The Italian House

by Teresa Crane

  Then they were, at last and thankfully, steaming through the snow-shrouded mountains of Switzerland. ‘What a pity, my dear,’ Milly Pilkington said. ‘We must part. You are certain you can’t take a few days’ break from your journey to stay with us? The Thorncrofts have plenty of room, and I know they’d welcome another house-guest.’

  ‘No. Thank you, but no. I can’t.’ Carrie was exhausted. They had slept fully clothed; she felt rumpled and grubby. She had spent the night in an uneasy, dozing half-sleep, the rhythmic clacking of wheel and rail always on the edge of consciousness, the narrow bunk hard and uncomfortable, the small, airless cabin too hot. She waved the Pilkingtons off with what she knew to be an ungrateful relief.

  She was glad to travel through the majestic mountains in daylight, even though the day was grey, the light dull. Free at last from Milly Pilkington’s exhausting attentions she allowed herself now the indulgence of contemplating her journey’s end. The house was waiting for her, nestling in the chestnut woods on its hillside above Bagni. Safely tucked into an envelope in her bag was the key the Italian lawyer – a Signor Bellini – had sent to Mr Bagshaw; a simple iron key, black painted and worn. She loved the feel of it in her hand. As through torrential mountain rain the train slid smoothly into the Swiss side of the St Gotthard Tunnel, she felt the rise of excitement; the next skies she saw would be the skies of Italy. A couple of hours later they would be past the lakes and in Milan. And surely, as they moved on south, the weather would improve, at least a little?

  It did not; in fact, if anything, it got worse. She saw little or nothing of the lakes; the view was lost in shifting sheets of windswept rain, the waters were grey and stormy. Villages huddled in sodden misery beneath the downpour, oxcarts and donkeys plodded along the streaming lanes and tracks, their stoically hunched drivers or riders quite often swathed in sacking in a futile attempt to keep dry.

  Tired, and with the beginnings of a faint but nagging headache, she dozed, fitfully.

  The train steamed noisily into the industrial sprawl of Milan early in the afternoon, scheduled to stop for ten minutes before continuing on to Parma and Bologna. The station was busy, noisy with announcements she could barely heat through the closed window, and would not have been able to understand if she had. Ten minutes passed. Then another ten. Half an hour later the train still had not moved. Opposite her sat a smartly dressed, middle-aged Englishman who had disclosed in the few words of stilted conversation they had exchanged since the Swiss border that he was bound for Bologna on business. He frowned now, leaning towards the window, peering along the platform.

  ‘Is something wrong, do you think?’ Carrie asked, hesitantly.

  ‘My dear, this is Italy. And this is a train. I would be extremely surprised if there weren’t something wrong. As a matter of fact I’m surprised we’ve got this far. I’d better go and find out what’s happening.’

  She waited for him, a little nervously. Rain dripped from the canopies above the station, pooled muddily on the platform. People jostled ill-temperedly.

  Five minutes later her travelling companion was back, his expression a mixture of resignation and exasperation. ‘We have to change trains, I’m afraid.’

  ‘But – my ticket was booked through to Parma. I was told there were no connections after Lucerne—’

  ‘My dear, as I said before, this is Italy. What someone tells you in a nice cosy ticket office in London tends to have about as much relevance to what actually happens within the Italian rail network as it has to the price of fish or the length of a piece of string. Don’t worry. If there’s a train, we’ll find it. Come, they’re unloading the baggage – best to be there.’

  ‘If?’ Carrie asked, faintly. ‘If there’s a train?’

  He smiled at her encouragingly. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said again, ‘I’m sure there is. Somewhere.’

  The next two hours were amongst the most miserable Carrie had ever spent anywhere. The station, for no obvious reason, was in chaos. They were shuffled from pillar to post, from one cold and draughty platform to another. Had it not been for the fortunate circumstance that her new friend – for certainly, after the first exhausting hour that was how she came to view him – had a very reasonable working knowledge of the Italian language she would have had little idea of what was going on, or why; as it was there was little by way of excuse or explanation for the delay. A lifted shoulder, an expressive wave of a hand was all that most enquiries elicited.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ her companion, whom she now knew to be a Mr Robert Gowrie, reassured her for at least the sixth time and over yet another thick, dark coffee purchased from the trolley that trundled dispiritedly up and down the long platforms. ‘We’ll get you to Parma. Eventually.’ He smiled, drily. ‘Perhaps even today.’

