A Theory of Love Read online

  Epigraph

  The World was all before them, where to choose

  Thir place of rest, and Providence thir guide:

  They hand in hand with wandring steps and slow,

  Through Eden took thir solitarie way.

  —Paradise Lost

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Epigraph

  Chapter One: Bermeja

  Chapter Two: Bermeja

  Chapter Three: Bermeja

  Chapter Four: London

  Chapter Five: London

  Chapter Six: London

  Chapter Seven: Sussex

  Chapter Eight: Saint-Tropez

  Chapter Nine: Fontainebleau

  Chapter Ten: Bermeja

  Chapter Eleven: Bermeja

  Chapter Twelve: Sussex

  Chapter Thirteen: Cala Blava

  Chapter Fourteen: London

  Chapter Fifteen: London

  Chapter Sixteen: London

  Chapter Seventeen: Saint-Tropez

  Chapter Eighteen: Saint-Tropez

  Chapter Nineteen: London

  Chapter Twenty: Tangier

  Chapter Twenty-One: Djemaa el Mokra

  Chapter Twenty-Two: Milan

  Chapter Twenty-Three: London

  Chapter Twenty-Four: Eastthorpe

  Chapter Twenty-Five: London

  Chapter Twenty-Six: Saint-Tropez

  Chapter Twenty-Seven: New York

  Chapter Twenty-Eight: New York

  Chapter Twenty-Nine: New York

  Chapter Thirty: New York

  Chapter Thirty-One: London

  Chapter Thirty-Two: London

  Chapter Thirty-Three: London

  Chapter Thirty-Four: Chamonix

  Chapter Thirty-Five: London

  Chapter Thirty-Six: London

  Chapter Thirty-Seven: London

  Chapter Thirty-Eight: London

  Chapter Thirty-Nine: London

  Chapter Forty: London

  Chapter Forty-One: London

  Chapter Forty-Two: London

  Chapter Forty-Three: Havana

  Chapter Forty-Four: Santa Clara

  Chapter Forty-Five: Havana

  Chapter Forty-Six: Bermeja

  Chapter Forty-Seven: Bermeja

  Chapter Forty-Eight: Bermeja

  Chapter Forty-Nine: Bermeja

  About the Author

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Chapter One

  Bermeja

  Twice the pilot dipped low and waved a wing to a fisherman who waved back. Christopher shifted his surfboard and stood it beside him. He watched the small plane disappear down the coast. He looked back at the fishing boats and sea that glistened as if cut from translucent stone. He remembered a retired sea captain telling him that he would always know where he was by the color of the sea. He said he could be blindfolded and dropped in any body of water and the moment he took off his blindfold, he would know where he was. The idea of color as a type of compass—a form of geography—had enthralled Christopher. The captain had been the caretaker of the land that now surrounded him.

  He heard the hum of tires on the river-stone road before he saw them—the hotel manager with a young woman in the passenger seat. They stopped to see if he wanted a ride. He had noticed her yesterday getting out of a taxi at the entrance to the small hotel. She was dressed in an ankle-length skirt and wore a fedora. Since his arrival in Bermeja two weeks ago, Christopher had watched crews from L.A. come and go—one for a photo shoot for an expensive brand of suntan oils, another for a bathing suit ad. There was something about her that made him know she was not from the West Coast.

  He angled his surfboard into the back and got in. “You look as if you’re going to give a lecture,” he said, leaning forward, looking at her blazer and the satchel she held on her lap.

  She shook her head and smiled. “I’m going to interview Paolo Pavesi.” Helen referred to the eccentric Italian financier who had spent the last two decades transforming Bermeja into a glamorous bohemian refuge.

  He nodded and asked her how long she was staying.

  “I’m leaving day after tomorrow.”

  Christopher asked the hotel manager to drop him off at Playa Azul, the small beach cupped between high cliffs a quarter of a mile south of the hotel. Helen watched as he took his surfboard from the back of the jeep. She could tell by the way he handled it, it was a familiar object. But if he had once been a surfer, he didn’t appear to be one now. He was lean and tanned, but his skin had not been punished by years and years in the sun.

  He noticed her watching him. As he thanked the hotel manager, he hung his free hand on the roll bar and leaned in toward her. “So, should we have dinner tonight at eight or nine?”

  She laughed and brushed the hair from her face.

  * * *

  Helen had not shown up for dinner, but the following morning Christopher walked down to the hotel and caught her getting coffee.

  “You didn’t show up last night. I waited at the bar for hours.”

  “I’m not so sure you did.”

  He mimed being stabbed in the chest.

  “I didn’t think it was a real invitation. I don’t even know your name.”

  “Christopher Delavaux. And it was. How about tonight?”

  “I can’t. I’ve been invited to a dinner party at Mr. Pavesi’s. At Casa de Mi Corazón.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “You might want to be careful.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, it can get pretty decadent around here.” He paused. “Or so I’m told.”

  “Really?” She waited for an explanation.

  “When you met with Paolo, how many young women were sunbathing nude? I’m guessing three or four.”

  “Four.”

  “Did he give you a tour of his house?”

  “He did.”

