‘Are you going to write about her?’
Pierangelo shrugs and licks his ice-cream cone as we wander across Piazza della Signoria. The rain didn’t materialize, just a drizzle which has left the paving stones slick and bright. Rising from the middle of his fountain, Neptune glows in the floodlights, and the bronze circle marking the spot where Savonarola burnt is surrounded by tiny puddles that shine like fragments of a broken mirror.
‘We’re thinking about a piece. More on the university, than the girl specifically. Profile of students today, that sort of thing.’
‘She was a student?’ I try to keep my voice nonchalant, as though this doesn’t really interest me, but I can’t help feeling that somehow Pierangelo knows, that he’s magically gotten inside my brain, and even as we walk here he can see me folding last night’s newspaper into my bag and, later, ogling the contents of the manila envelope I keep hidden in my bottom drawer like porn.
‘Yup,’ he says eventually, ‘in her final year at the university. She was pretty well known. Some kind of activist.’
‘And does she have a name?’
Piero knows this is a pet peeve of mine, the fact that the dead, and even the victims of crimes who manage to survive, are usually referred to as objects. In most of the pieces I’ve collected, for instance, Ty is called simply ‘her dead husband’ and I’m usually ‘the woman who was attacked’, as if any other identity we might have had became irrelevant the second Karel Indrizzio got out his knife.
‘Sorry. Ginevra Montelleone. Twenty-one years old. From Impruneta.’ It’s a village on the outskirts of the city, known mainly for producing huge pieces of pottery, urns so big you could hide in them, outsize copies of the Venus de Milo, that sort of thing.
‘I’m just not sure what the story is here,’ he adds. ‘Or even, really, if there is one. You know, if it’s bigger than she fell off the bridge, or jumped, or whatever.’ He takes a lick of his cone, his tongue as fast and agile as a cat’s. ‘So she killed herself.’ He shrugs. ‘You know how college students are.’
He smiles as if we’re sharing a joke, the full, sensuous curves of his lips at odds with his tone of voice, and I start to reply that, no, I don’t. At least, not if he’s suggesting that jumping off bridges is some sort of adolescent rite of passage, something that maybe Angelina or Graziella might do, when they get sick of dating lawyers and shopping. But then I stop. I don’t feel like arguing and, besides, I know it isn’t fair. I know I’m hearing the newspaper editor, not the lover, or the father. A cold gust of wind comes up and riffles my hair, blowing it into the top of my ice cream.
‘Bella!’ Pierangelo picks the strands that are plastered in frutta de bosco out of the cone with his free hand. ‘Very good,’ he says, and hands me a napkin. ‘Almost matches your other stripes!’
‘Don’t be a smart ass.’ I take the napkin he’s offering, and can’t help laughing myself because suddenly I am hit with a splash of pure happiness, just at the miracle of being here with him.
After that, we wander slowly, zigzagging and window shopping, and when we get back to the apartment, it’s late. The courier’s envelope is still on the table. Piero scoops the papers up and takes them down to his study, and by the time he comes back, I’m already in bed. He sits beside me with his hands behind his back. A sneaky smile lights his green eyes. I know what this means. Pierangelo loves giving presents, usually clothes. A peacock-coloured robe from Loretta Capponi. A watered-silk shawl from Como. Silly-looking army pants that tie in bows at the ankle. Sometimes I joke that I’m nothing but the giant Barbie doll he must have secretly yearned for as a kid.
‘Della sinistra? O della destra?’ he asks.
‘Sinistra.’ I tap his left elbow three times, as if I’m summoning a genie, and Pierangelo whips his hand out.
‘I forgot earlier. Senility, I’m telling you.’
This time it’s not silly pants or a pair of shoes, or even stockings or a bracelet. It’s a cell phone. He drops the tiny silver lozenge into my hand. ‘Now I can keep track of you,’ he says. ‘You can even send me pictures of yourself. Punch “one,”’ he adds, ‘and it dials my number.’
