The Night Falling (26 page)

‘Your driver put a gun to Iacopo’s head. Federico Manzo – he leads one of the squads. Have you chosen not to enquire about that as well? He was looking for me, and he
put a gun to the baby’s head
,’ says Ettore, through gritted teeth. Leandro says nothing for a moment. He sits back, sips his drink. His hands are completely steady; Ettore clenches his own to hide how they shake.

‘I knew he’d joined the fascists – most of the corporals have. But I didn’t know they’d marked you.’ His tone is soft now, dangerous. ‘I will speak to the Manzo boys.’

‘But you will not dismiss them?’

‘What good would that do? What control would I have over them then?’

‘I can’t work for that man, or near his son. I can’t be around them.’

‘Then leave.’ Leandro is composed again, his black gaze steady and implacable. ‘It’s my duty as your uncle to offer you what help I can, what help you will accept. But I will not be told what to do by you, Ettore. Do not insult me.’

Ettore rubs one hand across his mouth, grips his jaw hard between his fingers. There is so much he wants to say, so much he wants to shout. He wants to stand and kick the table over, and break every glass. He wants to roar. But he doesn’t. Marcie titters nervously, and they all begin to talk again; the stilted, self-conscious conversation of people who sense something grim in the room but can’t acknowledge it.

‘Why do you have these people here, Uncle? These English. Why do you keep them here at such a time? It’s not safe for anybody,’ says Ettore.

‘I have my reasons,’ says Leandro. ‘What makes you think they’re kept here?’

‘The woman speaks Italian.’

‘Ah! So she does.’ Leandro nods. ‘And she told you as much? I didn’t think the English spoke so openly. That’s not their reputation. Least of all this one, brave as a rabbit.’

‘Does her husband owe you something?’ says Ettore.

‘Owe me? Well, perhaps. Not in the usual way, maybe, but … Let’s just say there is something I need to find out from him, before I can let them go home. But don’t worry – they are quite safe here, I’m sure. My guards are loyal, and I keep their guns loaded; and if you like the money then stay on here as one of them. It’s that simple. But don’t make trouble, Ettore. And don’t make me tell you again,’ says Leandro. Ettore scrapes his hands through his hair, and feels the dust of Gioia on his scalp. He mutters a vague apology and leaves the room.

He goes to find Ludo Manzo; he has no choice, if he wants to start work again. Federico will stay at the
masseria
as long as Leandro does, ready to drive him, and Ettore hopes he won’t find the two of them side by side. He couldn’t stand their gloating unassailability. In the end he has to ask where to find the overseer, and then sets off on a long walk to one of the furthest fields, where the last of the wheat still waits to be cut. He goes part of the way without the crutch, only using it again when his leg starts to cramp from the uneven, hobbling way he has to walk. The dust swirls in his wake then resettles slowly. He sees the corporals on their horses, and the small work crew labouring under their bored gaze; the rhythmic swing of scythes, the bent backs of the men tying the sheaves. This is the last of this work; soon the men will spend days and days feeding the threshing machines – on those farms that have them, on those farms that have fuel for the machines. Otherwise it will be done by flail, as it has been done for hundreds of years. By the end of July, the grain should be stored, or sold; the straw baled for animal feed. August is the ploughing month; blades dragged through the rocky soil behind mules, oxen, work horses, rare tractors. Then there’s sowing, weeding, rock-breaking, the repair of damaged walls. Then by the winter there is nothing at all; no way for the men to earn a wage. The hands of this timeless clock turn inexorably, and Gianni is right – they have fought and fought, and made only fleeting changes.

Ettore pauses when he sees how closely Ludo is watching a pair of young lads at work, one hand on the bullwhip coiled at his hip. It’s like no time has passed since those two lads were Pino and Ettore, checking the broken stones for ancient shells, with this same man nearby, a figure from a nightmare, trailing fear into the world when there was hardship enough already. He walks over to him.

‘Tarano. You’re back safely then,’ says Ludo, with his sharp twist of a smile.

‘Why wouldn’t I be safe?’

‘These are troubled times. But here you are, tucked back beneath your uncle’s wing.’

‘And in your care, Manzo,’ says Ettore sarcastically. The overseer laughs.

‘I’ve never been accused of caring for my workers before. Ask these feeble wretches.’ He nods at the toiling men. Ettore looks over them; thin and bent and dirty. He frowns, and studies each face. Not one is familiar, and there are subtle differences in their clothes and the shapes of their hats.

