Uphill All The Way

by Sue Moorcroft

  The moment he appeared beside her at the railings near The Chalet, she tackled him. 'Giorgio, I doubt very much that you are a single man.'

  Meeting her gaze, he asked, 'Why do you say this?'

  Her heart contracted that he hadn't immediately burst out with a denial. 'It seems unlikely that a man of your age has never married. But there's no divorce here, I know that. So unless your wife's dead, you're married.'

  He crossed himself at the mention of death. Then his fingertips tapped gently on the railing. 'You are right. There is no divorce in our country. But some men live apart from their families. Many, many men. Shall we walk?'

  They began along the broad, paved promenade between the busy road and the drop to the rocky beach.

  Judith's heart was slithering in her chest. 'So you do have a wife?'

  Gravely, he nodded. 'Johanna. And I have daughters, Alexia and Lydia. We are all very unhappy when we live together. It's better not. I have lived alone for fourteen years. Alexia is 19, she works in a chemist shop in Tower Road, training. Lydia is 17 and still does her education. I love my children very much. But I do not love their mother, and I have not loved her for a very long time. I doubt whether she ever love me, ever.'

  His emphatic tone and the glitter of his eyes moved her.

  'So why marry you?'

  He shrugged, an exaggerated, frustrated gesture that brought his shoulders up around his ears. 'Many times I ask myself. Maybe her father thought I was best she could do.'

  'Giorgio,' she'd said, carefully. 'I am divorced. And I don't think we'd better go out together again.'

  'I am separate,' he declared forcefully. But he made no attempt to detain her when she turned and returned to the office.

  Two days later, he materialised at her side as she ate an apple on a green-painted bench facing the waves that were bigger today, bursting on the rocks. Despite her reservations, somehow she found herself joining another of his trips, this time on a ferry to Gozo, the largest of the neighbouring islands.

  At the end of the excursion he halted her as she made to follow the tourists from the boat. 'Tomorrow is my rest day. I spend a day on a beach. To help me enjoy this, will you be my company?' He thought for a moment, then amended, 'My guest.'

  She failed to resist his charm. Once couldn't hurt.

  They spent the day on the white sand of Anchor Bay at the north end of the island. Talking, laughing, swimming in a cooling sea barely ruffled by the breeze. That evening they ate in Rabat, in a small cellar restaurant aromatic with goat's cheese and herbs and lit by dancing light of red candles in wine bottles.

  He drove her home in the early hours, the stars bright against a black sky. Parking outside her flat beside the slack night time sea, he cradled her face gently and kissed her, a deep, carnal kiss, a kiss of clear intent, a kiss that made her muscles melt. 'Today we've made a good beginning. It's a big thing we begin.'

  A sudden bleak regret encompassed her heart. It was all very well to take pleasure from a single day to be enjoyed and allowed to sink into the past.

  It had been so innocent.

  Even if the air crackled. Even if his eyes burnt with hunger.

  It could be glossed over. And one single kiss.

  But now his words were forcing her to face facts, and she responded with a deliberate misconstruction. 'You're right, it would be big, if we allowed it. But, although you say you've been separated for years, you take me to places far away from home.'

  He grew still. 'I do not hide you.'

  'I think you do. I think your wife lives in Sliema.'

  He stared at her for several long moments. 'I apologise,' he said, at last. 'Yes, is true, a little. Johanna and me have been separate for fourteen years, but I do not make people talk of her by making a parade of my feeling for you. Why give her that pain? We will be always apart, but still we consider for each other, and for our daughters. They are good daughters and Johanna is a good mother. Also, my parents, they are unhappy their son cannot have a good marriage, and I try not to make them more unhappy. They are my parents. My Uncle Saviour and Aunt Cass, my cousins and their children, we all live in this big village, my parents would hurt to feel the family embarrassed by me. You live in Sliema, you know Sliema. People know other people.'

  'Difficult,' she acknowledged, sighing. 'I understand.' But that didn't make it any easier. The street lights and the moonlight glittered together in the ripples of Sliema Creek and flecked Giorgio's eyes. 'Perhaps it's impossible. I'm not sure I'm the right woman to be tidied away, a secret from your family.' And she kissed his cheek, a fleeting farewell, hurrying from the car and safely through the entry door to the flats where he couldn't follow.

