Three Days in Florence

by Chrissie Manby

‘Judging by the message, I guess his wife got into his Tinder account.’

  Kathy’s eyes widened.

  ‘I didn’t know he was married. He said he was divorced.’

  Kathy nodded in sympathy. ‘I’ve been there. Many times.’

  ‘Internet dating makes you start to lose faith in humankind, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Just a small section of mankind,’ said Kathy.

  ‘Still, I’m sure I had much more fun at home tonight than I would have had on any date. I didn’t even really like the look of the guy. His pictures were all of him posing in front of the bathroom mirror with his top off. Like pecs can make up for personality. The toilet in the background was a metaphor. I was just going on a date because I thought I should.’

  ‘Because you thought you should?’

  ‘Because my mother worries that Manu has no male role model. Apart from my brother, of course, and you’ve seen what an old misery guts he is. She also worries that there will be no one to take care of me when I’m old. I’ve told her that Manu will be like Henry. He’ll take care of me. He’ll never leave home. Not that I would wish that upon my boy.’

  ‘I don’t think I would ever leave home if I lived here.’

  ‘Oh, I left as soon as I could,’ said Carla. ‘At eighteen years old, I was out of this place and off to London. I was fed up with my parents’ collection of waifs and strays. As a teenager, I really didn’t appreciate having to spend every weekend with a bunch of nutty old people. I wanted the bright lights and the big city and people my own age. The minute I’d saved up enough cash, I was on a plane. I ran away … Where do people run away to when they already live in London?’ Carla mused.

  ‘Florence,’ said Kathy. ‘Like your mum did.’

  They chinked their glasses to toast that idea.

  ‘So, you ran away but your brother stayed here in Italy?’ Kathy asked.

  ‘No. He left too. The week after he finished school. But he went much further than I did. He went to the States to make his fortune as a musician. He was in a band. They had a deal, though nothing really came of it. But when they broke up, he was in big demand as a session player. He went on tour with loads of huge names.’

  Hence the festival passes in his room.

  ‘He flew round the world first class, stayed in some amazing places, played on loads of tracks you’d definitely have heard. He wrote some songs too, for other artists. And advertising jingles. Made quite a bit of money from that. When he wasn’t on tour, he lived in New York. He had a great apartment there in the Meatpacking District. Really impressive. He was going to buy a bar with his best friends.’

  ‘So why did he come back?’

  Carla took a big slug of wine. ‘I don’t suppose he’d mind me telling you. He came back because our father died. This was three years ago. Henry was going to come back that summer for the first time in ages with his new girlfriend Amy. The way Henry told it, she was the most beautiful woman ever to walk the earth. The kindest. The cleverest. The sweetest. We were looking forward to meeting her. It sounded like she might be “the one”.’ Carla made little quotation marks with her fingers in the air. ‘Though Mamma was starting to worry that if Henry married an American she would never see her grandchildren. Anyway, a meet-the-family trip was planned for the summer but Papa died at the end of April. It was quite sudden, though in retrospect, knowing what I know now, I think it was only sudden to Mamma, Henry and me because we didn’t understand what had been going on behind the scenes. Papa seemed healthy for his age but he was under a lot of pressure.’

  ‘From what?’

  ‘From this …’ Carla waved her hand to encompass the house behind them and the dark garden on the other side of the wall. ‘The whole Innocenti myth. Deus ope, manus mea. My father loved the idea of being part of this noble ancient family. He truly felt himself to be a proper descendant of all those sour-faced old men and women who used to line the walls of the great hall. He wanted to be like them. He wanted to carry on the old traditions. The generosity, the charity, the largesse. But after the Second World War the family didn’t have the money it used to have. Papa’s father – my grandfather – sold off the country house. My father had to sell the palazzo. That was a great source of shame to him. But he continued to be more generous than he could afford to be, and by the time Papa died, he had racked up such huge debts that this place, the gatehouse, was in danger too.’

  Carla looked up at the walls of her home, which seemed so solid and so eternal. Kathy commented as such.

