“Yes, it was his thing at the time. He’d go around with that worn-out pencil case, filled with charcoal and wax crayons. One thing that made you fall in love with him was that, after having sex, he’d draw you. You’d let him do it. You’d let that guy do anything. He’d spread your hair out on the grass and you’d lie there, naked, with his eyes on you. It was like giving yourself to him all over again. If anyone wanted to find out how many girls Renato Pagliuchi had laid, all they’d need to do is leaf through his sketchbooks, where he practiced his drawing skills. You’d have it dripping down your thighs, and there he was dipping in to you with another kind of brush. It penetrated you just as much. Maybe more.”
For Loriano, the conversation was like navigating a minefield. With every word an image of Donatella with no clothes on, dripping wet between her legs, could blow up in his face. “Maestro,” he said, to shake himself free of the image. “That’s what he used to call him.”
“Who?”
“The painter there. The one who had a workshop. Renato used to call him Maestro.”
“They were lovers.”
“Nives, what are you talking—”
“Edoardo Giambattista Freschi-Valeri.”
“You need a day’s vacation just to say his name.”
“They were lovers.”
“Well, that’s the kind of nonsense I don’t want to hear. This is worse than Rosa rising from the dead to kill you when you’re at the end of your life anyway.”
“He was his model.”
“That’s another matter altogether.”
“He used to draw naked Christ figures.”
“Christ?”
“Naked.”
“But they were actually—”
“If you go and look at the man’s paintings from that period, you’ll see many portraits of Renato Pagliuchi. His face. His body. Even the moles are the same. In our town and in the city, there’s one in nearly every house. Women throughout the province liked having an Adonis to look at whenever they wanted. Right out there in the open, with their husbands reading the papers in an armchair beside them.”
Bottai made a mental search of the house: there were no paintings of crucifixions or anything at home. He breathed a sigh of relief. He was surprised to find that he was intrigued. The secret life of his long-time friend was coming out. “At the time, he was famous for his womanizing and for getting beaten up now and again by jealous beaus. He’d walk into the local café with a black eye and split lip: people envied him his trophies. Knowing that he’s been immortalized in the role of Jesus Christ makes me think fondly of him. It’s one way to run a workshop.”
“The painter paid his gorgeous pupil with an apprenticeship.”
“When you’re rich, you always find a way not to open up your purse strings.”
“Another thing was that most of his bruises were not inflicted by betrayed partners.”
“Who was it then?”
“His father.”
“You mean old Bardo?”
“Yes, him. He’s a piece of shit.”
“With us kids he was always friendly. He used to give us cigarettes. He’d sometimes buy us sweets, too.”
“In the evenings, he’d hand out more to his son, with the back of his hand.”
Bottai stopped and thought for a moment. He wondered what it was that had upset the father: he had a son who was built like a statue and who pulled in girls from morning to night. For a father of that ilk, his son’s triumphs were proof of good blood, as if he himself had conquered the girls and married women. “What was he upset about?”
“The painting, for example. If it wasn’t house-painting or whitewashing cellars, it reeked of a pastime for faggots, if you get my meaning.”
Loriano shook his head. “Bardo was more sophisticated than that.”
“In front of others, he played the part of the friend everyone would wish for. Inside the four walls of his house, though, he took his son and nailed him down. Take work, for example. There was no way he was going to send him to art school. There wasn’t much money around. Renato couldn’t accept it. He wanted to take up the palette. He’d come over the ridge and down to the river with his face smashed in, and guess what?”
“Let’s hear it.”
“We fell even more deeply in love. We turned into the little nurses from the Red Cross that he’d always been looking for. If it weren’t blasphemous, I’d say that he was even better looking when he’d been beaten up. Those fleshy lips, split by his father’s beatings. When he laughed, they’d open and bleed.”
“So, there’s the explanation for the epidemic.”
“Bardo was a bad drinker. Outside the house, he was everyone’s friend; inside, he dictated the law, like a drunken old Fascist. When Renato got to the gully with his face smashed in, there were those of us who crossed ourselves because we didn’t have much time and we didn’t want to waste any of it listening to his complaints. Unlike them, I liked listening. Maybe more than stripping off for him . . . Well, no, not that much.”
Loriano felt deeply resentful on his friend’s behalf. “You used him.”
“Just as he used us.”
“He was looking for refuge. More for his soul than for his desires, it seems to me.”
“He found that in me. Not in the others.”
Attempting to wrap things up, Bottai said, “In any case, he didn’t become a painter. In the end, he was a bus driver, on the same route where I used to see him, early in the morning wearing that aviator’s jacket.”
“That’s his Rosa.”
Loriano sighed. “Right.”
“And then the painter was found dead.”
“What?”
“Surrounded by paintings in his studio. With a knife stuck into his belly.”
“I never heard about that.”
