Classic Love: 7 Vintage Romances (77 page)

The villa, rambling, large, of rough stone almost entirely smothered in climbing vines, was behind a brick wall whose rusty iron gate hung open and beyond which there was a courtyard, very medieval-looking. I could picture horses stabled there, with grooms currying them, but in today’s time it was a garden, wild and untended, but pretty and rustic. I could see at once, that, architecturally speaking, the beauty of the villa would be at the back of the house where, I knew, there would be a splendid view of the valley.

I went through the courtyard and then, after climbing a half dozen worn steps, clanged the heavy door knocker. I waited, but nothing happened. I reached for the knocker again, gave it three smart raps.

There was still no answer.

She did say six o’clock, I explained to myself. Didn’t she?

I rapped once again.

Nothing.

Well, this was a strange welcome, I thought and, making up my mind, went through the courtyard again. This time I plodded along a gravelled pathway that led to the back of the house, passing a small blue Lancia parked to one side. My footsteps crunched on the tiny pebbles. I was a little uneasy. Supposing there had been some error on my part … or some misunderstanding on hers. There was no way I could get a taxi back to town. I was annoyed too … after all …

And then I came to a most beautiful place. I was at the back of the house now, and standing in a garden that was so wonderful I had to draw in my breath. I had been right about the view. I was looking down on the glory of Florence. There was the Domo, the octagonal Baptistry, and the exquisite belltower of Giotto’s creation. Lacy churches dotted the landscape, the medieval campanile of the Palazzo Vecchio loomed; the Arno spun its way, with its many bridges, like a silver thread, below the lovely, lovely embankment.

I gazed, exalted. I felt as if I could reach out and scoop that miniature city, far below, into my hands, hold it there, captured, like a fistful of jewels.

It was at that moment that I heard the sound. For a minute or two I couldn’t pinpoint what it was … a light, sighing, quivering breath of sound …

Like someone crying.

Why, it
was
someone crying, I thought, and a fragment of memory flitted through my mind. When my little sister had died of meningitis … behind the closed door of my parents’ bedroom, the muted sobbing, like the tearing of silk … smothered behind a despairing hand.

I peered through sheltering trees and then I saw the figure kneeling on the ground. Like a penitent, with head bowed, and the dry sobs, almost but not quite soundless, coming from that crouched figure. I walked quickly toward it, and stood at last beside an old woman whose faded blue eyes were diffused with tears. White-haired, thin as a rail, with a long, sinewy neck, nose strong and carved and her mouth a red gash in the parchment white of her aging skin, she was bent over some object on the ground.

“Mrs. Wadley?” I said.

She looked slowly up at me, and her eyes were filled, not only with tears, but with shock and horror. Then I looked down, past her. The woman’s hands were threaded through a coat of fur. The coat belonged to a dog. A dead dog. I had never seen a dead dog, but I knew there was no life left in that little animal. Its eyes were open but unseeing. There was a foam of blood on its muzzle. It was rigid.

And then the woman spoke.

“He’s dead too,” she said. “And now Paolo’s dead too.”

“I’m so terribly sorry,” I said, and knelt beside her. “Was he very old?”

“Not old enough to die.”

“But — ”

She repeated it. “Not old enough to die. Oh, I know. Don’t think I don’t know. It’s a warning, you see.”

I stared at her. “A warning?”

She laughed, a strange laugh, looked down at the inert body of the little animal. She stroked its fur once more and then gathered the small body into her arms.

“He’s still warm,” she said softly. “He didn’t want to die. He grieved, yes, when she left us. But there was me, and he knew I needed him. He wouldn’t have wanted me to be alone. Oh, it was deliberate. They’re trying to frighten me.”

She struggled up. I helped her. “Oh yes,” she said, as she regained her feet. “Yes, I know. Everything’s very clear.”

And then a change came over her. Her face grew wary. There was a long silence and then, “Oh, you’re little Barbara.”

“I’m Barbara Loomis. You’re Mrs. Wadley?”

“Yes, how are you, my dear?”

It was grotesque; with the dead animal under one arm she held out a hand, shifting the weight of the dog. “Welcome to the Villa,” she said. “Come inside, do. I’ll give you some Punt a Mes, then I must have Gianni see to Paolo’s burial. He will be desolate, you know. He so loved our little boy. I want him buried under the twisted pine.”

