The Affair (23 page)

It was interesting to learn that Ernesto had a jealous streak. She rather liked it because it proved how much he cared about her but she would have to be careful not to give him any reason to be jealous. She dreaded to think how he would respond to the news that Trevor was coming out at Easter. He was going to be terribly hurt. She would have to choose the moment to tell him with great care.

At dinner that evening, Ernesto presented her with another birthday present – a silver cross on a chain. It was pretty but she was puzzled that he would buy her a traditionally Catholic item.

‘I thought you could wear it when I introduce you to my family,’ he said. ‘When my mother sees it, she will assume you are Catholic and the meeting will go much better.’

Diana’s pulse quickened. ‘You want me to meet your family?’

‘Of course I do. You’re my girl.’ He reached over the table to squeeze her hand. ‘Sadly, my mother is unwell just now, with something we call
fuoco di San Antonio
, but when she is better …’

It wasn’t a term she had come across but Diana questioned him about the symptoms of the illness and realised it must be shingles. ‘I’ll look forward to meeting her whenever she’s ready.’

She felt very moved that he was taking steps to make their relationship official. He genuinely seemed to want to make it work. With a jolt she realised that if he asked to marry her she would have to convert to Catholicism. Did they accept divorcees? She wasn’t sure.

When they made love that night, there was a special intensity about it and Diana felt as though she had fallen just a little bit further in love with him. But while he slept she lay awake racked with guilt about Trevor, who had made such an effort to choose thoughtful gifts for her. It felt wicked to be betraying him. He’d done nothing to deserve this.

She tried to picture what she would have done if she had been in Elizabeth Taylor’s position. What if she had been having a dinner party in the home she shared with Trevor, with all their friends there, when Ernesto burst in, insisting that she should choose between them? She simply couldn’t picture the two of them in the same room, but she knew she wouldn’t have humiliated Trevor publicly. It was as well that they lived in different countries, hundreds of miles apart, but she went cold with panic when she thought about Easter. She couldn’t tell Trevor not to come, and she still hadn’t told Ernesto about it, although the visit was only a month away. She was being a coward, and it was tearing her apart.

At least Elizabeth had made a choice and taken action. Perhaps she was just braver than Diana. She must have nerves of steel. But then why had she taken an overdose back in February when Richard broke off the affair? Maybe she had set her heart on the prize and was determined to get it. Diana shook herself. How could the likes of her attempt to get inside the mind of such an extraordinary star? They had nothing in common except dull marriages and exciting lovers but she felt a kinship with Elizabeth as they coped with their men in their own individual ways.

Just ten days later, Diana got an insight into Elizabeth’s state of mind that made her think about the woman quite differently. Every day there were minor dramas at Cinecittà but the drama became a crisis on the 26th of March when a
paparazzo
managed to sneak a long-lens photograph of Elizabeth and Richard kissing outside her dressing room, wearing bathrobes over their costumes. It was the first proof positive of the affair for the outside world and the picture instantly went global. The furore was such that next morning Diana’s studio car couldn’t get through the entrance gates for all the
paparazzi
outside and the driver had to take her round to slip in via the commissary.

Copies of
Gente
, the Italian newspaper that had splashed the fuzzy picture on its front cover, were all over the set, surreptitiously folded into jacket pockets or handbags so as to avoid causing offence to the protagonists. In the bar at lunchtime, word buzzed from table to table that Richard had released a statement to the press accepting what everyone knew to be the truth about his affair – but he added that he would never leave his wife Sybil. How would Elizabeth react?

By one of those extraordinary coincidences that often seemed to happen at Cinecittà, that very afternoon Elizabeth was to film a scene of jealous rage. Cleopatra hears the news that Mark Antony, her lover, has married Octavian’s sister back in Rome. The marriage is obviously one of political expedience but still Cleopatra flies into a frenzy. In the script, she is called upon to slash Antony’s possessions to ribbons with a sword. Diana had read the pages that morning and couldn’t believe how clearly the film mirrored real life at that precise moment.

