Secret of the Song

by Cathie Hartigan

  That’s what I was going to do, and had half raised myself from the sofa when the door of the cafe opened again and Jon walked in. He saw Daniela, she saw him. They didn’t see me. He smiled; she smiled. He kissed her on the cheek. I sat down again. His arrival was clearly not a coincidence.

  ‘So what happened?’ Sophie said, when I told her. We were sitting at Robert’s dining room table, although now that Sophie had commandeered most of the surfaces in the room with her bright fabrics and sewing boxes, it looked a vastly more cheery place. She was holding the fabric in place with the arm in plaster, and sewing with the other. I’d been called upon to thread the needle. ‘Has Daniela really got her teeth into him?’

  ‘Teeth and claws … it looked like it from where we were sitting. But …’ I had a sudden moment of horrid clarity. There was my friend with her arm in plaster and a house about to cost thousands, and I was bleating on about Jon and Daniela meeting for a cappuccino. Or a latte. I bet she had an espresso like Jon … aaargh! I shook my head. ‘Oh, Sophie, I am sorry. You should have stopped me. I really want to hear what happened to you.’

  ‘Me?’ she said. ‘Well, you know what they say about things being a recipe for disaster? Here’s mine. One ancient kettle left on the gas, loose floorboards because the boiler man hadn’t nailed them back, and one clumsy Welsh woman without her glasses on. See?’

  ‘Almost.’

  ‘It was one thing after another really,’ she said. ‘A sequence. I’d put on the kettle and gone away, only realising quite a long time later that I’d forgotten to put the whistle back on. So I rush in to rescue it, up comes the floorboard, I fall over, and the next thing, I’ve got a pain in my arm the likes of which I’ve never had before.’

  ‘Oh God, Sophie, you poor thing.’

  ‘I was screaming, I’ll tell you. Nobody’s about though. My phone’s in the other room, so somehow I get there and ring 999. But then, I’m clutching my arm in case it falls off and waiting for the ambulance, when I smell smoke.’

  I gasped. She nods.

  ‘So I stagger back to the kitchen, where somehow my bashing the kettle has knocked my music into the gas and it’s set my Noteworthy music on fire. I’d left it on the worktop, right next to it.’

  ‘Oh my God. What did you do?’

  She laughed, although I don’t suppose she did then. ‘Well, I turned off the gas, but you know how I’ve always got a vase of something on the table?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘your lovely roses.’

  ‘Well, I threw them at the music.’ With her good arm, she demonstrated. ‘The vase broke, of course, but luckily I’d just filled it up and there was enough water to put out the flames. It had only really caught the top piece of music. Funny thing that …’ She frowned.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It was that God-awful Gesualdo. Burnt to a crisp it was, but only the cover. The music underneath wasn’t even charred.’

  I let this sink in.

  ‘It was right by the curtains too,’ Sophie went on. ‘It was amazing they didn’t go up.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, slowly. ‘Amazing.’

  In the end, I didn’t tell Sophie about how Mollie and I retreated from Costa by way of the fire exit next to the loo. I was distracted by Sophie’s Gesualdo manuscript nearly going up in smoke.

  On the way home, I told myself that the cover paper was probably more flammable than that of the music, although God knows, it seemed unlikely. Perhaps her curtains were made of something fireproof. The frontispiece appeared in my mind’s eye. Ever since I’d looked at it through the magnifying glass in Signor Pace’s shop, I saw it with much greater clarity. And I kept seeing it. For a moment, I thought of when Mollie and I had watched Close Encounters, and how the people in it were inexorably drawn towards the place where the spaceship landed.

  My Noteworthy music was still in my case and as soon as I opened the front door, I just had to go and check whether the niggle I was having about it was true. The case was lying on the sofa with the flap open, spilling its innards. I thought of Sophie’s kitchen table again. The rose petals falling and the red spot on the cover. That uneasy, shivery feeling. The chill like an imaginary spider strolling across the back of my neck. I remembered finding the spot after that poor boy drowned. It seemed a mad connection but when I took the music out of the case, I realised how badly my hands were shaking.

