by Anna Jacobs
Rome was cold and dirty, also very expensive. Robert took another of his dislikes to it and they left after only a few days, to Helen's relief.
During the following two weeks, they made their way further south by easy stages, moving from one small town to another. Robert won small amounts here and there, and Helen occasionally helped out at the inns, or used her sewing skills. It was a pattern they had followed before, but now it was irking her.
They could have stayed on in Beziers, lived in modest comfort. Robert just didn’t understand how hard it was for her to keep them all clean while moving so often. Nor did he sympathise with the problems she had keeping a very small boy amused on tedious journeys, though he soon complained if Harry made too much noise.
They came to a place called Serugia by accident, having misunderstood what the man driving the carrier's cart said. It was a slightly larger town than most of the ones they had passed through, built around a small, semi-circular bay, with large white houses on the hills above the tight central cluster of red-roofed houses that scrambled over one another to cling to the lower slopes of the hills around the bay. The inhabitants fished, catered for summer visitors or carried on a multiplicity of small trades, growing their own wine and olives on the slopes behind town.
Helen fell in love with Serugia on sight, but she had learned by now that if she made a favourable comment on any place, Robert would discover nothing but faults there. So she made a slighting remark about the narrowness of the streets.
He scoffed at her. ‘Nothing ever satisfies you, does it? You’d complain if I took you to heaven.’
They lodged for a night or two in a small inn, whose owner spoke a little atrocious French and was very willing to help Helen improve her small store of Italian phrases.
Robert went out for a couple of short strolls, but spent most of the time resting. On the third morning, he said, ‘I like it here. My cough's getting better.’
‘I don't think - ’
‘Just shut up and listen, for once, and let me do the thinking! I want you to find us some rooms.
It'll be cheaper than staying at an inn.’
Helen enlisted the help of the innkeeper's wife, who had taken a fancy to Harry and who kept irritating him by stroking his honey-gold curls and clasping him to her ample bosom. Francesca found them a whole house to themselves, at a ridiculously cheap price, because it was winter and there were few tourists at this time of year. It was a small house, by most people's standards, with two rooms and a kitchen on the ground floor and two tiny bedrooms and an attic above. It was sparsely furnished, but clean and attractive. It was the largest place the Perrimans had ever had to live in.
Harry adored the attic, from which you could see the sea, and took immediate possession of it.
‘Me an' Dodo like this house,’ he declared, dancing the dog up and down on the windowsill.
The prospect of having a house of her own reduced Helen to tears. In her halting Italian, she confided in Francesca that never before in her married life had she had a whole house to herself.
Francesca, who disliked Robert as much as she liked his wife and child, tutted sympathetically.
She had constituted herself Helen's friend and protector and now proceeded to organise things for her. She had a cousin who would move the Perrimans’ luggage to the house, another cousin who would supply them with fruit and vegetables very cheaply, a brother who was a butcher and a female cousin who might be able to help signora Perriman to find some pupils who wanted to learn English or French.
Serugia was, it appeared, getting quite a few foreign visitors nowadays and it was useful for those tradespeople who wished to make money from them to learn English.
Francesca's Cousin Maria was housekeeper to il Conte, whose house this was, Francesca said with pride, and Helen made suitable noises to show that she was impressed. Il Conte was the largest landowner in the neighbourhood and he lived in the biggest of the white houses on the hill overlooking the town.
‘Un bel palazzo! Magnifico!’ enthused Francesca.
‘Magnifico!’ echoed Helen, memorising this easy to recognise word.
Robert graciously allowed his wife to arrange their move and joined her at the house only when it was all over. She wished he had not, for his ill humour seemed to mar the happy atmosphere of the small dwelling. She wished, as she had wished many times before, that he would just go away, the further the better, and never return.
Chapter 8
Thanks to Francesca's help and her volubility, Helen learned Italian with remarkable rapidity.
