The Echoes of Love (38 page)

She watched the sweeping green meadows give way to the rocks and sea in the distance, shimmering in the softening light of the afternoon. Venetia wondered about the story of the
Janas
and how they transported dreamers to their glittering treasure that could never be touched. She thought of those dreams about Judd that still haunted her, and her feelings for Paolo, both somehow strangely out of her reach. Perhaps if she ever succeeded in putting her finger on them… perhaps then everything would turn to dust for her too, and the dream of her happiness would disappear? At that moment, she felt Paolo's hand on her knee again and looked up into the sparkling cobalt of his eyes, and her unsettled thoughts evaporated.

They rode without speaking for several minutes, enjoying the scenery and each other's proximity.

‘There it is,' Paolo said, pointing to a small town set on a rock overlooking the sea, illuminated by the last half-hour of sunlight. The sky, already streaked with long strokes of petal pink, announcing that the sun would shine tomorrow, looked almost lilac in the strange light. Sea, sky,
macchia mediterranea,
and grey and ochre rock lay calm and innocent on the edge of dusk, wrapped in bluish tint.

‘It's such a moving sight,' Venetia marvelled. ‘Quite extraordinary… so blue! At twilight the scenery is usually veiled in bright pinks and yellows.'

‘The distance and the reflection of the granite rocks give it this blue colour. It varies in intensity according to the time of day.' He paused then glanced at her. ‘I've booked us into a hotel for the night, but tomorrow we'll drive to Cagliari, where I've reserved a villa on the beach.'

Venetia smiled, excitement warming her. ‘It sounds great.' She tried to focus on the drive, and not on thoughts of Paolo's wet and glistening body wading out of the sea. They were still driving, after all. She gave him a teasing look. ‘So tell me something about Castelsardo – I'm sure you're not short of a fact or two.'

He grinned. ‘I know a little.' As the car climbed up towards the small town, he gave her an overview of its history.

‘Castelsardo is a true example of a medieval town, built around its castle and fortifications. It was founded in the twelfth century by the Genovese family of Doria, who built it in a strategically high position, as a defence from possible attacks from the sea, and it passed under the Aragonian domination during the second half of the fifteenth century. The ceremony of
Lunissanti,
which started at dawn this morning, and the end of which we are going to attend tonight, is a tradition that probably dates from the eleventh century and was introduced by the Benedictine monks from the neighbouring basilica of Tergu.'

‘You never fail to disappoint,
Signor
Barone.'

He nodded and raised an amused eyebrow. ‘
Prego
,
Signorina
Aston-Montagu.'

Something made her look in the side-view mirror once more, but there were no cars behind them as they made their way up the hill. Relaxing, she smiled at Paolo.

The road curved around the hillside and began to slope down to the promontory where the town nestled. The Ferrari started to pick up speed, hurtling round the bends.

‘Paolo,
rallenta
. You're going too fast!' Venetia glanced at him, worried.

‘I'm trying.' Paolo slammed his foot down on the brakes but the car kept flying round the twists in the road. In an attempt to keep control of the vehicle, he swung the steering wheel wildly. ‘There's something wrong with the brakes. Hold on tight, Venetia!'

There was nothing Paolo could do but try and stay with the unruly movements of the car, turning the wheel sharply this way and that. A truck loomed towards them round another corner, sounding its warning horn as it swerved to miss them. Paolo shifted down a gear and kept pumping the brakes as the car's engine made a rebellious rasping noise. They raced through a short tunnel and out the other side to where the road was straightening. Venetia gasped. Far ahead she saw another herder, this time with a flock of goats, crossing the road.

‘Paolo, we're going to hit them!'

‘No we're not.' He gritted his teeth and pushed the car down through another gear. The engine screamed as the Ferrari careened over to the opposite side of the road. Although they had slowed down slightly because the gradient was levelling off now, Paolo hit his horn repeatedly as they sped towards the goat herder, still at an alarming rate.

