The Autumn of the Witch

by Anne Mather

  ‘I see,’ Stephanie repeated. ‘But how will Lucia and I communicate with one another? She doesn’t speak English, and she doesn’t understand my phrase-book Italian.’

  Pietro grinned suddenly. ‘Try some out on me and I’ll tell you what I think.’

  Stephanie bent her head, picking up her towel. ‘Oh, I couldn’t.’

  ‘Seriously.’ Pietro lifted her chin with one hand. ‘Go on. What do you know?’

  ‘Very little,’ said Stephanie regretfully.

  ‘Then I’ll teach you some more. Go on, say something to me. How about—Good morning, how are you today!’

  Stephanie smiled. ‘All right—er—Buon giorno, comé sta

  lei oggi?’

  Pietro laughed outright. ‘Well, it is not exactly the best accent I have ever heard,’ he remarked, as he sobered. ‘But I think we might be able to improve it. As to Lucia, I think you will find she understands what she wants to understand, do you understand me?’

  ‘I think so.’ Stephanie frowned.

  ‘Bene. Let’s go then.’

  They made their way together across the rocks and up the steep, winding cliff path. They reached the castello without incident, but when they entered the hall they found Santino lounging on the edge of the polished chest, talking on the telephone. Now there were sounds of activity about the building and Stephanie thought guiltily that she had been out much longer than she intended.

  However, Santino put down the telephone at that moment and regarded her intently. In cream cotton trousers that clung to his muscular legs, and a dark blue silk shirt that was laced up the front with cream cords, Santino looked much different from the immaculately clad businessman she was used to seeing in London, although in its way his outfit this morning was equally as elegant. His gaze flickered over Pietro for a moment, and then he looked back at his wife and said:

  ‘You will remember to take off that damp bathing suit, won’t you, Stephanie? I should not care for you to catch a cold on your first day here.’

  Stephanie’s cheeks burned, and a feeling of mortification spread over her. He must have seen them down there, on the rocks; he must have observed their every action. It was hateful and disturbing.

  ‘I didn’t know we were under surveillance!’ she said sharply, glancing at Pietro impatiently.

  Santino rose from his negligent position and regarded them mockingly. ‘Do not look so angry, Stephanie. Mario reported on your whereabouts to me. What you do is of complete indifference to me, and I was merely making a suggestion, that is all.’

  Stephanie could not have felt more humiliated, and with another angry glance in Pietro’s direction she turned and ran swiftly up the stairs to her room. Once there, in that enormous apartment, she flung herself dejectedly on the bed, burying her hot cheeks in the soft coverlet. How could he speak to her like that? So coldly and indifferently! Had he no streak of decency whatsoever? Was he so without feelings that he could dismiss anything she did without the flicker of an eyelid? Of course, this was a marriage of convenience, but surely the fact that she bore his name meant something to him.

  After a while she got up and went into the bathroom. Stripping off her clothes, she washed under the shower, rinsing her hair which was tangled and salty, and rubbing it dry afterwards. It was almost twelve before she could force herself to leave her room and even then she felt reluctant to do so. She had changed into a flared skirt of yellow cotton and a cream knitted cotton sweater, and although her hair was not quite dry she had secured it in a pleat at the back of her head so that it looked smooth and tidy.

  She descended the stairs slowly, and reached the hall without seeing anyone. However, as she made her way across to the lounge she heard the sound of voices coming from there and when she looked inside the room she found Santino and his daughter lying on the soft carpet wrestling together. There was something moving and disturbing about that scene and Stephanie could not understand the strange emotion that stirred inside her as she watched them together. It was a mixture of pleasure and pain and she wondered with a peculiar yearning what it would be like to have Santino treat her with such gentle abandon.

  As Santino held Lucia up above his chest he saw, under his arms, Stephanie’s presence in the doorway, and with lazy determination he put his daughter aside and got slowly to his feet. His eyes surveyed her appraisingly, and she felt an inordinate pleasure at the realization that he could find no fault with the curving fullness of her body, or the long slender length of her legs. Lucia got up too, and came to stand by her father, sliding one arm round his hips, hugging herself close to him in a wholly possessive movement.