  ‘Believe me, it was falling down. Still is. Anyway, Henry came back from New York for Papa’s funeral, but as soon as he got here, he knew he’d have to stay at least for a little while. Mamma was in pieces. She’d just lost the love of her life. She could barely dress herself. There was no way she could be expected to deal with the business side of Papa’s death as well as the huge hole in her heart. And there was the hotel to run. So, Henry took over the practical side and little by little he uncovered a mess far greater than we had ever imagined. The only way to get out of it would be by selling this place. Or by Henry abandoning the idea of his club in New York and using the money he’d saved to patch it up instead.’

  Carla’s eyes went misty at the memory of that time.

  ‘Henry knew as well as I did that asking Mamma to leave her home of forty years might be the end of her. Instead he sacrificed all he had dreamed of so that Mamma – and Manu and I, as it worked out – could stay here.’

  ‘I had no idea,’ said Kathy.

  ‘Why would you? It’s not something he would ever talk about to someone he’s known just a few days. Especially since it turned out to be a bigger sacrifice than he’d originally thought.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘Well, Amy – the fabled girlfriend – came over with him for the funeral, of course. I think she was quite taken by the idea of moving to Italy and becoming the chatelaine of a palazzo. When she realised that the palazzo had been sold long ago, and all that was left was a one-star hotel full of down-and-outs in a crumbling gatehouse, she was suddenly a lot less excited. Especially when Henry told her he was going to have to sell the New York apartment as well as give up on the club.’

  ‘Did she go back to the States without him?’

  ‘Not immediately, no. While she was staying here, the palazzo was under renovation by its new owner, the Silicon Valley mogul. When Amy got wind of that, she would come out onto the terrace wearing floaty white linen, gathering huge armfuls of lavender, like she was starring in her own little film. Of course, she caught the dot-com billionaire’s eye. She invited herself to “consult” on his interior design, using the Innocenti connection as her USP, can you believe? Within a month, she’d thrown Henry over for this new guy. She married him. They had a huge wedding. We could see it from here. I was surprised Henry didn’t fire up the old Innocenti cannon and send a ball right into the middle of the party. Amy even had stationery printed with “from the desk of the Countess of Palazzo Innocenti”. Whatever that means. Look at this.’

  Carla tapped an address into the browser on her smartphone. It brought up a page from an online interiors magazine. ‘This is her. Evil Amy.’

  Kathy took the phone and had a look at the woman who had broken Henry’s heart. The petite brunette, who wore her hair in the sort of severe bob only someone with really delicate features can get away with, was pictured wearing a flowing white dress against a backdrop of flowing white curtains dressing a window that opened onto a soft green lawn.

  ‘That’s the ballroom inside the palazzo. She took out most of the distinguishing features and made the whole thing like a warehouse. “Sensitive restoration”. Huh! It used to be painted with a trompe l’oeil scene of the hills around Fiesole. She just slapped white paint over everything. She’s wrecked the place. I’m just glad Papa never saw it.’

  ‘She’s very beautiful,’ Kathy grudgingly admitted.

  ‘On the outside.’ Carla took her phone back. ‘Believe me, the
re’s a pit of greed behind those eyes. Look at her Instagram account.’

  Kathy scrolled through more pictures of Amy in white, gazing out over various views, interspersed with motivational quotes. Including ‘If you want to feel rich, just count the things you have that money cannot buy’ and ‘All you need is love.’

  ‘It wasn’t enough for her.’ Carla snorted. ‘I can’t believe Henry was ever taken in. As soon as she saw a chance to live the rest of her life in luxury, she took it. She literally jumped over the fence. Fortunately, she and her husband live in San Francisco most of the time. I don’t think they visited the palazzo once last year.’

  ‘I’m not surprised Henry’s sworn off women now.’

  ‘He picked the wrong one, that’s for sure. And he’s convinced himself that all women are only interested in money and he won’t try again. He’s got prickly since it happened.’

  Kathy wondered if Carla had noticed how odd Henry had been with her.

  ‘You’ll have to forgive him,’ Carla said. ‘He’s a true softie at heart.’

  So that was the story of how Henry had come to be living with his mother and his sister as he neared forty. Kathy felt ashamed for having thought less of him for his circumstances, given she hadn’t had any idea of the truth behind them. No wonder he was so angry that, three years after he’d made his sacrifice, his mother was still filling the hotel with people who couldn’t afford to be there, or people who could afford to be there but were squatting in his bedroom. And to have to wonder whether Evil Amy might pop up in the palazzo gardens gathering armfuls of lavender at any moment.

