by Karen Swan
He stopped talking and she recognized a look on his face that she knew so well in her mother’s – he had retreated to another time, another place.
‘I have never forgotten the moment I went upstairs and found the bed empty. It was like someone had plunged my heart in ice.’ He shook his head, over and over. ‘And I knew then. I knew she was gone. There was no reason for her to have gone out.’
‘How much later was this?’
‘An hour? Slightly more.’
She had been out of his sight, then, for around two hours – and two hours of snowfall in a hundred-year storm meant her footsteps must surely have been obscured . . . ‘Had anyone in the town seen her?’
‘Not that evening. Not even Timo, and I believed him, though many didn’t.’
‘Who’s Timo?’
‘The boy she had been engaged to before me. A lot of people hated me for coming in and stealing the prettiest girl in town, and him most of all. It was a big upset back then.’
The revelations surprised her. ‘You weren’t born here?’
‘No. Bern. I was a city boy. My family had a successful printing business.’
After a lifetime of stunted family conversations in which memories were equated with secrets, it made Allegra’s eyes glow to hear about her great-grandparents. ‘So what made you come to Zermatt?’
‘You mean apart from the pretty girls?’ he laughed softly. ‘I came to ski with some friends before I started my apprenticeship. You can imagine my father’s reaction when I told him I was staying and marrying a goat farmer’s daughter.’
‘Oh heavens!’
He frowned. ‘People are strange, though. Her father was more against the marriage than mine. I came into it with if not a fortune, at least a modest dowry, and it was certainly better than anything Timo or any of the other locals could have given her. I told him I would give Valentina a better life than she could ever have expected, but he didn’t want her marrying a “foreigner”, as he called me.’ He shook his head bitterly. ‘Even now, all these years later, I wish he could have seen what I could have given her, that I kept my promise.’
Their eyes moved over the chalet and Allegra knew from her own Alpine holidays that this was probably worth at least 7 million Swiss francs.
‘There’s a saying back home – “There’s nowt so queer as folk,”’ she said.
Lars looked at her quizzically, clearly not understanding, just as the nurse came back in to collect the cups and plates. She was as unsmiling as she had been yesterday, and she placed Allegra’s half-empty cup down so hard on the tray it slopped over the sides.
Annoyed, Allegra watched as she walked away again. ‘Do you have many problems with your staff?’ she asked loudly – certainly loudly enough for the nurse to hear and Allegra saw her pause by the door. She already knew from Lars’s reaction yesterday that he felt less than supported by the woman.
Lars laughed, patting her hand appreciatively. ‘Indeed I do, Allegra. Indeed I do.’
‘So here you all are,’ she said, pulling off her gloves and staring down at the three men with a shy smile. Zhou, Sam and Massi were sitting in a row at a table, all leaning back on their chairs against the wall behind them, eyes closed, their faces tilted up to the sun. In front of them were tankards of beer, almost finished, suggesting they’d been here a short while at least.
Zum See was one of the most renowned mountain restaurants, not only in Zermatt but all of the Alps, and had been easy to find. She had wandered into the tiny constellation of ancient sheep sheds and grain stores that made up the famous eatery, led as much by ear as by nose, for the noise was terrific – a perfect storm of pan-European languages as ‘Pass the bread’ and ‘More wine?’ were called at the tables in French, German, Italian, Spanish, English, Portuguese . . .
The sun had pierced the snow clouds at last and everyone clearly wanted to make the most of the rare good weather. Every table was packed, some people squeezed in round the corners with barely room for a side plate; a courtyard of sorts had been created by virtue of outdoor tables being arranged against and around the various decrepit, tumbledown outbuildings, but the ground was uneven, straw strewn across the paths. It was a contrary scene – rich customers in their designer clothes clamouring to enjoy the erstwhile peasants’ delight – and she absolutely saw the appeal. In fact, she loved it. After all, she belonged to both worlds.
She took off her helmet and clipped it with all the others onto a rope that was slung between two pegs on the wall.
‘Our little bird,’ Massi grinned delightedly. ‘I knew you would fly back to us.’
‘Did you do what you needed to?’ Zhou asked, immediately raising his arm to flag down a passing waitress.
