The Italian Wife

  Roberto swung round to find a burly middle-aged policeman behind him on top of the tower. ‘Taking photographs, of course. That’s what Chairman Grassi commissions me to do.’

  ‘No one is allowed up here, the colonel’s orders.’

  The officer was beetroot red in the face, sweating and short of breath from the long climb up the tower steps. He glanced round the ten-metre-square space with its bell-house at the centre as if hoping for a chair to sit on. He removed his bicorn to cool his head but the sun slapped straight down on his bald patch, and the hat was rapidly replaced.

  ‘There’s nothing here to see,’ Roberto told him. ‘No sign of the woman. She’s left no imprint.’

  ‘That’s for Colonnello Sepe to decide, not you.’

  Roberto inclined his head. ‘Of course.’ He had no wish to cause trouble.

  ‘So clear off, fotografo.’

  ‘I’m just packing up.’

  He started to place the Leica back in his camera box but to his surprise the policeman stumbled over to the far corner and vomited. He remained bent over, his chest heaving. Roberto abandoned his camera box, strode over, and placed a hand on the uniformed shoulder.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  A grunt and a spit of sulphurous bile, then the man righted himself and wiped the back of his wrist across his mouth. His eyes looked anguished but he shook off Roberto’s hand.

  ‘I’m all right,’ he muttered. ‘It’s just that I’ve never seen a woman’s body damaged like that before. She’s no older than my own daughter and the thought of anything like that happening…’

  ‘Do they know who she is?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No identification on her? No purse or…?’

  ‘Nothing.’ The policeman shook his head weakly and propped himself against the parapet. ‘What the hell makes a person do such a thing?’

  The question hung in the air high above the steps below.

  ‘A desire to punish,’ Roberto said softly, more to himself than to the police officer. ‘To punish herself or to punish someone else.’

  ‘She’s beyond pain now.’

  Roberto felt a need to get away from this place, so he picked up his camera box, hitching its strap over his shoulder, and headed for the steps.

  ‘One thing,’ he said briskly. ‘Tell Sepe to look at her right wrist.’

  The policeman suddenly became a policeman again. ‘Why? What’s on it?’

  ‘A scar.’

  White. Shiny. The width of a flat knife blade.

  ‘A burn,’ he elaborated. ‘By the look of it, not recent.’

  The policeman snorted. ‘Women are always burning themselves on the stove.’

  Roberto shrugged and ducked into the cool silence within the tower. But as he hurried down the spiral steps, his left thumb could not keep from sweeping over the smooth shiny bar of skin inside his own right wrist.

  4

  ‘What’s that?’ Rosa asked.

  ‘It’s machinery. For the pumping station.’

  Two haycarts were rumbling down the street towards Isabella and Rosa, slowing all the traffic, but instead of hay the vehicles were carrying massive machine parts. A great long screw hung out over the rear of one cart like an iron tail.

  ‘It must be heavy,’ the girl murmured.

  ‘It is,’ Isabella assured her. ‘They come by train and are carted out to the pumping station.’

  ‘They must be strong.’

  Each cart was hauled by two well-muscled beasts and Rosa was staring at their long curved horns.

  ‘Here they use Maremmana cattle instead of draught horses,’ Isabella explained. ‘They can pull from dawn to dusk.’

  As the hefty grey animals trundled past, their chests glistening with sweat, Isabella continued to lead the way to the police station. Like the Maremmanas, she was in no hurry. She had no wish to get where she was going. The roads were busy here, the noise of cars filling the air as people ambled along the pavements, going about their business at their usual leisurely pace. The houses in this part of town were smaller and more traditional, nudged up tight against each other under terracotta roofs and intended for lowly office workers. Splashes of colour spilled from their windows. An amber rug was hanging out to air and a vibrant amethyst fuchsia trailed its tendrils from an earthenware window box.

  Rosa looked around with interest as she walked at Isabella’s side, as docile as a well-schooled dog – it made Isabella wonder about the girl’s past. It wasn’t that she lacked spirit – she could see it in the dark flashes of her watchful round eyes – but Rosa knew how to keep it curbed. Isabella glanced down at her gleaming curls and at her neat profile that had the beginnings of a patrician nose that promised to be somewhat too large for her delicate face.

  She would have to be told. Isabella knew that. She couldn’t let Rosa skip blithely into the police station with no idea why they were there. The words were prepared. I’m so sorry, Rosa, but a terrible thing has happened… Yet she could feel a resistance from Rosa, as if she sensed that something bad was about to come out of Isabella’s mouth. When the noise and smell of the carts had died away, Isabella tried again.

  ‘Rosa, there’s something that you —’

  ‘Why do you limp?’

  Isabella sighed. ‘My back is damaged.’

  ‘Why?’

  Rosa’s attention was on a group of barefoot children playing a game with pebbles in the gutter.

  ‘I was shot,’ Isabella said.