  ‘My brother drives me absolutely crazy but he’s the best brother a girl could ever have. Without him, I don’t know what we’d do. Any of us. Me, Mamma, Manu. He really stepped up when I left Manu’s father and had to come back from London. He practically saved my life … No, he really saved my life. I was in a relationship with a seriously controlling man.’

  But Carla didn’t get to tell the story.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Faustino, who had been napping quite contentedly in Kathy’s lap, suddenly sat up very straight with his ears pricked, like two pointy, furry satellite dishes. Having confirmed that he’d heard what he wanted to hear, Faustino leaped from Kathy’s lap and skittered into the house and down the stairs to the entrance hall.

  ‘Henry must be back,’ said Carla.

  She was right. As the two women listened in silence, they heard Henry greeting the dog in the hallway below.

  ‘Whoa! It’s the flying fluff ball of fury. How are you, Faustino? How’s my favourite member of the family? You know I love you the best, don’t you? Don’t tell the others …’

  Carla rolled her eyes. ‘He says that to all of us.’

  Downstairs, Henry continued to chat to the dog. ‘You want to know how the wedding was, Faustino? The wedding was the usual load of bullshit. The food was good, though. I brought you some ham. No, Faustino! Would I give you any old prosciutto? This is the good stuff.’

  ‘No wonder the dog’s diet isn’t working,’ Carla observed.

  Moments later Henry walked onto the terrace, holding Faustino as if he was cradling a human baby, cooing as he tickled him under the chin.

  ‘Oh. You’re still here,’ Henry said. ‘I mean, you’re still up.’

  But Kathy knew he had meant to say the first thing. She was still there. Though he’d said otherwise, he had been expecting her to find somewhere else. Hoping she would find somewhere else, more like.

  ‘Busy night in the kitchen,’ said Carla. ‘Ernesto went AWOL.’

  ‘Again?’

  ‘Again.’

  Kathy was comforted to hear that Roberta hadn’t been overstating Ernesto’s regular disappearing acts to make her feel less guilty about having been the cause of today’s episode.

  ‘What happened this time?’ Henry asked.

  ‘I’m afraid I told him, “Sei un grosso culo peloso,”’ Kathy admitted.

  ‘Good accent,’ said Henry, with a nod of appreciation. ‘And you’re not wrong.’

  ‘I’m sorry it caused so much trouble.’

  ‘You can guess who taught her how to say it,’ Carla said. ‘Still, Kathy saved the day by helping in the kitchen. It went well. She knows her stuff. We made pici all’pomodoro, tagliata—’

  ‘Tiramisu?’

  ‘Always bloody tiramisu!’ the siblings said in unison.

  ‘The guests didn’t notice the difference,’ Carla continued.

  ‘Well, anything is better than Ernesto’s tomato sauce,’ said Henry.

  ‘How was the wedding?’ Kathy asked.

  ‘Expensive. Showy. Pointless.’

  ‘Your favourite kind,’ said Carla.

  ‘Never seen a more badly suited couple. I could see what the groom saw in her – everyone could, the dress was barely there. But what she saw in him … Hidden assets, no doubt. So, I give them twelve months. Or as long as it takes to file for divorce in America, these days. They were American, of course, living the Tuscan dream, Four Seasons-style.’

  Henry’s eyes drifted to the trees in the palazzo garden.

  ‘Join us for a drink, big bro?’ Carla asked.

  ‘No.’ Henry didn’t hesitate. ‘You ladies probably want to gossip. I don’t want to break up your party. I’ll just hang out with Faustino for a while, then get some sleep. Thank you, Kathy, for helping Mamma and Carla with dinner. I appreciate it.’

  Kathy was pleased to be thanked but couldn’t help feeling that, had she not been there, Henry would have sat down with his sister. Perhaps she ought to go so that the siblings could talk. Carla didn’t seem too worried, though. ‘Suit yourself,’ she told her brother. ‘There’s pasta left in the fridge if you’re hungry.’