Venetia could hear her own cry of terror.
Oh my God, we're going to die,
she thought, her knuckles white on the dashboard, her neck glowing with perspiration.

Suddenly the goatherd looked up, and seeing them hurtling towards him and his herd, cried out something; he began beating the last of his flock with his stick, pushing them away on to the dusty verge on the other side, just before the swerving car screeched past them. Venetia didn't bother to look behind her as the vehicle roared on, now edging scrubby fields.

‘Brace yourself, I'm going to try and stop the car now,' Paolo shouted at Venetia, who closed her eyes for a moment, panic crushing her chest.

He began to pull the handbrake up slowly, straining his forearm for control and moving the steering wheel round with the other hand. The Ferrari span round one hundred and eighty degrees, carried on travelling in reverse and then span again to come to a halt sideways across the road.

There was silence in the car as both occupants breathed heavily. Venetia's heart was hammering as Paolo pulled off his seatbelt and leaned over to her.

‘Venetia, are you alright?'

‘I need to get out.'

She stumbled out of the car on to solid ground, her head and stomach churning.

‘
Cara
, are you all right? Are you hurt?' Paolo was beside her in an instant, his hands touching her head, her face, scrutinising her all over. His eyes were blazing with an almost primal, feral instinct, then he pulled her tightly towards him as if he never wanted to let her go.

‘Yes, yes, I'm fine.' She pressed her face against his chest and breathed him in. ‘Oh my God, Paolo! I can't believe that just happened.' She looked up into his face that was strained with tension, but only with the concern that she was unharmed. Paolo seemed almost unaffected by the brilliant manoeuvring that had saved their lives, though. ‘Are
you
okay?' she asked, gripping his arms tightly.

He nodded briskly, stroking her cheek. ‘Yes,
carissima
. I'm fine.'

Paolo's eyes had grown calm again, the concern for her now mixed with a steely expression of concentration as he gently broke away. He walked around the car and crouched down by the front wheels, touching something under the chassis. After rubbing his wet fingertips, he sniffed at them.

‘Brake fluid's gone.' He straightened, looking grave.

‘How?'

‘I don't know. It's pretty unusual for a car like this. Almost impossible, I'd say.'

‘So how on earth could it have happened?' The dragging sense of unease Venetia had been feeling all the way from the airport now began to take on a more alarming aspect.

Paolo saw the look on her face and stepped towards her, sweeping her into his arms.

‘I'm sorry,
cara
. You must have been terrified.'

‘Well, yes.' She pulled away and looked into his face. ‘But it seemed like you knew exactly what to do. How on earth did you manage it?'

He paused, his gaze oblique, then said: ‘I took a specialist driving course after my car accident. You never know...' He trailed off and drew her back, resting his chin on her forehead. ‘We're fine,
amore mio
, and that's the main thing. Come on. Luckily, there's a petrol station just a kilometre up ahead on the outskirts of town, where I can find out who to call to have the car towed. We'll take a taxi into town and come back for our luggage on the way. We can still make it into Castelsardo before dinner.'

Venetia gave a weak laugh. ‘Yes, at least we've made good time now!'

He grinned and turned her round in his arm. ‘You're right,
cara
. And soon I'll have you alone all evening in the comfort of our hotel room, and I'll make all this disappear. You'll forget it ever happened.' He drew her against him, kissing her brow and they started walking.

The town seemed to have been completely overtaken by crowds when they reached Castelsardo in the taxi that had picked them up from the petrol station. This event was obviously a popular one, Venetia noted, as the taxi driver endeavoured to manoeuvre the car through the clusters of people flooding the place.

They finally arrived at Rocce Sarde, a small, secluded hotel at the top of the hill with a view dominating the Tyrrhenian Sea. The vast suite Paolo had booked for the night overlooked the harbour. It had far-reaching views of the coast, with miles of sandy beach stretching in front of pinewoods, and the hills of the
macchia
rose up in successive tiers of violet that became deeper as the light of the day declined. Sailing ships floated across the sea, which had a soft opaque light, bringing out to the full the colours of the little crafts, and the rocks and buildings on the mainland.

