The Temptation of Gracie

by Santa Montefiore

  Colladoro’s paved streets were uneven, the stone worn away in places due to centuries of treading feet. The walls of the buildings glowed like rose gold in the late afternoon light and it seemed that everyone had come out of their houses to enjoy the coolest part of the day. Tourists browsed the boutiques, old men sat at café tables smoking and playing cards, young mothers gossiped while their children played and grandmothers huddled together on benches, complaining about the youth. Anastasia was drawn to the shop windows like a magpie to trinkets. Alex put his hands in his pockets and followed her patiently as she wandered from one to the other until she was finally lured inside.

  It was a small boutique with linen clothes hanging on rails and jewellery in glass cases. Alex was so tall he had to lower his head as he stepped through the door. A woman with a wizened face smiled at them and said something in Italian, waving her hands encouragingly. Anastasia went straight for the necklaces and bracelets made with silver and beads. ‘I want to buy something for my grandmother,’ she said, suddenly inspired. The thought of buying something for Gracie gave her a warm feeling inside.

  Alex joined her by the glass case. ‘Are you asking me for advice?’

  ‘Of course I am.’

  ‘What about something green to match her eyes?’

  Anastasia looked at him and laughed. ‘You’re very observant to notice her eyes.’

  ‘They’re the same colour as yours,’ he replied and there was something in the way he was looking at her that made her turn away, embarrassed.

  ‘So, let’s find a necklace in grey-green,’ she said, feeling the oncoming heat of a blush.

  Alex left her side to look in the other glass displays. The shopkeeper unlocked the cabinet and began to lift pieces out to show Anastasia. When she understood what Anastasia was looking for she hurried behind the counter and pulled out a tray. She put it on the glass with a big smile. It was full of shiny bead necklaces in every possible shade of green.

  ‘I defy you not to find one in there,’ said Alex, putting his hands in his pockets and wandering over to take a closer look.

  Anastasia’s fingers hovered over them indecisively. The shopkeeper lifted one off the tray and held it up to Anastasia’s face. From her gestures they both understood that she thought the green matched Anastasia’s eyes exactly. ‘She wants you to try it on,’ said Alex.

  ‘All right, but it’s not for me, remember. It’s for Granny.’ She sat down in front of the mirror on the counter. The shopkeeper gave the necklace to Alex.

  ‘Allow me to do the honours,’ he said, his lips curling into a typically wry smile. She lifted her hair off her neck and Alex hung the necklace at her throat and fixed it at the back. He looked at her reflection over her shoulder. ‘Well, she’s right about the colour,’ he said, grinning playfully. ‘It’s a match. It’s made for you.’

  Anastasia pulled a face in response to his teasing. ‘Do you think Granny would like it?’

  ‘I think your grandmother would be happy with anything you gave her. She looks like the sort of woman who appreciates a kind thought in whatever size or shape it comes.’

  ‘Then I’ll take it. Would you mind doing the honours again?’ she asked Alex, lifting her hair once more. Alex unclasped it. Anastasia felt his fingers brush the skin on the back of her neck and their eyes caught in the mirror. She looked away. ‘Granny is going to love this,’ she said, deflecting the intimacy that had suddenly inveigled its way into the moment.

  The shopkeeper dropped the necklace into a silky pouch and then the pouch into a paper bag and Anastasia left the boutique feeling very good about herself. She couldn’t wait to see her grandmother’s face when she gave it to her.

  Alex suggested they wander into the piazza and have a drink. The sun was a blood orange sinking behind the buildings. The piazza was bustling with people. Cafés spilled onto the paving stones beneath brightly coloured awnings and waiters and waitresses weaved languidly between the tables, stopping every now and then to chat. Dominating the town was an ancient church. Doves cooed on the bell tower and locals wandered in and out of the big doors along with the odd tourist with a camera. Alex and Anastasia chose a table with a good view of the square and sat in the sunshine.

