“Sir, it is the Signora Claire. She is ill, she is asking for you.” Foggi shrugged his shoulders apologetically.
“Wait outside a moment, Paolo—I will be there directly.”
Foggi left, closing the door behind him with exaggerated care. Shelley and Mary sat and looked at each other.
“He must have followed me on some prior occasion,” said Shelley, “and observed that I visit here.” He rose and kissed her hand. “I must leave you, but I shall return as soon as I can.”
Mary felt the baby flutter and kick wildly under her heart.
“No, Shelley, do not go. I feel unwell.”
“Marina, do not add to my distress.”
“Your distress? Your distress?” Mary exclaimed. “I have waited five months for you! Cannot Claire wait for an hour?”
“Marina, that is hardly fair,” Shelley began, and his tone of condescension only goaded Mary further.
“How dare you speak to me in that fashion! No woman on earth would have been so patient as I. Whilst I wait for you to summon the courage to tell your wife about me, I pay for the food your family eats. I pay for the roof over their head.” Mary’s head felt as though it was going to explode. She sat up on the sofa, her long-suppressed resentment boiling over. “Look at you, Shelley! You are no further advanced in your career as a poet than you were the day we met. Had you listened to me and done as I asked—”
Shelley stiffened, his hand still on the door knob. “You must forgive me if I reject your enlightened and zealous benevolence. Indeed, you are never deterred or discouraged in schemes for my advancement and well-being, but had you been placed in a situation where you might have understood, could you know one-tenth of the pain, and the galling necessity under which I labour—”
“You always tell me that I am the first in your affections!” Mary cried. “Why, then, am I always the last? Why? Would to god I were free of you now!”
With an effort, Mary rolled off the divan, snatched up a vase and hurled it at Shelley. She missed, and the vase exploded against the door frame, shattering into pieces and scattering in all directions across the polished floor.
For a moment there was silence. Shelley looked astonished at first, and then he scowled. “I had expected more of greatness and generosity from you. Here is an occasion which calls for the sublimest virtue, and you are playing a part of mean and despicable selfishness.”
She rushed toward him, ready to rake her nails across his face—Shelley opened the door and flew out—the door slammed in her face just as she reached it. Mary banged her fists on the door, giving herself over to rage, weeping wildly, huddling on the floor where Shelley had left her. She felt, rather than saw, the afternoon sun setting beyond the bay, and much later, she looked up to see the angry glow at the rim of Vesuvius.
After some time, she tried to rise, and was seized with strong pangs across her belly. She gave a cry of fright.
Her lady’s maid, who had not intruded upon the quarrel, came running.
“Madam?”
“Go to Dr. Roskilly’s surgery. Tell him to come immediately!”
The servant paused only to help Mary back to her divan and to place a quilt over her. Then she ran out the door.
Mary lay in the gathering darkness. Her flesh was taut against her belly; she rubbed the mound gently, willing the life within her to go back to sleep, to rest. It was too early, too early. She listened to her own breathing, to the pounding in her head, to the beating of her heart, and waited in dreadful anticipation.
The butler brought her brandy. She sipped several glasses and finally felt her body relax. She floated quietly, looking at the stars in the night sky, until the maid returned to her side.
“Signora, the doctor is not there. He has gone to another English lady.”
Mary groaned softly. Claire. She always came first.
* * * * * * *
Dr. Roskilly came the next morning, took her pulse, and spoke encouragingly, but advised her to remain in bed.
Mary preferred to lie on the divan, as the view from the drawing room windows was better. The dull pain in her back came and went with alarming regularity. “Keep yourself as tranquil as possible, madam,” the doctor advised. Mary feared that her anger toward Shelley might bring on an early delivery, and she resolved not to send for him.
Her first visitor of the New Year, to her disgust, was Shelley’s servant Paolo Foggi. The butler denied him, but Mary, hearing his voice, called to let him in. Her curiosity to know what was transpiring at the Shelley household could not be overcome.
She remembered Foggi’s elaborately servile manner from Bagni di Lucca. He removed his cap with a flourish, bowed profoundly, and approached her as though seeking an audience with an empress.
“May we speak alone, madam?”
“Do you have a message for me, Foggi?”
“No, madam? Who should give me a message?” Foggi said in an insinuating manner.
“What then, Foggi?”
“I came to see you for myself, knowing you to be the kindest, the most generous lady, to ask with all humility for your kind help. I am to be married, you see—and of course, one needs money to be married.”
“Well, Foggi, you seem to have forgotten poor Lucenza.”
“Ah yes, my dear little Lombard! Is she still in your service, madam?”
“Luckily for you, no. Was it you who stabbed her English lover?”
“Why—what did Lucenza tell you, madam? What did she say?”
“All right, then, I see there is nothing to be gained by asking you about it.”
“Indeed, madam. I know how to keep a secret. But, everyone at Bagni di Lucca thinks I am the one
