JULY–AUGUST 1957
From that point on, Elsa went from being the lone critic to Maria’s greatest supporter. In her column, in her syndicated radio show, on her weekly spot on the Tonight show, Elsa would rhapsodize about Maria’s voice and stage presence. Tebaldi was cast into the outer darkness and Maria became, in Maxwell’s words, la Divina. Elsa not only wrote about Maria constantly, she came to every performance that Maria gave in New York, Milan, or London. And while Elsa’s devotion could be oppressive, the parties and events she organized broke up the monotony of practice and performance, airplanes and hotel suites, the onstage bouquets and the offstage suitcases of cash. After years of thinking of nothing but her voice, Maria found it was pleasant to walk into a room full of beautiful people who were dying to meet her.
Battista was polite to Elsa in public, but inwardly he was suspicious of Maxwell and her entourage of European royalty, Hollywood film stars, and millionaires looking to give their lucre some cachet. He would sit mute while Elsa gave intimate little dinners for Maria with Cole Porter, Tallulah Bankhead, and “the dear Windsors.”
As her offstage life became more interesting, Maria was beginning to complain about the number of performances that Meneghini had committed her to. She was exhausted after her season at the Met and was looking forward to spending the summer at their villa in Sirmione overlooking Lake Garda. But Tita had already agreed to an engagement in August at the Edinburgh Festival with the La Scala company. When she objected, he told her, as he always did, “that I just want us to make hay while the sun shines, Maria.”
In the past Maria had always complied with his wishes, but since she had met Elsa, she had begun to question his decisions, declaring that she needed more time to rest. Meneghini pointed out that if she needed rest, maybe she should spend less time going to parties with Elsa.
The new tension between them flared up over the La Scala engagement. Maria was defiant. “I don’t care what you have agreed. I need time to recover, and I won’t go to Edinburgh.” Tita cajoled, threatened, and pleaded, but Maria was adamant. Tita knew that he needed reinforcement, so he invited Ghiringhelli, the manager of La Scala, to lunch at the villa.
Battista announced that Ghiringhelli was coming while Maria was having a fitting for the gown she was going wear to the costume ball that Elsa was throwing for her in Venice. Maria had declared that she was not going to come in character, as she spent quite enough time pretending to be somebody else. Alain had come up with a very simple design, a square-necked black bodice above a full white satin skirt sprinkled with black polka dots. The skirt would be full-length so that she wouldn’t have to worry about her ankles that, despite all her dieting, had never lost their sturdiness.
Alain was just pinning the toile to show off Maria’s waist when Battista made his announcement.
“Did he say why he wanted to talk to me so urgently?” Maria asked.
Tita shrugged.
“Did you tell him that the doctor said that I must have complete rest?”
Tita shrugged again. “He reads the articles of your friend Elsa. He knows that she is giving a ball for you.”
“A ball is not a performance!” Maria threw out her hands and winced as the pins in the shoulder straps pricked her skin.
She felt a familiar flush of anger—her husband was using her just as her mother had done in Athens—when she had sent her out to sing for Italian soldiers in return for food. She had told her mother that it was not good for her to sing in the open air, but Litza had ignored her then just as Tita was ignoring her now. The doctor had been very clear: her blood pressure was too low and her heartbeat was irregular. “You need three months of complete rest, Madame Callas.” Tita had been there too, and yet here he was letting Ghiringhelli into the house.
“He is going to ask me to do the Edinburgh Festival after I have already said no.”
She saw Tita’s gaze shift to the view of Lake Garda. The house was only a few years old and had picture windows that looked out over the lake. Maria had been thrilled with the villa until Zeffirelli had visited her there one day. When she had taken him into the sitting room, which she had filled with antiques, she noticed him wince as he looked around the room. “Do you like it, Franco,” she had asked, her voice a little plaintive, and he had smiled and told her that it was magnificent. But she had seen the wince and since then she had looked around at her Empire sofas and ormolu clocks and wondered what invisible rule she had broken.
One of the ormolu clocks was chiming midday, which meant that Ghiringhelli would be here any minute. After Alain had unpinned the toile, she went upstairs and put on her most severe suit.
Ghiringhelli made polite conversation about the terrible traffic in Milan and the new restaurant that had opened opposite the opera house, until Bruna brought in the coffee. This was his cue. “You cannot imagine the excitement there is about the La Scala season at the Edinburgh Festival. Normally I would think twice about taking the company to a festival in Scotland, but when we announced the lineup—the tickets sold out in minutes.”
