The Villa Triste (54 page)
I didn’t even try anything like that with Massimo. I always knew he would be the most difficult, the one most likely to fight. He had no conscience, you see. He was an arrogant, bullish man. Nothing in him but righteousness.
You had pushed me a bit, but it was hunting season, and I thought he would go out. He usually did. I was prepared, if I had to – if he hadn’t gone hunting that morning – simply to go to the house or the stables and shoot him. I had to finish it, you see – before you did. But in the end, that wasn’t necessary. My daughter has a country house not too far from Siena, and last autumn I started watching him. For all his security cameras, he made the most basic of mistakes. He became a creature of routine. I knew the back roads around the property and I had found a place to watch the front gates. I left just after dawn and got down there at first light. After I saw him leave it only took me a few moments to circle to the back of the woods. I was waiting for him when he got out of the car. I called his name, and when he came towards me, I shot him. I couldn’t fuss with the salt, make him kneel or eat any of it. There was too much of a risk that he might have got to his gun, so I had to compromise, be content with putting a bit in his mouth and his pockets. Thank you, incidentally, for the compliment about the gloves. They were my son-in-law’s, an old pair that went missing over a year ago. I wore them over my own and even practised firing in them. I couldn’t afford to miss. After he was dead, I simply slipped them off and put them on him, and arranged the body.
I tied up the dog. Then, finally, I dropped the gun. And it was over.
There is one more thing. Your Eleanor Sachs. Or Faber, as I believe she now calls herself. Fabbianocci did, indeed, mean something to me. It was Lodovico’s last name.
I thought long and hard, but in the end, I did not contact her. It’s selfish, I suppose, but I wanted what time I had left with my own daughters, undisturbed. Although Cosimo knew everything about me, my daughters know nothing. Cosimo always said it was my choice as to what and when I told them. I never did. We fought the war to end the past, not to live in it forever.
You will see that I have not left Cati’s book for them to come across, or burnt it – as I admit I considered doing. Instead, I am returning it to you, along with two other souvenirs. I trust your judgement, my friend. Do with them what you think best.
I have never been able to find out where Mama was buried, but I did go to see Carlo, and Papa, and Rico one more time after that morning in Siena. I wanted to tell them what I had done, and that, finally, they were free.
I took them a last bouquet. All roses. If you visit, you will find a card there – probably a bit worse for wear by now. But if you can still read it, you will see that this time it was not from Remember The Fallen, but from me – Issa.
Or if you prefer, Il Spettro.
Pallioti sat for a moment, staring at nothing. The letter lay in his hands, the envelope on the bench beside him. He reached down to pick it up, to slip it into his pocket beside the little red book, and realized that there was something else inside. Two other souvenirs.
Turning it up, he tapped the bottom. A ring fell into his hand, a small familiar cluster of rubies, and a photograph.
The photo’s paper was brittle with age. Pallioti held it up gently, grasping the corner between his finger and thumb. On the back, in faded ink, were the words
Issa and Carlo, 10 May 1944
.
Turning it over, he saw that the figures had faded. They appeared slightly ghostly, as if they, too, were finally leaving. But he could still make them out. A girl with cropped hair wearing a man’s trousers and shirt stood in front of a tall, fair boy. His bare arms, sleeves rolled up, were looped around her shoulders. Looking up at him, she was laughing. A meadow stretched around them. Behind them, mountain peaks rose into what must once have been a bright blue sky.
The street was tree lined. Branches spread over it, dropping little green propeller-like seeds onto the tarmac. Roots pushed up, buckling the concrete sidewalk. The houses were not large. Each of them sat on a small patch of lawn. Each had a front walk. Some had a garage. Eleanor Sachs’s did not.
A new-looking Volkswagen Beetle was parked in her driveway. Pallioti could not decide if this was a good or a bad sign. He had suddenly been gripped by the idea that she was away. At best, the car might mean she had not gone on a driving vacation. But she might still have taken a taxi to the airport. As he had. Enzo had offered to drive him, but he had hemmed and hawed, and finally said ‘no’. This was a trip he wanted to take, from start to finish, alone.
Sunlight the colour of honey dripped through the canopy of leaves. A woman came by, walking a dog. Two joggers ran down the centre of the street, their feet falling in tandem. He had been waiting for an hour, and the shadows were lengthening when he finally saw her, a small figure with the same dark hair, and the too-big bag over her shoulder. She was wearing a T-shirt and a flowered skirt and sandals, and seemed to be either talking or singing to herself, head bent, watching the sidewalk and hopping occasionally. He smiled when he realized what she was doing. Not stepping on cracks.
Eleanor Sachs checked her mailbox. He had already noted a utility bill, two magazines and a copy of today’s newspaper – the fact that there was mail had been one of the things that convinced him to wait. She continued up the front walk. On the porch, she dug in her bag for a key.
His plane had been delayed due to a thunderstorm early in the day. As he opened the car door, he could feel the close muggy embrace of late summer. He crossed the street, fingering the envelope he had folded the ring into. The small red book was in his pocket, the worn photograph tucked inside the front cover. Somewhere down the block, he could hear the rattle of a kid on a skateboard.
He rang the bell. The top of Eleanor’s front door was heavy bevelled glass, so he saw her legs first, coming down the stairs. Then the rest of her. She was running her hand through her hair, saying something to a large grey cat that scuttled in front of her. Then she looked up.
Eleanor Sachs stopped, frozen, one hand on the banister, her mouth opening in a small, soundless ‘oh’. Pallioti took a breath. He could feel everything going wrong, crumbling. Then she smiled. And stepped across the foyer and opened the door.
For a moment, neither of them said anything. Eleanor took in his blue jeans. His summer shirt. The fact that he wasn’t wearing a tie.
‘What,’ she said finally – the smile, which was rapidly turning into a grin, creased her face, lit the deep, deep blue of her eyes – ‘what on earth,’ she asked, ‘are you doing here?’
Pallioti took the red book out of his pocket. He held it out to her. The faint stamp of the gold lily caught the evening sun. Eleanor looked from the book to him.
‘I’ve come,’ he said, ‘to keep a promise.’
With very special thanks:
To my husband, for all the hours he spent listening and traipsing about the Italian countryside hunting down ghosts of the Partisans.
To Jane Gregory, and to all of the wonderful people at Gregory and Co. for their kindness, expertise and endless patience.
To Maria Rejt and Sophie Orme for their sound judgement, excellent advice and generous support.
And to the faculty of the Paris American Academy, and in particular John and Marsha Biguenet, for their inspirational teaching, wise counsel and for helping me to believe I could.
Thank you.