A Rather Lovely Inheritance

by C. A. Belmond

  “And while we’re there,” he said, “there’s a little lady I think we’d better pay a call on.”

  Chapter Thirty-three

  “MUM’S GOT PLENTY OF ROOM IN THE VILLA SHE’S RENTING, SO WE won’t have to stay in a hotel,” Jeremy insisted as we drove south to Rome to deposit the painting in the vaults of his firm’s Italian offices.“And she’s got plenty of explaining to do,” he added darkly. He telephoned to alert her that we were on our way. I made him promise that no matter what happened, he wouldn’t get sarcastic or holler at his mother.

  But by the time we’d dropped off the painting and reached her villa late that night, she’d already gone to bed.The servants had left us a cold supper, and we ate like sleepwalkers, then drifted upstairs into our bedrooms and tumbled gratefully into bed. I just lay there with my muscles twitching and my nerves vibrating, and then I fell into a deep sleep, disturbed only briefly the next morning by a shy maid who delivered a tray of coffee and boiled eggs, and a note from Aunt Sheila saying she had a morning engagement but would meet us for lunch. I ate, bathed, sat on the bed trying to work up the energy to dress, and fell asleep all over again.Then I woke in time for lunch.

  The house had been spooky-dark when we arrived at night, but now in the daylight I saw that it was a fine old villa on a hilltop of Rome, with tall doors and high vaulted ceilings, and when you flung the shutters open you could see beyond the bustling streets and buildings to the surrounding hills with their tall, imposing poplars standing like cool green sentinels.

  Jeremy had slept late, too. I met him on the wide, curving staircase. “Don’t act like a lawyer,” I warned him. He shot me a weary look as we went inside the cool terracotta-colored sitting room with a marble floor that made the sunlight undulate as if it were reflected on water.

  Aunt Sheila looked wary as we entered. She was seated on a dark blue sofa, and she wore a trim, green and white A-line sleeveless dress that ended above the knee, with white stockings and white flat shoes with a bow on them. And with those frosty blonde bangs and dark eyeliner, she seemed like an elegantly coiffed model from the early 1960s.

  “Jeremy darling,” she murmured, offering him her cheek to kiss as he dutifully bent toward her. She appeared to wish that she could get this over with as fast as possible. But she gave me an especially bright smile.

  “Hallo, Penny,” she said. “Would you two care for a drink?”

  “What are you having?” Jeremy asked.

  “Gin and T, dear,” she said.

  “Same,” he said. “Penny?”

  “Sure,” I said, on the verge of adding what the hell. I had no idea what, exactly, was going on here, but they both seemed suspiciously chummy and civilized all of a sudden, which made me dread that a whacking big storm was brewing underneath.

  “Harold’s been keeping me up on what you two have been doing,” she said quickly. “He seems to think it’s all going to turn out okay for you both?” Her sentence turned into a question at the very end.

  “Hope so,” Jeremy said.

  “Fingers crossed, then,” she said.

  Key-hrist, I thought to myself. Right now there was immense screaming and yelling and threatening going on back in France, because Jeremy had phoned Harold, who got Severine to alert the police, and the police had traced the license number and caught one of Rollo’s thugs—the one who’d gone to Monte Carlo with him, who was wanted for other crimes and therefore was spilling the beans on what Rollo had hired him to do—namely, steal the painting and hire a guy to make a fake replica of it that would turn up on the estate again so we’d all assume that Aunt Penelope had owned only the copy in the first place. My parents had been alerted, and were going to let me know when they could get a flight to London.Yet here we were, Jeremy and I, having drinks with Aunt Sheila, because Jeremy refused to leave Rome until he got some answers to some rather more personal questions.

  Jeremy cleared his throat, and his mother flinched slightly in apprehension. He saw this, and his gaze softened.

  “Mum,” he said with amazing gentleness, “Penny came across a fellow who used to perform with Aunt Pen, and he told us a few things about her that we want to check with you.”

  “Oh?” Aunt Sheila said with a falsely casual lilt to her voice as she reached toward the tray a maid had brought in and set on a low table. The maid vanished quietly, and Aunt Sheila handed each of us our drinks. She took a few sips of her own as she sat back on the sofa.

