Angels of the Flood (12 page)

The professor had been intrigued by Francesca from the start. ‘Are you by any chance related to Signor Bertoni?’ he asked when she told him her name.

‘Who’s he?’ She looked blank.

‘The art collector, Umberto Bertoni. He lives at the Villa Beatrice about fifty miles from Florence. They say the paintings no one has seen are far more valuable than those on display. I thought perhaps you might—’

‘Never heard of him,’ said Francesca flatly. ‘Besides, I’m American.’

She was being evasive, Kate thought. If Umberto Bertoni had been really unknown to her, then surely she’d have been curious about her famous namesake. And the way she’d stared unblinking at the professor when she denied even having heard of him reminded Kate of the time she and some friends had tried to brazen it out with their headmistress when they’d been spotted in a coffee bar with a group of boys instead of doing a cross-country run.

Still, if Francesca was being dishonest about her background, then so were many of the volunteers. Quite apart from the girl who said she was having an affair with the Aga Khan, no one could be quite sure that Jenny the dancer really had worked in West End musicals, or that Dido’s father was a cabinet minister, or that Aiden, with his black cloak and his yellow hair, had once worked as a runner for a Jamaican drug baron the way he claimed. Since the city of Florence was so different from its normal self, it seemed as though everyone there could experiment with different pictures of themselves: like skinny Larry with his squeaky voice who claimed to be a brilliant intellectual, in spite of working in a tax office, or like Hugo, doing floodwork at the consulate, who described himself as ‘to all intents and purposes a virgin’—a phrase which was endlessly dissected but which he never precisely explained. Then there were the people who were just pretending to be young and rootless, men who’d taken time off from wives and jobs in England, but were simply too old to be working for nothing and talking endlessly about sex with a bunch of kids fresh out of school or university. Even Kate, who told no overt lies, was pretending to be a sophisticated woman of the world, whereas she’d only left school six months before.

Francesca was unusual simply because she alone was trying hard to be just like everyone else. She gave the impression, right from day one, that she wanted to be ordinary, but she lacked the reference points the others shared. Conversation in the studio at the Uffizi while Kate and Francesca and half a dozen others worked together on the damaged sculptures was not all highbrow. It was soon obvious Francesca had never heard of
Top of the Pops
or the
Avengers,
nor even of American imports like
The Lone Ranger
or
Bonanza,
and her curiosity about what she’d missed only made it more obvious.

‘Where did you grow up?’ asked Jenny one day when Francesca had been asking about family relationships in
Peyton Place.
‘On a desert island?’

‘Of course I didn’t!’ she snapped. ‘That’s a stupid thing to say!’ And she sank into hurt silence for the rest of the afternoon.

‘They don’t like me,’ she said to Kate later that evening when they were back in their digs and changing to go out. Now they were officially employed by the Uffizi they had moved out of the hostel and were sharing a room with Anna. Dido and Jenny had the room across the corridor. The
signora
who owned the flat was so far uncomplaining about the number of ‘friends’ who often shared their rooms with them. Francesca peered into the mirror to apply some of Kate’s white eyegloss. ‘Everyone thinks I’m odd, but I’m not!’

Kate was still young enough to be flattered by confidences. ‘We’re all odd,’ she reassured her, ‘so I don’t see why you should be any different. But it might help if you didn’t try so hard. Sometimes that puts people off.’

‘You’re criticizing me!’

‘No, I’m not. Honestly. It’s just that you make life hard for yourself sometimes. People like you the way you are. However that is. Even if you did grow up on a desert island.’

Francesca stared at her. For one moment Kate thought she was going to be angry. Then, suddenly, her eyes filled with tears. ‘Do you mean that, Kate?’

‘Which bit? About people liking you how you are? Yes, it’s true.’

Francesca turned away quickly. ‘You are so strange, all of you.’ Her voice came out a bit growly. ‘I don’t understand it.’

‘It
is
puzzling,’ teased Kate. ‘Why would anyone like you how you are?’

Francesca regarded her warily before asking in an uncertain voice, ‘That’s a joke?’

‘It’s called irony, Francesca. Sarcasm’s grown-up sister.’

