A Heart Most Worthy (15 page)

His words caused her to stop in her steps. She blinked.

He set his doctor’s bag down and moved toward her. “Who were you with?” She bit her lip. Then she shook her head. Why should he have to know?

“Don’t you think you owe me that? At least?” After making him search for her all day, and worry about her all night? After he’d spent the better part of his morning shaving his face and shining his shoes and pressing his shirt?

She resented being scolded as if she were a child, and kept her eyes trained on the tops of her shoes.

In pure frustration he reached out and grabbed her by the shoulders. “Look at me!” The one fearful glance she sent him did nothing to assuage his fears. “Did he hurt you?”

That caused her gaze to fly toward his. “Ow – no! But you are.”

He loosened his grip. “I apologize. But so help me, if he did – ”

“He didn’t. He wouldn’t.”

Who was he? Did Mauro know him? Because if he did, he’d put the fear of God into him. Listen to him! Put the fear of God into him? He’d wring the boy’s neck with his own two hands!

She shrugged out of his grip. Stepped back. “I’m not a little girl anymore, Mauro. I can take care of myself.”

“You have no idea how much I want to hope that’s true.”

Hope
it was true? It was true! “He’s not like you. He treats me like a woman.”

“Like a woman? By enticing you away from your family, taking you God knows where, and marking you like a – ”

“Marking me?”

He wrenched her chin to bare her neck. “Right there. Gentlemen don’t do things like that!” Thugs did things like that. To whores. And girls who didn’t care enough to stop them.

Che macello!
She clapped a hand up to her neck to cover it. She had a mark on her neck? Was that what Angelo had been doing? How was she going to keep Mama from seeing it? And how long would it take to go away?

He was angry at her, frustrated by her, and scared for her. But more than that, he was frightened by her actions and her attitude. Terrified by the thought of her clasped in the arms of a man he did not know.

“Julietta . . .”

She raised her chin. Looked at him. “Leave me alone, Mauro. I know what I’m doing.”

21

The day of the festa hadn’t been any less eventful for Annamaria. She too had dressed for the occasion. On this one day in all the year, she had abandoned her head scarf in favor of a flower blossom tucked into the middle of her bun. And she tied a colorfully embroidered sash around her slim waist.

Her future suddenly seemed so broad. And bright!

Would she see Rafaello?

She hoped so! Even though he was . . . Sicilian. And Saint Marciano belonged to the Avellinesi. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be at his store, did it? And maybe she could coax Mama into buying a melon today. Just for special.

When Rafaello saw her with the flower and the sash . . . maybe . . . maybe he would smile at her again. Or take up her hand in his!

Her cheeks flamed at the thought as she jostled Theresa for the preeminent place at the window. But her victory was only temporary. They both lost out to Mama when she elbowed them aside. “Such a fine day for Saint Marciano! He must be pleased.” She stuck out an arm and gave a vigorous wave to someone Annamaria couldn’t see.

“Who is it?” Theresa whispered to Annamaria behind Mama’s back.

“I don’t know. I can’t see!”

There was a scraping sound behind her. Annamaria didn’t turn around to look because she thought she might be able to glimpse a view of the street. If she bent at the knees just a little, she could peer through the gap between Mama’s upper arm and her body.

“Here!” Theresa shoved something into Annamaria’s back.

Annamaria turned.

Theresa was holding out a chair. “Stand on this. Mama won’t let me; she knows about Giovanni. But there’s no one looking for you.”

Oh, but sì
,
there was! At least she hoped there was. And she almost spoke of it right then, but prudence made her guard her tongue.

“Tell me if you see him!”

Annamaria had already put Theresa completely out of her thoughts. She had Rafaello to look for. A few moments later, as she watched high above Mama’s head, she saw him come out of the store and put up the awnings.

Here I am. Look up. Right here. At me.

He did! And she almost toppled from the chair.

“Madonna mia!” Mama turned and looked up at her eldest daughter. “What are you doing up there? If you want to look, just say so. But keep Theresa away from the window. That Giovanni Sardo keeps sniffing around.” Mama backed away from the window as Annamaria jumped from the chair and took her place.

