19

I don’t know which of the two women looked the more surprised, or indeed discomfited. The onus was on me.

“I beg your pardon, signora,” I said. “Professor Donati asked me to call, and I’m afraid I’m before my time. May I present Signorina Raspa, who was kind enough to bring me?”

The frigid smile hovered for an instant on her face and vanished. The eyes were distant, looking beyond us to Jacopo with a mute reproach. “Good afternoon, signorina,” she said.

Carla Raspa, being the less embarrassed, recovered the quicker. She advanced with a certain brash assurance, holding out her hand. “We’ve never met, signora,” she said, “but then, why should we? Although we share the university life we live in different worlds. I am a humble member of the Arts faculty, and spend most of my time conducting parties of students round the ducal palace. I hope the Rector is better?”

“Thank you,” replied Signora Butali, “he is better but still very tired. We only arrived late last night.”

“To find all Ruffano in an uproar and the sudden death of a student the climax,” said Carla Raspa. “What a homecoming! I’m very sorry for you both.”

Her plunge into the burning topic of the hour was ill-timed. Signora Butali stiffened. “The accident was tragic indeed,” she said. “I know nothing of any uproar, nor does my husband.”

Carla Raspa turned to me with a smile. “Professor and Signora Butali are lucky,” she observed. “You and I were witnesses to one riotous event at least. But perhaps they will discuss it at the meeting.” She turned again to the Rector’s lady. “The librarian, Signor Fossi, is a good friend of mine,” she explained. “He told me they were meeting at your house at a quarter to two.”

The signora bowed. Comment must have seemed to her unnecessary. An awkward silence followed. Jacopo, who had lingered by the door, now disappeared, leaving the initiative to me. I looked at my watch.

“Don’t forget,” I reminded Carla Raspa, “your neighbor needs his car.”

“It’s early yet,” she said. “I promised I’d have it back by half-past two. What a charming room!” She advanced further and looked about her, sizing up the décor and the furniture with a rapacious eye. She wandered to the portrait of my father hanging on the wall. “I suppose that’s Donati the elder?” she remarked. “Not so handsome as his son, and lacking the Professor’s devastating charm. These things must all have come from his old home. Wasn’t it the house where you live now, signora?”

She flashed a look at Signora Butali, who, resembling more than ever the gentlewoman in the ducal palace portrait, bowed yet again with Florentine hauteur.

“That is true,” she answered. “We are very fortunate in our surroundings.”

“I wonder if Professor Donati grudges it?” smiled Carla Raspa.

“He has never said so,” came the reply.

The atmosphere, chilly, threatened to become glacial. The signora, who had been first in the room and was the older of the ladies, continued to stand. But my companion ignored protocol and perched herself on the side of the settee.

“If he did, he’d put it deviously,” she said, lighting a cigarette and offering one to Signora Butali, who shook her head. “But he’d charm the house out of you in the end by magic means. He has hypnotic eyes. Don’t you agree, Armino?”

The smile she gave me was deliberate, the puff of smoke provocative. Remembering what she imagined to be the relationship between Aldo and myself, doubtless she found the present situation intriguing, even enjoyable.

“His eyes are dark,” I said. “I don’t know about hypnotic.”

“His actors find them so, both male and female,” she continued, one eye on Signora Butali. “They’re dedicated, everyone. I suppose, like the rest of us humble members of the university staff, they hope that he will take notice of each of them individually.”

There was another pause, then, turning to the Rector’s wife, she said, “You’re not taking part this year, signora—such a pity. You made a beautiful Duchess of Ruffano last Festival under Professor Donati’s superb direction.”

Acknowledgment came from the signora, but no more. I felt the expression of agreeable attention already on my features become fixed.

“The rehearsals this year have been so secret,” pursued Carla Raspa, now mistress of the scene. “Conferences behind locked doors to all hours of the night. No women taking part. Admission by ticket only to the open meetings, to which I was lucky enough to obtain two tickets from the Director himself, and took Armino. It was a revelation, I can tell you. But then you must have attended one or two of the rehearsals, surely?”

