Siena Summer

by Siena Summer (retail) (epub)

  ‘Oh, I’d love to! I haven’t been yet. I only saw it from a distance on the day I arrived. Kit did say he’d take me soon, but he’s been very busy, and I don’t think he’s happy about leaving Isobel on her own – I didn’t like to ask.’

  ‘We’re leaving at nine. Can you get down to the village by then? Or would you rather we came to pick you up?’

  ‘No, of course not. I can meet you at Umberto’s at nine. What an absolutely lovely idea. Thank you.’ Poppy all but skipped along the path behind him. The sun-dappled woodland was very still. They had entered a grassy clearing that was carpeted with wild flowers. Poppy made a small, delighted sound and stilled, eyes bright with pleasure at the sight. Michel, turning to glance at her, stopped; and for a suspended, intimate moment their eyes held, warm and steady. Then the beguiling smile that had been the first thing she had noticed about him lit his face and he held out his hand. With no word she took it, and still enveloped in the sunlit, enchanted silence of the woodland they strolled together through the flowers, hand in hand and content, for all the world as if they had known each other for ever.

  That night, unexpectedly, there was a storm, the thunder rolling from hillside to hillside, great sheets of lightning flickering and crashing over a world drowned by torrential rain. Poppy watched from her window, enthralled. Unlike Isobel, who had been touchy and restless all evening as the thunderheads had built, she had always liked storms, enjoying their drama and the sense of power unleashed. She looked out into the drenched darkness that every now and again was lit brighter than day by the lightning, and hugged to herself the small secrets of her afternoon. She could still feel Michel’s firm, large-boned hand in hers, still see the warmth in his eyes as he looked at her, still feel the briefest touch of his lips on her cheek as he had left her at the kitchen door, reminding her – as if she had needed reminding! – of their arrangement for the following day. Thunder crashed directly overhead and she jumped a little, blinking at the fierce streak of lightning that followed. Trees stood stark and black for a moment in the glare and the tower was silhouetted against a threatening sky.

  In the house behind her she heard Robbie call out plaintively, but before she could move, Kit’s voice answered, and a door opened and closed. Poppy went back to her reverie. Tomorrow, at last, she would see Siena – and, better, would see it with Michel. Although this was his first visit to the city, too, he appeared to have made a real study of the place and knew far more of its character and traditions than Poppy had managed to glean. She had at first been a little worried that Kit might have taken affront at her agreeing to go with Michel and Peter instead of waiting until he had time to take her himself, but on the contrary he had been enthusiastic about the idea – even, she suspected, a little relieved.

  ‘What a splendid idea. You’ll be quite safe with Umberto and Michel. I’ll look you out a map later on, mark some interesting places for you to visit.’

  ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Kit!’ Isobel had been irritable. ‘I’m quite sure that Michel’s perfectly capable of finding his own way around, and Umberto knows the place like the back of his hand. He was born here, for God’s sake!’ Even in her own happy preoccupations Poppy could not help noticing a certain tension between the two of them; indeed when she had first returned to the house she had wondered if they had quarrelled, so odd was the atmosphere. For once, however, she had had overriding concerns of her own to think about, and had not pursued the question, even when, as the first ominous rolls of thunder had begun Kit had gone across to the studio to make sure all was secure against the weather, leaving her alone for a few moments with her sister.

  Isobel had sat, great shadowed eyes on the untouched plate of food that lay before her, her silence so obviously unhappy that even Poppy’s bright spirits were a little blighted.

  ‘You really ought to try to eat something,’ she had said gently.

  With an effort the long lashes had lifted and the blue eyes had met hers. In the shadows of the storm-darkened kitchen the pupils had been huge, the gaze unfocused. ‘I can’t,’ Isobel had said, and flinched as lightning suddenly streaked in the sky. ‘I can’t. Oh, God, I hate storms. I really hate them.’

  Now, with the elements raging apparently directly overhead, Poppy found herself wondering a little guiltily if she should not check that Kit, in very properly reassuring his son; had not left Isobel alone and frightened. On impulse she pulled on her dark silk dressing-gown, tugging the belt tight about her waist, and reached for the small lamp that burned steadily beside the bed.