  It was happening again, that feeling, only more magnified. There was a connection between the music and all the bad stuff that was going on. I held the copy in my hands while summoning up the courage to turn it over. Something would be changed on the front cover. I was sure of it.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Napoli 1590

  Don Fabrizio did return that same night, as I knew he would. I lay listening to their lovemaking and it sounded to me like the cries of agony rather than joy. Sleep would not come, as I started at every creak. It was a hot night and the sheets felt so damp that I began to imagine my throat was constricted, that my heart beat too fast, that I had a pain in my stomach. Perhaps the water in the pitcher did indeed contain something bad. The night bells tolled and I heard every one. Far away thunder rumbled and flashes of lightning lit the room. I shut my eyes tightly and pulled the sheet over my head.

  But morning did come and I dragged myself upright. When I opened the shutters, it was clear that a great deal of rain had fallen while I slept and I stood breathing in the new air for some time. Sparrows had taken up residence in one of the swifts’ nests just above me. They chirruped irritably then flew off towards the palazzo. The daylight lessened my night-time fears. I could be wrong about Laura, and the payment from Don Giulio was for something else. What did I care anyway?

  The pitcher of water still stood at the top of the stairs so I did not have to go all the way downstairs to fetch water for my lady. I was still alive with no pains, so it must have been sound. I took a sip and then a few more. The world brightened, and even more so when I thought of meeting Salvo in the afternoon.

  ‘Is Donna Maria really wicked?’ I asked him. I did not speak too loudly as we were sitting in the back of a wagon. Our plan was to picnic in the hills away from the noisy city, and we’d been thankful for a ride from a farmer on his way home.

  Salvo shrugged. ‘It depends. I’m sure the Holy Father would say so. But don’t go getting ideas, Silvia, it wouldn’t be the same for you. Besides …’ I felt his breath soft against my cheek and I would have had a kiss but the wagon rolled at that moment as we splashed through a puddle deeper than it looked. Instead, his nose crashed against my cheek and, laughing, we hung on to each other and defended ourselves against the toppling fruit crates. I was glad they were empty.

  It wasn’t so very far to the farmer’s home and when we clattered into the yard, a pair of geese set up a loud honking and a little girl of about ten ran out to meet us. She was very curious to find her father with two strangers from the city, and her eyes popped at the sight of us. At once I thought of my little brother and sister and felt horribly homesick.

  ‘Why don’t you tell Donna Maria you want to go home? Then you and I could go together?’ Salvo said, when I told him. We had found a grassy spot in an old lemon grove and the rain had either dried in the sun or never fallen there. No one had cleared away the fallen branches or the trees that had died, but there was a perfect place for us to spread the cloth I’d brought. ‘I would like to see my mother,’ he went on, ‘and I would like to visit your family too.’

  ‘Oh?’ I busied myself with unwrapping the bread and slices of roast meats that I had persuaded cook to part with. I wondered if Salvo wished to visit my family for more than a polite greeting.

  ‘I have to go away for a while,’ he said, ‘but when I get back we could go?’

  ‘Away?’ I said, startled. ‘Where are you going?’

  Salvo’s smile was shy, almost embarrassed, and my heart jumped as I thought all over again how handsome he was. Not in the same way as Fabrizio, who could crush with a gaze, a
s well as with his muscular arms, but I much preferred Salvo’s slender body and jaunty step. I loved the way his eyes twinkled, teasing and admiring me all at the same time. How I wished for the touch of his lips.

  ‘I’m going to Rome,’ he said, reaching up to pull down a branch that had a lone lemon amongst the leaves.

  ‘Rome?’ I was amazed. ‘But why?’

  ‘Why, Silvia,’ he said with a laugh. ‘You are full of questions as usual.’ He threw the lemon at me and I caught it with one hand.

  ‘And you are throwing things at me, as usual,’ I said, inhaling the fresh scent. ‘Now, tell me why you are going to Rome, or I’ll eat your picnic.’ I picked up a crust of bread.

  ‘Oh no you won’t.’

  Before I knew it, Salvo had leapt across the cloth and wrested the slice away from me. But it was the bread he let fall to the ground and not my hand. He knelt down and put his arms right round me.

  ‘I love you, Silvia,’ he said, pulling me closer. ‘You know that, don’t you?’

