One Hot Summer (6 page)

‘
Bella
?’

The view certainly was beautiful, even though the harbour was as far out of reach as ever.
‘
Tomorrow, Dino, we’ll try again. Let’s go home now. Villa Tramonti.’

He nodded.
‘
Villa Tramonti.’
Then he jabbed a finger towards the port.
‘
Il
porto.’

How could she destroy his pride of achievement?
‘
Thank you, Dino.
Grazie
.’

In the cool drawing room of the Villa, the mistress of the house was sitting with her embroidery. She looked up, smiled, and calling Jan Bianca, spoke to her in Italian.

Back to Square One!

Early next morning Jan put on one of Bianca’s bikinis, and her own trusty shoes. Then, with towel and sandals slung round her neck, she slipped away to find the steps down to that secret beach she coveted. She had a great longing to swim in the sea, and an even greater longing to be alone.

The gate was padlocked.

She felt sick with shock. That padlock definitely wasn’t there yesterday.

Yesterday she had walked through the gate and tested the path. Had someone seen her, and decided she was not to go down that way? If the steps were unsafe, surely the Signora could have told her? Who had made the decision—and why that heavy chain?

Dino had frustrated her desire to go down to the harbour yesterday. Was that lack of understanding, in such an apparently sensible and trusted young man? Or had it been done on purpose?

If so, did it tie up with the locking of the gate which effectively prevented her getting down to the beach?

‘
In other words,’ she said aloud, staring back at the silent garden,
‘
is someone trying to keep me a prisoner here?’

CHAPTER III

Jan sat on the warm stone, the morning sun across her shoulders, and stared into the azure distance,
thinking
hard. She hugged her knees and sat so still that presently a tiny green lizard flicked out from a crack and sunned itself beside her, the minute throat pulsating.

Marco’s stated purpose in bringing her to his villa was to keep an eye on his mother during his sister’s absence, but it was beginning to look as if he had another, and secret, purpose of his own.

It could be that the gate to the beach path was normally padlocked. It could be that Dino had not understood her repeated requests to be taken to the harbour. Maybe she was making a mountain out of a molehill.

It’s not that he planned to seduce me, she decided. He’s shown no signs of being impressed by my feminine charm. His only interest in my looks is that I’m very like his sister, and—

She caught her breath.
Very like his sister
!

He insisted that she wore Bianca’s clothes. Twice, he had asked her to wave to people at a distance—strangers who couldn’t possibly know her. He had encouraged her to play Bianca’s guitar.

‘
So
!’
She spoke aloud, and the lizard flickered into his crack with the speed of lightning. Was that what her host was up to? Had he brought her here to act as a stand-in for his absent sister? It was all right, was it, to be seen driving in the open beach buggy with Dino? But not permitted to stroll around the town where anybody could see she wasn’t Bianca Cellini?

So where was Bianca? Was she dead? No, because even an autocrat like Marco could hardly conceal a death for long. Had she eloped, made a marriage of which her brother disapproved? Young Italian girls of good family were strictly brought up and expected to obey the male head of the house, but Bianca’s room and her possessions suggested she had absorbed some pretty modern notions. So she might be defying Marco somewhere. Perhaps he had her locked up in some horrible dungeon in the rocks until she submitted and did whatever it was he wanted.

Whatever his motive, he had no right to involve Jan in it, without telling her. The more she thought about it, the more angry she became. She shivered suddenly, and saw that her bare arms had goose-pimpled. Not because she was apprehensive about her own situation, but because the sun had moved and left her in deep shade.

She moved over, following the warmth, stretched full length, prone under the orange trees, her chin on her hands. He couldn’t keep
m
e here after the end of my holiday; there’s the British Consul, with my passport; and the bank, dealing with my lost travellers’ cheques. They know I’m here. The masquerade will have to end when my holiday ends, and Marco knows it.