‘Yes, thanks,’ she replied brightly. She was still buoyant from seeing Lars again and felt relaxed, even in the face of Sam’s stony stare. ‘I’ll have a vin chaud, please,’ she said to the waitress. She looked back at Zhou. ‘Have you ordered food yet?’
He nodded. ‘We weren’t sure if you were coming or not.’
‘No, that’s fine.’ She looked back at the waitress. ‘Something quick – pasta?’ she shrugged.
‘Lemon ravioli?’ the waitress asked.
‘Great.’
She sat down on the bench opposite them as Zhou and Massi sat forward, their elbows on the table. Sam, naturally, had closed his eyes again, like a child pretending that if he couldn’t see her, she wouldn’t be there.
The guys took in her ski kit. She had gone back to the chalet to change and check on Isobel.
‘How is your beautiful sister?’ Massi asked, sloshing some warmed wine from a carafe into a glass for her, not waiting for hers to arrive.
‘I think the novelty’s beginning to wear off,’ she grinned. ‘Now that she’s on her own and we’re all skiing, anyway. I’m sure she’ll be delighted to relapse later when we’re all back.’
Zhou and Massi laughed.
‘Will she rally for the party?’ Zhou asked.
‘Will she rally? Listen, she’ll rule the party. Even from the sofa.’
‘I love her,’ Massi declared simply.
‘I know,’ Allegra smiled. She spotted the breadbasket and grabbed a piece. ‘So tell me about your morning. What’s the snow like?’
‘In-credible,’ Massi replied, pinching the air. ‘Powder up to your nose.’
‘He means knees,’ Zhou said with a roll of his eyes.
‘Wow. Where did you go?’ she asked.
‘Over the border into Cervinia,’ Zhou said. ‘It was quieter over there, and we prefer the north-facing slopes in backcountry.’
‘That sounds wise. I’m sorry to have missed it.’
‘Are you going to come out with us after lunch?’
‘If you’ll have me, thanks.’
‘We thought we’d try over in Trift. The Ober Gabelhorn glacier is at the top, and there are no marked runs or lifts at all. I’ve never seen anyone over there, so we should have the place to ourselves.’
Wasn’t that where Connor had said Valentina had been found?
‘Great.’ Reaching in her pocket, she found her Chanel Neige lip balm, which gave her full UV protection without making her look like a Test cricketer, and she began absently dabbing her lips, wondering if Sam intended to spend the entire lunch blanking her.
‘So,’ she said, putting the lip balm away again, determined to shine in his eyes like a too-bright light, ‘Zhou told me you all met at Harvard Business School. What do you do now, Massi?’
‘I make cupcakes.’
‘What?’ Disbelief made the word come out as a squeal. ‘Sorry. It’s just that . . . cup . . . You went to Harvard to make cupcakes?’
Massi laughed too. ‘I know! It’s insane. You should have seen my father’s face when I graduated and showed him my business plane.’
‘Plan. And no, you really shouldn’t have,’ Zhou said, shaking his head, no hint of a smile. ‘His father’s almost as traditional as mine.’
M
assi rolled his eyes, looking suddenly – scarily – serious. ‘Sì. Mafia. They like guns, not the cakes.’
Allegra immediately stopped laughing. ‘Shit, really?’
Massi’s face broke into another infectious grin. ‘No! But you know, as I said to him, the first thing they teach you at Harvard Business School is that eighty-four per cent of all buying decisions are based on emotion, not thought. And a hundred per cent of my cupcake sales are based on emotion. Each one is a little pot of happiness. It is why I now have seventeen branches throughout the United States, with annual turnover of thirty-four million dollars.’
Allegra’s smile faded. ‘I’m sorry, how much?’
‘That is exactly what my father said when I showed him my accountings!’ Massi grinned.
‘It’s still peanuts compared to my fortune, of course,’ Zhou said waspishly.
‘Your father’s fortune,’ Massi clarified. ‘It’s just as well for you there’s a one-child policy in China. At least there’s no one else for your father to give the money to instead.’
Allegra watched as they laughed, two multi-millionaires teasing each other like teenagers, throwing barbs back and forth like it was a basketball. They were all old friends, the three of them, far closer than she’d supposed. Would Zhou really encourage his father to choose her over Sam?
