The Tender Vine (Diamond of the Rockies #3)(98)

Was there something wrong with him that he cared so little for Divina’s distress? When she came to him, sobbing her news, he had felt nothing. Surely there should have been something? Maybe it was walled off in that place inside where he stood sometimes, wanting to go in, but unable to. In there was the child whose papa lay dying, whose mamma gave her life for his, whose family discarded him.

But he couldn’t go in. And what, he suspected, might make him human, stayed safely buried. His emotions stormed around it, but like the eye of a hurricane, that part remained still and untouched.

Anyone hearing his thoughts would be amazed. Flavio without feeling? Flavio, whose feelings were always evident—his love, his passion, his choler. But they were all on the outside. It had begun on the ship, when his dismay and terror made him savage and he learned what power such emotions could have on people. Had Signore Lanza once taken a belt to him? Never.

But Flavio knew he gained more through benevolence than rage. Oh, how he melted Signora Lanza. She was butter in his hands. And as soon as his body came to manhood, so were the girls. Flavio turned into the lane to the DiGratias. Yes, he would win back Carina’s love. He had been a fool to wait. He should have shown her what a husband he would be.

The gates were closed, but he opened them with a sense of authority.

He crossed the courtyard, seeing no one and expecting no one. They would be in the fields ripping out the vines, the unproductive struggling grapes that could no longer yield a productive harvest. Just so would he yank Quillan Shepard and replace him with a hearty root stock.

He knocked on the door, then entered. “Dottore?” Flavio walked toward the study where the doctor researched and read, adjoining the treatment room where he saw the patients who came to him. “Ti’Angelo, are you—”

The doctor emerged from the treatment room. His face was stern.

Flavio stopped. “Are you seeing someone, Dottore?”

Angelo DiGratia closed the door behind him. “Come with me, Flavio.” He led him to the study with its walls lined with books, the sort Flavio shuddered to read. Nothing beautiful—only facts, details, theories.

“What is it, Tio?” Flavio read his concern, his consternation.

“Is it true you struck a man yesterday with bocce balls?”

Flavio felt a flush of shame. His sons had told him? “I lost my temper. The old Chinaman . . .” He spread his hands. His excuse sounded churlish. “I was infuriated by . . . by the things that are torturing me. It had nothing to do with the Chinaman.”

“Nothing to do with him, yet he’s in my treatment room.” Angelo DiGratia indicated the door separating the rooms.

Flavio stared at the closed door. “Is he hurt badly?”

“He is old. His bones are brittle.”

Flavio shuddered. “I didn’t mean to hurt him.”

“The concussion is hard to gauge since I cannot employ him in discussion. I don’t even know if he has family to care for him. He is in and out of consciousness.”

Flavio knew better than to say it was only a Chinaman. And again, he was deeply ashamed of his outburst and violence, the sort of violence that had killed his papa. What must Angelo DiGratia think of him now?

“I’m sorry. What can I do?”

“Do, Flavio? You think you are a doctor now?” Angelo’s expression cut him. “I’m ashamed of you, to injure an old man.”

Inside Flavio quailed. To have earned the doctor’s disdain . . . “I’m ashamed of myself. But I’m so angry, Tio. It—” he spread his hands—“it’s tearing me apart. I thought nothing could be worse than when Carina left. But worse by far is her coming back with this, this—”

“I am taking care of that. I’ve spoken with Father Esser.”

“Father Esser is building a new church. What time does he have—”

“He will consider the validity of Carina’s marriage. He gave me his word to look into it immediately.”

“What if he finds it valid?” Flavio burst out with the words before he could stop them.

Angelo DiGratia looked at him with gentle concern. “We will consider that if we must. But until then I’m trusting the wisdom of the church.”

Flavio could not bring himself to do the same. Ever since he decided the healing Gesù was nothing but a myth, he’d had little concern for the church. Angelo might put his trust in black-robed fathers, but Flavio would see for himself that Carina’s marriage was ended.

He dared not even show a flicker of that thought, which he both hated and clung to. If the doctor’s concern was so deep for a worthless Chinaman, how would he consider the new plans in Flavio’s mind? Flavio trembled. He had felt brash and defiant an hour ago. Now . . .

“Flavio.” Angelo’s voice was soft, gentle. “I know you love my daughter. I watched you grow up together. You are like one of my sons.”

Flavio drank it in.

“But listen to me now.” His thin brows drew together. “You cannot be at the mercy of your temper. Your father . . .”

Flavio tensed. The doctor had never mentioned him.

“Your father was unwise in his moods. I don’t want your death on my hands.”

He didn’t say too. Flavio waited, but he didn’t acknowledge that his father’s death was already on his hands. Could the doctor have saved him? Had he tried? What judge was a frightened six-year-old? Just the same, Flavio imagined he knew the moment when Dottore DiGratia had decided either that he wouldn’t or couldn’t save his papa. He had seen a shadow pass over the man’s face, a shadow of death like a dark wing.