‘Not if I like them. Caradoc and Ma are family now, I’ll be broken hearted when they leave, which they won’t, as long as I keep producing large bowls of pasta!’
Luca parked in the square and led the children down the hill to the quay. Juno held his hand while Coco walked beside her grandmother, her eyes peeled for pretty shops. There had been plenty of shops in St Tropez. When they reached the trattoria, Rosa was on the terrace to greet them. ‘Buona sera, ragazze,’ she said to the girls.
‘These are my daughters, Coco and Juno,’ said Luca. ‘And my mother.’
‘Welcome,’ she said cheerfully. ‘When did they arrive?’ she asked, showing them to a table by the geraniums.
‘This morning.’ He followed Rosa across the flagstones. She was wearing a pink dress the colour of Coco’s toenails.
‘What can I get you all?’ She winked at Luca and added huskily, ‘Well, I know what I can get you.’ Romina shot her son a disapproving look.
‘I think ice-cream and freshly squeezed orange juice for the girls,’ interrupted Romina. ‘Black coffee for me and . . .’
‘Coffee for your son, with hot milk on the side,’ said Rosa.
‘She’s nice,’ said Juno.
‘She’s also unsuitable,’ said Romina in Italian so the girls wouldn’t understand.
‘I’m not looking,’ Luca replied. But he hoped Cosima would emerge with their order.
As they sat down, Luca’s attention was drawn to the other end of the terrace where a sultry looking woman with scarlet lips was smoking over coffee with a silver-haired man. He recognised her at once as Maria Friscobaldi. Sensing she was being watched, she raised her eyes. When she saw Luca, she smiled seductively, pausing her conversation a moment. Juno tugged at his shirt. ‘Daddy . . .’ she began. Maria acknowledged his daughters with a little shrug, took a drag of her cigarette, then rested her gaze once more on her admirer. Luca turned back to his daughter.
Soon Rosa came out with a tray of ice-cream, juice and coffee. She chatted to the girls in English, telling them about her children, inviting them to play if they got bored of being with their father. Coco admired her pink nail varnish and jewellery. Juno liked the smell of her perfume. ‘Yves Saint Laurent, Paris,’ she said. ‘One day when you’re a big girl, your daddy might buy some for you.’
‘How’s your cousin?’ Luca asked, tapping his teaspoon on the table absent-mindedly, trying not to look too interested.
‘Better,’ Rosa replied briskly. ‘It was good of you to come.’
‘How dreadful for you all,’ interjected Romina sympathetically. ‘I hope she is recovered.’
‘She is, thank you,’ Rosa replied politely. ‘Your son is a hero.’
Romina’s smile was genuine. ‘I know. I am so proud. I would expect nothing less of him. He is very instinctive for a man.’
‘Is she coming in today?’ Luca sipped his coffee.
‘No. She’s feeling better, but not up to working. Now, isn’t that a surprise!’
‘Oh dear, I sense a little jealousy. Sta attento, Luca,’ Romina warned. As Luca swallowed his disappointment he was distracted by a movement outside one of the small boutiques. It was Francesco.
‘Excuse me a minute, Mother. There’s someone I need to see.’
Luca strode to where Francesco stood playing with a yoyo. He was about to speak when Cosima stepped out of the shop. It took a moment for him to recognise her in a dress imprinted with little yellow flowers. She walked straight through Francesco.
‘Luca,’ she exclaimed in surprise.
‘Hello, Cosima.’ The boy had simply melted into thin air.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked.
‘I’m fine. You look . . . beautiful.’
‘Thank you.’ She lowered her eyes and Luca noticed how long her eyelashes were. ‘It feels a little strange, to be honest, not wearing black. I feel very conspicuous. It is better that we talk in private. Do you want to join me on the bench?’ She pointed to one that was empty. They sat in the sunshine, looking out over the little blue boats that bobbed about on the water. ‘Francesco would not want me to wear black all the time. He loved yellow.’ She lifted the fabric of her dress. ‘He’d approve of this.’
‘I don’t blame him.’ He wanted to tell her that it was because of Francesco that he had hurried to the boutique, but he hesitated.