  ‘So, Stephanie,’ murmured Santino coolly. ‘And am I to understand that you are now prepared to meet your—er—responsibilities?’ Stephanie straightened her shoulders. ‘As it seems to matter little to you what I do, I saw no point in hurrying,’ she retorted shortly.

  Santino raised his dark eyebrows. ‘Do I detect a note of censure in your tones, Stephanie?’ he queried. ‘Surely you would not have me demand your undivided attention?’

  Stephanie twisted her hands together behind her back. She, if not he, was supremely conscious of Lucia’s probing stare, and she had no desire to argue with him in front of the child. ‘I—I haven’t been properly introduced to Lucia yet,’ she said abruptly.

  Santino looked down at his daughter. ‘Nor you have. Still, that can soon be remedied. Lucia—this is your new mamma. Questa e Mamma, si?’

  Stephanie stared at him helplessly. ‘Perhaps she should just call me Stephanie—’ she began awkwardly.

  ‘Why?’ Santino straightened. ‘You are to be her mother, in every sense of the word.’

  Stephanie hesitated. ‘It—it is such a permanent word—’ she exclaimed.

  Santino’s eyes darkened. ‘Why not? Your presence here is a permanent thing, Stephanie. Make no mistake about that.’

  Stephanie shivered. He was so adamant, so immovable in anything he commanded. Was she really to stay here for always? Was there really to be no escape from this unnatural arrangement? She swallowed hard. Until this moment she had succeeded in pushing all the implications of what she was doing to the back of her mind, but now they all surged to the fore again, and with them the overpowering sense of inevitability she had felt the night before…

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MUCH to Stephanie’s relief Sophia came to announce that lunch was served a few minutes later and in consequence she did not have to make any conversation with Lucia. It was to be no easy task making friends with the child, although curiosity was a powerful stimulant, and Stephanie sensed that Lucia was curious about her now. Even so, her obsession for her father was likely to cause difficulties as Lucia was bound to regard Stephanie’s presence in the castello as a continual threat to their relationship.

  They ate lunch in a small dining room which adjoined the lounge. There was only the three of them and Stephanie wondered whether Pietro and Mario, and Giulio when he was there, ate with the family. But the meal at least gave her something to think about and she concentrated on the fresh melon they ate as an hors d’oeuvre. The melon was followed by chicken and ham cooked in oil and herbs that was rather too rich for Stephanie’s taste, and cheese and fruit completed the meal. The coffee was rich too and aromatic, but Stephanie, who had had no breakfast, was glad of its reviving strength.

  Santino was smoking a cigar and drinking his second cup of coffee when an elderly woman came diffidently into the room and spoke respectfully to him. Stephanie guessed this was Maria and that supposition seemed confirmed when Lucia began to shake her head vigorously, saying ‘No! No! No!’ over and over again as the woman came towards her.

  Lucia slid off her seat and ran to her father, wrapping her arms round his neck and pleading with him to allow her to stay, but he merely smiled firmly, disentangled her small fingers, and handed her over to the nursemaid. Lucia was carried screaming away and Stephanie, disturbed by the small scene, kept her eyes determinedly focused on the tabl
e in front of her. It was nothing to do with her, after all, and she had no desire to draw his attention to herself.

  Santino regarded her bent head steadily for several minutes and then said: ‘I sense your disapproval.’

  Stephanie looked up quickly. ‘You’re mistaken. What you do to your daughter is no concern of mine.’

  Santino’s eyes darkened. ‘Then perhaps it should be. After all, as you are to have charge of her while I am away, perhaps you should offer me your advice.’

  ‘The operative phrase is while you are away,’ remarked Stephanie carefully. ‘While you are here the responsibility is yours.’

  Santino chewed impatiently on his cigar. ‘I will not suffer your indifference, Stephanie!’ he snapped.

  Stephanie looked at him steadily. ‘What can you do to change it?’