“And bring me that chair, Theresa!”

For once, Theresa did some work, leaving Annamaria to revel in the luxury of having the window to herself. She placed her elbows on the windowsill and watched the street below, chin propped up in her hands.

Behind her, Theresa leaned first this way and then that, trying to see down into the street. “Move!”

“Mama said not to.”

“Mama said . . . and you always do what Mama says, don’t you?”

Annamaria ignored her. Because right at that moment, Rafaello came into view, carrying a crate of eggplants. He glanced across the street, up toward Annamaria, who suddenly found it difficult to breathe.

And then he winked.

Behind her, Theresa gasped. “Was that – did that boy over there wink at you?”

Annamaria pushed way from the windowsill and whirled to face her sister. “What? No.”

“He did! That boy from – ” She leaned out beyond Annamaria.

“From Zanfini’s? A Sicilian?”

“He didn’t.”

“I think he did! Mama!”

Annamaria grabbed Theresa by the forearm. “He didn’t wink at me.”

“He did.”

“He didn’t!”

“Then swear on the grave of Saint Marciano himself.” Theresa, noting the hesitation in Annamaria’s eyes, sensed victory. And a place at the window. “Mama!” She wrenched her arm from her sister’s grip.

But Mama Rossi was nowhere to be found.

Annamaria, hard on Theresa’s heels, followed her sister out the apartment door. They tore down the stairs, each of them trying to reach the bottom first. And then they burst out into the street, heads swiveling like marionettes, both of them looking for their mother.

Theresa gasped and clutched at Annamaria’s hand. “Look! There he is. There’s Giovanni!” Had you known him, you might have marveled at the excitement in her voice. But youth have a lamentable way of placing value on all the wrong sorts of things. And Theresa was no exception to that rule.

“Mama said you weren’t to – ”

“She also said not to talk to Sicilians.”

“I never – I never talked to him.” Not really. One word didn’t count.

“But he winked at you?” With narrowed eyes, she probed Annamaria’s gaze. But then her own gaze shifted up and over her sister’s shoulder. She lifted a hand and fluttered her fingers in greeting at someone. She squeezed Annamaria’s hand. “I won’t say anything if you don’t say anything.”

“About – about what?”

“Exactly!” She gave Annamaria a swift hug and then skipped away past her and disappeared – with Giovanni – into the crowd.

The throng in front of Annamaria parted and there was Mama. Right there! But – she glanced over toward Zanfini’s.
He
was there too. He had to be. And if she went back to the window, maybe she’d be able to see him. And he would be able to see her.

But what about Theresa? And Giovanni? Knowing them both, they might just get themselves into some serious trouble. But then, Theresa might land Annamaria in serious trouble too. If she told.

Indecision plagued her. Should she tell Mama? What should she do?

Annamaria ran up the stairs just as quickly as she’d run down them. She’d made her decision; she wanted to keep Rafaello to herself. The whole apartment was empty. She positioned herself at the window and soon after saw Rafaello come out of the store once more.

She held her breath as she watched him, willing him to look up.

He did.

He nodded – at her! – and then he proceeded to pick up an apple and polish it with his apron. And then he picked up another. And another. He polished that whole crate of apples, one after the other, all the while looking up at Annamaria.

She didn’t quite know what to do.

As her cheeks grew hot, she thought that surely it must be unseemly to stare down across the street at him, but she couldn’t seem to make herself do anything else. She thought, perhaps, maybe . . . she could wave at him.

And so she did.

And he saluted her with an apple, touching it to his heart before placing it back into the crate.

She felt a flush wash over her face.

But that wave – and his response – had emboldened her. She leaned forward, out over the window, and she smiled at him.

She did!

A smile so big that it was unmistakable.

And – heaven bless her! – he smiled right back.

Soon the tooting of horns, the rattle of drums, and the roar of a crowd approached. Leaning out the window farther still, she could see Saint Marciano’s statue come around the corner, swaying as it was carried by a contingent of Avellinesi men.

