The Incident at Montebello (40 page)

Nonna Angelina's eyes narrowed. “He'll take off and she'll go with him. It's all part of their plan, I bet.”

Deep in misery, he sighed. “I should let her go.”

“You're better off without her.”

“Do you think so, mamma?” he said, but she was distracted by Marcella who carried a tray of coffee and cookies into the room and set it on the table. To his surprise, Nonna Angelina leaned forward and patted Marcella's hand.

“You remembered the
biscotti
, eh?” she said, pointing to the cookies. When Marcella nodded, she told Donato, “Marcella makes them the way I like. Here. Try one. Aren't they the best you've ever tasted?”

He took a bite and nodded, but his eyes were fixed on Marcella, most particularly the gold cross dangling above the fertile valley separating her left and right breast.

After Nonna Angelina fell asleep, he sat with Marcella in the kitchen drinking a cup of hot milk. All the events of the day crowded into his head. He was weary, but he knew he couldn't sleep. “I'll stay with her. You can go,” he told Marcella and rubbed his aching forehead.

She hesitated. Her black eyebrows jerked up and down like spiders. “What's the matter,
signore
? Your head? I have just the cure for you.”

It was probably some ancient peasant superstition. Why the
paesani
still believed that spirits traveled at night accosting unsuspecting travelers, flat-faced goblins buried hordes of gold under the earth, and seemingly ordinary men transmuted themselves into wolves at night, shocking their unsuspecting wives. He told her, “If it has anything to do with drinking ram's blood, I want nothing to do with it.”

When Marcella laughed, her earrings jangled. “Oh no,
signore
. It's nothing like that. I'll massage your head. The pain will be gone in a few minutes.”

Suspicious, he stared at her, but then she smiled, revealing her strong, white teeth. Well, it sounded harmless enough. She lowered the blinds and the lamps until she was no more than a shadow. “The darkness is soothing,” she explained as she stood behind him and placed her cool hands against his forehead. “Shut your eyes,
signore
. And try to relax.”

Her touch was puzzling. In one minute, it was barely a whisper, but in the next, her fingers bored deeply through layers of muscle. His skin tingled.

“Soon you'll feel as good as new. A man needs to feel like a man. And when he's tired or sick, he loses his power, his
virilità
.”

He grunted, surprised at her understanding. “It makes a man feel old sometimes.”

“Not you,
signore
. You could pass for someone half your age.”

Her praise warmed him. As his muscles relaxed, his head slumped forward. A few minutes later when she turned up the lights, he sat up and blinked as if he were just awakening from a long sleep. “I do feel better,” he declared as he stood and stretched.

Her eyes swept over him, but lingered just south of his belt buckle. “A man needs to feel like a man.” She winked. “Perhaps,
signore
, I can help you in that regard, eh?”

He hesitated.

“Don't be modest,
signore
. Any woman can see you have more to offer than the other men in town. They brag in the
caffè
and in the piazza, but it's a lot of wind. You're a handsome man. The lord of the house. You should be treated that way.”

He jutted his chin towards the ceiling. “But my mother…”

She stepped closer until they were toe-to-toe. “A train couldn't wake her.”

In the back of his mind, a warning bell clanged. Did he really want to get tangled up with a maid with no husband? She was probably hoping he'd elevate her standard of living and prestige, as well as half her family's. But above all else, he wanted to hurt Lucia and he knew this was the best way to do it. And so, he nodded.

She led him to the room off the kitchen, where the bed was freshly made and the curtains were drawn. To his surprise, she took the initiative, pressing her lips against his, making him dizzy with desire. He thrust his hand forward, meeting the resistance of her breastbone. As he fumbled with her buttons, Marcella clasped his hand and brought it to her left breast. “Over here. That's better,” she murmured with a little smile.

More instructions? He couldn't avoid women who told him what to do. Thankfully, Marcella said little else as she undressed, tossing her clothes on the floor. His eyes were riveted on her breasts, certainly her best feature. They were momentous—firm and round, with nipples as large as silver dollars. He stared at them as he pulled off his shirt and pants and lowered his naked body over hers. Burying his face between her splendid breasts, he pushed inside her and the delicious slide of skin on skin began. It had been so long since he felt such heat, such passion from a woman. He opened one eye. Perhaps she was pretending? No. He was doing this to her, making her crazy with desire. The bedsprings creaked and rattled as they moved together. He sighed, she sighed and some peace drifted between them. When they finished, she sat up and reached for her clothes. “Stay,” he said, but she shook her head. In a moment, she had slipped on her sweater and skirt and was buttoning her coat.

“
Arrivederci, signore
,” she murmured in farewell and slammed the door behind her.

When Nonna Angelina strode into the kitchen the next morning, she squinted at Donato, slumped in a chair. He had been up for hours, smoking and feeling sorry for himself.

“What are you doing here?” she cried, studying him over the rim of her glasses.

“I never left. I have no home, mamma.”

“You always have a place in my house.”

“You're good to me, mamma.”

“Of course. You're my son. My only son. My heart breaks when I see how Lucia treats you. That
puttana
. She's no better than a whore.”

