Bellagrand: A Novel (36 page)

Gina kissed Harry. “He is like you in all the ways it counts,
amore mio
,” she said. “But why is he crying?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he wants an H name?”

“I don’t think that’s it.”

“Maybe he wants his father to hold him?”

And finally, reluctantly, she let him.

God! A night and part of another day had gone by, and Harry at last picked up his wriggling naked son and brought him to the open window. It was so hot. Barely a salty breeze drifted off the water. The boy quieted down, lay still, blinking up at his father, and fell back to sleep. Harry sat down in his favorite rocking chair on the balcony. “My son,” he whispered.

“Bring him back,” Gina said.

“In a minute.”

“He’ll get cold.”

“It’s ninety-five degrees out. It’s almost the temperature it was in the womb.”

When she didn’t speak for a few minutes, Harry glanced behind him at the bed.

She had fallen asleep, in a heap on top of the covers. Thank God. Harry refocused on the boy. The hours drifted by. “I think I’m beginning to understand why your mother won’t let go of you,” Harry whispered, his lips moving back and forth across the boy’s sleeping head. He might have fallen asleep himself, swaddling the baby with his arms. “What should we call you, son? Whisper to me the name you’d like so your mom won’t hear. What’s a good name for you? Howard Barrington? Herbert Barrington? Howie? Herbie?”

“Anthony Alexander Barrington,” Gina called hoarsely from the bed. “And we will call him Alexander. Bring him here.” She coughed.

“Uh-oh. She’s awake.” Harry put his hands over his son’s ears. “Now, don’t you listen to that croaky Sicilian voice telling you what to do. You name yourself anything you want. What name would you like? Harvey? Hector?”

“Alexander,” said Gina. “Bring him to me. He needs to eat.”

“Just because only your mom can feed you, don’t let that sway you,” he whispered into the boy’s head. “You and I can do many other things together. Fun things.”

“Nothing fun yet because I have to feed him.”

Slowly Harry brought the boy back to her. “Hector is a fine strong name.”

“If you’re Greek and on the losing side of a protracted battle, then yes. Otherwise no. Hand him over.” She reached for him. “You know what’s a fine strong name? Alexander.” Finally he was back in her arms. She smiled, kissing his head, pulling down her gown, adjusting him to her breast. “The conqueror of the world.”

“My son is not a fighter,” said Harry. “So he can’t be a conqueror.”

“He’s not going to be a Hector either.”

On the third day her milk had come in. Both Harry and Gina were astonished by the copious quantity of it. For the first few days the boy had been cranky and struggling at the breast. They couldn’t tell if he was getting enough nourishment. They feared he wasn’t. What meager sustenance he had been getting was thin and lemon in color. Suddenly a waterfall of abundant warm white milk flowed from her breasts into his mouth. The child became immediately tranquil, his appetite sated.

Harry brought his own face to Gina’s breasts after a feeding.

“
Amore mio
,” she whispered, “you haven’t shaved in days. What are you doing?”

With his stubble he scraped her stomach lightly, where the baby had been. He licked the underside of her breasts where the sweet milk was still warm and sticky. He fondled her carefully, happily. He kissed her brown arms from her wrists to her shoulder. He kissed her full breasts.

“Don’t touch the nipples, please,
mio tesoro.
I’ll scream. Downstairs the servants will think you’re doing unspeakable things to me.”

“I’m trying to.”

“Not yet.”

“When can I touch all of you? Come on, undress, take off your gown.”

“You can’t touch me, Harry. You heard the doctor. No conjugal activity until I heal.”

“I’m sure by conjugal he meant paying the bills or something. How long did he really say?”

“Four weeks.”

“Four weeks! Are you insane?”

She leveled him with a look. “You were in jail longer than that, Harry.”

“That was then,” Harry said. “My new self is like my self of old, full of wedded abundance. Please help.”

“I won’t help now.” She smiled. “The baby is here.”

“We might need to . . . when is he
not
going to be here?”

“Never.”

“Exactly. We might need to work around him.”

Afterward, they resumed other marital prerogatives, like argument.

“How about Absalom?” Harry smiled in contentment, curling up, touching the boy’s cheek. “Do you want to be Absalom, my son, my son?”

Gina stared at him puzzled from the pillows. “What in the world could
you
possibly know about Absalom,
caro
?”

