Halfway through the evening Patrizia, power-dressed like a character out of the eighties television show Dynasty, joined their conversation. As soon as there was a pause, she said, “Oh, Lina, you must tell Bruna what you heard the other day.”
My mother immediately sensed Lina’s discomfort as she shook her head and feigned ignorance.
Patrizia pressed her. “Oh, you know—the latest on Aldo’s new mistress.” She then spoke the woman’s name before telling Mamma, “He’s now bought her an apartment and some expensive works of art. Apparently there’s nothing he won’t do for her.”
The woman’s name meant little to my mother but still her heart froze. Determined to maintain her composure, she forced a smile as Lina sputtered, “N-no, Patrizia! What are you talking about?”
Maurizio’s wife studied my mother’s expression closely before saying, in mock apology, “Oh, Bruna. I’m so sorry. Didn’t you know?”
“Idle gossip!” my mother shot back before hurrying away. Lina chased after her, trying to reassure her that there was no substance to the rumors, but my mother had heard enough. She fetched her coat and went back to the apartment alone to gather her thoughts. Where had she heard the woman’s name before? It was vaguely familiar. Then she remembered, with a jolt. I’d mentioned her the night I’d gone to dinner with Papà on my own. That was the moment he’d introduced his amante to his daughter, she realized. He would never, ever, have done that unless he had lost his head—and possibly his heart.
Mamma was beside herself. That evening’s impact on her was profound. She was in shock and went into paroxysms of anxiety, wondering what to do. When my father returned to Manhattan a few days later, however, he had no inkling what she’d unearthed in his absence. Although the information was killing her, she decided not to spoil our Christmas holidays by confronting him with it. Instead, she became what she described as a “tigre,” actively seeking out further information in the coming months. “I was a masochist. I went in search of the information that would hurt me and then I dwelt on it. Sometimes I think I must have enjoyed the pain. I even kept a diary as a way of getting everything down on paper. I had all these hidden secrets…more secrets.”
None of the information she gathered in her detective work did anything to allay her fears. On a trip to Palm Beach, she rummaged around in the back of a wardrobe and found photographs of the woman there—proof positive that my father had taken his mistress to their beach house and almost certainly to their bed. Still, she held her tongue.
The new mistress, meanwhile, seemed quite brazen about being seen out with my father in public, so more and more gossip was drip-fed back to my mother. Young, sexy, and socially adept, the other woman turned out to be everything she wasn’t. The threat she represented was real.
The day came when Mamma could hold back no longer. I happened to be in the kitchen in Rome when my father walked into the apartment that evening oblivious to the impending storm. As usual, he went to freshen up before dinner but she followed him into the bedroom to blurt, “You’ve been having an affair!”
He froze.
“I could see the change in his face the minute I said her name,” she told me. “There was a twitch and a look in his eye.” The argument that ensued was the most explosive I’d ever heard. I sat glued to my chair as it spilled into the living room. Never had I heard my mother so angry. I soon understood what she was accusing him of but naively trusted my father when he denied it.
“I know what’s been going on!” she persisted, waving the photographs she’d found. “Tell me it’s not true!” He remained on the defensive and assured her that they were headshots for public relations purposes. Still, she wouldn’t be calmed. Her outburst shocked me so much that I remember thinking that I wouldn’t honestly blame Papà for taking a mistress if she didn’t change her tune.
Their fight only ended when my father suddenly picked up an object from a coffee table and hurled it against the wall. Then he stormed out, slamming the door so hard that the whole building shook. It would take me a long time to realize just how painful that whole episode must have been for my mother. If it weren’t for her frequent telephone calls to her guru, who repeatedly assured her that there was a reason she was being “tested” and that she had a “higher purpose,” I’m not sure how she would have survived.