  She did not like to tell him that what now bothered her most was what she would do, alone and unaided, after she reached Parma. It had seemed a simple matter, to disembark from one train and to join another that would take her to her final destination; now, suddenly, nothing was that straightforward. In the fly-spotted and damp-marked mirror in the Ladies’ Waiting Room she gazed at her reflection in near despair. Her reflection gazed back; sallow, dishevelled and weary. Her eyes ached abominably; she felt as if she had not slept in a week. It hardly seemed possible that it was a bare twenty-four hours since she had left Arthur standing on the platform of safe, sane Victoria Station. Half-heartedly she tried to tuck the dark, straight strands of hair that had fallen about her face back under the rim of her hat; abandoned the attempt as a miserable failure. She took a long breath. Here she was. There was no way but forward. She lifted her chin, and with a bravado she had not known she possessed made no further attempt to tidy herself but pushed her way back through the crowds to rejoin Mr Gowrie.

  ‘We’re in luck,’ he said, briskly. ‘It seems there is a train. In the inevitable ten minutes. Fingers crossed, my dear; we may be on our way.’

  Half an hour later they were, though slowly. The train meandered in its own time through the drenched, flat and uninteresting landscape of the Po Valley, stopping at the most wayward of halts. Occasionally, towards the south and through the steady rain, Carrie caught a glimpse of the distant Apennines, the mountain range that stood between this wide, pancake-flat, fertile valley and her destination. They loomed in moving mist, and disappeared like an enchantment, by turn enticing and terrifying.

  ‘Mrs Stowe?’ Mr Gowrie leaned forward and tapped her knee. She jerked awake. ‘Parma,’ he said, gently. ‘We’re nearly there.’

  ‘Ah.’ Clearly, her panic must have shown upon her face.

  ‘It’s all right.’ The words carried the affection of camaraderie, of dangers and confusions shared. ‘If I have to keep this damned train waiting for an hour I’ll see you on your way.’

  He was as good as his word. He armed her with timetables, platform numbers, lists of phrases. He enlisted the help of a small, cheerful and rotund porter who had a blessed if sketchy vocabulary of English, checked her baggage, bought her ticket. ‘At La Spezia you take the train for Bagni di Lucca. You won’t be there before late evening, I’m afraid. You can manage now?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you. I’m so grateful.’

  He smiled, lifted his hat. ‘It’s no trouble, Mrs Stowe. No trouble at all. Good luck.’

  She watched his retreating figure as an exile must watch the retreating shores of home.

  ‘Signora?’ Her rotund porter beamed at her, jerked his head. ‘Il treno ees ’ere.’

  ‘Thank you. Yes. I’m coming.’

  *

  The mountains, like the lakes, were hidden from her by the rain. With a self-possession born of desperation she manoeuvred herself and her suitcases from one train to another at La Spezia; and for once the gods smiled upon her. This time there really was a train in ten minutes. It was a very slow train. It stopped at all stations down the long, winding valley: tiny village halts, road crossings, the odd small town that spread, clinging like ivy, up the mountainside
. A river ran, churning and muddied over its rocky bed, in full spate alongside the tracks. Wind battered the windows and the mountaintops were lost in cloud. Totally exhausted Carrie dozed, and jumped awake, frightened, fearful she had missed her stop.

  And then, at last, there it was. Bagni di Lucca. Not a large station, but well lit and somehow welcoming, despite the weather. The end of the journey.

  She stood by her two scuffed and dilapidated suitcases, buffeted by the wind, as the train, hissing and steaming, pulled away into the gathering dusk.

  ‘Signora?’

  She turned. A tall thin man in something approximating a uniform executed a small and sloppy salute. ‘You want to get to hotel,’ he said; a statement rather than a question. ‘It’s late, but I help. My brother, he waits outside.’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘No, I’m not going to a hotel.’