  Anastasia lifted her phone out of her bag and took a photo of Alex. Satisfied with her snap she took some more. A grandfather with his grandson, feeding pigeons; a huddle of religious old women in black chatting outside the church; a beautiful young couple holding hands across the table and kissing as if they were the only two people in the world. Everything about Colladoro delighted Anastasia and she wanted to record it all so that when she was back at boarding school she would have photographs to remember it by as well as to put up on social media to impress her friends. With that in mind she suggested they take some selfies. Alex was very handsome and it would do her street-cred a lot of good to post pictures of them together. Alex rolled his eyes at her suggestion but he didn’t refuse. As she grinned into the camera he smiled ironically, cautious perhaps of making a fool of himself, Anastasia thought as she stuck out her tongue and made the V sign for victory. She didn’t want her friends to think she was taking herself too seriously, or being smug. They would want to know who Alex was and how she had met him and that gave her a kick. She would put it up on Facebook as soon as she returned to the castle.

  It was evening when they wandered back up the hill. The scent of flowers hung heavy in the air, sweet and earthy. Lights twinkled in windows, candles flickered on outside tables, and the first star shone through the darkening blue. The night was approaching and with it Giovanni in the pool house. Anastasia could barely contain her excitement. She laughed and joked with Alex and he teased her affectionately, and all the while she tingled with the anticipation of Giovanni’s touch.

  When they arrived at the castle most of the guests were already sitting on the terrace enjoying Mamma Bernadetta’s home-made wine and eating crostini. Carina and Lauren were deep in conversation while Rex was chatting up Wendy, Tiff and Brigitte, who were still tipsy and laughing raucously. To Anastasia’s delight her grandmother hadn’t come down yet. She hurried inside, hoping to get her on her own so she could give her the necklace. However, when she reached Gracie’s bedroom she found it was empty. As she closed the door Madeleine was sauntering slowly up the corridor towards her. She beamed at Anastasia. ‘Good, I thought I was going to be late,’ she said, rubbing her neck beneath her hair. ‘It is so hot. I’ve been for a lovely walk but I didn’t notice the time.’

  ‘I was looking for my grandmother. You haven’t seen her, have you?’ Anastasia asked.

  ‘Yes, she is on the lower terrace, talking to Mamma Bernadetta,’ Madeleine replied. ‘I will now go and have a cold shower. I will be down shortly.’

  Anastasia went back outside. Gracie was indeed on the lower terrace, at a small round table, with Mamma Bernadetta. The two old women were talking animatedly, and for a moment Anastasia thought her eyes were deceiving her because her grandmother didn’t normally use her hands when she spoke, and she wasn’t usually so vivacious. She listened more attentively, and then she realised that Gracie was speaking Italian, not in the faltering way most English people did, but fluently. Anastasia was stunned. Although she now knew that her grandmother had lived in Italy as a young woman, she hadn’t expected her to speak like a local. If she hadn’t known better she would have thought they were two elderly Italian ladies having a good old chin-wag.

  Anastasia approached. Mamma Bernadetta saw her first because she was facing her. She gave a small smile, which was the first time Anastasia had seen her smile. Then Gracie turned round. ‘Anastasia,’ she said and she still retained something of the lively Italian in the way her eyes sparkled. Mamma Bernadetta pushed herself off her chair and said something to Gracie before retreating inside.

  Anastasia took her chair. ‘That’s another secret of yours,’ she said, grinning at Gracie. ‘You speak fluent Italian. Why haven’t you ever told anyone? Why the secret?’
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br />   Gracie sighed and shrugged. ‘It’s complicated,’ she said, then changed the subject. ‘What have you been up to?’

  ‘I went into town with Alex.’

  Gracie smiled. ‘That’s nice,’ she said, wondering how the romance was going. She didn’t doubt there was a romance for Anastasia was glowing in the same way that she had once glowed and Rutger had commented on it.

  ‘I have a present for you,’ Anastasia replied, much to Gracie’s surprise. Anastasia felt a surge of pleasure at the astonished look on her grandmother’s face.

  ‘Oh, you mustn’t waste your money on me, dear,’ Gracie said, but she was touched that her granddaughter had.

  ‘It’s not wasting,’ Anastasia retorted. She pulled the gift out of her bag and gave it to Gracie.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Open it and see. I hope you like it.’ Anastasia watched with rising excitement as her grandmother lifted the silky pouch out of the paper bag and poured the beads into the palm of her hand.

  ‘Oh, it’s a necklace!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘It matches your eyes,’ said Anastasia.

  Gracie held it up. ‘It’s lovely, really lovely. How sweet of you.’

  ‘Let me help you put it on. It will go really well with your blouse.’ Anastasia stood to fix the clasp at the back of her neck, then sat down to admire it. ‘It brings out the green in your eyes.’

  ‘How thoughtful of you, dear.’

