Chapter 13
13
Up on the top table I settled into my allotted place, where I had a great view of everyone else in the room. The talk was well-modulated with the occasional gentle laugh. It almost looked like a film set. Smartly dressed people, wonderful flowers, the lights from the chandelier glinting off the gleaming cutlery and shining glasses. Although in all the films like that I’d ever seen, something unexpected happened and there were long-buried revelations of infidelity or suspicious death. Or possibly the police arrived or a masked gang with machine guns burst in to kidnap someone.
Even Eric, wandering around between the tables looking for spare breadsticks, provoked only affectionate comments and smiles. But then he was lucky; Italians were well known for their acceptance and love of children. Across the table, Raleigh was busy trying to impress me with how difficult her life was, fundraising and socialising, and on the other side were those whose coming had been foretold. Ceci’s sisters, Sylvia and Lucia.
Sylvia had arrived just as the priest was about to stand up and say a blessing. She came in with much ceremony, on the arm of a companion, pretending and failing to be quiet, clattering a walking stick on the stone floor and apologising loudly to everyone for her late arrival. I saw Ceci on the other side of Raleigh stiffen and roll her eyes.
‘ Santo cielo . Good heavens, can’t my sister do anything properly? I thought we were going to be spared her nonsense.’
Sylvia, resplendent in turquoise taffeta and what looked like all her jewellery, sat down next to me with a long sigh and then addressed the room.
‘I am all right, everyone. There’s nothing to worry about. Please carry on. Just ignore me.’
‘As always, we will try,’ Ceci said.
Of course, then Paulo had to get out of his seat and introduce her to everyone, ask after her health and her comfort.
Sylvia looked up at him with a brave smile. ‘I have been unwell, but there is nothing to concern you now.’
‘Then I will sleep tonight,’ Ceci growled, fingering the handle of her butter knife.
A few seconds later as everyone was settling down again, Lucia came into the room, pausing in the doorway for maximum effect. She was a short, voluptuous woman in a stylish pink dress which even at seventy-eight made the most of her fabulous legs.
‘ Oh, mio Dio, ’ she said loudly. ‘Dear me, am I the last to arrive?’
‘As always,’ Ceci growled. ‘I could set my watch by you.’
Lucia ignored her and allowed herself to be escorted to her seat opposite me. She inclined her head graciously towards me in greeting.
‘Meraviglioso,’ I said.
She smiled. ‘ Sì, yes, sono una donna meravigliosa. I am indeed a marvellous woman. How clever you are.’
Sylvia snorted at this and I thought Ceci muttered something under her breath that didn’t sound flattering.
Quiet restored, the blessing was said and the meal began.
‘So have you come far today?’ I asked Sylvia, realising too late that I sounded like the Queen at a Buckingham Palace garden party.
She looked up from her minestra maritata soup and thought about it.
‘I flew in from Brussels yesterday, where I was visiting my son Ralph at the European commission. He is an assistant administrator in the Personnel Selection Office. A very important post. Molto importante. ’
‘How marvellous,’ I said.
‘ Scribacchino ,’ Ceci muttered.
Sylvia was busy dabbing at her nose with a lace-edged handkerchief, but she caught the tail end of this comment, and her nostrils flared with indignation.
‘Indeed, Ralph does not wear chinos. He wears a suit and tie every day.’
‘I meant pencil pusher,’ Ceci murmured.
‘My hearing is not what it was,’ Sylvia said. ‘Old age takes no prisoners. It was a miracle I got here at all. Travel is so exhausting these days.’
‘Yes, it can be very tiring. And to do it on your own, I do admire you,’ I said.
Ceci wasn’t having this.
‘Your son drove you to the airport and got you on a plane, and my son made all the arrangements for you to get here from the airport. So basically, you have been sitting down. And you still are.’
Sylvia looked tragic, her voice quavering.
‘These days, at my age, even sitting down is a trial. My arthritis.’
‘We all have arthritis,’ Ceci fired back.
‘I don’t,’ Lucia said cheerfully. ‘I am blessed with our father’s genes.’
‘And his nose,’ Sylvia said.
Lucia sent her a hard look and lifted her chin.
‘You are just jealous because I have aged so well. And however old I am I will always be the youngest. Papa always said I favoured his side of the family. You two on the other hand are beginning to look like zia Maria , Auntie Maria. I remember her after she had that bout of pneumonia and lost so much weight, her face collapsed. You can keep your face or your figure after sixty, that’s what I read somewhere.’
