The Savage Garden (28 page)

    Arriving at the amphitheater, Signora Docci asked to rest awhile on the stone bench. She also asked to be left alone.

    From a distance they saw her gazing up at Flora, dabbing at her eyes with the back of her hand every so often.

    It was ten minutes or so before she called for Adam to join her.

    "Are you okay?" he asked, setting himself down beside her.

    "You don't know what you've done."

    "What have I done?"

    "Something extraordinary. Crispin will be proud of you.
I'm
proud of you." She patted him on the knee. "At my age you don't expect to learn anything new."

    Harry seized the opportunity of a lift with Antonella to make another foray into Florence, despite Adam's warning that he was taking his life in his hands by climbing into a car with her. As they pulled away, he made a sign of the cross, blessing the vehicle.

    Returning inside, Signora Docci was nowhere to be found. He called her name. "In here," came the dim and distant reply.

    She was in the study, standing to the left of the fireplace, examining the small portrait of her ancestor, Federico Docci.

    "Please, call me Francesca."

    "Francesca," he said, trying it on for size.

    "I insist."

    "It doesn't sound right."

    "It never did. I was never a Francesca. I always thought of myself as a Teresa."

    "A little too saintly, maybe."

    For a moment he thought he had gone too far, but her face creased into a smile. "Oh dear, you really do know far too much about me, don't you?"

    She turned back to the portrait.

    "I'm thinking about burning it."

    "But you won't."

    She shook her head. "It explains a lot in his expression, don't you think?"

    "I think we see what we want to see."

    "Goodness me," she said, "already talking like a wise old professor."

    Adam looked suitably chastened.

    "I would like to go to the chapel," she announced. "Do you mind helping me?"

    There were gardeners at work on the terraces, trimming hedges, raking gravel and sprucing up the borders for the party. Signora Docci greeted them but didn't stop to talk.

    "Are you religious?" she asked as they approached the chapel.

    "No."

    "Not even as a child?"

    "I enjoyed the stories."

    He was dreading a metaphysical debate. It didn't happen.

    "Yes, they're good stories," she replied simply.

    She crossed herself on entering the building and made her way to the altar, the tap of her cane echoing around the interior. She must have sensed his hesitation, because without turning she said, "I doubt he'll strike you down in his own house."

    He joined her at the altar, where she removed a candle from her pocket—a votive candle in a red glass jar. He offered her his lighter to save her fiddling with the box of matches.

    "Thank you."

    She lit the candle and placed it in front of the triptych.

    "Maybe now she can rest in peace."

    Her words caught him off-guard. Had she felt the same unnerving presence?

    "No one knows exactly where she's buried, do they?" he said.

    "When we buried Emilio we found some bones, but that means nothing."

    "Why was he buried here?"

    "Emilio?"

    "I mean, how many Doccis are?"

    "Most of us are in the cemetery at San Casciano. There is a place for me there, next to Benedetto." She paused. "It was Benedetto's idea. He insisted. He wouldn't even discuss it. He wanted Emilio here."

    She took a few steps and stood over the remains of her dead son.

    "Old men make the wars, but they send young men to fight the battles. It doesn't seem fair. They should go themselves." She smiled wistfully at the thought. "I wonder how many wars there would be if it worked that way." Only now did she look up at him. "All those boys. Parents should not have to see their children die before them. It's not easy to live with. Benedetto couldn't. The moment it happened he changed. I thought he was losing his mind. He would not even allow Emilio to be buried with the bullets that killed him. They were removed." She turned toward the wall. "They are there, behind the plaque, with Emilio's gun."

    "Really?"

    "No one else knows that. Only me. And now you."

    He tried to push the thoughts away, but they kept coming at him, buffeting him. There were only two plausible explanations for Benedetto's strange behavior regarding the bullets and the gun. He already knew what one of them was: the poor man really had lost his marbles. The second explanation required testing, and that meant gaining access to the top floor, it meant getting his hands on the key in the bureau in Signora Docci's bedroom.

    Annoyingly, she took to her room the moment they returned from the chapel, pleading exhaustion and requesting that Maria serve her lunch in the upstairs loggia. Adam shook off his frustration. If he had to wait awhile longer for an opportunity, so be it. There was another matter he had to deal with anyway—after he had phoned home.

    The moment his mother's voice came on the line he seemed to lose all power of reason and speech. This wasn't entirely due to her irritating habit of answering the phone with the words—

    "The Strickland residence."

