by Helen Pryke
I closed the window, tears prickling at my eyes as images of the previous day came to me. I blinked them away, furious at myself for having lost control like that. I heard it again, a constant drip, drip, drip.
“What the hell’s going on now?” I stormed out onto the landing and saw a puddle of water in the middle of the floor. “That’s all I need,” I groaned. I’d wanted to wait before starting repairs on the outside of the house, but I guessed I’d have to get it sorted as soon as possible. I grabbed a bucket from the bathroom and placed it under the leak as a temporary measure.
A long, hot shower later I felt slightly better; a cup of coffee helped me reach a more acceptable level of sociability. Unable to stay in the house alone any longer, despite the rain, I went to visit Aunt Liliana.
I rang the doorbell, looking like a bedraggled rat, rivulets of water running down my body and pooling at my feet.
“Oh my God, look at the state of you! Didn’t you bring an umbrella? And what on earth have you done to your head?” she cried as soon as she opened the door. I touched the bump on my forehead, wincing at how tender it felt. I hadn’t dared look at myself in the mirror, so had no idea how bad it was.
“Come in, let’s get that seen to,” she said, hustling me inside the door.
I hesitated. “The others…?”
“No, nobody’s here, I’m all alone. Giulia and Agnese went to the shopping mall down in the valley, the men are at work. Come on, you’re soaking.”
I followed her through to the kitchen and sat down while she hurried about, gathering all her medical supplies together. She handed me a towel to dry myself off, and I realised belatedly that I was dripping all over the floor.
“Oh, leave it, it’s just a bit of water,” Aunt Liliana said when she saw me glance down, “stop looking so guilty. Now, this is going to hurt a bit,” she added, dabbing some liquid on a gauze strip, “but it will reduce the swelling. Good job Luisa left me some of this.” I closed my eyes as she gently swabbed the cut, flinching slightly. The liquid was cool on my skin and brought instant relief to the throbbing pain.
“There, it’s clean but you’re going to have a nasty bruise for a while.” She pursed her lips. “How on earth did it happen?”
Panicking, I said the first thing that came into my mind. “I went out in the garden last night for a stroll, and bumped into a branch.” I gave her an embarrassed smile. “I really whacked my head, saw stars for a moment there.”
“Tsk. You’ve got to be more careful, up at the cottage all alone. What if you’d knocked yourself out?” She handed me the bottle of liquid. “Here, use it three times a day until the swelling’s gone down.”
“Thanks.” I noticed it was still raining, although the sky was starting to brighten. “I’m going to have to find someone to fix the roof, it was leaking this morning,” I said.
“Yes, Giulia mentioned you needed a handyman. I think Davide is looking into finding someone, but it’s a busy period, you might have to wait a while. I’ll send Dante over to patch the roof up in the meantime.”
I was glad the others weren’t there. It was pleasant listening to her gentle chatter and her quiet voice was a balm for my aching head. My mind started to drift as she talked, going back to the previous day’s events. I couldn’t believe that Mark had left me in the tunnel – had he done it on purpose? The more I thought about it, the more suspicious I became. He’d bought me a glass of wine afterwards, to calm me down he said, but then I’d drunk more… had I really drunk enough to black out later, or had he slipped…?
“Jennifer? Are you all right?” Aunt Liliana’s worried voice brought me back to the present with a jolt. “You looked like you were drifting off… you can never be too careful with a bump on the head, maybe I should take you to the doctor…”
“No, no, I’m fine, honestly,” I replied quickly. “I’m sorry, what were you saying?” I gave her a sweet smile and hoped she would forget about the doctor.
She peered closely at me, as if trying to see through my skull to any possible brain damage, then relented. “Well, you tell me if you feel dizzy or sick, OK? Another coffee?”
“Yes please,” I exclaimed, my voice a little too loud at my relief that she wasn’t going to call an ambulance. I looked out of the window while she busied herself at the stove, and saw that it had stopped raining.
