Cooking With Fernet Branca (25 page)

The next day I went messing about on the internet and discovered there were dozens of academic studies of Pacini’s work (
Visual
Signsponge:
The
Derridean
element
in
the
post-
structuralism
of
Piero
Pacini’s
later
films
)
but only one biography,
Piero
Pacini
, now seven years out of date. Good. That was step one completed. Step two was to get hold of a copy and be shocked by its triviality. Amazon.co.uk would no doubt provide me with one in due course. The Samper plan was whizzing along nicely. Full of energy I walked down to Casoli. Happening to be in the bar I asked for my mail which
the indolent
postino
would have left in blithe expectation that the letters would sprout wings and complete the journey themselves. But there were no letters for me, only one for Marta. Feeling a sudden burst of neighbourliness for her, I walked back up the hill with it in the brilliant sunshine. I looked at the postmark and wondered who she knew in Venice; but these days I shouldn’t have been surprised if it was the Doge himself. Once one was over the shock of discovering Marta to be well connected the possibilities were legion.

It turned out that I couldn’t hand her the envelope with a graceful bow after all. She was out and her rat-coloured car gone. Her house, of course, was unlocked so I left the letter propped on the music stand of her electronic keyboard next to an almost full bottle of Fernet, the one place amid the kitchen’s clutter where I could guarantee she would find it.

I spent the rest of the day working on a plan of campaign for Nanty by which he might achieve some street credibility in the thoroughfares of mainstream British culture. Nobody else would want such a thing, of course, a reflection that lent the whole project a somewhat surreal air. Then, taxed by what the Japanese call the
shokku
of the last few days, I went to bed early and fell instantly into hibernating bear mode. I awoke in darkness with a pang, not of night starvation but of fear. It took the usual blurred few seconds to focus on the sound that had woken me and to separate it from the remnants of a dream. There could be no doubt: in the night outside a helicopter was approaching. For the love of Pete, I thought, sinking back on the pillow and following its course in the dark with sightless eyes. As before, the machine missed my house by what sounded like inches and clattered and moaned to a standstill in Marta’s field. Oho! I thought (though with a pang of a different sort). We can guess who
that
is, can’t we? A little midnight visit from the boy racer, h’m?
How
does
she
do
it
? That’s the question. What has Marta got that I – I mean, what has she
got
? Well, perhaps it isn’t him after all. Maybe it’s one of the Branca family whom she
has urgently summoned from his bed in Milan with emergency supplies of Fernet. Voynovia’s St Cecilia calls for refreshment in the small hours. I see it as an allegorical painting.

I’m assuming it was Gerry who delivered Marja’s letter, given that our postman seldom calls. That was kind of him. I wouldn’t have returned home so late had I not impulsively decided to stay down in Camaiore and have dinner after doing the shopping. I had gone to see that smarmy little house agent, Benedetti, to tell him he should ignore the letter of complaint about my neighbour I wrote to him, oh, weeks ago now, and which needless to say he has never even acknowledged. Once the sale is through they wash their hands of you. Anyway, he was out of his office and I certainly wasn’t going to wait. Probably it doesn’t matter now. It was just that after this surprise discovery that Gerry is perhaps serious after all, or at any rate interestingly connected, I felt I’d been a bit hasty and mean to complain about him to a maggot like Benedetti. From now on, thanks to the discovery that underneath that pose of inflexible Englishness Gerry actually speaks amazingly good Italian, if I have complaints I can make them directly to his face. Anyway, enough of him. Let’s see what my darling sister has to say. Venice,
ek
ni
? I smell drama.

Dearest
Matti

Well,
that’s
that:
Mekmek
&
I
have
eloped!
We
just
got
the
hell
out.
The
fact
is
that
since
Timi
got
back
from
America
he’s
been
making
a
perfect
pest
of
himself
&
I
couldn’t
bear
it
any
longer.
I
didn’t
ring
you
because
I
was
scared
you’d
try
to
talk
me
out
of
it.
Mekki’s
being
just
great.
He’s
a
computer
programmer,
did
I
say?

