Rancid Pansies (27 page)

‘You’re beginning to sound like a badly scripted noir film, Razi,’ says Benedetti. ‘Not only is the maestro here superbly experienced in his profession, he is so wonderfully at home in
both our language and culture that I can never remember he is not by birth one of us. Besides, I’m sure that poor Mr Swanepoel’s death was a complete accident.’

The mayor is licking fig seeds off his fingers. ‘Even so. One can’t be too careful.’

I can’t get the hang of this evening at all. Something in the dynamics between Benedetti and Giardini remains baffling. More and more I’m convinced that of these two rogues it is the weasel estate agent rather than the mayor who calls the shots, but I couldn’t say why. With all this talk about floating corpses I can scarcely be blamed if my mind turns to thoughts of organised crime. I remember hearing someone allege that places like Lourdes and Fátima and Santiago de Compostela are run by mafias attracted by the constant stream of
desperate
pilgrims with money to spend on anything that might somehow be translated into miraculous cures. Maybe even here in Tuscany the racketeers are beginning to lick their lips in anticipation of a steady source of income and some fiefdoms are being staked out? Could it possibly be that beneath Eros’s shining and luxuriant wig there sits a made man, an
éminence grise
who helped put his fat old schoolfriend Orazio into office? It would explain how it is that a mere local estate agent has been able to do deals with me on behalf of the Comune. And most convincingly of all, how he has been able to arrange for the services of my new house to be connected in
record-breaking
time.

After another hour or so, and having paid my various
well-feigned
respects, I drive away from Benedetti’s house still
puzzled
about the precise purpose of the evening. However: suppose I’m wrong and it
is
still possible to scupper the cult up at my former home? Suppose this time the Vatican were to take more effective steps to protect itself from accusations of pandering to popular superstition by launching its own
investigation
, one that extends to tracking down and grilling all the guests at my birthday party on that fateful night last year? I sounded confident enough when I assured the gross mayor
that my other guests would unfailingly support my gospel, but I wonder if some of them might not have their limit. For instance, Adrian has already told me that Max Christ is a Catholic and comes from a devout Bavarian family. He might well prove susceptible to Church leverage. And if a man of Max’s international eminence were to recant and admit the apparition story was untrue, a sensational exposé across Europe’s news media hinting at corruption might very well be enough to destroy the cult at Le Roccie and with it the Comune’s (or the Mob’s) plans to get rich from it. And I hate to think what the press might do to my reputation as I take up residence in a house whose acquisition has been not entirely free of rule-bending.

But this is surely mere paranoia. That’s what comes of
dining
with splendidly corrupt and scheming men, I think as I let myself into my deceased landlord’s flat. After an evening at Benedetti’s sumptuous place I am struck afresh by its aesthetic squalor. Somehow Mr Swanepoel’s taste in bed linen and decor foretold a sticky end. But the casual tale of his sudden demise has made its point. I vow that just as soon as I’m installed in my new house I shall never mention any of this ever again to anyone.

I spend the next few days frantically buying the basics for my new home: kitchen stoves and washing machines and beds and suchlike. For the first time in my life I have enough money not to agonise over the cost. Just get it
done
, Samper, is what I tell myself; then you can move in. The only thing to which I devote real care is the
batterìa da cucina
: the all-important pots and pans and general kitchen equipment. We artists concentrate on the things that really matter. I’m sure Picasso was far more
particular
when selecting new brushes and easels than he was over choosing a new girlfriend. At last there comes the wonderful moment when I can lock the late Mr Swanepoel’s door behind me, salute the last doddery nun on the stairs, drop the key off at Benedetti’s office and drive up to my very own house.

As I have intimated before, the place lacks Le Roccie’s panoramic view which now strikes me as a shade too aerial, a little too detached and godlike. The new vista of adjacent wooded hills, the town’s far-off roofs and beyond them a coastless slot of sea suddenly feels appropriate for someone who, willy-nilly, has descended to being embroiled in local politics. Yet I can still sing up here without risking the
complaints
of a testy neighbour. On the other hand I can also drive a mere five minutes down the road and come to an outlying
alimentari
for basics like flour and sugar and lavatory paper. As far as I can discover my house has no name but the site is known informally to the locals as Sciupapiedi or ‘feet ruiner’: no doubt a reference to the days when ill-shod peasants named landscapes according to the different kinds of anguish they inflicted.