  Still carrying Faustino, Henry went into the house. ‘Let’s get comfy on that old sofa eh?’ he said, to the dog. ‘You’ve got me as your bedmate again tonight.’ Kathy felt another wave of guilt. She guessed she was supposed to.

  ‘I hope he’s not going to turn into a mad old dog lover,’ said Carla. ‘All I want is for him to be happy. But tell me about your man, Kathy. How did you meet him? Are you excited about getting married? It is your first time, isn’t it?’

  Kathy was suddenly very aware that if she and Carla had been able to hear Henry talking to the dog, then Henry could probably hear them talking to each other.

  ‘Neil’s a good man,’ Kathy said. ‘I wish he were here with me in Florence. I think he would like it. I’ve always wanted to visit this city.’ Rather than talking about Neil, Kathy chose to tell Carla about her parents, their honeymoon and her middle name.

  ‘Then you were destined to come here,’ Carla agreed.

  By the time Kathy went to bed, Henry was already asleep on the sofa. Faustino was asleep alongside him, flat out on his back with his four paws in the air. The dog looked extremely comfortable, Henry slightly less so, perhaps, as he did his best not to squash the dog.

  Kathy remembered what her father had once told her about dogs. Dogs know who the good guys are. They can tell whom to trust. The Courage family dog – Benji – was utterly devoted to Kathy’s father. Faustino always sought Henry out when Henry was in the house. Maybe it was just the prosciutto but Kathy doubted that. Faustino was devoted too.

  Neither Henry nor the dog stirred as Kathy crept by, which gave her a moment to observe them. Henry’s hair stuck up from his head and she could see in his sleeping face the young boy he must once have been, when he still dreamed of being a star musician, before the responsibilities had started to pile up.

  Carla’s revelations about why Henry was back in Italy had painted her brother in a different light. He wasn’t mooching off his family. He was holding it together.

  Just then, Faustino let out a fart so violent that he shook himself awake – doubtless a result of the illicit prosciutto – and his sudden movement caused Henry to begin to wake up too. Kathy tiptoed at speed to the staircase.

  Upstairs in the attic
room again, she looked at those festival passes with a fresh perspective, as remnants of a life Henry had left behind for the most admirable of reasons. What a sacrifice he had made for love. She understood it, though. Absolutely. Henry was in Italy for the same reasons Kathy had never made it this far before.

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Despite her late night talking to Carla on the terrace, Kathy was up early again. If this was to be her last full day in Florence, she didn’t want to miss a moment. Besides, there was already an awful lot of noise coming from downstairs. Specifically, an awful lot of yelling and clattering and crashing.

  When Kathy walked into the kitchen, it was a whirl of activity. For activity, read coordinated chaos.

  ‘Ernesto didn’t show up,’ said Carla, as she pressed an apron into Kathy’s hands. ‘You don’t mind helping Mamma and Manu, do you? Henry’s doing the tables outside. Everyone in the hotel has decided to have breakfast at once and so early. I don’t know what’s the matter with them all. It’s a nightmare.’

  Kathy tied on the apron and joined Roberta and Manu on the cooked-breakfast production line as they scooped and slopped the contents of various pans and dishes onto plates and into dishes. Meanwhile Henry and Carla took orders from the guests and kept the flow of plates to the terrace constant.

  ‘I’m sorry about Ernesto,’ said Kathy. ‘He must be very upset.’

  ‘He must be very hung-over, more like,’ said Roberta. ‘He’s not upset. This happens all the time. Any excuse to have Sunday morning off. Well, I’ll give him a real excuse. Next time he turns up he can hand in his chef’s hat and look for somewhere else to work.’

  ‘You don’t mean that, Mamma,’ said Carla, who was momentarily in the kitchen to fetch more eggs.

  ‘You’re right. Ernesto was taken on by my husband’s father,’ Roberta explained. ‘He’s been here since he was Manu’s age. However irritating the old man is, he comes with the house and that is that. Ernesto is practically fixtures and fittings.’

  ‘And about as useful as half of them,’ said Carla, giving the temperamental oven a kick as she passed it. ‘Kathy, would you come out and give me a hand clearing some of the tables?’