A good night's sleep had restored her fire and venom, but he was floundering. Instead of feeling vindicated by his little love affair, he was paralyzed by self-pity. To rescue his pride, he should be merciless and kick Lucia out. Why should he care what happened to her and her lover Sardolini? He remembered what Mussolini said—“We stop at nothing.” In pursuit of victory, a man needed to be relentless and heartless.

Seeing that he was shivering, she handed him a bathrobe. As he thrust his arms through the sleeves, he realized that it belonged to his father. Even though the hems stopped above the knees and in the middle of his forearms, Nonno Carlo still loomed large in his memory.

Nonna Angelina worked with brisk efficiency. In a few minutes, she had the coffee boiling and eggs frying. He sighed. She remembered to cook them the way he liked, the liquid centers trembling as she set the plate in front of him. With his fork, he shattered the yolk and sopped it up with a crust of bread. As he finished chewing, he picked up his cup and said, “I still don't know what to do about Lucia.”

Nonna Angelina patted her hair, which was braided and pinned in a circle around her head. “It's simple,” she told him. “Be a man.”

“What do you mean?”

“Stand up to her. Tell her you refuse to be humiliated.”

“I'd let her go in a second just to be rid of her, but I know how you feel about marriage.”

She frowned. “For better or worse. In sickness and in health. Those are the sacred vows we make before God and family on the day we marry. And when we marry, we stay married until the day we die. But in your situation, my son, I'm making an exception. You're better off without her.”

He squeezed her hand. “You always have my best interests at heart.”

“Of course,” she murmured. “But you must promise me something.”

“Anything, mamma.”

“If she goes, she'll want to take Nietta and Charlie with her. You can't allow it. They're your children.”

“But Charlie hates me.”

“All boys hate their fathers. It's natural. But when they grow up and become husbands and fathers, they realize how wrong they were.”

He hesitated.

“Promise me,” she insisted. “I don't want her to take my grandchildren away. Now that your father's dead, I have so little. My joy is my grandchildren.”

“But you have twelve of them.”

“This isn't a joke,” she cried, seizing his sleeve. “If Lucia takes them away, we both lose and I don't want that to happen. I want you to swear on your father's grave that they'll stay here.”

“Why? Don't you trust me?”

“If you let her take my grandchildren, I'll change the will and I'll give everything to your sisters.”

He was stunned. He stared at her in shocked silence. “You'd do that?”

“I mean what I say.”

“All right, mamma,” he said at last. “I swear it. I'll do whatever you want.”

“Good,” Nonna Angelina said. “Now my soul is at peace. Kiss me.”

As he pressed his lips against her cheek, her skin felt as dry as the
sirocco
wind blowing in from the African desert.

Sardolini's thoughts were in a muddle and every bone in his body ached at the thought of leaving her. And yet he knew he had no choice. How cruel and bizarre life was—to bring them together for a blink of an eye and then tear them apart.

He shoved a blanket and extra clothes into his haversack and scrawled a note to Lucia. After signing it—“with all my heart, Elio Sardolini,” he slipped it into an envelope just as the Widow Cantù burst into the cottage on her short, bowed legs. “The
fascisti
killed Rodi,” she cried. “You're next.”

His shock was so great he just stared at her and dragged his fingers through his hair.

“You must leave. Right now,” she insisted. “I put together some food for you.” She thrust a sack into his hands.

“All right,” he said, willing himself to move. He handed her the envelope and the Himitsu-Bako box wrapped in brown paper. “Can you mail this package to Boston and give this letter to Lucia Buonomano?”

The widow's eyebrows twitched. “Yes, of course,” she murmured, her eyes full of questions, but there was no time to explain.

He grasped her hand. “I'll never forget you,
signora
. Thank you.”

“Save your thanks for another day,” she grumbled. “I don't want to wash your blood off my floors. Someday when Il Duce is dead, which can't be soon enough, come back to us here in Montebello. With any luck, I'll still be alive.”

“You'll outlive me,” he joked as he kissed her tough cheek, but a shiver of apprehension rattled through him. Even as he shouldered his sacks and waved goodbye, he wished he could linger over her supper table, gossiping and savoring one more delicious meal, but it was pointless to even think about it. Steeling himself, he dragged his feet towards the bushes and plunged into the thicket. As he passed behind Lucia's house, he peered over the hedges, hoping for one last glimpse of her, but no one was there except the chickens.

On his way out of town, he spotted pigs and dogs in yards and alleys, but hardly any people—except the beggar and a boy sweeping the street. Reaching the Cantù's soap factory, he ducked into a field of winter wheat, not far from where Sofia was killed. He wasn't going to make Manfredo's mistake of traveling on foot or Rodi's of being too naïve and trusting. It was vital that he get some distance between himself and Prefetto Balbi. That's where Faustino came in, but he couldn't risk contacting him before dark. Dropping to the ground, he kept one eye out for the
fascisti
, but his mind skittered back to Rodi. The boy's death left him sick with guilt. He should have never put Rodi in more danger. He should have never trusted the boy to protect himself.

As the sun sank, he swiveled his head for one last look at the town, suffused with gray shadows and a haunting silence. Above the rooftops, smoke rose from dozens of chimneys and Don Cosimo's pigeons whirred in circles, their wings flashing black and white. His throat tightened. He'd miss many good people in this godforsaken place, Lucia most of all. Until they were on the boat steaming towards America, he'd be in agony, worrying about her.