Left outside, Justine and Dido sat down on a stone bench that ran along the foot of the building opposite Louisa’s shop. Dido put an arm through Justine’s. ‘This is nice,’ she said.
‘Yes,’ said Justine, waiting. There was a pause.
Dido sighed. ‘Mum used to take me shopping,’ she said, hesitantly. ‘She – she’d just started taking me to the places she bought her own stuff. I think she was fed up with me pinching it.’ She looked up at Justine. ‘When – when they found her, I went up to her room, I got a jersey out of her drawer and – I put my face in it. It smelled of her, you see. It was a red one, mohair. I always wanted it.’ She looked up at Justine, her eyes liquid.
Justine felt some memory tug at her. She nodded, thinking of the smell of her father’s top drawer, peppermints and tobacco, and pulled Dido a bit closer. ‘It’ll get better,’ she said, stroking her hair. ‘Eventually’
They both fell silent for a while, leaning against the cool, rough stone of the wall and looking at the passers-by; the narrow street was busy now. At the far end of their bench two elderly ladies, elegant in navy blue and dark glasses, had found a spot in the sun and were enjoying a leisurely conversation.
Then Dido spoke. ‘When you said – Mum was unhappy. Must have been unhappy. You’re right. She stopped – she stopped enjoying things. Shopping, painting, you know. But I thought she was getting better. When she – when she went. She’d been fine for ages.’
‘Mmm,’ said Justine, thinking. It was true, that last time, that summer evening, she really had seemed fine. Listened carefully, as she always did, to what was happening in Justine’s life. Justine nodded. ‘Was there anything in particular? That made you think things were improving?’
Dido shrugged a little, looking down at her hands in her lap, and Justine couldn’t see her expression. ‘She bought a dress,’ she said, slowly. ‘A summer dress, and some shoes to match it, red suede sandals, with high heels.’
‘The kind of thing you might buy for a holiday,’ Justine mused, half to herself. A summer holiday?’
Dido didn’t raise her head. ‘Except we didn’t go away anywhere. I never saw her wear it, after she brought it home, that first time. It wasn’t in the stuff we – we gave away. After.’ She looked away, up the street, her face still averted.
‘I just wish – you can’t help wanting to know, but Dad goes over it and over it in his head, I know he does. He wants to know why. Whose fault it was. But she’s not coming back, what good’s it going to do him? I just want it to be over.’
‘Yes,’ said Justine. ‘I can see that.’ She was looking ahead, at the plate-glass window glittering with shoes, but not focussing on them, nor on Louisa, emerging from the door with a bag. She was thinking of how it must be for the two of them, Dido and Martin, alone in that house.
‘Does he think it was his fault?’ she asked, carefully.
Dido looked puzzled. ‘Why would you think that?’ she said, slowly. ‘I – no. I don’t think so. Maybe sometimes… ‘her voice tailed off, and she bit her lip. ‘He never – he never did anything to hurt Mum.’
Justine felt sorry, sure she’d upset her, now. ‘No – it’s nothing,’ she said quickly. ‘It was a stupid thing to say’ She paused, looking at Dido’s small, downcast face.
‘I think we all want it to be over, not just you.’ she said. ‘It will be. Sooner or later.’
‘How long are you staying then, caro?’ Anna asked carefully. They stood at the bar at Il Cinghiale, waiting for their espresso, on their way home for lunch. At their feet were a couple of bags of shopping; four fat slices of sbricciolona from Giovannino’s cabinet in greaseproof wrapping, half a dozen eggs, some apples, flour, meat. A handsome bunch of grapes sweet enough for Anna to smell them through their damp paper wrapping, a head of garlic, some big red tomatoes, soft and splitting with ripeness at the end of their season.
It was nice, Anna thought in a moment of uncharacteristic weakness as she waited for her son’s reply, to have him here. It was much easier to have someone to stand shoulder to shoulder with her when Giovannino gave her that look. Paolo had not said, in fact, when he planned to return to Rome and she had not wanted to raise it with him for fear of sounding clinging.
‘Oh, at least until the weekend,’ said Paolo, slowly. ‘Maybe Sunday morning? Depending on the weather, of course. It seemed a long time since I was last here for more than a night, I just thought…’ He was thinking of his empty flat, the pile of crumpled shirts on the ironing board, the cold stove. The longer he stayed away, the less he wanted to return.