I thank him, of course I do. But the truth is, I hate these things. I hate their stupid ring tones. And I hate the way people grapple through their pockets for them, as though they’re so important that any call they miss might precipitate disaster. Most of all, though, I hate being with someone when they get a call and leave you on a sort of metaphysical hold with no idea where to look or what to do while they answer and then proceed to chat animatedly. In my book it’s as absurd and rude as being in mid-conversation and suddenly saying, ‘Oh wait a sec, I’m just going to pull out a pen and jot down a letter to someone else.’ All of which is a very roundabout way of saying that Pierangelo and I might never have gotten together at all, because the very first time I ever met him, about five seconds after we sat down at the bar where he’d suggested we have a drink, his cell phone rang.
It was the Culture editor of a paper I sometimes wrote for in Philadelphia who gave me Pierangelo’s name. ‘He’s an arrogant prick,’ she said. ‘But he knows absolutely everybody.’ And since I wanted to do a piece on a private villa in Florence I had no way of getting into, I eventually called him.
It was March, and cold and very wet, and I ordered a Martini, dry with an olive because, silly as it is, drinking them makes me feel like I’m a grown-up. I think I even mentioned that to Piero, because I remember he laughed, and ordered a scotch. Then his phone made a cheeping sound like a baby bird begging for food and he mumbled something about a story, and turned his head away as he answered, leaving me staring into the mirror behind the bar, reading the labels on the backs of the rows of bottles, and watching the made-up women who drifted by behind us like tropical fish swimming in a tank.
Pierangelo didn’t say a word when he finished the call and closed his phone. Instead, he downed the scotch that had arrived and signalled to the waiter for another almost in one gesture, and when I finally looked away from the mirror and back at him, there was no trace of a smile, no sign of the slick Italian bad boy I’d sat down with, in his face. ‘I’m sorry about that. It’s a story I’m working on,’ he said without my asking. ‘A follow-up. Eleanora Darnelli.’ He laughed, but it was more of a half-hearted bark, and I realized he was genuinely upset. ‘I hate this fucking story,’ he said. ‘But it’ll do well because of the religious angle, seeing how it’s almost Easter.’ The bartender placed a second glass in front of him, and he took a quick sip and looked at me. Then he saw that I didn’t understand.
I remember what happened next because it was the first time he ever touched me. Piero reached out and placed the tips of his fingers on the back of my hand, his skin cold from the ice in his drink. ‘It’s been a big deal here,’ he said. ‘But of course, you wouldn’t know.’ I shook my head, intensely aware of the pressure of those four cold points and the swimming green of his eyes. ‘It happened before you arrived,’ he explained. ‘She was murdered. Up in Fiesole. In January. Before that,’ he added, the corner of his mouth twitching as though the words themselves were distasteful, ‘she was a nun.’
The memory comes back so swift and clear that I wonder if it’s somehow contained in the little silver lozenge I hold in my palm. I know he did the piece, but I didn’t hear Eleanora Darnelli’s name again until I was in the hospital, where Ispettore Pallioti told me she’d probably been killed by Karel Indrizzio. He said the words carefully, as if they might hurt, and I remember thinking, in my drugged-up state, that they were nice. That this fact made me not so alone. Eleanora Darnelli and me, we were in this together. Soul sisters. At the time I thought we could practically be each other.
Now, the idea leaves a sharp taste in my mouth, as if I’ve bitten glass.
Chapter Four
PIERANGELO’S A NIGHT prowler, one of those people who almost always gets up and works for a couple of hours at two or three a.m. before coming back to bed. The result is usually a de
ep sleep until the alarm, followed by a chaotic rush, and the next morning is no exception. I leave him searching for a tie, and walk back across the river to buy the morning paper and the bitter marmalade-filled croissants that Billy and I have become addicted to.
The shop just down from our building is always crowded in the morning. The bakery trays arrive early and sell out fast, and the papers arrive at about the same time, tied in bundles, which makes it an acquired art to pull one out without ripping it in half. In the normal course of things, the large barrel-shaped signora rushes here and there, her dyed red hair bouncing up and down in a solid helmet of curls as she throws pastries into paper bags, works the till, and keeps a hand free to tug down her very short skirt and swat at children who are fingering the fruit.
