The Gulf Between

by Maxine Alterio

  ‘I’m sure she’ll bring me. She wants me to have a broad education.’

  Ratbag, I thought. He hung onto words the way his sister did animals.

  We set off, talking easily, but once in sight of the café Ilaria said, ‘I’ll come for pastries another day, children.’ She leaned closer to me and whispered, ‘I have to go.’ She strode off, head upright, swinging her arms, invincible I would have thought had we not had that serious talk at her flat a few weeks ago or if I hadn’t seen a man in a blue straw fedora cross the road and follow her.

  Matteo and Francesca dashed ahead and burst through the café door. As Ilaria turned the corner, the tailer glanced over his shoulder and up the street at me before he also disappeared. He looked more like a dandy than a hit man. All the same, I would slip out that night to a kiosk and phone Ilaria to make sure she was safe. In the interim, I chose an outside table beside a cluster of flowerpots overflowing with rampant orange plants. While the children made their choices, I speculated about Ernesto’s reasons for employing this man to watch Ilaria’s and my movements. None of those I came up with made sense.

  36

  We would have gone to the museum, and perhaps toured the historical site with Ilaria, if a series of events had not placed additional strain on our already complicated family situation. For starters, Francesca complained of a sore stomach. ‘A nasty bug’s inside me,’ she said hourly. If I came up without warning behind her, she jumped. She was neglecting her pets, and telling outright lies.

  Rosa caught her in the scullery cutting a hole in her school smock. The little minx denied it, saying, ‘It was there when I got dressed this morning.’

  ‘Go to your room, Francesca,’ I said, edging her towards the door.

  ‘Not unless Matteo comes upstairs with me.’

  I grabbed her arm and shook it. ‘Stop this nonsense at once.’

  She wiggled free, tore out the back door, and ran down the east side of the villa. Halfway along, she discovered I was in pursuit and poked out her tongue. I careered after her, reaching the driveway where Ernesto was swinging her up onto his shoulders. From her lofty perch, she squirmed and pouted.

  ‘Put her down, Ernesto,’ I said.

  He fixed his eyes on the line of trees behind me.

  ‘She’s been naughty.’

  He ignored me.

  ‘Badly,’ I said.

  Still nothing.

  Unable to contain my anger, I said, ‘She’s been disrespectful.’

  ‘Is this right, Frannie?’ he said, tickling her bare legs.

  His shortening of her name infuriated me. He had no right to use this endearment. She was my daughter, not his. ‘Put her down, Ernesto! Immediately!’ I pulled on her ankle, dislodging her sandal, which fell to the ground.

  ‘When you’re calmer, Little Toothpick,’ he said, and strode off with Francesca calling for her papa.

  He can deal with Ernesto, I thought, as I picked up the ruby-red sandal. The dye had run. Rivulets of red sullied the cream inner. I bowled into the kitchen clutching it.

  Rosa tilted her head towards mine and placed an index finger below her right eye. ‘Very bad you yell at Signor Moretti. Very bad.’

  My hands shook as I poured a glass of water. ‘I don’t like him being alone with Francesca.’ There, I had voiced my fear, even if I had not given full shape to it.

  ‘Stay here,’ Rosa said, handing me a vegetable knife. ‘I will get for you Francesca. You slice the runner beans.’

  Was that her way of agreeing with me without saying so, or was she just keeping the peace?

  While I rinsed the pods a paper ball flew over me and landed on the bench. I dumped the beans in the colander, dried my hands on a tea towel and peeled back the edges of the missile. Another message in Matteo’s handwriting: It’s supposed to be a secret.

  Was he developing the attitude Ben had warned me about in London, treating secrets as currency to obtain favours or settle debts? Or was he jealous of Ernesto paying Francesca more attention than he had him this week? Ernesto favouring one child and then the other differed from Alessia’s pattern with her sons. I was ruminating over these variances and the meaning of the note when Francesca slunk in with a fistful of flowers.

  ‘I’m sorry for my wickedness, Mamma. I won’t poke out my tongue any more. Cross my heart.’ She handed me the posy and sidled up against my skirt. ‘Wickedness’ was an odd word for her to say. I’d heard someone else use it here before, but I couldn’t recall where or who.

