The House in Amalfi (29 page)

She called me later and we had a long heart-to-heart. I told her how happy I was and that I believed Lorenzo was, too. “But I worry he thinks he’s too old for me.”

“He is,” Jammy said. “Or else you are too young for him. Think about it, Lamour: when Lorenzo is in his eighties, you’ll only be in your fifties. That’s when the difference comes in.”

I knew it was true, but surely love overcame things like age. Love conquered all. I wanted so much to believe that, but now I had a little niggling doubt. I told her it didn’t matter anyway, because there was no talk of marriage or a future together. Lorenzo and I were living for the moment.

And anyway, there was another major obstacle between us: Jon-Boy. I thought Lorenzo knew the truth about what had happened to him and was keeping it from me. I didn’t want to believe that the man I loved might in some way be involved in my father’s death, but the thought lingered ominously at the back of my mind.

I sought out Mifune. “I’ve fallen in love with Lorenzo,” I told him. He nodded; of course he already knew. “Mifune, I still think he had something to do with Jon-Boy’s death, but when I asked him about it, he told me it was all so long ago, it’s best forgotten.”

Mifune was sitting cross-legged on the meditation stone. His lined parchment face was lifted to the sky, his eyes half-closed. He seemed surrounded by an aura of tranquillity, and I longed to share that.

“The past has faded into infinity,” he said. “Isn’t it time now to proceed toward the future without Jon-Boy?”

But the future seemed very hazy to me. I was Lorenzo’s mistress; there had been no talk of marriage. “Besides,” I said, “there’s the age difference.”

“Age is of the senses,” Mifune said. “We are not constrained by our years; we gain by them. Eventually our bodies give in to time; some of us die young, some old. Time is what we possess, not age. And what you and Lorenzo have is time.”

Of course, he was right.

Then Aurora and Nico came home. They arrived together, in Nico’s red Porsche. Lorenzo and I were playing backgammon on the terrace. Affare ran around barking and Lorenzo immediately got up to embrace his children, but Nico came over to me. He offered me his hand and I took it.

“Bitch,”
he said, bending to kiss it.

I looked at him, shocked, but he grinned and said, “I haven’t given up hope yet, lovely Lamour, so don’t you forget that.”

I glared at him, but he turned away. Then I heard Lorenzo say to Aurora, “Lamour is here.”

“Of course she is,” Aurora said, and I knew that the grapevine had already reached her with the news that her father and I were “an item.”

“Buona sera, Signora Harrington,”
she said coldly, following her brother into the Castello.

A short while later, Massimo came to tell Lorenzo he was needed on the telephone. I was alone on the terrace, strolling among the sphinxes, looking at the glittering coastline, when I heard Aurora’s quick high-heeled footsteps. I turned round and found her immediately behind me, practically breathing down my neck. I took a quick startled step backward.

“Why do you come here?” she said, speaking so rapidly the words seemed simply to spill out of her. “Go back where you came from; leave us alone. The Pirata family doesn’t want you. You and your father bring nothing but bad luck. Go home now; leave us in peace. . . . My father is too kind, too good; he’s only being nice to you because he’s a gentleman; don’t you understand that—”

She stopped her raving as suddenly as she had started, staring at me with those huge dark eyes. “Go!” she commanded.

I recognized she wasn’t acting rationally; she was manic,
consumed with her fears about her father. Of course she loved him and he’d spoiled and protected her, but there was something more, something deeper I didn’t understand.

“I’m not here to harm anybody, Aurora,” I said as calmly as I could, because right then she looked ready to strike me. “I’m simply a friend, nothing more. I’ve come here to be where my own father lived, where I have happy memories. That’s all it is.”

“Ha!” She obviously didn’t believe me, and she shifted her gaze, looking out to sea, as though she saw my father’s ghost there, though of course she had never known him. As though reading my thoughts, she said suddenly, “It seems Jon-Boy Harrington will haunt the Piratas forever.”

Shocked, I caught my breath. How could she say such a thing, knowing my father had drowned right here, that I had lost him so tragically? What was
wrong
with the girl!