  “Did he show you his studio?”

  “You mean the room with the mats on the floor and the slits and small round openings in the domed ceiling?”

  He tilted his head. “Well then, I rest my case. So if you bring me along, I’ll look after you.”

  She bit her lower lip and thought for a minute. “Okay. Yeah, okay.”

  “Meet you here at nine.”

  “How do you know the time?”

  “I was invited, too.”

  He started to leave but hesitated. “I can count on you to show up this time?”

  “Don’t you need to know my name?”

  He smiled and shook his head.

  Chapter Two

  Bermeja

  Bermeja was the name given to the eight-mile stretch along Mexico’s Pacific coast halfway between Puerto Vallarta and Acapulco. Surrounded by a thirty-six-thousand-acre nature preserve, Bermeja was referred to as the land where nobody was born and nobody died. Protected by high cliffs and jungles and wetlands, it was often separated on its eastern boundary by flooding rivers. It was land that was so useless for agriculture that no roads existed before the 1960s. A Venezuelan family a century earlier had acquired the stretch of coastline as part of a complicated land deal. The third wife of Christopher’s grandfather had inherited much of the land, but when she died young without any heirs, her family reclaimed it. They had little use for the small house on top of a high cliff, so they granted their deceased daughter’s husband a ninety-nine-year lease.

  The next generation of the same Venezuelan family sold all the surrounding land along with the lease to Paolo Pavesi, who, it was rumored, had fled Milan over irregularities in the accounts of his family’s privately held bank. Whether he had to choose between going to jail or leaving Italy or whether it had been love at first sight or a
n unanswerable obsession, there was no question for him but to head west. With the ease of a chameleon, he anointed himself protector of the land and professed himself to be a picture framer on the grandest scale. After he had purchased the land of Bermeja, Pavesi stayed in the house granted by lease to Christopher’s grandfather as he and his architect made plans for others. A small number of houses were built into the sides of cliffs, with open-air palapas, curved stucco walls painted in bright saffrons, hot pinks, and ultramarine blues, and pools that did not interrupt the line of the Pacific. Over time a trickle of Europeans—the son of a famous artist, an heir to an industrial conglomerate, a rock star, a retired businessman turned philosopher-poet—followed and built their own houses.

  In appreciation for the loan of the house, Pavesi added a large palapa and pool to the Delavaux property. He christened it Casa Tortuga because, in the year of his arrival, sea turtles began nesting on the beaches and had continued each year since. No one could explain this change in the nesting habits of the turtles, but Pavesi took it as a sign that nature approved of what he was doing.

  * * *

  At nine o’clock, Helen was in the hotel lobby with the photographer who had been assigned to work with her. He had just arrived when Christopher pulled up in an open-topped jeep.

  “Helen,” he called. “Ready?”

  “How do you know my name?” she asked as she climbed in.

  “Bermeja is a small place,” he said. He pointed to lights at the top of the northernmost cliff. “See those lights? That’s where I’m staying—Casa Tortuga. Alfonso looks after it, and since I arrived two weeks ago, he’s been beside himself that I do nothing except read and surf and go for runs by myself. When you appeared alone—well, word traveled quickly.”

  She paused, recalibrating her assumptions. “So why are you here?” she asked.

  He explained that he was taking a month off between working for a New York law firm and starting an investment firm with one of his clients. “My mother used to bring us here. We stayed in the same place—Casa Tortuga—but it was much simpler back then.” He pointed back to the top of the cliff.

  “Us?”

  “My sister, Laure, and me.”

  She asked him if his parents were divorced. He explained that, when he was thirteen, his father and his father’s best friend were killed in a skiing accident. “They were excellent skiers, but they took risks they shouldn’t have. They were skiing off-piste and got caught in an avalanche. My mother wasn’t far away when it happened. After that she could never look at the color white without hearing the loud hissing of that avalanche. I think she started bringing Laure and me here because of the colors and because there weren’t any memories.” Christopher ran past words as if running past darkness.

  “We came here for years. It was the only place my mother didn’t seem sad. Back then it was all wilderness—no other houses except the shack near the beach where the caretaker lived. Laure and I would spend all our time with him. He would saddle up these wild renegade ponies and take us riding on the beaches, and we would disappear all day exploring in the jungle. If we got thirsty, he would slice open a coconut; if we got hungry, he would give us the meat of a prickly pear wrapped in a tortilla. My mother sometimes even came with us. She lived a very formal existence, but here—for a brief period each year—everything changed. This is the first time I’ve been back here since then.” He seemed to be talking to himself, as if he were working out something he needed to understand. He had never told someone so much about himself so quickly.

  Ahead the road forked. He shifted down a gear. “I think it’s this one.” He took the left turn and they climbed higher. “So tell me again, what brings you here?”

  “I’m here to write an article on Bermeja.”

  “For?”

  “The London Sunday Times.”

  “You live in London?”

  “I do.”

  “Interesting.”

  “Because?”

  “I’m moving to London.”

  “Seriously?” She pushed back sideways to look at him. She was not certain he was telling the truth.

