All at once her tone has changed, become persuasive, that odd unnecessary
you see
has given her away. All at once, she needs to be believed. But why, in God’s name, did she lie in the first place? He couldn’t believe it when she told him in the car on the way to the morgue. I’ve done something foolish, she said. You won’t let me down, will you? For old times’ sake? The man must have noticed as well because he leans back in his chair, as obvious in his way as she has been in hers, and caps his pen. Secret service, decides Giacomo. And now I’m implicated, damn her.
“You must be tired, Signora Di Stasi,” the man says before Giacomo can intervene. “I’ll arrange for you to be taken home.” He opens a drawer and takes out a card, which he gives to her. “I shall certainly be in touch, but if you would like to speak to me again–”
“I’ll take you home,” Giacomo says as Helen puts the card into her pocket. But the man shakes his head.
“I think it might be wiser, Dottor Mura, if you returned to your hotel.”
Giacomo, affronted, turns to face him. “I’m sorry?”
The man shrugs. “Naturally, you are free to do as you wish. I was merely offering a word of advice.”
“I’m sorry?” insists Giacomo. “I didn’t catch your name.”
“He’s right,” says Helen. “You’ve done quite enough already.” Giacomo can’t tell if he’s being thanked or dismissed. He stifles his resentment.
“I’ll call you later.”
“No, don’t do that,” she says, her voice still measured, in an oddly insistent way. “You won’t get through. I won’t be taking calls.”
“If you’re sure that’s what you want,” he says. He opens the door for her, stands back to let her pass, but she takes his hand in hers and he can feel her trembling. “If you’re sure.”
“I’ll call you,” she says. “Later. I promise.”
Then, at a volume the other man is not supposed to hear, she adds: “I have to talk to you, I just don’t know where.” And Giacomo nods and presses her hand before letting it go.
9
The flat is empty. Slowly, she lifts her hands to her face and holds it for a moment, skin against skin, her palms against her cheeks, as if to make sure she is really who she is, and not some other woman whose husband has been murdered. She has rushed at the stairs to be here, pursued by nothing but her growing horror of the world outside, the cars, the lights, the hustling intimacy of its demands. Outside the hospital, someone shouted as a man’s hand guided her lowered head into the car, one voice above the rest,
Bravo Federico
, and she flinched but didn’t turn. She sat straight-backed in the car with the police woman from that morning beside her, holding her arm the way a friend might although Helen didn’t see her as a friend and wished she wasn’t there. I’ve answered too many questions today, she thought. I shall be home soon. Part of her has been waiting to be alone for almost seven hours and now, with her back pressed to the front door, she closes her eyes and listens to her breathing as though there is nothing else to be done, as though – finally – she has what she needs.
She steps out of her shoes, the wooden floor warm and smooth against her feet. Her first thought is to take a shower, but she is suddenly so tired she can barely walk across the room to the sofa and collapse. Clutching a cushion to her side, she sits in the corner, her legs curled up beneath her, refusing to lie down, afraid she might fall asleep when there is still so much she has to do. She doesn’t know where to begin, her mind is a wiped slate, so blank she has a sudden sense of panic, as though she is literally being sponged away.
When the landline rings on the other side of the room, she bites the side of her tongue in shock. The taste of blood filling her mouth, she picks up the receiver. She hears a woman’s voice she doesn’t recognise repeat her name, the pitch insistent, hectoring. She drops the receiver, not on the phone where it belongs but on the pad, beside a number and a date, written in Federico’s hand, a doodle. The voice continues, the furious buzz of an insect trapped in a jar. Her name and a plea to be answered, a plea that is also, it seems to Helen, a threat. It is 7 o’clock. The news will be starting. Now everyone will know. Friends and others. Some people, it occurs to her, will be pleased. She pulls the pad free of the receiver and stares at the doodle, a flower in a vase; Federico must have made it the day before. What was she doing while he drew this? Who was he talking to? Someone she knew? She doesn’t recognise the number. The date is for next week. Next Tuesday. A week today. The doodle blurs. Eventually, her hand shaking a little, she puts it down.
