Chapter 71
TEO ARRIVED AT A QUARTER to one, apologizing profusely for being late.
“It’s fine,” said Francesca as they kissed hello. “We weren’t ready to eat yet anyway.”
When he saw me leaning against the sink, he stopped short. “Eileen.”
I stepped forward, and we did the kissing thing, too. I still wasn’t used to it and couldn’t shake the feeling that I was doing it wrong.
“I have to apologize for the other night,” he said.
“Oh, God. Please, no.”
“It’s Afonso who should be apologizing,” said Francesca, who was putting a large sea bass with olives and fennel in the oven. When she’d closed the oven door, she turned to me. “Teo told me what the idiot said.”
“It was really fine,” I said. “And honestly, I think I was part of the problem.”
Teo looked confused.
“I’d had too much to drink.”
He shook his head. “You were okay.”
I didn’t want to tell him that Paul disagreed, so I just said, “That’s good,” and let it drop.
We stood talking in the tiny kitchen while Francesca bustled around, sautéing some spinach and plating the fish once it was out of the oven.
I asked Teo if his parents’ apartment had the same layout as this one, and he said it was identical.
“But it’s two floors up,” said Francesca, “so the view is even better.”
Bernardo poured us wine, and Teo asked him about the regional election, which the PCI was either going to win by a landslide or lose handily, depending on whom you asked.
The Italian flying back and forth between them was way too fast for me to hang on to, but occasionally, Teo would translate a sentence or two. “There are all these big politicians flying into Cagliari from Rome. They’re trying to influence the election, but Bernardo says it won’t work.”
“Do you think the PCI will win?” I asked Teo.
“It’s possible, but even if they do, Rome can veto just about any piece of legislation they put forth.”
We talked for a little while longer about how a communist win in Sardinia might or might not affect the central government. Teo was easy to talk to, and he never made me feel like I should be seen and not heard.
“Shall we sit?” said Francesca finally, and steered us toward the table, where Bernardo encouraged me to take the chair next to Teo’s.
“This is so lovely,” I said. “Thanks for having me.”
“How do you say it in Italian?” Francesca teased from the kitchen as she plated the culurgiones.
“Grazie per invitato.”
“Grazie per avermi invitato,” she said, and I repeated her version word for word.
The culurgiones were the first course, and they were every bit as good as Francesca had promised they would be. “Eileen made these,” she bragged.
“That’s why they look a little lopsided,” I said.
“They’re perfect,” said Teo before he’d even had a bite.
“Buonissimi!” said Bernardo.
Everyone agreed, then Francesca said, “Perhaps, along with learning Italian, you need to learn to make pasta.”
“Is it hard?”
“She’ll tell you it’s easy,” Teo warned. “But she makes everything look easy.”
“I can teach you,” Francesca offered, and I said I thought Paul would probably appreciate that, because thus far all I’d managed to make was a very average cacio e pepe.
“Has Paul said anything about the U.S.S. Mirfield?” Teo asked when Francesca had cleared our plates and returned to the table with the main course.
“Is this the sub you were telling me about?” I asked Francesca, and Teo shot her a look.
“What?” she said. “I just told her what you told me.”
“Paul hasn’t said anything,” I added. “But that’s why you’re here on the island? You’re reporting on the Mirfield?”
“I’m trying to,” he said. “But nothing makes sense. The master-at-arms arrested eighteen men as they were coming out of the hatch in Santo Stefano. And there’s word that more arrests might be coming.”
“What’d they do?”
“That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” said Teo.
“What do you think they did? If you had to guess?”
He shrugged. “I’d say drugs. But eighteen men is a lot. And they’re not just sailors. They arrested the chief of the boat and the XO.”
“It can’t be drugs,” said Francesca, adamantly. “I refuse to believe that anyone—even Americans—could be that stupid.”
It did seem stupid, although Paul had told me a couple of stories from his Sand Lance days that seemed to suggest American submariners knew how to have a good time.
“How’d you find out about all this?” I asked Teo.
He liked this question. I could tell by the way his lip curled up on one side. “Your brig isn’t big enough to hold eighteen men. Not by half. So the commodore had to make other arrangements.”
I waited for him to say what those arrangements were.
“Most of the men were transferred to the Italian navy’s barracks.”
“And they’re still there?”
“Under twenty-four-hour surveillance.”
“Is the navy saying anything?”
He shook his head. “Although, with Daniel Bornemann, you never get much.”
“What do you think of him?”
He eyed me a little warily. “You’re not friends with him, are you?”
“No,” I said with a laugh. “You can say what you want.”
“He’s hard to work with. I used to think he was doing it on purpose—holding back information, giving us the wrong information, that type of thing. But I’ve decided the bigger problem is that he’s not very smart.”
“That’s funny. I get that feeling, too. But I can’t figure it out, because his wife is very clever.”
“Yes,” Teo agreed. “That is one word for her.”
“What’s another word?”
He looked up at the ceiling like he was trying to think of just the right adjective. “Cunning,” he said finally.
“Who is this?” Francesca asked, and Teo caught her and Bernardo up in Italian.
“My friend Laura and I have a theory,” I said conspiratorially. “We think Angela’s a spy for the KGB.”
We both knew I was joking, but as Teo poured us more wine, he said, “I like where this is going. Tell me more.”
“She took the job in La Maddalena to gather information about the U.S. nuclear fleet and deliver it back to the Russians. All these trips to Naples she says she takes, she’s really going to Leningrad, where she’s meeting with the head of the KGB and maybe even Brezhnev himself.”
“I love it,” he said, approvingly. “And then it makes sense she’s with Daniel. He’s her cover.”
“Yes!” I said. “If she’s KGB, then the fact that he’s so dumb is actually a big help.”