Francesca sighed. She seemed baffled by the joking and the approval. But it was true that she was popular, even though she could be difficult sometimes. Ever since she joined the group, she’d become a kind of unofficial mascot. The story of her maybe-suicide had spread quickly and her transition from doom to cheerfulness made everyone feel happier about themselves. In the ten days since joining them, she had blossomed.

‘Do you want to borrow my earrings?’ she asked suddenly.

Yes, Kate would. Francesca’s earrings were the most beautiful items of jewellery she’d ever seen, strange and delicate birds made of silver and enamel.

‘What are they?’ asked Kate as the two birds lay in the palm of her hand.

‘Phoenixes,’ said Francesca. ‘It’s kind of crazy to have two of them, because the poor things never have partners. They live for a bit and then they just burn up.’

‘So where does the next generation come from?’

‘Each one is reborn out of its own ashes.’ She smiled her odd little smile. ‘My kind of birds.’

‘What a way to carry on,’ said Kate, clipping the phoenixes on her ears. ‘Imagine, never having any sex.’ She slid a glance at Francesca, to see if she’d offer some information about herself. Alone among the group, she never talked about boyfriends. Aiden said it was obvious she was a virgin and she neither agreed nor disagreed with him.

‘They’re more than two hundred years old,’ she said.

‘They must be valuable.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘Then you’d better wear them. I’d hate to lose one.’

‘It’s just jewellery,’ said Francesca as Kate admired her reflection in the mirror. She’d never worn anything so beautiful. ‘They suit you. You should keep them.’

‘Don’t be daft,’ said Kate with a laugh. ‘But I’ll wear them tonight, for Jenny’s birthday.’

They were going that evening to a slightly more expensive restaurant than their usual cellar taverna serving cheap pasta. Jenny had received money for an advertisement she’d done in the summer and wanted to spend it taking her friends out for supper to celebrate her birthday. No one objected to being treated.

For Kate’s first couple of weeks in Florence money had played almost no part in their lives. She and the other volunteers lived for free at the hostel and were fed three times a day. The only cash they needed was for cigarettes and drinks. Once they got work with the Uffizi team, this prelapsarian state of affairs came to an end. They were now waged, so they’d moved into lodgings and had to start buying their own food. However, thanks to the Uffizi’s eccentric payment methods, they never had any cash: they received their wages on a Friday afternoon but the man who paid them left for the weekend at Friday lunchtime, so as often as not they returned with nothing. An elaborate system of debts and loans and counter-debts had grown up to deal with this situation. Many of these revolved around Hugo, who was paid regularly by the British Consul. He looked like an untidy choir boy, brimming with enthusiasm but horribly accident-prone. Also he was so generous that on pay day he invariably took someone out for a blow-out, then lent what remained of his wage packet and ended up with less than anyone. The prospect of a meal where only one person was going to be responsible for the bill was nearly as attractive as the food. Jenny’s birthday dinner was going to be a special occasion.

Jenny was a dancer, now ‘resting’ between jobs. She had shaggy dark hair and moved with an almost feral grace and exuded languorous sexuality. Hugo confided to Kate that she terrified him, but Aiden and Larry were obviously attracted from the start. For her part, Jenny looked on her weeks in Florence as a kind of working holiday, and was clear that she wanted to avoid any emotional involvement. She was fascinated by the Florentines, mostly poor, who had remained in the city, and took endless photographs of their suffering, but as she sent the films straight back to London to be developed, no one ever saw them.

By the time Kate and Francesca arrived at the restaurant, Jenny was already looking overwhelmed. ‘I never realized how many friends I had here,’ she commented, looking round the room at the twenty-odd people who’d shown up on the rumour of a free meal.

But after the first few carafes of cheap red wine had been consumed, even she stopped worrying about the bill. Between courses Aiden played a heartfelt version of ‘I’m a man of constant sorrows’ on the guitar, gazing meaningfully at her through his floppy yellow hair. Kate and David re-enacted the spaghetti-eating scene from
Lady and the Tramp.
Ross, a New Zealander who hadn’t been able to take his eyes off Francesca since she arrived, wanted to sing ‘Waltzing Matilda’, but no one would let him. Dido and Jenny had a whispered conversation on penis size and whether bigger was always best. The few diners in the restaurant who weren’t mud angels were soon looking as if they wished they’d gone somewhere else.