Anna laughed. ‘I’m not complaining,’ she said. ‘Stay forever, if you want.’ He looked at her.
‘Well,’ he said, and there was something in his tone that caused Anna to glance up at him sharply.
‘What?’ she said.
‘I’m thinking of leaving the hospital,’ Paolo said quickly. ‘Maybe trying for another position closer to you, like Siena perhaps.’
‘Why on earth…?’ Anna was incredulous. She knew how hard he had worked to get to his position in the hospital hierarchy, how many years of obsequy to his superiors he had endured, how many night shifts on casualty.
Paolo sighed. ‘Mama, I worry about you out here on your own. I don’t see enough of you, and you’re all I’ve got, after all.’
Anna sighed, and raised her eyes to heaven. ‘Not that, again,’ she said. ‘Paolo, I’m perfectly capable of looking after myself. And as for being all you’ve got, I know what you’re trying to say’ She looked down the bar at Giovannino, who was polishing glasses and pretending not to listen. She didn’t attempt to lower her voice. ‘I didn’t set out to deprive you of a father, you know That’s just the way things worked out, and I’ve never lied to you about him, not once.’
Paolo made an exasperated noise. ‘Not lying is one thing,’ he said, turning his back so that he didn’t have to watch Giovannino craning his neck, and facing his mother. And not telling the whole truth is another. If you tell me he’s dead, then I believe you. But – I don’t think you understand what it’s like, not knowing anything, nothing at all. Whether he was dark or fair, tall or short or fat – nothing. A good man, or – or not.’ He saw her frown, as though she hadn’t thought about it this way before, and he marvelled that he hadn’t dared say it, either.
‘I don’t mean right this minute,’ Paolo said, as he saw her catch the barman’s eye over his shoulder, warning him off. ‘But – sometime. We’re both getting old now, you know, me as well as you, and one way or another, soon it will be too late.’ He looked as if what he was saying caused him pain.
Anna looked at her son sadly, because she knew he was right about that, at least.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Let me think about it.’ She looked about her with agitation, as if she was feeling herself somehow trapped, there in the warm dark bar, smelling of roast meat and herbs and grinding coffee, filled with her own countrymen, most of whom she had known since she was born, or they were born. Paolo looked at her with resignation, aware that she had not answered him, once again. To some it might have seemed odd that Paolo had asked this question so many times, phrased differently, over so many years, and still he had not received an answer; not, however, to those who knew his mother.
Anna looked back at Paolo. ‘Don’t give up your job, caro. It wouldn’t be good for you to move out here, not now. You know what I mean, don’t you? Your wife leaves, and you just go home to mother.’ Paolo looked uncomfortable. She went on. ‘You won’t find happiness that way, you know. And I’m not just changing the subject, either.’
Paolo smiled, despite himself. ‘You could be right, mama,’ he said. ‘You usually are. OK, I won’t move back in. Not yet, anyway’ He tried a joke, admitting defeat. ‘But there are some mothers who would give their right arm for the offer, you know’
Anna gave him a sardonic look. ‘Are there indeed?’ she said. ‘Sorry to disappoint you.’
Shaking his head, Paolo laughed, and th
ey walked out into the autumn sunshine, arm in arm.
14
The terrace at Rivoire was almost full when they arrived dish of olives andin the Piazza della Signoria, breathless and weighed down with carrier bags. The piazza itself was humming with life, and at first they couldn’t see any of the others at the yellow-clothed tables. The clientele was about half and half foreigners and Italians, but they all seemed well heeled. The Italians, it seemed to Justine, stood out a mile; men in linen and dark glasses, honey-skinned women with gold jewellery, obedient children with white collars and shiny hair drinking milk. The foreigners were more of a mixed bag, indecorous, garish, with their designer shorts and pink faces, in front of them extravagant ice-cream concoctions with flags and wafers or litre jugs of beer.