All of a sudden her anger dissolved. Like a collapsed balloon her shoulders drooped and her head fell to her chest. “Forgive me,” she said, in a quiet little-girl voice. And with that she turned and walked slowly back along the terrace. She stumbled as though she couldn’t see properly. I thought she was crying and wondered why the outburst and then the sudden deflation, the drop into a kind of despair I didn’t understand.

I didn’t tell Lorenzo about the incident when he returned because I didn’t want to be responsible for any strain in his relationship with his daughter.

That night set the tone for my relationship with Lorenzo’s children. They resented me and I was angry at them. I refused to go to the Castello when they were there, and instead my little house became our rendezvous. Lorenzo and I spent those long, silky summer nights in my newly apricot-colored bedroom, on my hydrangea-embroidered sheets, naked in each other’s arms. Every morning we would leave Affare sitting
anxiously on the beach while we raced each other across the bay, though I had yet to beat him, and when we came back I would make him my special French toast. We put the problems with Aurora and Nico to the back of our minds and simply got on with living and loving. I was a happy woman.

And then on the spur of the moment, Lorenzo decided to throw a party.

Massimo delivered his handwritten invitation to me personally, saying the
signore
had wanted to make sure I received it.

The party was to be the following Saturday, commencing with cocktails at nine in the evening, followed by dinner and dancing. “Black tie” was written discreetly at the bottom of the vellum page. It threw me into an immediate panic. My wardrobe contained nothing more exotic than the pretty, summery dress I’d bought with Jammy in Rome, and that certainly couldn’t be counted as “evening dress.” There was no time to shop. What was I to do? I thought of the Vivari red chiffon hanging in Jon-Boy’s closet and knew I might just be skinny enough to fit into it.

I dashed upstairs and dragged it off its hanger. I gave it a good shake, sending dust motes flying, but there was nothing a good airing out on the terrace wouldn’t take care of.

I slipped the dress over my head, thinking about the woman who’d last worn it. A trace of her perfume still lingered, an exotic, almost Oriental scent, and I remembered Mifune’s story of the beauty with the long black hair. A shiver ran up my spine, but then when I looked in the mirror I saw a transformed woman.

The dress fit as though it had been made for me. The neckline swooped from narrow straps to a deep V. Draped
tightly under the breasts, the soft chiffon fell in a straight column to the floor. It was truly a gown for a goddess. Not only was Giorgio Vivari an artist; he was also a man who knew his craft—and who understood women. And I would wear his masterpiece to the party.

On Friday evening at dusk, I heard Lorenzo’s helicopter flying low on its way back to the Castello. A short while later he came running down the steps and I ran to meet him. We stood in each other’s arms, hugging and saying how much we’d missed each other.

“Will you stay with me tonight?” I asked, kissing his left earlobe, but he said he could not; people were already arriving for the weekend and he had to get back. “I would ask you, too, Lamour,” he said, “but it will be chaos with everybody arriving at once, including Nico and Aurora’s friends. Tomorrow will be better.”

I kissed him good-bye and watched him walk away, feeling like a child told she couldn’t go to the grown-ups’ dinner. I told myself of course I was being silly and guessed that obviously Lorenzo didn’t want to upset Aurora in front of his guests. She was a problem and there was nothing I could do about it.

The following night I prepared carefully. I pulled my hair into a shiny chignon, anchoring it at the nape with inexpensive coral pins I’d found in Amalfi. I put on the sexy red dress and the pretty high-heeled red mules I’d bought in Rome. I wound my yard of diamonds around my neck like a choker and added diamond hoop earrings, though these were fake. I wore no rings, no bracelets. When I looked in the mirror I was pleased. I could definitely keep up with the Joneses tonight.

I rode up the elevator, looking out at the sea sparkling under a full moon. Trust Lorenzo to get it right, I thought with a smile, because the Castello never looked more beautiful
than by the light of the moon. I took off my shoes and carried them, as usual, so as not to get them dusty. I could see the Castello through the trees, aglow with lights, and heard snatches of music.

