The Villa(44)
Is that why he’d suddenly decided to join them? Is he playing one of his weird little fucking games?
In that case, Mari isn’t going to give him the satisfaction.
She places her hands in her lap and faces forward, and if she hears a snicker from the backseat, she ignores it.
* * *
JOHNNIE HAD WARNED Noel to stay in the car lest he start some kind of riot, but Noel had insisted on walking the streets of Orvieto with them. He’s plopped Mari’s hat on his head, pulling the floppy brim low, and with Johnnie’s sunglasses covering most of his face, he’s actually fairly well disguised.
Or maybe it’s that Noel’s fame is beginning to fade. Because while heads do turn in their direction as they make their way through the narrow streets, Mari suspects it has more to do with Noel’s ridiculous getup than the locals actually recognizing that there’s an international celebrity in their midst.
“I’m not disrupting a planned romantic interlude, am I?” he asks Mari in a low voice as Johnnie walks slightly ahead of them, and Mari shoots him a look.
“Even if you were, would you care?” she asks, and he chuckles.
“I’m merely teasing, Mistress Mary. It’s very clear your heart belongs only to Pierce. Shame John-o there hasn’t quite picked up on that yet.”
Mari watches Johnnie ahead of them, sees the way eyes linger on his tall form, and shakes her head. “You’re wrong about him.”
“Am I? He’s been glaring daggers at Sheldon for the past week.”
Mari had noticed that, too, but she thought it might be more about Noel than about her. She still didn’t understand the nature of Johnnie and Noel’s relationship, and now, as Johnnie glances back at them, his eyes once again straying to Noel, she wonders again whether there’s more to the story than Pierce had suggested.
Noel reaches down, grabbing her hand and tugging hard, nearly pulling her off her feet. “Come on,” he says, and then cups a hand around his mouth and shouts, “John-o! See you back at the car, mate!”
Johnnie stops, his handsome face creasing with confusion. “Where are you going?” he calls back, and Noel holds up his and Mari’s clasped hands, shaking them.
“To hell!” he calls back, and then he’s pulling Mari down a twisting street.
The day has turned slightly chillier, clouds piling up thick and gray, when Noel brings them to a stop in front of a squat, circular building.
“Pozzo di San Patrizio!” Noel exclaims, sleeves falling back as he gestures up at the building, and Mari remembers Johnnie mentioning this.
The well named after a place in Ireland and said to spiral down into hell.
A shiver races down her spine that has nothing to do with the weather.
“Shall we descend?” Noel asks her, reaching for the door, but before he can open it, a man in some sort of uniform rushes forward, a rush of Italian spilling from his lips.
Mari can only pick up the odd word, but she knows they’re being told to bugger off, and she’s about to suggest they do just that, but then she sees the moment the man recognizes Noel.
“The Rovers!” he says in a thick Italian accent. “Rovers!”
Noel smiles, but it’s a little tight around the edges as he nods, and then makes an elaborate gesture back at Mari that has the guard—if that’s what he is—chuckling and nodding in that way that men do, and has Mari rolling her eyes.
But the door is opened, and she follows Noel into cool darkness.
It smells metallic, like earth and stone and water. Shafts of sunlight shine through narrow windows carved along the top of the spiraling path that descends into the side of the mountain. She can hear a slow drip, the slap of her sandals, and she wonders how many feet have walked this same sloping ramp, wearing grooves in the rock. How many people, long since dead, made this same descent. The thought seems morbid, but it comforts her, oddly. Especially today.
People are never just gone, after all. There are always marks, always signs.
“I have to say, this is substantially less dreary than I expected.” Noel’s words echo around them, and Mari snorts, poking him in the back.
“Less dreary than you’d hoped,” she corrects him. In the fading light, she can see him grin as he replies, “Guilty.”
It’s growing darker as they walk farther, the sound of water louder now, and Mari looks around, letting her fingers graze the cold walls.
“Do you think this really could reach all the way to hell?” Mari asks absentmindedly, and from just ahead and below, she hears Noel laugh.
“Depends on if you believe in hell, I suppose. I, for one, very sincerely and very obviously hope there is not one, but maybe we should cut this walk short just in case.”
“You just don’t want to walk all the way back up to the top.”
“If you were a man, I’d call you out for that.”
Mari’s laugh sounds too loud in this solemn place, but she doesn’t mind. She’s feeling better now, a little lighter. Her mind has started drifting back to Victoria, back to the book. Maybe she can use this spot, somehow. Is there a well at Somerton? Could it be a place where—
“Didn’t your mother write about Hell? Something about a demon?” Noel suddenly says, and Mari is so surprised, she nearly stumbles down the steps.