Fifty-Minute Hour (51 page)

She dithered at the crossroads, unsure which way to go, though Lionel had drawn her what he called a simple sketch map, with Sant' Agostino's clearly marked – well, clear to
him
, perhaps. She found Rome rather baffling, not just the roads, the money. She still hadn't quite worked out how many lire to the pound, except it seemed an awful lot, and the prices in the fashion shops looked really rather frightening with those daunting rows of noughts. And the dates were tricky, too. Back in simple England you could stick mainly to AD, but BC was just as vital here, at least in Oliver's classics course. She was really proud of Oliver, who knew all the different emperors without muddling them, as she did (even though she'd watched all twelve parts of
I, Claudius
and a series called
Decline and Fall
, which had starred Jeremy Irons in a laurel wreath and toga). He could even tell one ruin from another, and had spent ages in the Forum, not just rounding up wild cats as Jonathan had done (or getting bored like Simon), but studying his guidebook and making sudden brilliant comments, which even James admired.

She hadn't said a word, of course, but she'd found the Forum really quite a mess – all those crumbling piles of stones and depressing heaps of rubble, and all in such a shambles – expensive broken columns lying where they'd fallen and nettles choking everything. She'd have liked to sort it out, tidy things away, dump the debris in black dustbin-bags, do a bit of weeding. No point labelling something the Temple of Vespasian or Julia's Basilica, when it was just a few old dusty bricks or half a dirty column. And even Trajan's Market, which was very nearly whole, was really only a BC variation on the huge Tesco's in New Maiden. It was a treat today, to tell the truth, not to have to view another decomposing temple, or admire another ruin, or trek through a museum with her neck cricked at an angle. She had something far more crucial to carry out – alone.

She turned right, then left, still studying the sketch map, which was crumpled now and more or less illegible. Her sweaty hands had made it damp and smudged. The December air was still shock-cold, despite the glittering sun, but she was perspiring from sheer nerves. She could hear the fevered murmur of a fountain, plashing somewhere close, doubled back to find it, so she could cool her wrists, rinse her clammy fingers. The water in the basin was steaming like a bath, obviously warmer than the chilly air around it. How passionate it looked, that excited breath of steam panting from the seething fretted water. All the fountains which she'd seen so far appeared to be in a perpetual state of orgasm – gushing forth, spewing out, never still or sated. And there were at least three hundred of them, or so the guidebook said – three hundred endless climaxes, spurting day and night.

This fountain was exotic, and clearly overcrowded – not just nymphs and satyrs, but dolphins, eagles, porpoises, and some rather rude young men who were doing nothing to conceal their all-too-public parts, but sprawling with their thighs apart, as if to show them off instead. She compared each, size for size, wished they could be sculpted erect and really stiff, like an Etruscan god she had spotted in one of the museums. Since she'd arrived in Rome, she'd seen more sets of genitals than ever in her life before, so that all those recent words she'd learnt were coming in quite handy. She'd gawped at sculpted satyrs' tickle-tails, painted gods' flap-doodles, stallions' huge bronze master-tools, cherubs' marble joysticks. Some were chipped or broken off, some fig-leafed, draped or veiled, but they couldn't veil the passion – naked passion everywhere, on walls and plinths and ceilings: swoonings, orgies, blatant rapes – and her own sex just as shameless: flagrant females twined with swans, or fondling stiff-horned unicorns, or stroking their own nipples.

She had seen the brazen hussies even carrying on in churches: marble saints and angels who were clearly counting orgasms and had long since reached the million mark; nude men flaunting muscly thighs on the Sistine Chapel ceiling; Adam with a coupling-pin she'd examined through binoculars (which Lionel had kindly bought to assess the brighter colours in the recent restoration, compare them with the dingy ones he'd deplored in 1950). And even the Vatican Museum writhed with near-pornography: sixteenth-century swingers doing outrageous things on ceilings, voluptuous blushing murals more suited to a brothel, and so many different sizes of scrotums, pricks and testicles, she had begun to wonder if six hundred words were really quite sufficient.