  Somehow, we got through dinner. Afterwards Francesca escaped outside to feed her animals. I went to see Alessia, who complained about the lumpiness of her pillows, a fly crawling over the lampshade, a half empty tumbler on her bedside table, making me wish I was elsewhere.

  ‘How do you expect me to swallow my pills?’ she said. ‘Do you want one to stick in my throat? Kill me quicker?’

  ‘I’m doing everything in my power to make you comfortable, Alessia.’

  In need of a break, I took the jug into the bathroom to refill. While there I cupped water into my hands and splattered it over my face, which cooled me but didn’t diminish the resentment I felt towards her for failing to tell Ben about the circumstances of his conception. Nor lessen my anger at Ernesto meddling between Francesca and me, or overcome my frustration with Matteo, or make me less annoyed at Ben, who these days largely ignored me.

  I pushed my hair off my face and returned to Alessia. There were white rings around her eyes, circles within circles, everything collapsing. ‘It was wrong of me to be so beastly to you,’ she said.

  ‘Forget it.’

  I supported her head and inserted a sleeping pill into her mouth, washing it down with a spoonful of water. ‘There, all done.’ I hoped she would drift into a deep sleep, safe from the nightmares that plagued her on restless nights.

  Because I stayed with her longer than intended, I found Francesca curled up barely awake on the sofa in the drawing room. ‘I expect you to listen to me,’ I said, shooing her upstairs.

  She rubbed her eyes as I put her into bed. ‘Stay with me, Mamma.’

  I kissed her and gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. ‘Goodnight,’ I said firmly.

  ‘Mamma, please don’t go.’

  A bell rang downstairs. Alessia letting me know she’d either vomited or soiled the sheets. ‘I have to, Francesca. I’ll check on you again as soon as I can.’

  During the night I woke with a fright, thinking that Alessia had rung the bell, but when I sat up and listened I couldn’t hear as much as the rustle of a curtain or the scurry of a mouse or the buzz of insects moving between cracks in the walls. Little more than skin and bone, she couldn’t get up on her own accord. Her world had shrunk to her bedroom, conversations to her needs. I drifted back to sleep, wondering why Ben wasn’t in bed beside me.

  At breakfast, he wandered in wearing the same clothes he’d had on the previous day. His hair hadn’t been near a brush or a comb. I poured his coffee. He sat down beside Matteo, who asked if he could get new football boots. Holding up his current pair, he said, ‘These pinch my toes, Papa.’

  We were comfortable with his growth spurts, unlike Francesca who considered them abnormal. She was forever making cardboard outlines of his feet to prove he was descended from Bigfoot, a creature she’d heard about in class.

  ‘At the rate you’re growing, son,’ Ben said, ‘it won’t be long before I have to stand on a stool to look you in the eye.’

  Rosa rocked with laughter. The sight of her low-slung breasts jiggling about within her loose top sent Matteo and Francesca into uncontrollable giggles. Clasping their hands in hers, Rosa said, ‘When your papa was little, he dragged a stool to the bench where I worked, fished his hand down the front of my dress and grabbed my titty. Benito, he wanted what Signora Moretti she gave to Ernesto.’

  ‘But you’re the youngest, Papa,’ Matteo said. ‘Why wasn’t Nonna nursing you?’

  Rosa ceased joking. ‘I talk nonsense, Matteo. My brain it
is a rock. Benito, he is the most handsome.’ Believing she had restored Ben’s dignity, she passed around the fruit bowl. ‘And Matteo,’ she said when it reached him, ‘he is the fastest footballer.’

  A few fanatics were talking about his potential. Their predictions reached the ears of those who controlled the sport. Three representatives came to watch him play in an interschool match. The son of Salvatore, the taxi driver who drove us from the train station up to the Vomero all those months ago, turned out to be in the opposing team. On the strength of his lad’s performance and Matteo’s, both boys were picked for the city’s junior football team. Ben drove Mattie to the extra practices and games, and Ernesto or Carlo stepped in if Ben was detained at a meeting or called out of town on business, a common occurrence during what for me became a physically and emotionally exhausting period.

  Matteo’s voice broke that term. One minute he was speaking normally, the next in a low boom or high-pitched squeak. He spent hours in front of a mirror corralling his hair into place with Brilliantine. ‘Is he eating it?’ Ben asked, waving another empty jar at me.