“What, you think all I do is read Max Eastman?”

“Look at the books on our shelves. I
know
that’s all you read.”

He didn’t take his eyes off his baby. “Sometimes I peek inside your little books, too.”

“My little books?” She laughed, coughed. “You mean my little Bible?”

He shrugged, sidled up to the boy, cradled him. “I started reading Samuel for the battles. I kept reading for the naughtiness. There’s quite a lot of it in Samuel. What about Samuel?”

“No.”

“David?”

“No.”

“Solomon?”

“No.”

Harry thought of one last H name. “Homer!” he exclaimed. “Homer Barrington. A journeyman, a warrior, straight from the Greeks. That’s good, right? Perhaps our son can also embark on an odyssey.”

“Perhaps,” Gina said, unwavering to the end. “But he will embark on it named Alexander.”

Three

ESTHER AND ROSA STORMED
the house not seven days after Alexander was born.

In the master bedroom the three women bent over the baby in genuflection. On their knees in front of the bed, they stared at him open-mouthed. They adjusted him, centered him in the middle of the four-poster bed, uncovered him, and now all four adults leaned over him, gaping, murmuring, appraising.

“What are you staring at?” Harry wanted to know. “What?”

“We’re just studying him.”

“Like a telescope pointed at the Alpha Centauri,” Harry said. “He is perfect, isn’t he?”

“He is,” said Esther in wonder. “But he’s not like our family. We were all born bald. Look at his black hair.”

“In our family,” said Gina, “we were all born with hair. That’s the Sicilian way.”

Esther glanced at Gina, in a peach silk robe with her wild auburn mane loosely braided. “What’s wrong with your voice?”

“I don’t know.” Gina shrugged. “I can’t seem to get it back.”

Esther turned her gaze to her nephew.

“What is he doing now? What is that?”

“Nothing,” said Gina. “He’s yawning. It’s normal.”

“Why is he yawning? Does he do that often? Maybe he needs to sleep.”

“He just woke up.”

“Then why did he do that yawn thing?”

With amusement Harry eyed his sister. “What is happening to you?”

“Nothing,” she said, trying to sound brusque. “What are you looking at?”

“You’re staring at him as if he is the second coming,” said Harry.

“What do you mean, the second?” said Gina.

“Esther, why are you sniffling?” Harry ran his hands through his hair. “Why does one infant make all the grown-ups around him devolve into babies?”

“Esther, pay no attention to your brother,” Gina said. “Would you like to hold him?”

“May I?”

“Of course.” Gina wrapped the boy in a covering, picked him up, and handed him to her sister-in-law. “Anytime.”

“Oh,
Esther
can hold him anytime?” said Harry, poking Gina in the ribs.

For a few minutes Esther didn’t speak, couldn’t speak, she just held the baby, trying to keep the tears away.

Harry threw up his hands.

Gina handed Esther a handkerchief. “Did you forget your handkerchief, Esther?” she said quietly, mildly, fondly. “Like me?”

“Never you mind that.” Esther regained her composure. “I really think,” she said, “he is the most beautiful child that’s ever been born.”

“It’s not a matter of conjecture,” said Harry. “It’s simply fact.”

“What are we going to name him?”

“
We
?” said Gina. “Alexander.”

“What?” Esther held the infant closer.

“That’s what
I
said,” said Harry.

Esther shook her head, as if the matter were settled. “No one calls a child that in Boston,” she said firmly.

“Are we in Boston?”

“In America, then. You’re still in America, aren’t you? What are you really calling him? We have to think about this seriously. Naming a child is very important.”

“I agree,” Gina said. “We have been given this duty by God. Man names things. And we don’t have to think about it at all. We are naming him Anthony Alexander. We will call him Alexander.”

“You just said that man names . . .”

“I meant that inclusively.”

“No, no.”

“Yes, yes.”

Esther turned away from Gina as if shielding the infant from an intruder. “Please be serious. Harold, don’t just stand there. Talk some sense into your wife while I attend to your child.”

Harry opened his hands interrogatively. “Esther, why are you getting difficult with me, calling me Harold?”

“Are you not the child’s father?”

“What does that have to do with anything? As if I have any say in naming him.”

Rosa and Esther nearly required smelling salts.