  “Yes . . .” Jeremy began, then hesitated. “A man, name of Simon Thorne.” Nobody could miss the flicker of recognition in her eyes, but she was silent. “Mum, was it true that Aunt Pen asked you to marry Da—I mean—” He suddenly looked agonized.

  “Uncle Peter,” I supplied quickly.

  Aunt Sheila set her drink carefully on a cocktail napkin. “Well,” she said slowly and controlledly,“I suppose it’s true, though at the time I didn’t quite understand it that way.”

  She paused, as if hoping this would be enough and she would not be forced to elaborate. Jeremy was motionless, however, with his eyes trained on her like a hunting dog who’s spotted a duck and won’t move until you deal with it. She gulped.

  “You see, I met Penelope when I was working in a little theatrical agency as a secretary,” she went on.“It was a nice mix of the old troupers like Simon, and the up-and-coming kids. I got to see all the new acts, and a lot of them were musical groups. Anyway, Penelope used to have parties and invite all the people from the agency that she knew from her cabaret days, and that’s how I got to know her.And she seemed to take quite an interest in me, I thought because she sympathized with women who were defying convention, not marrying.”

  “Did Aunt Pen introduce you to Peter Laidley?” Jeremy pushed. She looked from him to me, as if imploring me, as a woman, to understand.

  “Yes. She was sort of matchmaking, I thought,” Aunt Sheila said, “at a time when I was feeling all alone in the world. Tony had died, and I was miserable, and I was still on the outs with my family—”

  “Why?” Jeremy interrupted ruthlessly. Aunt Sheila leaned forward.

  “Well, darling, because of you,” she said, with a glint in her eye.

  “Because your mother wouldn’t get rid of you, you dope,” I said. I turned to her.“Right?” I added. She nodded.“Did Uncle Peter know that Aunt Penelope was trying to throw you two together?” I asked.

  “Not at first,” she said, keeping her eyes on me but obviously very conscious of Jeremy’s attentiveness.“Penelope encouraged him to notice me, and she said nice things about me; so did your grandmother Beryl. Peter saw that his auntie and his mum approved of me. I don’t think he knew that I had a baby. So when I saw that he was serious, I told him. And introduced him to you, Jeremy. Peter liked you straight away. Said you were bright as a button.”

  Jeremy’s face had that look I’d come to know well enough by now, indicating that he was trying not to be emotional, or susceptible to his mother’s charm. But it was still briefly, touchingly obvious that it meant a great deal to him to hear that Uncle Peter had wanted him. I pictured Jeremy as a baby, after his real father had died, being presented to Mom’s brother. In those days an unwed mother with a child was a much bigger deal, and the fact that Uncle Peter accepted Jeremy made Mom’s brother seem like a more open-minded, bighearted guy.

  “Peter proposed to me that next Christmas,” Aunt Sheila said, looking at me for understanding again. “I told him I didn’t know if I could do it. Be a wife, I mean, in the conventional sense. I wanted to, because he was so good and kind and we were cozy together. But there were moments of panic when I thought of Tony and I—I—didn’t want this to be the beginning of forgetting about him.” She looked at Jeremy now. “When people die,” she said softly, “it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re ready to give them up.”

  “Then—what made you decide to marry Peter?” Jeremy asked.

  “Penelope invited me to tea and she talked very woman-to-woman and made me cry and confess
why I wasn’t sure about marrying,” Aunt Sheila said. “She said she understood, about mourning for a soldier, because she’d been in love with a man who was killed in World War II. She said I mustn’t let my grief for Tony overshadow the care of his son. She told me how hard it was for a mother and child alone, especially in show business, and that I’d need to give my son some stability in a world that was so uncertain.”

  She turned to me and explained, “I rather thought that in her own way, Penelope was offering me a chance to do good. Nobody ever quite put it to me that way before. It is really quite irresistible to young people.That’s why they go marching off to war. I wanted to do something right and good with my life, something that Tony would want me to do, so that I would survive, and his son would survive.”

  “So you married Peter for me—is that what you’re saying?” Jeremy said sternly, in that reproving way that men revert to so easily. She looked back at him, steadily and evenly.