‘These aren’t Gioia men!’ he says. Ludo glances down at him.

‘You can tell that by looking at them? Jesus, you all look the same to me. We hired these in Basilicata. What’s a man to do, if the local men don’t want to work? The harvest can’t wait.’

‘You broke the strike? These are
blacklegs
?’

‘Was there a strike?’ says Ludo, all innocence. ‘I just thought you Gioia scum had taken a holiday.’

‘You … you can’t! The treaty … Leandro signed – all the landlords signed. The Chamber of Labour …’

‘Last I heard there was no Chamber of Labour any more.’ Ludo can’t hide his amusement. He rests his forearms on the pommel of the saddle, leaning forward to the comfortable creak of leather.

‘You may have the police with you, but Di Vagno will see the agreements honoured! You can’t run roughshod over the law—’

‘There’s only one kind of law here in Puglia, same kind there’s always been. The sooner you lot realise you’re beaten, the better.’ For a moment Ettore can’t speak, and because he can’t unleash his anger it threatens to choke him.

‘I want guard duty again,’ he manages to grind out.

‘Then fuck off back to the
trullo
and take the night shift. And keep out of my way.’ Ludo straightens up, turns away, dismisses him.

As Ettore approaches the archway of the
masseria
the red car slithers past him, too fast, billowing dust from its wheels as it skids into the bend. He squints through the clouds and sees young Filippo at the wheel, concentrating hard but grinning, and Leandro in the passenger seat, laughing, holding tight. They roar away towards the gates, which Carlo scrambles to open in time. Ettore is left with dust in his eyes and on his lips. He wipes his face, spits. Clare is alone on the terrace when he reaches the inner courtyard; just sitting, not reading or drinking. Ettore stands in the middle of the empty space, not caring who sees him, who wonders; he stands there in silence, alight with rage, until she sees him. Her mouth opens slightly in surprise, she leans forwards as though she might get up, but then she hesitates. Ettore lifts one arm and points up and behind him, to the window of his room. He waits until he sees her understand, then he turns away and goes indoors. He stays on his feet inside his room; he stands and faces the door and waits, and has no idea if she will come or not. But if she does not, he decides right then, he will never look at her again. Moments later, she slips in through the door without knocking and carries on towards him, not pausing until she is close enough for him to feel her nervous breath on his mouth. She’s so bold, so sure; her certainty surprises him, and it’s he who falters.

‘Where is your husband?’ he says. She puts her fingers on his cheek, low down, near his mouth, as if she wants to feel it move when he speaks.

‘I don’t care,’ she says.

After they have made love the things he must think about, the problems he must solve, drop back into Ettore’s mind like stones into water, each one sinking fast, each one ruining the perfect calm, the perfect clarity, the perfectly empty head that sleeping with this woman leaves him with. He doesn’t want to let them back in. He opens his eyes and stares at her white skin, and runs his stained fingers over it; he breathes in the smell of her sweat and her hair, the human smell under the fragrance of soap. Chiara is awake; he can tell from the way she’s breathing. He lies with his face resting on her chest, breathing in time with the rise and fall of her ribs, but when his thoughts get too much and he can’t stay still, he props himself up on one elbow and looks away, and feels her watching him. A breeze from the open window caresses his back; outside, the white light is softening to grey. The dairy cows are calling out to be milked, making their way nearer to the milking parlour, and then there’s the sound of an engine. It gets louder and louder, comes thundering into the courtyard below, and dies. Leandro and Filippo’s voices echo up to Ettore’s room, happy and relaxed, and he realises again that this is not the real world.

At the sound of the car and their voices, Chiara tenses.

‘I should go. Pip might come looking for me,’ she says.

‘I didn’t think you would still come to me when your husband was here,’ say Ettore. Mention of him makes her restless, and she draws in a long breath, fidgeting.

‘Yes, I will still come. I will still come. My … lie? My traitorness …?’

‘Betrayal.’

‘My betrayal does not feel like a betrayal. To be married to him … to Boyd, feels like the betrayal.’

‘But you are married to him.
This
is the betrayal.’ For some reason he wants her to acknowledge it. He wants her to feel guilty, because he does – now that the peace has gone, and thought has returned. But he likes what she says. He likes that he has the greater claim. ‘My uncle takes the boy driving?’

‘Yes, he’s teaching Pip how to drive. And Marcie is teaching him now to act. Between them he is kept quite busy. He doesn’t need me any more; not like he did.’

‘You’re sad about that?’

