And now she wanted to bring an Englishman home for his inspection.
Well, we'll see.
He looked around the salon, satisfied. There were fresh flowers in the vases, Rachmaninov on the stereo.
The buzzer to the apartment sounded and their maid hurried to open the door.
He heard Simone's voice. Francesca was already there to welcome her and her guest. Angeli held back. He was afforded a view of a tall man with hair straggling over the collar of his linen jacket, long-legged, denim jeans. He was good-looking - too good-looking - and there was a leather bracelet on his wrist. He wore boots instead of shoes. Soft, Angeli thought. Vain. Unquestionably an opportunist.
He put his smile in place and stepped forward, hand outstretched, the perfect host.
***
They ate in the formal dining room, gathered around the great oak table with its gilded Renaissance chairs. The cook had prepared penne all'arrabbiata to start, an antipasto of artichoke hearts, roasted peppers, basil and black olives and for main course a whole grilled bass, which she filleted at the table. To complement the meal Angeli had produced three bottles of a Vigneta Torricella Orvieto.
But he did not let the food distract him from the business at hand, which was discover if this young man was a suitable companion for his daughter. He doubted it. He noted the way she looked at this young man. There was a glow in her cheeks. It occurred to him that perhaps this interloper had already slept with her.
He hoped not, because already he didn't like him. For one thing he was a journalist and journalists were all unreliable. Most of them were communists or liberals. This one asked a lot of questions. His knuckles clamped around the arms of his chair as they sometimes did during a turbulent air flight. Fortunately Francesca was carrying the day, explaining to this Luke - or Luca or whatever he called himself - the problems of renovating Renaissance apartments. Five years waiting list, she was saying, for a good tradesman. Fortunately my husband has connections and it was done in a few weeks.
The arrogant little shit seized on this opening. “Simone tells me you are a business consultant.”
Angeli bowed his head in acknowledgment.
“It sounds interesting.”
“Does it? Why?”
“She says you know a lot of important people in Rome.”
“I suppose so. I never think about it.”
He smiled. I really don't like that smile, he thought.
“She says you know your way around the Vatican better than the Pope.”
“Papito, I said the Curia.”
Angeli sipped his wine. I could snap you in half, he thought.
He glanced at Francesca, who took her cue. “And what about you, Luca? Where do your family live?”
Luca, he thought. What kind of name is that for an Englishman? A Spanish mother, he had said. Something was not right here.
“We live just outside London. Near Oxford.”
“Simone tells me you are a journalist,” Angeli said. He spoke the word with distaste, as if it were 'garbage collector' or 'pest exterminator.”
“That's right.”
“And what are you doing here in Rome?”
“I was sent here to write a feature. I have been interviewing various members of the Curia, getting opinions on who is likely to succeed the current Pope.”
“Oh? And who will that be?”
“It depends who gets their way. The conservatives or the liberals.”
“You make it sound like politics.”
“Isn't it?”
“Ah, but I am a traditionalist. I still believe the choice of a Pope is divinely inspired.”
“You don't think He gets a little help?”
Angeli laughed easily. “That is why we are here, surely. To help God's cause?” He could feel his daughter's eyes on him, willing him to drop this. “So who, in your opinion, are the front runners among the papabile?”
“The conservatives want another Wotylya. For once the prime conservative candidates are from the Third World. Trujillo of Colombia and Neves from Brazil are their front runners. The Italian candidate, for once, is a progressive. Martini. Or perhaps there'll be a compromise as usual.”
“Who?”
“Comacho.”
“The Mexican?”
“Wojtylya was a man for his time. It was considered a masterstroke to have a Polish pope during a time of so much upheaval in the communist bloc. But the Church needs someone who will address the problems of the modern Church in the Third World. Poverty. Repression. Overpopulation.”
It was painful to keep his smile in place. He felt his jaw muscles freeze. He poured Luke some more wine. “Is that what you think? You think because Russia is dead there are no more communists?”
“Not as a world force. It's a label right wing governments use to justify repression.”
“So now the Church must condone terrorism? In your opinion?”
“Papa,” Simone said, sensing the turn the conversation had taken.
“I am interested in this young man's opinions.”
“It depends on your definition of a terrorist.”
“A terrorist is anyone who spreads ideas contrary to Christian civilisation.”
“In Latin America a lot of priests support these so-called terrorists. Liberation theology split the church in Latin America. That is why many people think we need a Pope from that continent to bring the Church together again.”
“Or so that we can forget about civilised values and break down all order in society? Take away everything a man has worked for all his life, and give it to rabble? To destroy all respect for the Church and for authority? To allow women to have abortions? Is this what you call bringing the Church together again?”
There was a long silence. Luke stared into his wine, unable or unwilling to answer. Simone and Francesca stared at their plates. Angeli threw his napkin on the table in disgust and went up to the roof terrace to smoke a cigarette.