  ‘I think you know the answer to that as well as I do,’ returned Santino grimly, and Stephanie’s face suddenly suffused with colour. Then, as though satisfied by her reactions, he said in a quieter tone: ‘Did Pietro advise you that I am going away tomorrow?’

  Stephanie shook her head. ‘No! Should he have done?’

  ‘I thought perhaps, while you were—what shall I say—sunbathing—this morning, he might have told you that as from tomorrow you will have every chance to indulge yourself in whatever direction pleases you, so long as Lucia is not neglected—’

  ‘That’s a vile thing to say!’ Her impassioned young voice interrupted him and he lay back in his chair mockingly, watching her indignation with obvious amusement. ‘I don’t know what kind of an opinion you have of women in general, but so far as I am concerned you need not even consider such possibilities!’

  ‘What possibilities, Stephanie?’ His tone was sardonic. Stephanie thrust her coffee cup aside. ‘Don’t pretend that you were not implying that Pietro—that Pietro and I—’

  Santino drew deeply on his cigar, exhaling the smoke into the air above their heads with deliberation. ‘Do not get so agitated, Stephanie. My comments were not of a censorious nature.’

  ‘No. They weren’t, were they?’ Stephanie pressed her lips together tremulously. ‘Obviously you don’t give a damn what I do!’

  Santino leant on the table towards her. ‘That is correct,’ he observed chillingly. ‘What did you expect?’

  Stephanie straightened her shoulders. ‘Of course, I was forgetting your reputation, signor!’ she said unsteadily.

  ‘My name is Santino!’ His tones were harsh now, and his hard fingers curved round her wrist as it lay on the table, twisting it cruelly. ‘Do not forget again!’

  Stephanie shrank back from the anger in his expression, but she fought against his intimidation. ‘Why should I?’ she demanded. ‘Why should I call you a name that is alien to me? There is no closeness, no feeling of trust, in this marriage so-called! Why—why should I obey you?’

  ‘Because I say so!’ he responded fiercely, his eyes glittering brilliantly. ‘And if you find my methods of treating you so distasteful, then I suggest you use this period while I am away to harden yourself instead of behaving like an emotional teenager every time I say something that does not conform to your romanticized codes of behaviour!’

  Stephanie controlled her features with difficulty. ‘Am I—am I then to understand that neither of us is bound by any normal concepts of this relationship?’ she inquired huskily.

  Santino’s brows drew together. ‘If by that you mean shall I be spending my time in Rome in some other woman’s bed then you need have no anxieties!’ he replied coldly, causing the hot colour to envelop her whole body. ‘When I want a woman, I shall take one, but not when I shall be in conference half the night!’ He released her wrist abruptly and rose to his feet. ‘You are a child, Stephanie. You should do very well for Lucia. Now—excuse me!’

  He strode out of the room and with a groan Stephanie buried her face in her hands, shaking uncontrollably. His words to her were always so cruelly humiliating, so destructive, and although she knew she was a fool to allow him to upset her so she simply could not help it. It seemed incredible that the man who had just verbally devastated her should be the same man who earlier had been wrestling on the floor with his daughter. Last evening, when he had shown a little compassion for her feelings, she had half believed that maybe she had been mistaken about him, but obviously his moments of sensitivity were few and far between. He apparently did not care what she did so long as she took charge of Lucia and refrained from interfering with his life.

  Sighing she rose from the table. The afternoon stretched ahead of her, bleak and uninteresting, and she wondered with a feeling akin to panic how she was going to fill her days.

  But such thoughts were unconstructive and Stephanie was beginning to realize that to retain her sanity in this situation she would have to accept it for what it was and try and use her own intelligence to make it tenable. Acting on this assumption, she began by returning to her room and unpacking her suitcases, hanging the clothes away in the capacious wardrobes. Obviously there was no lady’s maid in the castello at the present time, and she wondered if Santino’s first wife had had one. There seemed little trace of Sancia’s personality about the place at all, unless the exquisite decorations had been designed by a woman’s hand. But if so there was professionalism in every line and somehow Stephanie doubted that Lucia’s mother should have been that kind of a woman.