‘You read this?’ Ceci said with mock astonishment. ‘In an actual book?’
‘And which one did you choose?’ Sylvia purred.
Lucia pursed her lips and turned away.
I was suddenly in the middle of an increasingly heated squabbling match. I leaned forward to distract them and started talking to Raleigh about the lovely weather. Even so, I heard Ceci give a little growl in the back of her throat, which suggested she was far from satisfied.
Luckily, Freddy distracted her, asking her whether he was going to be allowed some dessert, and they checked on his iPhone to see what his glucose levels were.
The main course was chicken, cooked in a delicious creamy sauce. Eric, by then safely corralled between his parents, looked at it suspiciously and then asked me if he was allowed fries, but when I shook my head he sighed and tucked in.
I watched Paulo as he moved around the room, chatting pleasantly with people, being the perfect host. How time had changed him.
As a young man when it had been his turn to cook, he had been known to just place a huge metal bowl full of spaghetti and sauce on the coffee table between us all and hand out the cutlery. It had been Ellen who insisted we clear all the books and discarded clothing off the dining table so we could eat there.
Ceci, her sisters and a couple of other older ladies were bickering gently about the world and everything that was wrong with it.
‘My son Ralph has dedicated his life to public service,’ Sylvia said. ‘I would have done the same if my health had allowed it.’
‘How sad for us all,’ Ceci said. ‘The world is a poorer place for you not being able to personally check all the chocolate truffles coming out of Belgium.’
Sylvia wasn’t listening. ‘Only two days ago, Ralph introduced me to the Deputy Commissioner. Imagine that! We saw him when we took a short cut through the executive car park. Un uomo affascinante . Such a charming man. He waved as he passed us and said hello. I think he took quite a shine to me.’
‘What with? A duster?’ Lucia asked.
‘Don’t be silly. I could tell he liked me,’ Sylvia explained patiently. ‘I sometimes wonder if you are quite all there. I’ve met all sorts of people from different walks of life and got along with nearly all of them. I once passed a plate of biscuits to Georgio Armani, at a garden party. Such a charming man. Such wonderful trousers. And what have you been doing since I saw you last, Ceci? Still living a life of luxury? Not a care at all? How wonderful to just have yourself to think about. And a man to do all the difficult things. I have always felt the world’s worries very deeply.’
‘I can tell. Worry is so ageing,’ Ceci said with a sympathetic look. ‘And if I waited for Freddy to do all the difficult things I would still be at home waiting for the car to take me to our wedding.’
‘And how long have you been married?’ I asked.
Ceci looked blank. ‘I’ve no idea. Freddy, how long have we been married?’
Freddy looked thoughtful.
‘Thirty years? Maybe? I’m not sure. I’ve forgotten all the years I lived without you, my darling.’
He leaned across and kissed Ceci’s cheek and she smiled with pleasure.
‘What an old flirt you are,’ she said.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake,’ Lucia snapped, ‘don’t encourage her.’
I bit back a smile as I turned away, afraid I was going to laugh.
Ceci’s eyes brightened then as she saw her favourite tiramisu being brought to the table.
‘This is good,’ she said after her first taste, ‘but perhaps mine is better.’
‘I’ve always thought this is so unhealthy,’ Sylvia muttered, tucking in. ‘What is it after all? Cream and coffee and stale cake?’
‘It’s far more than that,’ Ceci spluttered, indignant.
‘If you say so,’ Sylvia said, unconvinced.
‘They should have used my recipe, which was passed down to me by our mother. Don’t you remember? She used to say, “Give a woman tiramisu and she will be happy for ten minutes, but give her my recipe and she will be happy for life.”’
I watched, astonished and slightly delighted, as Lucia took a dollop of cream on her spoon and flicked it at Ceci. It landed on her nose, and Ceci wiped it off and gave her sister a withering look.
‘ Sei troppo vecchia – you are too old for that sort of behaviour!’
Lucia shrugged. ‘You might be, you old woman.’
Ceci took a spoonful of her own dessert and struggled for a moment, obviously considering returning the gesture, before eating it instead, and Sylvia laughed.
Unobserved by his wife, Freddy finished off his dessert in record time and then quietly signalled to a waiter for more. I watched Raleigh dabbing politely at the edges of her dessert with a teaspoon, and I could almost hear her brain totting up the calories as she did so.
‘It’s fabulous,’ she said after a tiny taste, and then proceeded to push the rest of it around her dish with a look of fear in her eyes.
Eric sat with his chin over the table, inspecting the bowl, asking what it was and looking doubtful.