***
After Luke had gone, Simone found him leaning on the balustrade, staring at the red-tiled roofs of the Piazza Navona. “Has he gone?”
“He said to thank you for your hospitality.”
“That was kind of him.”
“I thought so, in the circumstances.”
He tossed his cigarette aside. The way he looked at her scared her. She had never seen that look on his face before. “Never, ever speak to me like that again.”
She lowered her eyes. This was not her father, this was someone else.
They there for a long time, not speaking.
“Be careful of him,” Angeli said, finally.
“I like him very much.”
“How long is he staying in Rome?”
She shrugged her shoulders.
“He will go back to England and you will never see him again. Why are you wasting your time on this boy?”
“I don't know.”
“If he hurts you, let me know.”
“I'm cold,” she said and turned away from him and went back inside.
Chapter 64
“WHERE DID YOU get this information on him?” Luke asked. He flicked through the typed pages Jeremy had given him; plain A4 paper, unsigned. Completely anonymous.
They were in Jeremy's apartment in the Via Veneto, marble and chrome, looking out over the Villa Borghese and the gardens. Doing it tough. Jeremy opened another bottle of Barolo and refilled his glass.
“Rumour. Innuendo. Cocktail parties at the Embassy are like Mother's Union meetings. Really. Of course you can't publish any of that stuff. Libelous.”
Luke flicked through the pages again. “Where do I find someone who can substantiate some of this?”
“Could try the cemetery.”
“Thanks.”
“Anyone has connections, it's you. Rogering his daughter, God's sake.”
“I'm not sleeping with her.”
“Hopeless. Lost your touch?”
“It’s complicated.”
“Does she know why you’re interested in her? I hope you’re not going to do anything to make me regret our friendship, Luca.”
“I do like her.”
“But not enough to tell her about your interest in her father?”
“It’s not just about the story.”
“Bit of advice. Go back to London in the morning. Strange thing for an atheist to say, but your soul’s in danger. They know about that sort of thing here. Hell’s not a place, you know. It’s what you have to live with when all’s said and done.”
“I have to get to the bottom of this.”
“Journalistic integrity?”
“Like I said, it’s complicated.”
Jeremy sat down, crossed his legs, left one swinging; urbane, offended. “How was lunch?”
“I blew it.”
Jeremy made a tutting noise with his tongue and shook his head. “Really. You have lost your touch.”
“We were talking about the Vatican and he went ballistic.”
“Never discuss religion and politics. First rule of polite society.”
“Names, Jeremy. There must be someone who can help me out here.”
“Why?”
If I tell him, he’ll think ... what will he think? Better he thinks I’m crazy than he thinks I would dupe some girl just to get a story.
“Spit it out.”
“You never met my sister, did you?”
“Relevance?”
“You’ve heard me talk about her though.”
“Couldn’t tell you her name though.”
“Diana. Her name’s Diana.”
“And?”
“And she looks just like Simone Rivera. I don’t mean similar. I mean - just like her. Exactly. Oh, her hair’s different, her clothes, her style ... the surface things. But if you put the two of them side by side you wouldn’t be able to tell them apart.”
Jeremy leaned forward, frowned. “Where is this going?”
“Diana’s my half sister. My parents adopted her.”
“When?”
“I was very young. I remember my mother just having a baby one day. They told me she was adopted, that her parents were killed during the Dirty War. One of those things that never gets talked about. I did ask my father about it once but he was very vague. I got the impression that he was uncomfortable about it so I didn’t bring it up again. I got the feeling that ...”
“That what?”
“That what they had done wasn’t quite legal.”
Jeremy drank his wine and they listened to the traffic down in the street. Finally: “Jesus Christ Almighty.”
“I could be wrong about this. That’s why I want to get my facts straight first.”
“Nightmare, Luca. Should have told me.”
“I’m telling you now.”
“I mean ... horrible. How?”
“I don’t know.”
“When you’re with her. Can’t imagine. What are you thinking?”
“Diana’s not my real sister but I’ve never ... adopted or not, she’s my sister. But Simone is like any other ... but she’s not. And I really like her. I just have no idea what to do. None.”
“Have to do something.”
“Find out what I can, I guess. Go home. Talk to the old man first.”
Jeremy finished his wine, tapped the empty glass against his knee, stared at the window. Sirens wailed over the city. People were laughing down in the street. “Need to talk to Maldini. Prints this fringe newspaper. Back yard. Rumour is he's a disaffected P2. Give you his number. Other chap's a New Zealander. Arthur Fox. Drinks too much. National curse, I suppose. Good journalist, when he's sober. Been in Rome for ever. Met Caligula. Buy him lunch and he'll talk for days.”
“Thanks.”
“Be careful, Luca. Murky waters. Nasty people in this town. Your little nightmare scenario’s right, lot nastier than I imagined.”