Maria said nothing, just looked at him with a gaze that would have shriveled a lesser man. But Ghiringhelli was not a lesser man, he was the savior of La Scala—the man who had rescued it from postwar chaos and brought it back into magnificent life. He continued unabashed. “But although La Scala is undoubtedly the greatest opera company in the world, it is nothing without its greatest star, the incomparable Maria Callas.”
He held out his hand as if he were onstage, pledging his undying love. Ghiringhelli was a handsome man with his silver mane and blue eyes, and he liked to audition all the new sopranos in private. But Maria had not been one of the young women who had been used by Ghiringhelli. He told himself that she had been too heavy in those days to be worth the effort, but the truth was that Callas had always made him a little nervous.
Maria ignored the gesture. “If you are selling tickets on the strength of my name, then, Antonio, you should have made sure that I was going to appear. As Tita must have told you, I am taking a break from performing, on medical advice. So there is no question of me coming to Edinburgh.”
Ghiringhelli looked at Meneghini, who had indeed told him about the doctor’s recommendation but had not ruled out the possibility that Maria might be “persuaded” to perform.
“She likes to say no at first; like all women, she needs some persuasion, and after that she enjoys it.” Meneghini had then asked for a ridiculously high fee.
Battista put his hand on Maria’s. “Carissima, your health must come first, of course, but what Antonio is proposing is a concert performance, not a full opera.”
Maria took her hand away. “I still have to sing, Tita.”
Ghiringhelli leaned forward. “I was hoping that you would sing La sonnambula. There hasn’t been a production in Britain since its premiere in 1831. You have done so much to change the repertoire, Maria—all these great operas that you have revived. You are not just a voice; you are a pioneer. In the future, every soprano will have to acknowledge their debt to you.”
Ghiringhelli wondered if he had gone too far with that last comment, as he had never met a soprano who didn’t want to scratch Maria’s eyes out; but she had stopped glaring at him.
“Yes, I have made Amina my own. But I think even Bellini himself would not want me to sacrifice my voice for his opera.” As she spoke the word “sacrifice,” Maria put her hand on her heart and lowered her eyes.
“Of course not, but it is your role and no one can sing it better. And the Edinburgh audience will be so grateful to have the opportunity to listen to you,” Ghiringhelli replied.
It was true that there was nothing like singing to an audience that had been starved of opera. Perhaps they were less discerning than the patrons of La Scala, but they responded so enthusiastically in places like Dallas or Mexico City that she never regretted those engagements.
Tita put four spoons of sugar in his coffee and stirred vigorously. “You seem so much better now than when you got here, tesoro, I am sure Dr. Lanini would say the same.”
Ghiringhelli started to drum his fingers on the table. It was time to wrap this up.
“La Scala has been good to you in the past, Maria. Now is the time to repay the debt.”
He realized his mistake the moment the words had left his mouth. The softening he had detected earlier disappeared and Maria came back, eyes blazing.
“I seem to remember that you rejected me when I first came to Italy, and it was only after I had made a success at La Fenice that you understood what a blunder you had made. Yes, I have been in some excellent productions at La Scala, but do not imagine for a moment that my career has depended on your patronage, Signor Ghiringhelli. I have made my career through my own talent and dedication, and I owe you nothing.”
She put her coffee cup down with a rattle and stood up. “I am going upstairs to rest now. Goodbye.”
Both men got to their feet.
Ghiringhelli spoke. “You are quite right, of course. You did not need La Scala to become the greatest singer in the world, but, Maria, La Scala needs you desperately. Without you we will have to cancel the Edinburgh season, which will cost us a fortune and will make it impossible to put on a new production next year. I know how much you want to sing Anna Bolena. Please, Maria, I beg you to reconsider—if you come to Edinburgh, I promise you the undying gratitude of La Scala.”
Maria gave a little nod. “You have made yourself very clear. I will think about it.”
When she left the room, Meneghini said, “She will do it, Antonio, I am sure. Especially when I tell her the terms on which we have agreed.”
“You are truly rapacious, Meneghini.”
The smaller man smiled. “But as you yourself said, think of what it will cost you if my wife doesn’t sing.”
Maria lay down on her bed and closed her eyes. She knew that at this moment Tita would be negotiating her fee with Ghiringhelli. She had known from the moment that Tita had told her about Ghiringhelli’s visit that her husband had set it up. To refuse now would damage Tita’s standing as her manager and, although she was furious with him for not consulting her, she did not want the world to think that he was no longer to be trusted.