Venetia stood on the veranda looking down at the still yet smiling water, mesmerised by the romance of the view in the evening's blue dusk. It was nearly enough to dispel the trauma of the near-accident with the car, which still lingered in her thoughts, but she gazed over the sea and leaned on the balcony, letting the evening fragrance of the sea calm her.

After he had taken delivery of their luggage, Paolo joined her there.

‘We'll walk down to the entrance of the town to meet the procession,' he suggested, putting his arm around her shoulders and squeezing her to him. ‘We'll join it and come back to the church of Santa Maria, which is not far from here, just below the medieval Doria Castle. Come, we don't want to miss it.'

It was night by the time Paolo and Venetia left the hotel and finally joined the masses on the pavements. All lights had been extinguished and the town of Castelsardo with its narrow streets, alleys and squares lay shrouded in inky darkness except for the silvery light of a brilliant full moon.

They took their position outside a bar at the corner of a twisting narrow street, in the dense crush of people herded in the roads waiting for the procession. Between houses, the crowd completely filled the canyon; every window, every balcony that promised a view was taken, and even the rooftops offering a point of vantage were turned into grandstands. Sardinians were clad in all their finery, the women somewhat austerely dressed for the most part in black, and coiffed with black or white lace
mantillas
, a tradition left behind by the Spanish, who had occupied Sardinia for four hundred years.

Groups of men and women were wandering in and out of
caffetterias
. Some were chatting and fanning themselves, pausing for gossip between their prayers, or mouthing them as they fingered their rosaries; others sat astride the wooden barriers separating the pavement from the road, their arms crossed, engaging in banter with the other spectators. Blending in with the crowd, Venetia was aware of the happy reverence and the good humour of these people and she felt in touch with it.

As they waited for the pilgrims, she turned to Paolo.

‘Being here makes me realise how Venetian I've become. Everything is so different in Sardinia. I've seen all kinds of religious ceremonies and cultural processions in Italy and other countries before, but tell me more about the
Lunissanti
.'

Paolo stood close to her, leaning against one of the barriers. ‘It all begins before dawn with a mass in the church of Santa Maria, where the wooden cross of the black Jesus is kept, and where members of the
Confraternita di Santa Croce
– the Oratory of the Confraternity of the Holy Cross – meet. From there, a long procession unfolds. Two brotherhoods have the main roles. The
Apostoli
, who follow each other carrying the offerings, which are different objects relating to Jesus's crucifixion: the chalice, the glove, the pillar, the chain, the scale, the crown of thorns, the cross, the ladder, the hammer and tongs, the spear and the sponge. The second group, the
Cantori
,
is made up of three choirs of twelve members each, who sing the
Miserere
and other pre-Gregorian songs.'

‘Have you ever taken part in this procession?'

‘Yes, the first year I settled in Tuscany I came here for Easter. I had only just bought
Miraggio, which was in the early stages of the restoration work. I wanted to get away from everything and go somewhere isolated to take stock of my life. Taking part in the procession of
Lunissanti
did me a lot of good.'

‘In what way?' Venetia didn't wish to pry too much but she was curious for more insight into Paolo's accident and his amnesia.

He ran his hand through his hair. ‘It is a profoundly spiritual ritual. I found it cleansing somehow; I needed that. I also stayed for a couple of weeks after Easter with some monks in a monastery not far from here – I needed to find my new self.'

‘If you don't mind me asking, where did you get married and where did the accident take place?'

Venetia felt Paolo stiffen. She kicked herself for raising the matter.
The thought of the accident, even though he can't remember it, must still be painful for him
.

Paolo didn't answer immediately. His eyes skimmed over the crowds. ‘Oh, we married in Verbania, and the accident happened on the way to Pallanza,
where we were going for our honeymoon,' he said evasively, his mouth set in a line. ‘But I have no memory of all that. For me, today, that episode of my life never existed.'

‘Yes, yes, of course, how tactless of me. I'm sorry, Paolo.'