Ethan smiled smugly. “Somehow I doubt it. You’re going to stay here?”
“I’m at the hotel.”
“I won’t have it said I didn’t offer hospitality to my own blood.”
“Very well, you’ve convinced me.”
I took Philip’s arm. “Come on, I’ll show you around.”
The villa was small and it didn’t take long. Philip questioned me about my origins in the theatre and how I liked Italy. He was relaxed and humorous. I adored him from the first.
“Lovely house,” he commented. “Very congenial.”
“It’s lonely,” I said. “I’m glad you’ve come.”
He wrapped his arms about me. “It can be a cold world for us. It’s good to find friends.” He bent his head close to my ear. “There’s another anxious to befriend you.”
Ethan descended the stairs, dressed in a fine, dark suit. “Corrupting her?”
“You’d be disappointed if I didn’t.” Philip suddenly grimaced. “You aren’t wearing that? We’re going for a leisurely stroll through town to absorb the local color not a night at the opera. How do you expect to mingle?” Philip shook his head in disgust. “This hackneyed image, the suave aristocrat with the deadly secret— you’re not happy unless women drop at your feet as you walk by.”
“This is as dressed down as he gets,” I put in.
“Quick Mia, muss his hair, loosen his tie, make him appear a mere mortal!”
“Impossible,” Ethan drawled. “You’ll do nothing of the sort,” he warned me as my hand reached out to his freshly clipped, smoothly combed black hair.
“It’s so sexy when that lock of hair strays into your eyes.”
“He’s beyond help, Mia.” Philip offered his arm. “Come, we’ll have a good time in spite of Lord Ruthven. You must promise to show me the lifeblood of this place. He wouldn’t understand.”
“Ethan always knows where to find that.”
Our eyes met for a moment. Philip looked about to say something.
“See Philip, completely besotted, dull as I am.”
Philip stood there shaking his tousled head. “There are stars in her eyes yet. Wait until she figures you out monster. Lovers— how hopelessly banal— these dreary triangles, the old ones, the alphas, the little ones, all bound together in a ghastly morass of obsession.”
“Don’t you ever stop?” Ethan interrupted.
“Only at sunrise, when the cock crows, I cease to. We’ll take my car.”
“It’s a two-seater,” Ethan complained, as we stood in the drive, surveying the sharp little Bugati parked there.
Philip’s smile was all sweet viciousness. “Put her on your lap, I’m sure that she’s well acquainted with it.”
The saying is, “See Naples and die.” At this time, she was still badly scarred by the war, but valiantly rallying to her feet, with one of the most beautiful natural settings, yet the worst slums in the Old World. Crime was a way of life, commerce a bustling street bazaar of oriental proportion. The Greeks first settled in the hills above the bay, naming their city Parthenope after the mythological Siren. I for one appreciated the irony of the city’s origins.
We spent a lively evening in Naples at a jazz club with the loquacious Philip who, as it turned out was, in his former incarnation, an actor of Elizabethan vintage, which naturally sparked my curiosity. I asked if he knew Shakespeare and Marlowe, had he ever seen Gloriana herself?
Philip’s syllables came trippingly off of his agile tongue, “Why would a magnificent butterfly want to remember life as a lowly caterpillar? Bad food, plague, and cutthroats on the roads we traveled, not to mention the stigma of my profession— what did I have left— another ten, fifteen years if I was lucky? Brovik was a god. I’m eternally grateful to him.”
“He’s as much of a liar as the rest,” Ethan said, with a snide little smile.
“This is where your ravishing protector and I part company, Mia. He’s far too wrapped in his mortal raiment. Wear the mask by all means, especially if it’s so diabolically appealing in design, find the role you are most comfortable playing… ”
“The fool in your case,” Ethan said.
“Motley is the only wear. Give no offense— yet speak the truth. You’d be wise to follow my example, Mia. Ah, there’s that waiter again.”
We stayed out as long as we dared until false dawn lightened the sky, but still Philip rose early the next evening to go out. When he returned, I bounded out to meet him. He’d fed. His pallor was deeper, cheeks fresh and pink, looking even handsomer than the night before. The dark curls were neatly brushed, looking quite respectable by Ethan’s standards, but his suit was flashier, his