Heaps
to
tell
you.
I
got
away
without
telling
a
soul,
not
even
poor
Mili,
&
we
flew
direct
from
Voynograd
to
Vienna
&
then
on
to
Venice.
By
the
time
you
get
this
we’ll
probably
be
heading 
slowly
in
your
direction.
I
expect
Timi
&
Father
will
have
set
Captain
Panic
on
my
trail
but
it’ll
be
way
too
late.
Once
we
were
in
Venice
I
e-mailed
Ljuka
so
he’d
know
I
was
safe.
With
any
luck
he’ll
head
Father
off
from
drastic
action.

Sorry,
Matti,
this
is
in
haste.
Will
call
in
a
day
or
2
when
we’ve
decided
what
to
do.
Making
straight
for
you
would
be
feeble
as
well
as
being
the
first
place
they’ll
think
to
look
so
we’ll
probably
linger,
either
here
or
on
the
way.
Venice
is
a
first
taste
of
real
freedom
at
last
&
boy
does
it
feel
gooood!
I
don’t
have
to
explain,
do
I
?

Can’t
wait
to
see
you.
You’ll
know
what
to
tell
them
when
they
call.
Oh,
and
you’re
going
to
love
Mekki,
I
just
know
it.
He’s
cuddly
&
mmm!

Tons
of
love

Mari

Well, I was right to smell drama. No doubt my phone has been ringing these last several hours. Thank God I haven’t got one of those answering machines yet. So that’s that. She’s made the break and we’ll just have to see what happens. Tonight’s meal has left me very
mellowed
and much inclined to go to bed, to be honest. Time enough to worry about Marja tomorrow which, as we Voynovians so wisely say, is another day. (I wonder if other nations have these devastating insights?) I’m also beginning to wonder if that second bottle of wine wasn’t a mistake, especially with the Fernet over coffee; but what the hell, it was just the once. I surely have a long way to go before I risk becoming like Gerry, poor fellow.

I’m cleaning my teeth and trying to ignore that perennial sneaky worry about exactly what my next job of work is to be. Pacini hasn’t so much as hinted what he intends doing after
Arrazzato’s
in the can and it’s time I was thinking seriously about the future and an income if I want to keep my independence. Nothing in the universe will make me run to Father to ask him to bail me out, not now. (
What
an independent tearaway this studious elder daughter has become!) I’m just about to pour myself a tiny nightcap of Fernet when a familiar
sound begins to steal into the house. Of course! Dear Ljuka wouldn’t wait for phones to be answered at a moment of family crisis, bless him. Action men
act
. His helicopter approaches and I’m ready outside the back door with a torch when he lands. Up here on the otherwise silent mountainside the noise seems cataclysmic and I’m briefly conscious that Gerry’s complaint about disturbance was not unreasonable. Then my attention is distracted when I notice it’s a different helicopter, but I’m quite sure the pilot’s my baby brother and so it proves. We embrace beneath the still-whirling main rotor.

‘Rather too much,’ is his reply, half muffled as he eases his helmet off, to my anxious greeting ‘What’s new?’ ‘Marja’s done a bunk – did you know? Much worse, though, is they’ve arrested Father.’

‘What?
Who? Why?’

‘The police, apparently working with Europol. Panic called me in Trieste and warned me to lie low for a bit and certainly not to come home. It’s politics, of course. Basically, our dear government will do absolutely anything to get the country into the EU at the next intake, whenever that is. Panic says the old alliances are far from reliable any longer. So the police rolled up without the usual courtesy warning and took Father off with them to headquarters. I can’t imagine they’ll hold him for long. Panic got the lawyers down there within the hour. But even so. Oh – and they impounded that black helicopter of ours, as well as the Cessna, so that’s why I came in this.’ Ljuka gives a backward jerk of his handsome head to indicate the machine in the paddock, now dark and without sign of life except for a faint ticking of cooling metal. ‘It belongs to the company.’

My brother towers in the kitchen shedding his jacket. He catches sight of Marja’s letter lying on the keyboard where I dropped it and picks it up. ‘When did this arrive? Is she OK?’

‘Read it,’ I tell him. ‘I was out earlier and she may have phoned. As far as I know they’re somewhere between Venice
and here. Have you met this Mekmek fellow? Is he all right? I mean, is he at least better than Timi?’

‘Probably. She only told me about him the other day, cross-my-heart top secret, and I haven’t been allowed to meet him yet. Computer geek, I think. That could be useful, in the circumstances.’