It had worked so well at the beginning. Tita was thirty years older than her, and it had been such a relief to let him handle everything. He had given up his brick factory and had become her manager, choosing her engagements, calming her fears, and encouraging her to take on the most difficult roles. He had told her the first time they met that he thought she could be the greatest diva in the world. At the time she had been two hundred pounds, with legs like tree trunks, but Battista had never doubted that she was prima donna material. In the first year of their marriage, she had been so happy: at last she had found someone she could rely on, someone who wanted only the best for her. For a wedding present he had bought her a mink stole, and as she wrapped it round her bare shoulders the velvety softness had made her feel protected for the first time in her life.
Tita had not been her first lover, but he was the first man that she had felt relaxed with in bed. He was not urgent or overpowering, and Maria had found his gentleness a relief.
Tita never sulked if she was tired after a performance or wanted to go to bed early before one. Their lovemaking, which had never been frequent, had dwindled to almost nothing. But Maria was happy to have him in bed beside her, sleeping while she read through scores late at night.
She had once imagined that they might have a family. But Battista had been careful at the beginning not to make her pregnant, and at the time she had hardly noticed. All she wanted then was to sing at La Scala. She had once asked Elvira if she had ever wanted children, and her teacher had looked at her as if she were mad. “I already had a gift from God,” she said, pointing to her throat. “To have a child too would be greedy.”
When they bought the Villa Sirmione, Maria had put a swing in the garden as a gesture to a future child, to indicate that her offspring would have the kind of carefree existence that she had been denied. But the only occupant of that swing had been Maria herself, and then only for photoshoots that were designed to show what a happy domestic life the great diva enjoyed in “her charming villa on the shores of Lake Garda.” In these interviews Maria always declared that she would be perfectly happy to give up singing to settle down to a life of cooking, cleaning, and childcare. “All I have wanted,” she would say to the interviewer, her eyes often wet, “is to be a wife and mother.”
The journalists, the male ones, had nodded in sympathy. No one had ever wondered, aloud at least, why in that case she didn’t give up her career and have a baby. They had been happy to accept the assumption that Maria Callas had put aside her own personal fulfillment in the service of her art, a vestal virgin at the shrine of Opera. And if some tactless reporter, usually female or at least American, asked whether she planned to have children in the future, Maria would lower her gaze and talk about fertility treatment.
There had been moments recently though when, from the windows of her limousine or on airplanes, she had seen women with babies and she had wondered whether she really would one day become a mother. But then she imagined Battista sleeping next to her, his remaining hair confined to a hairnet, and she pushed the thought away. Battista never talked about having a child, he was too busy filling her diary.
She decided to make herself feel better by buying the diamond and emerald necklace that Alain had shown her in the jeweler’s next to La Scala. He had suggested that she should wear it in her hair at Elsa’s ball.
When she mentioned the necklace to Tita at dinner, he surprised her by agreeing immediately. “After the fee I have extracted from Ghiringhelli, you can buy two necklaces if that’s what you want, Maria.” He looked very pleased with himself.
“Antonio protested, of course, said that La Scala couldn’t afford to pay so much, that it went against all precedent, etcetera, etcetera. But he had lost his negotiating position because he had already admitted that the tickets would not sell without you taking part. And, as I know how much he is charging for the tickets, there is no danger of La Scala going bankrupt.”
A few weeks later, just before she was due to leave for Edinburgh, Maria was coming from Madame Biki’s, where she had been having her final fittings for the outfits she would be wearing during her visit to Venice, when she saw Tommaso Rossi, their accountant, drinking an espresso in a café in the cathedral piazza. She stopped and greeted him. He was delighted to be recognized by the famous Madame Callas in front of all his cronies, and even more excited when she agreed to sit down with him. He ordered her an affogato and watched in delight as she poured the black coffee over the yellow scoop of ice cream. She would have only one tiny bite, of course, but she would make it look so delicious that Signor Rossi would feel like a god. After surrendering to the ice cream, she looked up at the accountant and said that she longed to be like him and sit in a café in the sunshine, instead of toiling around the opera houses of Europe.
“Oh, but, madame, think how much pleasure you are giving to the world.”
“I don’t know for how much longer, Signor Rossi.”
A shadow crossed the accountant’s round face. “But, Madame Callas, tell me that you are not planning to retire any time soon. It would be a tragedy for the world of music.”
“Sadly, Signor Rossi, the decision may not be mine—a singer’s career can end in an instant, a vocal injury, an inflamed node—these things happen and when they do, I hope that I or rather we will be comfortable in our retirement. But of course I know that you and Tita have been working together to make sure of that.”
