The coffee was excellent, in fact. Someone standing outside the open door was smoking, and for a second Roxana thought, what the hell. The security guard can wait on the door until Val arrives, ten minutes late as he always is. Stay in this little bolthole half an hour, have another, borrow a cigarette, be five, ten minutes late to work. Life’s too short. Just for a second.
Maria Grazia had heard her inhale on the phone last night, when she had paused for breath herself in the middle of singing the praises of her Romanian forest and lecturing Roxana on how to take control of her life. And had started shouting down the line at her.
Are you mad? Do you remember that bronchitis three years ago? Do you remember how many times you’ve told me that giving up was the best thing you ever did?
‘Maria,’ she’d said, and it might have been the nicotine rush but it seemed to Roxana that just hearing the words coming out of her own mouth had made her dizzy, ‘I think Violetta – I think Ma might be losing it. I mean—’ taking a deep breath, ‘I think she might be getting dementia.’
Maria Grazia had gone very quiet. When she spoke eventually Roxana could hear the strained note in her voice. ‘Over one phone call? Forgetting to take a message?’
‘It’s not just the phone call,’ Roxana had said.
And she had unconsciously lowered her voice. Standing in the garden, with the street barely ten metres away, the nearest neighbours no closer, Ma fast asleep upstairs, whom did she think would hear? The pungent smoke from the moon tiger glowing at her feet spiralled into the still, hot, damp darkness.
‘She says there was someone in the garden yesterday. Someone hiding in the garden, and she didn’t dare leave the house all day.’
Damn, damn. It hit Roxana all over again, in the humid coffee-scented gloom of the Buca dell’Orafo, with Orlando’s kindly, tired eyes on her.
‘Your mother still alive, Orlando?’ she asked.
He crossed himself. ‘Not for twenty-five years,’ he said with genuine sadness. ‘God rest her.’ Shrugged. ‘Worn out. She passed away in the middle of scrubbing someone’s floor.’
And Roxana nodded, thinking of her mother on her knees this morning. Better to go that way, she thought, though she didn’t say it.
Ma hadn’t wanted to tell her. Had skirted uncomfortably around it, unable to tell an outright lie but miserably aware of what Roxana would think. After twenty minutes of going round in circles, Roxana had been reduced to taking a tough line, demanding only yes and no answers.
No, she hadn’t gone out. No, it hadn’t been because she hadn’t been feeling well. Yes, she had run out of bottled water and milk and bread. Yes, the supermarket was open all day even though it was August but she hadn’t gone out. Yes, she just hadn’t felt like it, would Roxana please just leave her alone? She needed to go to sleep. No, she hadn’t seen anyone.
But she had heard someone. He had come to the door.
‘A man?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You said he?’
‘I don’t know. I – I just thought it was a man. I don’t know why.’
‘Did he say anything?’
Yes, that was it, the man had called through the door,
Signora Delfino, I know you’re in there
.
At the bar Roxana signalled to little Orlando, thumb and forefinger about two centimetres apart, for an espresso. He’d bobbed a tiny bow, a smile toothless behind the big moustache, and busied himself.
She had stared at Ma.
‘You couldn’t tell,’ Roxana had said numbly to Maria Grazia, stubbing out the cigarette. ‘From the way she said it, it did sound bad. Like the big bad wolf, or something. With poor old Mamma trembling in the hall. But you couldn’t tell, could you? He might just have been a delivery man.’
Maria Grazia had taken her time answering and Roxana’s heart had sunk. They’d known each other since
asilo
, when their mothers had collected them from the nursery at lunchtime together; Maria Grazia still called Ma ‘Signora Delfino’ on her rare visits home.
In the brief silence as Roxana stood in the garden, something rustled in the dark, over towards the wall that divided them from the neighbours, and Roxana felt the creep of the fine hairs rising along her arm. She turned, just a fraction, setting her back against the rough trunk of the banana palm. Was someone hiding in the garden?
Eventually Maria Grazia had sighed. ‘Yes,’ she’d said. ‘Delivery man, postman, yeah.’ But she’d sounded – if not worried, then puzzled. ‘But they do usually leave a card, don’t they? If they’ve tried to deliver and – and there’s no one home?’
Someone had called in the background and Maria Grazia must have put a hand over the receiver to answer because there was the sound of a muffled reply.
I know you’re in there, Signora Delfino
. Would a FedEx man say such a thing? And what would they be delivering, anyway? Roxana never bought online, and Ma’s sister in Pescara mistrusted the post with a vengeance. Would rather make a 400-kilometre round trip by train to deliver a hand-knitted sweater that no one would wear, refusing all offers of a bed for the night.