She pointed. “That one. It was his favorite resting place. Now it will be his eternal resting place.”

“You mustn’t worry about me,” I protested. “I’ll wait here. Please don’t — ”

“No no,” she insisted. “You’ll have an aperitif, and I shall be back as soon as I can.” She cradeled the moribund dog in both arms and led me across the lawn to two lovely french doors that stood open. She stood aside for me to enter, and there was a forlorn drop on the end of her nose. She sniffled it away and pointed to a stand with liqueur bottles. “Help yourself, please, dear. If you don’t, I shall be most unhappy. I shall be back directly. Just let me attend to this sad undertaking. I’ll try not to be too long.”

“Please don’t hurry. Are you sure I can’t help?”

“Thank you, but Gianni and I will do it together.”

And then she left me, carrying out the dead animal like a sacrificial offering. I was, to say the least, shocked and put off by the whole thing. I thought it would be a long time before I forgot about those dead, glassy eyes, that blood-specked muzzle.

And the incoherent spate of words. “They’re trying to frighten me … it’s a warning …”

I poured out some liqueur into a small glass, lit a cigarette and looked about. It was a vast, white-walled room with a vaulted ceiling, like that of a cathedral, lancet windows, and an enormous open hearth. In the center of the huge room a gigantic trestle table, with the golden patina of age, was piled with books, ceramic pieces, pewter trays and a great earthenware bowl large enough to hold Ali Baba or one of his forty thieves. It was filled with masses of dried flowers. There was a big concert grand at the farther end of the room, its top down and over it an old-fashioned, fringed and flowered shawl. And on top of the silk shawl, an abundance of gilt-framed photographs.

I got up and went over to look at the photographs. Right away I saw Mrs. Wadley, in beach attire (very modest), in front of a striped cabana. Perhaps on the Lido in Venice, I thought … or Ischia, or Capri. Several gentlemen of various shapes and sizes and ages smiled at me, one of them with an impressive black mustache curled up at the corners like Toscanini’s. There were two pretty children in pinafores, with their pretty mother. And — I nearly fainted with surprise — a snapshot of two people who were my mother and father of years ago. There was the same snap in an album back home. It was so odd to see it there among a raft of strangers, two people the late Contessa had known twenty-five years ago, for a day or two, and whom she had never totally forgotten.

Truly, the ways of the human heart were inscrutable.

And then, as I put the framed snapshot back on the silken scarf, I saw my dead great-aunt. That it was she took no conjecture on my part. It was signed, at the bottom, in a bold, round hand. “To Elizabeth, with love,” it read, and the woman in the photograph was handsome and, yes, regal, with a crown of iron-gray, strong hair that haloed her fine face. She looked a little bit like the Tsarina, with that kind of chiselled nose, and the clear blue eyes.

She must have been a beauty in her youth, I thought, and then saw her in her youth. It was unmistakably the same woman, twenty or thirty years earlier, in the clothes of the period, standing arm in arm with a dark-eyed man who was not quite as tall as herself, and rather frail-looking. His head, which was handsome and finely-shaped, seemed a bit too large for his small frame. He was looking straight into the camera, but Mercedes was turned sideways, gazing worshipfully at him.

I had just put the photograph back when I heard someone coming into the room. I was primed to see Mrs. Wadley, but it was not she. It was a man, tall, slim, dark, young … and looking curiously at me. We eyed each other for a second and then he said, in English but with a charming accent, “Hello, I’m Giovanni Monteverdi.”

I said I was Barbara Loomis, and mentioned the dog. “Yes,” he said. “It’s terrible. He must have gotten into some weed-killer.”

“I feel in the way,” I explained. “I’m wondering if I shouldn’t call a taxi.”

“No no, don’t leave her. It will be a bad evening for her. She will be with you soon, just make yourself comfortable, signorina.”

He excused himself. “I need a spade, and some kind of box, so that we can lay Paolo to rest in the earth.”

He went away and in a few minutes I saw him walking round the back, carrying tools and a cardboard box, walking springily on the balls of his feet. He carried himself well. I hadn’t failed to notice the length of his eyelashes.

And then he vanished out of sight.