“I might go and visit Uncle Mario this morning.” The idea had just come to me, but now was as good a time as ever. “Didn’t you say he lives by himself?”
“Yes, he lives in a small house at the edge of the village, but no-one ever goes to see him. I went there a few months ago, just to make sure he was still alive. He sent me away, shouting and yelling that he didn’t need molly-coddling, he’d let me know if and when he needed anything. He was most unpleasant. The only person he ever got on with was Luisa, and since she died he does his best to show how much he dislikes everyone else. What do you want to go and see him for?”
“Agnese said that he helped Luisa look after the plants in the Grove, and I wanted to ask his advice on how to care for them. It’s all a bit overgrown, and I’d love to get it back to how it was when Luisa was alive.”
“That’s a lovely idea,” Liliana said, hugging me. “Luisa would be so happy, and it would keep you busy for a while.” She glanced at me and blushed.
“Have you been talking to Mum?” I asked at once.
“She-she phoned me a few days ago and told me about your… problems. I’m sorry, I didn’t know about you and your husband,” she replied, flustered.
“Yes, well, I came over here to sort myself out,” I said quietly. “And I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell everyone else.”
“Of course not. You take all the time you need. I promised your mum I’d keep an eye on you, that’s all.”
“OK,” I said, relieved.
“Yes, well, you go and see Mario. Tell him I sent you and start talking right away about the Grove, it might help. But if he starts shouting, get out of there as quickly as possible!”
I approached Mario’s house with some trepidation, after Liliana and Agnese’s warnings. But I had to find out, I had to know what had happened to the baby. The house appeared run-down, its weathered shutters badly in need of a few coats of varnish, the windows so grimy that they didn’t even reflect the morning sun. The patch of ground at the front was full of weeds and several rusting objects, so old I couldn’t make out what they were. An enormous metal gate and fence barred my way and I looked around for a doorbell.
An ugly, brown and white mongrel charged towards me, yapping loudly, and made me jump out of my skin. I stepped backwards as it put its nose between the metal bars of the gate and snarled viciously, upper lip curled back, showing off its razor-sharp teeth.
“It’s OK, I’m not going to hurt you,” I said, realising how stupid that sounded. It was more likely the dog would rip my ankles to shreds. It kept on barking, and my head started to throb. Surely, if Mario was at home, he would have come out by now to see what all the noise was about? I saw the doorbell at long last and, standing as far away as possible, reached out to ring it.
“What the fuck do you want?” came a voice from around the back of the house. “I’ve told you people over and over again, I don’t want to buy anything, my house isn’t for sale, and I definitely don’t need saving from God!” A silver-haired man came stomping towards me, furious. I couldn’t help thinking he looked exactly like his dog, and half expected him to start barking at me too.
“Uncle Mario…” I began, but he interrupted me.
“Uncle? I’m not your uncle, I’ve never seen you before. What do you want? Why can’t people leave me alone? You think I don’t know what they say about me in the village?” He grabbed hold of the gate with grubby hands and glared at me, drops of sweat on his forehead. “All I want is to be left alone, understand?”
I didn’t know what to say to him. His anger seemed to radiate from him in invisible waves, crashing over me and trying to
flatten me. My shoulders sagged in defeat.
“I-I’m sorry. I just wanted to meet you. Aunt Liliana suggested I come and speak to you about the Grove.” I turned to go.
“Wait,” he shouted. “The Grove?”
“Yes. I-I’m staying at Great-grandmother Luisa’s house. The Grove is so overgrown, and I wanted to sort it out, but I’m not really a gardener, so Aunt Liliana said to speak with you, because you used to help Luisa, and she said you’d know what to do.” The words all came tumbling out together, I hardly paused for breath in my hurry to explain everything before he sent me away.
“The cottage?” he mumbled, staring at me. “You’re staying there? Who are you?” He bent down and stroked the dog, who had stopped barking but was still snarling at me. “Hush now,” he said, and the dog lay down at his feet, watching me but completely silent at long last.