“The news was a bombshell, but in our little town who cares about artist types? Demaria saw it in the newspaper. She summoned us all one day, her eyes out of their orbits.
“To do what?”
“We didn’t say anything to begin with. We were scared of getting involved in something crazy like that. It was Tucci who put our suspicions into words. “Do you think it was Rosaltea?”
“Oh, do me a favor!”
“That was my reaction, too. Blaming her for the curse was one thing, but this was a much more delicate matter.”
“I know.” Bottai’s stomach clenched at the idea that the accusation had been bandied about. It sullied her memory.
“You know Donatella. She’s not scared of anything. ‘She wants him to herself,’ she declared. Demaria notched things up further. ‘His visits to the painter were convincing him to leave home and vanish into the big city.’ It was my turn to put the cherry on the cake, but I said it without thinking, as a joke. ‘If anything, the fact that he’s naked in that man’s paintings might not sit well with her. If she’s gone soft in the head, why not completely soft?’”
“You must have been so bored.”
“In the streets, we’d exchanged furtive looks with the wives we knew had had dealings with the town toy boy. We said ‘good morning’ to them through pursed lips. Meaning: ‘Look out!’”
Loriano chuckled. “That was over the top.”
“Anyway, it was a tough blow for Renato. After being interrogated, he stopped going into the city. One evening, Bardo told him what he thought in no uncertain terms: ‘Look where your mania for stupid drawings has gotten you.’ He went around looking grim. He took to the bottle a little more than he should have, which he’d always avoided before, seeing how you lot were wrecking yourselves, wasting your evenings at the local bar. Renato tried going back to his old ways a few times, trying to shake himself out of it. ‘Shall we go and do some sketches?’ That’s what he’d say, but even the ugly girls would reject him.”
“Did they ever find him?”
“Who?”
“The one who stuck the knife in.”
“They said it was bad debts or something like that.”
“I bet there wasn’t even a name or a face attached.”
“Exactly.”
“So, you all got stuck on the idea that it was Rosa.”
“There’s no other explanation.”
“It was the most logical answer,” Bottai said, sarcastically.
“Nobody would ever have suspected her.”
“Except you girls.”
“Except us girls.”
“And Renato.”
“It was different for him.”
“Why?”
He took her for granted. There were lots of girls with crushes on him. He treated Rosa like he treated the others, ignoring them and making them die of desire. He loved being courted. She wasn’t that stupid. She went on following him around, but she’d learned not to be caught out. As far as Renato was concerned, she was one of the many girls who’d given up on him after a fling. Like hell she was.”
“How do you know?”
“Easy. We followed her.”
Loriano rubbed his eyes. “Rosaltea followed Renato, and you followed Rosaltea?”
“She might have killed the painter.”
“Was Donatella with this gang of idiots?”
“After lashings of mint tincture, she managed to cure the disease in her panties, but she was the most anxious of us all. She was devoured by an obsession. She always had to know where Rosaltea was, otherwise she’d be convinced she was standing right behind her. So, she started tracking her every move. But it was never enough for Donatella. To keep her cool, she would have had to pin Rosaltea’s shadow to her, even when she went to the bathroom.”
He glanced back towards the bedroom. “Crazy.”
“She had two lives. One normal, all smiles and smooth-talking. The other, in the shadows.
“Rosa, you mean?”
“Yes, Rosa.”
“She was a waitress at Momo’s.”
“As soon as she took her apron off, she was something else.”
“Heads turned when she served the tables.”
“Her face was nondescript.”
“Her smile was enough to wake the dead.”
“We took turns.”
“Turns?”
“Some of us were studying at the time. Tucci and Demaria, for example. I was an apprentice at the Fracassi cleaning company, working part-time.”
“The great Taddeo Fracassi!”
“Donatella was the best-off; she was already pulling down a full salary.”
“She still takes out the tools of her trade sometimes and goes to see clients at home; people who trust her and nobody else. Those are the good days. On those evenings, she sits down to dinner more grounded.”
“Working with a family firm gave her a lot of freedom.”
“And she wasted it running after that poor wretch?”
“In the end, most of us ran out of steam. All the intrigue at the beginning was soon forgotten. At that age, things move along quickly. In my case, for example, I’d set my eyes on that hunk who came into town on Sundays from the countryside.”
“Poor Anteo.”
“We gradually stopped wasting our time. Whether or not it was Rosaltea, the painter was six feet under. We’d played a bit-part in a mystery for a while, but that was it.”
“Well put.”
“Instead, Donatella couldn’t make peace with it. She would arrive with detailed reports. Since she was so keen on tailing the girl for hours, we let her do it. We listened, as we would a radio drama. Then she found something out.”
“What?”
“Rosa had a boyfriend.”
“There you go!”
“They’d meet on Wednesdays, late at night. Down at the soccer fields. Right by the restaurant. Rather than go home after her shift, she’d go the other way. Think about it. Wednesdays, low season. If there were three tables a night at Momo’s it was a miracle. Just like now.”