‘So you’re based in the States, then, Massi?’ she asked, wrapping her hands round her warm glass.
‘Boston.’
She nodded, wondering how his English could still be so lousy. ‘You all seem very close. Do you get to see each other regularly?’
‘This man here, he is my brother,’ Massi said, gripping Sam’s arm and jolting him out of his faux sleep. ‘We used to see each other most weeks, but Sam moving to London has erupted our routine. We would play every week in the racquets and tennis club. I would catch the shuttle down especially for it.’ He reached over and patted Sam on the arm. ‘I hope it was worth it, buddy.’
Sam, forced to contribute to the conversation, shrugged. ‘Gotta go where the work is.’
‘Or where the ex isn’t, huh? You know Amy called me—’
Sam tipped his chair violently back. ‘Stop right there.’
Amy? That was the name of his wife? Allegra’s eyes slid between the two of them.
‘But she just wanted to—’ Massi protested.
‘I said stop. You don’t go there.’
Allegra watched as he drained his beer and immediately raised his arm, indicating a fresh round for the table. What had Amy done that was so bad he wouldn’t even let her name be brought up?
She looked across at Zhou, surprised to find his eyes already on her. ‘We fight like brothers too.’
‘Fair enough. Who’s the boss?’ By anyone’s definition they were alpha males, the lot of them.
Massi, shaken by Sam’s warning, rallied quickly. ‘Well,’ he said, leaning in closer across the table, ‘these two are the jokers of the pack. I am . . . I am . . .’
‘The knave?’ Zhou quipped, one eyebrow slightly lifted.
‘No. I am the ace.’
‘Huh?’ Zhou frowned, confused and no doubt concerned at the prospect of Massi swerving into metaphorical territory.
‘You know – I can be high or low.’
‘And don’t we know it!’ Zhou quipped.
Massi shot his friend a tart look. ‘I am the bridge man. I have to’ – he looked up to the sky, straining for the word – ‘negotiate between these two.’ He thumbed towards Sam and Zhou. ‘Like for hostages.’
There was a puzzled silence.
‘Really?’ she smiled, pretending to understand.
‘Oh yes.’ Massi lowered his chin, speaking in sombre tones. ‘They are just so jealous of each other: Sam because Zhou is so rich; Zhou because Sam is so good-looking.’
‘Oh jeez,’ Sam groaned under his breath, not looking remotely amused.
‘What? You think that is not true?’ Massi asked, looking over. ‘Would you be his friend if he did not have all his money? I mean, really, what else is there to like about him?’
‘Massi!’ Allegra shrieked, laughing.
‘As you pointed out, it’s his father’s money,’ Sam corrected drily.
‘Ouch!’ Zhou winced at the double punch, eyes gleaming with amusement.
‘So you were listening,’ Massi grinned, stretching further on the table and resting his head on his hand. ‘Well, you love him but hate him too for being so rich,’ he said provocatively.
‘Is that so?’ Sam asked laconically, drumming his fingers on the table.
‘Allegra, do you think there is more to Zhou than his money?’
‘Of course!’
‘Thank you,’ Zhou said with an appreciative smile.
‘And what about Sam?’ Massi asked.
She frowned, unsure what he meant. ‘What about him?’
‘Is there more to him than just a pretty face?’
Allegra stiffened. ‘Well, strictly speaking, I never said he had a pretty face.’
Massi’s mouth dropped open and he slapped Sam hard on the thigh. ‘I don’t believe it! Never did I think I would see the day. A woman who is impossible to your charms!
‘Tell me, then, Allegra,’ Massi said, drawing back to her. ‘If Sam isn’t a pretty face, what is he?’
‘Well, I never said that either,’ she pushed back. ‘And besides, we’re talking about you three, not me.’
‘But a conversation is a two-way road. Tell me. What is Sam? In five words?’
Both Massi and Zhou were watching her intently. Sam had fixed a stony stare on the floor, but she knew from his straining stillness that he was listening. ‘Well, he’s Canadian, divorced,’ she said, aiming for benign. Handsome, funny, good in bed, stylish, successful . . .
