by Julie Sarff
Everyone says this, don’t they? Everyone says everything will be alright when someone dies. Yet nothing is ever right. That memory of a loved one pales in comparison to the flesh and blood of the person with whom we share our days. It’s such a sad thought that I shed a tear. I wipe it away hastily on my coat sleeve before I begin gently pressing Beatta for information.
“Beatta, please, I have to know. What happened with Carlo Buschi?”
She stares at me blankly for a moment before responding, “Ah, yes, that.”
“Where is he?” I ask.
“Why, he’s buried in his tomb, in the cemetery in Arona of course,” she responds and places her hand in her lap as if that is that.
Chapter 13
As the evening wears on, Brandon pulls me aside. He doesn’t think we should leave tonight. “She’s too distraught, and she doesn’t seem to have anyone here to help her. We should at least stay one more night and then we can visit her in the morning,” he whispers when Beatta goes into the kitchen to fetch a glass of water.
At half past six, Brandon leaves to retrieve our luggage from Orvieto and book us a room for the night in Bagnoregio. While he’s gone, I try to keep Beatta talking about positive memories of her mother. Two hours later, after laughing and crying, and after visiting the stray cats she has rounded up in the tool shed in the garden, Brandon and I leave with a promise to return first thing in the morning. We walk hand in hand back across the expansion bridge to the only hotel in Bagnoregio. Room #103 in the Hotel Grand is a cozy affair with a bathroom so small that Brandon doesn’t fit in the shower stall. While he tries to wash up, I sit on the bed and dial Uncle Tomasso on my cell. It’s good to hear from him and the boys. After jibber-jabbering with my twins about their day, I explain the situation to Uncle Tomasso.
“I’m afraid I won’t be home tonight. I’ll be away an extra day.”
In response Uncle Tomasso informs me that he’s perfectly pleased to watch the boys for another night. He also agrees that after such a terrible event, we simply cannot leave Beatta without checking on her in the morning.
“I suppose after everything that has happened wild monkey sex would be out.” Brandon smiles as he returns from the bathroom wearing only a towel.
I ignore his sly grin and remark about how the owner of the hotel must have loved the seventies because everything in the room is done up in orange and yellow and looks as if it has not been swapped out since before “generation X took over the world.”
“Lately, Lily, we’ve stayed in a couple of, how should I say, ‘quaint’ hotels, but I think we should go a little more upscale next time. How do you feel about the Emerald Coast?”
Sardinia? How can we even think about going to Sardinia with everything so topsy-turvy right now?
“Do you believe what she said? About Carlo Buschi and all?” I ask Brandon, after we climb into bed and turn out the lights.
“Of course, I do,” he whispers, lying next to me. “Now, I think I know a few things that will help you get your mind off of today’s tragedy.”
You know, Brandon was right. For a while I forgot about everything except the two of us together. Afterwards, I drifted fairly quickly into a deep sleep. But a few hours later I woke again. Now I watch the moon rise through the window and stew over the very complicated story Beatta revealed. She claims that when Buschi sought refuge from whomever it was who was chasing him, he faked his death by doing the following: he sent his own car into a ditch. Nobody was inside. The coroner and Signor Tacchini had been paid by Buschi to lie about the whole affair. According to Beatta, what happened in the coroner’s office was quite simple-- another man had recently died in Arona, and when the coroner showed this body to Signor Tacchini, the gardener falsely identified him as Carlo Buschi. This spectacle was for the benefit of the coroner’s assistant, a man of impeccable morals, who was above corruption. The assistant quickly filled out a death certificate before leaving to take his lunch at the nearby pub. While he was eating, the coroner showed the body to another family, who declared it to be their dear, departed uncle. The coroner himself then filled out a second death certificate.
“So nobody was buried in Buschi’s tomb?” I asked when Beatta finished talking about the coroner’s exploits.
“Not at the time, no. It was empty when they put it in the crypt.” Beatta blushed at this. The whole thing was so ghastly, it left me feeling tainted by its sordidness. Like Lady Macbeth, I headed into the kitchen to wash my hands with soap and water.