“Esther,” Gina said, taking her baby from Esther’s unwilling arms. “My father was Anthony Alexander. My oldest brother was Anthony Alexander. My son will be Anthony Alexander.”

“The Third?”

Gina shook her head. “They had Italian names. Antonio Alessandro. He will have the first American name.”

Rosa piped up. “Have you considered other possibilities? So many wonderful names for children these days. William. Walter.”

Gina’s gaze shifted downward, adoring on her baby. “He is not a William or a Walter. Look at him. He is an Alexander.”
Il mio bambino. Il mio figlio
.

“No use arguing, Esther,” Harry said. “You’re just wasting the air I have already wasted. Would you like some lunch? I’ll ring for Emilio.”

“Well, I’m not going to call him Alexander,” Esther declared. “Never. I’ll call him Xander.” By her side, Rosa kept sniffling.

Harry rang the service bell. “Emilio! Come, save me! Oh my God. Will a man ever come into this house, or am I going to live out my life surrounded by wailing women?”

“A man
has
come into this house.” Gina lifted the baby to Harry’s face. “Your son.”

“How would I know? I’m barely allowed to hold him.”

“He needs his mother. Can
you
feed him?”

Harry and Gina blinked at each other with affection, intimacy, longing. “He doesn’t need to be fed twenty-four hours a day, does he?” Harry asked, lowering his voice.

“Harry is right,” said Esther stiffly. “You might be overfeeding him. He is too big.”

“Can a boy
be
too big?” asked Gina, her voice lowered by the birth of her son. She smiled. “I don’t think so.”

“How much did he weigh at birth?”

“The doctor said ten and a half pounds. But that has to be wrong,” said Gina. “And he was twenty-four inches long. That must be wrong, too.”

“All I know is he is too big. He won’t fit into any of the things we brought for him.” Esther turned to Rosa. “Will he, Rosa?”

“We underestimated him,” Rosa said, nodding, blowing her nose.

“Let’s go across the lagoon to Tequesta and buy him more clothes. Harry, can you call for Fernando? Tell him to get the car ready.”

“You’re leaving right now? You just got here!”

“Why dawdle, I say.” She reached for Alexander. “Can he come with us?” She chuckled, nuzzling his head. “Good boy, come shopping with the girls?”

Harry and Gina exchanged a look of amazement at hearing Esther chuckle.

“I don’t see why not,” said Harry. “He’s not under house arrest like me.”

“That may be,” said Gina, shaking her head. “But you can’t take him out yet. He’s not baptized. An unbaptized child can’t leave the house. In six weeks he’ll be baptized. Then he can go out.”

“Fine. We’ll go without him,” Esther said. “We’ll stay until the baptism.”

Harry groaned. “I can’t—I need reinforcement. Please, Gina, call Salvo, invite him to come. Tell him on my knees I shall beg for his forgiveness.”

“I’m glad to hear you say this,” Gina said. “Because Salvo
is
coming. He is going to be the baby’s godfather.”

“Salvo? Godfather?” Esther exclaimed. “Oh no—don’t tell me that after naming him Alexander, you’re also going to baptize this child a
Catholic
!”

With the peach folds of her silk robe, Gina blocked Alexander from Esther’s view. “As opposed to what? Baptizing him into Harry’s religion? Does your brother even know what religion he is?”

“Gina, I’ll have you know that we’ve always been Methodists.”

“Esther, darling,” said Gina, “I guarantee you, there is not a single thing Harry can tell you about it.”

“Not true,” said Harry. “It’s definitely a Christian religion . . . right?”

Four

A WEEK LATER SALVO
strolled through Bellagrand’s African blackwood doors. Somehow he found his way from the train, without needing Fernando to pick him up. He didn’t have a car, or a map. He asked someone for directions in Italian, received them in Spanish, and walked to the house across the bridge, his earthly belongings in a duffel bag on his shoulder.

Salvo’s hair was graying slightly at the temples, but it hadn’t lost its thickness or its shine. He wore a white shirt, a rumpled beige suit, a brown tie, slightly askew. His perspiring olive face was covered with days of train stubble, and he had become wider than in his younger, more sinewy years. He wasn’t built tall like his sister, for modeling the finest long dresses, but he had an easy carefree charm, a seductive smile. First he assessed the man or woman in front of him, then he dazzled them. The more charm needed, the more dazzling the smile.