The House in Amalfi (9 page)

By now the sky had clouded over and the sun was hidden. I sat hunched on the terrace steps, shivering in my wet bathing suit, thinking longingly about that hot coffee.

“What are you doing here all alone, little girl?”

I hadn’t heard anyone coming. I looked at the old man, a little scared. Even then, to me he seemed old and so thin, and wiry, with strange pale eyes and tangled eyebrows, I thought he was a ghost.

“Oh,” I said, startled. “Are you a ghost?”

He laughed. “Not yet,
piccolina.
Are you?”

“No.” I eyed him carefully. He was carrying a large watering can and a long-pronged rake. “Where do you live?” I asked, still a little afraid of the stranger, aware that Jon-Boy was not here to protect me.

“In my cottage, up at the Castello.”

“Oh,” I said again, impressed because I’d seen the Castello from a distance and it looked like a place a princess would live.

“I am a gardener, little girl. My name is Mifune.”

“Mee-fu-nee . . . ,” I repeated it, smiling. I liked the way it sounded. “My name is Lamour.”

I was shivering by now and he said, “You should go indoors, Lamour, change your clothes, get warm.”

“But the door won’t open,” I said. “All the doors are locked, and Jon-Boy isn’t home.”

Mifune didn’t ask any questions about Jon-Boy or why a seven-year-old had been left alone. He simply said, “Then come with me,
piccolina.
We’ll go to the kitchens at the Castello. The cook will find you some warm clothes to wear and give you a hot drink.”

I went willingly, intrigued by my strange new friend skipping along beside him, chattering away, asking a million questions. Where did he come from? Why did he live here? What was Japan like? What kind of Japanese food did he eat?

He stopped in his tracks, grabbed my hand, and bent his face close to mine. “
Piccolina,
do you
ever
stop talking?” he said. “Stop now. Look around you. See what beauty there is. It is not always necessary to talk.”

I stared back at him, dumbfounded. Where I came from every kid talked nonstop and usually over the top of other kids.

“Look,”
Mifune said. And I looked.

I looked where he showed me he had planted new seedlings in the shade of the pine trees that he said by summer would be in full bloom. I looked at the rabbit burrows in the hedgerow and at the birds’ nests and he told me the names of the flowers I saw, both the English version and the Latin that I repeated after him, intrigued that anything could have two names.

We walked through the pines, along the path to the back of the Castello Pirata, where the maids tut-tutted over the story of me being left all alone by my father, locked out of my house and wearing only a wet bathing suit. Garments
were found to wrap me in—a too-large sweater, a pair of shorts—and hot chocolate was made specially for me.

Thrilled with my big adventure, I thanked them and said good-bye; then I followed Mifune back through the beautiful gardens that I now saw with wide new eyes.

When we got home, the front door was open and Jon-Boy was there, searching anxiously for me.

“Oh my God, there you are!” He hoisted me off my feet, hugging me to his chest. “You scared me, Lamour. I saw your bathing suit was gone and there was no sign of you in the sea. Jesus!” He crushed me to him again and I felt his heart pounding. He then suddenly noticed we were not alone.

“Signore,”
Mifune said, bowing.

“Signore.”
Jon-Boy also bowed.

“I am Mifune, the gardener at the Castello. Your daughter was alone. She could not get into the house. She was cold and wet.”

Jon-Boy heard the reproof in Mifune’s voice. “I apologize to Lamour, and to you, Mifune,” he said politely. “It was unavoidable but also inexcusable.”

“Mifune took me to the Castello,” I interrupted, still excited by my important adventure. “They gave me hot chocolate and these clothes.”

“Then we must thank Mifune for helping you.” The two men assessed each other. “I’m thanking you from the bottom of my heart,” Jon-Boy added. “Lamour’s my girl; she means everything to me.”

Mifune nodded. “She is a fine
piccolina
even though she talks too much,” he said, and Jon-Boy laughed. “I would be happy if you would take tea with me, at my cottage in the Castello’s grounds, tomorrow, at four o’clock,” he added, and Jon-Boy said we’d be delighted.

Mifune bowed and said good-bye, walking away with that
soundless loping walk. Jon-Boy said his invitation sounded like a royal command and we’d better go, so the following afternoon, dressed in my best, which wasn’t much, a T-shirt and shorts, but at least was better than the old red bathing suit, and carrying a gift of some Amaretto cookies wrapped in pink tissue paper, I walked together with Jon-Boy through the pine trees to take tea at Mifune’s house.

I’d never seen anything like it. It looked like a Japanese temple. Two columns supported a pedimented roof that rose to a peak, then swooped in a gentle curve to deep overhanging eaves. Three low steps led up to the porch, where a small brass gong awaited by the front door. The shoji-screened windows had, of necessity, been flanked by Italian wooden shutters against winter storms, but for the rest Mifune’s home looked completely Japanese.

Feeling as though I were in storybook land, I struck the gong softly, announcing our arrival.

Mifune came to the door. “
Signore, signorina,
please enter,” he said with that curious little bow.

I looked at the shiny bamboo floor, at the shoji screens dividing the single room, and at the tatami mats around the low table in its center. The only other piece of furniture was a long narrow table that Jon-Boy told me later was an antique elm-wood altar table. It held a small shrine where a candle was lit to honor the ancestors Mifune had never known.

The old man busied himself preparing tea, presenting the three thin porcelain bowls on a black enamel tray. He poured strong green tea from a pot with a bamboo handle and he and Jon-Boy talked while I stared around me, taking everything in.