Now that her face was known, she occasionally managed to step in to the sound stages and watch the filming and she decided to try that afternoon. She felt almost protective of Elizabeth, although that was ridiculous. The woman didn’t even know her name.

The centrepiece of the set was a large bed circled by gold gauze curtains. Diana stood in the shadows by a back wall and kept very still as Elizabeth emerged and Joe went over for a word with her.

‘Quiet on set. Going for a take,’ called the assistant director, then there was the familiar sequence: ‘Roll sound’, ‘Rolling’, ‘Roll camera’, ‘Speed’. The clapperboard operator called ‘Slate 57, Take 1’ and slapped the wooden boards together. ‘And action,’ Joe called.

Elizabeth began to slash at Antony’s clothes with a Roman sword, a deranged expression on her face. ‘Cut!’ Joe called, then asked for another take. When that scene was in the bag, Elizabeth had to sweep the ornaments from a dressing table, and this took several takes, with continuity girls hard pressed to replace them in exactly the same positions between times. In the last scene, Elizabeth leapt onto the bed and began to stab it with the sword so that the stuffing spilled out. She went utterly berserk, sobbing and stabbing the mattress and pillows over and over again. Joe failed to call ‘Cut’. Everyone was mesmerised.

Finally, someone said ‘She’s hurt herself’ and Diana realised there was blood on the sheets. Joe rushed onto the set to put an arm round Elizabeth as she wept uncontrollably, then led her quickly out towards her dressing room. There was silence until the door closed behind them, then a script girl remarked, ‘I hope we don’t need to retake any of that.’

‘Are you OK?’ a voice next to Diana asked. It was only then she realised that she was crying herself.

Scott called round at Helen’s
pensione
the evening after her vitamin shot and found her looking cheerful and full of beans.

‘It’s wonderful. I wish I’d known about this doctor months ago. Thank you so much, Scott.’ She threw her arms around his neck.

‘Wanna come out for dinner? My bike is round the corner.’

‘I’m not hungry but we could have a drink if you like.’

Scott looked at her skinny arms. ‘You need to eat, sweetheart. You’re all skin and bone.’

‘I know. None of my clothes fit any more. I’m sure my appetite will come back soon.’ She laughed. ‘Tell you what. Could we get an ice cream? I love ice cream.’

‘Sure can. I know a place not far from here.’ He’d noticed it because it reminded him of an American soda fountain with high stools on which you sat at a counter. There were no other customers. They chose stools with a view into the street and perused the menu.

‘Could I have one of those?’ Helen pointed to a picture on the wall of an ice cream sundae with three different scoops of ice cream – vanilla, strawberry and chocolate – and some pink syrup and sprinkles on top. ‘It looks divine.’

Scott laughed and ordered her one, requesting just a coffee for himself.

‘What’s your job?’ she asked. ‘Did you tell me and I’ve forgotten? I’m famous for that.’

Scott decided not to mention that he was a journalist. The press had a bad name at Cinecittá and he didn’t want her jumping to the conclusion he was only befriending her to get information about Taylor and Burton. ‘I’m a writer. A struggling writer.’

‘How romantic!’ Helen licked a spoonful of ice cream. ‘Do you write love stories?’

‘Not exactly. I write crime stories and sometimes there’s love involved. Gangsters and their girlfriends. Say, I was wondering if you and Luigi were ever an item?’

Helen shuddered and shook her head, but she wouldn’t meet his eye. ‘He’s
disgusting
,’ she exclaimed with feeling. ‘I really
hate
him.’ The question seemed to have upset her and he regretted asking it because she stopped eating and simply toyed with her ice cream as it melted into puddles in the dish.

‘I hope he’ll leave you alone now, but tell me if you have any trouble and I’ll deal with him. OK?’

She nodded, but a dampener had been put on her mood. ‘Do you have a girlfriend?’ she asked, and Scott found himself telling her about Rosalia, who still called the office from time to time.

