by T A Williams
The road levelled out as she reached the top of the ridge and ran along between a high stone wall to her right and olive trees on her left, through whose branches she caught glimpses of Alassio and the curve of the coastline stretching off to the east in the direction of Genoa. The road grew ever narrower and a minute later made a sharp turn to the right and abruptly ended and she found herself in a small piazza, little bigger than a couple of tennis courts, surrounded by ancient stone buildings. There was what looked like a bar/restaurant in one corner, right alongside a tiny old church. A stone horse trough full of geraniums added a touch of colour to the scene.
Sophie drew up in front of a pair of ornate iron gates set into the same high stone wall she had been following. A discreet sign on one gatepost informed her – just in case there could have been any doubt – that she had arrived at the Castello, her Uncle George’s holiday residence. The wall and the gates were so high she could see no sign of the castle itself, which remained discreetly hidden from view beyond them. She turned off the engine and stretched. As she did so, she heard movement from behind her and, glancing in the mirror, saw Jeeves’s head loom above the rear seat. She swivelled round towards him.
‘We’re here, Jeeves. I bet you’ll be glad to get out.’
In response the dog shook himself, wagged his tail hopefully and gave his trademark half-whine-half-sigh, one of his familiar ways of communicating with her.
Sophie glanced across the square to the handsome clock set into the main façade of a fine old building directly opposite the castle gates. It read half past twelve. Her watch told her it was a quarter to four. She decided to trust the more modern technology.
‘Right, Jeeves, we’ve just got time to stretch our legs before four o’clock. Fancy a quick walk?’
The Labrador’s tail started wagging more enthusiastically as he recognised the magic word, so she opened the door and climbed out. The heat hit her like a physical slap after the car’s air con and she could feel the hot arid air dry her throat as she breathed in and coughed. There was a very definite smell of burning coming from her little car and her heart sank. Still, she reminded herself, at least it had got her here. She opened the tailgate and the dog leapt out eagerly, stopping to shake himself again before turning back towards her, front legs splayed, raring to go.
‘Come on, let’s go and take a quick peek at our new home before we have our little walk.’ Over the past year since getting Jeeves as a puppy, she had got into the habit of talking to him quite a lot. What he lacked as a conversationalist, he made up for as a listener, and he definitely knew the meaning of the words walk and food. He also probably knew the words stop it and get down, but his memory for these regularly failed him.
She wandered across the square towards the castle and looked around but she couldn’t see another living soul. This was no doubt partly because most sensible Italians were still resting after their lunch and partly because of the heat. She hadn’t needed the regular updates on the radio in the car to tell her that July was kicking off with a heatwave all along the Riviera. She felt sure the temperature gauge was correct in indicating it was thirty-six degrees here in Paradiso today.
When they reached the gates of the castle, Jeeves stopped to pee on an ancient stone bollard and Sophie wished she had thought of stopping at the last service station on the motorway to do the same – with or without a bollard. It had been a long drive. In fact, it had been a hard couple of days, driving down from England via the Channel Tunnel, stopping only now and then for fuel, food and to give Jeeves a chance to stretch his legs.
They had spent last night in a cheap hotel in a centre commercial outside Vienne, to the south of Lyon, where Jeeves had pleasantly surprised her by behaving almost like a grown-up – apart from an unfortunate episode involving him trying to hump the poodle at the next table at dinner. Still, she couldn’t complain, apart from the habit he had developed of erupting into paroxysms of barking every time they stopped at a motorway pay toll. Because she was driving a British-registered car, the steering wheel was now on the wrong side and she had to shuffle across to the empty passenger seat each time she came to a toll and this clearly bothered her dog. The series of pay stations around Nice had been particularly harrowing and his vocal accompaniment to her recent struggles with the self-service machine at the motorway exit here meant that her ears were still ringing now.
The castle gates were closed and locked but she managed to peek through the narrow gap between the gate and the gatepost and what she saw was mightily impressive. The castle was an imposing stone fortress, no doubt dating back many, many centuries, with crenellations on top and a huge arched doorway flanked by arrow slits at the front. It looked very old indeed and she hoped there would be internal sanitation and at least a few creature comforts. The idea of spending three months in medieval squalor did not appeal one bit – although she pinned her hopes on a wealthy man like Uncle George having made at least some modifications to render it habitable.
The castle was surrounded by a host of magnificent trees, chief among which was an absolutely enormous umbrella pine that was almost as high as the castle itself and cast welcome shade across the gravelled area directly below the main entrance. Just along from it was a huge fig tree, beneath whose broad leaves Sophie could see luscious figs just waiting to be picked and many more already littering the ground at its feet. There was no doubt about it: this was quite some place.
She turned away and accompanied Jeeves across the square to a pair of old horse troughs. The one filled with flowers looked delightful and the one alongside it was full of water, fed by a constant stream pouring out of a narrow metal pipe. The water was crystal clear so she let her dog have a good drink before heading over to a narrow track that led directly away from the castle in the direction of the sea. Within seconds, they were away from the houses and in the midst of a mixture of rough scrubby bushes and weather-beaten trees, their branches bent backwards by the prevailing wind over decades.