The accountant shifted in his seat. “Well, since you mention it, madame, I do have a concern on that score. Your husband is a very generous man, as you know, a family man, but I sometimes think he is a little too generous. Recently I have said to him that maybe it is time to let the family fend for themselves and to put more money aside for your future as a couple. As you yourself have so gracefully pointed out, a singer’s career is not forever, and it is sensible to have savings for all eventualities.”
“He must have been very grateful for such prudent advice. I hope he followed it,” Maria said.
There was something in her voice that made Signor Rossi dab his forehead with his handkerchief. “In the end, it is always the client’s decision, Madame Callas.”
Maria got up.
“But aren’t you going to finish your affogato?”
“No, Signor Rossi. I find that I have lost my appetite.”
Maria wanted to confront Tita immediately. But she had a performance the day after she arrived in Edinburgh, and she needed to conserve her energy. She decided to wait until the four performances were over, and they were on their way to Venice. She could hardly believe that Tita could have been spending her money on his worthless family in Verona. How often had he told her that she was all the family he needed? How dare he use the money that she had earned to support his grasping relations, who had never made the slightest effort to be nice to her?
The suite at the Balmoral Hotel had a splendid view of Arthur’s Seat, the volcanic outcrop that dominated the city, but it boasted a tartan carpet so lurid that it gave Maria a headache just to look at it. While Meneghini went to the barber’s, Maria rang the front desk and asked if they had another suite with a grand piano.
“Certainly, Madame Callas. There is the Royal Suite, which I am sure you will find very comfortable. Madame Tebaldi stayed there for the festival last year, and she was kind enough to say how much she enjoyed it.”
The Royal Suite had an even more splendid view of Arthur’s Seat, and while the carpet was still tartan, the pattern was a whisper rather than a shriek.
When her husband returned, Maria forestalled any protests about the change by telling him that this was where Tebaldi had stayed, adding, “As you are always telling me how much money I am making by coming here to sing, I thought it was only right that I should be as comfortable as Renata. I don’t want the world to think that she is earning more than I am.”
The first three performances were a pleasure. The Edinburgh audience was rapturous in its appreciation of her Amina. But on the morning of her last performance, she woke up with a tightness in her throat. She tried her usual warm-up exercises, but she could not shake the constriction. She told Bruna to make the usual tea with honey and went to bed, leaving a note for Tita to warn Ghiringhelli to have a replacement ready just in case she couldn’t sing.
When it was time to leave for the theater, her throat was feeling looser. Maria thought that it was tight rather than damaged and that if she sang carefully, she would be able to get through what would be her last performance without injury.
But halfway through her most difficult aria, where Amina is sleepwalking through the moonlit glade and the melody is ornamented by the kind of cadenzas and trills that are the hallmark of bel canto, she reached for the high B and she felt her voice falter.
She told herself that she had to think beyond the note. She started on another trill and this time the note was there—and for the rest of the aria she concentrated on being Amina, the sleepwalker. The audience appeared not to notice her faltering. Thank God, she thought, that this was Edinburgh and not Milan, where she would have been booed and cabbages thrown onstage.
Between acts Bruna and the dresser changed her costume behind a makeshift screen in the wings. She was telling Bruna how relieved she was to have got through the aria when one of the young sopranos from the chorus stopped to speak to her. “I just wanted to say, Madame Callas, that you are an inspiration to me. It was your recording of Norma that made me decide to be a singer.”
Maria nodded and gave the younger woman a brief smile, hoping that she would get the hint to leave her in peace. But the girl, who had large blue eyes, was still gazing at her.
“I just wanted to ask your advice for a young singer like me, just starting out.”
Maria winced as the dresser pulled the laces of her corset.
“I have two things to say. First listen to the music, but I mean really listen—it will tell you everything you need to know. The composer has left you instructions; it is your job to follow them.”
The girl nodded vehemently. “And the second piece of advice?”
“Never bother a singer in the middle of a costume change. Concentration is everything.”
The girl flushed. “I am sorry, Madame Callas. But I was so hoping that you would put in a good word for me with Signor Ghiringhelli. My name is Flavia Leith.”
“If you have the voice and the belief, you will succeed. Nothing I can say will make any difference. Now please go away.”
Flavia left, and Maria tried to get back into the mind of Amina, sleepwalking her way into disaster. She prayed that she could get through the reconciliation scene and then she would be done.
As the curtain came down, she saw Tita waiting for her in the wings. Maria grabbed his arm.
“Did you hear how I missed a B in the cadenza? Thank God this is the last performance.”