‘I don’t understand why she doesn’t have more pride,’ he complained.

Helen had a distant look in her eyes. ‘If she could only get you back, she could pretend the rejection never happened and that it was all a misunderstanding. Then she could stop thinking of herself as the kind of girl men always leave.’

‘Is there such a thing as the kind of girl men always leave?’

‘I think so,’ Helen frowned. ‘Don’t you?’

‘No, I think they just need to meet the right person. And maybe stop trying so hard.’

All of a sudden Helen leaned her head in her hands and seemed exhausted. ‘I need an early night, Scott. Sorry I’m not much company.’

‘Hey! I’m just glad you’re on the mend. Let’s go out again in a few days when you’ve got your appetite back. Why don’t you give me your number?’

Helen scribbled the phone number of her
pensione
on the cover of a matchbook. ‘I won’t hold my breath since you’ve already admitted you’re the kind of guy who doesn’t return girls’ phone calls.’

‘Idiot!’ he grinned. ‘Of course I’ll call. We’re friends. It’s the girls who try to force me down the aisle on the second date I tend to dodge.’

When he dropped her off, he put his arms round her and hugged her tight, then kissed her forehead. She looked very vulnerable as he drove off, and he decided that he would definitely try to see her again soon. Perhaps he would find out more about this Luigi character as well, so he could protect Helen from him.

Every evening Scott had a few beers in one of the bars round the Via Veneto or Via Margutta, where he kept his eyes open and watched the comings and goings, especially the furtive deals in which money was palmed from one person to another and small paper packages given in return. It wasn’t long before he noticed Luigi, the dealer he’d seen with Helen, but this time he was talking to an actor Scott vaguely recognised. They disappeared to the men’s toilet, then the actor left first, glancing around self-consciously, before Luigi sauntered out and stood near Scott at the bar.

‘
Bella serata
,’ Scott ventured in Italian, and Luigi looked up at him. ‘Do you speak English?’

‘When I feel like it.’

‘The town is full of actors at the moment. Must be good for business.’ Luigi shrugged and Scott continued. ‘I hear they’re all alcoholics or drug addicts. They pretend to be someone else at work during the day then use mind-altering chemicals at night so that they never have to face up to who they really are.’

‘That’s profound,’ Luigi replied. ‘Are you a philosopher?’

‘No, just a businessman,’ Scott lied. ‘Look, I know this is a long shot and I’m sorry if I’m way off target but I saw you going to the gents’ with that guy and I wondered if by any chance you know where I could buy some cocaine? I heard it’s easy to find drugs in Rome. Someone told me that certain bartenders will even supply you from under the counter if they know you, but I haven’t been able to find any like that.’

‘If that was the case, the quality would not be good,’ Luigi scoffed. ‘Every time it changes hands I expect it will be cut with
farina
. You need to buy from a dealer if you want it to be pure.’

‘You sound like a guy who knows what he’s talking about. Can I buy you a drink?’

‘Sure.’ Luigi made a face as if it was neither here nor there to him and ordered a coffee and a Jack Daniel’s.

‘So how does it work when famous people want to buy drugs?’ Scott asked. ‘Let’s say Elizabeth Taylor fancied a couple of tabs of LSD for a party. How would she get them?’

Luigi gave a sly smile. ‘I imagine she has trusted people she would send out to make enquiries. For all I know, you could be one of them.’

‘Well, maybe I am,’ Scott grinned. ‘So does that mean a dealer could be supplying lots of famous people without even knowing it?’

‘Some, perhaps. Other dealers have more personal relationships with their clients. They know the precise type of product the client prefers, the exact strength and purity, and make sure they supply what is wanted. The client will pay a premium for guaranteed quality.’

‘I bet you know a lot of famous people yourself,’ Scott hinted. ‘Who are your favourites?’

That was the tipping point. Luigi couldn’t resist boasting about the international stars he had dealt with. The names tripped off his tongue in a libellous stream. He said they always sought him out when they were in Rome and he never let them down. Many of them were household names across continents.