by Babs Horton
Meredith Evans was deep in thought as he made his way along Goose Row. As he passed the war memorial he looked up from his reverie and saw Catrin Grieve sitting on the step outside the Café Romana. He was taken aback when she smiled at him and said, “Hallo, Mr Evans.”
“Afternoon,” he said, doffing his cap to her.
“I’m glad you came along.”
“You are?” he said, surprised.
“I’ve just been up to Shrimp’s and I think there’s someone up there who shouldn’t be,” she said, getting to her feet.
Meredith put his finger to his lips to silence her. “Did you see who it was?” he asked in a throaty whisper.
“No, but I heard them upstairs poking around about ten minutes ago.”
“Thank you, girl. You won’t mention this to anyone, mind?” he said urgently.
She shook her head, smiled angelically, and watched him hurtle off towards the beach.
The door to Meredith’s shop was stiff, and the glass rattled ominously as she closed it behind her. It was dark inside and she was too afraid to turn the light on in case anyone passing down Cockle Lane saw her.
She stumbled around, looking up at the sepia photographs of Kilvenny folk that stared down accusingly from the walls. There was a large photograph of Aunt Alice, and one of Aunt Ella and some other people outside Shrimp’s Hotel. She looked impatiently round the room but there was nothing of much interest. Conscious of time passing, and scared of being caught by Meredith, she crept into the back parlour.
It stank of whisky and stale tobacco and made her stomach lurch dangerously. There were more photographs of Alice; Alice sitting outside the Fisherman’s Snug, holding a shrimping net; Alice standing next to the cherub in the fountain, copying his pose; Alice on the beach, posing in a bathing costume…She looked like a film star except for that vacant look about her eyes. Meredith must have been very much in love with her to keep these photos for so long after she had died.
Catrin moved quickly into a small kitchen at the back of the house, where dirty plates were stacked up on the draining board, reminding her of a photograph she’d seen of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. A rubbish bin spewed out potato peelings and empty tins, and flies tap-danced in sticky spillages on the floor.
It was nearly as dirty as Shrimp’s.
She retraced her steps to the parlour, and looked nervously up the narrow staircase. If she went up there and Meredith came back she’d be trapped, but she was here now and she might not get another chance. She put her foot on the creaking stairs and went slowly upwards, ears cocked for the slightest sound.
There was nothing of interest in the bedroom or the spare room, so she made her way silently down the stairs and through the parlour. She had just set foot in the shop when she heard the door creak open. She ducked down behind the counter, crouching fearfully in the darkness. She edged further underneath the counter between an ancient camera and a pile of mouldy newspapers.
She listened; no sound now except the ticking of a clock in the parlour. She peered round the side of the counter; the shop was empty. It must have been just the breeze rattling the door. She’d wait a while and then make her escape.
She was about to crawl out from under the counter when she heard the soft pad of footsteps as someone tiptoed furtively through the shop. Silence again, and then the sound of chesty breathing. She stayed crouched and petrified, her bladder filling up like a balloon about to burst. Any minute now she’d be discovered and then anything might happen.
She sniffed, wrinkled up her nose in disgust. There was a horrible smell, a mixture of fish and stale wee.
And then she sneezed.
The silence was unbearable, the air full of pins. She squeezed her eyes shut and bit her lips to stop herself screaming.
Something nudged her behind the knees and she toppled forward on to her face, scattering the pile of newspapers.
She wriggled round and came face to face with Dan Gwartney’s fat white cat. Pedro, the Italian lady-killer. The cat studied her with curious green eyes. She looked back, drawn in by the hypnotic stare.
As she tried to put the newspapers back as they had been, she noticed a small, battered wooden box.
She looked from the cat to the box. And back at the cat.
The cat made no attempt to move, and she wasn’t sure afterwards how long they’d stayed locked in a gaze, but the spell was broken when a clock in the parlour tinked the hour and she blinked, shook herself. She snatched up the box, stuffed it inside her cardigan, edged past the cat and out through the gloomy shop, past ancient camera stands and an antique brass birdie on a dusty shelf.