‘Enjoy it,’ Paulo said, ‘it’s Bisnonna’s favourite. She will eat yours if you aren’t quick.’
Eric did his usual trick of sliding off his chair and wandering around the table inspecting everyone else’s food.
‘I don’t want it,’ he said furiously, at last. ‘It’s got spiders in it.’
‘Nonsense,’ Leo said cheerfully.
‘Hers has,’ Eric said, pointing.
I realised he was looking intently into my dish and, looking down, I saw one of my false eyelashes peeking out from behind a dainty chocolate shard.
I hastily peeled off the other one, wondering what on earth I must look like. And then I burst out laughing. So much for my attempts at new glamour.
Horrified, Eric watched me and then after a moment burst into tears.
‘I’m never eating that again!’
* * *
The meal had finished by four thirty and we had all moved outside into the sunshine for coffee. Eric, having recovered from the false eyelashes episode, scuttled between the tables sneaking petit fours. Despite the threat of bad behaviour from the sisters, the event had all gone very well indeed.
‘So how did you enjoy the meal?’
It was Paulo. Walking through the gardens, he had found me and Susie sitting in the sunshine. Beneath us, the Mediterranean spread out, a blue silk sheet under a hazy sky.
‘Lovely,’ I said. ‘Everything was marvellous.’ Apart from losing one of my false eyelashes in my dessert and giving Eric a fit of hysterics. I decided to gloss over those two issues. It might be easier to pretend I’d forgotten about them. ‘I’ve met some really charming people and had a great time. I am so pleased to have been a part of it.’
‘I was glad to have you here,’ he said.
Susie suddenly stood up and darted off, muttering vaguely about some things she had to sort out. I didn’t think she was very convincing at all.
Paulo and I, alone in our sheltered spot, looked at each other, neither of us really sure what to say.
‘Everyone had such nice things to say about Ellen,’ I said at last. ‘Everyone seemed to love her.’
Paulo sat down with a sigh and rubbed his hands over his face. He suddenly looked tired. There were dark shadows under his eyes. An expression on his face that I didn’t recognise.
‘You must be pleased it’s all gone off so well,’ I said, ‘despite your aunts’ behaviour.’
He gave a short laugh. ‘Them? They are always squabbling; I hardly notice it any more. And do you mean I must be glad it’s all over?’
‘Well, not exactly, but yes, I suppose so.’
‘I am,’ he said. ‘It’s been difficult. I could sleep for a month. It’s been on my mind for so long and I didn’t seem to have the same grasp of things as Ellen did.’
‘Perhaps you need a holiday,’ I said, ‘to get away somewhere and relax.’
He shrugged. ‘And you? What will you do?’
‘Go home at the end of the week, I guess. Think about what to do next. Home seems a long way away. This place is so lovely. I wish I’d come here more than just once.’
‘Why didn’t you?’
‘You know why,’ I said.
We were silent for a few minutes then.
There. I had touched on the history between us. I didn’t know what he was thinking, but my mind was busy with memories of him, of us.
He turned towards me, searching my face for my reaction.
‘We liked each other, didn’t we, all those years ago? Despite all the arguments. And the misunderstandings.’
Ah yes, that.
There had been an incident around Christmas. We had all agreed we would do a Secret Santa, to keep the costs down. I had drawn Ellen out of the hat, and she had drawn me.
I supposed it had been the build up to Christmas that had made us all so prickly. There was always someone in the house arguing about something. Ellen’s ideas about Christmas decorations were quite subtle and tasteful, whereas mine were the exact opposite. We’d had a disagreement about whether fairy lights were a good idea above the fireplace, which I had won, and then, out of sheer devilment, added more and more. By the time I had finished it looked like Santa’s grotto and Ellen had tutted every time she came into the room.
On Christmas morning I had felt quietly confident because I had found Ellen a brand new, very expensive makeup case in a charity shop. She had bought me a foot spa which had been heavily promoted on television and must have cost a lot more than the limit we had all agreed on. Every time the advertisement appeared we had all scoffed at it, saying what a horrible thing it was, how it was almost insulting to consider that a suitable gift for any woman, and yet that day, there it was.
Ellen had watched me unwrap it with a little smile on her face.
‘I thought you needed one. You were complaining about your feet only the other day. You said they were like hooves. Apparently you can get special abrasive things to get rid of really bad bits.’
And of course, everyone looked at my feet and laughed and I had clenched my toes inside my socks with embarrassment. And then How generous , everyone said, forgetting that we had all thought it was a horrible thing.