Today, however, there wasn’t so much as a breath of wind and Sophie was glad to be in the shade cast by the foliage around her. It was very quiet up here and all she could hear was the distant clucking of hens and the cooing of a pair of amorous doves somewhere in the branches above them. There was a heady cocktail of scents in the air, among which she identified wild thyme and rosemary, and as the trees began to peter out and she could look out over the open hillside towards the sea, she had to admit it was quite some view. It came as no surprise to see that the local council had thoughtfully put a bench here, perfectly positioned to take advantage of the spectacular panorama.
She suddenly realised that she wasn’t alone. There was a figure sitting there and the penny only dropped as the woman on the bench turned in her direction and rose to her feet.
‘Hi, Soph. Long time no see.’
‘Rachel!’ Sophie couldn’t get another word out.
She just stood there. Rachel was still unmistakably Rachel, although she looked, and of course was, six years older than the last time they had set eyes on each other. Her hair was still long, still that same lovely golden colour and still far glossier than Sophie’s had ever been. She had shed what little puppy fat she had had and she looked good, in spite of the wary expression on her face. It took some time before Sophie managed to kick her brain into gear, genuinely torn between screaming at her sister and hugging her. In the end she did neither.
‘Hello, Rachel. I was beginning to think I was never going to see you again.’
‘And you probably didn’t want to either, I bet.’ By now Rachel was bending down, making a fuss of Jeeves, who looked delighted to meet a new friend.
‘I…’
Sophie choked off the upsurge of emotion she could feel welling inside her and came close to going over and giving her sister that hug, but finally restrained herself. There would be time for reconciliation as and when they had had a chance to talk the whole thing through. So much had happened in both their lives over the interveni
ng years, starting with their mother’s illness and death. Instead, Sophie transferred her attention to the Labrador. He was a naturally friendly dog and normally a good judge of character so the fact that he was cosying up to Rachel was a promising sign. In fact he was getting very affectionate already and she stepped in to protect her sister’s clothes.
‘Jeeves, don’t jump all over her. Come here.’ She was pleased to see him turn and come trotting amiably back to her, tail wagging.
‘Jeeves – cool name.’
Sophie didn’t respond. She just glanced at her watch. ‘It’s almost four. We need to go and meet the lawyer.’ She slipped easily back into her big sister role and Rachel just nodded and shouldered her heavy-looking backpack before they set off together back along the path.
When they reached the piazza, they saw a middle-aged man in a suit hugging what little shade was cast by a branch of the umbrella pine that extended out over the wall. He was wearing glasses, carrying a briefcase and he looked hot. They walked up to him and he gave them a little smile and shot a nervous glance at the Labrador.
‘Good afternoon, ladies. Are you the sisters Elliot? My name is Massimo Verdi. Is this your dog? Is he friendly?’ He was speaking comprehensible if heavily accented English. Sophie could probably have saved him a lot of trouble by telling him to switch to Italian which she now spoke fluently after her years in Rome but, although their maternal grandparents had been from Italy and the girls had grown up speaking to them in Italian, she wasn’t sure how much her sister still remembered.
She adopted a reassuring tone and replied in English. ‘He’s very friendly, Signor Verdi, probably too friendly. I’m Sophie and this is Rachel.’
They shook hands, after which he removed a hefty bunch of keys from his briefcase and turned towards the gates. He inserted a long key into the lock and not without difficulty managed to make it turn with an ominous grating noise. He pushed, but nothing happened. He pushed harder, adding a hefty kick with his foot, and the gate finally swung open, producing an alarming screech of ancient hinges as it did so. Jeeves took two apprehensive steps backwards, pressing himself against Sophie’s thigh. He had never been the bravest of dogs. She gave him a reassuring pat on the head, and she and Rachel followed Signor Verdi into the gravelled courtyard. An intoxicating scent of resin and roses filled the air. Here, in the shade of the big pine tree, it felt delightfully cool after the blistering heat of the piazza and she felt a smile forming on her lips.
Half a dozen stone steps led up to the imposing front door which was set back inside the arched entranceway. All the way along the front of the castle were shrubs and plants as varied as cactus, palms and a spectacular display of roses, most smothered in aromatic blooms. The flowerbeds had been meticulously maintained and, although the main gates didn’t appear to have been used for some time, it was clear that somebody had been coming to look after the plants. Presumably this meant there was another access to the property. Sophie was pleasantly surprised to find the garden so well cared for. She had never been interested in that sort of thing and didn’t really want to have to start getting involved in it in a temperature of thirty plus degrees. Thinking back on it, gardening had been one of Rachel’s interests as a girl – along with boys, of course.
‘Ladies, if you would like to follow me…’
Sophie looked back to see that Signor Verdi had already managed to open the massive wooden front door a lot more easily than the gates, and that was a relief. She glanced across at Rachel and indicated to her to go ahead but, as it turned out, the first across the threshold after the lawyer was Jeeves, followed by the two sisters.
They found themselves in a large, dark hallway with huge flagstones covering the floor. A couple of full suits of armour against the walls added a rather intimidating feel to the place and Sophie and Rachel exchanged apprehensive glances. It was like stepping back into a bygone age and the initial impression was more daunting than welcoming.