And now what shall I do? she asks herself. She starts to cry again, slow effortless tears. Not even her home is safe; she has the sense of being hounded by savage beasts, as though beyond the door there is no longer the familiar hall, the worn-down stairs, the furled umbrellas waiting to be used; as though she has become detached from that. The world seems hostile and unknown. She should feel safe here, in her own sitting room, surrounded by all the objects they have chosen, yet how empty the flat is without him, how silent and indifferent; although he was never home by this time. He never gets back before nine, he works too hard. Normally,
that dreadful word
. She turns on the television and makes herself a snack, some olives that Massimo’s mother has sent them, a handful of cashew nuts; she pours herself a glass of wine or beer, and sits on the sofa to watch the news. She waits for Federico.
Normally
. But this evening, she isn’t hungry and doesn’t want to pour herself a drink. She is afraid that once she starts she won’t be able to stop, because
normally
it is the thought of Federico finding her drunk that stops her after the first two glasses. And she can’t believe that might not happen.
Sitting in the car on the way here, she planned to call Giacomo as soon as she arrived, ask him to come over. But she realises now, alone in the home she’s made with Federico that what she wants to do, more than anything in the world, is to talk not to Giacomo but to Federico, and she won’t be able to. As if for the first time that day, she understands that she’ll never be able to talk to Federico again. But this time it is worse. Before this, some part of her has told her that he’ll be back, that he’s away on business, but he’ll be back; he always comes back. And now this part has fallen silent and she feels a flush of pain and rage, so strong it takes her breath away. Who has done this to me? To us? She stares at the phone, which has started to make a curious noise, then replaces the receiver on the handset. Immediately the ringing begins. She lifts it to her ear. It is Giulia, Federico’s mother.
“I’ve been trying to get hold of you for hours, Helen,” she snaps. “Your mobile’s turned off.”
“I couldn’t stand it any longer, Giulia.” Talking again, Helen tastes the blood in her mouth. “I was being pestered by journalists.”
“You’ve only just arrived home?”
“Ten minutes ago. The police brought me back in the end. I’ve been at the hospital all afternoon. I had to identify him, Giulia.”
“How dreadful for you. You aren’t still with that Mura man, I hope?”
“Giacomo left me at the hospital. He was a great comfort.”
“They could have asked me.” Giulia pauses. “Oh, by the way, the president’s called. He has to talk to you.”
“What about?” For a moment, Helen wonders who she means. The president of what?
“Fede was such an important figure, especially at the moment.” Giulia’s voice fills with pride. And now Helen understands that this is what will happen, for Giulia at least. Federico will become a hero and then a martyr. Perhaps it is happening already. What she stops herself saying, just in time, are the words:
He isn’t dead yet
. Without putting down the phone, she stretches out to the remote control and turns on the television to see what is left of the news, the volume off. Giulia’s voice, with that undertow of offence, continues to talk of Federico and his achievements, but what Helen sees is herself and Giacomo as they climb into a car, and a smile on her face she doesn’t remember, followed by a glance of complicity between them, accusing them both. And there are more pictures of Giacomo, on a demonstration in France, standing with his arm round the shoulder of the man who bombed the McDonald’s branch, the one with the moustache, and then a photograph she hasn’t seen for years, from his first driving licence, the one all the newspapers used when he was on the run. Appalled, she tries to tell Giulia that she has a headache, she can’t talk any longer but Giulia insists that Fausto has something important to say to her first. Helen expects her father-in-law to cry and feels her own lip tremble. He hasn’t been able to speak to her until this moment. Before she can answer, or protest, Fausto is on the line. “Turn on the news,” he says, his voice breaking.
“I know. I’m watching it.”
“But what on earth were you thinking of?” She’s right: he’s close to tears. “What did you imagine people’s reaction would be? Today. On the very day…” He pauses. “Giacomo Mura, of all people. All that terrible business had been forgotten and now, now that Fede’s–”
The news moves on, Giacomo’s bleached-out bearded face is replaced by footballers training, the wedding of a couple she recognises from the gossip magazines.
