The Italian Matchmaker (40 page)

‘Yes, if you’ll stay here with me.’

He took her hand across the table. ‘If you want to stay here, stay here you will. My happiness depends on yours, Cosi.’ He laughed as Francesco placed his hand on top of theirs. ‘We have your son’s blessing. Now let’s keep quiet until we’ve got my daughters’ blessing too.’

 

When Manfreda hobbled laboriously on to the terrace, followed by Rosa and Eugenio, she was pleased to see that peace had been restored. The large diamond on Cosima’s finger shone almost as brightly as the light in her eyes.

Rosa put down the tray of drinks and embraced her cousin. She only felt a mild twinge of envy for the beautiful diamond and Cosima’s good fortune. ‘I’m happy Luca’s not the liar I thought he was,’ she said, then turned to Luca and added, ‘I’m sorry I doubted you.’

‘It’s all resolved. Cosima’s agreed to marry me. I’m dizzy with happiness.’

‘We must tell
Mamma
,’ said Rosa.

‘We’ll tell no one until I’ve told my daughters. Then I’ll ask Toto for your hand in marriage and announce it for all of Incantellaria to hear!’

Manfreda sat back in her chair, content. ‘Everything is as it should be,’ she said, folding her hands in her lap.

‘Well, almost,’ interjected Luca. ‘Rosa, there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you for some time.’

‘What’s that?’

‘Are you the intruder at the folly?’

Eugenio was quick to reply for her. ‘Don’t be ridiculous! What would Rosa want with the folly?’ But as he spoke he knew he was wrong. ‘Rosa?’

She poured a drink for herself and sat down. ‘No, I’m not the intruder. At least, not the
original
intruder.’

Eugenio looked at her in surprise. ‘So that is where you disappear off to at night?’

‘You know?’

‘Of course I know. I watch you leave and I watch you return, but I don’t know where you go.’

She took his hand, horrified. ‘You must think I . . . ?’

‘I trust you,’ he interjected. ‘At least, I
want
to trust you.’

‘Please don’t tell
Mamma
!’

‘Just tell us the truth.’

‘Who’s the
original
intruder?’ Luca asked, intrigued.

‘You know the strange lights in the
palazzo
and the reports of noises in the middle of the night? The place is haunted and has been for years, but not by the dead. I like to walk up the beach in the middle of the night.’ She smiled apologetically at Eugenio and squeezed his hand. ‘Don’t be angry with me, it’s a way of clearing my head and having time alone. I love the darkness. I feel exhilarated when I’m walking that path in the dark. The sea looks beautiful beneath the moon and I can hear everything, even the rattling of my own thoughts. But then, one night, I felt compelled to walk up to the folly. I make no secret of my fascination with my grandmother, Cosima. Her life was tragic but I see the romance of it. It would make
Mamma
mad, but the folly attracted me like a magnet. I wanted to be near Valentina and I was curious to see whether Romina had changed it or whether she had seen what I saw in there and kept it just the way it was.’ Rosa felt a frisson as she held everyone in her thrall. ‘So I walked that path I know so well and reached that darling little house. But there was a light on inside. The flickering of a candle that shone through the gaps in the shutters. I could either turn around and go home, or open the door and see who was in there. Incantellaria is a sleepy little place, nothing much happens here. Now was my chance to live an adventure of my own. So I opened the door.’

‘Who was it?’ Luca asked.

Rosa grinned secretively. ‘Let me make a telephone call. Then I’ll show you.’

‘You have to tell us!’ Cosima exclaimed.

‘No, I want you to see for yourselves.’ She turned to her husband. ‘I’m sorry.’

Eugenio’s fears dissolved in the sweet light of her smile for only he knew how hard it was for Rosa to apologise.

Cosima gave Manfreda an affectionate hug. ‘Thank you,’ she whispered into the old woman’s ear.

‘Don’t thank me. This is what you deserve. It is time to open your heart to happiness.’

Alba and Fitz watched the sun descend into the sea. The land was bathed in a dusky purple light.

‘This is the best time of day,’ Alba said contentedly.

‘I don’t want it to end. I don’t want to return to my life. I want to stay here with you, pretending that it’s thirty years ago. That we’re young and in love.’

‘We’re not the same people we were.’

