The Tuscan Child(83)

“Yes, I have the key. I will take it with us and give it to you when it is safe for you to return.”

“You are so clever, Ugo. Our beautiful boy will be safe and dry down there.”

“Yes,” he agreed. He went over to the great door. She bent beside him, and together they manhandled it across the rubble until it was in place over the opening. It fitted perfectly. They looked up at each other and exchanged a grin of conspirators.

“You go,” he said. “I will cover it with rocks and wood, and nobody will ever know it was there.”

“Yes,” she said. She came to him and kissed him, full and hard on the lips. “Until tomorrow, amore mio.”





CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE





JOANNA


June 1973

“Oh, there you are,” Paola said, looking up from the beans she had been retying. “I was beginning to get worried about you. I thought you had gone up to the town, but then Renzo came seeking you and said that you were not up there.”

“Renzo came?” I blurted out the words.

“Yes. Looking for you.” She misinterpreted my alarm. “I think you might have made a conquest there, mia cara.” She gave me a knowing little smile.

“Did he say what he wanted?”

“He didn’t. Maybe just to enjoy your company, to get to know you better.”

“Oh no. It’s not like that,” I said. “He must have wanted to arrange a time to meet me and take me to the station tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? So you will really leave so soon?”

“I think it would be wise,” I said. “If I stay longer then I fear that the inspector may still try to say that I killed Gianni. He may also try to say that you helped me. It is better for everyone that I go when I can. And Cosimo told me that his son has to drive into Florence tomorrow and will give me a ride to the train station.”

“So soon.” She came around the table and embraced me. “I will miss you, little one. You have become a second daughter. And Angelina has enjoyed your company, too. She says I am old and boring and it is good to speak to someone her age.”

“I know. I have enjoyed every minute with you, especially your cooking. And I am sorry that I will now never learn to become an Italian cook.”

“We will have a good meal tonight if it is to be your last,” she said. “A mushroom risotto, perhaps, before the aubergine Parmesan and panna cotta, definitely. You can help me to prepare them, if you like. We will start with crostini. Perhaps Signor Renzo will want to help us, too?”

“Renzo?” I asked.

“Yes, I invited him to join us for dinner, and I know that he loves to cook.”

I could tell from her face what she was thinking: she was playing matchmaker with Renzo and me. On any other occasion I might have welcomed her help, but now I knew what I did, I didn’t want any more to do with him. The chats we had, his taking me to his old house—they were probably designed to find out what I knew and what I didn’t know. He was just following instructions from Cosimo. I took this one stage further—had he also witnessed Gianni pushing the envelope into my room and now wanted to retrieve its contents or find out what it said?

I couldn’t stop him from coming, but I would have to tread very carefully this evening. I put my purse back in my room, locked the door again, and came to help Paola in the garden. Later I had a rest, locking myself in, but I slept undisturbed and awoke feeling refreshed. Heading over to the farmhouse to see if the preparations had begun for dinner, I was startled to find Renzo standing close to my door.

“Oh,” I gasped, and took an involuntary step back.

“Sorry if I startled you, Joanna,” he said. “Paola wanted me to pick more asparagus and see if any more tomatoes were ripe. I came early to help prepare the meal. She is making a real feast for you.”

“I know. She told me. She is so kind.”

“She has become fond of you,” he said. “She is sorry you have to leave so soon.”

“I am, too, but it’s better that way, isn’t it?” I said. “I would rather be far away from that inspector. He still seems to think I might be somehow involved with Gianni’s murder, which is ridiculous. I only exchanged maybe a dozen words with the man at a table full of other men.”

“Quite ridiculous,” he said. “But I, too, am sorry you are going to leave. I would like to have found out the truth about your father and my mother. And the beautiful boy. I can’t stop thinking about it. If your father was in this area long enough for my mother to have a child, how could they possibly have kept both those things secret? And would he have hidden a child where nobody else could find him, only to write to her about him months later?”

“Perhaps the child was given to a family in the hills to look after?” I suggested. “She was going to reclaim him later, but she never did.”

“Then why does nobody know about this? Surely the family would have told someone? They would have said, ‘A British airman left a baby with us. Now we have to find his mother.’ There would have been talk. Old memories would have been jogged.”

“Yes,” I said. “And yet nobody in San Salvatore seems to know anything about a British airman. And everyone believes that your mother ran off with a German.”