three

Chaos struck the following night.

Marisa had rarely been seen at the villa over the past week, and everyone knew that Grant had finally asked her to remove herself from the property.

“This slow-drip torture has to end,” Vera said, as we were gathering empty plates for Maria Pia to take into the kitchen. Grant remained at the table, ignoring everyone, reading a newspaper while he finished a glass of brandy. Holly and the children were talking among themselves, planning a trip to the piazzetta for ice cream.

“Last week, I suggested that she go back to Naples,” I said.

“A rotten idea.”

“I know.”

“You’re full of rotten advice,” she said. “You should become a psychiatrist. Americans are mad about them, aren’t they? You could make a packet.”

“We don’t really have psychiatrists where I come from,” I said. “And I don’t want a packet of money.”

“I keep forgetting that you’re a poet.”

Suddenly Mimo lunged into the dining room, his eyes wide. He looked as though he’d just seen the ghost of Garibaldi.

“La signorina!” he said. His mouth continued to move, but without words.

“What the bloody hell?” said Grant.

The room fell still. We all knew that he meant Marisa, and that something had happened.

Mimo motioned us to follow him, his large, dark hands clawing the air.

There was a mad race behind him, with Vera leading the flock. Holly and Nigel were just behind her, while Nicola and I trailed by half a dozen steps, rushing through the moist evening air, now tinged with woodsmoke. Grant, it seemed, was not going to run, but I caught a glimpse of him some twenty yards behind me, walking quickly, as we passed the swimming pool and turned toward the sea.

It was sundown, with the sea blood-bright as Mimo led us to the ledge I had dreamed about many times, our version of Il Salto, the leap. Before I got there I knew what it was.

“Dear God,” said Vera, clutching my arm and teetering on the edge, looking down.

Marisa’s body lay in a broken state below. Such a fall, or leap, could hardly be survived. The black swaddling of her hair, dandled by the surf, rose and fell, but she was otherwise motionless. I thought I could see blood in the water.

Grant approached us, out of breath. He looked a million years old as he peered over the ledge. “The silly girl,” he said. “There was no need.”

Holly looked once, then stepped backward. All life seemed to drain from her eyes.

“I’d say she was mad,” said Nigel. “What do you say, Pater?”

Grant, to his credit, told his son to shut up.

Nicola began to weep, and her mother comforted her, guiding her back to the Villa Clio. There was no point in standing there, gaping.

“Call Ruggiero!” Grant called to Vera, who nodded. Ruggiero was the local commandante, a regular attendee at dinner parties on the island. It was always good to have the police on your side, especially if you were an alien resident.

Grant took me by the wrist. “Let’s go down there. She might still be alive.”

I was sick inside, wasted and confused. The world spun around me, a lazy Susan of colors and sounds. The voices I heard seemed unreal, detached from their bodies. I myself felt detached: a floating consciousness that looked on this bizarre and tragic scene without understanding. Involuntarily, I followed Grant down the rocky path.

It was apparent from thirty feet away that Marisa was dead, her brains splattered on the rocks.

Mimo stood beside me, in tears, crossing himself every few minutes and muttering what must have been a prayer. Nigel was chuntering on, foolishly, about the possibility of murder.

“She didn’t strike me as the jumping type,” Nigel said. “I’ll bet someone pushed her.”

“The bloody girl dashed herself on the rocks,” Grant said, bitterly. “How very operatic of her.”

I simply stared at Rupert, disbelieving. What a fucking asshole, I thought. What a cruel, fucking bastard.