For the last few mornings, however, the shop has been less chaotic than usual. I figure that this must be due to the fact that the ‘Help Wanted’ sign that’s been in the window since I arrived is gone, so now the signora has time to join her customers, most of whom hang around before and after they’ve shopped to chat about the weather and the prime minister and the shocking price of housing. When I come in, she’s in rapid-fire conversation with a wizened old man whose dachshund is lifting his leg on a crate of wine bottles. She nods when she sees me eyeing the pastry tray and shouts, ‘Allora, Marcello!’ without taking so much as an extra breath.
Marcello is presumably the result of the sign. He appears from behind the beaded curtain at the back and shuffles to the counter, eyes lowered and shoulders hunched. A solid young man in a dark sweater, there’s something oddly insubstantial about him, as if he wishes he could disappear. Taking my coins, he almost drops them, but when he mumbles ‘dispiace’ and suddenly looks me in the eye, I’m struck by how sweet his face is, oval and almost childlike, although he must be in his early twenties. His eyes drop, long lashes brushing the rising pink on his cheeks. The poor guy’s so painfully shy that his hands actually tremble as he gives me my bag.
When I get home it turns out there are six croissants in the bag instead of the four I paid for. Maybe a mistake, I think, and then flatter myself with the idea of maybe not. Silly as it is, this gives me a little flush of pleasure. It’s the hair, I guess. Or perhaps there’s truth in the old saw after all, that being in love makes you beautiful. I lay the croissants on a plate, almost tenderly, proof positive as they are of the new me. Then I spread the paper to see if there’s anything in it about Ginevra Montelleone.
There isn’t a word. It looks like Piero’s right. This isn’t his paper, but she isn’t a story for this editor either. At least not today. Most of the headlines are taken up by arguments about immigration and the economy, and by a piece on Vatican politics. So I’m not surprised to find Massimo D’Erreti staring out at me from the bottom of the page. I study him, looking to see if he really does look like those paintings of Richelieu, and have just about decided he doesn’t, not even a little bit, when Billy comes up behind me.
‘Who’s the hunk?’ she asks, making me jump so badly I almost choke on my coffee.
‘Jesus, I wish you wouldn’t do that!’ I wipe my chin with the back of my hand, and she grins and reaches over me for a croissant.
‘Jumpy? Didn’t get much sleep last night?’
A shower of crumbs falls onto the cardinal’s face, and as Billy brushes them away with the back of her hand, I realize she’s right, he is handsome. It’s something of a revelation. I never thought of him that way before. Billy smirks and glides out of the kitchen without making a sound. This is something I’ve learned in the month I’ve lived with her, for a very tall person, Billy is unusually silent.
It’s disconcerting. Last week, for instance, I was slicing a red pepper, making neat thin strips with the very sharp carving knife I’d bought the day before, when she announced, ‘I never even saw a red pepper until after I was divorced,’ from so close behind me that she could have been sitting on my shoulder. When I whirled around and damn near gutted her, she didn’t even blink. She just picked up one of the pepper strips, and bit it in half. ‘I thought all peppers were green,’ she said. ‘And I never did see a romaine lettuce until I was twenty-one. Imagine.’
The absence of romaine and red peppers. Divorce. Billy drops these clues about her former life like Hansel and Gretel leaving breadcrumbs. When I asked her once, by way of conversation, how she made a living, she shrugged and replied, ‘Oh you know, stuff.’ Then, a second later, she added, ‘For a while I used to be a nurse,’ like it was something she’d just remembered.
Now she reappears in the kitchen and pours herself the last of the coffee. Then she opens the French windows so she can have a cigarette, which would probably give Signora Bardino a seizure if she knew about it. Despite her Sophia Loren accent and liberal use of the word bambina, Signora Bardino is still American enough that she wanted to know we didn’t smoke before she rented to us. We assured her, of course, in unison, that we didn’t. In my case it’s true. But in Billy’s it’s a downright lie.
I’ve told her cigarettes will kill her. A few days after we moved in, I pointed out that they’ll strike her dead sure as a bullet or a speeding car. But Billy just smiled and pulled out her pink Elvis lighter. ‘My ex-husband bought this for me in Vegas,’ she said. ‘As a wedding present. A week after we graduated High School.’
Now smoke hovers above Billy’s head and hangs in the damp morning air, mingling with the faint smell of diesel and mud that rises from the river a block away.
‘Listen.’ She cocks her head and gestures to the apartment opposite, and I hear it too, the high-pitched whine of a child crying.