Signora Butali, assured in her own house when she played hostess, looked vulnerable under this roof that was not hers. Even her stance, her hands clasped in front of her, holding neither gloves nor bag—she must have hurried up here on an impulse to waylay my brother before he saw her husband—seemed one of evasion, even of self-defense.

“I’m afraid not,” she said, “it wasn’t possible. I’ve spent so much of my time just latterly in Rome.”

I saw her furtively consult her watch in a downward glance, easy enough because of her clasped hands, and then with mournful eyes she looked at me, the message one of entreaty. There was nothing I could do. The only hope was for Aldo to return and himself take charge. I had no authority to turn Carla Raspa out of the house, nor had Signora Butali. The interloper, conscious of her power and caring not a jot for her intrusion into what was very obviously a private visit, intercepted the signora’s glance and misinterpreted it as being hostile to me.

“Professor Donati must have been held up,” she said. “It doesn’t really matter to Armino, he can wait here for the rest of the afternoon if he feels inclined. Can’t you, Armino?”

“I’m at his disposal,” I said shortly.

“Such a pleasant corner of Ruffano this,” Carla Raspa went on, lighting yet another cigarette from the butt of the first. “No traffic, no endless parading students, no peering neighbors to gossip about who goes out or who comes in. Your house is only just down the street, signora?”

“Yes.”

“Convenient for Professor Donati when he wants to consult the Rector about anything. But of course, as you said, you’ve been so much in Rome.”

The inflection in Carla Raspa’s voice was now ironic. One allusion more to Aldo’s proximity as neighbor to No. 8, and she might overstep into the realm of direct insult. If she did, I wondered whether Signora Butali would counter with a crushing retort or offer the other cheek.

“Luckily for your music pupils you were able to return to Ruffano at the weekends,” the voice continued. “One or two of them attend my lectures, and they spoke of you most gratefully. I don’t think many of them had to miss a single lesson through your absence.”

“Signora Butali puts the interests of everybody else before her own,” I commented. “She even found a moment to play to me last week.”

The interruption did no good. Indeed, it whetted Carla Raspa’s appetite.

“The psychologists tell us that piano playing is therapeutic,” she observed, “allowing full reign to the emotions. Do you agree, signora?”

The muscles of the victim’s face tautened. “It helps one to relax,” she answered.

“It wouldn’t work for me,” sighed Carla, “though I can see the point of a duet. There’d be stimulation there. Have you tried duets, signora?”

This time the intonation was unmistakable. Had it been last Sunday night and the three of us, Aldo, Signora Butali and myself, at the dinner-table under candlelight, a remark like this would have been accepted as a challenge in the sex-play we were all engaged in. The signora would have smiled, parrying the question with another equally lighthearted. Not so today. This was a thrust, seeking to probe her weak defenses.

“No, signorina,” she replied. “I leave that sort of thing to children. My pupils study for diplomas, to equip themselves as teachers.”

Carla smiled. She was, I felt, gathering her forces for the kill. It was time for me to intervene. But before I could do so the slam of the front door signaled an arrival. There was a hurried murmur from Jacopo in the hall, an expostulation—my brother’s—then an ominous silence. Signora Butali turned pale. Carla Raspa intuitively extinguished her cigarette. The door opened and Aldo came into the room.

“I’m extremely honored,” he said, the inflection in his voice warning his visitors that he had expected none of them. “I hope Jacopo has been looking after you, or have you all already lunched?” He did not wait for a reply, but crossed the room and kissed the signora’s hand. “Signora,” he said, “I was just on my way to your house, and seeing a car here outside which I did not recognize looked in to investigate.”

“The car is mine,” announced Carla Raspa, “or rather, borrowed for the occasion. Armino lunched with me, and I dropped him here.”

“How thoughtful of you, signorina,” replied Aldo. “The hills of Ruffano must be hard on a courier’s legs.” He turned to the Rector’s wife with a manner equally detached. “What can I do for you, signora?” he asked. “The meeting called by the Rector hasn’t been canceled, has it?”