It was almost half an hour later when Mrs. Wadley returned through the french doors. Pale and drawn, she apologized for keeping me waiting so long. She had regained her composure and, in spite of her pallor, smiled pleasantly and said how happy she was to meet me. “You’re so good-looking and have such beautiful legs,” she told me. “American girls have such a
style.
”

She pulled off a pair of garden gloves, white cotton and stained with the brown of the earth, so that I knew she must have helped Giovanni make the “final resting place” for the dog, Paolo. She saw that I had helped myself to the liqueur, nodded approvingly, and filled a glass for herself. We sat together on a rather worn sofa, and, lifting her glass, she said,
“Buona fortuna.”

Then, her eyes keen and sharp as she gave me a piercing look, she said quietly, “You must excuse, please, my earlier hysteria. I don’t know what I said in my excitement … and sorrow … but I was, of course, shocked and — ”

She twisted her hands together. I saw the knuckles go white. But it was with a calm and clear voice that she went on. “When one is under stress,” she said, “one says ridiculous things.”

For a moment she was silent. Except for the whitened knuckles, there was no sign of agitation. “Well,” she said, at last, “let’s forget it, shall we? You’ve met him, Gianni. He said so. I like him, that nice boy. I like Italians, don’t you? I’ve spent a good many years of my life living with them. You must meet Gianni’s family. His father and mother. And the other son, Benedette, whose wife is Francesca. They have a beautiful little girl, Eleanora. But you must be hungry! It’s almost seven o’clock.”

She picked up her glass again and drained it, then saw the package I’d brought, exclaimed over it. “I’ll just put them on a tray,” she said. “Thank you, my dear. Aren’t they beautiful? I’ll be right back. And then I’ll make us a lovely dinner. You must be starved.”

She refused all offers to help, and when she left me to prepare dinner, I went to the piano. It was somewhat out of tune and the keyboard was a little stiff, but I played a few Chopin preludes and was beginning to feel quite at home by the time Mrs. Wadley wheeled in a loaded cart. The smells were wonderful. “It was so nice to hear the music,” she said, as she wheeled the cart over to the windows, where there was a small table with a centerpiece of flowers in a pewter vase. She didn’t lay a tablecloth, but put the dishes right on the well-worn wooden table. Then she drew up two chairs, cane-bottomed.

I said it looked marvelous, and she beamed, uncorking a bottle of wine with great professionalism. She filled two smashingly lovely crystal goblets and then sat down opposite me.

“A tavola nonsi invecchio,”
she said, ladling food onto my plate.

“That means — ”

“At the table one doesn’t grow older.”

I looked at the wealth of food and remembered signore Predelli’s comment about the paucity of vittles served by the two women. Well, times had changed, I thought wryly. There was enough food for four people; furthermore, Mrs. Wadley ate voraciously. As if she had been starved for a long time. But then, of course, when Mercedes was alive, it had been the Contessa’s house, the Contessa’s way of doing things. Perhaps, like the signores Predelli and Pineider, Mrs. Wadley had habitually left the dinner table unappeased.

I was trying to form a picture of my great-aunt in my mind. More than that, I was determined to find out everything I could about her. It was a kind of challenge, a compulsion to
know
her, to ask, discreetly, questions that would give me a clue as to Mercedes’ss life-style and character. After all she had left me a tidy sum of money. But it was more than that … it was like wanting to walk into a picture on the wall, to enter into the mind of the man who had painted it.

And so, when Mrs. Wadley casually said that of course I would have dear Mercedes’s room, where I would be quite comfortable, and the use of the car whenever I wanted it, I didn’t protest for very long. I said I had booked a room at the Hotel Continentale and wouldn’t dream of imposing on her, but she insisted so vehemently that I stay at the Villa Paradiso (and in fact it was exactly what I wanted) that in the end I gave way gracefully, thanked her profusely and when I left, after my hostess called me a taxi, I said I would be round, bag and baggage, before siesta on the following day.

She said one last thing before I left, a thing that remained in my mind as I drove the perilous trip back to the center of town, at the same reckless rate of speed as the earlier trip out (only it was far more intimidating in the darkness). Framed in the dim light of a lantern as she stood in the doorway, she said, “You’ve no idea.”

Her brisk, clipped British voice was emphatic, and she was smiling in a kind of triumphant way. “Of course you’ve no idea. But I shall sleep so much better tonight. Knowing I won’t be alone. It’s so
good
of you.”