An Accidental Life (12 page)

“Oh, that was a watch tower in the old days, Signora,” he said, straightening. Wrapping the water bottle in a napkin, he opened it and bent to pour water into their glasses. “It was built to warn villagers when barbarians or the
saracens
—the pirates—came calling.” He set the bottle down on the table and stood beside her, draping the napkin he’d used to hold the water bottle over his arm.

“Up there,” he waved his hand in the direction of the watch tower, “when the watchmen spotted the ships, they would light a fire to warn everyone in our village, and others along the coastline too. Each village watch would see the fire and light their own, all the way along the coast from Sorrento to Positano to Praiano to Amalfi to Molare . . .” He rolled his hand as the musical names rolled from his tongue.

“My grandfather told me the stories. And when our people saw the fires, they would run up into the mountains, carrying their valuables with them.”

“That’s a good early-warning system,” Rebecca said, thinking of the steep stone steps climbing the mountain that substituted for roads in the village. The steps would be difficult climbing for those not used to them. Still today, Positano was a warren of alleys and passageways and steps. The road at the top of the cliff past their hotel was the only one for automobiles around.

The man handed her a menu, and gave one to Peter, and then straightened, smiling.

“Si, certo!”
His face crinkled with amusement. “The saracen’s sea legs couldn’t handle our steep mountains. They could climb the masts of their ships, but our mountains defeated them.”

After he left Peter leaned close, pointing out to sea. “Look at that.”

She gazed at the hundreds of dancing lights in the darkness all the way to the horizon, where they became almost indistinguishable from the stars. Those were the
lampara
. The small boats with lanterns swinging from the bow were fishing for anchovies and cuttlefish as they’d done for hundreds, maybe thousands, of years.

Peter rested his hand on her shoulder as they looked at the beautiful sight. “Already I’m letting go. I’m glad we came.”

“I don’t know,” she said, shaking her head. “I kind of miss the old purple K&B signs and Whitney clocks.”

Just then the waiter arrived with a dish of sweet local olives, and warm bread, and a hunk of Parmesan cheese. They ordered a large plate of escargot to share. Neither were very hungry since their body clocks still warred with the local time.

Despite the nap and the surroundings, Peter was still tired and wound tight, his mind caught between thoughts of the trial starting in two weeks and the Chasson case.

He’d promised himself that he would not become embroiled in details of the Chasson case, not yet, not this early. The facts he’d seen so far had created a dark emotional pit, and if he allowed himself to sink into the pit this early, he suspected that would shadow his judgment when time came to make a decision on charges, and whether the State could sustain the burden of proof at trial. He empathized with the young Chasson woman’s rage, of course he did. But Peter knew that he couldn’t afford to let his emotions get in the way. The State’s prosecution of Glory Lynn Chasson’s complaint depended upon a clear evaluation of the evidence in context, not merely reviewing an autopsy report and pictures. He would wait until Mac came up with more. Meanwhile . . .

He blinked, realizing that Rebecca had asked a question. “Sorry.” He picked up an olive from the bowl the waiter had left on the table and turned to her. “What did you say?”

“I asked if you’d like to walk down to the cove early tomorrow morning to watch the sunrise. Like we did before.”

Without thinking, he groaned and bit into the olive. The olives of southern Italy were plump and sweet, not briny, like at home.

She laughed and rolled her eyes. “Never mind. I’m tired too. We’ve got plenty of time.”

13

Rebecca woke early and lay in
the bed beside Peter, orienting herself. In the distance she could hear sea gulls calling, and closer, in the trees around the terrace she heard songbirds. Rolling her head toward Peter, she saw that he was still asleep.

So she lay there for a few minutes, drifting in the half-light between dreams and reality, thinking that maybe she’d get up and dress and walk down to the cove. She could watch the fishermen coming in with their catch. Then again, she told herself there was no reason to move from this soft, comfortable spot beside Peter—this was not a workday, there was no morning traffic to fight—

And then, suddenly she remembered.

She slid her hand to the little bulge as it all came back, the conversation that she must have with Peter, and the knowledge that when she told him, this would all be real. But, at the same time, inside she felt something disconcerting, a strange new feeling—a strong instinctive feeling that above all else she must protect this child. The conflicting emotions were almost overwhelming. And yet the baby was still so small; she could hardly feel a thing.

Pushing the covers away, gently, without waking Peter, she slipped from the bed. They’d left the terrace doors open last night to hear the waves below. Barefoot, she walked silently out onto the terrace and stretched. Her spirits lifted a bit as she put her hands on her hips and looked out to sea, inhaling the crisp morning air. She told herself to get a grip, that this was the time alone she’d longed for, time to think about the problem with no interruptions, no telephones ringing, or clients waiting in the conference room. Turning, she padded back into the bedroom to dress. With a glance at Peter, still sleeping, she pulled on some loose flax-colored linen pants, a white T-shirt, and slipped on some sandals. She would probably be back before he even woke.

But the thoughts that she’d been fighting off since they’d flown out of New Orleans all surfaced at once, suddenly demanding attention. Arms hanging at her sides, Rebecca halted in the middle of the room and looked at Peter, finally—at last—facing facts. She was almost nine weeks along, now. Nine weeks, and the due date was just ahead, in December. She had to break the news to Peter.