The long wait, and the conversation that succeeded it, seemed to have drained Signora Butali of energy, of resource. It occurred to me that she had been unable to reach Aldo by telephone since her arrival home, unless it had been in her husband’s presence, and that this was, in fact, their first encounter since they last saw one another on Sunday night. Her eyes searched his to convey a message. The anguish was very evident.

“No,” she said, “it has not been canceled.” She struggled bravely to find words that could not be turned by the listening Carla Raspa into food for gossip through the university. “I merely wished to consult you, Professor, on a small matter. It’s really of no importance. Some other time, perhaps.”

The lie was pitiful. Had the matter been so small she would never have waited for him so long. Aldo looked at me. He must have wondered why I had not gone discreetly, taking my companion with me, the instant I knew Signora Butali was under his roof.

“You’ll excuse us, signorina, I feel sure,” he said, looking past me to the cause of all the embarrassment. “Liqueurs, Beo, cigarettes, see to it, will you? Signora, I’m so sorry… Would you come this way?”

He gestured to the hall and the dining room beyond. Signora Butali passed through, and Aldo closed the door behind him. I went to the tray of drinks and poured Carla Raspa a liqueur which she did not deserve.

“You behaved disgracefully,” I told her. “You’ll never receive an invitation to the Butalis’ now.”

She downed her liqueur and held out the glass for more. “What did Donati call you?” she asked, her eyes curious.

“Beo,” I said, “short for Il Beato, the blessed.”

The eyes grew wider still. “How touching,” she murmured. Then motioning towards the dining room, where supposedly they had gone, she added, “Does the noble lady know?”

“Know what?” I asked.

“About you and Donati?”

The devil entered me. Things had reached such a pass that I did not care. “Oh, yes,” I said, “we’re quite open about it. But only to her.”

“You amaze me,” said Carla Raspa. She was so excited that she got up, spilling her drink. I mopped it up with my handkerchief. “But she’s mad about him,” she exclaimed, “a child could see it. It shrieks to the heavens. Doesn’t she mind?”

“No,” I said. “Why should she?”

“A woman like that? Avid to be the one and only? My dear Armino! Unless…” A world of possibilities filled her mind. Images floated before her. “Livia Butali, Donati, and you. It isn’t possible…”

Her mind reeled. I took away her glass and put it on the tray.

“Now will you go?” I pleaded.

“No,” she said, “not after that piece of information. Donati will have to kick me out. Where have they gone, into his bedroom?”

I looked at my watch. “Hardly,” I said. “It’s ten to two now. He’s five minutes late at the Rector’s meeting.”

“You’ll be telling me in a minute that the Rector’s in this too,” she said.

I shrugged. “He may be, for all I know,” I answered.

Voices came from the hall and passed to the entrance outside. Then after a moment or two Aldo came back into the room.

“Who’s next?” he asked. “I like to see my clients one at a time.”

I spoke before she had a chance to get in first. “The police have been to 24, via San Michele,” I said. “I thought it best to take refuge in Carla’s apartment. I told her why.”

“They’ve been to the library too,” Aldo replied. “Fossi telephoned me. That was what held me up.” Then, turning to Carla Raspa, he added, “Thank you for what you did. This fellow could be in trouble. I’ve stalled them for the time being, and he’s safe enough here with me.”

The signorina, having gained her ends and confronted her host face to face, was ready to call it quits.

“I was only too glad to help,” she admitted frankly, “especially since it gave me a chance to enter your house at last. I’ve tried often enough. I’ve called about three times.”

“How unfortunate,” murmured Aldo. “I must have been engaged.”

“You were,” she said, looking at me, “with him.”

She picked up her bag, and, wishing to show herself aware of the situation which she imagined between us, observed with emphasis, “I had no idea, Professor, that you and Armino were such close friends.”

The parting shot fell wide of its target.

