The Tuscan Child(27)

“Friendly natives,” I muttered. Was this what I was about to face? In which case I wasn’t likely to learn much about my father. I stood looking around me. I seemed to be on top of the world with views in all directions, but there were higher hills to the north and west covered in thick forest. No sign of any village. I sighed and set off along the road, then spotted a small side road leading up the hill between vineyards before it disappeared into the forest. The hill rose steeply and it seemed a daunting prospect. I had gone about half a kilometre when I heard the sound of an approaching engine. I stopped and did what I had done only once before: I stuck my thumb out.

A van approached, driving fast. When the driver saw me, he screeched to a halt. I ran up to him. “Are you going to San Salvatore?” I asked.

“I’d be wasting my time on this road if I wasn’t,” he said. “It doesn’t go anywhere else. Jump in.”

He was a portly middle-aged man and seemed quite safe. I got in and sat with my bag on my lap because there was nowhere else to put it. The interior of the van was crowded with various sorts of tools. He was either a plumber or a handyman of some sort. He was wearing a not-too-clean overall, and he gave me a friendly grin. “German?” he asked, noting my fair hair and height.

“English,” I said.

“Ah, English.” He gave a nod of approval. “And you speak Italian.”

“Just a little,” I replied. “I hope to learn more.”

“And why do you go to San Salvatore?” he asked. “Nothing much there. No historic buildings. No towers like San Gimignano.”

“My father was there during the war,” I said. “I wanted to see for myself.”

This made him react with surprise. “In San Salvatore? I always thought it was the Americans who liberated this part of the country. The English were over on the coast.”

“His plane crashed, I think.”

“Ah.” We drove for a while in silence. The road was now little more than a dirt track. At first it climbed through thick forest, then emerged on to a ridge lined with cypress trees. The view was spectacular. Ahead of us I could see a cluster of buildings huddled together at the top of a hill. On all sides vineyards and olive groves fell away into small valleys, only to rise again to meet woodlands. The top of the hill opposite was thick with leafy forest, and a rocky crag rose from it, topped by an old ruin. It was the sort of scene one would have expected from the Romantic painters. All it needed was a few merry peasants coming home with rakes on their shoulders.

We entered the little town and drove up a narrow street lined with old stone buildings, most of them with shutters closed against the midday sun. Down below, shops were open to the street: a butcher or delicatessen with piles of salami in the window, a shoe shop, a wine merchant with casks outside. Impossibly narrow alleys led off from that central street, some hung with laundry, others with casks of wine outside doorways. And everywhere there were bright window boxes full of geraniums. The street was made of cobblestones and we bumped over them. Then we came to a central piazza. On one side was an imposing church built of grey stone. Facing it were what seemed to be municipal buildings with crests above their doors, and on one side was a small trattoria with tables outside. At one of these tables a group of men sat in the shade of a sycamore tree with glasses of red wine and plates of bread and olives in front of them.

My driver stopped. “Behold,” he said. “This is San Salvatore. You must descend here. I go to the farmhouse just outside the village.”

I thanked him and climbed out. The van drove away and I stood looking around, conscious of the eyes of those men on me. There didn’t seem to be anyone else to ask, so I plucked up the courage to ask them if they could tell me where there was a hotel in the village.

This made them look amused.

“No hotel, Signorina. If you want a hotel, there is perhaps a pensione down in the valley at Borgo a Mazzano. Otherwise”—he spread his hands expressively—“there are good hotels in Lucca.”

I fought back tiredness and frustration. I had not really slept on the train all night. Now I was really hot and hungry. “Is there nobody who rents rooms to visitors in this town?” I asked.

They looked at each other, muttering and conferring. Then one of them said, “Paola. She fitted out that old animal barn to let to visitors, didn’t she?”

“Ah, Paola. Yes. Of course.”

They nodded to each other. Then one addressed me. “You should go to Signora Rossini. She may have a room for you.”

“Thank you,” I said, although the mention of her old animal barn did not sound too inviting. “And how do I find this Signora Rossini?”

One of the men stood up. For a moment I thought he was going to escort me, maybe offer to carry my bag, which now seemed to weigh a ton. Instead he came around to me, then pointed. “See that archway? Go through the tunnel. Then keep straight ahead, you understand. Always straight. And after the last houses of the village, it is the first place you will come to on the left.”

I thanked them again and set off with trepidation. I’ll stay tonight, I thought, and then maybe take the bus back to the valley tomorrow and stay at a proper pensione there.





CHAPTER TWELVE





JOANNA


June 1973

On the side of the piazza, a narrow alley dipped down between a greengrocer’s with a wonderful display of fruit and vegetables outside and what looked like a wine shop on the other side. Then it entered a tunnel. I hesitated, wondering if this was some kind of local joke and God knows what I’d find at the other end of that tunnel, or even if it actually led anywhere. Was it a route to a dungeon? A cellar?