Remembrance (12 page)

“She was very angry, Brad. I was frightened for you.” She looked very young as she stood in front of him in the courtyard. “I was afraid.…” She closed her eyes briefly. “I had to run …I thought that if I disappeared it would make things simpler for you. …” Her voice trailed off and he reached out his arms again.

“Have I told you lately that I love you?” She smiled in the darkness and nodded.

“I think that was what you meant when you came here.” She looked at him pensively then and tilted her head to one side. “It is over with her, then?”

He nodded, and then smiled. “And now it can begin in earnest with us.”

“It already has begun.” She reached out her arms for him, and he stroked her hair with a gentle hand.

“I want to marry you, Serena. You know that, don't you?” But quietly she shook her head.

“No.” It was a simple word, and he looked down at her with a smile.

“Does that mean that you don't know it?”

“No.” She looked up at him again. “It means that I love you with all my heart and I will not marry you. Never.” She sounded resolute and he looked at her in dismay.

“Why in hell not?”

“Because it would be wrong. I have nothing to give you, except my heart. And you need a woman like her, of your world, of your own kind, your class, of your country, someone who knows your ways, someone who can help you if you ever do decide to go into politics one day. I will only hurt you, if that's what you want later on. The Italian war bride…the maid.…” Pattie's words still rang in her ears. “The Italian whore … others will call me mat too.”

“The hell they will. Serena, aren't you forgetting who you are?”

“Not at all. You're remembering what I was. I am not that anymore. You heard what Pattie said.”

“Stop that!” He took her by both shoulders and shook her gently. “You're my principessa.”

“No.” Her eyes never wavered from his. “I'm your upstairs maid.”

He pulled her into his arms then, wondering how he could convince her, what he could say. “I love you, Serena. I respect everything that you are. I'm proud of you, dammit. Won't you let me make my own decisions about what's right for me?”

“No.” She smiled up at him with a look of sorrow mingled with love.

“You don't know what you're doing. So I won't let you do it.”

“Do you think we could argue about it later?” He looked down at her with a grin, sure that eventually he would convince her, but he had suddenly realized that he had been driving for hours and he was exhausted. “Is there anywhere for us to stay? Or have you decided not to sleep with me anymore either?”

“The answer is no to both questions.” She grinned at him sheeplishly. “There's nowhere for miles. I was going to sleep in Üre barn.”

“Did you have anything to eat today?” He looked at her worriedly and she shook her head.

“Not really. I brought some cheese and some salami, but I finished it this morning. I was going to walk into town tomorrow and go to the market. But I was awfully hungry tonight.”

“Come on.” He put an arm around her shoulders and walked her slowly back to the car. He pulled open the door, helped her up into the seat, and pulled out the knapsack in which he had put half a dozen sandwiches as a last-minute thought before he left. There were also apples and a piece of cake, and a bar of chocolate.

“What? No silk stockings?” She grinned at him over the sandwich she was devouring.

“You only get those if you marry me.”

“Oh.” She shrugged, leaning back against the seat. “Then I guess I don't get any silk stockings. Only chocolate.”

“Christ, you're stubborn.”

“Yes.” She nodded proudly and he grinned.

They slept in the jeep that night, their arms cast easily over each other, their legs cramped, but their hearts light. He had found her, all was well, and before she fell asleep, she had agreed to come home to Rome with him. And when the sun came up, they each ate an apple, washed at the well, and she showed him the farm she had loved as a child, when life had been so very different. And as he kissed her in front of the old barn, he promised himself that whatever it took, he would convince her and one day she would be his for good.

11

When Serena returned to Rome the next day, Marcella was already sleeping. She left her suitcase in the little hall to let her know she was back, and then tiptoed upstairs with B.J. to the familiar bed. They made love as they hadn't dared to on the road, and Serena rejoiced to be back in his arms again. The pictures of Pattie were gone for good, and she felt free and happy to be alive. The next morning Marcella gave her hell for running away, and berated her at the top of her lungs for almost two hours, threatening to box her ears, shouting, insulting, and then finally bursting into tears as she clung to Serena and begged her never to go away again.

“I won't. I promise you, Celia. I'll be here forever.”

“Not forever.” She looked at Serena cryptically. “But for as long as you should be here.”

“I should be here forever,” Serena said calmly. “At least in Rome, this is my home.” She had long since abandoned all thought of returning to the States.

“Maybe not for always.” Marcella looked at her again.

“I don't know what you're talking about, and I don't think I want to hear it.” Serena turned away to make a pot of coffee. She knew exactly what Marcella meant.

“He loves you, Serena.” The voice was old and wise, and Serena wheeled to face her.