If I’d hoped the argument would blow over, then I was mistaken. My mother wasn’t as helpless as she sometimes appeared. Furthermore, she was determined to get to the truth. It was almost as if hearing my father admit his guilt out loud would somehow diminish its power over her. Having never previously been comfortable with confrontation, she now accosted him at every opportunity, demanding to know more as the atmosphere between them grew increasingly toxic. This went on for months and included one hysterical row in a hotel in Hong Kong. Repeatedly, he denied being unfaithful, but my mother was a terrier worrying at a bone.
“He took whatever I threw at him,” she said later. “He was like a statue, never saying a word.” With stealth I never knew she possessed, she began to compile the evidence against him by seeking out those who knew more and who—like Patrizia—would enjoy filling her in on the details.
“I can get you the address of an apartment he bought her in Rome,” one woman apprised her over lunch. Another so-called friend Mamma referred to as the “messenger from God” was especially eager to help after her own husband had also been having an affair. “She has jewelry you wouldn’t believe,” she confided. “This has been going on behind your back for quite a while.” Being the last to know was humiliating, to say the least.
Painful as all this was to hear she registered every date and event until she’d amassed a dossier to confront him with once and for all. The evidence was damning. Looking back on the kinds of things he was prepared to do for this woman, she now says she thinks he went “a little crazy” during this period. Whether he was having some sort of midlife crisis or was genuinely infatuated, we will never know. “This episode definitely unbalanced him,” she said. “It made him wonder who he was and what he really wanted.” One thing is fairly certain—my father seemed beguiled by the new temptress in his life, who appeared to demand so much from him. My mother’s pure goodness and what he often referred to as her “virtue” must have seemed such a sharp contrast.
I hated being a silent bystander to their ongoing dispute, especially when I recalled how happy they’d been in Palm Beach. I barely recognized them now. Even though I was only thirteen, I had moved into the studio apartment on the floor above Mamma’s. I couldn’t hear her but I knew she was crying her eyes out most days. Although I felt sorry for her, like most teenagers I also found my mother deeply irritating. She nagged at Papà for every little thing and her constant sniping was unbearable to be around. It is only with the wisdom of adulthood that I can see how distressing it must have been for her to be neglected in this manner.
As soon as he went away again on business, my mother took her frustration out on me, which only made me even more resentful. Our quarrels intensified and our relationship suffered to the point that I stayed away as much as possible to avoid her. She accused me of turning into a “nightmare” of a daughter, claiming she didn’t know how to handle me anymore. In her angriest moments she’d tell me, “If it wasn’t for me, your father wouldn’t even know you!” I think I was supposed to be grateful to her for the life that I’d had.
I’m sure I was as much to blame. I was disrespectful and started answering back. “If you’d put half as much energy into raising me as you spent doing whatever your precious guru told you, then things might have worked out differently!” I’d counter. “I was the perfect little girl! I did my schoolwork and kept out of trouble, but it was never enough for you, was it?”
When everything else in her life was spinning out of control, it must have been dreadful to realize that she was also losing her grip on the one person she’d always been able to command. Then one day I went too far. In response to something I said, she
went to slap me and then chased me out of her apartment with a broom. Shocked, I locked myself in my room and turned up the music to muffle her shrieking at the door.
After that incident, I told myself I’d pack my things, move out, and live at Andrea’s house. Her mother would happily take me in and with Papà away so much, there was nowhere else for me to go. I felt trapped. Yet in spite of my dreams of running away, I never did. Nor was there any need to. Mamma had other plans and when things had calmed down, she sat me on her bed and revealed them to me.
“I’ve had enough of your attitude, Patricia,” she said wearily. “I’m tired of fighting all the time. Since we left England, you’ve become impossible!” She made it perfectly clear that she wasn’t going to take any responsibility whatsoever for the breakdown in our relationship. “Your father has asked me to spend more time with him in the United States, and as we’re also worried about these kidnappings in Rome we need to make alternative arrangements for you. Staying at St. George’s is no longer an option. You’re going back to boarding school—in Switzerland.”
I didn’t see that one coming.