A couple of beautifully dressed, deeply tanned Italian women drinking mineral water on a front table looked the three of them up and down as they stood scanning the bar’s terrace. From their discreetly logo-ed sunglasses to their manicured feet in high-heeled sandals’ the women were finished in every detail, and the look they gave the English group was not so much hostile as disbelieving, as though they were wondering what kind of people would want to come to the smartest bar in Florence looking as they did. Justine had to remind herself of her purchases sitting, folded in tissue, at the bottom of the shiny bags; she could feel the first creeping approach of regret already, in anticipation of what Lucien might say. She closed her eyes for a second, imagining herself again as that different person she had seen in the tiny shop. And, after all, she surprised herself by thinking, it’s my money.
Justine looked up again and suddenly she saw Lucien, sitting on the far side of the terrace. At least she recognized his shoulder, because he was turned away from them and engaged in conversation with someone on the next table. He was good at that kind of thing, casual intimacy had always come easily to Lucien, chatting to strangers, as long as he liked the look of them. She called out to him, his head turned towards the sound of her voice and for a fleeting moment she saw a curious expression flicker across his face, a kind of blankness, as though he did, recognize her. But then he smiled and waved, and with a curious sensation of relief Justine waved back. She saw heads turning towards Lucien, and she remembered how people looked at him, and she felt she had been uncharitable. She was lucky to have him, after all.
‘Come on,’ she said to the others, ‘ther’s Lucien.’
‘God’ I’m gasping for a drink,’ said Louisa, as they made their way between the crowded tables. ‘I wonder where Tom is?’
‘And Dad,’ said Dido, looking around. ‘But it’s not even seven yet.’
Lucien had a martini glass in front of him, and a small dish of olives and canapés. ‘You won’t believe the prices,’ he said, as they sat down. ‘Talk about a tourist trap. I’d stick to coffee and mineral water, if I were you.’
‘Certainly not,’ said Louisa indignantly, and Justine, who had been prepared to give in and have a mineral water, felt her spirits lift. ‘I think I’ll have what you had, thanks, Lucien,’ Louisa went on. And she lifted a hand high in the air to summon a waiter.
‘What have you got there?’ Lucien said to Justine, peering down at her bags. He sounded querulous. ‘Oh,’ she said, blushing, ‘just a couple of things. Not expensive, really.’
‘It’s crazy,’ he said, sighing. ‘Just because you’re on holiday’ you’re suckered into thinking you have to buy stuff.’
Justine opened her mouth to remonstrate with him, to point out the bags that Lucien had stacked beside his own chair, but the words evaporated unspoken in the soft evening air and the gentle murmur of conversation around them. She found she could, be bothered.
‘Ther’s Tom,’ said Dido, and pointed. He was wading towards them through the crowded square, even more dishevelled than usual and with an ice-cream-smeared boy clinging to each arm. He looked tired and pale.
‘Oh, God,’ said Lucien, ‘they’ll never let them sit down looking like that.’ He looked uneasily round at the waiter approaching them.
‘Oh’ shut up’ Lucien, ‘said Dido suddenly, and stood up and waved. Tom! Over here!’ And sat down again’, grinning. ‘Can I have some wine?’ she asked.
Louisa looked dubious.
‘Go on,’ Dido said. ‘Dad lets me.’
Louisa sighed. ‘Half a glass,’ she said. ‘With water in it.’
Tom and the boys arrived while they were ordering from the waiter who, although he appeared slightly taken aback by their number and appearance did not, as Lucien had predicted, order them off the premises.
‘A martini, yes, please,’ said Tom, his spirits seeming to lift as he sat down heavily in the wicker chair. Lucien, looking disapproving, asked for a mineral water.
‘I’m paying,’ said Tom, looking across at Lucien a little sharply and although Lucien did not change his order in receipt of this information he did look put out. The boys clamoured for Coke’ and Lucien pursed his lips.
The waiter, a small, business-like professional with a damask napkin over his forearm and a deep tan, took their order and departed, and the group sat back and looked out over the busy piazza. Tom sighed, and Justine looked at him. If a little weary, he seemed contented enough now; perhaps it was the pleasurable anticipation of the first drink of the evening, and in such a beautiful place.
And it was beautiful, suddenly; the ceaseless human traffic they had battled against all day now seemed a happy sight, so many motivated people in close proximity, all with somewhere to go and someone to talk to. Opposite the bar’s terrace on the far side of the piazza loomed the honeyed stone and tall, crenellated tower of the Palazzo Vecchio, asserting the power of government. Massive and benign in the dusk, the battlements were warmed and softly lit by the last rays of the sun as it set and the tiny, shadowy shapes of bats were beginning to dance around the tower in the fading light. Looking up over the many heads at the ranked clover-leaf windows and bright flags inset in the great façade the palace seemed to Justine to mute the noise of the crowd into an agreeable hum, dwarfing them into insignificance in its shadow.