‘Yes,’ Roxana had said. ‘There wasn’t a card.’
He hid round the back
, Mamma had said, and then it had all spilled out of her in a quavering torrent, face in her hands with shame.
I waited and waited, I sat in the hall by the door and waited for him to go
.
‘Ma said it was at least an hour,’ Roxana had told Maria Grazia, ‘she said she heard him moving around outside the house. All around, then back again, then into the garden. But she fell asleep in the end so she can’t be sure. When she woke up, she thought he was gone but she stayed inside, just to be on the safe side.’
Orlando slid the small shot of coffee with a dash of hot milk across to Roxana. Behind the bar the clock said seven-fifty-five. Roxana smiled at him. Wished she could stay in here all day.
‘Did you look around?’ Maria Grazia had asked. ‘In the garden, for example? To see if there was any sign anyone had been there?’ There had been more noise at her end: raucous, end-of-the-day voices, people perhaps heading off for a drink together.
‘It was dark,’ Roxana had said, and heard the dull certainty in her voice. ‘But there was no delivery man, was there? No stalker, either.’
And Maria Grazia had changed tack then, not wanting to answer. Briskly she had shifted back to her constant refrain.
‘Look, get proactive, Roxi. I don’t know how you can stand to have that Marisa Goldman promoted over you, to start with, useless piece.’
Marisa and Maria Grazia had history, as they said. Some ex-boyfriend of Marisa’s had pulled out of funding one of Maria Grazia’s films.
She went on, ‘What you need to do is prioritize. Talk to your boss.’ As if it was Roxana who was going off the rails. The answer to everything: get ahead. Get your freedom.
You think it’s all in my head
. That’s what Mamma had said, disbelieving, reproachful.
No, Ma. I believe you. It’s all right, Ma
.
As Roxana set the cup back down on the bar, the door swung open and the sharp-shouldered silhouette of a new customer blocked the doorway, a gust of dirty summer air entering with him: the sour smell left by the morning’s bin collection, and the exposed slime of the river bed. It was Val.
He smiled cheerfully. ‘You’re late,’ he said, nodding up at the dusty clock over the bar. ‘That’s not like you.’
Prioritize
.
‘You’re later,’ she said sharply. ‘Five minutes, Valentino.’
*
For the first time since as long as Sandro could remember, they had a lie-in.
Luisa wasn’t starting till midday, she said, padding back into the bedroom in her nightdress with a tray, a napkin on it, two glasses of water, an espresso for him. He had heard her bustling in the kitchen, had smelled the coffee, and had kept his eyes closed in case it might all be a dream.
It was so unusual for Luisa to start late – her mind was on work the moment she opened her eyes; she was always excited to get into the shop – that it did cross his mind, very briefly, that it wasn’t true. That she was regressing, turning into an idle teenager phoning in sick. Not that Luisa had ever, ever been idle.
They drank, set the tray aside, slid back under the sheets to talk, side by side. Luisa was holding his hand, quite unconsciously. It was like being newly-weds. Sandro didn’t know if it was due to getting his anxiety over Anna Niescu off his chest and Luisa actually being fine with it – with the discussion of a pregnancy, an imminent birth. Or it could have been the meal at Nello together, just the right amount of wine – his small suggestion of a hangover almost pleasurable in the dim bedroom, a reminder that he wasn’t past having fun.
Mostly, Sandro decided, it was the house-hunting. They had both, separately and in silence, lain there as the light crept in around the shutters. Enjoying the tiny breath of dawn cool in the air, seeing with new eyes the familiar lines of the room they’d woken up in together for thirty-five years and wondering whether they really could say goodbye to it.
Yes, was the answer.
‘It’s down to money, you know,’ Sandro said. ‘That’s all. Down to how much we can get for this place, how much there is in the bank, how much we can borrow.’
There was a pause while they considered what a bank manager might say to a modestly employed couple of sixty-something, thinking of taking out a mortgage.
‘I’ll make enquiries,’ said Sandro.
He tried not to listen to the happy, whispering voices that started up in his head, telling him how good it would be to begin again in a quiet street with a view of a green hillside, how good it would be for Luisa, give her something to think about. Boost her immune system.
‘But it’s OK, you know, if – if it doesn’t come off,’ said Luisa, as if she knew what he was thinking. ‘This place isn’t so bad. Or somewhere else might come up, somewhere cheaper.’
