Lucy Gordon: Rinaldo’s Inherited Bride

‘I understand all I need to,’ Gino said.

‘Gino, listen,’ Alex begged, ‘Rinaldo hasn’t taken anything that was yours. It was always going to be him. It took us both too long to realise it, but it’s as he says. There was something there between us right from the start. All the time we were quarrelling, we were falling in love as well.’

As she spoke she’d moved forward so that she was standing directly before Gino.

‘Please,’ she said softly, ‘please believe me, I’d do anything rather than hurt you.’

‘Would you? You could have warned me.’

‘But I didn’t know how you felt. You treat love as a game, and you play it so well that that’s all it seems.’

‘It started that way,’ he agreed, ‘but then I found I was really in love with you.’

‘I didn’t know,’ she said. ‘If I had-I could have told you earlier that I could never love you.’ He closed his eyes. ‘Not as you want, anyway,’ she said desperately.

He nodded. ‘Not as I want,’ he repeated softly.

‘What happened at the party-I would have prevented that if I could.’

Gino made a despairing gesture. ‘So I made a fool of myself in front of our neighbours. That’s not important.’

He looked at Rinaldo. ‘I came back here tonight to find you. I wanted to speak to you, ask your advice-there’s a laugh. And I’ll tell you another thing that’s funny. The one thing I never thought of was that I’d find her in your bed.’

‘I wish that had never happened,’ Rinaldo said gravely. ‘But Alex and I love each other, and we’re going to be married. I didn’t take her from you. The choice was hers.’

Alex hadn’t thought it possible for Gino to grow paler, but suddenly his face seemed to become grey, the grey of death.

‘Be damned to the pair of you,’ he said with soft violence, and strode out.

‘Gino-!’ Alex cried, reaching for him.

‘No,’ Rinaldo stopped her following. ‘He can’t bear the sight of either of us right now. When he calms down he’ll forgive us. But right now he needs to be alone, and we should respect that.’

Bleakly she nodded and let him lead her away. Together they climbed the stairs but at the top they paused, looking at each other. Then, as if by a signal, they went their separate ways. They couldn’t be together again tonight, not in the face of Gino’s anguished condemnation.

Alex went alone in her room and after a moment she heard Rinaldo’s door close.

It seemed strange to come down in the early morning and not find Gino there. His handsome, smiling face, his clowning and his kind heart had always been part of her pleasure in Belluna.

She did love him. Not as she loved Rinaldo, with a dark, burning passion, but with the tender affection of a sister. But he wanted so much more from her that the chasm was unbridgeable.

She went out onto the veranda, hoping against hope that she would see him. But the morning was quiet.

Then her eyes fell on the chair where he always sat. The jacket he’d worn the night before was tossed down there. Alex ran her fingers over it, thinking of him putting it on before the party, slipping the ring into the pocket, planning how he would propose to her. He’d been full of young, eager love, sure of being loved in return. And it had turned to heartbreak.

There was a clatter as something fell to the floor. It was the ring he’d tried to give her. She sat down heavily and leaned her head on her hands.

After a moment she heard Rinaldo, felt his hand on her shoulder.

‘That’s how I feel too,’ he said.

They sat together for a while, just taking comfort from each other’s presence.

‘Gino’s gone away,’ he said at last. ‘His car isn’t there, and some of his clothes are missing.’

‘But he’ll come back?’ she said quickly.

‘Of course he will. We just have to be patient. Everything will work out.’

Meeting his eyes, Alex saw that he didn’t believe it any more than she.

‘All these years,’ he sighed, ‘watching him grow up, being a second father to him, and now-dear God, what have I done to him?’

‘What have we done to him?’ Alex said.

‘He’s changed. Grown up. Last night it was like talking to an old man.’ He sighed. ‘Whatever happens now, we’ll never see the Gino we knew.’

Alex forced herself to say the words that terrified her.

‘How can I stay here if it’s going to do this to him? If I go away-’

‘No,’ he said quickly. ‘I can’t live without you. I won’t let you go.’

‘I don’t want to leave you,’ she whispered, ‘but-’

‘No buts. We have the right to our love. Besides, your leaving wouldn’t solve anything. Gino and I can’t turn time back to before you came, and even if I could do that, I wouldn’t.’ His voice deepened, became tender. ‘Never to have known you, loved you, to return to the half-life where you didn’t exist-I couldn’t do it.

‘Thank heavens!’ she said huskily. ‘I was so afraid you’d want me to go.’

‘Then you don’t know me very well. I can’t live without you now. The only reconciliation my brother and I can have is when he discovers the woman who will really be his love.’

He took her face between his hands.

‘I told him we were to be married, although I hadn’t asked you.’

‘You know you didn’t need to ask me. All I want is to stay here with you.’

‘That’s all I want too. Please God, we’ll have many years together.’

They set the date of their wedding for three weeks ahead, and chose a small village church, on the edge of the farm. Many of the guests would be the farm-hands who, more than any others, had cause to rejoice at this marriage.

Wedding presents poured in, but the only gift they wanted was news of Gino, who had not returned.

He arrived unexpectedly one day while they were both out, and they reached home to find his car standing outside while he loaded luggage onto it.

His appearance shocked them. He had actually aged. His face, once so full of smiles, looked as though it would never smile again.

‘I came for the rest of my things,’ he said. ‘But I waited for you. I couldn’t leave without saying goodbye.’

‘You’re going for good?’ Rinaldo asked. ‘But this is your home.’

He did smile then, wanly and with irony.

‘What do you suggest?’ he asked. ‘That we all three live together? You know we can’t.’

They were silenced, knowing he was right.

‘Where have you been?’ Rinaldo demanded at last.

‘I’m staying with friends while I sort myself out. I think I’ll go abroad.’

‘But you own part of this farm,’ Rinaldo reminded him.

‘I know. We’ll have to make some kind of arrangement about that.’

‘We’ve got time,’ Rinaldo argued. ‘At least stay here until the wedding-’

Gino stopped him. ‘No,’ he said with finality.

‘But you will be there?’ Alex implored.

‘I don’t know. Don’t count on me.’

‘There’s something I’ve been wanting to tell you,’ Rinaldo said heavily. ‘I never thought it would be like this, but you must know. It’s about Poppa. You’ve often asked me what happened at the hospital, when I was alone with him, and I could never tell you, because I couldn’t remember. It was as though a curtain had been drawn across it, blotting it out from me. But that night-the night you came home-’

‘Go on,’ Gino said.

‘It came back, while I was asleep. He spoke to me, and he tried to tell me about the money. He couldn’t finish the words, but he tried. He didn’t want to leave us to discover it the way we did.’

Gino nodded. ‘Thank you,’ he said at last. ‘I’m glad you told me. It seems to give him back to us somehow.’