How can one describe that sublime evening when one pours oneself a large g-&-t and for the first time sits outside one’s own house, looking out across a froth of olive trees over a new domain? So many dice have been cast one can no longer be bothered to think or worry about them. It’s even possible to ignore the fact that this otherwise bijou residence is still
wearing
a tin hat. The main thing is that Samper is finally
here
, at home once more, breathing juniper fumes in the sunset and hoping never again to move house until it’s time to be carried down to the local cemetery with its discreetly hidden rubbish heap of dried flowers and the empty red plastic cylinders of grave candles. Meanwhile, there’s much to be done. The one outstanding alteration to the house is the removal of its illegal top floor and the restoration of the original roof. This is to begin at once, and I have arranged for the entire upper storey to be sealed off and for the workmen to have access to it – together with their rubbish chutes and hoists – from outside at the back. It shouldn’t take long for them to demolish the
unfinished
walls, and putting the roof back on ought to be equally straightforward since it turns out that the speculative builder who removed it stored most of the original timbers in his yard
in Lucca where they still are. The point is, I shan’t need to have workmen traipsing through the house with their bags of cement and rolls of
carta catramata
. A pity in a way, since from earliest childhood I’ve adored the smell of workmen: that manly, capable scent of dust and fresh sweat and linseed oil. What I don’t like are their cigarettes and transistor radios. All would be forgiven if only they smoked Egyptian rather than Virginia tobacco and listened to Haydn string quartets. But alas.

What I’m really looking forward to is fitting my kitchen up as I want it. My natural creativity has been badly frustrated over these interminable homeless months, although I have managed to concoct a modern version of humble pie that I shall try to induce the St John restaurant, down by Smithfield, to take up. There is nothing wrong with deer’s entrails, liver and heart, and the St John has a wonderful way with umbles of all kinds. However, inventing ‘thought recipes’ is simply not satisfying. I am a hands-on cook par excellence. I need to get my fingers into the ingredients; that’s when the saliva and ideas start flowing. You would think this was a most basic human pleasure but I recently learned a shocking thing: that
residential
flats are now being built in London that don’t have a kitchen. Can you believe this? Apparently they
don’t have a kitchen
because their overpaid, philistine owners eat all their meals out. One can’t even begin to guess what sort of creatures these are. Imagine delegating one of life’s great pleasures to total strangers! If you can’t be bothered with your own food, what
would
you take trouble over?

Two days later history uncannily repeats itself. Years ago at Le Roccie when Marta first came to call I was up a stepladder in the kitchen. So I am today, busy fixing the hood of the
extractor
fan above the cooker, when the door opens and that
well-known
squeal ‘Gerree!’ turns my blood to ice. This time, however, history has added a twist. Marta is no longer a
neighbour
but a collaborator in the grandest artistic project of my
life. With an inward sigh I carefully balance the screwdriver and felt-tip marker on the edge of the hood next to the glass of prosecco that I find aids concentration in these fiddly DIY jobs. Then I descend the ladder while fixing a courteous smile of welcome to my face.

‘Marta!’ I exclaim. ‘Welcome to Casa Samper. And Joan too,’ for that lady is even now coming in behind her, tucking the car keys into one of the pockets of her dungarees. ‘How inspired of you both to have arrived in time for a late
morning
celebratory glass.’ Thank goodness the prosecco, which I’ve only just opened, is not very special. There’s nothing more galling than having to waste a really good wine on
people
who can barely tell it from Coke. I quickly retrieve my own glass.

‘Gerree, your house is so lovely!’ Marta is saying. She is looking far less frumpish, I notice. In particular her hair has emerged from its Struwwelpeter phase. It has been cut and styled and, most important of all,
washed
so it has lost that aura of pristine undergrowth that would once have made a field entomologist’s pulse quicken in anticipation. What’s more, she’s even wearing a dress instead of one of her baggy old shifts that gave her that characteristic Bedouin traffic-warden look. In fact, she appears to be dressing like the sort of girl she now regrets not having had the nerve to be twenty years ago. For the first time since I have known her Marta looks, well, practically
feminine
. Even Joan seems not to have brought with her the trademark reek of dogs, for which I am grateful.