The scent of orange blossom and canna lilies was heavy this morning, so presently she gathered up her swimming things and went to the pool. There was time for a leisurely swim before her Italian lesson with the Signora.

After the lesson, the walk round the garden with Signora Cellini, the slow walk from one plant to the next. As they passed the white arched gate, Dino greeted them. The boy was washing and polishing the gaily painted buggy, and the sight of the little vehicle put a mischievous idea into Jan’s mind.

She left her companion in the long gallery overlooking the sea, and raced back to the gate, snatching up her Greek canvas shoulder-bag as she passed the pool.

‘
Dino, the Signora wants you at once—in the open gallery, by the bronze statue. Hurry
!’

The boy dropped his polishing cloth and ran off on brown bare feet. Jan gave him a couple of minutes’ start, then slipped into the driving seat and started the engine. The thing was simplicity itself to drive, but Jan remembered the eight hairpin bends on the precipitous road to the harbour, and went carefully. She had no doubt the Signora would believe she had sent for Dino, and find him a dozen jobs to do among the flowers before releasing him. She had plenty of time.

Parking her vehicle, Jan wandered round the harbour, watching the boats rocking on azure water, the fishermen mending coloured nets; peering into blue-painted wooden pails to admire the striped and gaudy fish so different from any she had seen on an English fishmonger’s slab. Pretty, they looked, but she had learned by experience that none had the good flavour of cold-water fish, cod and plaice, halibut and sole.

Leaving the harbour, she soon discovered the town, which had a miniature piazza surrounded by shops and caf
e
s, and with a fine though small church at the top of a sweep of steps. A beggar woman sat on the steps by the church door; children played with a ball, a dog slept in the shade. Barini not having a regular ferry service, it had escaped the tourist invasion so far, and Jan enjoyed the experience of seeing the beauty of the old buildings and shops not swallowed up in advertisements of hotels, restaurants, and garages. There was, however, a bright clean caf
e
with basket chairs and coloured umbrellas, and here, when she began to feel hot and tired after her explorations, she sat for a while, ordered a coffee-flavoured ice, and thought about Marco.

Contact with the workaday world of the harbour had blown away her fanciful ideas about Bianca and the dungeon in the rocks. Perhaps even the idea that her host wished her to impersonate his sister to disguise her absence was a bit far-fetched too. She had
been unjust to him, though luckily only in her thoughts.

He had rescued her from a nasty situation like a true knight errant; offered her the hospitality of his magnificent villa; given his servant orders to drive her anywhere she wished in his absence. That he had offered her not only his sister’s rooms but also her clothes and possessions might, for all she knew, be a form of extravagant Italian hospitality.

Am I annoyed that he did not follow up all this generosity by paying attentions and compliments? Piqued that I failed to attract him?

She paid for her ice-cream and walked on. Until her money arrived, she could buy nothing beyond a few postcards and stamps. The few hundred lire she gathered up from odd pockets and crannies in her hotel room would not go far.

A marquetry shop attracted her. Here were boxes of all sizes, tables, trays, plaques and pictures delicately made in coloured woods, inlaid sometimes with mother-of-pearl. She decided on small caskets for her special friends at the hospital, the prices here being much lower than on the mainland and, she felt sure, the craftsmanship was better. Farther along the cobbled street there was a shop exhibiting work in onyx and marbles white and red, translucent green, creams and browns. A magnificent green onyx horse with mane and tail flying made her gasp with pleasure, but for practical purposes she examined the ash trays, book-ends and little gilt boxes with onyx lids.

When at last she tucked her postcards into the Greek shoulder-bag and turned towards the harbour again, she realised she had lingered the whole morning and it was now nearly lunchtime. Island life was so leisurely that one could completely forget that time existed.

Obviously the town must be visited again when she had money, but for the moment one must hurry or be
late for lunch. The meal, simple as it was and served outdoors, was nevertheless a formal one. She ran the last few yards to the harbour.

