Summer at the Lake
This book is for Edward and Ally, Samuel and Rebecca, and a very special little boy, my gorgeous grandson.
RICA
J
AMES
Thanks and Acknowledgements
I couldn’t have written this book without the help of some fantastic people who were so generous with their time and knowledge.
In Oxford I had help from the superbly efficient Digna Martinez at the Oxford Visitor Information Centre.
I was also fortunate enough to be shown round Queen’s College Library by Lynette Dobson.
Closer to home, I have Grace Hulley to thank for leading me down a particular path.
In Italy, help came from some wonderful sources, in particular Rita Annunziata who, together with her
nonna
, supplied me with no end of invaluable information and patiently answered all my questions.
Help also came from Danilo who invited me for dinner and introduced me to his charming mother.
And not forgetting Mikael Mammen who inadvertently gave me a light bulb moment – I’m just sorry I couldn’t find a way to use the salami submarine!
Lastly, special thanks to Sara Cilia for knowing what a nosy parker I am and taking me to see the villa, which later became Hotel Margherita.
While most of the places featured in this novel are real, I have taken a few liberties here and there. For instance Hotel Margherita doesn’t actually exist, but take a trip to Lake Como and you’ll find plenty of villas just like it.
When you write the story of two happy lovers, let the story be set on the banks of Lake Como.
Franz Liszt
It had been a mistake to open the envelope.
She should never have done that. If only she had left it to deal with when she returned home from work, or if only the postman had been late, her day wouldn’t have been ruined. As it was, her thoughts had been constantly drawn to the Christmas card from Seb with its ruddy-cheeked Santa up-ended in a snowdrift.
But it was the high-quality card tucked inside that was the real shock. Embossed with fancy gold calligraphy it requested her to save the date of 10th July next summer for the wedding of Imogen Alicia Morgan and Sebastian Hughes.
On the back was a scrawly handwritten message from Seb –
Floriana, I do hope you’ll come, it would mean a lot to me.
An email address she didn’t recognise had been tagged on at the bottom.
Would it mean a lot to Seb for her to be there? Would it really? Floriana found it hard to believe. For two years there had been nothing from him. Not a single text, email or phone call. Now, out of the blue, this announcement. An announcement that made her feel as though she had been slapped. Then slapped again, hard. And just when her mind managed to blank it out –
wham!
– there was another slap.
Turning off the High into Radcliffe Square, where earlier she had been explaining to an enthusiastic group of American tourists that it was England’s finest example of a circular library, she hurried along in the bitter cold to Catte Street, passing the Bodleian on her left and the Bridge of Sighs on her right. It was always at this spot in the road that she warned people to look out for approaching cyclists – she had lost count of how many tourists had very nearly come a cropper here as they stopped to admire and take photographs of the bridge.
No two days were the same for Floriana; it was one of the things she loved most about her job as an Oxford blue badge tour guide. Yesterday she had taken a group of fiercely clued-up fans on an
Inspector Morse
and
Lewis
tour – some of whom had been determined to catch her out on some minute detail or other. But blessed with an excellent retentive memory – Seb used to refer to it as her dark arts super-power – they’d have to be up early to get one over her.
Today she had been conducting what Dreaming Spires Tours called their Classic University and City Tour, culminating in afternoon tea at the Randolph Hotel. From there the group of Americans had been picked up by coach and taken to spend the night in Woodstock. Tomorrow they were scheduled to visit Blenheim Palace for mulled wine and carol singing. When Floriana had been saying goodbye to them – while accepting their discreetly palmed tips – she had inexplicably wanted to clamber on board the bus with the jolly, carefree group and run away, if only to Woodstock. Anything than go home and deal with Seb’s card – a card that had scratched at the dormant and humiliating ache of her love for someone beyond reach.
But home in North Oxford was exactly where she was now heading. Avoiding Broad Street and the tangle of bus queues on St Giles, she took the quieter route of Parks Road. Usually she cycled to work, but this morning, on top of the shock of opening Seb’s card, she had found her bicycle had a puncture.
Fixing the puncture was another job to add to the growing list of things she had to do. Mostly they were things she kept putting off because she couldn’t be bothered to deal with them. Such as changing two of the halogen light bulbs in the kitchen that hadn’t worked for the last month, or getting a handyman in to replace the cracked window pane in her bathroom. The guttering also needed clearing and that tap in the bathroom was dripping too. At the back of her mind was the thought that if she waited until everything that was going to go wrong went wrong, she’d get someone in to sort it all out in one go.
‘For heaven’s sake, Floriana,’ her sister would say, ‘stop procrastinating!’ Doubtless Ann would add that they were all simple jobs anyone with half a brain could do for themselves and why on earth didn’t she roll her sleeves up and get on with it?
Four years older than Floriana, Ann never put anything off; she was the last word in getting things done. She was what the world would class as a proper grown-up – wife, mother, domestic technician, and workplace Hitler. She was eminently sensible and led a thoroughly organised and blameless life and never missed an opportunity to make Floriana feel that she had somehow messed up, even when she hadn’t. Her every comment, so it seemed, was weighted with the sole intention to make Floriana feel inadequate and recklessly irresponsible. And though it was true there had been times when her impulsive nature had got her into a close shave or two, she had, it had to be said, always escaped actual outright disaster.
Most notably was the occasion in her first year at college here in Oxford when she spent a night in a police cell. She had thought she’d been successful in keeping it from Mum and Dad, but then a letter for her had arrived at home with the words
Thames Valley Police
stamped on the envelope. Ann had gone to town on making a ludicrously big fuss as to why Floriana was receiving letters from the police.
‘Just the one letter,’ Floriana had retaliated, ‘which I might add is none of your business.’
Poor Mum and Dad had been mortified when Floriana had confessed to a ‘lark’ that had got a bit out of hand. ‘It won’t be in the newspapers, will it?’ Mum had asked with a trembly catch in her voice.
‘Of course not, Mum,’ Floriana had assured her while crossing her fingers. ‘As misdemeanours go, this is very small potatoes and will be of no interest to anyone.’
‘And you won’t be busticated?’
‘It’s rusticated, Mum. And no, the college won’t do that to me.’ Again her fingers had been tightly crossed.
As luck would have it, both she and Seb – her partner in crime – had been let off with nothing more than a warning. The principal of Floriana’s college had said, ‘I’m sure you don’t need me to point out the error of your ways,’ and had gone on to do exactly that, detailing the folly of their drunken caper: that of scaling a wall to peer inside the building the other side of it – a building where, and unknown to them, animal research took place, which made it perhaps one of the most highly sensitive and well-guarded buildings in Oxford. The second they were atop the wall, security lights had flashed on and they’d been deafened by a siren blaring. Before they’d had a chance to scramble down, a police car had appeared and they were taken to the police station. The following morning, and after their college rooms had been searched, and their laptops and mobiles thoroughly scrutinised for any animal rights activity – they were told they wouldn’t be charged and were sent on their shamefaced and chastened way.
Floriana was thirty-one years old now but Ann wouldn’t hesitate to raise the incident as an example of her wilful nature always to do the wrong thing. But compared to Ann anyone would look reckless and irresponsible.
And that was Ann without an E. Giselle Anne Day had never forgiven their mother for giving them the names she had – names that would make them stand out as being different. Just as soon as she was old enough, having had enough of being teased and bullied at school, she had insisted she be called Ann and had stripped back her middle name to the simplicity of just three letters, as if that superfluous E would somehow invite further trouble.