‘Do people change that much?’

‘Yes, life moulds us. Incantellaria has moulded me. I watched the arrogant girl in a mini skirt and clog boots sink with the
Valentina
.’

‘No, she’s still there inside you,’ said Fitz, grinning raffishly. ‘I can see her.’

‘Well, thankfully no one else can.’

‘Because they wouldn’t recognise her if she slapped them across the face. I recognise her because I love her.’

‘You’re an incurable romantic.’

‘You once told me that was my problem.’

‘You remember?’

‘Yes, you said that you didn’t believe in love or marriage.’

‘You see, people change.’

‘And I told you that when I fall in love, I lose my heart completely. Once gone, I can never get it back.’

‘Oh, Fitz.’ She took his hand. ‘Are you in love with a memory?’

‘I let you go. The stupidest thing I ever did in my life.’

‘Don’t worry, you’ve got Rosemary,’ she teased.

Alba felt a wave of exhilaration wash over her. Perhaps the girl in a mini skirt and clog boots really was still inside her. ‘Hey, Fitz. Why don’t we sneak up to the
palazzo
again, just the two of us?’

‘Why would you want to do that?’

‘Because I haven’t been up there since we broke in thirty years ago. I haven’t dared. But with you, I dare.’

He held out his hand to help her up. ‘Let’s go to the folly. No one will have to know. We can sneak in there together. Apparently, Romina hasn’t changed a single thing.’

‘She hasn’t,’ he replied. ‘I’ve seen it, and it’s exactly as it was when your mother combed her hair at the dressing-table.’

‘Oh Fitz, I’m trembling with nerves.’

‘Don’t be scared. We’re in this together. If it wasn’t for my stiffening joints I’d believe I was a young man again.’

‘You are a young man inside,’ she said. ‘I recognise him, because I loved him.’

‘Tell me you still do.’

‘If you remember, I also told you there are many ways of loving.’

‘So you still love me.’

She set off up the hill. ‘I still love you, Fitz,’ she shouted back.

He hurried after her. ‘And I love you for loving me still!’

Rosa parked the car a little way down the hill from the
palazzo
. They didn’t want Romina to find them sneaking around. Cosima took Luca’s hand and followed Rosa through the trees until, they reached the folly. It was dark. A misty moon rose slowly into the navy sky and the sparkling eyes of a thousand stars began their nocturnal vigil. The breeze rustled through the leaves and invisible crickets sang their habitual song in the undergrowth.

Rosa opened the door. Inside, the warm glow of candlelight illuminated the room. Rosa walked in. Eugenio, Luca and Cosima followed, craning their necks to see who was inside. There at the back window, smoking into the night air, stood a man. He was so thin his trousers hung off him, cinched at the waist by a belt, leaving his ankles exposed. He wore a white shirt and the little hair that he had was as white as goose down. The hand that held the cigarette was bony, covered in skin as diaphanous as moths’ wings, mottled pink and brown. The room was filled with the same sweet perfume that had clung to the mysterious scarf.

‘Nero?’ said Rosa softly. The old man turned. When he saw she wasn’t alone he seemed to shiver with pleasure.

‘So, we have company tonight,’ he said languidly. ‘
Che bello!
’

‘This is my husband, Eugenio, my cousin, Cosima, and her
fiancé
, Luca.’

‘Ah, Eugenio, I have heard only good things about you.’ Eugenio didn’t know what to say: he could never have imagined this. ‘And Luca, welcome.’ He settled his pale eyes on Cosima, devouring her features. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Cosima. I can see the resemblance,’ he added, extending his hand. Cosima shook it. The skin was as cold and damp as a corpse. ‘But, you, Rosa, are the one who has inherited your grandmother’s face.’

‘You’re the
Marchese
’s adopted son?’ said Luca incredulously.

‘The very same. This was my special place. Ovidio loved this more than anywhere else in the world. When he died I let the
palazzo
go.’ He waved his hand, dismissive of his past. ‘I fell apart and the
palazzo
fell apart around me. But this, this I looked after, for Ovidio. And he’s still here. Can you feel him?’ Cosima looked around warily. ‘Well, sit down everyone. Let’s not stand on ceremony.’