When it paused in front of her window, she pinned a dollar on his robe. On behalf of the entire Rossi family. “Please!” She hardly dared voice her wish. But then again, she hardly dared not to. And so, she whispered her prayer as she pinned a dollar onto the statue’s robe. “Please, help me, God. Please. With Rafaello Zanfini. Somehow. Some way. Please, God.”

As the party of revelers carried the statue down the street, the crowds began to thin. This was her chance! She took a few coins from Mama’s jar, enough to cover both the cherries and a melon. And then she went to find Mama.

She sidled up to her and waited for a pause in the conversation. “Can I get a melon today, Mama? Since it’s Saint Marciano’s?”

Mama frowned.

“You know how Stefano likes them.”

Her face softened. Stefano. Her precious baby boy. “Go ahead.

But only one.” She shook her head as she watched Annamaria cross the street. A melon. As if they were royalty.

Knowing Rafaello was in the store, waiting for her, imbued Annamaria’s every thought with purpose, every movement with grace. Never before had she felt so . . . female. It came to her then that Rafaello didn’t really know who she was. He must think she was just a normal girl. A girl like Theresa. She only wished she were.

She entered the store, and as her eyes adjusted to the sudden dimness, she saw Rafaello’s back disappear behind a curtained doorway even as she heard someone call his name. Her heart froze. She lingered in the store, hoping he would reappear. He never did. And Mr. Zanfini grew impatient.

She pointed to the crate of melons.

“How many?”

“One.” She didn’t have the heart not to speak. What did it matter? It was only Mr. Zanfini. She walked back across the street, disappointment weighting her steps. She climbed the stairs up to the Rossi apartment and abandoned the melon on the sideboard.

22

That night Annamaria helped serve dinner at the Sons of Taurasi Hall. And then she helped Mama Rossi clean up afterward. Once Papa and the boys had left for more revelry, and once Mama had found her group of friends, Annamaria walked home to the tenement. Finding it empty, she pushed aside the curtains and sat at the open window, drenched in the silvery light of the summer’s moon.

Zanfini’s was closed now. The awnings drawn. The store dark.

If only she’d had the chance to see him! Would she have spoken to him again? Maybe . . . sì! Sì, she would have. And she would have said more than just one word.

Her gaze lifted from the store to the windows of the buildings opposite her own. And just there, across the street, one story up and one building down, sat Rafaello, his face glowing in the moonlight. They weren’t supposed to speak. No self-respecting Avellinesi should speak to a Sicilian. And they could not meet, save for Annamaria’s trips to the frutta e verdura, but no one could stop them from staring out the window at each other, if they chose to, of a night. And so they did. And when Rafaello burst into song, when the notes of a lilting melody drifted across the street to her window, Annamaria knew – she knew with a certainty borne of true love – that he sang those words just for her.

She couldn’t understand the words; no one on her side of the street could. The song was an ancient one, sung in the Sicilian dialect. But everyone who heard them understood their meaning. You would have to, for he was singing of love. Amazing love. Fantastical love. An all-consuming love that was born when the world first began, a love that would venture to the very gates of hell – past the gates of hell! – in honor of its beloved’s heart.

Children who were playing in the street below, liberated from the night’s chores by the festa, soon ceased their games. Passersby stopped to listen. Even the wind ceased its teasing gusts. One old nonna cheered as Rafaello finished his song. Insisted that he sing one song more.

He did.

And then he sang another. And another one after that.

But long about midnight Mama Rossi came home, Theresa in tow, and insisted that Annamaria go to bed. “No good ever came from sitting in front of a window at this late hour. You’ll catch your death. Go to bed.”

“I’m going, Mama.”

But before she did, she pulled the flower from her hair. Held it out over the casement and let it fall three stories to the street below. She didn’t dare to look at Rafaello as she did it. She was much too timid for such obvious displays of affection.

After Annamaria had left her window, Rafaello dashed down four flights of stairs and out into the street. Rescued her flower from the sidewalk and tucked it in his pocket. Flowers and amorous glances were not for him. They did well enough for the moment, for he was in no hurry. But he knew, son of a greengrocer that he was, that things happened for a reason. That nothing flowered and fruited and ripened except when it had a purpose. So he would sing, and he would watch, and he would wait. But he had no intention of surrendering such newfound love as was his to some ancient idea of honor. Not here. Not in America. Not when he had just come to discover the very meaning of life itself.