My annoyance had continued unspoken all through the day, until we had drunk a few too many tequila sunrises, and in the end, I had taken myself off to bed early to avoid saying what I really thought. That she had pretended to be generous, but in fact had just been unkind. But of course, I couldn’t say so out loud. Everyone thought it was a nice gesture, but I knew different.
I got you back , her smile seemed to say. You won’t tangle with me again .
She’d said sorry the next day, she hadn’t meant to upset me, and she sounded so sincere that I had believed her. A week later she had put a multipack of Crunchies on my dressing table by way of an apology.
Now my mind was more focused and not wafting in the sentimental haze I had constructed of the past, other memories were resurfacing and somehow making sense. It had taken a long time for us to properly reconcile after that, and somehow she had made me feel that the whole thing was my fault.
I remembered her insistence on the loo roll being hung a particular way, her wanting the kitchen window open, me wanting it closed. If we had a disagreement she would later act as though nothing had happened and be very friendly, whereas I would sulk, once again putting me in the wrong. And then she would hug me and say something nice about my outfit or congratulate me for a meal I had made and there would be a truce between us until the next time. Had I just maintained that friendship with her over the years because of Paulo?
So, in answer to his question, had he and I been happy back then, despite all that?
‘Yes, I think so. You and I liked each other.’
My mouth was dry, my heart beating erratically. Perhaps it was the Prosecco, and maybe it wasn’t.
What a terrible answer. I think so.
‘And were you content,’ he asked, ‘after you married Greg?’
‘On and off,’ I said. ‘I have three smashing children, two lovely granddaughters. A nice home. Shouldn’t that be enough? And of course, I had my job and a home to run.’
‘I understand,’ he said.
I looked up at him in astonishment.
‘Don’t be ridiculous! How could you possibly understand? Greg was difficult, rather selfish and unkind. Ellen was such a marvellous person in every way; I’ve heard nothing else all day. Everyone loved her. She thought the world of you. And Leo. Everyone said what a wonderful wife she was, what a great friend. All the tales I have heard about her today. The charity work, rescuing pets, helping the local school.’
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘she did all those things. And more.’
‘I bet she wouldn’t have nearly fallen down the stairs on the way to this event. I bet she wouldn’t have lost her false eyelashes in her food,’ I blurted out. ‘Is Eric okay now?’
Paulo gave a little chuckle. ‘Yes, he’s fine. And if that’s the worst thing that ever happens to him, he won’t have much to complain about. I think he has recovered enough for Andrea to take him for a swim in the pool.’
There was a burst of laughter from a group somewhere in the garden. I looked over to see Ceci, Sylvia and Lucia, heads together in a huddle. Perhaps it was possible to argue and disagree and still really be friends after all. Instead of pretending, as I had with Ellen.
‘You asked me and I gave you an answer, so I’ll ask you the same question. Were you happy?’
He didn’t reply for a moment and then he sighed.
‘Sometimes, in the beginning. Ellen was a good person, but there were a lot of things I never really understood about her. There were things we couldn’t discuss. She had little contact with her own family, and she was the sort of person to have many acquaintances but few true friends. There were parts of her life she would not share with me.’
I wondered what on earth he meant, but then I supposed it was true of a lot of marriages. There was always some small, dark corner into which the other person could never see.
‘What sort of things?’
‘Sometimes, in the end, I felt that the only thing she really cared about was this hotel. To make it successful, to make sure it was run properly.’
‘She did a good job,’ I said.
‘She did,’ he said, looking down at the table between us.
I felt so sad for him at that moment. Despite outward appearances, life in the last few years for him must have been very different from what I had imagined.
In a way, I could see it had been easier for me and for Susie too, I supposed. My marriage had ended in a burst of relief. But I had exchanged a cheating husband for a rather isolated life and for a long time had held on to my feelings of anger and betrayal like a comfort blanket.
‘Forgive me, you don’t seem very happy now.’
‘No,’ he said, ‘I guess I’m not.’
I thought of all the useless things people said under those circumstances.
Things about time being a great healer. Tomorrow is another day. When you’re going through hell, keep going. Remember the happy times. All that stuff.
And yet at that moment, sitting in the sunshine, the sky clear and blue above us, the gentle noise of people chatting, enjoying themselves. The lovely meal we had eaten, the wine, the glories of the occasion; those platitudes didn’t seem appropriate.