***
By Thursday Luke had run his credit card almost to its limit. He remembered Martin's warning: if he didn’t get back to London by the next day he wouldn't have a job to go back to.
He tracked down Maldini to a grimy flat in the southern suburbs and entertained Arthur Fox over lunch and numerous bottles of wine at a trattoria in Piazza di Spagna. He filled four ninety minute cassettes with his conversations with the two men, and at the end of it he felt he knew as much as any man alive about César Angeli-Rivera.
Except how he came to have a daughter who was a mirror image of his own sister.
But he could guess.
***
“I don't remember much of Buenos Aires now,” Simone said. “I remember we lived in this huge house in Belgrano. There was a garden and a swimming pool and this great marble staircase. '
They were in a restaurant in Campo de Fiori, lingering over a bottle of Colle Gaio. Drapes billowed from the ceiling, the restaurant lit by candles that flickered in the breeze from the open windows. Luke and Simone lingered over their digestivi, the last couple in the restaurant, their lives suspended for that moment, trapped in the spell of the wine and the food.
“I remember whenever my parents had a dinner party I'd sneak out of bed and crouch at the top of the stairs in the dark to watch people arrive. My father was in the army then and I remember the men in their caps and uniforms and the women in their beautiful dresses and jewellery. It just looked so glamorous.”
“What did your father do in the army?”
“I don't know. He hardly ever talks about it. I think he is perhaps a little ashamed. He is a very honest man and he does not like what happened in his country during that time.”
“Why did he leave?”
“He said it was the war with Britain that made up his mind. When we were humiliated in the Malvinas.” She used the Argentine term for what he knew as the Falklands.
“Have you ever been back?”
She shook her head. “We still have family there. Sometimes they visit us in Rome. My father goes to Buenos Aires, on business. But he never took us with him. Sometimes I think about buying an air ticket but ...” She shrugged her shoulders.
She looked at him over the rim of her glass. I wonder what she's thinking, Luke wondered. Has she ever asked herself if her father is telling her the whole truth? Is there doubt lurking somewhere in the back of her mind?
“What are you thinking?” she asked him.
I was wondering what my parents will say when I show them the photographs of you that I took outside Saint Peter's and in the Piazza di Spagna; I was thinking that my sister will be devastated when she discovers she has a twin. I am wishing I had never come to Rome, that I had never seen you, that this terrible secret - if that is what it is - would stay buried.
“Nothing,” he said.
“I know you are thinking something. You have this look in your eyes.”
Her eyes were too wide. This was leading somewhere he had never intended it to go. He felt a thrill of panic and looked away.
“I was thinking I did not make such a great impression on your family the other day,” he said, trying to break the tension between them. He picked up the bottle of wine. Empty. “I'm sorry.”
“You should never talk politics to papa. He is like some men are with football.” She pushed away her wine glass. “One eyed and fanatical. The rest of the time he is a pumpkin peach.”
“I came on too strong, I suppose.”
“He is a strong character. So are you.”
“I should mind my manners more.”
Her eyes shone in the candlelight. He suspected she had drunk too much wine. “You are a strange guy. I can't figure you out.”
“In what way?”
“When I say no to you, you chase me all over Rome. When I say yes and I come to dinner with you, you look all around the restaurant, out of the window, anywhere but look at me. It is like you are frightened of me.”
Truer than you know. “I have to go back to London tomorrow. I don't want to hurt you, I guess.”
“You can
only hurt me if I let you hurt me.”
If only that were true.
She said: “I think I want to go home now.”
***
She stood at the shuttered window, looking over the piazza, her back to him. It had been raining and the cobbles were slick and black, splashed with the yellow reflections of the street lamps. The rattle of a Vespa echoed along the alleyway, a group of teenagers were laughing and smoking on the corner. A breeze stirred the curtain. There was a radio playing somewhere.
He stood closer, breathed in the scent of her, felt the warmth of her body through his shirt. She wore a sheer black dress, cut low at the back. He watched the ripple of her shoulder blades beneath her skin, traced the curve of her spine with his finger. He heard her catch her breath.
What the hell am I doing?
She turned around, put her arms around his neck. He felt like some wild creature, hypnotised by the lights of an oncoming car. Nothing he could do to stop now. There was a sheen of sweat between her breasts.
He couldn't help himself.
Chapter 65
HE WOKE SUDDENLY, panicked. The bedroom door threw a shaft of light across the bed. She lay on her stomach, asleep, her hair splayed across the white pillowslip.
What had he done?
He slipped out of bed, gathered his clothes and walked naked into the bathroom. He stood under the shower for a long time, the hot needles of water playing over his scalp and shoulders. He had not meant this to happen. He tried to project the consequences in his mind. He closed his eyes and groaned aloud.
When he got out of the shower Simone was in the kitchen, making coffee in a macchinetta. She wore a silk housecoat, short and loosely tied. She had the wonderfully ravaged look of a lover. He wanted her again.
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