‘That’s two,’ Massi prompted, and she looked back at him from far-off eyes.
Heart-broken, recovering . . . ‘Ambitious, unscrupulous.’
‘Four. I thought you were better at maths than that, Allegra,’ Zhou teased.
Imaginative, persistent . . . ‘A thief.’
She watched as Sam’s eyes blazed, his mouth falling open a little in shock at the word as it resounded around the table. Massi’s eyes were positively dancing with delight.
‘Oh! That is . . . that is . . .’ He exhaled loudly. ‘Sam? That is a beeg accusation. What have you to say to that?’
The waitress set down his fresh drink, appraising him with eyes that suggested she would blatantly disagree with Allegra’s synopsis.
‘What? You expect me to dignify it with a comment?’
Massi clasped his hands together like he was chairing a panel. ‘OK, then. How would you describe Allegra in five?’
He didn’t even blink. ‘Simple: single, beautiful, successful, lonely, bitter.’ The words tripped off so quickly, no hesitation, no pause, like it was something he’d been musing on for days.
She looked away quickly, reaching for something pithy to say, but her mind had gone blank, all the blood rushing to her heart, and she forced herself to take another sip of her drink instead as a clunky silence descended like an iron cloak.
‘Oh no! No, no!’ Massi said, rushing to her rescue this time, like a Labrador whose loyalty was being tested. ‘I cannot allow that. It is ingallant.’
Their food arrived, trailing steam ribbons in the air, and they all concentrated, even Massi, on the black pepper as it was twisted onto their plates with lavish ceremony, asking for extra parmigiano, some more water – anything to distract from the joke that had started off funny but fallen horribly flat.
Chapter Twenty-Five
‘Just what exactly are you looking for down there?’ Zhou shouted, barely audible above the engines.
‘Nothing!’
‘Doesn’t look like nothing!’
She looked over at him, her bright eyes reflected back to her in his rainbow-tinted oil-slick goggles. He looked menacing and lean in his ninja-style all-black kit -unlike Massi, who, in baggy
green and yellow, looked more like a giant jelly baby.
‘You may be in line to inherit a mining company, Zhou, but see down there? One day, all that down there’s going to be mine!’ she laughed.
Zhou roared with laughter, but her joke wasn’t as unfeasible as it sounded. Her family’s old pastures were somewhere here, below them, below the snow, and had they not been sold almost sixty years earlier, she may well have stood to one day inherit her own corner of a mountain.
But it mattered not. Even without the deeds to some acres of grass, she felt connected to this place now, like a balloon tied to a rock.
She pressed her face to the window again, her breath fogging the glass. The hamlet of snow-capped huts was almost invisible from the sky. Clustered together like windblown cattle, it was only the flashes of blackened walls as the helicopter swooped past below them that betrayed their presence at all.
‘This is a good choice, no?’ Massi shouted with a buoyant grin. Only his white teeth were visible with his goggles on, but his curls easily escaped the helmet, wrapping round its edges like a climbing rose. Sam was checking his bindings behind them.
The slopes on this side of the resort were untouched and still boasting pristine powder. They circled a small plateau in ever-decreasing circles, the helicopter lowering slowly, and snow whirled up like a sandstorm in the desert. Sprays of snow particles blew past the windows as Zhou slid open the door, ready to jump first.
She watched him leap, arms wide, the ski poles extended like an eagle’s wing tips . . . Then it was Massi’s turn. He jumped almost without looking, hurling himself out with a kamikaze ebullience that was to be expected.
She was up next and she took a breath. She had helied before, but she’d never liked this bit, the pop – or the jump.
‘After you!’ Sam shouted after a moment, and she glanced back at him, half wondering whether he was lining up to push her out. It was the spur she needed – just in case and before he could, she leaped unaided, Sam following a few seconds after. Zhou had already taken off down the slope, with Massi in hot pursuit, both wanting to be first to make tracks in the snow, and she didn’t bother this time to turn round to see exactly where Sam might be. He was breathing down her neck, she knew, and she waited for the moment he shot past her, determined to beat her and catch them up. They could hear Massi ahead, whooping with delight, and she suspected that meant he had taken the lead.
