Lucy Gordon - One Summer in Italy…

Holly seized her clothes and vanished hastily back into the bathroom. When she emerged the three of them breakfasted together. It was a cheerful meal, but Berta seemed to be working herself up to saying something. At last she found the daring to say,

‘Would you mind if I went away for a few hours? I need to do some shopping, and now Liza has you…?’ She spread her hands in a pleading gesture.

So this was the reason Berta had accepted her intrusion so easily, Holly thought, amused. She saw the chance of a little extra freedom. She hastened to declare that she and Liza would be fine together, and Berta departed, humming.

‘What are we going to do now?’ Holly asked when breakfast was over.

‘Come and meet Mamma,’ Liza said eagerly.

Carol Fallucci’s memorial had been erected in a shady corner of the grounds. The first time Holly saw it she had a feeling of something not quite right. She could not have defined it, except to say that she would have expected more restraint from the judge. There was something romantically gothic about this fountain with the marble angel, wings extended, that didn’t quite fit with the coolness she had encountered from him.

He must have been deeply in love with his wife to have erected such a monument. She tried to picture him consumed by passionate feeling, but she couldn’t do it. Nor could she imagine this self-possessed man in the abandonment of grief.

And yet it must be so. Nothing but the most terrible love and yearning could explain such an extravagant monument. And perhaps it was all the more painful for being so fiercely controlled.

Now Holly understood Liza’s reference to ‘meeting Mamma’. As with many Italian gravestones, this one carried a picture of the dead person. It showed a woman of about thirty, with fine features that were as exquisitely made-up as her hair was elegantly arranged. She looked exactly the kind of wife that a judge ought to have: sophisticated, assured, beautiful.

A million miles from me, Holly thought wryly. Now, she could really have worn those cocktail dresses.

To Liza this place was the nearest thing to happiness. She could come here and sit on the step, or dip her hands in the cool water, and talk about the mother she missed desperately, and who had died just before Christmas.

‘“December 21st,”’ Holly said, reading the inscription. ‘That’s the worst possible time. Not that any time would be good, but to happen then-’

She felt a small hand creep into hers and Liza nodded in silent agreement.

‘Do you have a Mamma?’ she asked after a while.

‘Not now. She died almost a year ago.’

‘Was that just before Christmas, too?’

‘It was last October, but Christmas was my first one without her.’

The silent house, the sudden unwelcome freedom for one whose life had been all duty, the aching emptiness-

‘Wasn’t there anyone else?’

‘No, just the two of us. She’d been ill for a long time.’

Holly didn’t want to talk about the long, agonising years watching her mother die by slow degrees. Words rose to her lips, all calculated to divert the conversation down another path and kill it with platitudes.

Then she saw Liza’s eyes on her. They were innocent and had a quality of kindness that seemed strange in a child. But this one knew more than any child should, and she deserved honesty.

‘The doctors couldn’t cure her,’ she said. ‘So I looked after her.’

‘Until she died?’

‘Yes, as long as she needed me.’

‘But you knew she was going to die,’ Liza said with an understanding that was too mature for her years. ‘She didn’t just vanish-suddenly, when you thought everything was all right.’

‘Was that what happened to you?’

Liza nodded.

‘We were going on holiday,’ she said in a slightly husky voice. ‘I remember Mamma packing lots of cases because she said we were going away for longer this time. It was going to be a special Christmas holiday, but we’d never been away at Christmas before.

‘It was funny because everything was different. Poppa didn’t come to see us off, and he didn’t say when he’d join us. I asked Mamma when he’d come but she didn’t know.

‘And then we were on the train, and Mamma was sort of-jumpy. When I said things, she didn’t seem to hear me. A man came and talked to us. I’d never met him before, and I didn’t like him much.

‘Suddenly there was a loud noise and the train turned over and over. Mamma put her arms about me, and I remember a terrible pain. I clung on to her because I knew she’d keep me safe, and I kept calling Poppa because if he was there he’d look after us both. I cried for him again and again but he didn’t come.

‘Then I went to sleep and when I woke up I was in hospital, and Mamma was dead. I cried and cried, but I never saw her again.’

‘You poor little thing,’ Holly murmured.

‘If I’d known-I could have said lots of things to her first. I could have told her that I loved her.’

‘But she would have known that without words.’

‘Maybe. But we had a squabble. I didn’t want to go without Poppa and I cried and said I wouldn’t go. I was nasty to her on the train. Now I can’t ever tell her that I’m sorry.’

‘Oh, piccina ,’ Holly said, struck to the heart by the burden the child was carrying. ‘None of that matters. People fight but it doesn’t mean they don’t love each other. She knew that.’

‘But I want to tell her.’

‘And you can. You can still talk to her in your heart. She knew how much you loved her, and that was more important than any argument. You didn’t need to say it, because your love for her was part of her love for you. And when it’s like that, it’s always there.’

‘Really?’

‘Really.’

Liza nodded. She seemed satisfied, as though anything her new friend said could always be trusted. Holly knew a slight qualm. This appealing child was laying too many expectations on her, and it might lead to her getting even more hurt.

‘What was your mamma like?’ Liza wanted to know.

‘She was brave. In spite of what was happening to her, she always found something to laugh about. That’s what I remember most-how she laughed.’

Something caught in her throat as the memories of that laughter came back to her, frail, growing shakier but more defiant, until at last it was gone forever. She turned her head to hide the sudden rush of tears, but Liza was too quick for her. In a moment her arms were about Holly’s neck, the comforter, not the comforted.

Holly tried to speak but the ache in her throat was too much. At last she gave up and hugged the little girl back, accepting the consolation she offered.

‘Perhaps we should go back to the house now,’ Holly said at last. ‘Aren’t you supposed to have a nap?’

‘Berta says so,’ Liza grumbled, making a face. ‘She wants me to use my wheelchair all the time, but I don’t need it.’

‘I think you need it sometimes. And if you don’t rest enough you’ll delay your recovery. And then I’ll be in trouble,’ she added lightly.

Liza scowled but got back into the wheelchair. As they headed home they saw Anna approaching them.

‘There’s a parcel for you,’ she called.

‘Already?’ Holly said. ‘I thought it would be several days.’

‘What is it?’ Liza asked eagerly.

‘My new clothes. Your father made me order some last night because all mine were left on the train.’

‘Let’s go and see them.’

Back in the house she almost dragged Holly into the tiny lift that had been installed for her, and then into her room, where Anna had laid out the parcel. The child plunged into the delightful business of unpacking, sighing over the lovely clothes.