  ‘I do, Salvo,’ I said, in barely more than a whisper. ‘I really do.’

  Every bit of me wanted to say that I loved him too, but I had no breath for speaking with so much kissing going on.

  A rustle nearby disturbed us. We glanced up as a plump pigeon flapped overheard. Salvo toyed with the lace of my bodice. ‘Did you sew this?’ he asked and I nodded. He began to pull at it slowly.

  To begin with the lace became tighter and tighter, but then, almost with a pop, the bow came undone and my bodice loosened. ‘May I?’ he said, slipping my chemise down from my shoulder. I was only alive to the line of fire that Salvo’s fingertip was drawing down from my neck to where the fabric’s edge caught on my nipple. I gasped as he released it and then more so as he kissed it, his lips soft at first, but then with more urgency.

  I’d never felt such desire. Had I always lived in the dark? Here was a hot sun on my flesh for the first time. On a fine day, the finest ever day. Oh, Salvo, I moaned, hardly recognising my voice and feeling light as a feather as he wrapped his arms around me and lowered us both down onto the warm grass. There was a soft brightness in his eyes that thrilled me in a way I had never known before.

  ‘You are so very beautiful, Silvia. May I …’ he hesitated. ‘May I see?’

  Perhaps it was the contact with the ground that gave me weight again, and a thistle with sharp thorns that reminded me that a lot of pain and trouble can come along with pleasure. I pulled away a little and immediately he did too.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I … I’m frightened, Salvo. You are going away so soon, and for a long time. What if …’

  ‘I want you more than anything, Silvia,’ he said, and I could see very clearly that he did not lie. ‘But I will also never hurt you.’ He sighed but took my hand to his lips. ‘Have no fear. You will save your virtue.’ He paused, looked at me closely, and smiled with the old familiar and delicious twinkle in his eye, ‘We shall make do very well with kisses.’

  After very many kisses of all different sorts and in all different places, we lay on the picnic cloth in the late sunshine.

  ‘Rome?’ I said, suddenly remembering. ‘Why are you going there?’

  ‘It is Signor Carlino’s idea, although I must say, Signor Pace is not so keen.’ Salvo hesitated. ‘The thing is … wait, let me show you something.’ He reached across me to the leather bag he always wore over his shoulder and took out a paper. ‘Here.’

  I could not help gasping at what I saw. It was a frontispiece, an engraving – the sort I’d seen in all of Donna Maria’s books, but none were so lovely as the one I held in my hand.

  ‘But, Salvo …’ Suddenly, I was short of words. I was looking at a pastoral scene not dissimilar to the one we were in. A grove, but well kept, the trees hanging with plentiful fruit. Birds flitted about and sat on the branches, I could almost hear them singing. In the centre was a small choir, and I could see that the picture I held in my hand was reproduced in miniature for the copy that each of the singers held. They had an audience of both real and imaginary beasts and above the trees, angels cupped their hands to their ears in an effort to hear the music from below.

  Tears formed in my eyes. ‘Salvo,’ I mumbled, ‘this is so … so beautiful.’

  ‘Thank you. I’m rather pleased with it. Look,’ he pointed at two of the singers, ‘did you notice …’

  ‘Oh!’ I laughed and choked on tears all at the same time. ‘It’s you and me.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, pleased with himself. ‘We may never get our portraits painted, Silvia, but we’ll have our faces alive in this for some time to come. That’s if Signor Marenzio likes it, of course.’

  ‘Signor Marenzio?’ I said, impressed. The composer’s name was often mentioned by the musicians at the palazzo. ‘I’m sure he will. It’s nicer than anything I’ve ever seen, and it’s very much better than the one in Orlando Furioso.’

  Salvo kissed me on the nose and I inhaled the delicious inky scent of him. ‘You can keep that one if you like,’ he said. ‘I’d like to give you a perfect one but Signor Pace counts the pages and would miss one.’

  ‘But isn’t this perfect?’

  ‘There’s a smudge in that corner.’

  Then I could see, but it was nothing but a small blot. ‘I’ll treasure it,’ I said, and I held it next to my heart.