Robert said languidly that he'd known she would come in useful and condescended to learn the numbers from her. ‘If you know the numbers and a few other phrases, you can play cards or throw dice in any language. But why the devil are you feeding us so much of that damned pasta stuff? I need some real meat.’
‘We can't afford a lot of meat. I haven't got much work yet, only the two pupils.’
He sighed. ‘Well, at least that stuff is filling. When I've recovered from this damned cold, I'll find some way of picking up a bit of money and then we can eat properly. There must be a few fellows around who like a game of cards.’
And sure enough, since he was tired of poor men's food, Robert made it his business to hunt around for kindred spirits. He soon met ‘a good fellow, Italian, but speaks a little English’. Paolo introduced Robert to some others with similar tastes. ‘Rum bunch, but they know their cards. That Conte they all fawn over comes down to play sometimes, they tell me. Useful, eh? He won't be short of money. He owns half the town.’
As usual, Robert was successful at first, then more and more unsuccessful. Helen had enough students by now to cover the cost of the little house and food for herself and Harry, but only just.
She entrusted her small emergency fund to Francesca, explaining that her husband was a gambler.
She flushed as she added that he sometimes took her money, and that she wanted to save some
‘per il piccolo Harry' .
Francesca swore that the devil could tear out her entrails before she would surrender one single coin to signor Perriman. And she would personally see that Harry and his mother never went hungry again.
Helen couldn’t help hugging her. It was wonderful to have a friend once more. She wrote a letter to Roxanne and another to the Hendrys, telling them where she was and trying to sound optimistic.
The seasons passed and summer came again. Robert's brief run of luck was long past now. He was becoming very nasty about the food she served him and had gone through her things several times searching for money. She retaliated by refusing to make him an evening meal unless he gave her the money to buy food.
She was very embarrassed when she visited Francesca one week, because of a bruise Robert had given her, when he slapped her hard on the face. Her friend fingered it, clicked her tongue in dismay and found her some evil-smelling ointment to anoint it with.
Harry now went and hid in the attic whenever his father was in a bad mood.
One hot summer night, Robert came home in the foulest of tempers.
‘Is something wrong?’ Helen asked. It must be money. Surely, oh surely, they wouldn't have to move again! She didn't think she could face it. She had grown to like Serugia and to love her little house. And there was Francesca, too. Not to mention some boys with whom Harry had made friends.
‘Oh, no, everything's wonderful!’ Robert sneered. ‘What do you think it is, you fool? The damned cards won't fall for me lately. Never had such a bad run. Never!’ He started gnawing on a piece of bread which had been intended for Harry's breakfast. ‘Not even a smear of jam to put on it! What sort of a housekeeper are you? I don't know why I keep you around, I really don't!’
‘You're very welcome to leave us. Go and try your luck elsewhere!’
‘Oh, yes, you'd like that, wouldn't you? Like to get out of all your marital duties.’
She tensed. Was he going to demand that she share his bed? Because she w
ouldn't. Whatever he said or did, she would not lie with him willingly again. She couldn’t bear him to touch her and she wasn’t risking him fathering another child on her, for it was hard enough to feed the one they had got.
‘Don't worry. I don't want to touch you! But I do think it's about time you helped me.’
‘What do you want me to do?’ she asked, puzzled.
‘See that chap for me - il Conte.’
‘Why?’
‘He's getting a bit nasty, that's why. We'll see if you can soften his heart a little. Play the poor little woman, who can't feed her child. That might get to him. Though I wouldn't rely on his being sympathetic. He's no gentleman, I can tell you, whatever stupid Italian title he gives himself!’
‘Do you - owe him money?’
‘Some. Nothing I can't pay off, if he'll only give me more time.’
Her heart sank.
‘So,’ he said, with what she recognised as assumed casualness, ‘you'll have to go and see him for me tomorrow. It's a long way up that hill. It'd make me cough.’ He avoided her eyes. ‘And anyway, your Italian is quite good now. Think of that damned brat. Play on il Conte’s conscience.’