“I assume both men were paid handsomely, although Carlo always said that Signor Tacchini did it out of the goodness of his own heart. Carlo said Signor Tacchini wanted to help him get away from the bad men who were chasing him. You see, Carlo’s gardener just wanted to help him stay safe. They were good friends,” Beatta told me when I returned from the kitchen, drying my hands on an embroidered tea towel.
“Of course,” I said, nodding my head like it all made so much sense. “Of course.”
“You mustn’t tell a soul about any of this, Signora Bilbury,” Beatta beseeched and I nodded again. I assumed Brandon was excluded from this pact since Beatta had made a partial confession in front of him, so the moment he returned, I met him in the entrance hall and told him the whole story.
“Now what are we supposed to do?” he mumbled darkly, as he pulled off his wool jacket. “We’re privy to a crime now, Lily. We’ve got to tell the police.”
It’s these very words that are haunting me right now, as the Bagnoregio Cathedral strikes three in the morning. Brandon’s right. Signor Tacchini and the coroner both committed fraud, didn’t they? But based on what Beatta said, they did it to keep Carlo Buschi from being murdered. It seems there are a lot of ethical lines that have been crossed; so many that they are all starting to blur together.
“So what happened after that?” Brandon asked as we stood in that dimly lit hallway at Beatta’s house. “What happened to Carlo Buschi?”
In the end, according to Beatta, Carlo Buschi lived out his days in Civita, a fugitive in her house. He lived another two years after his fake death and when he died, he left enough money for Carmelina to have him buried, quietly, in his own tomb in the cemetery up in Arona.
“How did she do that?” I asked Beatta, “Didn’t the people in the cemetery need a death certificate? A recent death certificate?”
“That I don’t know. My mother and Carlo took care of all the details in advance and I stayed out of it. I figure there may have been bribes involved. Or people slipped in and put the body in its place in the dead of night. Oh, it's horrible! I know. It’s been such a burden on me, but it’s over now. Both my mother and Carlo are dead, and the details of the burial go to the grave with them.”
Her story was so dark and twisted, it’s no wonder I’m wide awake. What I really need is an instant pick-me-up. My mood has become so gloomy given all these secrets that what I really need is Reddi-wip. I need to do a shot right out of the can. It’ll make me feel better.
“Reddi-wip? At three in the morning? I like where you’re going with this, Lily, but we’re in Italy. They don’t have Reddi-wip.”
That’s what I get for mumbling out loud. I turn to Brandon and whisper, “I think we may be on a different page about what to do with whipped cream. I just want to down it straight out of the can. Or on top of a decaffeinated espresso, with sprinkles on top.”
“Down it straight out of the can? That is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard,” Brandon mutters before falling back to sleep with a snore.
(Four months later, March)
Chapter 14
Ever since our return to Arona, my life with Brandon has become welcomingly quiet. Over the last four months, I have become a frequent visitor to Villa Buschi in the mornings. I drop the children off at nursery school and head off to spend some time with Brandon before reporting for duty at the ice cream shop. This new status as “guest” at Villa Buschi is a little strange for Aunt Alice. Nowadays, she offers
to take my coat when I arrive.
“Oh please, Alice, I know where my coat goes. Don’t bother.” I maneuver around her to hang up my raincoat in the closet stowing my heavy handbag with its contraband in a storage bin. A moment later, I stride confidently into the dining room, looking smart in wide-legged plaid pants, black pumps and my new three quarter length pink sweater with sleeves that flare out in the latest fashion.
Yes, it’s true. Brandon took me on a spending spree. But I haven’t betrayed the sisterhood, and I’m not a kept woman. I still have my own place. And I still work a crappy job that consumes most of my day. So what’s wrong with a little shopping at the fine boutiques in Stresa? Brandon insisted that I needed new things, my old clothes were falling apart. My sweaters were unraveling, my socks had holes, and my shoes were coming apart at the soles. I looked like a bag lady.
“You look lovely today, Lily,” Jason, Brandon’s brother says as I take my place at the breakfast table. It’s festively set with Easter plates depicting stoic looking rabbits in waist coats and pince-nez glasses. I picked them out when Brandon, me, and the boys went to London for a long weekend.