‘Are you here with the professor?’
‘I’m with my daughters,’ Luca replied, pointing back at the café table.
‘You have daughters?’
‘Two.’
‘How old are they?’
‘Four and seven.’
‘Are you married?’
‘Divorced.’
‘I should say that I am sorry, but I’m not.’
‘I’m not sorry either,’ he said. ‘Not sorry at all.’
15
Luca brought Cosima back to the trattoria. The children had almost finished their ice-creams and Romina was telling them a story that had them enraptured. ‘Mother, this is Cosima.’
Romina’s face crumpled with sympathy. ‘My darling girl,’ she said. ‘I hope you are feeling better now. What a drama. You are so beautiful and young. It would have been a terrible waste!’
‘I made a mistake,’ said Cosima.
‘Those who don’t make mistakes make nothing at all,’ said Romina. ‘The professor told me that.’ Sensing something going on, Rosa swept out of the restaurant.
‘Cosima, what are you doing here?’
‘I was passing and bumped into Luca.’
Rosa looked stony. ‘You’ve barely touched your coffee,’ she said to Luca. ‘It’ll be cold now.’
‘Why don’t you get him another one?’ said Cosima.
‘You should both come up to the palazzo,’ said Romina, attempting to defuse the situation.
‘Of course,’ said Cosima. ‘I’m curious to see what it is like.’
‘Now, your father is Panfilo Pallavicini?’ Romina asked Rosa.
‘One and the same,’ Rosa replied proudly. That was something Cosima couldn’t lay claim to.
‘Why don’t you sit down and join us?’
‘Some of us have to work,’ said Rosa, making a face at her cousin.
‘Then I’ll get Luca another coffee,’ said Cosima calmly. ‘It’ll be my pleasure. Would you like anything else, signora?’
‘No, thank you,’ said Romina.
Romina and Rosa sat chatting together for an hour, their heads almost touching. The girls ran around the quay with the other children who played there. Luca wondered what Claire would think of them mixing with the locals. Cosima brought his coffee but was unable to join them, as people needed to be served. Rosa deliberately left her cousin to take all the orders. It was about time she pulled her weight, she thought. Toto appeared for the evening shift, a spring in his stride because his daughter was restored to him. His eyes took in her new radiance as if he had never seen anything so beautiful.
The girls had found a couple of skinny mongrels and were chasing them up and down the waterfront. Cosima weaved gracefully through the tables, smiling at the locals, accepting their compliments with poise as they told her how pretty she looked now that she was no longer wearing black. Every now and then she turned and caught Luca watching her and her eyes softened. He was grateful that Rosa was distracting his mother, so he could savour those moments.
‘Come to the palazzo with your father when he photographs it,’ Romina urged Rosa. ‘It would give me such pleasure to show you around. Bring your mother, too. I would love to meet her.’
‘I don’t think Mamma will ever step foot in that place again. She said it gave her the creeps.’
‘Oh, all that was a long time ago, surely. Do ask her.’
Romina called the girls and they got up to go. Luca’s eyes lingered on Cosima a moment then he was gone, taking her smile with him.
The following morning Cosima attended Mass. She took comfort from the embracing walls of the church and
the invisible presence of God among the flickering candles and iconography. Was Francesco there, too, as he had apparently been during the Festa di Santa Benedetta? He’d be nearly ten now, not the little boy he had been when the sea had swept him away. She couldn’t imagine him with big feet and long legs and a deep, gravelly voice. In her memory his skin would always be silky, more familiar to her than her own, his hair smelling of vanilla, his eyes gazing at her as if she were the most beautiful woman in the world. He used to stroke her face. ‘Mamma, you smell nice,’ he would say, winding his arms around her neck and nuzzling her like a puppy. Her body ached with yearning to hold him again, to bury her nose in his neck and inhale the scent of his hair, to hear his laughter bubble up from his belly. She remembered the white feather he had been playing with on the beach and the wind that had whisked it away. She remembered him wading out to retrieve it. She’d never forget the moment he had lost his balance . . .