She was horrified. ‘I won’t go! Why should I? The debt is your concern.’
‘Will you not, madam? Will you not?’ He raised his fist to her. ‘You'll do as you're told!’
She backed away. ‘But I don't even know the man, Robert! And it's you who owes him money!’
‘Doesn't matter. Wear something pretty. That green thing. Go and weep buckets all over him.
I'll look after the boy.’
‘No.’
‘You will go, you know. He's expecting you. I sent him a message. And he replied to it. He's expecting you tomorrow at three.’
They argued for a while longer, then he turned violent and started to hit her. She could hear Harry sobbing quietly in his room, and in the end she capitulated, for the boy's sake, and also because she didn't want to move from Serugia. But she didn't leave Harry with his father. She would never trust Robert again. She left the boy with Francesca and, face burning with embarrassment, she asked her to hide Harry if his father came looking for him. Thank goodness, her friend couldn’t see the bruises on her body.
Francesca watched her walk away up the hill. ‘Poverina!’ she said without thinking.
‘Papa è cattivo!’ announced Harry, whose Italian was coming along fast. ‘Picchia la mamma.’
‘To think a child of his age should know such things!’ Francesca told her husband later. ‘What a villain that man is! He’s been beating her.’
Helen arrived at the palazzo, feeling ashamed as well as hot and tired. It was a hard pull up the hill and she knew her face was red and her skirt dusty, though she tried to shake off the worst of the clinging white dust before she went in. There was no one at the tiny gatehouse, so she walked slowly and reluctantly up the drive to the big house. She summoned up her indignation at having to come here and that helped overcome her embarrassment and her strong desire to run away.
At the big house, she pulled briskly on the bell. ‘La signora Perriman,’ she said loftily to the footman who opened the door.
He grinned, a knowing grin that sent a shiver of apprehension up her spine. Did even the servants know why she’d come? To her surprise he led her towards the stairs and she hesitated for a moment. Surely the salone couldn't be up there?
‘Il Conte L'attende,’ said the man, using the polite form of address, but still leering at her in a way that was definitely not polite.
She hesitated, then followed him, but stopped dead on the threshold when he tried to show her into a bedroom. ‘No!’
Without more ado, he pushed her inside, threw a piece of folded paper after her and slammed the door.
She heard a key turn in the lock and with a gasp of horror, she ran across to bang on the door and shout to be let out. It was a very solid door and didn't even shake under her blows. Nor was there any noise from the other side of it.
Catching her breath on a sob, she flew across the room to the window, but that, too, was locked. What was Robert up to now?
As she turned round and began to pace up and down the room, the crackle of paper underfoot reminded her that the footman had thrown a piece of paper at her. She bent to pick it up, smoothed it out and icy horror shivered along her veins. The paper bore Robert's handwriting. Why should he need to write her a note when she had just seen him? It was a moment before she could bring herself to spread it out and read the message.
If you want to stay in Serugia, be sensible for once. Think of Harry and be kind to the Count. R.
He’d underlined the word ‘kind’. Disgust and panic held her motionless, then she looked at the large bed and had to gulp back a sob. She didn’t want to believe that Robert would offer his own wife in payment for his debts, but he’d broached the matter before and why else would she have been sent to the palazzo and locked in this bedroom?
She walked across the room to rattle the handle of the big french window that led out on to the balcony, but it held firm. Should she try to break a pane of glass? But she couldn’t see a key on the other side, so what good would that do? For a moment, she leaned her head against the coolness of the glass, but she couldn’t seem to think clearly.
When a voice spoke behind her and she jumped in shock and twisted round.
‘He say you shy, but not that you go back on your word.’
A thin, grey-haired gentleman whom she recognised as il Conte, though she had never spoken to him, stood there. He inclined his head as she stared at him.