  He raised his eyebrows and cocked his head enquiringly, waiting.

  ‘But, if your brother would take me to the house…?’

  ‘He will take you anywhere, Signora. Anywhere.’ He spread long hands and smiled disarmingly, ‘For a small fee of course.’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course.’

  He picked up her suitcases as if they weighed nothing at all. ‘Where you go? You stay with the good Mrs Johnston-Smith? Many young ladies from England stay with Mrs Johnston-Smith, or perhaps Signora Webber? Ah yes, she too has many visitors.’

  She hurried along the platform beside him. She had long since given up trying to keep her hat on, and had stuffed it into her pocket. The wind whipped her flying hair across her face. ‘No. No, I want to go to the Villa Castellini. It’s near San Marco. Do you know it?’

  They had entered the small, bright booking hall. He stopped, looking at her in surprise. ‘You go up the mountain? Tonight?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He shook his head. ‘Not a good idea, Signora. The weather – it’s wild.’

  ‘I can see that.’ The words were wry.

  ‘And the mountain tracks – they’re dangerous in the rain. You go to hotel. For tonight. Then, tomorrow, you go up the mountain to this house.’ He looked pleased with himself to have solved her dilemma so satisfactorily. ‘I fetch my brother.’

  ‘No, please—’ she put out a hand to detain him. The journey had cost her much more than she – or rather Arthur – had budgeted for; to spend even one night in a hotel would stretch her sketchy resources even further. Before she had boarded the train at La Spezia she had purchased bread and cheese, cooked meat and fruit. ‘I really must go to the house tonight.’

  ‘Signora, I know a good hotel. Very cheap.’ He spoke as a reasonable man in an unreasonable world. ‘Believe me. It’s not good to go up the mountain tonight.’

  Quite unexpectedly, her patience snapped. She was tired, and cold, and not a little scared at the prospect of arriving at the empty house in the dark. To stand and argue about it with a stranger, however well meaning, was the last thing she needed. ‘Good or not,’ she said, shortly, ‘I’m going.’ She reached a hand for her suitcase.

  He somehow managed to hold on to the suitcase and shrug at the same time. ‘Very well, Signora, if you insist. Come. We talk to my brother. But I tell you, he will say the same.’

  They stepped outside into the teeth of the gale. Rain swept along the empty street. Shutters clattered and crashed. A wooden bench set outside a bar had overturned, and an empty can rattled along the pavement, as if kicked by an invisible child. Water ran bubbling in the gutters. Within a few steps Carrie was drenched. She turned her collar up about her ears, pulled the scarf from around her neck and battled to tie it over her blowing hair. The man led her a little way along the street, shouldered open a door. ‘Eh, Mario!’

  Carrie followed him, and found herself in a small bar, where several men were sitting around an oilcloth-covered table playing cards.

  ‘Eh, Mario,’ her escort said again. ‘Una cliente.’

  One of the players turned; a burly, unshaven man with wiry dark hair.

  Carrie’s self-appointed guardian spoke swiftly in Italian, indicating Carrie with a jerk of his head as he spoke. The cardplayers watched her. Self-consciously she scraped the sodden strands of hair from her cheeks. Mario listened, grunted, shook his head.

  The other man put down the suitcases the better to use his hands as he spoke again.

  Mario flicked a glance at Carrie, shrugged, and shook his head again, answering his brother in a few sharp words.

  The man turned to Carrie. ‘He says – you see – the weather, it’s too bad. It’s not good to go up the mountain tonight.’

  Suddenly, infuriatingly, Carrie felt the unwelcome and embarrassing rise of tears. In all her dreams of her arrival at the Villa Castellini nothing like this had ever figured. The stresses of the past twenty-four hours had been bad enough; to find herself now stranded here, alone, with little money and with no readily apparent means of reaching the house was almost too much for her. Obstinately she gritted her teeth. ‘Please,’ she said, ‘tell him I’ll pay.’

  He shook his head. ‘He won’t.’