She opened her prayer book and focused on the words as best she could through her tears. The church was full, the priest chanting in Latin, incense rising from the thurible. She had made a pact with God the day of the festa: if Jesus wept blood she would accept that her son was with Him in Heaven. If He didn’t, she would give herself to the sea because she couldn’t bear to live knowing that she would never see him again. How strange, then, that Jesus’s dry eyes had brought her Luca and a message from Francesco. God did indeed work in mysterious ways.
After Mass, she waited until the church was empty, then approached the table at the front where rows of little candles flickered eerily through the remains of incense that lingered in the warm air. As she reached for a candle she noticed a long white feather lying across the back of the table. She was quite alone. She picked it up and twirled it between her fingers. Was someone playing a cruel prank? Or was it evidence that her son was trying to communicate with her?
The priest walked down the aisle towards her, noticing the pretty cream dress beneath her black shawl. ‘Hello, Cosima, are you all right?’
She held out the feather, her hand trembling. ‘Did you find this here after the festa?’
Father Filippo knitted his bushy white eyebrows. ‘No, I haven’t seen it before. I don’t believe we’ve had a bird in the church and besides, that’s a rather large feather, isn’t it?’
‘Francesco loved feathers.’
‘Then consider it a message from God,’ said the priest. ‘Miracles happen every day, my child. Much of the time we dismiss them as coincidence or luck.’
‘Do you really believe that?’
‘Of course. If Christ had the ability to turn water into wine and feed the five thousand with a few fish and loaves, leaving a feather for a mother in mourning is a very small thing.’
‘Thank you, Father,’ she said, bringing the feather to her lips as Francesco had done. ‘I shall light my candle now.’
Father Filippo left her, confident that he had managed to return a lost sheep to the fold.
Rosa didn’t know whether she preferred Cosima in or out of mourning. When she had draped herself in black, slipping through the house like a spectre, albeit a rather conspicuous one, at least she had been self-effacing. Now that she was wearing pretty dresses, smiling, humming even, her cheerfulness grated more than her self-pity had. Rosa wished she had never invited Luca to the house. Whatever had happened up there in Cosima’s bedroom had had a dramatic effect. It would be intolerable if her cousin fell in love with Luca. He was out of bounds to her, of course, but if she couldn’t have him she was damned if her cousin would. If Cosima hadn’t been so foolish as to have given herself to a married man in the first place, Francesco would never have been born and all the drama that followed would never have happened. Cosima had only herself to blame. She did not deserve Luca.
It was night when Rosa crept out of the house. She loved the soft blanket of darkness, the silence of the cliffs, the gentle hiss of the sea below. Then she could imagine her life was different, the way it should be rather than the way it was. Valentina had shaped her life to her heart’s desire. Outwardly a simple village girl, she had been the mistress of the Marchese and the lover of the infamous Lupo Bianco. That was glamour. That was living life on the edge. She had had it all. Rosa knew she could have it all, too; times were different now and she had the guile of a fox. It was in her blood. It had been in Alba’s blood, too. But she had fallen in love with Panfilo who had his own unique blend of glamour and risk. Maybe if Rosa had found a man like her father, she wouldn’t be dreaming of a secret life.
The trouble was, her life here in Incantellaria was so limited. She had met Eugenio and he had seemed to embody everything she desired. He was manly, strong, handsome – a responsible policeman with authority – but he was never going to be rich. She should have held out for a man with the means to keep her like a lady. Now she was a mother, she was forever tied to domesticity. A brief affair had been an invigorating interlude and she was lucky not to have got caught. Luca looked as if he knew how to please a woman and his family clearly had money. She should have held out for a man like him, not a local policeman with a peasant’s salary. Then she could have travelled and seen the world, lived in London and Paris, shopped in New York and Milan, sat in the front row at fashion shows, worn the latest collections, been fawned over by Karl Lagerfeld and Dolce & Gabbana. Now she only glimpsed that world in the pages of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar.
When she returned home, Eugenio had not stirred. She climbed into bed and rolled over to face the window. She was twenty-six and this was her life. What was there for her to look forward to?