  “It’s where we’re locating our business.”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, you know, halfway between the U.S. and China, most European cities are an hour or two away.” He stopped in front of gateposts made from tree trunks. Beyond was a pathway lit by candles in large glass cylinders.

  “I think this is the entrance. Look familiar?”

  “Yes, but it’s hard to tell at night.”

  “Did Paolo show you the hanging bridge?” Christopher referred to the rope bridge that hung from the top of the cliff where Pavesi’s house was located to the equally high, rocky island some three hundred feet away.

  “He did, but we didn’t go on it. It looked dodgy. It was windy and it was swaying back and forth.”

  “You should have. The island is extraordinary—like one of those tepuis in South America except this one is covered in wild tropical trees. If it hadn’t been so difficult to get to, Paolo would have built his house there.”

  As they turned in to the entrance, a man they presumed to be the majordomo approached and spoke to Christopher in Spanish. Christopher thanked him and backed up to change directions.

  * * *

  “The dinner party’s been switched to Playa Azul,” he said, lifting his chin in the direction of the man with whom he had just been speaking. “He said a large group from Madrid who are staying down the coast were added at the last moment. So Paolo moved the party to the beach.”

  “Where is Playa Azul?”

  “It’s the beach where you dropped me off yesterday—south of the hotel.”

  He drove even more slowly down the twisting road, testing his brakes before each curve, listening for cars.

  “So is it true what they say about Mr. Pavesi?”

  “About his being involved in financial scandal and fleeing Italy to avoid jail? Who knows. I’ve never looked into it. This is the first time I’ve met him. But you know, sometimes when someone does something remarkable, especially if it’s unusual, people like to find explanations that diminish the achievement—often with tinges of impropriety. Maybe it’s an oblique form of jealousy. When I first came here over twenty-five years ago, there was nothing—no electricity, barely any roads. It was rough. When I heard he had bought all this land, I assumed it would be destroyed by development, but just the opposite has happened. He’s been a wonderful protector—he’s created his own version of Sacro Bosco. If this place had fallen into the wrong hands, it would have been destroyed. So I find it hard to believe that someone who loves this place, loves beauty as much as Paolo does, could be all bad.”

  Helen noticed that Christopher had a way of letting a sentence slide to a stop to indicate the end of the discussion.

  “Are all the interiors of the houses painted the same as Mr. Pavesi’s?”

  “Every one that I’ve seen. Of the thirteen houses, I’ve been in—I don’t know—maybe five or six. Paolo decided that only colors found in the landscape could be used. That’s why everything seems so harmonious. The interiors are designed to be as continuous as possible with the natural world. The blue of the ocean, the pink of the bougainvillea, the yellow of the sun—are all brought inside. He designed the houses never to lose contact with the sun or the ocean breezes or the night sky. That’s why no house has paned windows, just openings. He and his architect spent months on-site recording the way the winds blow, where the sun sets, where the constellations in the night sky appear, before deciding exactly where to position each house. That’s why in every room, there’s always a breeze and no opening gets too much sun. Paolo deserves all the credit for this place—there are no big boats or landing strips for private jets. It mainly attracts rich artists and wealthy Europeans who want a break from people.” He pulled close to the side of the road to let an approaching car pass. “So how’s the article coming?”

  “Good. I think I’m getting what I
need.”

  “Did Paolo show you the shrine to the sun?”

  “The shrine to the sun?”

  “The big concrete bowl that sits on the southern promontory at the end of his property. I’m surprised he didn’t show it to you. Definitely worth mentioning in any article you’re writing. It’s not that far—maybe a twenty-minute drive away. Do you write for the travel section?”

  “On occasion, like this one, but most of the time for the features section.”

  “Do you get to choose your subject?”

  “Sometimes my editor suggests something, sometimes I come up with ideas.”

  “So what was your last article?”

  “It was very short, just a column. The one before was on new trends in organic gardening, the one before that was—”

  “What was the short one on?”

  “Words.”

  “Words?”

  “Yes, words that don’t have counterparts in other languages—such as schadenfreude or enamoramiento or shi. It takes at least seven words in English to describe the emotion that the Germans can describe in one. English does not have a correct word for enamoramiento—it’s translated in English as an infatuation or obsessive love but neither one is quite right. Shi means waiting to do something at the right time. It’s the moment when everything is in harmony. Someone can wait all his or her life and never experience it. Chinese is the only language that has a word for it.”

  “So do you have a favorite word?”

  “I do.”

  He ducked his chin and waited.

  “Neverness.”

  “Neverness?” He rolled the word as if he were trying to find something underneath it. “Is it a word?”

  “Yes, invented by an English bishop in the seventeenth century. He wrote a dictionary of philosophical language, and he listed neverness underneath his entry for everness, which he defined as ‘eternity, for ever and ever, always.’ He left the definition for neverness blank. There’s no word like it in English or any other language. There is nothingness. Keats used it in a sonnet.”

  “Spanish has nadería.”

  “Similar but not the same.”

  “Neverness.” Christopher said the word as if it were breakable and he were putting it down on a hard surface. “It’s rather hopeless—the opposite of infinity—incredibly sad, don’t you think? Not sure I like it.”