Aiglon College was located in the village of Chesières high in the Swiss Alps. My future had been decided by Mamma’s pendolino, a crystal on a chain that she dangled over the names of Aiglon and another Swiss school, Le Rosey, until it settled. Modeled loosely on the British “public” school system, Aiglon was established after the war by a former teacher of Gordonstoun, a notoriously tough school in Scotland. His avant-garde philosophy was that education should be about the “whole” self, including spiritual, physical, and environmental factors. Students were expected to respond positively to the disciplinary regimen, which included taking part in rigorous physical activity—even in the depths of an Alpine winter.
Although I was initially horrified by the idea of being banished to the mountains, over time I began to appreciate my new environment. From the moment I arrived, I was made welcome. There were three hundred pupils from all over the world and Italy in particular. As one of my roommates said, “We already have a Pucci, now a Gucci. All we need is a Fiorucci!”
Admittedly, there were times when I wasn’t so thrilled about being there, especially with the seven a.m. wake-up calls and having to do PT on a freezing-cold terrace first thing in the morning. None of this sat well with my inner city-girl. My days lying dreamily by the pool in Rome seemed a distant memory, especially during one particularly arduous trek in which our group was wading through waist-deep snow in a blizzard ten thousand feet up a mountain. I’m ashamed to admit that the extreme conditions brought out the worst in me and I refused to take another step. Flopping back down into the snow, my sealskin-covered skis sticking up vertically, I declared the expedition too dangerous and demanded an immediate helicopter rescue. “This is crazy!” I screamed above the winds, unable to feel my hands or feet. “Our parents didn’t send us here for this!”
What they did send us there for was what happened next—the esprit de corps of my fellow classmates. “Come on, Patricia! Let’s get going!” they said encouragingly. Even though every muscle in my body hurt and my tears were turning to ice on my cheeks, I pushed on through the pain. The sense of achievement when we reached our destination was phenomenal, and we clung to one another like the survivors we felt we were. The friendships I forged at Aiglon are among those I cherish most today.
While I was finding myself in the mountains above Lake Geneva, my father was still whizzing around the globe as the so-called Guru of Gucci. He showed no signs of slowing down and seemed unable to relinquish control of anything, from the design of new stores to the look of the latest advertising campaign. As part of his ongoing expansion of the company, he supervised lucrative new licensing contracts, including my brother Paolo’s new ready-to-wear range. Then he launched his very own signature perfume. Full-page adverts for Il Mio Profumo were tagged with Papà’s autograph above the strap line, “Inspired by and dedicated to women of love.”
He also launched the first Gucci wristwatch—the Model 2000—whose multimillion sales would earn an entry in the Guinness Book of Records. It was a project that had first been suggested to him in New York when a Belgian-born salesman named Severin Wunderman rang the Gucci offices one day and was surprised when my father picked up and agreed that he could pay him a visit. Severin, a Jew who’d survived the Holocaust, spun Papà a hard-luck story on his arrival. After emigrating to California at the end of the war, he worked for a French watch company that was trying to break into the American market. Wunderman claimed that times were hard and he couldn’t pay his rent so he was prepared to negotiate a deal in which a Gucci watch would be manufactured under license. Noticing his scuffed shoes and frayed cuffs, my father took pity on him and placed a huge order. When Severin’s company couldn’t keep up with demand, Papà cut him a large check to set up on his own. Gucci Timepieces would go on to generate annual royalties of $150 million, while the company Wunderman created grew to gross more than $500 million a year, ensuring that he never again had to worry about meeting the rent.
My father’s business was running like clockwork and someone was coming up the ranks who seemed to feel as passionately about it as he did. Unexpectedly, it wasn’t one of my brothers. Although Paolo was showing flair and ambition and Giorgio and Roberto were plodding away quietly in the background, my cousin Maurizio looked to have inherited the Gucci acumen. The young pretender had thrived as an apprentice under Papà for seven years, and while he admitted that my father was “a tornado” who screamed at any member of staff who dared take time off, he was also quick to praise him for his courage and vision. “With Aldo it is not living, it is surviving,” he said. “If he does one hundred percent, you have to do one hundred fifty percent….From my uncle I really learned the business and the market.”