  The dark head whipped round. Now Isabella had her attention.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes, really.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘My husband and I were both shot. But he died. The week before, he’d been in the March on Rome with Mussolini and…’ Isabella shrugged. As if it meant nothing. ‘Someone wanted us dead because of that. That’s what the police said anyway.’

  Their pace slowed. The child’s feet in scuffed sandals dragged across the paving stones. She stared up, eyes bright with curiosity. ‘Who did it?’ she whispered.

  ‘I don’t know. No one was ever caught.’

  Rosa’s face turned away. ‘Oh,’ was all she said.

  ‘Your mother said something to me, Rosa. Something about my husband.’

  Isabella looked for a reaction in the girl’s face, but there was none.

  ‘Do you have any idea how your mother knew about my husband?’ She asked the question gently, aware that she shouldn’t be asking. Not now. But she needed to know, so still she asked it. ‘How did she know who I am?’

  The girl abruptly stopped walking, her thin blue dress clinging to her legs in the breeze, and stared directly into Isabella’s eyes. ‘I never know what thoughts are in Mamma’s head. She tells me nothing.’ She gave a sharp single shake of her head to underline the word. ‘Nothing,’ she repeated. ‘So I don’t know.’

  A rush of guilt brought a flush to Isabella’s cheeks. How could she be having this conversation with the girl just before she told her that her mother was dead?

  ‘Rosa.’ She wrapped an arm around the small bony shoulders. The girl stiffened but didn’t pull away. ‘Take no notice of me, Rosa. I’m not used to talking with children, so I’m no good at it. I say the wrong things.’

  Rosa dipped her chin to her chest. The slender pale triangle of the nape of her neck looked vulnerable in the glare of the sun.

  ‘Yes,’ she said solemnly. ‘You do.’

  ‘We’re going to the police station now.’ Isabella took Rosa’s hand and started pushing herself along faster. ‘It’s about your mother.’

  Rosa’s small fingers tightened. ‘Don’t say it,’ she whispered in a voice so soft it was whisked away immediately on the wind. She tipped her head back and gazed up at the carved triangular pediment above the meeting hall that they were passing. ‘Tell me more about the architecture instead.’

  Isabella understood. The desire to stave off the bad news that was rolling like thunderclouds towards them. She fel
t the same herself.

  ‘See those,’ she said, pointing at the façade of the building. ‘They are fluted pilasters copied from the designs of Ancient Rome. But see how Frezzotti has combined them cleverly with soaring straight lines in the verticals and abrupt angles to create a building that is modern and exciting. We are creating a city that all Italy can be proud of.’

  Rosa smiled and looked up, eager for more.

  Isabella was not used to policemen. Or nuns. Or even priests, for that matter. In the airless interview room in the police station, she could see that the blackness of their robes and dark uniforms was crushing Rosa.

  Isabella refused to give up her seat next to the girl at the table, despite the fact that Colonnello Sepe clearly wanted her out of the room. The nun was Sister Consolata and she took Rosa’s face between her two large hands and beamed God-given comfort into her young soul with a warmth and conviction that Isabella envied. Rosa didn’t cry when she was told the truth about her mother. She sat there with lips white as bone, her hands gripping the edge of the table and her shoulders hunched forward as if she’d been punched in the middle of her chest. She said nothing. Not a word. Just a faint rush of air escaped from her lips. Isabella wished the girl would cry.

  They had entered the police station and found a waiting-committee of priest, nun and policemen ready. The priest informed Isabella in a low rumble that her father had telephoned them all before hurrying to the suicide scene himself. She thanked him and held tight to Rosa’s hand, overtaken by an urge to turn around and drag the girl out of there, to flee from the accusations and complications that she could sense hovered in the air, thick as the cigarette smoke.

  They were marched down a polished corridor flanked by dark office doors. Isabella could hear the chatter of typewriters behind them and she glanced to her left when she saw that one of the doors stood open, revealing the figures of two men inside. Part of her hoped that one might be her father, though what he could do to help, she had no idea, but she knew his presence would steady her.

  ‘Did you find out anything? Was she pushed?’

  The words came to Isabella clearly from inside the room, though they were not spoken loudly, and she recognised the voice of Signor Grassi, the Party chairman.

  ‘No.’ The answer was firm. ‘There was no sign of anyone else up there with her.’

  The tall figure who replied had his back to her and as she passed she caught the impression that he was a younger man with a pair of strong shoulders and a restlessness that made her think he did not want to be in that room.

  Was she pushed?

  Isabella looked quickly down at Rosa. Had she heard? Had her fingers tightened? The small face gave no sign but stared straight ahead with eyes that were flat and dull. The policeman opened a door at the end of the corridor. The interview room was painted a soulless beige and contained nothing but a metal table in the centre and a row of chairs. It felt crowded with all five of them in it and smelled of bad drains – a problem that the new drainage pumps were fighting hard to rectify. A raw young police officer marched them into it, and it was plain to see that despite his crisp uniform and the gun holstered on his hip, he was ill at ease when confronted by an orphaned child and the might of God in a cassock and a wimple. Like the coward he was, he went for the easiest target.