‘The living room’s through here.’
Evidently Signor Verdi knew his way around the castle. Rachel shrugged off her hefty backpack and left it in the hall before they followed him through a pair of double doors into a large room with a high, vaulted ceiling. It was equally dark in there but as Sophie and Rachel stood apprehensively by the doorway, Signor Verdi went around opening windows and pushing the shutters outwards so that more and more light gradually filtered into the room through the narrow openings. As for the contents of the room, these were also rather disconcerting. The various pieces of furniture had been covered with white cotton dustsheets, creating strange amorphous shapes. It looked spooky in the half-light and Sophie made a resolution not to come in here at night – or at least not until the furniture had been uncovered. Hopefully the rest of the castle would be a bit less scary.
After opening the windows, the lawyer busied himself pulling the dustsheets to one side so as to reveal a set of comfortable-looking leather armchairs with an antique coffee table positioned in the midst of them. He laid the covers carefully onto the stone floor and indicated they should take a seat. Sophie and Rachel chose armchairs side-by-side facing him while Jeeves plonked himself happily on the pile of dustsheets, raising a little cloud of dust as he did so and sneezing as a result.
‘Welcome to Paradiso castle.’ The lawyer set his briefcase down on the table and his face adopted a formal expression. ‘In accordance with the instructions left to me by your uncle, I now have to explain the exact conditions surrounding his bequest to you. Have you any initial questions or shall I proceed?’
Sophie glanced across at Rachel who gave a little shrug and a shake of the head.
‘Please continue, Signor Verdi.’
He opened his briefcase and pulled out a thin file. ‘First, merely as a formality, please could you both confirm your dates and places of birth?’ They both did so and Sophie saw him do a bit of mental arithmetic. ‘So, Sophie, you were twenty-nine in April and you, Rachel, are twenty-seven and you’ll be twenty-eight on the first of October?’ They both nodded and he reached for the file in front of him. From it, he extracted a single sheet of paper. ‘This is a letter from your Uncle George to you both and I’m instructed to read it to you. I must assure myself that you understand the full implications and obligations outlined in it, and then give you each copies to be signed and returned to me for my files. You should be aware that you are about to enter into a serious legal undertaking. Is that clear?’
Sophie and Rachel’s eyes met for a moment. Implications, obligations and legal undertakings sounded ominous, but neither of them commented. Taking this as consent, the lawyer reached for his reading glasses and read the letter out loud to them. It was dated February of that year and Uncle George had written it shortly after having been handed his terminal diagnosis. It wasn’t long, but it contained three main criteria to be observed.
The first – which Sophie, and presumably Rachel, already knew – was potentially the trickiest. The two of them had to live together in the castle for three full months, until midnight on the thirtieth of September, the day before Rachel’s birthday. Whether this date had deliberately been chosen by their uncle because it was directly prior to her birthday wasn’t stipulated but Sophie wouldn’t have been surprised. He had always remembered their birthdays and marked them with a card and a gift. By the sound of it, this year’s gift was going to be way bigger than anything he had given them before. The onus was on both of them to observe this cohabitation stipulation rigorously. If either of them wavered – even missing one single day – both of them would lose any chance of ownership of the property. In order to guarantee they adhered to this, one of the boffins in one of Uncle George’s highly successful companies had come up with an ingenious solution as the lawyer explained.
‘In this digital age, your uncle has devised a way of ensuring you abide by his instructions. Upstairs on the first floor you’ll find his study. In there is a computer with a touch screen, on which there is a special app. Every day you must b
oth lay your hands on the screen at the same time to prove that you are indeed here and together. No exceptions will be permitted, for whatever reason. He was adamant about this. In a moment we can go upstairs and try it out, but first I need to know that this is quite clear.’
Once again the two sisters exchanged glances. Uncle George was taking no chances. They both nodded to the lawyer.
The second stipulation consisted of a list of works that needed to be carried out on the castle before the end of their stay, ranging from selecting and arranging installation of new kitchen units and appliances, to remedial work on the lead flashings around the chimneys, repairing crumbling stone arches, and a number of other tasks, including sifting through the bric-a-brac on the uppermost floor, disposing of anything unwanted and selling anything of value. Sophie nodded slowly. It was inevitable that an ancient place like this would have no shortage of repairs to be undertaken and junk accumulated over the centuries to be sorted. Presumably this was some sort of test of their initiative to see if they could be trusted to look after the property and, of course, a necessary preparation for the day when the castle could hopefully be put up for sale. She nodded to Signor Verdi.
‘We have three full months to get the work done, so I don’t see any great problems there.’
He nodded but added a word of caution. ‘Good, but be aware that many businesses here in Italy close down for all or part of August, so do plan accordingly. Again, satisfactory completion of these tasks forms an integral part of the agreement.’
Finally, they had to oversee the harvesting of the grapes in the castle vineyard, the production of this year’s wine, and the donation of fifty litres of last year’s red to the local church. That, too, seemed fairly straightforward on the face of it – the letter said oversee, after all, not do all the work themselves. Both of them assured the lawyer they were happy to comply with the full complement of points their uncle had laid out.