Paolo must have envied Maurizio’s relationship with Papà, especially as he repeatedly clashed with management over his own plans to woo a younger clientele. He had set his sights on creating a new company—Gucci Plus—funded by outsiders. My father and Uncle Rodolfo wouldn’t hear of it and their objection infuriated him. He accused them of “medieval” practices and secretly decided to forge ahead regardless, confident that Papà would ultimately back him. None of them realized it then, but that was the beginning of the end for Gucci as a family business.
Packing me off to school in Switzerland might well have rid my mother of the conflict between us, but it left her even more beleaguered in Rome. I wasn’t there the night she felt she’d gathered enough evidence against my father to confront him once more. On an otherwise uneventful evening, she waited until he was sitting comfortably after dinner before launching her attack. There was no shouting or broken objets this time. Instead, Papà sat in silence as she presented him with a dossier of his misdeeds, complete with dates, places, and times. It detailed virtually every trip, every hotel room, and every gift he had bought his lover.
“He sat stock-still, as speechless as the Sphinx. Then he said, ‘But who told you?’ A muscle in his jaw twitched involuntarily but there was no other response until he stood up, reached for his jacket, and quietly left the building.”
Holding her breath, she watched him go, fearing she might never see him again. Still hell-bent on getting her confession, however, her relentlessness knew no bounds and she continued to plague him with questions, demanding, “Aldo, admit it! Tell me that it’s true!” After more than two years of her hounding, my father felt the need to escape. In 1978, he flew alone to Palm Beach for some peace and quiet but one night he was woken at two o’clock in the morning by a phone call in which my mother wailed that she was tormented by the demons in her head. Tearfully, she sobbed again down the line that he owed it to her to tell her the truth.
Exploding with frustration, my father cracked. “Basta, Bruna! Sì, sì. E’tutto vero. It’s all true,” he shouted. “I admit everything—okay? Satisfied?” There was an eerie silence. He waited for her to respond but there was no sound. More ginger
ly, he called her name. It was his turn to fear that he’d gone too far. “Bruna?…Bruna?” he tried, before the line went dead.
Their roles were reversed in an instant. With my father’s confession, my mother had what she wanted but felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach. This was it—the moment she’d dreaded for years. She was convinced that my father was lost to her now and that we were completely on our own with no legal rights. “I became paralyzed, sitting on the bed like marble,” she said.
Reaching for the telephone in a daze, she called her guru in London, dialing a number she knew by heart. She realized the futility of that as he rarely answered, preferring messages to be left. But someone must have been on her side that day, because this time, Sari Nandi picked up. As soon as she heard his voice, she broke down and told him everything. “Mr. Nandi, I don’t want to live anymore. My life is a mess!”
The significance of that call cannot be underestimated. There is no knowing what my mother might have done if she hadn’t been able to talk to the only man she still trusted. Hearing the distress in her voice, he coaxed her back from the emotional ledge. “I will help you,” he promised. “Please, Bruna. Calm down and pray with me.”
She was comforted by his reassurances. “For reasons I can’t explain, he gave me hope,” she told me.
My father meanwhile was left hopeless in Florida. Unable to return to sleep and frantically worried, he called her back repeatedly but the phone was constantly engaged. When he eventually got through she didn’t answer, no matter how often he redialed. He had no idea that her guru had insisted she leave the apartment and spend the rest of the day with a friend. Panicking, Papà continued to call every hour for the next eight hours without success. Terrified that she’d done something foolish, he called everybody he could think of—even her sister, Gabriella, and the porter of her building—but her apartment was found to be empty and no one had a clue where she might be. He was half out of his mind.
In the Name of Gucci Page 16