I reached across and put my hand on his arm, the fabric of his suit jacket warm under my fingers. My feelings were so intense it was almost as though I could feel the individual threads in the cloth. The warmth of his skin beneath it.
‘You must miss her so much. Give it time,’ I said. ‘It will be okay.’
He looked at my hand.
‘Will it?’ he said.
‘Of course it will. You still have your friends and family here. And your son and his family are only a plane trip away. You must be so proud of him.’
‘Yes,’ he said, and then he turned away and looked back at the hotel, which was gleaming white in the afternoon sunshine. ‘I’m very proud of Leo. I wish we could have had more children, but then – as I said, Ellen didn’t want them and it never happened.’
‘But your life here, in such a lovely place, must have been wonderful.’
He nodded slowly, glanced at me and then looked down. And then he stood up, walked away a few steps, deep in thought.
I waited in silence, hardly breathing.
At last, he came back.
‘I never wanted to do this; did you know that? This life was not my choice. Ellen was the one who insisted we stay when we had a chance to leave. It was the closest we ever came to a proper argument. And then she did what she always did – she shut down and wouldn’t talk about it. As the years went by, she came to need this place far more than I did. And eventually, more than she needed me. She worked so hard; she was efficient and clever. Almost obsessive about every little detail. Which of course is why she was so successful. But gradually, over the years, this place seemed to become smaller and smaller to me. Until our lives were bound by the layout of the dining room, how the napkins were folded, the way a sprig of redcurrants was placed on a dessert.’
I was astonished then. Could this be true? Had I been wrong about their marriage? I started to feel tense and breathless, quite lightheaded. He had admitted something which would affect my memories of Ellen and our relationship once and for all. It would explain why she never mentioned her own family and seemed to have no attachment to England and the old days other than me and Susie. She’d had this strange ability to be warm and generous and at the same time distant and self-contained.
‘Sometimes I thought about you, remembered the way you made me feel. When we lost touch.’
‘I told you; I lost your address that night,’ I blurted out. ‘I put it in my pocket and when I looked, it was gone. And the next time I saw you, you were with Ellen. It wasn’t like today when people have emails and mobile phones and tracking devices. I didn’t know how to find you. I would have done.’
‘Would you?’
‘Of course I would. I looked for you everywhere.’
‘I looked for you.’
He had looked for me. He hadn’t forgotten me after all. But then he had found Ellen instead. Or perhaps she had found him. I had settled for Greg. How different things might have been.
‘When I saw you again that day, when I came to move into the attic room, I was so happy. But it couldn’t be the same,’ he said.
‘Because of Ellen.’
‘Of course. I didn’t know what to do. But I knew how much my father had hurt my mother over the years, and I was determined not to be that sort of husband. And you said something about not hurting either of you, so in the end I did nothing. Which was also wrong.’
‘How can it have been wrong? Look around you,’ I said. ‘It was all okay in the end, wasn’t it?’
We sat in silence for a while, and the hotel cat, a sleek tabby, came and wound its way around his feet, and Paulo reached down to scratch its ears.
‘I suppose so. I’m beginning to remember so many things about that time, things I thought I had forgotten. But it could have been different, couldn’t it?’
‘Everyone’s lives could be different,’ I said.
He reached out and took my hand, and it felt warm and safe in his.
‘Look, I have an idea,’ Paulo said at last. ‘Today is busy with all these guests and visitors. But by tomorrow things will be calmer. If Susie is – how shall we say – busy, then I want to be with you. I don’t care if the whole place slides off the cliff into the sea! I’ll take you somewhere, show you more of the island than just this place. There are so many delightful spots to visit. But the main thing is I want to spend some time with you.’
His mobile rattled with a text and he checked his phone, frowning as he read the message.
‘Oh , non di nuovo questo . Not again. I really can’t do this any more. I’m so sorry – you must excuse me. Another emergency. Do you see what I mean about having too much wonderful?’
He started to walk towards the hotel, but then he turned and came back. And then in the shade of the lemon tree, he pulled me to my feet, took me in his arms and kissed me. And for a moment I was back in the dark damp night when we had first met, both of us young, our optimism and energy undefeated by life.
‘Don’t go away,’ he murmured.
‘I won’t,’ I said.
I sat down again, my heartbeats skittering. I touched my fingers to my lips where he had kissed me, with the hand he had held. And then one of the young waiters came quickly towards me, a drink on a tray.
‘Compliments of Signor Massimo,’ he said.
And he placed a tequila sunrise on the table in front of me.
Unexpectedly, tears sprang into my eyes. Paulo had remembered.