She had a passenger. Marco was sitting in the buggy, stony-faced with anger.

‘
You
!’
he exclaimed when he saw her.
‘
Where is Dino? I’ve been waiting twenty minutes. We shall be late for lunch.’

‘
Dino’s not here. He—he wasn't expecting you, was he?’

‘
Certainly he was. I told him I would be here by noon, and he was to meet me. And what happens? I find a car but no Dino. Two more minutes and I’d have driven off without him.’

‘
I’m surprised you waited so long,’ she challenged. Sheer fright had thrown her into an aggressive mood. What had she done?

‘
Naturally I assumed Dino had been asked to fetch something from the town for my mother, or I wouldn’t have waited at all. Why isn’t he here? I assume you came down with him.’

‘
I’m afraid not. I came alone. I’m an experienced driver,
signore.
It was quite safe.’

‘
Did Dino allow this? Surely he told you I was to be met at noon? Or did you wander round the shops and forget?’

‘
He didn’t tell me and I didn’t forget. I took the buggy without his knowledge. It was outside the gate. He’d been cleaning it and left it there. So I just—took it.’

He gave a small, sarcastic bow, a shrug of his elegant shoulders.
‘
A guest’s privilege, of course, but not altogether considerate. One is supposed to ask whether it is convenient, to make off with the only means of getting up and down the hill.’

‘
I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have taken it without asking.’

‘
Please try to be more thoughtful in future. I gave Dino orders to drive you wherever you wished to go. He would have brought you down if you’d asked.’

He moved into the driving seat, indicated she should get in, and drove off.

‘
But he didn’t,’ Jan felt she ought to explain what had happened.
‘
I asked him yesterday, but he drove all round the island taking me everywhere but to the harbour. And I really did need to buy postcards.’

‘
I thought you hadn’t any money.’

‘
Odd lire from my pockets and a spare purse, no more.’

He said no more, but concentrated on driving up the twisting road. She stole a glance at him, but his face was set in an expression as cold as marble.

Dino came running to meet them when he heard the engine. He was wringing his hands in distress.

‘
Oh,
signore
,’ he wailed.
‘
Oh,
signore,
I thought some thief had stolen the buggy. I am so sorry,
signore.
I didn’t know what to do.’

‘You should have walked down, you stupid lazy boy! Then at least you could have told me about the thief and we could have taken a taxi back. If you hadn’t been so idle you’d have found our thief yourself, as I did.’

‘
The Signorina? Oh—’

The look Dino turned to Jan was compounded of surprise, reproach, distress.
‘
I’m sorry, Dino,’ she said gently.
‘
It is I who am in trouble, not you. I have explained to the Signore that it was not your fault.’

‘
All right, all right,’ Marco said crossly.
‘
Spare us the apologies; and Dino, stop snivelling! We shall be late for lunch and Mamma will be upset.’

There was no time for a shower. Jan brushed her smooth shoulder-length hair, coaxed it into turning up at the ends. I must look for a photograph of Bianca, she decided. Does she have my dark hair, my grey eyes
and arched brows? The nurses say my skin is my best point, fine and clear. In fact—she smiled at herself and leaned forward into the mirror—not to beat about the bush, chum, flawless.

Why do we look alike at a distance? Michael used to say, ‘Jan looks like a woman and walks like a princess,’ but he’s probably saying that to another girl now.

She was scrambling into one of her own dresses when the significance of what she had just thought struck her motionless. She had thought about Michael, remembered he had left her, without that awful sickening pang of agony. For the first time. Was she getting over him?

The Cellinis, mother and son, were waiting for her. She apologised for her lateness and moved to her seat, which Marco drew out for her with his never-failing formal good man
n
ers. But he was frowning.

‘
Why are you not wearing one of my sister’s dresses?’

‘
Is it a rule,
signore
? Surely I am allowed to decide what I wear? It seemed I had already made too free with your family possessions this morning.’