I’d never seen a home like this, never met anyone like Mifune. And I was willing to bet he’d never met anyone like me, either. I looked at him and smiled. I knew we were going to be friends.

From that day on, Mifune kept watch over me. He always seemed to know where I was and when I was alone. He began to teach me about flowers and plants, about the earth they grew in, about the power of water in plant life and the need for sun and shade and wind. I began to learn about life from Mifune, and I never forgot what he taught.

Jammy sprawled languidly poolside at the Santa Caterina. A big straw hat covered her face and she gazed heavenward through the chinks in the raffia at the peaceful blue of the sky. Somewhere down below, waves broke gently on rocks, and a gull cried.

She heard Lamour’s footsteps on the steps, quick, light, urgent. She would have known them anywhere.

“Jammy!”

The sun lounger next to her squeaked as Lamour plopped onto it. “Yeah?” Jammy said, acting casual and praying Lamour would too.

“Jammeeeee!”

Under the hat, Jammy grinned. “What?” she said. Then the hat was snatched off and Lamour’s face was beaming into hers.

“Jammy Mortimer Haigh, stop pretending you can wait to know what happened.”

Jammy sat up. “Okay, so I can tell it was good by the smile on your face,” she said, adjusting the strap of her bathing suit.

“Jam, it’s still
there
! My little golden house. Of course it’s been abandoned since Jon-Boy . . . left. It’s a bit run-down now. And the garden . . . well, let’s just say it and the house need my TLC. But more than that, Jam, I met someone special.”

Jammy listened quietly to Lamour’s story about her old friend and mentor, about the sorry state of the gardens and
the house. That is until Lamour said, “And now I’ve decided to stay on here. I’m going to fix up the house, and I’ll work hard with Mifune to restore the gardens. I’m going to live there and be myself again. . . . I’ll grow vegetables, keep chickens, a cow. . . .”

“Are you out of your mind!” Jammy jumped upright on the lounger. “For God’s sake, Lamour,
a cow
! I know you’re excited, but at least talk sense. You
can’t
live here. Your life—your
real
life—is in Chicago . . . your work, your friends. You’ll buy a new apartment; you’ll finally get on with your life—God knows you’ve wasted enough time.”

“I’m not coming back, Jammy.” Lamour’s eyes shone with the fervor of the newly converted. “I’m going to live in my house in Amalfi. I’m going to be self-sufficient—as far as I can, anyway. I mean I can’t grow vines on my cliff side, but I do have a pasture on the hill across the road for my cow. . . .”

“And exactly how close have you ever been to a cow?”

“Well, of course I’ve seen them, you know, on farms, in the countryside. . . .”

“Driving by in a car. Right?”

“Well, right. But that doesn’t mean I can’t learn all about them, and after all, I only want
one.
”

Jammy lay back on the chaise. She put the straw hat over her face again. “So you’re going to milk the cow twice a day, right? At five in the morning, right? And again at about seven in the evening? Just when regular people might be thinking about going out to dinner somewhere nice, with a good bottle of wine to sustain them. Hey, maybe you could whip up a batch of mozzarella to sell at your little roadside stand the next morning, along with some fresh brown eggs—no doubt with double yolks—from your charming little chickens, who just can’t wait to lay them for you in their neat little nests. And of course you’ll make fresh lemonade from your
homegrown lemons to sell along with the eggs and the mozzarella, and of course you’ll have knocked out a batch of crusty rustic bread, still warm from the oven, to go with the eggs and the cheese. What an idyllic life, Lamour; I can see it now. . . . Away go the red-suede mules; good-bye, pretty dress; good-bye, the possibility of a sex life, because you’ll soon be a grizzled, overworked old woman in a black dress and granny shoes, wishing you were back in a peaceful Chicago apartment, tending other people’s gardens for a living. And a darn
good
living it is, Lamour. Which is one thing you seem to have left out of your plan. Exactly
what
are you going to live on? After all, you’re not
exactly
used to roughing it.” Jammy pushed back her straw hat and glared at Lamour. “Sometimes you are such a silly bitch, Lamour, I don’t know how I put up with you.”

Lamour’s face fell, but then she grinned. “The Amalfi house was Jon-Boy’s; now, it’s mine. It’ll cost me nothing to live there. Of course I know I’ll have to work; I’m not that stupid. But Jammy, I’ll get a smaller apartment so I can go back to Chicago to work on my commissions. I won’t give it up entirely, at least not until I’m sure I can make it out here.”

Jammy slid the hat back over her face again. “What am I going to do with you, Lamour Harrington? Whatever am I going to do?”

“You could at least
look
at the house before passing judgment,” Lamour said, sounding hopeful. “I admit it needs a touch of paint and I haven’t even seen what the inside’s like yet, but Mifune is leaving the key under the lemon pot outside the door. We could look at it tomorrow. Will you come with me, Jammy?
Please,
say you will.”

Jammy’s sigh almost gusted the straw hat right off her face. “You know I will,” she said resignedly, hearing Lamour’s delighted laugh.

With his ugly white dog, Affare, in the seat next to him, Lorenzo Pirata flew the Bell helicopter low over the ink blue evening sea as though seeking that no-man’s-land, the line where the darkening western sky meets the sultry water. To his left, ropes of glittering lights lit the resorts along the Amalfi coast, highlighting the charming inlets and coves and the terraces of the hotels. He spotted the red beacon atop the Castello Pirata and the hazy yellow lights of the tiny coastal town of Pirata itself. With a small sigh of relief, he brought the helicopter in lower.