The parade had long passed by. Night had fallen, and now even the drunks had stumbled home to their beds. At last Luciana could open her window. And leave it open for the rest of the night. She hadn’t wanted to do it when boisterous groups of young men and raucous throngs of boys had still been roaming the streets. Who knew what menacing elements lurked in those crowds?

As she pushed at the window, it creaked in protest and then stubbornly jammed halfway up. Try as she might, she couldn’t get it to budge. But at least she could feel the cool of the outside air. Luciana pulled the contessa’s chair closer to the window, folded her arms atop the frame, and set her chin on them. She looked down into the shadowed street.

At least the contessa slept soundly in their bed. That was one thing to be thankful for. And there was so little to be thankful for these days.

What about in Roma? Had she ever once thought to be grateful for all those luxuries? All those things she had thought were necessities. Had she ever really appreciated them? What she wouldn’t give for . . . a down-filled pillow. Or her carved and gilded bed. For even one pair of pumps, one gown, from her closet filled with clothes. Clothes and shoes that had been replaced in their entirety twice a year. She could have clothed the entire tenement building with her castoffs. And maybe even the building next door.

But they were alive, weren’t they?

And there were some good things that had happened. Some things to be grateful for. There was . . . Madame Fortier. At least Luciana was getting paid. For something she didn’t mind doing. And there was . . . Julietta.

Her lips quirked at the thought of the girl. How she’d hurried Luciana down to the Settlement House and signed her up for a class. And she’d been persuaded to make over the ivory gown. And the others ones as well. That was another thing to be thankful for. She didn’t have to wear the old yellow satin.

Had she truly once thought it was pretty?

She thought of other things too. Of the picture in the strega’s house. How lovely it had been to look upon a painting again. And to stand, for just a moment, in a place of elegance and refinement. She had not known how much she had missed the estate – the house itself – in Roma.

And thinking of the estate led her again to the loss of the family’s jewels. How she could use them now! And she could put them to better use than adorning her neck and wrists and fingers for parties and receptions and balls.
Magari!
What a fortune a pile of jewels like Mrs. Quinn’s could fetch! And how long that small fortune could keep her and the contessa in food. And clothing. The old woman couldn’t go much longer wearing her peasant’s blouse and skirt. Not with autumn approaching and winter’s chill to follow soon after.

What a price those gems would bring.

She sighed, pushed back the chair, and went into the bedroom.

Crawling into bed, she faced the contessa’s back and closed her eyes, vowing to think of other things. Things lovely and charming and gay. Things like . . . the strega’s son.

When she’d been with him, she’d felt like her old self again. Such startling green eyes he had. And such a firm chin. With generous lips that seemed always to curve with good humor . . . though it often seemed his amusement came at her expense. But he did have the most noble of noses. A nose any Roman would be proud to claim. One that started from the spot between his brows and gradually curved to a decided tip at its end. An altogether agreeable son . . . born to an altogether disagreeable woman.

She wondered: Had he approached her in Roma, would he have wanted to dance? Would he have asked to call. . . if he had known her as she was?

She turned away from the contessa and curled into a ball. As she surrendered to sleep, she prayed that God would spare her, this one night, from reliving her memories of
that
night. That this night she would be able to sleep the sleep of the innocent.

Or the dead.

But several hours later, she awoke to the percussion of an enormous thud. A dozen smaller concussions followed on its heels, rattling the window.

She knew the sound. She knew the vibrations. She knew exactly what it was.

O God! Please, save us!

She pushed from the bed, ran to the window, and peered out into the dark. Above the roof of the building across the street she could see a ghostly cloud rising to blot out the moon. A cloud that was soon lit with the flames of a fire beneath it, glowing as it hung there, suspended in the sky. Her nose wrinkled at the acrid odor. She saw people pour from the tenements into the street. Trembling, she wrestled with the window. Banged on it with her elbow. Finally managed to pull it down. Then she went back into the bedroom and shut the door. Got into bed and wrapped her arms around the still-sleeping contessa. She did not need any more information to know what the sound had been.

