understand the arts of love. Unless you—the reader—understand the arts of love, you won’t understand my poems. That’s what she is saying!” She danced around him.
“Are you sure?” The teacher in him wouldn’t let it rest.
“What else can the roses be? If it is about her life, perhaps she means her children. ‘You can’t appreciate what sort of beauties my children are...’ The rest of the poem doesn’t follow then.” She thought about it silently for a while.
He knew he should offer some ideas, but watching her gave him pleasure; and the direction of his thoughts was extremely improper. His ideas about the epigram and about Georgiana were as erotic as Nossis of Locri probably intended.
“Perhaps she refers to the ladies of Locri.”
She shocked him; he couldn’t hide it. It amused her to continue; he could see it in her devilish eyes.
“If the ladies of Locri are roses, then no one who is without knowledge of the sensual arts—as someone beloved by Aphrodite would be—could appreciate them or know what sort of ‘flowers’ they are.” She peeped at him impishly.
“Have I totally given up all hope of propriety?”
“Yes.” He schooled his features to disapproval, or at least he tried to.
She laughed at him.
“But it is a pagan poem,” he went on. “You wouldn’t expect it to be entirely proper for a sheltered English maiden.”
“Maiden Aunt, I fear is more accurate,” she said in a huff, “and not so sheltered!”
He didn’t speak. He thought of all the things she still had to learn and allowed realization to grip her.
“Could Nossis be referring in some fashion to herself?” Her eyes lit up with awareness.
The light in them held him fast. Georgie learned quickly. Monday’s lesson in the sensual arts, brief as it was, had already broadened her vision of the poems.
“She could.” He swallowed before he continued. “What are you suggesting?” He wondered if she could even imagine the imagery that poets used for a woman’s most feminine anatomy. Roses were the least of it.
“Perhaps she is saying that only someone really loved by Aphrodite would appreciate her own...” She groped for a word. He watched in horrified fascination. She was on her own with this one.
“...charms,” she said at last. “Her beauty? Her body?” She looked at him, challenge in her eyes and vulnerability in every line of her face and posture.
Andrew found reasons to study his fingers. He spoke very carefully. “Exactly how do you propose to convey that in English?”
“I don’t.” Her wicked grin was as unexpected as her answer.
She sobered and continued. “It is impossible to tell from the context which interpretation is correct. Nor could we express my suggestion about the ladies of Locri without the risk of communicating ideas that are mine and not hers. It is likely that the roses are poems, but I refuse to say ‘poems.’ I think in this case we will call a rose a rose and let the reader draw her own conclusions.”
“Our readers are to be ladies, are they?” He noticed she no longer doubted there could be readers.
“And why not? Perhaps married ladies will see one meaning and young girls another. Our choice of ‘desire’ for line one would undoubtedly set up a variety of interpretations.”
“Young girls?” He gasped. “Yesterday you didn’t believe our work would be printed. Today you think it will invade the school rooms of young girls. How likely is that?”
“Not very. Far more likely this work will never see the light of day in English. The more we go on, the more I wonder if that isn’t the safest result.”
“Are you losing your nerve?” Still wavering, Georgiana?
“Certainly not! Don’t look so hopeful. The works are what they are. These voices may not be respectable English voices, but they deserve to be heard as much as Sophocles and Euripides.”
“What about the folks who find any translation of the ancients dangerous to women?” He couldn’t resist provoking her. Georgiana, ready to do battle, her eyes blazing with determination, stirred him as nothing else ever had.
“Fools, every one of them. Foolish old men afraid of anyone smarter than they, anyone they can’t control.” She paced, a fury of movement propelling her across the room. Ten years of indignities spilled out of Georgiana in a flood, and desire raged through him like a pillaging horde.
“Men listened to Korinna in her lifetime, but scholars buried her work. Nossis, Anyte, all of them were pushed aside. Buried!” Anger gave way to anguish.
Andrew’s eyes prickled, and his throat constricted.
From the day he left her, Georgiana was pushed aside.
“Buried!” she repeated, and he had no doubt that was how she felt.
“Buried alive.” Her voice faded on a sob.
Rampaging desire laid siege to his common sense and set fire to his heart. He could only reach out, take her hand, and pull her close.
“We will finish it, Georgie. We will give them a voice.” He rasped out. He rubbed her palm with his thumb and drank in the blue of her eyes. Dangerous electricity filled the air of the workroom.
“Andrew,” she whispered. “I can’t bear it alone. I can’t bear it any longer.”
He froze at the sound of his name in her mouth. Her eyes were on his lips, and her own parted as if in anticipation. She wanted him. He could take one taste, one soft gentle brush of her lips. All other delights would come second to that.
He lowered his head and felt her sweet breath on his face. The lilac scent of her filled him.
She swayed toward him, almost touching. He released her fingers and ran his hand up her arm to cup her cheek.
“Door,” she breathed, voice husky.
The unexpected word confused him. “Door?” he repeated without taking his eyes from her mouth.
“It isn’t locked.” She turned her head to point it out. That small gesture broke the cord holding them. The door stood slightly ajar.
Dear God! A house full of servants loyal to the Duke of Sudbury and Andrew was ready to seduce his daughter on her Axminster carpet. Good sense flooded back into him, and he released her.
“Excellent idea, Lady Georgiana,” he said with unnatural force loud enough to be heard beyond the door. “If we’re to bring this project into a whole piece,” he continued in a voice so gruff it was as if the words were torn from his throat, “we had best continue.”
Andrew limped over to the table and put it and distance between them. He looked up to find Georgiana staring back, hurt vivid on her face. He turned away, but he could still feel her eyes on the back of his head.
“Record your proposed translation, my lady, and make notes for the commentary.” His words sounded harsher than he intended. He feared what she might say if he gave her the opportunity to speak.
Faint shuffles in the hall told him all he needed to know.
This house was not safe, not safe enough for a schoolmaster’s son to make love to a Duke’s daughter.
If he did what his body urged, her reward would be humiliation, harassment, and hurt.
He wanted to protect her from it even if she wouldn’t protect herself.
Andrew picked up the pen and began to write.
His entire body betrayed him. His eyes refused to focus.
His hand wrote shaky words on vellum, but his mind gave no meaning to them.
The rest of him, body and soul, yearned with an ache that destroyed all rational thought for the woman who stood across the room as still as marble.
Her indignation filled the air as thoroughly as her lilac scent.