  ‘Take it from me, it’s perfect.’ Anastasia was pleased.

  Gracie ran her fingers over the beads, moved beyond words that her granddaughter had taken it upon herself to buy her a present. This child, who she barely knew, who had been more interested in her phone than in anyone else, had bothered to go into town and buy her old grandmother a present. Gracie felt the tears stinging behind her eyes. ‘Thank you, Anastasia.’

  Anastasia touched her grandmother’s hand. ‘It’s a pleasure,’ she said, feeling a little emotional herself. ‘Shall I show you my photographs? You really must go into town. It’s so pretty.’ She rummaged for her phone, which lay at the bottom of her bag, then put it on the table in front of Gracie. Anastasia flicked the screen and the photographs slid by in quick succession. When she got to the pictures in the piazza Gracie suddenly caught her breath. ‘Slow down,’ she said, looking closer. ‘I didn’t catch them.’ She dragged her finger across the screen as Anastasia had done and stopped at the photograph of the grandfather and grandson feeding the pigeons. She recognised him at once. Donato, still handsome, yet old now, as she was.

  ‘That man reminds me of someone,’ she said softly, swiping away the picture. ‘He was called Donato.’

  ‘Oh yes, you were going to tell me about him.’ Anastasia rubbed her hands together theatrically. ‘Goody, more secrets!’ she enthused.

  ‘Yes, many more secrets,’ said Gracie, excited to share them at last. ‘I was only nineteen, living with my uncle and learning to restore paintings. I loved Gaetano from afar, but I never imagined he would ever notice me. We were from very different worlds, he and I. He was aristocratic and wealthy. I was working class and had nothing. Donato was the town flirt. He had had his way with all the pretty girls and I was flattered when he wanted to have his way with me. I wasn’t beautiful, but I learned later that attraction has little to do with that. Donato found me mysterious. He liked the challenge. My heart was elsewhere, you see, and that made me aloof with him. It drove him mad. He sensed that I was never truly his. Then he asked me to marry him.’

  ‘He proposed?’ Anastasia was astonished. ‘Granny, you dark horse!’

  Gracie chuckled. ‘Poor Donato. I said I’d think about it. I knew I could be happy with him. I knew I should feel lucky to receive such an offer, but I didn’t. I just wanted Gaetano.’

  ‘So, what happened?’ Anastasia was impatient to get to the love story part.

  ‘Gaetano’s mother had inherited half a collection of paintings from her father and Rutger and I were summoned to value them, and restore the ones that needed restoring. It was during that week that I met Gaetano and got to know him.’

  ‘And he fell in love with you?’

  Gracie smiled wistfully and his image floated into her mind amid yellow sunflowers and crimson poppies. ‘He did,’ she said.

  ‘So where did it go wrong?’

  ‘I wasn’t just a restorer, Anastasia.’ Gracie looked at her granddaughter steadily and felt something of the young Gracie rattle the bones inside her, as if preparing to emerge.

  ‘What were you?’

  ‘A forger.’

  Anastasia frowned, disbelieving that her sweet and shy, law-abiding grandmother could possibly have had anything to do with such a thing. She grabbed her hand and stared at her with wide, incredulous eyes. ‘Are you telling me that you forged paintings?’

  ‘I am,’ Gracie replied and there was a part of her, buried deep, that was immensely proud of the fact. ‘I was not just a forger, dear. I was a brilliant forger.’ She chuckled again as Anastasia looked at her with new eyes. ‘There are Matisses and Renoirs and Monets out here, hanging in the houses of wealthy art collectors, which are, in fact, painted by me.’

  ‘Granny! You could go to prison for that.’

  Gracie squeezed her granddaughter’s hand. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘But at the time I didn’t think of the consequences should it all go wrong. I loved my uncle. He was like a father to me, and I wanted to please him. I would have done anything for him.’ At that, her eyes began to prickle with tears again. The memory of what had happened resurfaced to hurt her once more.

  ‘Was he a forger too?’

  ‘He was the very best,’ Gracie replied. She took a deep breath and moved the story away from Uncle Hans. She wasn’t ready to tell that part of the story yet. ‘I told Donato that I couldn’t marry him.’

  ‘Was he broken-hearted?’

  ‘For a while, and the whole town sympathised with him. No one could understand why I had turned him down. He was a good catch for a girl like me. But he didn’t wait around. He married someone else a few months later. A pretty farmer’s daughter, and I didn’t care. I was in love with Gaetano and as far as I could see, there was no reason why we couldn’t be together.’