“I just don’t understand.” She interrupts him, her own voice breaking. “Why is everyone so angry with me?”
“I’ll speak to you tomorrow,” Fausto says.
“Yes,” she says. “That’s the best thing. We’ll talk tomorrow.” She can hear Giulia’s voice in the background, and Fausto saying yes.
As soon as she has put down the phone, with the receiver deliberately off the hook, she raises her eyes to the ceiling. “Oh my God, Federico,” she says, out loud, her voice unexpectedly strong, as though she is calling him from the next room. “Help me get through this without you.”
She goes to the kitchen and opens a bottle of wine from the fridge and sits in front of the television, with the sound turned off, to drink it.
PART TWO
1
Rome, Wednesday, 2 June 2004
Helen wakes up at six, her head throbbing. After hours of fitful half-sleep, the top sheet pushed away in a sweat and then pulled back, she has had a dream in which she and Federico are seated together on a train as it passes through the countryside around Turin, low hills and houses, the mountains behind, the neat green woods. She lies there, her eyes still closed, her temple pressed against the pillow, and struggles to remember what she has seen, as she always does, in that state between sleep and wakefulness. For a moment, absorbed by her efforts to recall the dream, she is calm, even happy, despite the dull but insistent pain in her head; she will tell Federico what she has seen, as she always does, when he comes back from the bathroom, toothbrush in hand. And then, with a wave of emptiness, as though she is being filled with it, stifled, she knows where he is. She opens her eyes, the dream wiped out, and hears herself moan. Her hand reaches out to his pillow, to stroke it, but also to check, because it can’t be true. What she knows to be true cannot be true. She lies there, alone on her side of their bed, and thinks, I shall never get up again. How can I?
Three hours later, Helen sighs at the voice of Fausto, muffled and urgent, over the entry phone. She still isn’t dressed. After waking and remembering, she somehow went back to sleep, and woke again, and remembered again. When the doorbell rang, she was on the point of calling Giacomo, sitting with the mobile in her hand and his name staring up at her, afraid of what she might say.
She stands by the open door in Federico’s old towelling robe, hearing her father-in-law’s feet slow down as he climbs to their floor, until, at the corner of the final landing, he makes an effort and almost runs up the final few steps to embrace her. He is carrying a case. He begins to cry and then so does she, and she is filled with such gratitude, because this is what she needs, someone whose grief is as simple and uncompromised as hers should be. She hugs him to her, her hand on the back of his head, her mouth pressed into his coarse grey hair. They stand on the threshold, the case squashed between them, until Fausto eases her gently away from him and guides her back into the flat. He closes the door behind them, then puts down the case with a little sigh as he bends over.
“There are people in the street outside. Journalists. Not too many yet. They will take it in turns to pester us for the next few days, I imagine. All of them with their little tape recorders as though pen and paper have never been invented. Television people too. No sign of the police. You’d have thought they could provide some kind of guard. Perhaps they’re all needed at the parade.”
“Parade?”
“You don’t remember? Of course you don’t. It’s the military parade this morning, for the Republic. All these helicopters, you haven’t heard them? Federico will have received an invitation. Perhaps he forgot to mention it. He’s been so busy these past few weeks.”
“Federico never goes to that sort of thing.”
“I should have been there,” Fausto says. “Giulia wanted us all to be there, you two as well. She says we should show ourselves a united front. Against what, I don’t know. I only wish I did. Sometimes the company you are forced to keep is less palatable than that of the enemy. Giulia doesn’t see things that way, of course.” He shakes his head. “She’s there now.” He runs his hands through his hair. “I wanted her to come with me, to be here with me. I don’t understand her sometimes. I didn’t want her to go, but she insisted. She said that someone had to show their face.” He sighs again. “It’s all so clear for her, even today, so clear where her duty lies.” His face puckers and she thinks he’s about to cry again.
“Please don’t,” she says, resting her hand on his arm for a moment. “I’ll make us some coffee.” She turns towards the kitchen, expecting him to follow. But Fausto touches his heart.