The terrace was a pleasant place to be; it caught the last of the sun as it sank behind the pale arcades of the Uffizi and seemed at the centre of all the evening life of the city. Under the table Justine could feel the crisp, reassuring shape of her purchases, expensive carrier bag, the tablecloth was clean and ironed, at the next table a honeymoon couple in their Sunday best were drinking champagne, and all around them was the happy murmur of relaxation and the clink of glasses.
Dido was sitting beside Justine, hands across her stomach, looking happy. Her face, flushed after a day walking in and out of the sun was, Justine realized, just like Evie’s when Justine had first met her, her cheekbones prominent but still softened by youth and a suggestion of plumpness. Only her thick, dark eyebrows were like Martin’s, and a certain seriousness in her look, although that was something she had gained from her experience of life rather than either parent. Just now, however, everything about Dido seemed more relaxed than she had been since they arrived, and Justine suddenly felt optimistic that the holiday might, after all, turn out to have the desired effect.
The drinks arrived, and suddenly their little tablecloth disappeared under frosted glasses viscous with alcohol and spiked with olives, and dishes of canapés, tiny sandwiches, salatini, cashews. In their excitement at the sight of so much Coke the boys rushed the table, overturned a bowl of crisps and were banished to play in the piazza.
‘They’ll be all right,’ said Tom wearily, and Louisa, who had been about to protest, closed her mouth again. As one, they reached for their drinks in the moment of blissful calm that followed.
Dido tentatively took a sip of her wine and water and grimaced. ‘I wonder where Dad is?’ she said, frowning, as carefully she replaced the glass on the table.
Tom blinked. ‘Oh,’ he said slowly, remembering. ‘Sorry, he called me.’ He pulled out a battered mobile, and looked at it as if it might remind him
of what Martin had said. ‘He wanted the address of the restaurant, he’s run into someone, and he wanted to meet us there, later.’ Justine saw Lucien look up’ and for a moment she felt an involuntary twinge of dislike for the expression she saw there, something like superiority and avid curiosity carefully but not quite perfectly concealed. It was as though he knew something he didn’t intend to share.
‘Martin’s got your mobile number?’ said Louisa.
‘He asked for it before we left England,’ said Tom. ‘In case one of us got lost en route breakdowns that kind of thing. You know Martin, he’s organized.’
Louisa nodded absent-mindedly, but it was obvious to Justine that in fact none of them knew Martin very well at all. And now that they were all here, in something approaching sociable congregation, and he was not, Martin’s difference from the rest of them seemed even more pronounced; a dark horse. Certainly Justine had not known he had friends in Florence, and by the puzzled look on Dido’s face she hadn’t either; she wondered who it might be. It seemed quite improbable to Justine that one might just happen across an acquaintance on holiday, on the one day they happened to choose to venture out of the woods. But just as she was speculating on the odds against such an encounter, something remarkable happened.
‘Lucien Elliott! God, is it you? What on earth are you doing here?’ A woman’s voice, piercing and unmistakably English, was raised over the hum of conversation on the terrace and several heads turned at once.
Just on the other side of the waist-high hedge of bay that divided the terrace from the passers-by, a small blonde woman had raised her arm and was fluttering her hand at them. Justine glanced across at Lucien, who was looking startled, and just a little evasive, she thought, although perhaps that was Justine’s imagination.
At first Justine had no idea who the woman was although as she looked a tiny chime of recognition began to sound. Bobbing eagerly towards the break in the hedge that would allow her on to the terrace, the newcomer was tiny, with sleek blonde hair to her chin, and wearing tight, sumptuous clothes, some kind of short, dark-red beaded T-shirt and minuscule velvet jeans that revealed the flat stomach of a twelve-year old. The surprise was her face; half concealed by the shining wings of streaked hair, it was, if not quite haggard, certainly a generation older than her body. Close behind the woman was a stocky, tanned man in an expensive linen jacket; on his face as he followed her was an expression of stolid resignation.
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