  “Not entirely,” she said. “I did tell you that I was fond of Peter, happy with him, not as I was with Tony—your father—but in a way no less valuable. I wasn’t so afraid of the world when Peter was by my side.” She returned to her drink.

  I looked at Jeremy. “Well?” I said. “Are you satisfied, you big ape? There are lots worse ways to grow up than being loved and cared for by everybody in sight.”

  Jeremy looked startled. “Why do you always turn on me where Mum is concerned?” he said.“I go along thinking you’re ‘for’ me, and then bang! there you go.” Aunt Sheila studied him, then broke into a giggle.

  “Jeremy, stop it. She doesn’t know that you’re teasing her,” she said.

  “Oh, I’m used to taking his abuse,” I said theatrically.

  “Mum,” Jeremy asked cautiously, “how much do you know about my real dad’s family?”

  Aunt Sheila said, “Quite a bit, actually. Tony’s mother’s name was Rose, and his father’s name was Domenico. They met in America; both left Italy because of World War II. Domenico’s father, Giulio, was killed in that war, actually.”

  I could barely contain myself. “And did Aunt Penelope ever tell you the name of the man that she loved, who died in World War II?” I asked. Aunt Sheila shook her head.

  “No, I don’t believe so,” she said. “Why?”

  “It just so happens that Aunt Penelope’s lover was also named Giulio,” I said, fairly bouncing on my chair cushion with excitement as I hauled out my diagram of the family tree and slapped it down on the table. Aunt Sheila looked mystified.

  “What’s this chart?” Jeremy said, glancing first at it, then at me. “Crib notes? On our family? Good God. Detective Penny Nichols strikes again.”

  “Yeah, right,” I said defiantly. “And don’t think it was easy, either. Just when I thought I had you people all figured out, new secrets came popping up.” They both peered at it.

  I pointed to the trail down the middle, leading from Aunt Penelope’s lover, Giulio, to Aunt Sheila’s lover, Anthony, and in the end, to Jeremy. At the center of it all was Domenico, whom I saw as the key to all this.

  “Aunt Penelope’s lover, Giulio, had a son, Domenico, who got stranded in Italy when Giulio died in the war,” I said.“Aunt Penelope managed to get Domenico to London. But his American mother took him back to the States. That’s why Domenico grew up there, and he had a son named Anthony.That’s your Tony, Aunt Sheila,” I said.

  “Tony,” Aunt Sheila repeated, turning so pale that for a moment I thought she was going to faint. “Oh, God,” she said. “Oh, my God.” She caught her breath and glanced away.

  I turned to Jeremy. “And Jeremy, that little boy Domenico who went to America is actually your grandfather.” Jeremy had a stony look on his face, and at first I wasn’t sure he’d heard me, but then he frowned and I knew he had. I realized that, while all this was a fascinating jigsaw puzzle to me, for Jeremy it was his whole identity, up in the air.

  I turned to Aunt Sheila and said encouragingly, “Aunt Penelope was keeping tabs on Domenico because he was Giulio’s son.And when she heard that Domenico’s son,Tony, died after serving in Vietnam, she wanted to help you, Aunt Sheila—so, by putting you together with her nephew—Uncle Peter—she found a way to take you and Jeremy under the protective wing of her own family. My family.”

  Aunt Sheila, still stunned, had fallen silent, listening closely. She looked as if she were going over her whole past in her mind. “Well,” she said softly, “that explains quite a lot.”

  Cautiously I asked,“What became of Domenico? That is, Jeremy’s grandfather?”

  Aunt Sheila, still trying to absorb it all, glanced up as if in a dream, and said, “Domenico? Why, he lives in Italy now.”

  “See that, Jeremy?” I said triumphantly. “Your grandfather is still alive! Where does he live?” I asked in excitement.

  Aunt Sheila answered, “In a little town not far from here, actually. Tony and I used to look in on him occasionally. I still do, whenever I come here.”

  We both stared at her in amazement.“You do what?” Jeremy asked in a choked voice.

  Before he could roar at her I said hurriedly, “Do you have an address for him?”

  “Of course, darling,”Aunt Sheila said.“I can call ahead and let him know you’re coming. If you want to, of course.”