  Stowing her cases away in the bottom of the cupboards, Stephanie straightened and looked about her. She still wished she had been given a less awesome apartment. This was obviously the main suite and as such meant to be shared. She sighed and looked at the enormous bed. Had Santino slept there with Sancia? Had this been their bedroom? Was that why he had given it to her because he could not bear to use it now that Sancia was dead? A feeling of distaste accompanied these inquiries and Stephanie thrust such thoughts aside as being of little consequence. Whatever Sancia’s relationship had been with her husband, wherever they had spent their nights was of no interest to her, and therefore not worthy of consideration. Even so, Stephanie was only human, and she was annoyed with her own reactions to such speculations.

  Leaving the bedroom, she went downstairs again and found when she entered the lounge that french doors had been opened on to the terrace. Walking across the lounge she saw that there was a glass-topped table on the terrace set with a tall jug of iced orange juice and several tumblers, and Lucia was perched on the edge of a cane chair drinking from one of these glasses. Obviously she was newly risen from her rest, for her eyes still held the vaguely sleepy look that children sometimes have after resting in the afternoon. Maria was seated at the table also, smiling and nodding at her charge, their contretemps earlier apparently forgotten.

  It was Maria who first became aware of Stephanie’s presence in the open doorway and she gave a deferential smile and rose to her feet. ‘Signora,’ she murmured politely.

  Stephanie hesitated for a moment and then stepped on to the terrace. ‘Good afternoon, Maria,’ she responded, returning the older woman’s smile. ‘Good afternoon, Lucia.’

  Lucia looked up at the mention of her name and regarded Stephanie curiously, obviously wondering why she kept appearing everywhere. Whatever Sophia had explained to her it was easy to see that Lucia was finding it difficult understanding why there was suddenly another woman about the house.

  Stephanie linked her slim fingers together, feeling the cutting strength of the engagement ring, and took the seat beside Maria, indicating that she should be seated again. Maria subsided with obvious reluctance, but Stephanie knew there was no point in dismissing the older woman or no doubt Lucia would demand to go, too.

  So she smiled encouragingly at both of them, and said: ‘May I have some orange juice? This looks quite delicious!’

  Maria understood what she was saying by her actions and nodded vigorously, and poured some of the liquid into a glass, pushing it towards Stephanie. She sipped it experimentally and realized as she did so that she had never tasted real oran
ge juice before. It was so sharply palatable with none of the synthetic cloyness of the bottled variety. Lucia watched her carefully, but when Stephanie caught her eye she hastily looked away and began playing with her own glass. As it was almost full the result was not unexpected. Its contents were spilt across the glass surface of the table, narrowly avoiding Stephanie’s lap as she leapt quickly out of the way. The orange juice dripped steadily on to the paved terrace and Lucia burst into giggles at the sight of Stephanie’s shocked face.

  The unexpected sound of Lucia’s laughter caused Stephanie to place a restraining hand on Maria’s arm as she would have moved to chastise her, and with a shake of her head she indicated that the old woman should simply wipe up the mess.

  Maria took a cloth from the capacious pockets of her apron and soaked up what was left on the table. The little that had fallen to the ground could be cleaned up later. Stephanie took her seat again, and with slightly unsteady hands poured some more juice into Lucia’s glass, not filling it so full this time.

  Lucia’s giggles subsided and she pushed the glass aside, apparently unwilling to drink any more, and Stephanie made no demur. Instead, she looked out across the magnificent vista that could be seen from this terrace and marvelled at the distance that was visible. From here the road which wound down into the valley looked like a grey snake, twisting and turning in torment down the hillside. At this hour of the afternoon the workers were returning to the fields below them and a lorry struggled with its load along a mud-baked track. There was the drift of smoke and the scent of the citrus groves and the lazy strumming sound of a guitar. A heat haze distorted the view suddenly and Stephanie turned smarting eyes back to the immediate environs of the terrace.