But when it came to paying the bill, there was a problem. Jenny’s money wasn’t enough. Hugo instantly emptied his pockets and produced two banknotes of gigantic size; Jenny took one and made him put the other back. Kate, Dido and Ross each contributed some coins, as did a few of the people who’d turned up on the offchance of a free meal. Aiden had no money at all and looked depressed. Several others who had no money didn’t seem bothered at all. The restaurant owner, who had been all smiles at their arrival, now looked stern.

Kate and David offered to wash up. The restaurant owner changed from stern to contemptuous.

Francesca fidgeted, then spoke to the patron in rapid Italian. Kate caught a few words, but her grasp of the language wasn’t yet up to following complicated negotiations. Whatever Francesca had said, it worked like magic. His face was wreathed in smiles in an instant and he went away to get liqueurs.

‘How did you manage that?’ asked Jenny.

‘Did you offer him your body?’ asked Hugo wistfully.

‘I told him I’d pay the whole lot,’ said Francesca with a smile. ‘It’s my pleasure, Jenny. After all, it’s your birthday.’ She pulled a fistful of notes from her bag and there was a general sigh of relief.

Jenny frowned and pushed the notes away. ‘Thanks, Francesca, but no thanks.’

‘What?’ Francesca was bewildered.

‘This is my party and I said I’d pay.’

‘But you don’t have enough money and I do.’

‘I’ll pay it somehow.’

‘Let me pay half, then. That way it’s still your party.’

Larry and Aiden, agreeing for once, said that sounded fair.

‘No,’ said Jenny.

Francesca appealed to Kate. ‘Why’s she being so difficult? Make her see sense, Kate.’

Kate was on the verge of doing so, but she held back. The little silver phoenixes were brushing against her cheeks and she had the uncomfortable feeling that her support was expected, not because Francesca was in the right, necessarily, but because Kate owed her. She said, ‘It’s up to Jenny to decide,’ and avoided Francesca’s horrified expression by rolling herself a cigarette.

Francesca shoved the heap of money across the table. ‘Take it,’ she said.

Jenny shoved it back. ‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘I don’t want your money.’

Francesca looked stumped. She shook a cigarette out of a packet lying on the table, clicked her lighter once, but let the flame die down before the cigarette was lit. Removing it from her mouth, she ground it to shreds on the table in front of her. She glanced warily at Jenny, then at the pile of unwanted money on the table. A flush spread across her face.

‘You really don’t want it? You’re sure?’

Jenny nodded.

‘I’ll have it,’ said Ross, but Francesca didn’t seem to have heard.

She picked a note from the pile, then twisted the control of her lighter, and this time when she clicked the trigger, the flame shot up like a blow torch. The corner of the banknote floated into the edge of the flame.

Kate reached across the table. ‘Francesca, don’t be such an idiot,’ she said, trying to pull the banknote out of her hands, but Francesca whisked it out of reach, holding it aloft until the flames were about to touch her fingers, then she released it to fall in a curve of ash. No one moved. She picked up another, let it catch the flame, then another, until all her money had been reduced to a drifting pile of ash. Without another word, she stood up and stalked out.

Jenny lit up a cigarette.

‘Wow,’ said Aiden. ‘Heavy trip.’ He began strumming his guitar. ‘Nobody loves you when you’re down and out.’ Singularly inappropriate, Kate thought.

‘She’s crazy,’ said Dido. Her mother, the wife of the cabinet minister, had been in analysis for years, so Dido was an expert on crazy.

‘Yeah,’ said Ross, ‘and I reckon we were pretty crazy to let her do it.’

‘Why didn’t you want her to pay?’ asked David.

Jenny looked baffled. ‘I don’t know, exactly. Just something about Francesca and money—I didn’t feel comfortable with it.’

‘You didn’t want to owe her?’

‘Maybe.’ Jenny gave up the attempt to explain and went to negotiate with the patron about owing him the balance of the bill for a few days.

The evening continued as before, but Kate was no longer enjoying herself and decided not to wait for the others. She’d been feeling bad about Francesca ever since she stalked out of the restaurant and now she wanted to be on her own. She promised Jenny to help with the bill as soon as she got paid, and left.

She walked slowly, savouring the solitude and the strangeness of the Florentine night: its rich smell of damp and dirt, wet plaster and sewage. Battered and forlorn, the city possessed a quality she knew it would never have again.