‘I was forgetting you’ve never seen this place,’ I say, handing them glasses of prosecco.

‘Never, Gerree. But it is so big! I think you have many rooms here, more even than at Le Roccie with your garage together.’

‘Yes, there’s certainly ample space for little me. And a bit too much land outside, unfortunately. Three hectares of olives. But there we are.’

‘Smashing position,’ says Joan. ‘But I have to say the
corrugated
iron doesn’t look very Tuscan.

‘That’s all coming off in a day or two and the original roof will go back on. That’s how I managed to get this place at an affordable price, among other things.’ It’s clear the girls want to be shown around so we top up our glasses and bring them along as I give them the obligatory guided tour.

‘Once the new roof’s on it’ll be sensational,’ says Joan approvingly at the end.

I notice she seems to be smoking less and the absence of canine bouquet is quite startling. ‘Have you been back to the UK since I met you at Pisa?’ I ask. ‘And if not, how are those dogs of yours managing?’

‘I haven’t, no. Too much to do here. The dogs are fine. I rang the kennels the other day and far from pining away in my absence the rotten bastards are putting on weight. The
hullabaloo
at home seems to have died down and they say I could go back without getting lynched. So I may do that and bring the hounds over here.’

‘Bring them over? You’ll be staying here for longer, then? That’s good.’

‘Well,’ says Joan a little awkwardly, ‘I’ve been meaning to tell you but with all the bloody hubbub recently there hasn’t been a proper opportunity.’ She glances as Marta who …
simpers
. The only word. ‘Cutting through the bollocks and the lovey-dovey stuff, we’ve discovered that we’re natural
shipmates
. We go together like bacon and eggs, don’t we, Matti?’

Matti?
I suddenly remember that Marta’s younger sister Marja called her by this childhood nickname. By now we’re sitting on the terrace under a brand new awning out of which the June sunshine is beating a textiley smell of fresh
waterproofing
or something. Normally these admissions of
romantic
partnership merely make me raise a pair of cynical inward eyebrows while maintaining a bland expression of indulgent goodwill. Couples, for heaven’s sake. Dinky little dyads. One can’t take them seriously. Whenever I read that some creature like the brindled titmouse or the Pripet vole ‘pairs for life’ I am possessed with an immediate yearning for its extinction. I’ve
always assumed this is perfectly normal for single people, regardless of gender. But now the idea of Joan and Marta becoming a domestic item does actually give me pleasure, although I expect the prosecco helps. I’ve grown rather fond of old Joan, and as for Marta I’m anxious that as composer of the moment she should be as settled and contented as possible. I even go and fetch a bottle of almost-the-best champagne to celebrate.

‘Crikey, Gerry, we didn’t come here to get slewed, you know,’ says Joan when we have all toasted each other’s new houses, new romances and ageing livers.

‘Still, now that you’re here … Though I think I’d better scratch us together some lunch otherwise we’ll get completely sozzled. But what news of your own house, Marta?’

‘Ah, the
mustelje
Benedetti comes to me the other day and says he has a very good offer if I am thinking to move.’

‘Which you bloody well are,’ adds Joan. ‘There’s no way a composer like you can go on working up there. The place is a frigging madhouse. Honestly, Gerry, if you thought it was bad a couple of weeks ago you should see it now. A constant stream of people, cars parked any old where so Matti can’t even get out of her own drive, hymn-singing and chanting and Christ knows what else. Can you believe an actual monk in a dressing gown came knocking on our door asking for a meal and a bed for the night? A complete twat. He kept on talking about
carità
and flashing his rosary. I soon sent him packing and he was a lucky monk not to get a swift kick in the beads for good measure. The nerve of the bloke! I’m glad Matti was busy with her music at the time because her Italian’s
wonderful
and she’s so kind she would probably have invited him in and wound up giving him our bed while we slept on the floor somewhere. Talk about a heart of gold, old softy here. I’m a much tougher proposition and it certainly helps not being able to speak much of the lingo. I’ve always found saying “bugger off!” works well in any language.’