I make us coffee and Ljuka takes the torch and goes back out to fetch a small overnight bag from which he produces a bottle of
galasiya
from the estate – the real thing, ninety-two per cent proof. ‘Luckily I had this in the Trieste office,’ he says. ‘Make the most of it. It looks as though you may have to do without food parcels from home for a bit.’

He sits on the sofa with his cup and leans back, eyes closed. I suddenly realize he’s all in. For the first time I can remember, my little brother looks like a tired adult.

‘How bad is it?’ I ask. ‘Really?’

‘Pretty bad.’

‘Are they after you?’

‘Oh, probably. Possibly. I don’t know. It’s too early to tell whether they’re trying to give Father a scare – or a warning, which amounts to the same thing – or if this really is it and from now on we’re going to be chivvied and harried wherever we go. Arrested, released; arrested, released – you know. Much the same tactics as the Russians used, I gather. Only this will cover most of Europe. Raids on our offices, bank accounts frozen, our people picked up on trumped-up charges, our computers hacked into, electronic surveillance.’ His voice dwindles as he takes a gulp of coffee.

‘“Trumped-up”, Uki? No – I’m a coward; I don’t really want to know. That makes me a hypocrite, too, since we all know how this house was paid for, the car, my subsistence here until Pacini’s cheques began coming in. But …’

‘Better you don’t know, Matti. If there are innocent parties in all this they’re obviously you and Marja and we must keep it that way. Not that I think ignorance will be much defence if they’re really determined.’

What a fool, I think, looking at him with such fondness it may not be that second bottle of wine that fills my eyes with tears and swells my heart with protectiveness. What a stupid boy and how predictable all this is. How predicted it
was
, given my last conversation with him in this very room a month or two ago.

‘Stay here, Uki,’ I tell him. ‘You’ll be safe here.’

He shakes his head with a smile. ‘As safe as anywhere, that’s true. Anyway, I’ll gladly sleep the night here. I’m bushed.’

‘Do we still have money?’ Really I’m thinking of dumb practical details like being able to fill the helicopter’s tanks.

‘They can’t possibly know all the accounts. They’ve been disguised and dispersed over years. Hell, Matti, you yourself have a dozen at least.’

‘
I
have?’

‘Of course you have. So has Marja. What do you think Father’s been doing with his money all this time? He’s been steadily salting away a good part of it for us children. “Family first”, remember. What did you imagine?’

‘You’ll think me
crazy,
’ I say humbly, ‘but to tell the truth I’ve never really given it a thought. I’ve been too interested in, well, music I suppose. And wanting to make my own living.’

‘Oh, Matti, you’re hopeless. Small wonder Father despairs of you.’

‘He does, does he?’

‘Honestly, this misconception of Father is ridiculous. He loves you deeply. He loves all of us deeply. But you know his character, that generation. It’s perfectly natural that sometimes he gets a bit exasperated by your, I don’t know, other-worldliness or something.’

‘Only I bet he doesn’t use that word. I bet he says I’m
prikmul
.’

‘It’s true.’ My brother smiles into his empty coffee cup. ‘Other-worldly to the detriment of your family obligations. He says what other word can he use about a daughter who shows no inclination to settle down and get married and
make a grandfather of him, as is his right.
Prikmul
. Says it all.’

‘And do you think that too, Uki?’

‘No. No, I know you better than Father does. I know you’re not deliberately
prikmul
, Matti. I guess you’re an artist, and that’s that. God, I’m bushed,’ he repeats.

Prikmul
or not, I suddenly become concerned for my little brother and start throwing sheets over the sofa. ‘I’ll get you a pillow from upstairs.’ But by the time I come down with it Ljuka is already asleep. There is a light sheen of sweat on his forehead. Although he has taken his jacket and trousers off and despite the altitude up here it is a warm Tuscan night in September. I leave him with the sloppy smile one bestows on sleeping babies and go up to my empty
letto
matrimoniale
where I remember I never asked him whether Father already knows that his other daughter, too, has fled the coop. I’m smitten with a pang of guilty affection for this father who, all unbeknownst, has been making generous provision for me and whose empire may even now be starting to collapse around him. I stare sleeplessly up through the darkness past the invisible beams and through the stone roof, but without seeing the hard-eyed galaxies staring back. For the first time in a long while I realize I actively miss my mother.

The absolute uselessness of regret.