When I got in sight of the front steps, I put on my shoes. Cars were out front and people were milling around in a flurry of “
ciao
s” and bursts of laughter. Massimo in a formal black jacket stood at the top of the steps to greet them. Behind him, I glimpsed white-coated waiters hurrying through the hall with silver trays loaded with canapés. A bar had been set up on the terrace, and globe lights hung from the trees. The birds had forgotten to go to bed and were chirping excitedly, along with the usual chorus of crickets.

An attack of shyness hit me suddenly. I hovered uncertainly in the shadows. I didn’t know anyone, and these people came from a different world.

“
Perdona, signora
, but don’t I know you?” a voice said.

I turned and looked at Giorgio Vivari, the man who had designed the very dress I was wearing. The man who had complimented me on my charming instep at the restaurant in Rome.

“Of course I remember you,” I said. “We met briefly in Rome, at Da Fortunato.”

“Ah, now I remember.” He bowed over my hand oh, so charmingly. “How could I ever forget your pretty foot.”

We laughed together; then he said, “I am Giorgio Vivari.”

“And I am Lamour Harrington.”

He asked why I was all alone out here in the shadows, and I admitted I was shy and knew no one.

“But I, too, am alone,” he said. “Please, allow me to escort you to the party.” And feeling like Cinderella at the ball, I floated into the Castello on Vivari’s arm.

Lorenzo came hurrying toward us. I thought he was so
incredibly handsome, so darn elegantly man-of-the-world-gorgeous in his tuxedo, my knees went weak and I was seized with a mad desire to kiss him all over. But to my astonishment he stared at me like a man who had just seen a ghost.

He gathered himself quickly. Kissing me politely on both cheeks, he said, “Lamour, welcome. You look beautiful. And with Giorgio, I see.”

I was taken aback by Lorenzo’s coolness. “Actually, I’m surprised to find myself with the man who designed my dress,” I said. “Though it must have been years ago. You probably don’t even recognize it,” I added, turning to Vivari.

“But I remember it well,” he said. “It’s a couture dress designed specially for a famous client. Only this one was ever made. But on you it looks perfect.
You
were made for this dress, instead of the other way around.”

Lorenzo excused himself abruptly and went off to greet some new guests.

“I have a confession to make,” I said to Vivari. “I found the dress hanging in the closet at my father’s house. I wondered who it belonged to, but it’s been there so long, I thought anyhow she wouldn’t mind me borrowing it tonight.”

Vivari put an arm around my shoulders. “Let me tell you Cassandra Biratta would be furious if she saw you, because it looks better on you.”

My pulse leaped at the sound of her name. “Cassandra Biratta?”

“The Contessa Biratta. Do you know her?” I shook my head, and he told me she lived at the famous Palazzo Biratta in Rome. “But of course Cassandra has houses in many places,” he said. “And don’t worry about it,
cara;
this dress was made for her when she was much younger. She would not look good in it today.”

He escorted me out onto the terrace, got me a glass of
champagne, and introduced me to some people, but I soon wandered away.

At last I knew the name of my father’s lover. I knew where she lived in Rome. From what I knew of her from Jon-Boy’s diary, I felt in my heart she had killed him. And with a sinking heart, I realized that Lorenzo knew. Shocked, I made my way indoors in search of the powder room.

The large bathroom and adjoining bedroom had been decked out like a fancy hotel in debutante-ball days, with a plump lady in black and a starched white apron ready to supply fresh towels, tissues, face powder, and perfume, to pin a broken strap or stitch up a ripped hem.

“
There
you are.” Aurora appeared suddenly, slamming the door behind her. The attendant looked up, startled, and so did I.

“Oh, hello, Aurora. This is a lovely party,” I said, though in fact I was here to take time out and gather my shattered dreams. I wasn’t even really thinking about Aurora. My thoughts were all of Lorenzo. What did he know? What was he hiding? Why hadn’t he told me about Cassandra?