“I love him too. Enough not to destroy his life. He broke off his engagement with that American girl. He seems to think he had good reason to do it, and maybe he was right. But I will never marry him, Celia. Never. It would be wrong. And it would ruin his life. His family is very important to him, and they would hate me. They wouldn't understand anything about me. So, no matter what he tells you, or what you think, the answer is never, Marcella. I've told it to him, and I'm telling it to you. I want you to understand that. You have to accept it, just as I do, and I have accepted it, so I think you can too.”

“You're crazy, Serena. His parents would be lucky to have you.”

“I'm sure they wouldn't think so.” She could still hear Pattie's words. She handed Marcella her coffee and went back to her own little cubicle to unpack.

After that, life was peaceful all the way through November. She and Brad were happier than they had ever been, Marcella settled down, and it was as though nothing could ever go wrong with the world. She and Brad shared a private Thanksgiving dinner. He taught her how to make a turkey and stuff it. He had commandeered some chestnuts, and some desperately rare cranberry jelly, and Marcella made sweet potatoes and peas and creamed onions for them, and together they had a rare feast. It was Serena's first Thanksgiving dinner.

“To the first of many.” He toasted her happily with a glass of white wine with their dinner, while secretly she knew that this would be her last. Within the year he would surely be transferred home, and moments like this would not come again. Now and then she thought of that time and wished that she would become pregnant, but Brad was determinedly careful that nothing like that would happen, so Serena knew that when B.J. left Rome, that would be the end of it. There would be no Brad, no baby to remember him by, only memories like this one to keep her warm.

“What were you thinking about just then?” he asked her as they lay in front of the fire and he watched the brilliant emerald eyes.

“You.”

“What about me?”

“That I love you.” … And I'll miss you unbearably when you're gone.… She never said it, but the thoughts were always there.

“If you really loved me,” he began to tease and wheedle and she grinned, “you'd marry me.” It was a game they often played, but he knew he had months to convince her, at least he thought so, until the next day.

He sat at his desk, the envelope on the floor, staring at his orders, and fighting back a strong desire to cry. The idyll in Rome was over. He was being transferred. In seven days.

“You can't be.” Her face had gone pale, just as his had when he read it. “So quickly? I thought they always gave a month's notice.”

“Not always. Not this time. I leave for Paris a week from today.” At least it was only Paris. He could come back to see her. She could come to see him. But it wasn't all that easy, and they wouldn't have the normal routine of their life anymore, their nights in the big canopied bed, the early mornings together, the constant looks and glances throughout the day, and the stolen moments when he came to her quarters after lunch just for a kiss, for a word, for a hello, a joke, just to see her and feel her and hear her … they would have none of that, and as he thought of it he wondered how he would live. He looked at her frankly and asked her for the ten thousandth time. “Will you marry me and come with me?” Slowly she shook her head.

“I can't marry you and you know why.”

“Even now?”

“Even now.” She tried to smile bravely at him. “Couldn't you just take me along as your personal maid?” He looked angry as she said it and he shook his head as though to shake off what she had just said.

“That's not even funny. I'm serious, Serena. For chrissake, realize what's happening. It's all over for us. I'm leaving. I'm going to Paris a week from today, and God knows where after that, probably back to the States. And I can't take you with me unless we're married. Will you please come to your senses and marry me so we don't lose the one thing we both care about?”

“I can't do it.” There was a lump in her throat the size of a fist as she said it, and that night after he fell asleep in her arms she cried for hours on her side of the bed. She had to let him go, for his sake. She knew that she had to, if she really loved him, and she did, but she knew that it would be the hardest task of her life to peel her heart from his. She steeled herself for it daily, but when the last night came, she felt such a terror in her heart at the thought of losing him that she didn't know if she could bear it. For days Marcella had been hounding her, tormenting her, pleading with her, begging, and in his own way B.J. had been doing the same, but Serena was so certain that to marry him would ruin his life that she was unwilling to listen. She knew what she had to do, and however unbearable it was, she would do it, even if she died when he left, it wouldn't matter then. She had nothing left to live for anyway. There would never be a man that she loved as she loved B.J. And knowing that on the last night made it all the more bittersweet as she held him and stroked him, and smoothed a gentle hand across his hair, wanting to engrave the moment forever in her memory, as a way of holding on to him.

“Serena?” She had thought he was sleeping, but his voice was a whisper in the canopied bed and she leaned forward to see his face.

“Yes, my love?”

“I love you so much … I will always love you … I could never love anyone else like I love you.”

“Nor I, Brad.”

“Will you write to me?” There were tears in his eyes as he asked her. He had finally accepted that he was going to leave Rome alone.

“Of course I will. Always.” Always. Forever. The promises of a lifetime, which she knew only too well would dim in time. One day he would marry and he would forget, he would want to forget then, and it would finally be over between them. But she knew that for her it would never be over. She would never forget him. “Will you write to me?” There were tears in her eyes. There always was the threat of tears this past week, for both of them.

“Of course I will. But I'd rather take you with me.”

