Chapter 4 Elisa
Elisa
It’s almost sunset when a speeding red sedan almost hits me out of nowhere.
A middle-aged couple gets out of the car as soon as it parks on the edge of the driveway, right on top of Mamma’s beloved begonias. She’s already glaring at them.
“We’ve come to take possession of the estate,” the man announces, taking off his sunglasses like he’s some kind of movie star. “I’m Ferdinando Armaroli Ricasoli, and this is my wife. You are the servants, I imagine.”
The famous Ricasolis of Pontassieve.
Donatella, Mamma, and I stare at them rigidly from under the colonnade. We’re employed here, but describing us as servants doesn’t exactly curry our favor. We can’t be bought and sold.
“Welcome to Le Giuggiole,” Donatella greets them coldly in her capacity as keeper of the house, as she likes to call herself.
“Ferdy, am I wrong or is the villa smaller than in the photos?” asks the woman, with her lips puckered in disapproval. “I thought it was a noble palace.”
“I can assure you, as someone who cleans every inch of it, it’s not exactly small,” Mamma replies.
“And you are?” asks the woman, looking her up and down.
“Mariana Monteleoni, cook, waitress, and second housekeeper.”
“Very good. I’m Graziana Armaroli Ricasoli, but everyone calls me Graziella.”
“More like Drisella,” I murmur, but Donatella hears me and elbows me in the ribs.
“Easy, dear,” she hisses.
Graziana holds out the back of her ringed hand to us. “Well?” she asks impatiently.
“Well, what?” repeats Donatella.
“I’m a countess. Are we no longer kissing hands?” Graziana, outraged, turns to her husband. “Ferdy! They won’t kiss my hand.”
“Women don’t kiss other women’s hands,” points out Donatella, an etiquette teacher.
“What about a bow? Or a curtsy?” asks Ferdy.
“We never once bowed for Count Ricasoli,” I point out. “And in any case, the title lapsed with Umberto’s death—he had no direct heirs.”
“What?” Graziana doesn’t like this news at all. “Ferdy, do something! I’ve already ordered the business cards and a letterhead. Write to the prime minister. Indeed, no, to the president of the Republic!”
“Don’t hold your breath waiting for an answer,” I say.
Graziana withdraws her hand in a huff. “We have a lot of work to do here when it comes to manners,” she comments, throwing her cigarette onto the pavement and crushing it with her sky-high heel.
Le Giuggiole isn’t mine. I have no rights to the property, but I grew up here and the Armarolis’ lack of respect is already making me hate them. I wish I could make her pick up that cigarette butt with her tongue.
“So?” she says brusquely, clapping her hands as if we were dogs. “Are you going to show us the house or not?”
Donatella scrutinizes them icily. “Follow me.”
Mamma and I join the convoy, a few steps behind.
“If these are the new owners, I’ll resign,” she mutters. “I’ll definitely resign.”
“Why waste such an excellent opportunity to spit on their plates?”
“I actually have some soup on the stove.”
Donatella leads the way into the reception room. “This is the foyer. Behind that door is the private living room.”
“What a hideous painting,” comments Graziana, indicating the object of her disgust hanging over the fireplace.
“It’s a Chagall,” Donatella points out, annoyed.
Graziana frowns. “Who?”
“Marc Chagall,” she repeats, edging toward implosion. “I had the honor of meeting the maestro in 1978, in Saint-Paul-de-Vence, during my honeymoon.”
“Well, tell him to come take it back; it’s awful. There should be a portrait of Count Armaroli Ricasoli in the foyer. And maybe some leopard-skin rugs instead of these old carpets.”
Not surprisingly, Ferdy nods. “Darling, you have impeccable taste, as always.”
Donatella sighs, trying to maintain control of herself. “If you’ll go upstairs, I’ll show you the primary suite.”
“I’d rather go downstairs,” Ferdy objects. “I’d love to see the legendary cellars.”
“I look after the cellars,” I say. The cellars are my sanctuary, the idea of letting this troglodyte down there annoys me to death. I could turn off the lights, push him down the stairs, and make it look like an accident . . .
“Ah, a woman,” he notes with a skeptical air.
“What an eye,” I can’t help but reply.
He doesn’t understand my sarcasm. “You know something about wine?”
“I only have a degree in agriculture and a concentration in enology,” I reply. “Nothing serious.”
“Ah, from school!” he exclaims in a voice tinged with reproach. “Wine isn’t learned from books. You have to travel and I—if I say so myself—I’ve seen the world. I’ll have a lot to teach you. Come with me to the cellar.”