  The next day he surprised her at the office a few minutes before she would normally take her lunch. He'd never visited the office before. Very solemn, he faced her over her desk. 'Is not impossible. If you want, we promenade ourselves. We go now to Tony's Bar on The Strand, and eat at a table on the pavement where everyone in Sliema can see. Every day, if you want, we do it.'

  His eyes were almost black and her head spun with how much she wanted him. She could not let him make his life so uncomfortable, either for himself or for those he loved. Instead she allowed their love affair to begin. Discreet, if not quite secret.

  He was, after all, separated from his wife.

  In England, she would've thought nothing about going out with a separated man. The only difference was that Giorgio would never take the next logical step - to divorce.

  Richard was brilliant, though he never approved. Richard, who married Erminia, a Maltese woman, when he'd been stationed on the island with the British Army in the sixties, at least understood. Probably too clearly.

  'It's dangerous to go into these relationships half-heartedly,' he counselled. 'If your partner's Maltese and you want to live in Malta you're well advised to embrace the whole thing, race, religion - and marriage.' He'd told her this as they worked together at polished maple desks, guiding foreign buyers through the labyrinth of acquiring property on the island. He tried to tell Giorgio the same over a palely gleaming Cisk beer at a pavement café overlooking the creek that bobbed with boats in blues and reds.

  Giorgio just grinned. 'We make our own rules.'

  But no, they didn't. They worked around those of others.

  Chapter Two

  The entry system intercom buzzed suddenly, jarring her out of her thoughts.

  Disorientated, she reached quickly for the handset. 'I thought you were never coming! Have you forgotten your key?'

  A hesitation. 'Is Charlie Galea. Can I speak with you?'

  What on earth...? Maybe Giorgio was ill. Or drunk! 'Of course, Charlie. Come up.' She made herself sound composed, and pressed the button to release the front door.

  Charlie Galea was younger than Giorgio, thinner, taller. He lived with his wife and three small children in San Gwann, behind Gzira and Ta' Xbiex. She knew him a little, he was another recent addition to the diving fraternity.

  He stepped through her pale green front door and into the entrance area that opened out into the other rooms, his eyes flickering around the white walls decorated with pastel watercolours.

  He looked so drawn and ill at ease as she showed him into the sitting room. The poor lad was horribly uncomfortable. Probably Giorgio was drunk, and had sent gullible young Charlie Galea to make his excuses. Or perhaps to fetch Judith, so that Giorgio could sparkle his eyes at her and urge her to join the fun?

  'Coffee?' she offered.

  He shook his head. Cleared his throat. Then, unexpectedly, slid a hand across his eyes.

  Silence.

  Despite the temperature, Judith felt a chill slither around her. Giorgio being drunk would hardly make Charlie cry. Her lips tingled. 'What, Charlie?'

  The young man took a deep breath. 'There was an accident, today. With Giorgio.'

  She sat forward, fists balling, heart pummelling her rib cage from the inside. 'How bad?'

  He nodded, sniffi
ng. 'Very bad. There was a jet ski - '

  Her stomach tossed like a pancake. 'Oh no!'

  The story came tumbling out, torrents of words clumped together between Charlie's sobs. 'There was plenty of sea for everyone. Anchored there was a cruiser, we see it before we go down.

  'Under the water, we hear engines as we come up, but we are at the end of our air, messing about at three metres on the last of our tanks. We are well within the 50-metre zone and we send up our marker buoys already. We are safe to surface with caution.' He wiped his face with his T-shirt.

  'But there were two jet ski, put in the water from the cruiser, I think. They move so quick, right inside the reef. Giorgio, he surface first...'

  Horrific images flashed into Judith's mind, Giorgio mown back under, his respirator torn from his mouth as the moaning beast of the jet ski bounced across the water, into the exclusion zone and right upon the surface marker buoy.

  Her heart beating in her throat, she jumped to her feet. 'He's alive?'