How had he got in? She looked round, saw an open door behind a curtain, connecting the room to another one and with a sob of desperation, she ran towards it, only to be tripped up by the long cane upon which the Conte had been leaning. She lay there for a moment, winded, then struggled to her feet, keeping as far away from him as she could.
‘Please - why have I been brought here? I don't understand.’
He frowned at her, looking intently at her face. Something he saw there made the frown deepen. He rapped the cane on the floor. ‘There is something wrong, I think. Please to come with me.’ Seeing how she hesitated, he bowed to her. ‘We talk. I not touch you. Is some mistake, I think.’
She swallowed hard, then followed him next door into a sitting room. She sat where he indicated, her trembling hands clasped tightly together in her lap and waited for him to explain.
He limped across to another chair. ‘I sit, too. Bad leg.’ He studied her, still looking puzzled.
‘You are the wife of il signor Perriman?’
‘Yes.’
‘He send you here?’
‘Yes. To speak to you. About the money.’
‘Your husband owe me much money. Play cards. No luck. Say you pay in other ways.’
Helen blushed a fiery red. ‘I knew nothing of this, Conte, nothing!’ Her voice broke. ‘I can't believe that even he would do such a thing. Or that you would want a reluctant woman!’
‘I am bored. Is nice to have a young woman. But I do not,’ he struggled to find the right words,
‘take woman who not want me.’ A look of pride came on his face. ‘I never need to force women.’
She let out a long shuddering breath of relief. She believed him. Suddenly she couldn’t bear to look him in the face. Robert’s behaviour had embarrassed her so deeply she could only cover her face with her hands and try to hide the tears she could no longer hold back. ‘I'm ashamed, so very ashamed! And I have no money to give you.’
‘No.’ His voice was slow and thoughtful. ‘But I am a lonely man. You shall give me company instead. I like you to share a merenda with me - same as the English tea.’
She looked at him warily.
‘How old are you, signora?’ he asked gently, tapping the top of the cane with one fingertip.
‘Twenty-one, sir.’
‘And I am - near to sixty - and lame. My wife, she is dead long time. My daughters are marry
.
My son,’ he snapped his fingers in a gesture of dismissal, ‘he prefer to live in Roma. I have think -
you are like your husband. Ma non è vero. You are what the English call - a lady. Is true?’
She smiled reluctantly. ‘I was brought up a lady, Conte, but my family are very poor. And since my marriage I haven’t led the life of a lady.’
He nodded. ‘Not with that one. You make bad mistake, to marry him, I think.’
‘Yes.’
‘So. You teach English - and you sew to earn money for your child.’
He laughed at her surprise. ‘I stay home much, but news come to me. I know many thing. How much you charge for teach English?’
She named a modest sum. ‘Per hour, sir.’
‘Good. You come teach me - two times a week - speak English, take meal - two hours each time. I pay.’ He tapped her hand lightly with the end of the cane. ‘Not look like that. Is not trick to get you in bed. Bring the son too. We talk about,’ he shrugged, ‘life, books. You read much books?’
She felt suddenly more at ease with him. ‘When I can.’ Which was not often lately. You didn’t buy books when you could barely afford food.
His eye fell on a small table with a board set open on it. ‘You play chess?’ His voice did not sound hopeful, but he brightened visibly at her response.
‘Yes, sir. But I haven’t done so for a long time.’ Strangely, it had been her mother's one passion, chess, and the two women had played it sometimes when her father was out of the house.
‘Good.’
She shook her head. ‘I can’t come here like that, Conte. People will - will say - ’ She couldn’t finish the sentence and she could feel how flushed her face was.
His face fell. ‘Ah.’ He leaned his head on one side, like a bright-eyed bird, then snapped his fingers together and beamed at Helen. ‘I know. My housekeeper is very respectable. She sit with us, tell everyone what happen. Then all town know you are respectable. Maria play with boy. You talk English with me - play chess, too. I pay you for this.’
Helen bowed her head and tried to wipe away the tears that had filled her eyes at this offer.