Rancid Pansies (9 page)

Brilliant! Well up to the little weasel’s usual standard of florid insincerity. He has even managed to suggest the image of the statue in a church only a few hundred metres away of the Virgin with her heart transfixed by a ring of gilded tin swords representing seven distinct dolours, any one of which would have been enough to spare her the other six: the Baroque
version
of overkill. We both smile at the same moment, happy to be sparring partners once again.

‘In confidence, I was hard hit myself,’ I admit. ‘As a
gentleman
of your exquisite sensibility may imagine, the shock was life-threatening.’ (I use the word
micidiale
, which can cover anything from the unwelcome attentions of a mosquito to assault by a knife-wielding maniac.) ‘To lose one’s entire house and very nearly several dear friends with it – not to mention one’s own life – in a whiff of brimstone, how can mere words do it justice? The incident provoked in me the gravest medical repercussions. I was prostrated for many weeks.’ That’s enough dramatic pathos. Time now to give him a taste of
Samper
redivivus. ‘For endless hours I lay and contemplated the dire event. Yet do you know, in all that time it never crossed my mind that even so brilliantly qualified and experienced a property surveyor as yourself could have guessed that the site at Le Roccie hid a fundamental geological weakness.’

Benedetti gets the point at once. His raven plumage may be borrowed but his mind is still very much his own. ‘Naturally not, maestro. There was, of course, a meeting in the Comune only days after the tragedy because the tremors were also felt down here, although thanks to the Blessed Virgin we were spared damage. As a courtesy you were invited to attend this meeting yourself, but we gathered that you never received the invitation, being by then back in England. It was our loss. But the region’s geological assessor gave evidence, recorded in the minutes, stating clearly that any suggestion that such a
weakness
could have been suspected in advance would amount to slander and misprision. The truth is we were all taken
completely
by surprise, and new geological surveys are now urgently in progress. There is of course concern for Greppone. As you know, there have been several landslides up there in the past, although in general these were caused by heavy rain rather than seismic tremors. But, signore, if I may presume to enquire: what are your plans now?’

‘I was going to a bar for coffee.’

‘But what a coincidence! So was I. I pray you would not think it presumptuous if I joined you and had the privilege of
offering you the coffee? I feel there are still matters we might profitably discuss.’

Obviously the crafty bastard wants something from me. He has certainly been quick to soften me up. To find out if there actually was a previous geological survey of the area that he could have known about I shall probably have to go to the central records in Lucca and dig them out. He must also know I could never be bothered. Meanwhile, I badly need coffee.

The surprised barman gives me a welcome reassuringly free of hyperbole. Indeed, he manages to make me feel something of a local celebrity. I suppose I am, really, but it’s nice to know at least one of the tradespeople is pleased to see me. Benedetti elects to sit at a table instead of standing at the bar, and the barman duly brings us our coffees and chocolate-filled croissants.

‘You must forgive me for harping on it, maestro,’ Benedetti dabs at his lips with a tiny square of tissue paper, ‘but I feel myself privileged to be sitting here not merely with an esteemed client and valued friend but with the authentic
beneficiary
of a miracle. I remember in one of our previous
conversations
you were, dare I say it?, somewhat
Protestant
in your scepticism about the powers of Our Lady. But I
understand
that the ex voto intercession of the Blessed Diana was your salvation. It is my firm belief that she is simply another aspect of the maternal principle embodied by Our Lady who watches over this sad world of ours. At some level they are surely indivisible.’

Huh? What nonsense is this? I have come prepared for
coffee
, not for a theological discussion. ‘You must forgive me,
dottore
. I hadn’t taken you for so profoundly religious a person.’

‘Oh, I am, signor Samper, I truly am. For a while as a student I even wondered whether I might have a calling. But as
scripture
soberingly points out, many are called but few are chosen. I, alas, was not chosen.’