    "Mum, it's me."

    "Adam, darling. How are you?"

    How could she muster such heartfelt warmth and enthusiasm in her condition?

    "Fine. Good. Yeah."

    He wanted to tell her that he'd been blind, insensitive, self- absorbed. He wanted to say that he knew what she must be going through. He wanted to reassure her that it would all be all right in the end, whatever happened, that even if Dad left her she would always have him and Harry and a life worth living.

    As it was, they talked chiefly about the weather and his laundry arrangements in Italy. When she raised the subject of his work on the garden, he brushed the question aside, not wanting to diminish her story with an account of his own small triumph.

    After ten minutes or so, it was patently clear to him that he was never going to raise the matter of his father's infidelity. How could he? It wasn't a language they had ever spoken. They both lacked the vocabulary.

    "Mum, I have to go."

    "Of course you do. Make sure you give Signora Docci something for this phone call. You won't forget, will you?"

    "Mum . . ."

    "Yes, darling?"

    "I love you, Mum."

    "Gracious me," she chuckled, "you must be having a terrible time."

    "I'll see you next week."

    "What day did you say again?"

    "I didn't. I'll call and let you know. 'Bye, Mum."

    "I'll send your love to your father."

    "Yes, do that."

    "Goodbye, darling. And try to keep Harry out of trouble."

    He replaced the receiver on its cradle and made straight for the kitchen. He told Maria that he wouldn't be requiring lunch today; he was going for a bike ride.

    There were two men zealously tucking into bowls of pasta on the terrace in front of the Pensione Amorini—stonemasons from the look of them, powdered white from top to toe. Signora Fanelli must have insisted they eat outside regardless of the heat.

    She was inside, chatting to the only other customer, an overweight man sporting a dark suit and a loud necktie. She turned as Adam entered, a flicker of alarm in her eyes. She recovered quickly, though, smiling warmly as she wandered over to greet him.

    "How are you?"

    "Good."

    "How's life at the villa?"

    "Good."

    "Do you want to eat?"

    "No thanks."

    "Something to drink, then? A beer?"

    "Why not?"

    His arrival had disconcerted her. Maybe she didn't want to be reminded of their tryst. Or worse still, maybe she thought he had dropped by in the hope of a replay upstairs. Before he could set her mind at rest, she was gone, heading for the kitchen.

    She really was very beautiful, more beautiful than he remembered, and he wondered, not for the first time, what on earth had induced her to share herself with him.

    He took a sip of beer and pressed the chill glass to his cheek. It was good to get out, away from Villa Docci, to slip its grip for a while. That's what he told himself. He knew in his bones he'd done no such thing.

    Villa Docci had not released him. If it had, he'd be wandering the streets of Florence right now, dipping into churches, galleries and museums with Harry. Why was Harry the one down there doing it? The Renaissance was
his
thing, not Harry's. All that seminal art right on his doorstep, destined to go unseen by him, masterpieces callously ignored. And in favor of what, exactly?

    He tried not to think too hard about why he had allowed himself to be drawn back into the dark abyss of his suspicions. The reasons flew in the face of common sense, they violated the laws of logic by which he liked to think he operated. This was uncharted territory for him, instinct his only guide.

    It occurred to him that he wouldn't be sitting there on a bar stool in the Pensione Amorini if that same instinct hadn't served him so well in the memorial garden. As ever, all things sprang from and returned to the garden.

    Signora Fanelli served the lone gentleman his food, then joined Adam at the counter. Was it significant that she had tied up her hair while in the kitchen?

    "It's nice to see you."

    "I came to say goodbye. I'm leaving soon."

    "Before the party?" she asked.

    "You know about the party?"

    "Everyone does. The children here always go and watch—from a distance, of course. I used to when I was young."

    "I also want to say goodbye to Fausto, but I don't know where he lives."

    She drew him a map on a paper napkin. He'd forgotten that she was left-handed.

    When he pulled some coins from his pocket to pay for the beer, she said, "Don't be silly, I don't want your money."

    She accompanied him outside to his bicycle. "You won't tell him about us, will you? Fausto, I mean."

    "Don't worry, I'm too embarrassed."

    She smiled apologetically. "I didn't mean that. But you won't, will you?"

    "No."

    She cast a fleeting look at the stonemasons before kissing him on both cheeks.

    "Goodbye, Adam."

    "Goodbye."