A bomb.

A bomb just like the one that had changed her life forever.

That night had begun like a hundred others before it. There was nothing to suggest to Luciana that anything had been about to change. There had been a dinner at the prime minister’s mansion, dancing in the ballroom afterward. A ride in a motorcar back through town beneath the pale glow of a spring moon.

And there had been a man lurking in the bushes by the house.

She had blushed when she’d seen him; she knew him. He was one of the people her father had brought home. The count collected eccentrics and artists, scholars and zealots. She’d been flattered by the newcomer’s attentions. Who would not have been? He was young. He was handsome. And he had existed apart from her world of society and balls. Her fascination with him, her attraction to him, had been all the greater for it.

It made her want to retch now.

But she hadn’t known anything, any of it, that night, so she had looked at him as they had passed by in the motorcar. As he touched a hand to his heart.

She had been thinking of him still, of how the moon had lit the planes of his face when her father had escorted her and her grandmother to the steps of the house. But she’d paused before climbing them. She’d actually taken a step backward, thinking that she might be able to steal away, unnoticed, to spend a moment with the man. At least to steal a kiss.

But he had already begun to stroll away.

She had sent one last lingering look out into the night as she began to walk up the stairs. As she looked up toward the house, the silhouettes of her father and her grandmother had been thrown into high relief.

She had felt a sudden, scorching heat.

And then she saw.

She saw . . . she saw the flames shoot up over the top of her father’s neck – his neck! – for his head was no longer there. And then his body had pitched forward into that consuming blaze. Grandmother had stood there for one long moment, outlined in flames, and then had crumpled into a heap.

Luciana remembered running up the last of the steps, taking up her grandmother’s arm, and pulling her down into the drive. And then she remembered no more. Remembered nothing more until she had awakened in the home of a family friend.

She was told that her father had been assassinated.

Assassinated!

Just like their beloved King Umberto. Just like the Russian Tsar, Alexander II. Like the French president, the American president, and two Spanish prime ministers. Elizabeth, Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary. The king of Greece and Archduke Ferdinand of Austria. Just like them, her own dear papa had become a victim of the anarchists’ rage.

They told her the resultant fire had swept through the main floor of the house. That her grandmother, though bowed by grief, was alive. That the house could be repaired, although technically it now belonged to her father’s cousin, the new Count of Roma.

She had lain there in that bed for a week, trying to grapple with the life that had been left her, a girl orphaned and title-less, without inheritance or means. Trying to determine which of her sometime suitors might still be persuaded to ask for her hand. And whether her cousin might be coaxed into supplying a dowry.

But though she had lain there for the week, her cousin had never sent a motorcar to collect them. Or offered any other sign of largesse. He’d never bothered to contact them at all. She had finally recovered strength enough to go to the estate and beg a meeting with him when the letter had found her.

Written on pink paper it was addressed to Luciana. And it was brief.

There will be bloodshed; we will not dodge; there will have to be murder; we will kill, because it is necessary; there will have to be destruction; never hope that the carabinieri and your hounds will ever succeed in ridding the country of the anarchistic germ that pulses in our veins. . . . Long live social revolution! Down with tyranny.

And to the letter he had signed his name. That was how she’d known it was him. And that was when Luciana had decided to flee.

The anarchists were everywhere. They were as numerous as fleas and as insidious as the plague. From them, there was no recourse. There was no place to hide when someone could snuff out the life of a person simply by blowing them up with a bomb. There were no policemen that could be called for protection, no guards that could make any difference when an anarchist was bent on murder.

What grievous sin had her father committed, had she harbored, that she had been targeted by such a murderer? Was it because they had been born to their positions? To wealth? Was it because they had the gall to socialize with others of the same station? Or the unforgiveable impudence to be inclined to keep the government the way it was? To retain power in the hands of the people who could manage it? To support the monarchy?

Luciana knew all about the anarchists’ philosophies. She had learned them from her association with
him
. That murderer! She had almost started to believe that he was right. And, most damning of all, she had thought him mysterious and charming and handsome. But she had not known that he had intended to blow them all up.