“I’m Angela’s daughter,” I said, relieved that both he and the dog had calmed down. “I live in England but, well, it’s a long story… I’ve come over here to stay at the cottage while I sort myself out.”
“Angela?” he said, looking closely at me.
“My mother. Bruna’s daughter.”
“Bruna?” he snapped.
“Y-yes,” I said, startled at his tone of voice.
He ran his hand through his white hair, making it stand up on end. When he spoke, his voice was calmer, but he had a wild expression in his eyes. “Well, I guess you’d better come in, then,” he said, and opened the gate. I expected the dog to rush out at me, but it remained at its master’s feet, glaring, as if to remind me exactly who was in charge.
The inside of his house was just as dirty, if not dirtier than the outside. I followed him into the living room, which was sparsely furnished. The dog jumped up onto the only armchair, clouds of dust rising up into the air, shimmering in the subdued sunlight. Mario went over to a small table where there were two wooden chairs and gestured to me to sit down.
“What’s your name?” he muttered.
“Jennifer,” I replied.
He snorted. “Not very Italian, is it?”
“No, not really.” I smiled, determined not to let him goad me. “I was born in England, Mum didn’t want to give me an Italian name that would make me stand out too much. I didn’t realise it at the time, but now I know why she did it… I quickly found out that kids can be very unkind. They used to sing the cornetto song at me during break times, just because they knew my mother was Italian.”
“Ashamed of her Italian heritage, was she, your mum?” Mario said, frowning at me.
“Not at all. It’s just that it was the eighties, and things were very different then.” I tried to change the subject. “I found the Grove, at the bottom of the garden. It’s a very beautiful place.”
He actually smiled at that. “Mamma loved the Grove. She told me some of the fruit trees and bushes had been there for hundreds of years.”
Mamma? Luisa was his mother? I had to keep him talking. “Hundreds of years? Is that possible for plants?”
“If Mamma said it, then it’s possible,” he retorted. “She knew everything about that house… it has been in the family for generations, did you know that?”
I nodded encouragingly. “Will you tell me what you know?”
“About the Grove or the family’s origins?”
“Both.” I held my breath.
He looked at me. “Why should I?”
“Because it’s my heritage, I’d like to find out more about my family,” I replied. I leaned forward, looking him straight in the eyes, and gently touched his hand.
“All I know is what Mamma told me,” he said. “It’s an extraordinary story but she was adamant it was all true.”
I waited with bated breath, not daring to interrupt him.
He picked up a pair of glasses from the table and rubbed them on the corner of his shirt, squinting to see if they were clean. “She said the house has been in our family since the 1300s, when Europe was devastated by the plague. An English girl arrived here and married a noble from the Innocenti family. He had the cottage built for her, and it passed from generation to generation, up to today.”
I looked at Mario, his leathery face staring at me earnestly, and saw once again that wild light in his eyes, barely-contained intense nervousness coursing through his body, and wondered whether I should believe him or not.
“Mamma said the girl was a witch,” he continued, lost in his thoughts. “She created the Grove, she planted the fruit trees and made medicines that helped people get better. Not from the plague, but from normal illnesses, afterwards. She lived till the ripe old age of ninety, and her daughter took over from her, and so on, right up to Mamma. Then it all ended there.”
“Bruna didn’t want to carry on the tradition?”
“Bruna? Huh.” He spat on the floor. The dog jumped up and barked loudly. “Shut up, you,” he yelled. “No, Bruna didn’t want to have anything to do with all that. She left for England, as you damn well know.” He stood up and started pacing around the room.
“I found the grave,” I said, trying to see if that would calm him down. “Agnese said you could tell me what happened, why they buried the baby there.”
“Grave? What grave?” A confused look appeared on his face, then his eyes suddenly snapped wide open. “Who are you?” he bellowed. “What do you want? Always people here snooping, asking questions… leave me alone, I tell you.” He gestured wildly with his arms. “Get out. Get out of my fucking house before I set my dog on you!”