  As she passed Robbie’s room, in a momentary lull in the pyrotechnics outside she could hear the reassuring murmur of Kit’s voice, mingled with the light voice of the child. Kit was, then, with the little boy; just as she thought it, the thunder crashed again, so violently that she fancied she could feel it through the fabric of the house.

  She tapped on Isobel’s door, which stood a little ajar. ‘Isobel? Are you all right?’ Both sounds were completely lost in the noise of the storm. Rain lashed at the windows in torrents, as if intent upon drowning the world. Poppy pushed the door open wider. A lamp burned upon the table. Isobel stood next to it, a glass to her lips, the bulk of her distorted body silhouetted against the light. Poppy stepped into the room. ‘Isobel?’

  With a small shriek Isobel turned, and the glass slipped from her fingers, crashing on the marble top of the wash-stand, splintering to shards. Isobel stood trembling, hands cupped about her face, staring at her sister in fright and in dawning anger.

  ‘Oh, Isobel, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to startle you like that.’ Instinctively Poppy stepped towards her sister.

  ‘Look what you’ve done! Look what you’ve done!’ Isobel stared down at the broken glass. ‘No!’ she added quickly, sensing her sister’s movement. ‘Stay where you are. There’s glass everywhere. You’ll cut your feet.’ In clumsy haste she reached for the basin that stood on the wash-stand and began to sweep the shards of glass that still lay upon the marble into it.

  ‘Isobel, please – let me help.’ Poppy picked her way carefully across the floor and bent to pick up the bottom of the broken glass that had rolled beneath the bed. As she did so, she was aware, almost without noticing it, of a very faint, sickly-sweet smell hanging on the air.

  ‘No!’ Her sister turned upon her as she straightened. ‘Poppy, just—’ she paused, obviously fighting for composure, physically wincing as thunder crashed again, ‘—just go back to bed. I’m all right. It wasn’t your fault. It was—’ another infinitesimal pause ‘—it was only a glass of water. It’s just a nuisance to have broken it, that’s all.’ She held out her hand for the shard that Poppy held.

  ‘Isobel? Is something wrong?’ Kit had appeared at the door, lamp in hand. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Nothing. I was drinking a glass of water. Poppy startled me, and I dropped it. That’s all.’

  ‘I’m terribly sorry—’ Poppy began.

  Her sister shook her head tiredly, all anger gone. ‘Don’t be silly. It wasn’t your fault. Go back to bed, Poppy. Kit will help me.’

  Poppy picked her way to the door. As she passed

  Kit he smiled reassuringly. ‘Good night. Sleep tight.’ She dropped a quick kiss on his cheek. ‘Good night.’ Back in her room she walked once more to the long window, stood for a moment looking out into the night. The storm was receding a little, the lightning less fierce and less frequent, and the rain had eased. Tomorrow would be fine, she was certain. Tomorrow! Suddenly, hugging herself, she took a couple of dancing steps towards the bed, dropping her dressing-gown on the floor as she went – tomorrow would be the best tomorrow ever, no matter what the weather did. ‘So there!’ she said aloud, and jumped on to the huge old bed, bouncing a little, covering her mouth with her hand to stifle childish laughter; and then stopped, surprised, sniffing at her fingers. There it was again: the faint, almost nauseous, sweetness she had smelled in Isobel’s bedroom. And this time a memory stirred, distant and elusive. She had smelled
something very like this before. Puzzled, she sniffed again, wrinkling her nose, but the memory would not be recaptured. Shrugging, she reached out to turn off the lamp.

  Moments later she was asleep, as the storm growled its way into the distance and the softer rain of its passing pattered through the branches of the trees, a lullaby in the darkness.

  Chapter Nine

  ‘I like Kit.’ Peter braced his small, sturdy figure against the bouncing of the calesse, swinging his legs to the regular rhythm of the pony’s step. ‘He’s really nice. And he knows some smashing things.’ The boy was dressed immaculately in white shirt and khaki shorts, a floppy sunhat shading his face and neck.

  Michel smiled, amused. ‘What sorts of things?’

  ‘He knows about birds, and animals. And he knows how Michelangelo painted that ceiling in Rome. Did you know that wasn’t his real name? His real name was—’ the child paused for a moment, concentrating ‘—was Michelagniolo di something or other Buonarroti and he didn’t really want to be a painter at all. He just wanted to be a sculptor. Kit told me.’

  ‘It must be true, then.’ Michel was teasing.