  We’d reached the same door in the palazzo through which Fabrizio came in and Laura had left. Salvo put his arm round me and squeezed. I couldn’t resist another kiss even though people were walking by. If there were sniggers, I didn’t hear them.

  ‘Let’s go in,’ Salvo said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I want to see Pietro.’

  ‘Pietro?’

  ‘You’re doing it again, Silvia.’ He shook his head and sighed. ‘What is to be done about all these questions?’

  But I could see the twinkle in his eye and I gave him a playful push, only to have him reel back as if I had used all my force! We both started to laugh. Perhaps it was the jug of wine we’d shared in the village the other side of Chiaia.

  ‘If you really want to see Pietro, then you’d better go through the stables.’ I pointed round the back. ‘That’s where he spends most of his time, and I heard this morning that Don Carlo is preparing for yet another hunting trip.’

  ‘Yet another?’

  ‘He’s always going hunting,’ I said, ‘and a good thing too. I’m much easier in my mind when he’s away.’

  Salvo caught hold of my arm again. ‘I hope you won’t be easier in your mind when I’m away.’

  I frowned and raised my eyes heavenwards as if wondering what to say, but then he looked so anxious I had to laugh and shook my head, smiling.

  ‘Of course not. I only hope you aren’t away for too long.’

  He sighed. ‘So do I, but I have been told that if Signor Marenzio wishes me to go to Florence, or even Venice, then I am to go. There are many composers that wish to be published and my job is to see their business comes to Carlino and Pace.’

  ‘Everyone will admire your work, you’ll see. Perhaps Signor Marenzio will give you all his madrigals to publish, then you will be back home in no time.’

  I left him then and climbed very slowly up the spiral stairs to my lady’s apartment. Donna Maria wasn’t there and I guessed she was at evening prayers. I didn’t care that I’d missed them. I didn’t care either that I would have quite a few little sins to confess next time.

  After a quick splash of water over my face and hands, I glanced at myself in the mirror and couldn’t help thinking that kissing did wonders for the complexion and brightness of eye.

  ‘Stop that now,’ I said, wagging a finger at myself. ‘Put the day out of your mind and pay attention to your work. Besides …’ A small frown creased my forehead and I looked away.

  I did love Salvo but I hadn’t been entirely truthful with him. It wasn’t only that I was afraid of conceiving a child that had made me draw back from him. I was a
fraid of the act itself, and how it might change me. Would I become like Donna Maria? Reckless and wild in my behaviour? Distracted and forgetful? That would not do at all. Not when Don Carlo held our lives in his hands.

  I went down to the sala and found Donna Maria not at prayers but with cheeks puffed out, full of almond lumbolls. No sooner had she swallowed one, than she took another from the bowl. It was a large dish and only a few were left. For a moment, I thought she might be with child, remembering her appetite from last time.

  ‘Have one of these, Silvia,’ she mumbled, whilst chewing. ‘I do believe cook has excelled herself.’

  I only nibbled the sweet, but the strong flavour of almonds and caraway burst in my mouth. Delicious, even though I didn’t usually trust caraway seeds. They always reminded me of mouse droppings and I often saw the flick of a tail in the kitchen.

  ‘Don Carlo is going hunting again,’ Donna Maria announced, in between mouthfuls. There was a happy gleam in her eye and once the bowl was empty, she stood up and twirled about laughing. I had seen little Margarita do just the same thing.

  ‘I’m glad, my lady,’ I said. And felt so relieved I took hold of her hands and we twirled round like children. Faster we went, throwing our heads back and letting our laughter swirl up to the ceiling. Only part of my joy was for Donna Maria, for I was happy in my love for Salvo. In the little pocket beneath my petticoat, I could feel the kitten and not my olive-wood swan but another swan, made of a smooth wood almost black. It was highly prized and expensive, according to Salvo.

  ‘Swans are very special,’ he’d said when he gave it to me. ‘Once they choose a mate, it is for life.’ Putting the two side by side, I saw they fitted cleanly, almost like the pieces of a puzzle. ‘See? They’re meant to be together. But for now, they must be apart. Here, let us exchange. It will gladden my heart when I am away to think how near you this little swan has been.’ He’d kissed my swan and made me kiss his. Then he’d kissed me very nicely indeed.