‘Now, Gerald.’ She reaches back and hands him the cream then leans forward, her hands on the dresser. Esmond can see the heavy curve of her breasts in the mirror, dark circled nipples, the beginning of a grin on her face as Gerald rubs the cream into her neck and her back. She lets out a long sigh, which begins as a shiver, and ends in a definite moan.
After a few minutes, she raises her head, stands up and turns around. Her eyes are bright, her hair falling in sweat-damp tails to her shoulders. She looks like a goddess, with her burnished skin and bare breasts, a dark Venus.
‘I think Esmond is the most sunburnt,’ she says, looking over at him.
Gerald grins. ‘I agree. Kit off, Lowndes. Come and lie on the bed.’
Stumbling, laughing, Esmond takes his shirt and trousers off. He lies down on the bedspread in his briefs, his face pressed into Fiamma’s pillow, smelling her scent and hair. The first of the cream is almost painfully cold against his skin. But then the hands, indistinguishable and swift across his body, begin to smooth and caress and he closes his eyes and gives himself over to the pleasure.
When he opens them again, he realises he has been asleep. The lamp is extinguished and there is only the low light of the moon from the door to the corridor. His briefs have been removed and his cock stirs gently between his legs. He is lying against the wall and beside him on the bed, Gerald is naked on his back, Fiamma pressing cream along him. Gerald groans every so often. Esmond lies there, hardly breathing, eyes half-closed, watching. Fiamma sucks in her lower lip, pausing when her hands reach the centre of Gerald’s body. Esmond realises she has taken the dress off completely and shifts to get a better look. She stops, Gerald turns, Esmond smiles foolishly.
‘I fell asleep,’ he says, but Gerald pushes a finger to his lips and then reaches across to kiss him. Fiamma clambers over to lie on top of the two boys and Esmond feels her fingers close around his cock again. She slides downwards, guiding him into the damp warmth of her and then it is just flesh and sweat and spit, the warm breach of a mouth, the slippery press of a tongue, hot breath panting, laughing, groaning. They melt into the sweating night and into each other. By dawn, they are nothing but husks of bodies on the bed, burnished with sweat, sheets torn to the floor. A jug of water lies shattered on the tiles, its contents soaking into the sheets. Fiamma sleeps with her mouth open, her head on Gerald’s chest, one arm around Esmond. Their limbs have been shuffled, redistributed; they might be one spiritless creature. The bells of San Gaetano chime for matins, but they sleep on in sluggard happiness.
19
‘Come on Esmond, up we get.’ Gerald has opened the blinds and sunlight streaks into the room. Fiamma rubs her eyes and stares down at the wreckage on the floor. Esmond stretches, looks over at Gerald, who is dressed and carrying a mug of coffee.
‘Leave us alone,’ he says, trying to pull the pillow over his head.
‘Not a chance. You and I are going to church. Bailey was a real brick to the old man while he was in hospital and we haven’t so much as glanced at him since. You’ve got twenty minutes to get vertical.’
Esmond bathes in cold water, his head pounding, mouth dry. He sinks down beneath the surface for a moment and blows bubbles out of his nose. He dresses quickly, hands shaking as he knots his tie. He looks into Fiamma’s room, whispers goodbye to her sleeping body and then walks down to meet Gerald in the courtyard.
The church is emptier than the last time, despite the worshippers from Holy Trinity. As he steps through the wicket gate and down the aisle, Esmond discovers in himself an affection for the gloomy place, for its tortured paintings. Gerald bows deeply before the altar, crossing himself, and then takes a seat near the front, Esmond beside him.
‘Love the decor,’ Gerald says, nodding towards the triptych. ‘Fucking terrifying. Just what you need in church.’
Esmond smiles. He makes a rough calculation: their combined age, he thinks, still less than half that of anyone else in the congregation. Bailey beams when he sees them, and Esmond senses a verve and bluster to the sermon, a twinkle as they go up to take communion.
During the slow, prayerful parts of the service, Esmond feels Gerald breathing beside him and, looking at the slim-fitting suit on his thigh, remembers his head in Esmond’s lap, grinning wolfishly; Fiamma perched above them, her legs apart showing slick darkness, swaying; he remembers how, at one point, the two of them had pinned him down, taken turns to have him inside them, Gerald letting a silver string of spit down onto the tip of his cock beforehand. He feels a hot rush to his face as he realises he must stand for the Peace and carefully adjusts himself through the fabric of his pocket. Gerald looks at him and grins.
After the service, they wait for Bailey while he and Reggie Turner clear up. Gerald stands looking at the triptych, a warm detachment on his face. Esmond lounges in the pew, longing for his bed, wondering what it will be like to see Fiamma again. Now Bailey bounces down towards them from the sacristy, rubbing his hands. Esmond had forgotten how big he was, how his body seemed out of place in the small, dark church.
‘How’ve you chaps been? Any word from your father, Gerald?’
They walk out and into the entrance hall with its faded notices and plaques.
‘I telephoned him on Friday. He says he’s better, although he sounded awfully tired. Gesuina tells Fiamma that the doctors are still in a dither. I’m going to catch the bus up there next week, see for myself.’
‘Why don’t you let me drive you? Always good to give the Alfa a run. Hold on a minute, Esmond.’ Bailey takes him by the elbow. He can smell the priest’s cologne, feel the strength in the fingers that close around him. ‘There’s something I wanted to show you,’ he says, guiding him up the stairs. ‘You come too, Gerald. It’ll give you something to tell your father, buck him up.’
They make their way up the stone steps and then along the corridor to the room overlooking the Piazza Santo Spirito. Esmond pauses for a moment, allowing Bailey and Gerald to pass in front of him. He thinks of the airless feel of Aston Magna, the ancient dust of his prep school at West Down.
‘Ecco là,’ Bailey says, opening the door to the studio.
Esmond steps into the room and lets out a gasp. The studio is no longer empty. A walnut desk, a pair of microphones. A silver cross-hatch BBC standard, a direct-to-disc recorder. An RCA sound-mixing desk and reel-to-reel electromagnetic tape machine sit on a chest of drawers. Against the far wall, hiding the mould patches Esmond had noticed before, stands a large cupboard with what looks like a transmitter. There are wires spewing out from the front, a series of parts, screwdrivers, spanners and a hammer on the mantelpiece.
‘What do you think?’ Bailey asks, smiling broadly at him.
‘This is amazing, bloody brilliant. How did you manage—’
‘Not my doing at all. Ada’s the miracle worker. She rounded up some engineer friends at the university. They did this for next to nothing. It’s her you should thank.’
Esmond runs his hand along the desk, looks at the reels on the tape machine, lifts the needle on the recorder, blows dust from the disc.
‘How fabulous.’ And then, grinning as it dawns on him, ‘We never have to see Carità again.’
‘Exactly.’
‘I must— Do you know where Ada lives?’