I resist saying this showed a novel fastidiousness on the deity’s part. ‘My stepmother assures me that anyone may serve, regardless of profession. Even a humble prostitute or
estate agent or’ – I add hurriedly, for I like to be fair – ‘a mere
writer
can, I gather, be an instrument of glory. But I’m puzzled by your mention of a Blessed Diana. I’m afraid I’m not very well up on your Catholic saints. Is this to do with hunting? The Roman goddess?’

‘Oh, but surely?’ Benedetti raises his eyebrows and I am intrigued to see how his rug almost (but not quite)
imperceptibly
floats like a dark continent above shifting tectonic plates. ‘The newspapers here were full of it. A police helicopter pilot reported you as saying that you and your friends were saved by an apparition of the Blessed Diana, the late British princess, the wife of
il Principe Carlo
. It was all in
Il Tirreno
and other newspapers. Did you not see it? You told the pilot she appeared in your kitchen surrounded by a halo of light and warned you to leave the house at once. Already, I believe, her followers are visiting the place, and not all of them British, either. Many Italians are –’

‘
What?
Signor Benedetti, this is utter nonsense! This is truly the first I’ve ever heard of it. No such thing happened and I assure you I said nothing of the kind. I’m afraid the entire
incident
is a complete invention by the pilot and the press. A total fabrication. What I think I said was –’ But although I’m in full expostulatory mode I now can’t remember exactly what I did say at the time. It had hardly been a moment for great
coherence
, dangling underslept and overwrought above the ruins of my house. ‘Whatever I said, I most certainly didn’t claim we saw an apparition. I’ve never heard such rubbish. And I’m quite sure that if I were going to see an apparition it wouldn’t be of a public figure I never met and who, at best, moved me to utter indifference. In any case you can’t possibly describe her as “Blessed” as though she were a candidate for sainthood. She was a Protestant and certainly no saint.’

It’s infuriating how difficult it is to deny something
vehemently
without incurring the suspicion of over-protesting. I hope that in these chronicles I have painted a self-portrait of Samper the inflexible rationalist. Quirky and passionate on
occasion, maybe, as befits an artist; but someone who has no truck with the sordid cop-outs and infantile comforts of
religious
belief and similar superstitions. I generally treat
transcendental
assertions with pained impatience, hoping to get back quickly to a subject worthy of intelligent conversation. But this tactic can also be overplayed and appear too casual by half, just a little too studiedly indifferent. Here and now, back in my favourite home-town bar and hearing outrageous lies imputed to me by a weasel in a wig, I can’t stop myself from lapsing into furious denial.

Meanwhile, the bewigged weasel is looking rather shocked. He collects himself enough to begin blustering, ‘Of course,
signore
, these are matters for the individual, and I’m sure in the confusion of that terrible night …’ But then he changes gear as though he has suddenly thought of something. ‘Might I humbly suggest it would be to your advantage if you didn’t express such views too widely?’

‘You think it might put me on the Vatican’s hit list? Papal assassins stalking me and lacing my coffee with polonium?’

Benedetti turns around and with a graceful gesture indicates to the barman that he should bring us fresh supplies. Turning back, he says in a suddenly businesslike tone, ‘
Rompo il
discorso
.
To change the subject ever so slightly, my friends at the post office tell me there are a good many letters waiting for you that they were unable to deliver. I would expect some of them to be the usual tiresome bills from ENEL and Telecom Italia since here one still pays for services like electricity and the telephone even if the cables are snapped off and dangling in space. One has a vision of volts and voices just dribbling out into the void,’ he adds with a surprising flight of whimsy. ‘You know how it is with these companies: if you wish to
discontinue
a service you are required to give suitable notice in advance. They are relentless.’

‘I’m sure a good lawyer will sort that out in thirty seconds.’

‘Oh, then there’s nothing for you to worry about. An agent of your insurance company has also been trying to find you
quite urgently. In her frustration she was even reduced to
calling
on me to see if I could give her your address. But alas! Still, I’m sure a man of your astuteness will long since have had such matters in hand and I have no business even mentioning them. No doubt your good lawyer will easily be able to cancel whatever financial penalties accrue from a failure to notify a loss as soon as it has occurred. I am impertinent even to
mention
it.’