  37

  I tucked apples into Matteo’s and Francesca’s satchels and shooed them outdoors, pecking Ben’s cheek as he passed. In a semi-distracted state, I watched the Lancia vanish in a cloud of dust. Something equally murky stirred within me. I put it down to tiredness. Alessia had rung her bell overnight. The first time I’d found Ben with her. The second, Ernesto dragging his brother out, saying, ‘Keep your distance. I didn’t bring you over to suck up to her,’ and Ben replying, ‘I’m her son too.’

  Apart from Rosa dunking a mop into a bucket and swooshing a mass of looped yarn across the floor, the place was quiet. I didn’t expect Alessia to wake for a couple of hours, so I fetched the latest novel Ilaria had lent me and went outside. The main character, a woman, had fallen for her best friend’s husband and had to conceal her passion or face the prospect of losing them both.

  The previous summer, in the lower garden, Carlo had strung a hammock between two large trees. I settled into it, stretched out and crossed my ankles. Hidden under an umbrella of leaves, I removed my bookmark.

  I had reached the part where the main character was imagining what might happen if she and the husband ended up alone in the same room when Rosa’s and Carlo’s voices floated through the thick vegetation.

  ‘She couldn’t find the egg basket the other day so she pinched my cap,’ Carlo said. ‘When I told her to bring it back she threatened to tell her Mamma that I had pulled down her panties and slobbered on her bare bum.’

  This wasn’t something Frannie would just come out with. Where had she picked up that from?

  ‘Carlo! You didn’t!’ Rosa’s voice rose to a crescendo.

  ‘Of course not,’ he said. ‘I like a well-aged rump.’ There was a sharp thwack. I presumed he’d hit her backside.

  In a tone as taut as fence wire, Rosa said, ‘Why Francesca she makes up this nonsense?’ A scuff of gravel, then Rosa’s voice again, more hushed. ‘A small girl with a big imagination, she can cause trouble.’

  ‘Our Lord will take Signora Moretti soon,’ Carlo said. ‘Until it happens Ernesto wants Benito’s wife kept on a short rein.’

  Had I dropped off, had a bad dream? No, I could hear the swish of Carlo’s hoe and Rosa’s shoes clomping along the path. Who was putting rude ideas into Francesca’s head? A girl in her class, maybe. I couldn’t count on Ben to find out. He and Ernesto were at each other’s throats again.

  Yesterday, they’d argued over whose turn it was to drive to a coastal town to collect an overdue payment. ‘Olive oil,’ Ben said when I asked what it was about.

  The men arrived back at the villa earlier than I had anticipated. Not wanting them to find me slacking, I left my book in the hammock and hurried inside. Ernesto was snarling at Ben on the stairs, ‘You’re not to enter her room alone.’

  They were circling one another, faces drawn tighter than the bands on their Saturday-night cigars. As I backed away I fantasised about whisking Matteo and Francesca home to London and leaving the brothers to deal with Alessia’s death and burial. I almost convinced myself she was their obligation, not mine. But on a deeper level, I knew I couldn’t abandon her, partially because I wasn’t with my parents when they had perished, but mainly because I had promised her and Ben that I would stay until the end. And despite everything, I had come to care about her.

  On top of worrying about the strife between the two men, I fretted over the conversation I’d overheard between Carlo and Rosa. It was obvious where their allegiances lay. And I couldn’t count on Ben or Matteo. For reasons I wasn’t privy to, Matteo had become less tolerant of Francesca, and Ben was too caught up in his concerns to listen to mine. Talking to my husband in bed was no longer an option. He came upstairs after I fell asleep and left before I woke.

  Late afternoon, while I shelled walnuts outside, not far from the open kitchen door, I heard Francesca moaning to Rosa, ‘Mattie won’t play with me. Papa’s a grump. So is Mamma.’ I came inside too late to prevent Rosa squirting a dollop of icing she had ready to decorate a cake into Francesca’s mouth. Was she the one giving Francesca the extra sweets?

  ‘Please don’t spoil her with sugary treats, Rosa,’ I said. ‘Her teeth will rot.’