“You don’t look so bad yourself.” I beam at him as I pour orange juice into my glass. In response, Jason leans over to clink his tumbler with mine. Jason is a taller, skinnier version of his brother with spikey brown hair and a long face. I love both Jason and his girlfriend, Anna Lidiano. They are the cutest couple. I feel that they are practically my new in-laws. These days, there’s great energy here at Ca’Buschi as Anna and Jason are beginning to plan a huge, “proper” wedding to be held on the front lawn of the villa this June. I’m really caught up in the spirit of it all, and while Brandon and Jason are busy with other things, Anna and I pore through bridal magazines. It’s quite funny though, because if Brandon catches us, he always repeats, “Really, Anna, don’t encourage her. She’ll be wanting her own wedding soon and you know how I feel about marriage.”
Anna and I just laugh at this because we are sisters of the heart. Every time Brandon makes his little speech Anna quips, “Don’t believe it, Lily. I’ve never seen Brandon so happy. You’re the one for him.” These words make me love her all the more. Although there’s one tiny thing that bothers me about both Anna and Jason. Well, not so much bother, as makes me curious. You see, she and Jason have installed themselves at Ca’ Buschi and don’t seem intent on leaving. So what bothers me, I mean what makes me curious, is will we all live here after Brandon and I are married? Is it wrong that I want it to someday be just the four of us, Brandon, me, and the boys? I’m not sure why I worry about any of this. After all, Brandon and I are taking things slow. Our wedding, at least in my opinion, is probably still over a year away.
Speaking of weddings, I’m hoping to have some time alone with Anna this morning. I’d like to get her to pin down a date in June for the wedding so we can start putting plans in motion. Plus, I have some more magazines to show her. My mother, who is so consumed with the idea that I’ll be marrying Brandon, has sent a slew of magazines in a large package all the way from Colorado. The package that arrived yesterday was so thick and heavy that the postage must have cost her a month’s salary.
Anyway, my favorite wedding magazine is The Knot, and I’ve been telling Anna all about it. “I call the brides who read the magazine Knotty Brides,” I informed her the other day. Being Italian, she didn’t get my pun so I explained it in painstaking detail.
“What is it, Lily? You look positively giddy about something,” Jason asks on this rainy morning, as I settle into my breakfast of scrambled eggs. Truth is, I am positively giddy. Spending time going over wedding ideas with Anna sounds like tremendous fun. But I mustn’t give myself away. I don’t want Brandon to know about the contraband magazines sitting in my purse in the coat closet.
“No, not giddy. Actually feeling a bit down, weather and all.” I do my darndest to make my mouth form a frown, which is hard to do when I’m feeling so genuinely excited about my future.
“You feeling alright, Lily?” Brandon asks, putting down his newspaper. “That’s a pretty intense grimace on your face.”
As luck would have it, I am saved by the bell. “Who is it?” I hear Alice ask, answering the intercom in the nearby kitchen. These days, we have to be so careful. The photo of me and Brandon in the Orvieto train station went viral and it was plastered on the front of every tabloid from here to the Antarctica. For the last four months, the paparazzi have been thick as flies in downtown Arona and I can barely leave my house without flashes going off.
“Signor Logan,” Alice says coming through the swinging door that separates the dining room from the kitchen, “The police are here. They’re at the gate. Shall I admit them?”
“My goodness,” Brandon wipes his hands on his napkin, “That was fast. I thought they would simply write down my complaint about the photographers hanging around at all hours of the day. I didn’t expect them to want to discuss the matter. They’ve never done anything in the past. But that’s okay, go ahead, Alice. Ring them through.”
It turns out that ringing them through was a huge mistake. An absolutely massive police officer greeted Alice when she opened the door. Faster than anyone could say boo, he bellowed, “Alice Bettonina? You’re to come with me down to the police station. You’re under arrest for conspiracy to commit fraud.”
******
An hour or so later and I am sitting in a small gray cell. It all seems so surreal. Only a few months ago, I was in Lipari’s Luxurious B and B by Debi, and Brandon and I were venturing out in the squally weather. We were trying to unlock the “technical shed” to retrieve the bicycles so we could ride to a nearby restaurant. We ended up giving it up after a few seconds because the wind was so strong, it blew me sideways off the bike. In the end, we had to walk to the restaurant, hand in hand, bent forward with our heads into the wind. I thought that if he let go of me, I might sail away out into the night sky like a wayward balloon. But that’s the wonderful thing about Brandon, he’ll never let go. Now that we’re finally together, he’ll never let go. That whole wonderful image of us during our first days together in Lipari seems so far away as I look around at the peeling gray walls.