  Chapter Thirty-four

  “JESUS,” JEREMY SAID. “DID YOU HAVE TO OPEN YOUR MOUTH AND ask for the address? I have no memory of this Tony bloke, even if he is my real father. So why on earth would I want to meet his father? I don’t know these people. I have absolutely no desire to do this, damn it.”

  “ ’Cause like it or not, the old guy is your gramps,” I said.We were sitting in his car outside Aunt Sheila’s rented villa, and Jeremy looked as if he’d suddenly forgotten how to drive.

  “What is it about women that they always want to control a man’s life?” he fumed.“First Aunt Pen, thinking she could play God, matchmaking and all. Then Mum, keeping her little secrets and then heypresto, she arranges for me to meet my so-called grandfather, just like that. And you, going right along with it.”

  “And isn’t it funny,” I said, “that out of all those women, I’m the only one you’re hollering at? You certainly never would have hollered at Aunt Penelope, and you were very well-behaved with your mother, but with me you just explode like Vesuvius.”

  “I suppose that’s a slur on my Italian ancestry now,” he said darkly. “And I’m not hollering. I do not holler. I merely raised my voice to impress upon you—”

  “Come on,” I said coaxingly. “I’ll go with you.”

  “That’s just what I’m afraid of,” he said. “With you by my side, I know I’m guaranteed to get into more tight spots. Car chases. Casinos and international art theft.What’s next?”

  “Your mother told me more stuff while you were bringing the car around,” I said eagerly as he started the car and descended the drive.Within minutes we were bumping along the narrow side streets of Rome. “And you’d better listen,” I continued, “because it’s about Domenico’s American mother.You know, the lady who snatched him back from Aunt Penelope—well, she was from an old Boston Brahmin family, and her name was Lucy. She died of tuberculosis not long after she brought Domenico to Boston. Once she was gone, the Boston relatives were rotten to Domenico and treated him like a servant, which is why he ran away to New York. Where he married an Italian-American girl, Rose—your grandmother—and together they ran a little grocery store. And they raised Tony—your father—as an American kid, and he went to university in New York. After Tony graduated, his parents moved back to Italy, but Tony came to London, to be part of the rock-and-roll scene. He had a band, Jeremy, just like you. And Tony—your father, kept in touch with his parents right up until . . .”

  “He died,” Jeremy supplied.

  “Right. Rose—your grandmother—died here in Italy in the early eighties,” I said. “Your grandfather Domenico still lives with her relatives. He’s probably in his mid-seventies now.�
�� I paused. “He’s known that you existed, but he and Rose didn’t want to interfere while Uncle Peter was alive. He’d like to see you.You don’t have to go and see him, but personally I think you’ll be sorry about it your whole life if you don’t.”

  “For Christ’s sake, Penny,” Jeremy said with a sudden burst of desperation. “Will you just shut up for two minutes so I can hear myself think? Just when I imagine I’ve heard it all, you come up with more. You haven’t stopped chattering since we crossed the border!”

  Now that was unfair, even if it was true, which it wasn’t, not really. At least, I didn’t think so. Even though Aunt Sheila had given us beds to sleep in and bathrooms to wash in and some food, I still felt punchy, sleep-deprived, and high on adrenaline from chasing Rollo across the freaking border and finding out that we’d got hold of a possible Leonardo worth gazillions. I mean, Jeremy could have cut me some slack. But no, there he was, using THAT TONE with me again, a scant day or so after kissing me. I don’t see how a man can kiss a woman like that, then turn around and use tones of pure sarcasm bordering on contempt.

  We’d just come to a lurching halt at a traffic light. So I did what any self-respecting, slightly punchy woman would have done under the circumstances to salvage her wounded dignity. I said, “Fine!” and opened the car door, stepped out, slammed the door behind me, went plunging off into the city, walking as rapidly away from him as possible—and I promptly got lost.

  Look, it’s easy to do in Italy. Go down one cobbled street, turn a corner, cross a piazza, and there you are. Lost. Suddenly you can’t remember which end is up and which way is south and where the hell you were when you started. That’s what I did, and I really didn’t mean to, but he annoyed me so much that I wasn’t looking at street signs. The city was waking up from its post-lunch slumber, so the shops were flinging open their doors, the cars were suddenly zooming around and honking their horns, and I was thoroughly exhausted and utterly disoriented, not knowing where to turn first.