  Due to football commitments and model-making, Matteo wasn’t around much. If he showed up for meals, he picked at his food or teased Francesca without provocation. If the men were absent, he spoke disrespectfully to me. No please or thank you, or may I be excused.

  One evening, with only the children and me at the table, he flicked pasta sauce onto the tablecloth. ‘Stop that at once, Matteo,’ I said.

  ‘Make me,’ he said, creating a bigger splatter.

  I leapt to my feet and seized his shirt collar. We scuffled. His elbow collided with Francesca’s head. ‘He hit me, Mamma!’ she roared. ‘I want Misty. She never hurts me. Where is she? I can’t find her.’

  ‘Shut up about the bloody cat. She’ll be somewhere quiet away from this nonsense.’ Both children were glaring at me now. ‘Go to your room, Matteo,’ I shouted, ‘and don’t come out until you’re willing to apologise.’

  He took off, slamming the door behind him. I thought he’d circumvent the grounds, sneak through the front entrance, go to his room, write an apology note, fold it into a dart and fire it downstairs. But he left the property.

  I took out my frustration on Francesca, grumping at her for not sitting up straight in her chair. She burst into tears. ‘Get upstairs,’ I said. If Ben hadn’t headed off again with Ernesto, I would have insisted he sort out the children. Rosa and Carlo had taken the bus to visit a sick niece in Gragnano so they couldn’t help either.

  Night had fallen when I heard Matteo skulking along the landing. I ran to the stairs. By the time I reached his bedroom door, he was already inside. No amount of pounding or demanding he let me in weakened his resolve.

  I was leaning against the kitchen bench nursing a cup of coffee when Rosa and Carlo returned. Carlo went to their cottage. Rosa came to see me. ‘How Signora Moretti she has been?’

  ‘Quiet,’ I said curtly.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ She replicated my woeful expression.

  ‘I’m tired. It’s been a long day.’

  She rubbed her hands together. ‘My niece she gave me good gossip. I tell you, yes, make you laugh?’

  ‘No, thank you.’ I poured the dregs of my coffee down the sink. ‘I’m going to check on Alessia.’ Rather than make a graceful departure as intended, I clipped my hipbone on the corner of the bench. It hurt. I swore.

  Rosa flapped her hands. ‘I sit with Signora Moretti tonight. You sleep. Otherwise Benito, he will come home and find an ugly old woman for a wife.’

  Befana! Half-believing I had turned into a hag, I went to the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror. I barely recognised my haggard face.

  Something shifted between Matteo and me around this time. I hesitate to call it a balance of power, alth
ough similar elements were at work. Our interactions became frosty. We might as well have lived on different shelves of the refrigerator.

  I attributed his moodiness to puberty, Alessia demanding my attention, and the growing strain between Ben and me. After Ernesto put him in charge of what he termed a ‘volatile territory’, Ben grew increasingly preoccupied and short-tempered. He invariably returned from Castellammare di Stabia in a brusque mood. The one occasion I offered to go with him, he jumped away from me as though I’d pressed the flat side of a hot iron to his face.

  The same week the brothers had another dispute. I was fetching a bucket close to the pump; they were checking the water levels of the storage tanks.

  ‘I expect results, little brother,’ Ernesto said.

  ‘You’re better suited than me to deal with those morons.’

  ‘I have other important matters to sort. Get on with it.’

  Ben sounded dog-tired. On top of the work he took on for Ernesto, he was driving Matteo to, in my view, an excessive number of football practices and games, including several out of town. So while I dished up pork cotoletta for dinner, I said, ‘Why not drop the school team, Matteo, and concentrate on the city’s? Salvatore could pick you up and take you to the venues with his son.’

  Mattie fixed me with a cold stare. ‘What would you know? You never listen.’

  Ernesto slammed his palms on the table. ‘Don’t use that tone with her.’

  Coming to my defence was the last thing I expected from my brother-in-law. I was even more surprised when Matteo fell into line. It gave me reason to hope I could regain his respect if I showed a firm hand.

  After washing and drying the pans I went upstairs and knocked on his door. There was no answer. I marched in anyway. ‘Listen to me, young man. I’ve had enough of your nonsense. Buck up or I’ll withdraw you from both teams.’