As already noted, I’m not good in emergency situations. I cannot be a first responder. I am also not good around death. And I think it’s fair to say, I’m not the person one wants around in a crisis situation. Which is precisely why I am in a holding cell in a tiny jail on the outskirts of Arona. You see, when that policeman told Alice she was being charged with conspiracy to commit fraud, my mind went wild. Alice stood there in the bracing wind on the front steps of Villa Buschi looking genuinely confused. I started shouting bloody murder when the policeman grabbed her by the arm and began yanking her towards the car. Brandon was there and he was yelling, “What’s this all about? You can’t arrest her. She’s done nothing wrong.”
For a few short moments, as the policeman continued to prod Alice along, it was as if the world, the universe, and time slowed way down. A strange silence took over inside my head and it went like this: silence, silence, silence --deck the burly man-- silence, silence, silence.
“Let go of my aunt,” I shouted and sprang forward. At first, I tried to pull on Alice’s arm and tug her backwards but the policeman tugged equally hard in the other direction. Then, I tried to insert my body between Alice and the policeman, but this didn’t work, and the policeman continued to parade Alice towards the car. Flooded with adrenaline, I did the only thing I could; I began slapping the policeman about the head. (Lightly though, nothing too hard or disrespectful.)
“That’s my Aunt! Let her go,” I yelled. Behind me, I heard the gasps of horror from Elenora and Carla as they watched the scene unfold from the villa’s steps. I also heard Jason and Anna come to the front door and demand to know what was happening. And I heard Brandon’s sharp voice say, “Lily, no, Lily, don’t!” That’s when my right hand, which was flailing about, collided (quite accidentally) with the policeman’s nose.
In a second, all hell broke loose as another policeman, a small skinny one, jumped out of the car and grabbed me about the waist.
“My nose, my nose!” the burly man shouted as a most unfortunate amount of blood began to spurt all over his face. From the stairs, Elenora and Carla gasps morphed to wails so magnificent, it sounded as if Alice and I were being thrown on a funeral pyre, rather than being stuffed into a police car by two very irate-looking men.
“I’m dialing my lawyer, right this minute. If you take those ladies beyond the villa’s gate, I will file charges against the police department,” Brandon boomed authoritatively. His voice brought me out of my daze. Suddenly things were no longer in slow mo. Indeed, numerous things were happening at once:
1.) The small, skinny policeman behind the wheel yelled that I was going to be charged with assault, while
2.) The other policeman climbed into the passenger seat, dribbling blood all over the cheap interior, while
3.) Jason ran, as if on fire, to the converted carriage house which housed Brandon’s collection of cars, while
4.) Anna tried to calm down Carla and Elenora so that Brandon could speak to whomever it was he had dialed on the phone.
Amidst all this chaos, the skinny policeman started up the car, did a three point turn, and rocketed off towards the gate. Behind us came a loud roar of a V8. It was Jason, driving Brandon’s silver Maserati. Turning around in my seat I saw him pull up to the front steps. Brandon hopped in and Jason gunned it. Quickly, the Maserati came racing along behind us, its engine thundering in a most intimidating fashion. Yet there was nothing Brandon or anyone could do, the police were intent on carting us off to jail.
Beside me in the police car, Alice sat in eerie silence, staring straight ahead. For once in my, life I was quiet too. Obviously I was going to be charged with assault, but why on Earth were they arresting Alice? If this was about the fact that Carlo Buschi faked his death, then they got the wrong woman. Alice knew nothing about that. A flashback transports me momentarily to last October when I told Alice that Signor Tacchini had lied about identifying Carlo Buschi’s body. When I told her that Signor Tacchini had confessed this crime to me, Alice’s face registered real shock. There was no way Alice could have been that good of an actress. No, I already know all the people who were involved in helping Carlo Buschi commit a fraudulent death and Alice wasn’t one of them.