  Bright, serious eyes met his. ‘Oh, yes. I’m sure it is.’

  ‘Perhaps I could persuade Kit to come back to school with us? It sounds as if he has a talent for teaching that some of us haven’t acquired.’

  Still Peter refused to be drawn by his uncle’s laughter. ‘Oh, no. He doesn’t teach. That’s boring.’

  ‘Thank you.’ The words were dry. Poppy chuckled. ‘He talks to you. Explains things. He makes things interesting.’

  ‘That’s true, actually.’ Poppy nodded. ‘I remember it myself. When I was a child – just about your age, in fact – I adored him.’

  The clear, hazel eyes widened. ‘I didn’t know you knew him when you were a little girl?’

  ‘Oh, yes. It was through me he met Isobel, and they ran away together to get married. It was all very romantic.’ She smiled a little. ‘Quite like something you might see at the cinema, in fact.’

  Michel had turned his head and was watching her interestedly. ‘I didn’t realise that, either. How did that come about?’

  Poppy firmly refused to allow herself to be distracted by the warmth in the eyes that held hers so steadily. ‘I met him by a river one day. It was towards the end of the war. We became friends. As Peter just pointed out, he’s extraordinarily good with children. Then Isobel met him and persuaded Papa to let him paint our portrait – Isobel’s and mine – and while he was painting it they fell in love with each other. Papa was furious. They ran away before the picture was ever finished. Funnily enough, I mentioned it to Kit the other day. He said he still has some of the sketches. He’s going to find them for me. It’ll be very strange, I think, seeing myself at ten years old.’

  Peter cocked his head. ‘That’s interesting. When he finds them, could I see them, too, please? I’d really like to.’

  Poppy could not help smiling at the grave politeness of the question. ‘Of course. I’ll ask him when we get back, if you’d like.’

  ‘As a matter of fact I’d rather like to see them myself.’ Michel’s own smile, that so transformed his face, was quick. ‘If you don’t mind, that is?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Kit was in the war,’ Peter said. ‘Like my father.’

  ‘Yes, he was. He was wounded. That’s how I met him. He’d come to England to recuperate.’

  ‘I didn’t know that. He didn’t tell me. He told me about going up in a balloon, though, to sketch the enemy lines. And how one of the balloons broke loose and drifted absolutely miles – though luckily the wind was in the right direction, or he’d have been captured by the Germans.’

  The child chattered on. Poppy leaned back in her seat, enchanted by the moment. As she had thought it would, the storm had cleared the air and the morning sparkled about them. The sun, not yet high, was pleasantly warm and a gentle breeze stirred the leaves of the woodland. The overnight rain had freshened everything and on every rocky outcrop and beneath every gnarled tree’s bole the lichens and wild flowers had bloomed anew. The smell of woodsmoke hung in the air, and high above them swallows and swifts swooped in a crystal clear sky not yet over-burnished by the heat of the day. They were on the last slope of the hills and approaching the valley that Poppy could see from her window, with its terraces and low stone walls, its olive and lemon groves, its huddled clusters of houses and its huge, dominating church.

  They passed an old man, riding side-saddle on a plodding donkey, the animal’s hooves splashing in the occasional puddles that reflected the bright sky. Umberto returned his civil greeting, and the man answered Poppy’s smile with a courteous inclination of his head. As Umberto swung the calesse on to the wider, flatter track that followed the valley, a house came into sight surrounded by paddocks in which grazed several milk-white horses, sturdy, graceful beasts with flowing manes and tails that glinted silver in the sun. As the trap passed, one of them trotted to the rail, neck arched, head tossing, whinnying gently. Poppy smiled delightedly, turning in her seat to watch as they passed.

  Peter was still talking. ‘Kit said that long ago the people in the towns around here used to live in towers. The higher the tower, the more important you were. So the towers got higher and higher, and they built these walkways between them, and the families had vendettas and used to fight each other—’

  Suddenly sensing Michel’s eyes upon her, Poppy turned her head to look at him. He was watching her, the pale, clever eyes for once unsmiling, closely studying her face. His hand, lying relaxed upon the worn seat was very close to hers. After a long moment he smiled, and, very gently, his fingers closed upon hers.

  ‘—so they made them pull them down. Though there are still a few left, Kit says. There’s a place called San Gimignano not far from here. Kit’s been there. He says it looks like a trial run for New York.’