  ‘But there was a reason,’ said Anastasia, looking at her apprehensively, and Gracie was reminded of her young self in the way her granddaughter got straight to the heart of the matter.

  ‘Yes, there was,’ she replied. ‘And it wasn’t class or religion or—’

  ‘Gaetano was married,’ Anastasia interrupted.

  Gracie nodded. ‘How did you guess?’

  ‘I don’t know. What a bastard!’

  ‘I thought so too, at the time,’ Gracie agreed. ‘He was very unhappily married, but married none the less.’

  ‘That’s terrible! How did you find out?’

  ‘It was the following spring. We had been secretly seeing each other for almost a year when his wife turned up unannounced and he was forced to introduce me.’

  ‘What a shit! Excuse my language, Granny. But how could you go out with a man for a year and not know that he was married?’

  ‘We were in a bubble, Anastasia. We saw each other and no one else. We didn’t socialise with his friends. He lived in Rome but had a place in the countryside, near where I was living with my uncle. When we saw each other, it was either there or at my uncle’s, or we wandered into the hills to picnic in the poppies.’ Gracie sighed as the tender memories returned as soft as dandelion seeds on the breeze. ‘It was a secret love story. I thought we had to keep it secret because his family would never approve of me, but it was because it wasn’t just a love story, it was an affair.’

  ‘When you found out, did you make a scene?’ Anastasia asked.

  ‘No, I was controlled. He introduced me as his art teacher. He was quite a good painter, you see. His wife was in a terrible mood and barely noticed me. She didn’t see my stricken face, because she was only aware of her own troubles. She wanted to speak to hi
m in private, so I made my excuses and left.’

  ‘You must have been devastated.’

  ‘I was. I thought my heart had snapped in two.’

  ‘Then what happened?’

  Gracie sighed. ‘That wasn’t an end, as I thought it would be, but a beginning . . .’

  ‘Mum! Anastasia!’ It was Carina calling them to dinner.

  Anastasia sighed irritably. ‘Why is it that she always interrupts at the most gripping moment? Did you carry on your affair? Did Gaetano apologise? What happened next?’ In her eagerness to hear the rest of the love story Anastasia had forgotten about her own.

  ‘Come on,’ said Gracie, pushing herself up. ‘We’ll resume another time. It can wait.’ After all, she had waited forty-four years to tell it.

  Gracie sat beside Rex at dinner. He settled his blue eyes onto her and there was an element of surprise in his gaze. ‘You look very pretty tonight, if you don’t mind me saying, Gracie.’

  ‘It must be my new necklace,’ Gracie replied. ‘My granddaughter bought it for me today.’

  ‘What a nice thought,’ he said, though he knew her prettiness had nothing to do with the necklace. It was Italy, he decided, that had made her flourish.

  Ilaria presented the banquet with her usual fanfare. Carina and Lauren couldn’t resist the pasta. Wendy, Tiff and Brigitte were drunk on Mamma Bernadetta’s wine and more boisterous than ever, telling jokes and smoking between courses. The hills were silhouetted against the indigo sky. Above them the stars twinkled and the moon shone brightly. The night was beautiful and beguiling and Anastasia couldn’t wait for everyone to go to bed so that she could sneak off to see Giovanni.

  It was past midnight when Anastasia’s moment finally came. Her mother had drunk enough rosé to send her swiftly into a deep sleep. Anastasia dressed in the bathroom and tiptoed out without waking her. She hurried down to the pool house where Giovanni was duly waiting for her. She saw the red glow of his cigarette, like a firefly in the darkness, and her heart gave a leap of happiness. She fell into his embrace, inhaling his smell. He kissed her ardently and whispered Italian into her ear that sounded like words of love. Then he took her by the hand and led her down a path that snaked its way through long grasses and shrubs to a track below the pool, where she saw that he had left his scooter. ‘You come,’ he said, climbing on and grinning at her encouragingly. Anastasia didn’t hesitate. She mounted the seat behind him and pressed her body against his, winding her arms around his middle. It felt good to feel him there, solid against her belly, and she rested her head on his shoulder. They set off up the track with the cool night air in their hair and the scent of the Tuscan hills in their nostrils. She didn’t know where they were going and she didn’t care. So long as she was with him, she was content.