Eugenio opened his eyes and watched her breathing grow heavy as she slipped off to sleep. He wondered where she went at night, whether she was just going out for air or seeing another man. His jealousy mounted at the likelihood of an affair and his mind whirred with possibilities. He could confront her and cause yet another row, leaving himself open to be blamed for mistrusting her, or forget it and hope the affair petered out. He closed his eyes and prayed that she was innocent of his suspicions; the evidence was flimsy – nothing more than the result of a jealous mind. She wasn’t an easy woman to be married to, but he had no choice; he was bound to her by love.
In spite of Maxwell’s desire to remain at the palazzo, Dizzy was adamant that they leave. She had suffered him flirting with Sammy for long enough. Romina was pleased to see them go. Maxwell and Dizzy had outstayed their welcome.
‘I’m rather sorry to see the back of them,’ said Ma, as their car disappeared down the drive. ‘They had become rather fascinating.’
‘Any longer and I would have had to stand guard outside Sammy’s door,’ said Luca.
‘Not before Dizzy had put a knife in the poor child’s back,’ said his mother. ‘If looks could kill, Sammy would be dead as a doornail.’
Romina never tired of company. No sooner had she waved off Maxwell and Dizzy than her brother, Giovanni, arrived. Nanni was large and shaped like an egg, grown fat on pasta and cheese, with thin ankles that he showed off with short trousers and bright socks. Cancer of the throat had left his voice high and reedy. In spite of the disease, he smoked incessantly and refused to give up the foods he loved. His exuberance was irrepressible.
‘My darling Romina!’ he exclaimed, striding on to the terrace in a pair of scruffy beige trousers and a creased blue shirt. ‘Every time I see the palazzo it is grander and more exquisite. What it is to have a good eye and a lot of money.’ Nanni, of course, had neither.
Luca hadn’t seen his uncle for many years but Nanni embraced him as if he were still a boy. ‘Madonna! How you’ve grown.’
‘You sound like Mother.’
‘That’s hardly a surprise, we come from the same womb.’ Nanni sat down and helped himself to a bread roll. ‘Might I have a little butter?’ he asked Ventura. ‘And a large glass of wine.’ He already knew Ma and Caradoc. The three of them were like a circus act.
The children appeared, chaperoned by Sammy, who wore a sarong over her
bathing suit. Nanni adored children but was less at ease with young women. He ran his watery eyes over Sammy’s lovely figure and felt the sweat gather on his forehead in large beads. To cover his embarrassment, he turned his attention to the children, and soon had them laughing at his funny imitations and silly voices. Porci, who had taken a shine to the girls, snuffled and grunted around them, competing with their great-uncle for attention. Sammy disappeared inside to change for lunch and emerged a little later in a sundress. Nanni recovered his composure and after he had tucked into all four courses he sat in the shade doing the Times crossword with a large glass of limoncello and a cigarette.
‘The trouble is,’ Romina confided to Ma as they sipped peppermint tea, ‘my dear brother has a brilliant mind but a terrible weakness for alcohol and gluttony. He could have been a great man writing film scripts for the best Italian cinema, but he’s indolent and self-indulgent. Now he is old, it is too late. Look at him, that crossword bores him, it’s so easy, and English is not even his first language. He can speak ancient Greek and Latin as well as he speaks Italian, Spanish, French and English, and yet he hasn’t two pennies to rub together.’
‘I bet he used to be very handsome,’ said Ma.
‘He was divine, like a Greek god. But now he’s grown fat and has lost most of his hair. He’s nearly seventy; if he doesn’t watch out he won’t make seventy-one.’
‘What does he do with his time?’
‘Collects antique games. He has the largest collection of Tudor playing cards in the world. They’re worth a fortune, but he won’t sell them. He keeps them somewhere secret. He’s paranoid someone’s going to break in and rob him.’ Romina finished her tea. ‘Now, where’s my darling Porci? He’s as round as a football but isn’t eating his food. I can’t understand it.’
‘Let’s go to the folly,’ said Nanni, putting down the paper.
‘Have you finished that crossword, or shall I help you?’ said Ma.
‘I’m afraid I’ve finished. Perhaps you can check it for me to make sure I haven’t made any mistakes?’ There was a twinkle in his eye. Nanni didn’t make mistakes.
The Italian Matchmaker Page 15