  How, Poppy found herself wondering, bemusedly, could the simple touch of a hand be so physically exciting? Just a few days before she had not known of this man’s existence. Now it seemed that he had bewitched her.

  Peter curled his legs under him and turned to face the way they were travelling, bouncing a little on the leather seat. ‘I think Robbie’s really lucky,’ he said, ‘to have a smashing dad like Kit.’

  *

  The city of Siena, unique in the world, stood within her encircling walls, as she had for six centuries, a medieval masterpiece that lived and breathed. Within those great walls her people, descendants of those who had established her, defended her and often died for her, had fiercely and jealously preserved her ancient rites and traditions, not as a museum preserves, nor as an insect may be preserved in amber, but in vivid and colourful life. At every turn of the steep and narrow streets, canyon-like in the Chianti sunshine, there was evidence of her singular history. A great colourful banner streaming from a rooftop or a balcony. A strangely embellished fountain, an emblem upon a wall. A panther, a she-wolf, a unicorn. The sound of a trumpet or a drum, echoing, in practice for the pageants to come. The sight of a small boy, tutored by his father or an older brother, learning the fanciful intricacies of handling a Contrada’s silken flag. The first Palio of the year was ten days off, and the city was in a fever.

  As Umberto ushered them through the warren of narrow alleys, fountained squares, busy, cobbled lanes and flights of steps that led to the centre of the city, Poppy thought it was much like being in a maze – a hilltop maze constructed of more churches than she could ever have conceived gracing a single city, of palaces, of tall, shuttered houses, of abbeys and nunneries and sudden, unexpected tree-hung rock-faces brooding with pigeons. They toiled up a steep hill, turned in to a wider shop-lined thoroughfare that Umberto told them was the Via del Città, one of the main thoroughfares. And still she did not realise where she was until the little man led them down a steep flight of steps between two towering buildings, and there it was: Il Campo. The heart of the city. The huge, paved, almost circu
lar arena in which so much of the city’s turbulent history had been made; and in which, twice a year, the honour of the seventeen Contrade was tested in a horse race that was not a horse race.

  ‘It’s glorious,’ she said.

  Michel spoke with her. ‘C’est magnifique.’ She smiled. She had never heard him resort to his native French before, but had to admit that the words were truly fitting. Peter, for a change, said nothing, but his eyes widened as he looked about him. They had entered the Piazza opposite a massively elegant building of brick and stone that dwarfed the by no means small buildings that surrounded it. Its beautifully proportioned façade was punctuated by rows of tall mullioned windows, the crenellations of its roof standing stark against the bright sky. But what caught and drew the eye was the slender column of the tower, brick-built and topped by an ornate stone bell-chamber. It was, Poppy estimated, perhaps three hundred feet high and dominated the great Piazza that it overlooked, yet, like the building itself, so perfectly proportioned was it that the overall effect was of sheer grace, a kind of perpendicular harmony that took the breath away.

  Umberto watched their reaction with satisfaction. ‘Il Palazzo Pubblico,’ he said, pointing at the great building.

  ‘Can we go in it?’ Poppy asked. And ‘Can we go up the tower?’ Peter asked in all but the same breath.

  Laughing, Michel spoke a few words to Umberto in Italian. The little man nodded emphatically. ‘Si, si—’ He spoke volubly for a moment, then turned and pointed to another of the narrow entrances to the square, at the far end from where they stood. Michel listened, nodding, to what, judging from the expressive hand movements, were a set of directions. He reached into his pocket and produced the map Kit had given them. The man’s short, stubby finger traced a route. While they consulted, Poppy glanced with eager interest around the Campo. Like the palace, most of the buildings, four and five storeys high, were of brick, and all of them that brownish terracotta colour to which the city had lent her name. Even the most part of the great open space that the buildings encircled, which sloped gently down towards the palace, was paved with bricks, the whole divided, fan-like, into nine separate areas by the different herringbone patterns in which the bricks were laid. Not far from where they stood, water splashed from the walls of a stone pool. Shops and cafes, sheltered by awnings of the same colour as the buildings, lined the square. The whole place bustled with life, truly, obviously, the very centre of the city. She turned. Umberto was lifting a hand in salute. ‘Arrivederci, Signorina Poppy. A piu tardi.’