I lead the way while he babbles on about what an expert he is at tasting, and I pray that God makes me momentarily deaf.
“Here we are,” I say, opening the heavy wood and wrought iron door.
“Huh,” Ferdy moans, scanning the room through the dim light, with the lanterns barely illuminating the rows of bottles. “That’s all?”
“There are hundreds of wines,” I reply with bewilderment. “All rare labels.” I approach one of the racks and remove a bottle worth over a thousand euros. “This Amarone della Valpolicella is practically impossible to find. And this Barolo Riserva too.”
“Yes, but where are the champagnes?”
“Champagne?” I ask.
“What kind of collection has no champagne?”
I cross the cellar, unnerved by his attitude.
“And among the French bottles, here we have very fine DRC Romanée-Conti. The count highly appreciated the Sauternes Chateau d’Yquem.” But the labels I mention, which would normally send any connoisseur into a fit of rapture, have no effect on him.
“No Dom Pérignon? No Cristal?”
I could get into it with him, but I prefer to mock him instead. “I can let you taste a wine from a case that cost the count almost half a million at a Sotheby’s auction. He won an all-out bidding war against a Saudi emir.”
At the mention of the words “half a million” and “Saudi emir,” Ferdy’s antennae perk up. “Interesting.”
“Wait here. I’ll fetch it from the vault.”
Ferdy almost faints at the word vault. Obviously there is no vault nor, much less, is there a case of wine bought at auction. I go into the pantry, take the very cheap carton of wine that Mamma uses for cooking, and pour it into an empty bottle.
I put my index finger between my lips and imitate the noise of a powerful cork pop, then I leave the pantry with the open bottle in one hand and a cork in the other, which I pretend to smell.
“Is that it?” he asks me eagerly.
“Yes,” I say, placing it theatrically on a barrel.
“It is a Crétin Casse Couilles from 1868 that belonged to Emperor Napoleon III, one of six bottles found in the basement of the Louvre. Do you see how the label is worn?” If it’s worn, it’s because this bottle has been washed, filled, emptied, and washed again dozens of times.
“Perfect hygrometric storage conditions.”
“A wine for royalty. Now you’re talking,” he gloats, without even realizing I’ve just called him a crétin casse coullies, a pain-in-the-ass idiot.
I make a production out of pouring it for him. “It has a complex bouquet. Few palates can truly appreciate it . . .”
But Ferdy, who is excited at the idea of tasting a wine that belonged to the royal family, snatches it from my hand. “Give me the glass.”
“If you allow me, I’ll pour myself just a taste, to check that the organoleptic structure has not been altered.
” I bring a second glass to my lips and pretend to savor it in a considered manner.
“Forest notes of juniper berries and pine, woody but fragrant aroma,” I say, completely at random.
“Full bodied, slightly sweet, with a tannic finish.” If he were truly an expert, he would debunk me here, since I’m talking about tannins in a white wine, as opposed to a red.
Ferdy takes a sip, then two. “Excellent,” he comments. “The juniper is lush, aromatic. And then, the tannins, so . . . powerful.”
“Indeed,” I agree, laughing to myself. What an imbecile.
A heated uproar upstairs draws our attention, and we go back up.
In the hall, Mamma, Donatella, and Graziana are arguing.
“It’s out of the question,” says Donatella in her typical icy tone.
“Never, ever,” decrees Mamma with folded arms. “Over my dead body.”
“What is it, Cicci?” Ferdy asks his wife.
“The servants refuse to wear the uniform with the white apron, gloves, and crest.”
Ferdy shakes his head. “How could that be?”
“I cook, I clean, I tend to the garden; it would all be impossible dressed as a mannequin.”
“What kind of counts will we be without uniformed staff?” Graziana whines.
“You’ll just have to find other staff.” Donatella would never abandon her Chanel-style suits and pearl necklaces.
The uniform battle is interrupted by a loud knock at the entrance.
Donatella, who has zero interest in a debate, goes to open the door, ignoring Graziana, who threatens her immediate dismissal.
On the doorstep there is a young man dressed in a dark suit and tie, with slightly disheveled red hair and lively blue eyes, accompanied by a woman with the same coloring and a decidedly more affected air.
“Good evening, everyone,” he greets us in an Italian that’s beyond rusty. The “good evening” is addressed to everyone present, but I notice that his gaze has fallen on my sister, who has emerged from the kitchen.
“I beg your pardon. Who are you?” asks Donatella.
Before he can answer, I beat him to it. “Carletto!”