“We should be,” said Aldo briefly. “He’s my brother. We believed each other dead, and hadn’t met for twenty-two years until last Sunday.”

The effect was startling. Carla Raspa, who had taken my possible status as a suspected murderer without flinching, flushed a deep crimson. Aldo might have struck her.

“I didn’t know,” she said. “I hadn’t realized… Armino said nothing.” She looked from one to the other of us, overcome, and then, to my consternation, burst into tears. “I lost both brothers in the war,” she said. “Much older than me, but I loved them dearly… I’m very sorry. Please forgive me.”

She blundered towards the door, but Aldo stepped forward and, seizing her by the arm, swung her round and stared into her face.

“Just how lonely are you?” he asked.

“Lonely?” she echoed, the tears blotching her mascara, her skin, now the flush had died, sallow under her makeup. “I haven’t said I’m lonely.”

“You don’t have to,” he retorted brutally. “You proclaim it in your body each time you wrap yourself round a different man.”

I stared aghast at this sudden violence on the part of my brother. Carla Raspa, by breaking down, had shown herself as vulnerable in her fashion as Signora Butali in hers. Why couldn’t Aldo let her go in peace? She stared back at him, and, miraculously, everything collapsed. All pretence and all bravado.

“It’s all I have,” she said, “there’s nothing else to give.”

“What about your life?” he demanded. “Can’t you lose that too?”

He dropped her arm. She continued staring at him. The running mascara had now smudged both eyes.

“I’d lose it for you,” she said, “if you asked me for it.”

Aldo smiled and, stooping, picked up the bag that had slipped from her shaking hands.

“That’s all that matters then,” he said.

He gave her the bag and patted her on the shoulder. He put his finger on her cheek, showed her the smudge of black and laughed. She smiled in answer, and dabbed at it with her handkerchief.

“I may ask for your life tomorrow, at the Festival,” he told her, “so remember that you’ve promised it to me. I may need you at the ducal palace. You will get your instructions sometime this evening on the telephone.”

“I’ll do whatever you want, now, and forever,” she said.

He pushed her towards the door. “One thing’s very certain,” he said, “if you want to die, you won’t have to die alone.”

As she went into the hall she looked back over her shoulder at me. “Shall I see you again, Armino?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” I answered, “but thank you for giving me sanctuary.”

She glanced inquiringly at Aldo. He gave her no indication of my future, and she passed out through the front door to the double entrance and the street. Through the open window of the room where we were standing came the thin high sound of San Donato striking two.

“I must go,” said Aldo, “I’m already fifteen minutes late. I’ve just telephoned Cesare telling him you are here. He and Giorgio have been looking for you all the morning.”

His manner was abrupt, evasive. Whether because of the trouble I had caused him or for some other reason I could not tell. It was as though he did not care to be alone with me.

“When Cesare comes, I want you to do whatever he tells you,” he said. “Do you understand?”

“No,” I replied, “not immediately. But perhaps I shall when Cesare appears.” Then, hesitant, I added, “I don’t know if the signora told you. I called at her house this morning.”

“No,” he said, “she didn’t tell me.”

“I met her husband,” I went on, “and when she was out of the room we had a few minutes’ conversation. During the course of it he mentioned—I won’t bother with the details now—that he had been receiving anonymous telephone calls while he was in hospital in Rome. The caller was a woman, the allusions to you.”

“Thank you,” said Aldo. His voice remained unaltered. His expression did not change.

“I thought,” I said awkwardly, “it was best to warn you.”

“Thank you,” he said again, and turned towards the door.

“Aldo,” I said, “I apologize for what happened just now—the unfortunate clash between Signora Butali and Carla Raspa.”

“Why unfortunate?” he asked, pausing, his hand on the door.

I gestured. “They’re so different,” I said, “no common ground between them.”

He looked at me. The eyes were cryptic, hard. “That’s where you are wrong,” he said. “They both wanted one thing only. Carla Raspa happened to be more honest about it.”

He left the room. I heard the front door slam. The uncertainty of what was yet to come closed in upon me with his presence gone.