Thoughts of Elise rose. She could hear her mother weeping in the church. She could see the little coffin just before the altar. With a sudden sense of desperation, she quickly ran a brush through her hair, twisting it and winding it into a knot at the nape of her neck. She secured it with one more twist, holding it tight with a pen that Peter had left on the table last night.

Then, turning, she stared at Peter, her love, thinking of the responsibility that she would have as a mother, and the havoc this would create with her career. And what if, as with Elise, she failed? She’d learned the hard way what a momentary lapse could do. She would never admit this to Amalise, or to anyone else, but despite the façade that she’d fashioned for the world, she was frightened. She’d never held an infant, never changed a diaper. She could handle a multimillion-dollar financing transaction for a client, but she knew nothing at all about raising a child.

As she watched her husband breathing, his chest rising and falling, his eyelids fluttering in his sleep, fear gripped her. Her mother had never forgiven her for that one instant in time, and she’d never forgiven herself. She turned, heading for the door. As she picked up the room key from the table, she accepted at last that the baby was real. She was a mother. And that everything in her life would surely change.

From the hotel Rebecca turned left on Cristoforo Colombo, heading back toward the top of the town where steps down to the cove began. The air was crisp and cool, carrying the scents of lemon and fresh baked bread and flowers and the sea. At the turn of the road, she started down the long stone steps which had been carved from the cliffs many centuries ago, shading citizens from the beating sun with thick grape arbors overhead. The steps were slippery, still moist in the early hour.

The passageway down to the cove was steep and winding. She hurried between the little shops and markets and galleries, all still closed. Sunshine filtered through the vines overhead creating dancing patterns of light on the shaded pavestones beneath her feet. In places the steps joined with other passageways winding off through the village, but she ignored those and kept walking down and down and down.

When she reached the terraced plateau forming a small piazza before the church of Santa Maria, the steps divided and she looked about, momentarily confused. And then, remembering, she turned to the right and continued walking down again, until she reached the base of the village and the sandy beach.

The sand in the small horseshoe cove was beige and pebbled. From the steps looking out over the scene, it was just as she’d remembered. Behind her the village of Positano ended at the base of the cliff in a terraced swath of cafés, restaurants, and open bars—so that from where she stood and looking to her left or right, they appeared to be built one on top of the other, all vying for views of the sea. In the evenings this area was alive with music and festive colored lights and the sounds of laughter and shouting and dogs barking and plates and glasses clanking.

Bending, she slipped the sandals from her feet and dangling one in each hand, she walked over the sand to the edge of the water where gentle waves lapped the shore. Here, water that had appeared green high up from the terrace of the hotel, now was translucent. She could see every stone and shell on the sand underneath.

Digging her toes into the cool wet sand, she stood there, letting the water wash over her feet. Colorful
barcas
dotted the water far out to sea, far past the dancer’s green island. Golden sunshine caught the tips of the dark blue waves. She glanced to her right, to a small paved area, a concrete pier and a makeshift dock bearing a huge black balancing scale suspended from an iron tripod with heavy chains. The fishing boats would come here to weigh the catch later on. Above the pier a boardwalk ran the length of a stone jetty that curved into the cove like the inner side of a crescent moon. A small two-storied hotel was built on the jetty, too. The jetty protected the beach area from the surf pounding the rocky shoreline on the other side, stretching toward Sorrento.

An old man was fishing on the pier. Sitting on the concrete, legs dangling above the water, he wore a rumpled straw hat that had seen better days. As she watched he reeled in a fish, worked it off the hook as it wiggled, then he tossed it into a bucket beside him. She hoped there was some water in the bucket. He didn’t seem to notice she was there.

Turning left, she ambled along the pebbly shore. In an hour or two the beach would be fully stocked with rows of wooden lounge chairs facing the water, and bright colored cushions and umbrellas, and an hour after that every chair would be occupied. She strolled along, kicking at the shallow water with her toes, past three chairs that were left on the beach from last night. She walked on past the open-air restaurant at the back of the beach that she and Peter liked. Further on she saw the storage hut where the chairs and umbrellas were stored, and past that the beach swerved out around a rocky jut of the cliff. On the other side was another, narrow straight beach. She could walk on, if she wanted. But here she stopped and turned back.

Dragging one of the abandoned chairs right to the edge of the water, Rebecca sat down, folded her hands behind her head, and stretched out. A dog barked and she turned her head as the dog ran up to her, slid to a stop, spraying sand, and then spun around and sat back on his haunches, tail whipping back and forth. Turning, she saw an old man coming down the steps holding a stick. He held it up, waving it, and the dog jumped up and raced toward him.

Shielding her eyes from the rising sun with her arm and elbow, she watched the man and the dog for a while. Then she relaxed again, closing her eyes and shutting out the sunshine and the world. And with the waves lapping against the shores and the dog barking and the old man’s laughter in the distance, for her alone a thought came—unspoken words that were not her own:
I have called you by name; you are mine.

As she thought these words, a new kind of love swept through her, a love so powerful that it seemed to radiate from her very center into every cell, filling her. Committing her to the child created long ago in the most ancient of days. And, like a prayer, she spoke to her baby, because she knew that this time she must not fail: