In the early morning after that unsettled night it seemed to me that the only story I was being offered was the story of the summer that was slipping by. The circumstances were those that followed a tragedy, the people were those who had crowded my night, the places you can guess. Ceaseless Tears was a working title only, and that morning I abandoned it. All I had dreamed was the chaos from which order was to be drawn, one way or another. Everything in storytelling, romantic or otherwise, is hit and miss, and the fact that reality was involved didn’t appear to make much difference.
I prayed, and then I finished my cigarette and soon afterwards rose. I walked about my house in the cool of the morning, relishing its tranquillity and the almost eerie feeling that possessed me: inspiration, or whatever you care to call it, had never before struck me in so strange a manner. I poured myself some tonic water and added just a trace of the other to pep it up. It seemed like obtuseness that I hadn’t realized the girl in the white dress was Aimée.
7
Aimée was calm when she awoke, but during the days that followed there were further setbacks, though thankfully none was as alarming as the first one. Her uncle’s departure from America was again delayed to allow her further time to make a recovery. But even so Dr Innocenti was optimistic.
We ourselves – the General, Otmar and I – were naturally apprehensive and each day that ended without incident seemed like a victory of a kind. And for me there was another small source of pleasure, a bolt from the blue as agreeable as any I have experienced. As I recall it now I am reminded, by way of introduction, that overheard conversations do not always throw up welcome truths. ‘Pass on, my dear, for you’ll hear no good,’ Lady Daysmith advises in Precious September, but of course it is not always so. Pausing by the door of the salotto one evening, I overheard Otmar and the General tentatively conversing.
‘Yes, she has mentioned that,’ the old man was saying, and this was when I paused, for I sensed it was I who was referred to, and who can resist a moment’s listening in such circumstances?
‘I would take the chance,’ Otmar said, ‘to pay my debt to her.’
His wife had been quite expert, the old man said next, especially where the cultivation of fritillaries was concerned. Otmar didn’t understand the term; an explanation followed, the plant described. The name came from the Latin: fritillus meant a dice-box. ‘She was always interested in a horticultural derivation. She read Dr Linnaeus.’
Otmar professing ignorance again, there came an explanation. I heard that this Linnaeus, a Swedish person apparently – Linné as he’d been born – had sorted out a whole array of flowers and plants, giving them names or finding Latin roots for existing names, orderliness and Latin being his forte.
‘She wants a garden,’ Otmar said, not interrupting but by the sound of it repeating what he had said already, in an effort to bring the conversation down to earth.
‘Then we must make her one.’
How could they make me a garden? One was too old, the other had but a single arm left! Yet how sweet it was to hear them! As I stood there I felt a throb of warmth within my body, as though a man had said when I was still a girl: ‘I love you…’
‘He’s not the sort of person,’ the old man was observing when next I paid attention. ‘He’s not the sort to be a help or even be much interested.’
I guessed they spoke of Quinty, and certainly what was deduced was true.
‘A machine is there?’ Otmar asked then. ‘An implement to break the earth?’
‘There’s a thing in England called a Merry Tiller. A motorized plough.’
I imagine Otmar nodded. The General said:
‘Heaven knows what grows best in such dry conditions. Precious little, probably. We’d have to read all that up.’
‘I do not know seeds.’
Fuchsias grew in the garden of his parents, Otmar went on. He was not good about the names of plants, but he remembered fuchsias in pots – double headed, scarlet and cream. The geranium family should do well, the General said, and brooms. To my delight he mentioned azaleas. Shade would be important, and would somehow have to be supplied. The azaleas would have to be grown in urns, and moved inside in winter.
‘With one arm,’ Otmar reminded him, ‘I could not dig.’ ‘It is remarkable what can be done, you know. Once you settle to it.’
I moved away because I heard them get to their feet. A few minutes later I saw them at the back of my house, gesturing to one another beside the ruined out-buildings. Their voices drifted to where I watched from; the old man pointed. Here there’d be a flight of steps, leading to a lower level, here four flowerbeds formally in a semi-circle, here a marble figure perhaps. A few days later, when they revealed their secret to me, they showed me the plans they had drawn on several sheets of paper in the meantime. The General promised a herb bed, with thyme and basil and tarragon and rosemary. There would be solitary yew trees or local pines, whichever were advised. They’d try for box hedges and cotoneaster and oleander. There’d be a smoke tree and a handkerchief tree, and roses and peach trees, whatever they could induce to thrive.
‘When I’m grown up I’d like to tell stories too.’
Aimée had Flight to Enchantment in her hand. She had asked me and I had related its contents, while effortlessly she listened.
‘I like being here in the hills,’ she said.
8
On 14 July Thomas Riversmith arrived. Telephoning a few evenings before, he insisted that he did not wish to be met; that he wished to cause the minimum of inconvenience. So he took a taxi from Pisa, which is an extremely long journey, and then there was difficulty finding my house. From an upstairs window I watched him paying his driver in one-hundred-thousand-lire notes. He had black Mandarina Duck bags. I went downstairs, to welcome him in the inner hall.
He was a tall, thickset man, rather heavy about the face, not at all like the young woman on the train. His eyes, between beetle-black brows, were opaque – green or blue, it wasn’t apparent which; his crinkly hair was greyish. Mr Riversmith was indeed as serious and as solemn as he had seemed on the telephone: the surprise was that, in his way, he was a handsome man. He wore a dark suit, which had become creased on his air flight and creased again due to his sitting in a hired car for so long. His wife would have bought him the Mandarina luggage; it didn’t match the rest of him in any way whatsoever.
‘I’m Mrs Delahunty.’
He nodded, not saying who he was because no doubt he assumed that no one else was expected just then. He stood there, not seeming interested in anything, waiting for me to say something else. It was a little after six in the evening; the cocktail hour, as the Americans call it. A certain weariness about his features intimated that Mr Riversmith could do with a drink.
‘Drink?’ he repeated when I suggested this. He shook his head. He had better wash, he said. He had a way of looking at you intently when he spoke, while giving the impression that he didn’t see you. Beneath the scrutiny I felt foolish, the way you do with some people.
‘Quinty’ll take you up, Mr Riversmith.’
‘After that I should see my niece.’
‘Of course. Simply when you’re ready, Mr Riversmith, please join us in the salotto.’
He followed Quinty upstairs. I made my way to my private room. Earlier in the day an accumulation of fan mail had come, forwarded from the publisher’s offices in London. After that brief encounter with Mr Riversmith I found it something of an antidote. People endeavour to explain how much a story means to them, or how they identify. I quite felt I was Rosalind. Years ago, of course. I’m in my eighties now. Occasionally a small gift is enclosed, a papier mâché puzzle from Japan, a pressed flower, inexpensive jewellery. Was Lucinda really furious or just pretending? Will Mark forgive her, utterly and completely? Oh, I do so hope he can! Little adhesive labels come, for autographs. I have all your stories, but dare not trust them to the post. Return postage enclosed. I do my best to reply, aptly, but sometimes become exhausted, faced
with so much. What a lovely birthday party Ms Penny Court had! It reminded me so much of my own when I was twenty-one and Dad made a key out of plaster of Paris and silver paint! I’m forty now, with kiddies of my own and Alec (husband) is no longer here so I do my best on my own. I always think of her as Ms Penny Court, I don’t know why. I envy her her independence. Dad and I were close, that’s why he made the key for my twenty-first, you remember things like that. I’m fond of the kiddies of course, it goes without saying, and they wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t married Alec. He went off two years ago, a woman security officer. Often the letters go on for many pages, the ink changing colour more than once, the writing-paper acquiring stains. When gifts of food are sent I am naturally touched, but I throw the food away, having been warned that this is advisable.
Dear Ron, I wrote on the evening of Thomas Riversmith’s arrival, addressing my correspondent so familiarly because I’d been supplied with that name only. Thank you for your nice letter. I am glad you enjoyed ‘More than the Brave.’ It is interesting what you say about Annabella and Roger being acquainted in a previous life. I quite accept this may be so, and I am interested in what you tell me about your pets. I do not believe your wife would be in the least aggrieved to know you find Fred a comfort. In fact, I’m sure she’s delighted. I added another sentence about the ferret, Fred, then placed the letter in an envelope and sealed it. I never supply strangers with my address, having been warned that this is inadvisable also. And some correspondents I really do have to ignore. Correspondence with the disturbed is not a good idea.
Mr Riversmith was standing in silence in the salotto when I entered.
‘Would I mix you a drink, sir?’ Quinty offered.
‘A drink?’
‘Would you care for a refreshment after your journey, sir?’
Mr Riversmith requested an Old Fashioned, then noticed my presence and addressed me. He remarked that his niece was pretty.
‘Yes, indeed.’ But I added that Aimée was still mentally fragile. I said that Dr Innocenti would visit us in the morning. He would explain about that.
‘I greatly appreciate what Dr Innocenti has done for my niece.’ Mr Riversmith paused. ‘And I appreciate your looking after her in her convalescence, Mrs Delahunty.’
I explained about the tourists who stayed in my house when the hotels were full. It was no trouble was how I put it; we were used to visitors.
‘You’ll let me have an account?’ Mr Riversmith went on, as if anxious to deal with all the formalities at once. ‘I would wish to have that in order before we leave.’
I said that was Quinty’s department, and Quinty nodded as he handed Mr Riversmith his glass. ‘G and t would it be tonight?’ he murmured. He rolls that ‘g and t’ off his tongue in a twinkling manner, appearing to take pleasure in the sound, heaven knows why.
‘Thank you, Quinty,’ I said, and as I spoke the General entered the room.
I introduced the two men, revealing in lowered tones that the General had been only a couple of seats away from Aimée on the train. I mentioned Otmar in case Mr Riversmith had forgotten what I’d said on the telephone. Lowering my voice further, I mentioned the old man’s daughter and son-in-law, and Madeleine. In the circumstances I considered that necessary.
‘You’ve come for the child,’ the General said.
‘Yes, I have.’
There was a silence. Quinty poured the General some whisky, and noted the drinks in the little red notebook he keeps by the tray of bottles. The old man nodded, acknowledging what had been said. In order to ease a certain stickiness that had developed I asked a question to which I knew the answer. ‘You do not know Aimée well?’ I remarked to Mr Riversmith.
‘I met my niece for the first time in my life half an hour ago.’
‘What?’ The General frowned. ‘What?’ he said again.
‘I never knew either of my sister’s children.’ He appeared not to wish to say anything more, to leave the matter there. But then, unexpectedly, he added what I knew also: that there’d been a family quarrel.
‘So the child’s a stranger to you?’ the General persisted. ‘And you to her?’
‘That is so.’
His wife would have accompanied him, Mr Riversmith continued, apropos of another question the General asked, but unfortunately it had been impossible for her to get away. He referred to his wife as Francine, a name new to me. In answer to a question of my own he supplied the information that his wife was in the academic world also.
‘We should be calling you professor,’ I put in. ‘We weren’t entirely certain.’
He replied that he didn’t much use the title. Academic distinctions were unimportant, he said. The General asked him what his line of scholarship was, and Mr Riversmith replied – his tone unchanged – that the bark-ant was his subject. He spoke of this insect as if it were a creature as familiar to us as the horse or the dog.
The General shook his head. He did not know the bark-ant, he confessed. Mr Riversmith made a very slight, scarcely perceptible shrugging motion. The interdependency of bark-ant colonies in acacia trees, he stated, revealed behaviour that was similar to human beings’. It was an esoteric area of research where the layman was concerned, he admitted in the end, and changed the subject.
‘My niece will not forget the time she’s spent here.’
‘No, she’ll hardly do that,’ the General agreed.
Otmar came in, his hand grasping one of Aimée’s. I introduced him to Mr Riversmith, and I thought for a moment that he might click his heels, for Otmar’s manner can be formal on occasion. But he only bowed. Quinty, still hovering near the drinks’ tray, poured Aimée a Coca-Cola and Otmar a Stella Artois. He made the entries in the notebook and then sloped away.
‘Those are interesting pictures you drew,’ Aimée’s uncle said.
‘Which pictures?’
‘The ones on your walls.’
‘I didn’t draw them.’
‘I drew the pictures,’ Otmar said.
‘Otmar drew them,’ Aimée said.
For the first time Mr Riversmith was taken aback. I knew that Dr Innocenti would already have spoken to him on the telephone about the pictures. I watched him wondering if he’d misunderstood what he’d been told. He opened his mouth to speak, but Aimée interrupted.
‘When are you taking me away?’
‘We’ll see what Dr Innocenti says when he comes tomorrow.’
‘I’m better.’
‘Of course you are.’
‘Really better.’
Aimée, in a plain red dress that she and Signora Bardini had bought together, took up a position in the centre of the room. Otmar leaned against the pillar of an archway. The fear was still in his eyes, but it had calmed a little.
‘Feel like that long journey soon?’ Mr Riversmith was asking Aimée in the artificial voice some people put on for children. ‘Tiring, you know, being up in the air like that.’
‘You want to rest?’ She stumbled slightly over the words, and then repeated them. ‘You want to rest, Uncle?’
‘It’s just that we mustn’t hurry your uncle,’ I quietly interjected. ‘He needs a little breathing space before turning round to go all that way back again.’
The conversation became ordinary then, the General in his courteous way continuing to ask our visitor the conventional questions that such an occasion calls for: where it was he lived in the United States, if he had children of his own? You’d never have guessed from the way he kept the chat going with Mr Riversmith that the General’s courage had deserted him, that he could not bring himself to visit an empty house or even to expose himself to the talk of solicitors.
‘Virginsville,’ Mr Riversmith responded, giving the name of the town where he resided. ‘Pennsylvania.’
He supplied the name of the nearby university where he conducted his research with the creatures he’d mentioned. I was right in my surmise that no children had been born to Francine and himself.
‘Nor to
my daughter,’ the General said.
In response to further politeness, Mr Riversmith revealed that his wife had children, now grown up, by a previous marriage. I asked if he’d been married before himself, and he said he had. Then he went silent again, and the General saved the situation by telling him about the garden that was planned. In a corner Otmar and Aimée were whispering together, playing their game with torn-up pieces of paper. The General mentioned the names of various plants – moss phlox, I remember, and magnolia campbellii. He wondered if tree peonies, another favourite of his wife’s, would thrive in Umbrian soil. Trial and error he supposed it would have to be. Enthusiastically, he added that Quinty had discovered a motorized plough could be hired locally, with a man to operate it.
‘I have little knowledge of horticultural matters,’ Mr Riversmith stated.
As he spoke, for some reason I imagined 5 May in Virginsville, Pennsylvania. I imagined Mr Riversmith entering his residence, and Francine saying: ‘One of those bomb attacks in Italy.’ Easily, still, I visualize that scene. She is drinking orange juice. On the television screen there is a wrecked train. ‘How was your day?’ she asks when he has embraced her, as mechanically as he always does when he returns from his day’s research. ‘Oh, it was adequate,’ he replies. (I’m certain he chose that word.) ‘They’re colonizing quite remarkably at the moment.’ Her day has been exhausting, Francine says. She had difficulty with the hood of the Toyota, which jammed again, the way it has been doing lately. No terrorist group claimed responsibility, the television newscaster is saying.
‘Does your wife research into ants too, Mr Riversmith?’ I asked because another lull hung heavily and because, just then, I felt curious.
Before he replied he drew his lips together – stifling a sigh, it might have been, or some kind of nervous twitch. ‘My wife shares my discipline,’ he managed eventually. ‘Yes, that is so.’