2008 - Recipes for Cherubs

by Babs Horton

  “We must keep calm and try to be logical. If Piero knew the truth, he would have done more than just paint a picture that made fools of us all.”

  Signor Bisotti sat down abruptly on the side of the fountain. Nausea rose in the pit of his stomach as he thought back to that awful moment in the church when the cloth had been removed and the painting revealed.

  Sweet Saviour, he’d been expecting to see a masterpiece and instead there was a painting of himself and Father Rimaldi naked as the day they were born. There were devil horns growing from their heads and long tails protruding from their naked behinds. Signora Bisotti had been painted, too, and her daughters: the three of them staring down from the church, three revolting gargoyles with gaping mouths and bulging red-veined eyes, a shower of golden coins spewing from each of their mouths like vomit.

  Signor Bisotti put his head in his hands. Signora Bisotti would never forgive him for this public humiliation. She had stormed off to the Villa Rosso and shut herself in the bedroom. He himself had stood in horrified silence as the church emptied around him. He could still hear the laughter of the peasants echoing in his ears, the visiting priests hurrying away, twittering like scandalised sparrows.

  “I won’t rest until he’s found and punished – until they’re all found and punished,” he said, getting to his feet. “I’ll have men sent to Napoli to look for them; you can bet that’s where the four of them would have headed.”

  “The five of them,” Father Rimaldi said grimly, and he nudged Signor Bisotti in the ribs. Bisotti, realising what he meant, spat on the cobbles and stormed off towards the Villa Rosso, hell-bent on swift revenge.

  71

  When Kizzy had gone Aunt Ella suggested a walk up to Shrimp’s, but Catrin refused. She was restless and wanted to be on her own to think about her mother’s parting words. Which girl could she have been talking about? It was infuriating, and she wouldn’t be able to speak to Kizzy for weeks now to find out what she’d meant.

  She watched Aunt Ella walk off towards the library with Dan and raised her eyebrows. Grown-ups could be dead funny. One minute they hated someone, the next they were best friends. Ella was forever popping over to Meredith’s shop, the Café Romana or the library, which was really odd because she’d avoided Dan and Meredith until Kizzy came back.

  Catrin headed towards the beach, but no sooner had she sat down when Meredith came whistling along and plonked himself down next to her. She talked politely for a while and then, frustrated at not being left alone, got up and went back to the castle, where she collected Recipes for Cherubs from her room.

  Then, checking no one was watching her, she went into the graveyard and sat down in a shady spot; she ought to get some peace in there.

  She was distracted, though, by Norma, who was standing in the upstairs window of the Café Romana, looking over at the graveyard. Well, not really looking, because she was blind, but it still made Catrin feel as if she was being spied on.

  When Nonna moved away from the window, Catrin heaved a sigh of enormous relief and turned her attention back to the book.

  Bugger. There was Dan coming in through the gate, beaming at her. He sat down next to her and started making small-talk.

  She gave up, closed the book, and sat talking about this and that until eventually Ella called her in for tea.

  72

  Maria Paparella was worried. She was fretting over leaving Istnelda behind, despite Piero’s promise that, although they had to get away from Italy, he would come back for Ismelda. She was anxious because for the past few weeks she’d been having bad dreams and there was something niggling at the back of her mind, something she knew was of great significance.

  She sat at the window in the inn in Napoli, waiting for Piero to return. He’d gone to see an old friend who’d agreed to store his canvases until he could send for them. When darkness fell, they would take them to the friend’s house, but they must be careful because Luca had seen Father Rimaldi and Signor Bisotti down at the docks, asking questions.

  She left her seat and walked across to where the paintings were stacked against the wall. Carefully she peeled back the oilcloth and looked at the top one.

  “Mother of God!” she shrieked, and she sat down heavily, her breath forced, whistling, out of her heaving lungs. She got shakily to her feet and looked again at the painting of the woman, a woman with a lovely face, her lips parted as if about to speak, her hair held off her face by a blue scarf fringed with gold and red.