  A chair scraped as one of the cardplayers stood up. He was an older man, thick-set, his square face lined and weather beaten. ‘I take her,’ he said, unsmiling.

  Relief almost made Carrie dizzy. ‘You will? Oh, thank you. Thank you so much.’

  He held out a large, dirty hand, palm up.

  It took Carrie a moment to understand what the gesture meant. Then, hastily, she opened her bag, took a handful of coins from her purse, dropped them into the calloused palm. The stubby fingers curled a little, encouragingly. The hand remained outstretched. She reached into her purse again.

  Mario spoke explosively, making a fierce, almost threatening movement with his hand. The older man ignored him. Calmly he stowed the money in his pocket, picked up the cases.

  ‘Come,’ he said to Carrie, as he passed her.

  *

  The weather on the mountain was indeed wild. Carrie huddled within the oilskin cape provided by her taciturn driver as the donkey, an animal of skin and bone, toiled up the steep and winding track. Beneath them the lights of Bagni glittered wetly through the tossing branches of the trees, strung out along the churning river like a bright necklace. The wind was bitterly cold.

  ‘How far?’ Carrie turned her wet face to the driver, raising her voice above the storm. It was almost completely dark now. The lamps on either side of the little cart guttered and gleamed.

  The man shrugged.

  ‘Where is the house? Can we see it from here?’

  He shook his head. ‘No. In a moment, perhaps.’

  She subsided, shivering, beneath the cold, heavy oilskin that smelled mustily of donkey.

  ‘There,’ the driver called. ‘The Villa Castellini.’ He lifted an arm, pointed upwards. She turned her head. They had come to a fork in the track. Ahead she could see the dim, clustered lights of San Marco. Above her the hillside climbed steeply, and against it she saw the dark bulk of the house. For a moment, through the storm-tossed woodlands she imagined she saw a light; but when she had rubbed the streaming rain from her eyes and looked again, it was gone. It must, she thought, have been a reflection – perhaps of the lamplit village ahead.

  The whip cracked. The tired animal turned in a wide arc, head down, and began to pull up the steep and slippery stony track. A few moments later they were swinging through tall, rusted wrought-iron gates, set permanently ajar. Water gushed like a stream about the donkey’s hooves. The wind shrieked, and a shutter banged monotonously. Carrie’s silent companion manoeuvred the cart expertly in the small area in front of the house and drew up at the foot of the steps that led to the front door. Stiffly Carrie clambered from her seat. The driver made no attempt to assist her, but splashed down onto the gravel himself, swinging her suitcases from the cart and setting them on the step.

  ‘Thank you.’ With fingers that were clumsy with cold Carrie fumbled in her bag for the key. ‘Would you, would you wait for a moment �
� just until I get the door open?’ She hated the tremor in her voice, knew how close it came to a plea.

  He grunted something that did not sound too unhelpful, then unhitched one of the lamps from the cart and brought it to the door. By its light Carrie fitted the key into the lock, and the door swung open. She stepped into the high-ceilinged hall, grateful to be out of the wind, though draughts whispered coldly. The driver held up the light. On a nearby table stood a lamp. Unspeaking he fished in his pocket, pulled out a box of matches. Carrie watched as with short, stubby fingers he removed the glass shade and set a match to the wick. To her surprise and relief the flame caught immediately, flared, and steadied. He set the shade back upon it, started to put the matches back in his pocket and then, abruptly, offered them to her.

  ‘Th—thank you.’ Why hadn’t she thought of matches? ‘Thank you,’ she said, again. And then, a little shyly, ‘Grazie.’

  ‘Prego.’ He turned to the door, hesitated for a moment, turned his square, lined face to her. ‘You sure? You stay here?’

  ‘Yes. I’m sure.’ She wasn’t sure. She wasn’t sure at all.

  He nodded. ‘Then I go.’

  ‘Yes. Thank you. Thank you for bringing me.’ There was a smell – a tang – in the air that she could not identify. She looked around. Four doors and a curving staircase that swept into darkness; the entrance hall at least was just as she remembered it. The door behind the staircase led to the small hallway that in turn led to the kitchen, she was certain of it. Her companion went back to the door, hesitated again.