  Charlie nodded. 'But bad.'

  'I should have been there,' she breathed. 'Is he in St. Luke's?' The main hospital, at Gwardamanga.

  He nodded again, coughing back his tears. 'The helicopter take him.'

  Judith began to cast around furiously for shoes, her bag. 'I must go - '

  And suddenly Charlie was on his feet, his eyes enormous with apprehension. 'They say no. They say no, no!'

  Her movements slowed. Stilled. The world went quiet apart from a mosquito-like whining in her ears. She fell back, bonelessly, into her chair. 'Who does?' she whispered. As if she didn't know.

  'His wife. His mother. They ask the hospital to make sure you are kept out. You are not family, you not visit, they say.'

  'Nonsense!' she snorted, robustly. 'They can't do that!'

  But they could.

  Until the accident, despite Giorgio's mother, Maria, walking out of the one meeting Giorgio tried to arrange, Judith hadn't quite appreciated the strength of his family's feelings. It hadn't mattered if his parents refused to acknowledge her. Their relationship could go on without them. Her existence shouldn't cause too much harm to Johanna, his wife, it had been so long since Johanna and Giorgio had lived together.

  She'd had her rationale.

  And now that disaster had struck, surely the family would realise that her place was with Giorgio?

  Apparently not.

  Giorgio was placed in intensive care, and Judith's pleas and demands for admittance availed her nothing but a variety of nurses advising her pleasantly, 'I'm so sorry. Family only.'

  She called twice at his parents' house in an attempt to negotiate, willing to do anything, say anything, to make them understand and permit her to see him. But no one answered her knock.

  She went to Cass.

  Cass Zammit, Giorgio's aunt, was the only member of Giorgio's family who'd ever had any respect for their relationship, meeting them occasionally for quiet evenings well away from Sliema to eat pasta and drink red wine. Although she had her own children, Giorgio held a special spot in Cass's heart.

  But even she was unable to help. 'I dare not. I cannot,' she declared. 'It's too difficult at the moment. And if Saviour found out I'd interfered...!'

  Her husband would be furious. Saviour was Agnello's brother.

  'I'm sorry, Judith. But Maria and Agnello...' She hesitated. 'They're adamant that it's your fault. You introduced him to diving, then abandoned him to an inexperienced partner. You could have kept him safe. They say it over and over, and tell Giorgio how you have let him down.'

  Judith couldn't even refute it. Since Charlie had broken the news the same thoughts had whirled through her head constantly. She should have found a way to stop Giorgio diving with another novice. Shouted or screamed or cried. Made him wait.

  Damned well made him.

  Giorgio had only just been certified for open water. Judith had more advanced certificates, and qualifications in first aid and rescue. Training and experience enough to limit the damage in bad situations.

  'Just tell him that I love him.' Responsibility and guilt felt liable to choke her. 'Make sure you tell him, won't you, Cass? And that I never wanted him to dive without me. Try and make him listen.'

  'I'll tell him,' Cass promised. She hesitated. 'But I don't know if he will hear.'

  Helpless, Judith went through the motions of her life without really eating or sleeping. Empty days and endless nights were her harsh reality.

  Richard was lovely, her rock on a suddenly heaving world. 'You take what time off you need,' he said. But she took none, because what would she do with it? Go hospital visiting? Hardly.

  The Times of Malta printed the full story of this latest diving accident; the slow process of Charlie getting help, Giorgio airlifted to hospital as that first 'Golden Hour' when treatment to head injuries is most effective, filtered away. There was a new outcry against jet skis in letters to the editor, and diving clubs made statements both of caution and reassurance.

  Judith winced at a counter outcry about novice divers. Was it fair to blame only the jet skier. Had the diver had adequate instruction? And supervision whilst experience was gained? Desperately sick in the heart, Judith collected the clippings.

  She drove out to see Giorgio's partners, Anton Dimech and Gordon Cassar, at the large, low shed that housed the buses and the filled-to-bursting office of Sliema Z Bus Tours that backed up the kiosks in Sliema and Paceville that sold the majority of trips.

  'Hello?' they said, as if surprised to see her.