I sat, stunned at this sudden onslaught. “B-but, Uncle Mario, you know who I am. I’m Jennifer, Angela’s daughter. You were telling me about…”
“Jennifer? Angela? I have no idea who you’re talking about.” He strode over and grabbed me by the arm, pulling me up from the chair. “Get out,” he roared, dragging me to the front door. The dog barked angrily around my feet, its teeth snapping at my ankles. I found myself out on the doorstep, as Mario slammed the door behind me. Shaking, I left the house, almost running as I got to the gate.
Aunt Liliana tried to comfort me. “There, there, Mario’s like that with everyone,” she said, placing an enormous slice of castagnaccio in front of me. “Eat this while I get you a cup of tea. Isn’t that what you English like when you’re in shock?”
I smiled, even though I was still trembling. The Italians had such funny notions about the English. “Yes, that would be lovely.” I bit into the cake. “Wow, this is wonderful. Did you make it?”
“Of course,” Aunt Liliana exclaimed. “You don’t think I bought it, do you? No, it’s made with my own hands. There are chestnuts, raisins, walnuts and pine nuts in it.”
I grimaced. “Not too many calories, then.” I closed my eyes as I savoured every mouthful, devouring the cake in minutes.
“Here’s your tea.” She handed me the delicate china cup and saucer.
“Thanks.” I looked at the slice of lemon floating in the cup and repressed a sigh. Teaching Italians to put milk in tea was an uphill struggle. “But he was fine until I mentioned the grave, then he suddenly turned all weird.”
“He was devastated when Bruna left. He adored her and she spoiled him rotten when he was little, him being the younger one. He was the first one to hold the baby when it was born, and he helped dig the grave when the poor thing died. He finds it hard to talk about it.”
“I guess I’ll never know, then,” I said.
“You could try one last time. Come by tomorrow morning and I’ll give you some castagnaccio to take to Mario as a peace offering. He was always partial to my cake. And don’t mention the grave for the time being.”
“Well, if you’re sure.” I really didn’t fancy a second round with Mario and his dog, but my curiosity was getting the better of me.
“And maybe pass by the butcher’s first, and get a nice bone for that mongrel of his,” she suggested with a wink.
Chapter Nine
The next morning I left Aunt Liliana’s house with a
still-warm cake in one hand and a plastic bag containing a meaty, smelly bone in the other. I walked across the piazza, saying hello to people as I passed, nodding at the elderly gentlemen already sitting outside the bar, soaking up the morning sun.
As I walked down the narrow dirt track that led to Mario’s house, I saw a bundle of brown and white fur come hurtling towards me. “Shit,” I yelled and looked around for somewhere to hide. But there were only bushes all around me, not even a tree to jump behind. I stoically stood my ground and waited for my fate.
“Bella. Bastarda! Come back here.” I’d never have thought I’d be so relieved to see Uncle Mario. My relief soon turned to fear as he hurled a stream of insults at me, his arm raised high above his head, ready to pound me into the ground.
The dog stopped at the sound of its master’s voice and turned, cowering. “Bastarda,” Mario hollered at the terrified animal. “I opened the gate and she was off like a shot.”
She? Ah, so maybe the insults weren’t aimed at me, then.
“Are you all right?” he asked. “She… she didn’t bite you, did she? She’s not nasty, she’s a softy really, but she feels she has to protect me.”
“I-I’m fine, Uncle Mario,” I replied, without thinking.
He narrowed his eyes, staring at me. “Uncle?”
“Y-yes.” I wondered if there was going to be a repeat of yesterday. “I’m Jennifer, remember?”
“Ah, the English girl,” he exclaimed, laughing loudly. “Angela’s daughter, right?”
“You remember me?” I said, hardly daring to believe it.
“Yes, you came to visit me… when was it… the other day, yes?”
I smiled at him, hoping the relief I felt wasn’t too obvious. “Yesterday. I thought I’d come and see you again. And I’ve brought you some castagnaccio from Aunt Liliana. It’s still warm, look.”