‘No, no,’ I say magnanimously, while sipping hot espresso cautiously. I don’t suppose polonium has any taste. ‘These are all things I shall be attending to now that I’m back.’

‘I’m relieved to hear it. As one familiar with your house as well as someone who esteems you greatly, I naturally have only the well-being of your affairs at heart. So I need not allude to other concerned parties such as the carabinieri, the Forestale, and the Comune itself.’

‘You may set your mind at rest, dottore. La signora Marta has already apprised me of them.’

‘Ah, you have seen her?’

‘In England. And only last week.’

‘What an estimable person! I believe she is destined to be a great artist.’

‘So does she.’ Estimable, my foot. Not long ago, Benedetti was spreading the implausible canard that Marta was either a call girl or a madam, a calumny for which he was later obliged to apologise. There is craftiness in the wind here but I can’t yet make out its direction.

‘Because you and I are such old friends’ – Benedetti’s eyes guilelessly take in the flyblown ceiling overhead that still bears signs of the exuberance surrounding Italy’s last World Cup win – ‘I will tell you something you will not have heard me say once I’ve said it. It is that gossip in our small world suggests la signora Marta has already made enquiries about the status of your remaining land at Le Roccie.’

‘
Ahh
.’ Not to me, she hasn’t. Devious bitch. Wants to expand her little empire, I suppose.

‘Yes indeed. I expect you are wondering about property
values
and so on.’

‘Suppose I were. What would you say my remaining land is currently worth? In round figures?’

‘In round figures? Precisely zero, I’m afraid. The roundest figure of all.’ Benedetti darts me an intense glance as if daring me to protest that only a few years ago he had promised me its value could only ever go up in leaps and bounds. ‘How could it be otherwise, signore? You would never get planning
permission
to rebuild a house up there even if you wanted to. And if by some miracle you did, no one would insure it for you.’

‘I suppose not.’

‘Definitely not. As
terreno
it is valueless. It is not
agricultural
land, nor is it proper forest. At best it is merely
sottobosco
. And blighted
sottobosco
at that.’

It’s dreadfully upsetting to hear my treasured patch of Eden so described. ‘You mean I might as well give it to Marta?’ I exclaim bitterly.

‘Ah, but would the signora want it? Don’t forget that from the moment of the earthquake, the value of her own house halved.’

‘Really?’ I perk up a bit.

‘Of course. Who else would want to live there when one day a slightly bigger tremor might drop her house into the gulf as well? I fully understand your predicament, maestro, and I am overwhelmed by sympathy. Both you and la signora are artists. You must have silence and solitude. However, I promise you need not search out wildernesses above the snow line in order to find an ideal house for yourself in this area.’

Good God, I do believe he’s going to try and sell me
another
house! The
nerve
of the man! One really has to admire his chutzpah. ‘No doubt you have somewhere in mind?’

Again Benedetti scans the ceiling. Some of the adhering flecks may be the dried toppings of ice creams that were hurled heavenwards at the moment of Italy’s winning goal:
peppermint
and chocolate sprinkles and the like. For the first time I
notice that the little round grey marks are actually dimples in the plaster, no doubt impacts from the metal-topped corks of shaken spumante bottles. ‘But when I say your property is
valueless
,’ he says as though I hadn’t asked the question, ‘that is true only in terms of the
terreno
.’

‘Oh? So what else is there? Don’t tell me the landslip has exposed an Etruscan hypogeum full of treasures? Or an
unexpected
vein of gold, perhaps?’

‘I’m afraid not. No, I am still thinking of your Princess Diana.’

And suddenly I get it. Of
course
. How dumb I’ve been! So fixated have I become on the demise of my beautiful home that I have been blind to alternative possibilities. Seeing my
expression
Benedetti nods, the lights gleaming in his jet black thatch where only a few months ago they would have glistened pinkly on his scalp. Does he take it off at night and put it on a stand? I wonder. Or does Mrs Weasel like to run her fingers through it when hormonally urged? And why does this make me feel marginally more softly disposed towards him?