“That’s proof, then.”
“Proof of what?”
“She had other affairs. Being discarded like an old glove by the boy she was in love with was painful, but she’d gotten over it. She was moving on. Curses and these terrible suspicions of yours had nothing to do with it.”
“It was Bardo.”
“Who?”
“Rosa’s boyfriend.”
Loriano had to steady himself by leaning on the telephone table. “What are you saying?”
“It was him.”
“Nives, these are things that—”
“Since she couldn’t have the son, she had the father. In secret. It was all in the family, after all. There was a bit of Renato for her there!”
“I don’t believe it.”
“I’m not making it up.”
“You must have seen wrong.”
“We saw what we saw.”
“These are unpleasant accusations.”
“Bardo was the beast here. He must have been nearly fifty at the time, and he couldn’t have believed his own luck when he got his hands on a girl who was only just eighteen.”
“As far as I know, he’s still in a care home.”
“He must be a hundred by now . . . they used to meet down at the playing fields and do what they were there to do. As soon as they started, we left, with shivers running up our spines. Bardo looked like an old, decrepit man to us.”
“What a story.”
“Rosaltea had everything twisted up.”
“Did she go on chasing Pagliuchi?”
“Whenever she had a free moment, that’s who she’d be thinking about.”
“I can’t remember any of it. Renato was one of us. He’d join us when we went out on the town, especially after we first got our driving licenses. He was always happy to tag along, even though quite a few of the gang turned their noses up when they saw he was coming. He was a few years younger than us. But that wasn’t why. We’d walk onto the dance floor, and all the girls’ eyes were on him. Followed by the eyes of the boyfriends and envious suitors. A brawl would break out over nothing. It was part of the fun, in the end. He never turned away from a fight, no sir. Sometimes he comes downstairs to try out the grappa, and we talk about the old times!”
“What does Donatella say?”
“She usually hides away in the sitting room in front of the TV.”
“She’s ashamed.”
“I don’t think so. She’s just not interested in hearing about all the pranks we got up to when we were kids. She prefers her TV series.”
“She was the one who was most into it.”
“Into what?”
“Mysteries. Intrigues like that.”
“She’s never mentioned any of this since the day I first met her. Does that seem normal to you?”
“She’s ashamed.”
“Did you tell poor Anteo everything?”
“God, no.”
“Never? Not even about the curse?”
“God, no.”
“And then you go and tittle-tattle to me about my own wife. I can’t work out whether you’re trying to stir up trouble, or what you’re up to.”
“We fell into the subject. One word leads to another, and here we are. I want to see you happy, believe me.”
“That may well be . . . but let’s get back to the point. You were talking about a girl who was into it.”
Nives took a moment to get back into her story. “Once she found out about the secret assignations at the playing fields, Donatella started chewing over it in her head. After a while, she reached her verdict. She spat it out, just like that, with no embellishments.”
“Let’s hear
it.”
“In her view, it was Bardo who’d stabbed the painter.”
“She was a thinker, alright.”
“She said it was not completely unlikely that Renato’s father had found out about his affair with the artist.”
“Which still needs to be proved, by the way.”
“How am I supposed to know? There were a few lines written on a scrap of paper . . . One thing is sure: Bardo would have accepted anything but having a fag for a son. That it would have gutted him is an understatement.”
Loriano thought for a minute. He had to admit Nives was right. Pagliuchi Sr. was the kind of man who could easily have punished an offence committed by his own flesh and blood with more blood. He could be as friendly as anything, but he flew into a rage over nothing. He was a man from another era. One thing that had always shocked him was how Renato’s father would deal with the hunting dogs he wasn’t happy with. He could still hear Bardo’s gruff voice. Sitting on the café bench, he’d say, “I’m not wasting a bullet on you,” and drag the poor, inadequate creatures out into the scrub. He’d entice them with dog biscuits in his hand. He’d let the animals smell them in one hand while, with the other, he’d slit their jugulars with a blade and then eat the biscuits himself. Loriano trembled at the memory. “These accusations are serious.”
“He could have shut Rosa up the same way.”
“Really? You’re veering towards science fiction now.”
“Think about it. Maybe she knew about Renato’s affair with the artist. She might have been blackmailing her handsome playboy. In any case, the situation is proof enough: Bardo uses her a few times and then decides to end it. Too risky. A scandal of the kind could break up more than one family.”
“Rosaltea jumped from the belfry in front of the whole town.”
“Wrong.”
“For God’s sake, I was there!”
“You heard the thud.”
“What more do we need to know?”
“How did she get into the church? How come nobody saw her? You said something before that scared me, but it also switched a lightbulb on in my mind.”
“What am I supposed to have said?”
“She was in her nightie.”
“It’s the truth,” Bottai stammered. “I was there. I saw her.”
Nives Page 5