“In your pocket perhaps, or a secret compartment, or a suitcase. …” She smiled down at him and kissed the end of his nose. “Paris is so pretty, you're going to love it.”

“You're coming to visit in two weeks, aren't you? I ought to be able to get the papers for you as soon as I get there.” She was going to spend a weekend with him in his quarters if it could be arranged, and he had made her promise that she would come often, as often as she could. And he had told her to bring Marcella. He didn't want her traveling alone on the train. But it would be impossible for both of them to leave together, she reminded him. One of them had to stay behind and work at the palazzo. He had nodded then. For Brad the past week had sped by in a fog, and by the morning of his departure he felt drained. He sat up in bed before sunrise, and looked at Serena, lying in the canopied bed, beneath a vast fan of her silky blond hair. He touched her hair and her face, and her arms and her breasts, and then gently he woke her, and they made love again, and as he held her close to him in their bed he realized that he had just made love to her for the last time in Rome. In two hours he would be leaving, and all they would have left were the occasional weekends they would share in Paris, before he would eventually be shipped back to the States. As he held her close to him she felt him swell and hunger for her again and gently she touched him, at first with her fingers, and then with her deft tongue. She had learned a great deal with Brad in their bed of love, but most of it had come from her heart, or from instinct, as she sought to bring him pleasure and to give herself to him in every possible way. And so one last time he moaned softly and ached with the pleasure of her touch, of her kiss, of their longing for each other, and he pulled himself from her mouth and entered her again. It was she who realized then what had happened, and hoped that his last gift to her would be a son.

But neither of them were thinking of anything but each other as they met for a last time in his office an hour later, and he held her and kissed her once more, as they looked out into the bleak garden and remembered how it had looked in the summer and fall. And then, gently, he turned her face toward his and kissed her for the last time.

“You'll come in two weeks?”

“I'll come.” But they both knew that it wasn't sure.

“If not, I'll fly back to Rome.” And then what? An abyss of loneliness for both of them over the years. She had condemned them to a difficult loss with her staunch principles about not being good enough for him to marry. And he couldn't help trying again. “Serena … please … will you reconsider … please … let's get married.” But she only shook her head, unable to speak at the pain of seeing him go, her face washed with tears. “Oh, God, how I love you.”

“I love you too.” It was all she could say before the orderlies came to get him, and after he left the room, she let out an almost animal moan as she steadied herself against the wall and stared out into the garden. In a few minutes he would be gone … she would have lost him forever … the thought was almost more than she could bear, and she ran breathlessly down to the garden near where she and Marcella lived. She knew he would see her there as he drove away, and that way she wouldn't have to stand with the others, and only Brad and his driver would see her face contorted in sadness. As it was, when he drove past, she saw that he was crying too, his face somber and pale at the window of the car, and his face wet with silent tears as the driver pressed relentlessly forward. And then, all she saw was a face at the rear window, until finally the car that bore him, away disappeared.

She walked slowly inside then, with a look of glazed pain, and walked straight into her room and closed the door. Marcella said nothing at all to her. It was too late for reproach. She had made her decision and now she would live by it, if it killed her. And after two days of her lying there, Marcella feared that it would. By the third day Marcella was truly frightened. Serena refused to get up, wouldn't eat, never seemed to sleep. She just lay there, crying silently and staring at the ceiling. She didn't even get out of her bed the one time that he called and the orderly came to tell Marcella. She was beginning to panic and the next day she went to the orderly herself.

“I have to call the major,” she announced firmly, trying to make it look as though it were official business, as she stood in the secretary's office in a clean apron with a freshly pressed scarf on her head.

“Major Appleby?” The secretary looked surprised. The new major wasn't due until the next morning. Maybe the old woman wanted to quit. They were all beginning to wonder if her niece would. No one had seen Serena since Major Fullerton had left.

“No. I want to call Major Fullerton in Paris. I will pay for it myself. But you must make the call and I wish to speak to him in private.”

“I'll see what I can do.” The secretary glanced at the indomitable old woman and promised that he would do his best. “I'll come and get you, if I get him on the line.” As it happened, luck was with him and he got hold of B.J. less than an hour later, sitting bleakly in his new office, wondering why Serena wouldn't take his call. He didn't have good news for her anyway. Her traveling papers for a weekend in Paris had been denied. There had been some vague hint about fraternization being frowned on, and it was deemed “wisest to leave one's indiscretions behind.” He had burned angrily when he had got word, and now he knew he had to tell her. All he could offer was to come back to Rome in a few weeks, when he could get away, but he had no idea yet as to when. He was sitting staring out into the Paris rain on the Place du Palais-Bourbon in the Seventh Arrondissement, when the call came in from his old secretary in Rome, and he gave a little start and smiled to hear a familiar voice. “I'm calling for Marcella, Major. She said it was important and private. I've just sent someone to fetch her. You'll have to hang on for a minute, if that's all right with you.”