70

MARTIN

I’d drifted off to sleep and was woken by the sound of Zoe stumbling, grabbing the bedside lamp and pulling it down with her.

‘Shit, who left their pack here?’

I switched on the light. ‘You, I’d guess, since it’s your pack on your side of the bed. Where have you been?’

‘Ooh, Mister Control Freak. Is this what you’d be like?’ Then an attempt at a Northern accent: ‘Where you been, then?’

Gilbert, Bernhard and I had washed our pizza down with a bottle of Chianti, but Zoe had apparently drunk a good deal more. Unusual for her.

‘Well, obviously—’

She interrupted. ‘Don’t get started on “obviously”. I have to tell you something before I forget it. You’re not going to like it.’

‘It can’t wait till morning? When we’re both sober?’ Meaning when the one of us who isn’t sober is.

‘No, I’ll forget it. I’m a bit drunk.’

‘Just a bit.’

‘No. Not just a bit. Did I say that? I didn’t mean it like that. I meant I was a lot drunk. But I said “just a bit” because that’s what you say. Not just when you’re drunk.’

I could see Zoe waking me in half an hour to tell me the room was spinning.

‘Spit it out. What do you need to tell me?’

‘I still love you.’

‘But you’ve got to look after Camille, right?’

‘Shit. How did you know?’

Zoe looked seriously the worse for wear the next morning, and I went downstairs to get her a coffee. Sarah and Bernhard were having breakfast, and Sarah made a beeline for me.

‘Can I talk to you for a few minutes? Without Zoe?’

Zoe’s welcome to join in hadn’t lasted long. ‘She’s still upstairs. You guys had a big night?’

‘Some people did. Dad, I’m really, really not trying to come between you and Zoe, and I know she was drunk, but you need to know that it’s all about her and Camille.’

‘It’s okay. I know. We’ll sort it out. She’s trying incredibly hard to do the decent thing by her best friend. Hard not to admire it.’

‘Dad, I’m trying to say…Camille wants you and Zoe to be together. Zoe’s pushing this thing, not her.’

Was it because her daughters didn’t need her? And she needed to be needed? Whatever the deep, underlying ‘something’ that was driving Zoe, she seemed to be set on a future as Camille’s carer, whether Camille wanted it or not.

It wasn’t that I wanted her to abandon her best friend forever, the bloody soulmate that she heard from when it suited her, but I did want us to make our plans together, not for her to go off on some path without talking to me first. Especially two days after I’d offered to marry her. The least I could ask for was a joint effort at finding a way through.

Sometimes it’s best to be direct. I told her, in pretty much those words, and from her reaction I concluded that we would be making our own ways to today’s destination of Ponte d’Arbia.

•

I hadn’t given up: I wondered how much longer I’d be saying that. I expected we would both have walked off the morning’s altercation by the day’s end, but in the meantime, I was going to push it a bit harder with Gilbert and at least establish how he saw the situation.

He raised it before I did, as soon as he joined me for breakfast. Zoe had already departed with Camille: I hoped they’d packed plenty of water and headache tablets.

‘I had to phone Camille’s physician this morning,’ he said. ‘To ask about the effects of alcohol poisoning on multiple sclerosis.’

‘Shit. Is she okay?’

‘The physician thinks there will be no change to the progress of the disease. You should be pleased with your daughter. She woke up Bernhard, and they aided her and Zoe to return to the hotel. Camille was extremely…floppy.’

‘Has she talked about Zoe caring for her?’

‘I think it is only to deflect me. If I make the argument that she needs me to look after her, she says Zoe will do this. But I don’t think she is serious.’

That was in line with Sarah’s take. We picked up the conversation again once we’d cleared the traffic around Siena.

‘I agree you’re the better alternative,’ I said, ‘but they’ve been friends forever…bonded…’

Gilbert walked for a while. ‘It was only at the last minute that Camille asked me to contact Zoe. Don’t misunderstand: once she decided she wanted Zoe to come, she was insistent. I made the email less…clear, so Zoe would not feel pressured.’

Another long break. Gilbert seemed to be looking for words.

‘Shall we speak French?’ I asked.

‘Thank you, but language is not the problem. Camille likes you very much, but she is disappointed that Zoe brought you. She wanted a more…I know Zoe is not religious but…Camille did not think this through.’

‘Sorry, I’m a bit lost.’

‘You are not religious?’

I shook my head. ‘I’m nominally Church of England, which is to say, not really. Zoe was brought up in some sort of Southern Baptist tradition—except she came from the North. Guns and Jesus and saving unborn babies. Especially the last one.’

Gilbert nodded—a grave nod. ‘You know about this road trip and what it was for?’

‘I think I do. Camille had an—’

‘Yes. You must understand that Camille is Catholic. If you were Catholic, you would see this story through different eyes. For Camille, it was a terrible sin—a crime. Can I tell you something you cannot tell Zoe?’

‘I’m planning to marry Zoe. I can’t go into a marriage with secrets.’

‘Then I will trust your judgment, but you may choose not to hurt her. When they were young, Camille saw Zoe as conservative. You have described her family’s religious views and Camille assumed she shared them. They were not close friends or Camille would have known better what to expect. She did not want help to have the termination; she wanted Zoe to help her find another way. She does not blame Zoe…directly. I’m sure she was not clear about what she wanted. But imagine you and I had killed a man, and nobody else knew. We would have a bond…’

‘Thelma and Louise.’

‘Who?’

‘It’s a film. They kill a man, as you said. But something here doesn’t make sense to me. If Zoe gave her the wrong kind of help the first time, why ask again?’ I answered my own question with a shot in the dark. ‘To give her a chance to make amends?’

‘Exactly. Penance. She wanted Zoe to come with her so they could be forgiven—together—for their mutual sin.’

‘No wonder she hasn’t told her. Zoe doesn’t see it as a sin. She thinks she did a great thing…’

‘That’s why I suggest you do not tell her.’

We could see Camille and Zoe ahead, Camille limping again. Soulmates, or partners in crime?

‘The two women,’ said Gilbert. ‘Did they find redemption?’

‘Thelma and Louise? I suppose you could say that.’