We’ve heard it before, more than once. In fact, it’s become something of a feature of living here. In the mornings it’s usually a petulant shriek, the bratty yell of a second pastry denied, or toast thrown on the floor. But at night it’s different. At night the crying is deep and breathless, the jagged, frantic scream of nightmares.
‘They fight,’ Billy says. ‘That’s what’s wrong with that kid.’
She nods her head like an old woman as she speaks, punctuating the words with certainty, because we’ve heard that too. Along with the child’s howling, we’ve heard the ring of adult voices, the rising rhythms of sarcasm, and trills of matrimonial gripe that are so universal they don’t need translation. Walking across the courtyard, or sitting out on the balcony, we can even figure out, more or less, which names they call each other.
The wail reaches a crescendo, and Billy stubs her cigarette out in the green tin ashtray she stole from the bar. ‘Kids,’ she says. ‘I tell you. They’re cute, but you know, whenever I felt tempted, I just thought what it would be like to have a vampire hanging from my tits.’ Then she goes to get dressed for a lecture on Perugino she doesn’t want to miss.
A few minutes later, I stand on the balcony and watch as she comes out of our side of the building and walks across the court-yard. Halfway, she stops and looks up. Her hair ripples around her face, and from up here the baggy tweed coat she bought in the market at San Ambrogio looks like a tent. ‘Bar?’ she mouths, and I nod. Pierangelo has already told me he’ll be late tonight so there’s no reason not to join the others for a drink. I wave, and Billy waves back. Then she hoists her leather pack, skirts the skeletal lemon trees in their enormous pots, and disappears, the yellow crown of her hair turning suddenly dark as she steps into the shadow of the archway that leads to the street.
The crying winds down to whimpers, thin shreds of sound that slip from the apartment opposite and drift away like smoke. A window opens, and against the background noise of the city, I can hear the murmur of a woman’s voice, low and soothing. I imagine her bending to pick up the dropped toast, moving to get the pastry after all or refill the glass of juice, and I wonder what it must be like to be that child, and to grow up in that apartment in a city like this, so surrounded by beautiful things you don’t even know where to look.
Beautiful things were in pretty short supply where I grew up. Going to Mass
on Sunday mornings, to the Rotary Social on Saturday nights, sneaking cigarettes behind the High School auditorium and coming home to fall asleep and dream you were from somewhere else—somewhere like this, maybe, except you didn’t know it existed—that was about it for Acadia, Pennsylvania. Billy grew up in Indiana, somewhere outside Fort Wayne, which her mother called Fort Pain. In certain parts of Indiana, Billy says, that passes for a joke.
When she told me where she came from, I laughed, and then, embarrassed, explained that I’d never actually met anybody who grew up outside Fort Wayne before. At that, Billy looked at me over the rims of the granny glasses she sometimes wears, and said, ‘Don’t be such a snot, Mary Thorcroft. I bet you don’t come from anywhere so special.’ And she’s right, of course. I don’t.
Coal and quarries. Deer Hunter country. A town that lived, thrived only moderately, and finally died at the hands of the mining industry. The land around Acadia was too scrappy to farm, and the town too far from anything to be much use once the mines closed, so by the time the sixties rolled around most of the men, like my uncles and my dad, ended up first unemployed, then in Vietnam.
Afterwards, the ones who made it home bought hunting rifles and collected disability and got mean on their own bitterness. And I guess that might have happened to my father too, and probably would have, if he’d lived long enough to find out exactly what things like napalm and Agent Orange really do to the inside of your head. But he didn’t. Instead, he made it all the way through the war and came home to get himself killed, drunk as a skunk one Christmas, driving my mother back from a party at the veterans’ club.
Not that I understood that too clearly at the time. I was seven, and on the night my parents died, my aunt Rose, who was married to my daddy’s older brother Frank, just told me they couldn’t come home for a while but that they loved me more than anything in the world. I can remember her, in her party dress, kneeling by the edge of my bed. Her perfume smelled like air freshener, and the light that fell in a shaft from the hall made the red sparkles on her sleeves and earrings twinkle like stars. She had a big Santa Claus pin on her shoulder, and if you pulled the white cotton ball on top of his hat he sang the first bar of ‘God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen.’
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