He squeezed her hand and, to forestall the disappointment creeping into the conversation, Sandro sat up. ‘OK,’ said Luisa, changing the subject obligingly. ‘So what’s your plan today? This girl, yes? This Anna Niescu.’
‘Yes,’ said Sandro. He snorted. ‘Actually, maybe I could ask her fiancé for a loan. He’s supposed to be a bank manager, after all.’
‘You think he really is?’
Sandro pondered. ‘No,’ he said finally. ‘She believes it, though.’
Luisa persisted. ‘If there was no answer on his mobile, or at this apartment he’s supposed to be doing up—’ And she paused. ‘Well, why didn’t she just call him at work?’
Sandro recalled Anna’s eyes, round as saucers in response to this very question. ‘Oh, no,’ she’d said, something of reverence in her voice, and something else too. ‘I’d never call him at work, never. Oh, no, I couldn’t do that.’
‘I think he’d warned her off coming to the bank,’ he said warily.
‘Well, husbands do,’ said Luisa, getting up, tying her robe tight at her waist and setting her hands on her hips. ‘Don’t they? Not many like the idea of the wife turning up at the office unannounced.’
‘I suppose not,’ he agreed. ‘Particularly if she’s pregnant and hasn’t been introduced to anyone and isn’t even your wife yet.’
Luisa turned towards the kitchen. ‘Never an issue with us,’ she said cheerfully over her shoulder. ‘You out in a patrol car with Pietro half the time, I’d never have known how to find you if I’d wanted to.’
Reluctantly, Sandro got out of the bed, straightened the pillows and smoothed the single sheet under which they’d slept. At the window he pushed open the shutters and heard the rattle and roar of the garbage truck at the end of the street, smelled the stench from the dumpsters as they were upended into the back of it. There was early morning rubbish collection all over the city, he reminded himself; there were drunks and tourists too. A little apartment south of the river wasn’t the answer to every problem. He leaned on the windowsill. It was hot, already. Eight o’clock. But for the first time in weeks he’d slept soundly.
‘Did you?’ he asked absently. ‘Ever want to find me?’
Luisa was back beside him, leaning out, wrinkling her nose at the smell. ‘Now and again,’ she said, with a smile. ‘Mostly not. Mostly I didn’t want to know what you were up to, cleaning up car wrecks, taking dead junkies to the morgue. Getting shot at by armed robbers. Maybe I should have.’
Sandro tipped his head from side to side, considering the matter. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t think so. And I never actually did get shot, did I?’
They both knew that this was an evasion: he’d been shot
at
, during a raid on a warehouse in Prato, but they’d missed. He’d been stabbed three times – once in the arm, once in the thigh and once near a lung; he’d nearly bled to death. An HIV-positive hooker had bit him, twenty years earlier, when no one had known anything about the disease and it had taken nearly a year to have final confirmation that he was clear.
‘But one thing’s for sure,’ he said. ‘If her Josef was not the manager of the station branch of the Banca di Toscana Provinciale, he would make damn sure she never turned up there asking for him.’
‘Funny bank to choose, if he was just making it up on the spur of the moment,’ mused Luisa, head cocked as she looked at him. ‘Don’t you think? I mean, it’s such a dodo. Old-fashioned, obscure – I keep expecting it simply to vanish.’
‘That occurred to me, too,’ said Sandro thoughtfully. ‘And Pietro, for that matter.’ He shrugged. ‘Maybe he picked it at random, or maybe he has some other connection with the bank we don’t know about.’
With the departure of the garbage truck, the street was abruptly, albeit temporarily, deserted. Sandro blocked out the thought of that rusting wrought-iron balcony, on which they might both be sitting now, looking out towards the Casentino. ‘Although,’ he said, ‘the station branch is probably as far away from the Loggiata Hotel as you can get.’
Chin in her hands on the windowsill, Luisa just nodded. ‘Uh-huh,’ she said. ‘But I still think it’s strange.’ Then she straightened. ‘I’m starving,’ she announced cheerfully. ‘Let’s go and get some breakfast.’
C
HAPTER
S
IX
E
VEN IN
A
UGUST, THE
Piazza Stazione was never deserted. Nor was it much of a piazza, surmounted by the low, modernist bulk of the Fascist-era station that overlooked a patch of sparse and scrubby grass. The blackened concrete façade of an ugly 1970s hotel to one side, the shabby bus station, a busy roundabout. Not much of a piazza at all.