‘Yes, I …’ She draws up her knees, wraps her hands around them and rests her chin, turning to look at him. ‘When I am not with you I am alone. When you go … Now, even with Pip I feel alone. That makes me sad.’ Her gaze has barbs and he recoils, gets up and moves away, reaching for his shirt.

‘I won’t be here for long. I will go when I can. And you will go when my uncle lets you. With your husband and your boy, back to …’ He realises he has no idea where she lives, no picture in his head of what it might look like. What her life might look like. Not like his, that much is certain. ‘Back to your real world.’

Ettore goes to the courtyard window. Federico is sitting on the water trough, smoking idly, watching Anna as she draws water. The sight of him causes a hard jolt of violence. Ettore grips the window ledge, stepping back when Anna goes inside and it seems like Federico might look up. Just then, Filippo appears on the terrace across the courtyard and pauses. Looking for Chiara. Ettore turns back to her and she has not moved, or dressed. She looks closed in, shrunken, and he knows he’s hurt her.

‘My uncle told me he needs to find out something from your husband before you can go. Do you know what that could be? You could go sooner if you told him.’ There’s nothing but silence from the room. ‘The boy is looking for you,’ he says.

‘Yes. I’ll go. But I don’t want to. I don’t want to go back to my real world, with my husband. I don’t love him.’

‘Why did you marry him?’

‘I was just a girl. I was eighteen when we met, nineteen when we married. I’d just finished school … and my parents introduced us. He seemed … he seemed the right person to marry.’

‘For money?’

‘No, no. Not for money. For … safety, I suppose. For a life that was the way life was supposed to be. The way I had been brought up to think it should be. And for Pip. I also married him for Pip.’

‘Because you loved the boy?’

‘Yes. He was so little, and so lost without his mother. And I loved Boyd … That is, I thought I loved him. Now I think … I think perhaps I had no idea what love was. No idea how things could be between a man and a woman.’ She looks up at him quickly, uncertainly, like she’s said too much. Ettore stays quiet. ‘But how could I have known? I was so young …’ She shakes her head, seems to want him to absolve her of her mistake. ‘I was a schoolgirl, and then I was Mrs Boyd Kingsley. That’s all I knew how to be, until now.’

‘You’re still Mrs Kingsley. You still have your life to go back to – the one you chose. The one that is how it should be; the one you
will
go back to. This is life. Full of things we must do whether we want to or not,’ he says harshly, and wants to feel angry with her and her naivety, but can’t. She takes a quick breath, like a gasp, and then hurries to her feet and starts to dress, but her hands are shaking and she can’t manage her buttons, the clasp of her brassiere, her hairpins. Ettore finds he can’t bear it; it’s like a little knife in his own heart, the ease with which he can hurt her. He goes to stand behind her, puts his arms around her, tucks his face into the crook of her neck. For a second he wants to tell her that she is like a cool drink at the end of a hot day, but he doesn’t.

‘You’re not going yet,’ she says, the words blurred. ‘Your leg is still not strong enough. You’re not going yet.’

‘Not yet,’ he agrees, but in his head he’s already back in Gioia, in the small room where his father is determined to die and his sister nurses her son with a knife in her spare hand. He is in the fields with the men he has always worked alongside; he is in the
piazza
, he is in the ashes of the Chamber of Labour; he has Livia’s murderer beneath him, and rocks in his fists; he is a blaze of outrage.

For a week he works. He uses his leg whenever he can and the wound no longer opens when he does so, and he can no longer feel it pull in the bone. The ache of it is manageable, and no worse than the fire in his back after a day with the mattock or scythe. The Gioia men return to work and threshing starts; the thump of the machine out away from the house is a constant background noise, like a giant, restless heartbeat. Leandro Cardetta, it seems, has no trouble procuring fuel. Ettore waits for Chiara; when he is not on duty he goes away from the
masseria
and waits. They meet in ruined
trulli
, the abandoned homes of poor men, peasant men, dead men. He avoids company inside the
masseria
; he still itches with impatience, but when he sees her coming towards him with that rapid, light, marching way she walks, he finds himself smiling. They learn each other’s bodies, and how they like to be touched; the pattern of their love-making is like a dance, learnt and instinctive at the same time. And he finds that his mind returns to it, to her, more and more; at times when he should be thinking of leaving, when he should be thinking of finding Livia’s killer, when he should be thinking of Paola, and home, and the war they are so clearly losing. One more time, he thinks, each time she goes. Just one more time.