  She pulled herself up tall and drew all her people skills into play, pasting on a smile. She was a shareholder here, which surely gave her a little leverage in a negotiation. Private investment had been sought earlier in the year, expansion capital to buy two new buses. Purchase negotiations were obviously incomplete, but they still had her money.

  'Good morning.' She sat down and gripped her bag to prevent her hands from shaking. 'I'm sorry to bother you at this awful time. You must be busier than ever in Giorgio's absence?' She waited out the following silence.

  Gordon was the one to blink first. He was a small, pleasant man with coppery lights through untidy hair, and black-framed glasses. He smiled. 'Of course, we have plans to cope with the unexpected absence of a partner, you need not worry - '

  Anton made a rapid gesture to hush the other man. 'Madam, what is your enquiry?'

  She swallowed, the quality of Anton's smile an uncomfortable reminder that he was used to being in control. He was the one the others deferred to, with his push and focus and faultless English. She cursed herself for not cornering Gordon on his own, the easier target. On his own she might have steered him into the channels of information she wished to investigate. 'As a shareholder, I thought it was reasonable to ascertain - '

  'Madam, we appreciate your investment. I can assure you that his absence will not affect our shareholders.'

  She was flustered by his cold courtesy.

  'And how is Giorgio?' She hated to hear herself ask, she who'd shared a bed with Giorgio several times a week, and should now be beside him every day.

  Anton cut off the reply Gordon had opened his mouth to make. 'His family will have the most accurate news, Madam.'

  Her throat congested stickily, making it impossible to do more than poke out her chin against the humiliation of her reception, and nod her curtest goodbye.

  She returned to the office to stare out at the traffic and the creek beyond. What else could she do? At least, there, she had Richard, his quiet support preventing her from racing in madness to St. Luke's Hospital and hurtling at the plate glass, or attempting to thread in through a door unlocked for a member of staff.

  But she just had to wait.

  It was weeks before she could persuade Cass to meet her in a café in St. Julian's, a tiny, front room of a place where Cass felt tucked away from curious eyes. A bead fly-curtain clicked softly in the doorway, and the serene young lady behind the little counter hummed under her breath as she pu
t out trays of fresh arancini, balls of rice filled with cheese or bolognese sauce.

  On the pale green table were two glass cups of capuccino.

  'News?' Judith poked her teaspoon into her froth.

  'He's out of intensive care.' Cass and Saviour had worked in England before her marriage, and her English was effortless. Cass lifted her cup elegantly, and pursed her lips to sip. Her dress was smart, her hair carefully 'done'.

  'I read that in the paper.' Judith leant forward eagerly, as if she could haul Cass's knowledge into herself by sheer proximity, her feelings, impressions, visions. 'So how does he seem? When did you see him last? What are the changes? What do the doctors say?'

  Sipping again, Cass raised her pencil-arched tan eyebrows sadly into hennaed hair. 'Changes? Everything about Giorgio is changed. There is no energy, no smile, no laugh, no joke to make you smile, no endless conversation. It is a completely different Giorgio.'

  Hope sank and settled somewhat lower in Judith's stomach. 'But he no longer needs intensive care?'

  'He has stabilised,' Cass acknowledged, sighing, shaking her head, then sipping again.

  'And has he... has he asked for me?'

  Another sigh. An aching silence. 'He's not going to.' Cass's voice was very kind. 'If that had happened, don't you think I would've found a way to let you know? To leave a message at your office? Don't torture yourself.'

  Judith tried to lift her cup, but her hand was shaking, and her voice came out as a whine. 'I must see him! I might not exist for his parents, but I can't just suddenly stop existing for him.'

  Compassionate tears stood in Cass's eyes. 'I'm so sorry. But you do need to accept that Giorgio will never ask for you again.'

  Chapter Three

  OK. Cass had confirmed it: he was out of intensive care.

  Out from behind the locked doors.

  She visited when siesta emptied the street, the Maltese summer sun blazing down to yellow the limestone buildings. Inside, the hospital corridors were cool and quiet. Judith stole along, following Cass's - reluctant, it had to be said - directions.