John-Paul was right – as always. He'd explained several times already that sex and religion were not necessarily incompatible and she had no need to feel guilty because she'd helped herself to pleasure and release. Here in Rome, the centre of her faith, unbridled lust was commonplace, merely labelled ‘Art' and allowed to grace the churches, even the Vatican itself. She'd said ‘cunt' and ‘prick' out loud in St Peter's great basilica, felt no trace of guilt, only wild elation. Her own passion and excitement were now part of something higher, had been sanctified and vindicated, allowed the imprimatur. John-Paul had transformed her from a confined and lowbrow housewife to an artist and an intellect – even something of a linguist. She'd learnt several colloquial French words for the penis (
la queue, la verge, la bitte
) and also Anglo-Saxon ones, such as
gesceapu
and
teors
. She felt different altogether – uplifted and creative, leavened like her home-made bread (which she no longer had the time for). And in Rome she was a star, her blue eyes and blond hair attracting constant glances, even blatant whistlings, whispered assignations. Even now, a youth was strolling up to her, not more than half her age, yet leering at her breasts, trying out his bad but bawdy English.

She shook him off, continued on her way, found herself at last in the Piazza Sant' Agostino, staring up at its tall and stately church. According to the guidebook, famous sixteenth-century courtesans had come tripping to this church, artists' models, mistresses of Popes, even common prostitutes. She shivered with excitement. It all seemed fitting, somehow, consistent with her mission. She was here to beg the special help of the Madonna del Parto, a statue of the Blessed Virgin famed throughout all Italy, visited by women from Palermo to Milan. She might not know Italian, but
parto
she had learned – five letters which were swelling to nine months.

She entered the dim church, admiring its rich splendour, the gold and marble majesty which seemed commonplace in Rome. She found the statue just inside the door, gleaming and dramatic amidst its blaze of dazzling lamps. The shrine was overflowing with offerings from the satisfied: jewelled medallions, solid silver hearts, priceless gems and treasures. If her own request were granted, she'd donate her sapphire ring, a piece of antique jewellery which had been left her by her mother (and which James had often tried persuading her to sell). She did her best to lose her debt-plagued husband on the golf course as she showered all her heavy change into the boxes by the candle-stands, watched every dead electric bulb spring to instant life. Each candle was a wish, a prayer, a strengthening of her hope. She knelt before the statue, kissed its marble foot, worn smooth by countless women who had come for the same reason, come secretly and desperately, as taut with nerves as she was.

The Virgin seemed impassive, her eyes cast down, ignoring all her trophies. Supposing she were deaf, or chose simply not to hear? Yet she was lauded as all-merciful, renowned for her compassion. Mary gazed up at the marble breasts, which looked engorged with milk, then down at the wide hips – perfect hips for child-bearing, the strong and powerful Mother. She could hear the prayers of would-be mothers vibrating through the church – twentieth-century typists, sixteenth-century peasants, women rich or ragged, young or middle-aged. She joined her prayers to theirs, then tiptoed to the door again, closed it very gently, reluctant to disturb the hushed fervour of the church.

She stepped out into sunlight, blinking in the glare, wincing at the traffic noise as she jumped five centuries. She dodged between two taxis, turned into a side street, searching for a bar. Step One was completed; Step Two far more daunting. Would she ever have the courage, ever dare that tiny test – tiny yet momentous; three brief and trifling minutes which could change the whole remainder of her life? She'd been dreading it all night, a dread confused with longing, as her fear was mixed with hope.

She found a small and sleazy bar, propped up either side with scaffolding, as if it needed crutches. Never mind how rough it was, so long as it had a lavatory. She had learnt the word for toilet, now blushing as she stammered it, and ordering a coffee first, to justify her asking. (Public loos were rare in Rome, as poor Harry had discovered.) She left her coffee steaming, slunk out to the back, found a cramped and smelly cubicle with sawdust on the floor. She pulled her knickers down, crouched above the toilet, mouthing one last desperate prayer as she watched the stream of urine falling in the bowl, and catching a few vital drops in the little pot she'd brought.