  At that moment Piero came hurrying up the stairs, banging into the walls and cursing roundly because his sight was worse than ever.

  “We have to move, Maria. I’ve just heard that the Flino is to sail earlier than we thought. We must leave the paintings; my friend has promised to come later and will have them taken to a safe place.”

  “But, Piero, I need to talk to you.”

  “Not now, Maria. Signor Bisotti has people everywhere looking for us. I’ve sent Luca on ahead, but I can’t find that bloody Bindo anywhere.”

  The Flino was ready to sail. The cargo holds had been filled with every type of fruit imaginable, and the air was redolent with the scent of lemons and limes. The captain, Antonio Ravello, was itching to be off because there was talk of the weather turning bad.

  Standing on the deck, Piero di Bardi hung on to Maria Paparella’s arm. “You were going to tell me something earlier?” he asked.

  “It’s just that I’ve been having some strange thoughts, and today I saw something which gave me a great shock.”

  “Tell me now. Distract me and stop me worrying about that bloody Bindo.”

  “Years ago, when I was only a child, I saw something in Santa Rosa which has always bothered me.”

  “Goon.”

  “It was the first night I stayed at the Villa Rosso, the night of the great snowstorm – Signora Bisotti had just given birth to Ismelda. I couldn’t sleep, you see. I was missing my mother and I was afraid. I sat up looking out of the window and I saw Father Rimaldi carrying a baby wrapped in a shawl.”

  “That’s not surprising. Wasn’t that the night when Bindo was found?”

  She nodded. “There was something strange because there were two sets of – ”

  A roar of laughter broke out down on the dock, and Maria and Piero leant over the railing to see what was going on.

  The crowds parted, making way for Bindo, who was pushing a barrow almost as big as he was.

  “What in God’s name has he got there?” Piero demanded.

  Bindo came to a standstill, wiped his sweat-soaked hair from his forehead and called up to them, “I couldn’t fit everything of mine in the cart yesterday so I had a few things sent down from Santa Rosa, keepsakes to remind me of my birthplace.”

  Two hefty sailors hurried down the gangplank, took the handles of the barrow from Bindo – and almost dropped them.

  “Hey, little fellow, what the hell have you got in here that weighs so much?”

  Bindo lifted back the cloth and Piero and Maria burst into peals of laughter. There lay one of the cherubs from the fountain in Santa Rosa.

  “I couldn’t leave that little fellow behind. Piero will want to remember his brother, and I’m sure we’ll find a home for it somewhere.”

  Maria looked at him, thunderstruck. “He’s only gone and stolen the little saint, the Stella Maris from outside the convent,” she screeched in disbelief.

  “One must have something from home to remind one of one’s past. That little saint has guarded me since the night I was abandoned in the olive jar,” Bindo said.

  “He’s brought that mangy old cat as well!” Piero yelled. Sure enough, Pipi was fast asleep, snoring contentedly, between the tiny saint and the smiling cherub.

  “Well, this lot will probably sink the bloody ship,” Maria said. “Hurry up, Bindo. If you get left behind and Signor Bisotti gets his hands on you, he’ll have your gizzards for ornaments.”

  “Come, Maria, you must finish your story or it will never get t
old,” Piero said softly, taking Maria’s hand and kissing it.

  “Like I said, there were two sets of footprints in the snow.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “That Father Rimaldi went over to the Villa Rosso and then back across the piazza. Do you see?”

  Piero wrinkled his forehead. “You’ve lost me, I’m afraid.”

  “Think. If he’d just come out of his house and found Bindo, he’d have walked straight to the convent and would have had no need to cross the piazza.”

  “I don’t see what you’re getting at.”

  “One thing has always puzzled me. The first time I saw Ismelda there was something wrong. She was too big for a newborn baby. I didn’t really see that then, because I was just a child, but I’ve seen enough newborn babies since to know I was right.”

  “And yet she was newborn?”

  “So it was said.”

  “What are you implying, Maria?”

  “That Signora Bisotti had given birth to a child who was deformed, a child Signor Bisotti could not bear to look at.”

  “And?”

  “I think that it was Ismelda who was abandoned and that the babies were swapped.”

  Piero looked at her in wonder. “So Bindo is Bisotti’s son?”

  “Well, there was always talk about Signora Bisotti and the woodcarver, but who knows?”

  “You never thought of telling him?”

  “Would you want to find out that Bisotti was your father?”

  “Best keep it to yourself, then,” Piero said.

  “The other thing is, Piero, the woman in the painting of Woman and Child was wearing a very beautiful scarf.”

  He smiled then, and said, “I had it made for her in Rome; it was made especially to my own design by an old woman, a weaver of great talents.”

  Maria put her hand under her cloak and pulled out the scarf. “Is this the one?”

  Piero looked down at it and his eyes widened in incredulity. “Where did you get this?”

  “I found it the morning after the snowstorm. It was wrapped round the neck of one of the cherubs. I couldn’t believe my luck, finding such a beautiful thing. I’ve kept it ever since, locked away as a treasure.”

  “She was in Santa Rosa that night. She came looking for me,” Piero said. “She was carrying my child.”

  “Hey, there, wait for me!” It was a frantic shout, and Luca came running towards the Flino, pushing through the crowds. He leapt from the quay on to the moving gangplank, and clambered up on to the deck.

  “Where have you been?” Bindo asked.

  “I met a nun from Santa Lucia – she’d come down here looking for us,” he panted, barely able to get his words out.

  “What’s happened?”

  “She had news for us from the Convent of Santa Lucia.”

  “What kind of news?”

  “Bad news. It’s Ismelda,” he wailed. “She’s dead.”

  As the boisterous crowds on the dockside waved to the departing Flino the four of them stood, heads bowed, the wind whisking the tears from their eyes and blowing their hair about their anguished faces.

  The ship moved slowly away into the choppy waters and the blue sky above turned slowly from cerulean to indigo and finally lampblack. It was the last time they would see the sky above Italy, the last time that Piero would ever see the sky.

  73

  It was dark when Catrin made her way across to the chapel. She needed some peace; wherever she’d been today there had been someone on her tail. She slipped quietly inside, lit the candles on the stand in the lady chapel and sat down near the altar, glad of the space to think.

  She’d been impatient for Kizzy to leave this morning, couldn’t wait to see the back of her, and Kizzy had duly gone, heading off for the bright lights or the luxury villa as she always did. And yet in those few moments when she’d handed her the walnut etui, Catrin had felt close to her for the first time ever, as if Kizzy had been trying to apologise in her own way for being a rubbish mother.

  She thought she heard a movement in the chapel. It was probably only a mouse scuttling about. She closed her eyes and clasped her hands. Her head was still reeling from the bombshell that Tony had dropped the other night. Before Kizzy came back, she’d been playing the scene over and over in her head. Kizzy would tell her the truth, and Catrin would scream and shout and have a fit of hysterics. It hadn’t been anything like that, though. She’d been delighted to hear that he was her father. She was shocked – after all, her mother had done S.E.X. with Tony and then she’d been born. But it was a better shock than she’d thought she was going to get. She couldn’t think of anyone better to have as a father. And yet…she didn’t quite believe that it was true. Still, who cared? A pretend father like Tony was better than any real one she could imagine.

  She stayed quite still, the coolness of the chapel soothing her as it always did. She needed to get her thoughts into some kind of order. Aunt Ella had been fussing over her all the time recently, checking on where she was going and what time she would be back, and that wasn’t like her at all. Dan and Meredith had been just as bad, popping up wherever she went.

  She breathed deeply. The smells of incense and candle-wax filled her nostrils, along with the smell of wild flowers and rosemary. Rosemary for remembrance. As she opened her eyes, a sliver of moonlight slipped through the arched window above the main altar and danced across the walls of the chapel, playing around the feet of the tiny saint in the lady chapel.

  The dandelions in the jamjar glowed like miniature suns, sending out rays of golden light, and the candles grew brighter. She got slowly to her feet and walked up to the altar, picked up a dandelion and held it to her face. Then for some inexplicable reason she lifted the altar cloth, and crawled underneath the altar.

  She ran her hands across the smooth flagstones until she found something. She sat back on her heels and looked at the floor and then slowly she made the sign of the cross. She crawled out and fetched a candle from the stand by the altar. As the candle cast its glow around her it illuminated two memorial tablets laid side by side in the floor.

  Bindo

  Born 1751, died of cholera in Kilvenny, 1771

  Ismelda Grieve

  Beloved wife of Nathaniel Grieve, mother of Charles

  Born 1751, died 1819

  Ismelda hadn’t died in the convent! She had made it here to Kilvenny and married Nathaniel Grieve. That meant that Ismelda was one of Catrin’s ancestors, her own flesh and blood.

  As she knelt there, head bowed, gazing at the final resting place of Bindo and Ismelda, she heard the chapel door open and close quietly, and the key turn in the lock.

  She got out from under the altar and looked around, but there was no one there. She inched towards the door, heart thumping, ears straining for any sound. Then she saw him.

  Father Rimaldi was standing in the shadows at the back of the church, his hooked nose protruding from beneath his wide-brimmed hat. She opened her mouth to scream but he put his hand up as if to silence her. Then he walked slowly towards her, a cruel smile spreading across his pale face.

  “So good to see you, Catrin, it’s been too long,” he said, thrusting his hand towards her. She put her hands behind her back. It was a conjuring trick of some sort. The dead couldn’t come back to life – that was impossible.

  Then a slow realisation crept over her. She was looking at a man she knew, but she hadn’t recognised him at first because he’d shaved off his beard and beneath it his skin was an unearthly pallor.

  Arthur Campbell smiled that familiar superior smile of his, which always made her heart twist into a knot.

  “I see you’ve found the family skeletons,” he said, gesturing at the memorial tablets.

  “Ismelda Bisotti and Bindo,” she said quietly.

  “My, my, your cleverness astounds me, Catrin, and to think I’d given up hope on your academic intelligence.”

  Catrin stayed silent.

  “A little research
led me to find out all about those two,” he said.

  “And what did you find out?”

  “That the two lovebirds married and had a child, but poor Bindo was carried off in the cholera epidemic.”

  “I know that, it says so on his grave.”

  “What you don’t know is that Nathaniel Grieve, who was childless, married Ismelda. It was a marriage in name only, by all accounts – he was very foiward-minking, apparently, and let her live her own life – but the child, Charles, took his name, the Grieve name.”

  “So I’m not really a Grieve.”

  “Quite right. I expect Nathaniel was afraid the family name would die out and he saw a solution to his problems. So you’re related to both Bindo and Ismelda, which is why I was so interested in you when you were a child.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I sent you to art lessons, if you remember – expensive ones, I might add – hoping that the genes would out in the end. I wondered, you see, if I had a budding Piero as a godchild, but I was disappointed on that score.”

  “What has Piero got to do with me?”

  Campbell laughed. “More research, my dear, my own family research, in this case. I had access to the journals of one of my own ancestors, and in them was a deathbed confession which made very interesting reading.”

  Catrin barely heard him. All she could think about was that she was related to Ismelda and Bindo.

  Campbell continued, “A certain Gregorio Rimaldi, onetime priest of Santa Rosa in Italy, admitted that he had committed a dastardly deed and swapped two babies.”

  “Bindo,” Catrin said. “Bindo was left in the olive jar.”

  “Bindo was of no interest to me, but Ismelda Bisotti was, because she was the daughter of Piero di Bardi.”

  Catrin breathed deeply, trying to clear the lightheadedness threatening to overwhelm her. That explained the paintings she’d found in Aunt Alice’s dowry box. They had a resemblance to Piero’s, but the hand that had painted them was less steady, the colour not as intense, though they were very good.