  ‘You,’ he snapped at Isabella. ‘Who are you? What are you doing here?’

  ‘My name is Isabella Berotti. I am a friend of Rosa’s.’

  That silenced him. Even he realised that the child needed every friend she could get right now. It was Sister Consolata who did most of the talking at this stage and Isabella hoped that her sweet musical voice was bringing comfort to Rosa. The middle-aged nun, her grey eyes cradled in soft folds of freckled flesh, spoke to the girl with a gentle kindness from within the tight jaws of her white linen wimple and her stiff white headdress.

  ‘Sorrow,’ she crooned to Rosa, ‘is a heavy burden for one so young to carry, but our dear Lord is with you, He is our refuge and our strength at all times, my dear. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. He gives us that promise, Rosa.’

  But Rosa said nothing. Her small figure sat silent on the hard chair, her head bowed, her eyes down, cutting them all out of her world. Only her shoulders twitched now and again, a ghost walking cold fingers over her skin. Isabella longed to wrap an arm around her but knew instinctively that the girl wouldn’t welcome it, not here, not in front of these people. The priest stood in matching silence, a tall imposing silhouette in flowing robes in front of the window where the light seemed to stream through him. The abrupt arrival of the carabinieri chief of police, Colonnello Sepe, in the interview room altered the atmosphere. It became suddenly more threatening. He took the seat opposite her.

  ‘What’s your full name, Rosa?’ he demanded. ‘What are you doing here in Bellina? Why did your mother go up our tower?’

  The child’s lips didn’t move.

  ‘She’s badly shocked, Colonnello. It’s too soon to be questioning her like this.’

  ‘That decision is not yours to make, Signora Berotti.’

  The police colonel was a man whose voice was as sharp as his features and whose dark hair, glistening with brilliantine, was cropped into a Julius Caesar style as though to remind people where the power lay. To Isabella’s surprise it was the priest who stepped forward in her support and she noticed that an odour hung around his cassock, the smell of mothballs and incense. His eyes were the exact colour of the ancient Bible clutched in his hand. His high forehead was deeply lined although he wasn’t old, as if the battle for souls had left its mark on his face.

  ‘She’s right,’ he said. ‘Let the girl go with Sister Consolata. You can speak to her tomorrow.’

  ‘I brought her to you, Colonnello,’ Isabella added, ‘because she needs help, not for her to be treated like a —’

  ‘Silence!’ Sepe snapped. ‘We have to ascertain whether this is the child of the dead woman. I need names. Rosa,’ he leaned across the table, his hand slicing through the air between them as if to cut through to the truth, ‘what is your full name and what is your mother’s name?’

  Even Isabella, who knew nothing at all about children, could have told him he wasn’t going to get far with a child using that tone of voice. All it did was make Rosa curl tighter into herself. Her head dropped further down on her chest, her dark hair hiding her face from his inspection and thwarting his intent to intimidate her.

  ‘We need the truth, girl,’ he told her. ‘Your mother has committed a crime against God. As well as a crime against our town and a crime against Fascism itself. Her blood has tainted us. It defiles the steps of a glorious building that stands as an example to other towns and cities throughout the world. Italy is proud of this town. How dare your mother come here to —’

  ‘Maybe, Colonnello,’ Isabella interrupted, ‘if you tried being kind to young Rosa you would learn more. Offer her something that she needs right now, instead of insults.’

  The police colonel’s glance slid across to Isabella. A tense silence spread itself through the room.

  ‘Such as?’ he asked coldly.

  Rosa’s head jerked up and her eyes fixed on Colonnello Sepe with an unblinking stare. ‘I want to see Mamma.’

  ‘Madonna mia! ’ The words burst from Sister Consolata. ‘But she’s dead.’

  ‘I want to see her. Please. Let me see my mamma.’

  ‘Rosa,’ Isabella murmured, ‘are you sure? It will not be pleasant.’

  But Colonnello Sepe had already pushed back his seat and was up on his feet. The faintest of smiles tugged at one corner of his mouth and Isabella wanted to knock it off his face.

  ‘Request granted,’ he announced and headed for the door.

  Rosa jumped to her feet and was at his heels before he had crossed the room. Father Benedict strode forward and carved the sign of the cross into the air behind her.

  It didn’t take long, but for Isabella every minute was a minute
too long. She was not good at disguising her emotions. The hospital morgue lay in a windowless chamber in which harsh lights picked out the details of the female form stretched out on a metal slab. Fingers at strange angles, the gleam of black hair muted by dried blood, a broken body hidden beneath a coarse brown rubberised sheet. In the foul-smelling silence they approached it warily, alert for the slightest movement.

  Isabella tried not to look at the face but it was impossible. It drew all eyes, a brutal mask of blood and bone. Someone had mercifully closed the dead woman’s eyes, so there was no doll’s empty gaze this time, but her forehead curved the wrong way like a saucer of blood and the raw ends of cheekbones and jawbone protruded through the blackened skin. Isabella took Rosa’s hand firmly in hers.