He pulled out the chair in front of the dressing-table and Rosa threw herself on to the bed as if she owned it, patting the place beside her for Eugenio to join her. Luca and Cosima, uncomfortably aware that Nero had probably watched them making love, sat together on the floor.

‘You can imagine my delight when I first saw Rosa. I thought Valentina had risen from the dead. We’re friends, aren’t we, Rosa?’

‘Nero was so sad when I found him. He was like a lost dog, lingering over the body of his dead master. A pitiful sight.’

‘Where do you live?’ Cosima asked.

‘In a small house in the hills not far from here. I bought it with the last of Ovidio’s fortune when the
palazzo
became uninhabitable. I struggled to hold on to it, truly I did, but it was rotting around me. In the end I was forced to go. But like a homing pigeon I came back every day and watched it slowly sink into the garden. I left this folly as it was because everything in it was chosen specifically for here by Ovidio. These books, the statue, paintings, furniture, rugs, none of it has any value anywhere else but here, in Ovidio’s folly. So I left it like a shrine.’

‘Isn’t that romantic?’

‘You couldn’t count on my mother keeping it the way it was,’ said Luca.

‘No, I tried to frighten people away but I wasn’t a very convincing ghost!’

‘So, it was you who haunted the
palazzo
?’ said Eugenio.

‘I’ve wandered those corridors at night when everyone’s asleep.’ He clearly felt the
palazzo
still belonged to him. ‘I know every corner, every crevice.’

‘No wonder Ventura complains about ghosts,’ said Luca.

‘She need not be afraid. The only person this ghost has hurt is himself. So, it is your family who live here now?’

‘Yes,’ Luca replied.

‘I was lucky it fell into such sensitive hands. It was a gamble I had to take. I needed the money, so I had to sell.’

‘He likes what your mother’s done to the
palazzo
,’ said Rosa.

‘She thinks she’s captured the beauty of the original building,’ said Luca.

‘It’s not the same,’ Nero replied sharply. ‘It’s not at all like it was. I’ve got a book of old photographs to prove it. But,’ he conceded graciously, ‘she has good taste. Ovidio appreciated good taste.’

‘Nero and I talk long into the night, don’t we, Nero? You’d be amazed at the people he met with Ovidio. Grandees from all over Europe came and stayed here when he was a boy. The Aga Khan, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor . . . I could listen to Nero’s stories for hours.’ She glanced at her husband for his approval. He looked at her lovingly, relieved beyond words that Nero wasn’t the young lover he had feared.

‘And I could talk for hours. I don’t like people on the whole, I’m happier with memories of those I loved who are dead. But Rosa and I are friends. I’m no longer alone. How ironic that the granddaughter of the woman who stole Ovidio’s heart is now my consolation.’

At that moment the door opened and Alba’s face peered in, shocked to see that the folly wasn’t empty.

‘
Mamma!
’ Rosa sat up guiltily.

‘What are
you
doing here? Oh my God! Nero?’

‘Alba,’ said Nero, pleased to see his audience was growing. ‘Is that Fitz?’ Fitz walked in behind Alba.

‘Come in, don’t be shy. Aren’t the years just falling away!’

‘Rosa, how do you know Nero?’ Alba was baffled. She thought him dead long ago.

‘I found him here.’ She shrugged, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

‘Now we’ve found the intruder, the only thing left is to tell Mother.’

Fitz looked anxiously at Alba. He thought of Rosemary discovering them here together and barely dared contemplate the consequences. ‘I should go,’ he said.

‘Don’t go,’ interjected Nero. ‘We’re having a
salon
. We must make it a nightly event. It’ll be the most desirable
salon
in Italy.’

As Fitz turned to leave, he bumped straight into Romina who had appeared in the doorway with Rosemary like a pair of schoolmistresses walking in on an illicit midnight feast. ‘What on earth is going on? Who is that?’ She pointed at Nero.

‘You must be Romina,’ said Nero, standing up. ‘Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Nero. Palazzo Montelimone was once mine.’

‘Nero?’ she repeated. ‘
Madonna!
The world could not get any stranger! So you are the intruder?
Che fascinante!
I’ve always wondered. Luca, run to the house and bring some wine, I need a drink. Move over, Rosa my darling, I must sit down. Nero, who’d have thought
you
would come back from the dead?’