She scrabbled for the dipstick with its two embedded circles. No need to read the instructions – she'd done that twenty times or more, knew them off by heart, knew the crucial colour-code. One circle would turn purple if she were genuinely pregnant, but remain completely colourless if she were mistaken or imagining things. The test took just three minutes, which was really quite miraculous, and you could do it at an extremely early stage – as early as the very day your next period was due. When she'd been pregnant with her first child, she'd had to wait six weeks, and her doctor sent the specimen to a hospital laboratory, which meant hanging around another week before her condition was confirmed. You couldn't buy these quick home-kits from any local chemist, expect almost total accuracy, yet bypass all the doctors and laboratories.

The only thing you needed was a fairly steady hand, and hers was really trembling as she used the tiny dropper to transfer the precious urine to the tube of purple powder, then plunged the dipstick in. She shut her eyes immediately, not daring to watch the circles in case they stayed unchanged. She counted to a thousand, then began at one again, eyes still tightly closed; only jerking to her feet as someone battered on the door, a drunkard by the sound of it, hollering in Italian.

‘Yes, I'm sorry. Yes, I'm coming. Just wait a moment, would you? This is absolutely crucial …' He didn't understand, couldn't even hear her, was swamping her tense whisper with new and louder curses. She crumpled up the instruction sheef, smoothed her skirt and coat, glancing at the circles with a hopeless desperation. Of course they would stay colourless, of course she wasn't pregnant. It was simply wishful thinking, fantasy, delusion. No, wait – that vital right-hand circle was beginning to change and deepen from a listless chalky nothing to a weak and wavering lilac. She blinked and looked again. No mistake. The colour was now deepening to the triumphant vivid purple of a bishop's flaunting robes. She clung on to the cistern as she tried to take the truth in, relish its full meaning. She was pregnant by John-Paul, carrying his child, had his genes inside her, fusing with her own. The child would be a prodigy, combining all his skills; his intellect, his brilliance, his insight, his …

‘
Chè cazzo c'è là dentro? Vuoi uscire brutto stronzo
?'

She almost dropped her dipstick as she struggled with the bolt; could hear the rudeness in the words without grasping what they meant; feel the man's impatience shudder through the door as he hammered it and kicked it. She flurried from the cubicle, stammering her apologies as a ruffian in ragged jeans cannoned roughly past her, clutching at his flies.

‘I'm going to have a
baby
,' she mouthed in explanation as the door slammed shut behind him; repeated the same awesome words as she walked along the passage, almost in a daze. She longed to tell the world; flung a marvelling smile at two dozen surly customers as she re-entered the drab bar, gulped her scummy coffee standing up. She still couldn't quite believe it, kept peeping at the dipstick which she would never throw away, keep as a memorial, a glorious purple trophy. Two young men were ogling her from further down the counter. She nodded to them graciously, received their adulation as her natural right and privilege, now John-Paul had made her Mother, changed her from mere patient to sacred vehicle.

She left a generous tip, swept out to the street again, passing festive Christmas streamers which seemed strung up in her honour. The air was now much warmer, old stone glowing golden, glints of dazzling sunlight flickering on the cobblestones. A withered cringing gypsy came hobbling up beside her, holding out her hand. She'd used all her change on candles, so she filled the dirty paw with crisp new banknotes. She could afford to be magnanimous now she'd be saving James a fortune every month. No need to continue her sessions with John-Paul, when she had him deep inside her and was cured in any case. She'd first sought his help for coldness, sexual prudery, then become his torrid mistress, avid and awakened. She would replace his shrine in the spare room with an exquisite wooden cradle, hand-carved from precious wood, lined and ruched with silk. It would no longer be a ‘spare' room, and she no longer spare – her life's work now to nurture John-Paul's child.

She could see babies everywhere, in prams and pushchairs on the streets, in posters and advertisements, in the straw-and-plaster mangers set up in the windows of several shops and cafés. She stopped at one such crib, glanced at the Madonna kneeling by the Christchild – a princess, not a peasant, robed in real blue velvet. She touched her sapphire ring, the same vibrant shade of blue, slipped it off her finger. It was no longer hers to wear, belonged to the Madonna in the church of Sant' Agostino, the all-merciful Madonna of Childbirth. She must return there right away, beg the powerful Virgin for one last grace and favour as she offered her the ring: John-Paul's child – and hers – must be a girl.