47
The winds grew cooler as they blew up the valley, rattling the tiles on the church and snatching the water from the mouths of the cherubs in the piazza. The first shrivelled leaves began to fall and blow along the Via Dante, and the shutters on the houses rattled like old bones.
In the convent stable Bindo lay curled up in the straw, listening to the night sounds. A bird croaked up in the rafters and mice scurried across the dusty floor. Soon the church bell would clatter out midnight and startle the sleeping pigeons into flight.
He got up and went outside, stooping to wash his face in the water trough. He saw his reflection looking back at him, and over his head, the huge moon drifting above the roof of the church. He crept silently out of the convent gates, stood in front of the statue in her niche and crossed himself.
“Life’s turning out good for me,” he said to the tiny saint. “You’ve looked after me well”
Then he made his way over to the Villa Rosso. He stood for a moment, looking around warily. Usually at this hour Santa Rosa was quiet as the grave, but he was sure tonight that not all the inhabitants were asleep.
He got a foothold on the garden wall and began to climb. When he reached the top he paused to regain his breath, then dropped soundlessly down into the darkness of the garden.
Pipi the cat emerged from the bushes and rubbed playfully against his legs. What a change in that creature since Bindo had relieved him of his teeth. Not that they’d been of any use, because the bloody things were rotten and only attached to his gums by threads. Piero di Bardi wouldn’t want to buy them for burnishing. The poor cat must have been in agony with a mouthful of festering teeth.
He rubbed the cat’s head affectionately and then tiptoed across the garden to the villa. He slipped in through the larder window and crossed the hallway to Ismelda’s room. He listened. He could hear Signor Bisotti snoring loudly upstairs. He drew back the bolts soundlessly and pushed open the door.
Ismelda was awake and waiting for him.
The moonlight was soft, outlining the houses round the piazza in a silvery sheen. Bindo and Ismelda crossed to the fountain and sat down on the wall looking up at the cherubs.
“That one is my favourite,” Ismelda whispered, “the one with the lopsided smile.”
“Mine, too,” Bindo said, reaching out for her cold hand. “They say that that one is modelled on Piero’s brother, who died when he was little,” he said softly.
“I’ve seen him through the window, and he always stops to touch its face.”
“Are you enjoying yourself!”
“Oh, Bindo, you can’t imagine how wonderful it is to be outside those walls. The Villa Rosso feels like a prison to me.”
“We must not be out long tonight.”
“Why?” she asked, disappointment in her voice.
“I have a feeling in my water that things are not quite right in Santa Rosa.”
“How do you mean?”
“There’s a kind of restlessness about the place tonight. Come on, let’s go.”
They slipped into the darkness of the Via Dante, scaring a black cat which ran past them with a nervous wail. In one of the houses an old man coughed and groaned in his sleep.
A light shone from Piero di Bardi’s house, and they crept stealthily up to the window. Bindo put his finger to his lips to warn her to be quiet.
Piero was hard at work on the far side of the room, his face half in shadow.
He finished mixing some paint, put his brush to the canvas and began to work like a man possessed. Ismelda was captivated by the way the muscles tightened in Piero’s slender hands, the sudden tension in his neck, the way he tilted his head to one side and then stood back to scrutinise his work.
Suddenly, as if aware of being watched, he turned round and they ducked down out of sight. When they looked again, the room was empty.
“See what he is painting!” Bindo said excitedly.
Ismelda looked at it in awe.
Sunlight filtered through the leaves of a pomegranate tree, dappling the faces of the four people sitting on the grass. She herself was there, looking longingly at Bindo, her blue eyes lit with a curious light. And there was Bindo, his skin as soft as milk, his green eyes watching her…
Luca was leaning back against the tree, a satisfied smile on his lips, and Maria sat cross-legged on the grass, showing her plump and dimpled knees.
Ismelda turned to look at Bindo, her eyes wide in the darkness. “Look,” she whispered, “he’s given us all wings.”
“Luca says he calls the painting Feasting Cherubs,” Bindo said.
“I thought he was supposed to be using the Zanelli twins as his models for the cherubs,” Ismelda said.
Bindo shrugged.
“How I wish we had real wings, Bindo, so that we could fly away from here.”
“Where would we go?” he asked.
“Somewhere far away where we could be free, if there is such a place.”
“I will find this place one day and I will take you there,” Bindo said.
“When Papa marries the widow Zanelli, life will be so terrible.”
“Have you met her yet?”
“No. She is coming to the house tomorrow with Father Rimaldi to discuss the wedding.”
Bindo sighed. “I’d better keep out of the way, then. I thought that we were going to make brutti ma buoni tomorrow.”
Ismelda smiled and patted his hand. “Here.” She took a cloth from her pocket and opened it. “I brought you some Maria and I made specially for you this afternoon, after Papa told us the widow was coming to dinner tomorrow.”
He took a biscuit from her, and ate it enthusiastically. “Am I ugly but good, Ismelda?”
“You will never be ugly to me. I think you are beautiful.”
“You do?” he asked.
She nodded and grinned.
“Tomorrow I will light a candle for you in the church and pray that you will be saved from the widow Zanelli,” Bindo said.
“Maria is going to make strangolapreti.”
“Is she?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s hope it lives up to its reputation, then! When will I be able to come to the Villa Rosso again?” he said through a mouthful of biscuit.
“I don’t know. When it’s safe I’ll let Luca know and he will tell you.”
Just then, Piero came back into the room and they ducked down beneath the windowsill.
“Come,” said Bindo. “I need to get you back.”
They walked along the Via Dante and paused when they reached the piazza. There was a candle burning behind the shutters of an upstairs room in the widow Zanelli’s house, the flickering light escaping through the cracks in the splintered wood.
“She’s up late tonight,” Bindo said.
“What if Papa is there with her?”
“We must be quick. Come.”
As they scuttled across the piazza, the door of the widow’s house opened. Bindo grabbed Ismelda’s arm and pulled her down so that they were hidden behind the fountain.
She was so afraid that she pulled the skirt of her dress up over her head.
Bindo strained his ears.
“Goodnight, Alfonso.”
“Goodnight, my darling. I’m going to miss these nights with you.”
“It won’t be for too long. I have great plans for us.”
“You won’t forget me?”
“Don’t be so foolish. I am determined to encourage the old fool to sell up here as soon as possible, move to Napoli and make an even bigger fortune.”
“Signor Bisotti’s wealthy enough already, isn’t he?”
“Yes, but I know how to make his money work in his favour.”
“You do?”
“Trust me. In the next few years we will move to America, and when we’re settled I’ll send for you and we can take up where we left off.”
Bindo was horrified to see the widow Zanelli kiss Father Rimaldi for what seemed like a very long time. Then he heard something that chilled him to the bone. He looked across at Ismelda and shuddered.
The priest’s footsteps hurried across the piazza and the door closed softly on the widow Zanelli’s house.
Ismelda whispered from under her skirt, “Was it Papa?”
“No, it wasn’t. Whoever it was has gone now. Come, we must get you back quickly.”
His head reeling from what he had seen and heard, Bindo took her hand and, keeping to the shadows, they hurried back towards the Villa Rosso.
“What did they say?” asked Ismelda.
“Didn’t you hear?”
“No. I had my fingers in my ears and my skirt over my head.”
Bindo sighed with relief.
When they were safely back in the garden of the Villa Rosso, he stood looking at Ismelda.
“Here – I have a present for you.” He fished something out of his pocket and put it in her hand. It was a burnished walnut.
Ismelda looked at him enquiringly.
“Look. Lift the catch on the side.”
She fumbled in the darkness and then suddenly the walnut split in half.
“It’s a little painting set for you. See, there are brushes and charcoal and a tiny palette.”
Ismelda’s face broke into the widest smile he’d ever seen. “It’s beautiful. Perfetto.”
“I made it all by myself. Well, with a little bit of help from the woodcarver, who’s a good friend of mine now.”
“You are wonderful and I love you.”
“You do?”
She took something out of her pocket and handed it to him; it was a silver ring and engraved on it were the words Tutto e possibile.
“This is for me?” he said in disbelief.
“It’s for you. It was my mother’s. It will bring you good luck,” she said, bending down and kissing him on both cheeks.
In the bushes they could hear Pipi purring contentedly. Somewhere close by, an owl called, long and low.
When Ismelda was safely in her room Bindo stood for some seconds outside her door before sliding the bolts across so that no one would know she had escaped. Then he went back into the garden, climbed the pomegranate tree and, sitting among the moon-silvered branches, looked at the ring on his finger and thought about what the widow Zanelli had said to Father Rimaldi. He was still there when the moon began to wane and the last stars melted away into the lightening sky.
48
It was quiet in the castle, just the faint sound of the wireless from down in the kitchen where Ella was taking an afternoon doze. In her bedroom Catrin put the box down on the bed with trembling hands and stood looking at it for a long time, longing to open it but afraid of disappointment.
She found the key, turned it in the lock and opened the lid. The tantalising smell of camphor drifted out into the room. She lifted up a piece of rotting tissue paper and her heart sank at the sight of a pile of shells and slivers of blue and green glass; Alice’s treasures. She ran her hands through them and her fingers came across something: a small necklace with an orange horn with an eye engraved in the middle, a corno like the one Norma wore to ward off the evil eye.
She held it up to the light and it glowed warmly. Had this belonged to Alice? A silly charm which she thought would keep her safe?
She ran her fingers through the shells again and unearthed a tiny heart-shape
d box, the sort that expensive rings were kept in. She snapped open the lid, and then drew back in dismay. Four yellowing teeth lay inside on the faded velvet. Ugh! Why would Aunt Alice keep anything so disgusting?
She closed the box and grinned. She imagined the look on Arthur Campbell’s face if Alice had handed him the teeth! He would have been mortified if she had presented this old box to him as her dowry. What would he have wanted with a boxful of childish things, fragments of weathered glass, shells and four disgusting teeth? She giggled, thinking of how his mouth turned down at the corners whenever he saw something disagreeable, the way he wiped his hands on his waistcoat if he came into contact with something unpleasant. Whatever it was that he had wanted from Alice, it certainly wouldn’t have been this box of old flotsam and jetsam.
Catrin wandered across to the window and looked out into Cockle Lane.
She could hear Tony singing as he worked over in the Café Romana and outside the Proprietary Library, sitting in a pool of sunlight, was Pedro the cat.
She stared at the cat without really seeing it. Think, Catrin Grieve. Think hard. With a whoop of glee she rushed over to the wardrobe, yanked out her school blazer and felt in the pocket for the card Sister Matilde had given her at Paddington.
At first she’d thought it was a holy picture, then that it was one of Sister Matilde’s little jokes, but looking at it now it was clear that this was the same cat as the one in the picture in Recipes for Cherubs. The only difference was that this one was much bigger, and whoever had painted it wasn’t as good an artist as Piero.
It was a large fat, white cat sitting beneath a pomegranate tree. Its mouth was open as if in a snarl and most of its teeth were missing. She chewed her lips with excitement. Could the teeth in the ring box have belonged to this poor old animal? And what in God’s name was Sister Matilde doing with this picture of the cat?
She knew from Tony that when the Flino went down, a cat had been saved, a ship’s cat. Dan Gwartney had said that Pedro was from a long line of feline Casanovas and that his bloodline would never die out. It was a long shot, but maybe Pedro was descended from the Flino’s cat. Maybe Pedro’s ancestors had spent their days in sunny Santa Rosa, basking beneath the pomegranate tree, or looking down from the branches of a tree on to a snowy piazza.