The clapping from the audience showed no sign of diminishing, and she could hear them shouting her name. The stage manager beckoned her onstage again. When she came back, Tita was looking nervous. “But, tesoro, this is not your last performance.”
Maria stared at him, but she was being beckoned onstage again.
When she came back, she said, “What do you mean?”
“You have another show on Tuesday.”
The applause was getting even louder—she would have to go back out again. She strode onto the stage and made a gracious curtsy to the audience. They yelled in delight as she gestured to the cast, to the orchestra, and finally to the audience with outstretched arms. She curtsied again, but as she came offstage, her eyes were blazing.
“I agreed to four performances! How can there be another one?”
Meneghini shrugged. “I don’t know. There must have been a mistake somewhere.”
Maria felt the anger surging through her; she wanted to break something. But the audience were still calling for her, and she could see the stage manager beckoning to her from the wings opposite. She took a deep breath and went onstage. On her return, she hissed in Tita’s ear, “I agreed to four performances. And I have sung four. Basta!”
“But they have sold the tickets, Maria.”
“That is not my problem,” she said as she went onstage again.
There were nineteen curtain calls for Maria that night, and the audience would have called for more, but Maria signaled to the stage manager that she had had enough.
When she finally came offstage, Tita had vanished. Maria started to walk back to her dressing room but then decided that she would speak to Ghiringhelli at once and tell him about the mistake. She pointed at the stage manager, a slender young man with red hair.
“Where is Ghiringhelli?”
The young man went a painful scarlet. “I don’t know, Madame Callas. Shall I go and look for him?”
Maria shook her head. “I don’t have time. Take me to his office.”
The young man gulped. “His office is miles away. Let me bring him to your dressing room.”
Maria shook her head again and waited until the stage manager, who looked as though he might cry, began to lead the way. She followed him through a corridor onto a landing where he stopped in front of a door and made a tentative knock. Maria did not wait for an answer and pushed the door open.
The first thing she saw was Ghiringhelli’s back. Then she looked down and saw the large blue eyes of Flavia, the soprano from the chorus. The young woman was scrambling to her feet.
“Am I disturbing you?” Maria said.
Ghiringhelli wheeled round, his fingers fumbling with his trouser buttons.
“I came to say goodbye, as this is my last performance, but clearly I picked an inopportune moment.”
She moved her gaze to Flavia. “It’s the music you should be listening to, not bastards like him.” Maria pointed at Ghiringhelli.
Flavia looked as if she had been slapped and then ran past Maria, bumping into the stage manager in her hurry to get away.
“Well, now that you have made a scene of truly operatic proportions, Maria,” said Ghiringhelli, who had brushed off his initial embarrassment, “perhaps we can talk in private.”
The stage manager scurried away, and the corridor emptied of the various stagehands and chorus members who had followed the diva as she stormed upstairs.
“Your dramatic farewell is premature, Maria. You have another performance on Tuesday—surely you haven’t forgotten.” He gave her a rictus smile.
“How could I forget something that I didn’t know about?” Maria cried. “I agreed to four performances of La sonnambula, and tonight is the fourth.”
Ghiringhelli put out a pacifying hand. “Shall we find your husband, Maria. I am sure he can help us resolve this … situation.”
“But there is no situation. I am leaving in the morning for Venice.”
She turned away from him and walked back to her dressing room.
Ten minutes later she was taking off her makeup when Tita came in followed by Ghiringhelli.
Tita’s face had faded from its usual olive to parchment.
“Where have you been, Tita? I need you to tell Antonio that he has made a mistake and that he will have to find someone else to sing on Tuesday. I am sure there will be no shortage of candidates. Indeed, I believe I interrupted him in the middle of an audition.” Maria smiled nastily at Ghiringhelli.
Ghiringhelli looked at Tita, waiting for him to speak.
Tita opened his mouth silently like a fish gasping for air before saying, “Maria, I think perhaps you have misremembered. We agreed to five performances.”
Maria looked at him in disbelief. “No, we didn’t. Do you really think that I would make a mistake about a thing like that, Tita?”
Her husband shrugged, and again he and Ghiringhelli exchanged glances.
Maria wanted to scream, but she managed to control her voice. “I said I would do four performances when you begged me, Antonio. Even though it was against my doctor’s advice. I missed a note tonight because I have overtaxed my voice, and now I must rest.”
Ghiringhelli made a face that attempted to look sorrowful, but it was clear that he was just as furious as she was. “I am sorry to hear that, Maria, but the house is entirely sold out for Tuesday. Even if the performance is not up to your usual standards, it will not matter. How many curtain calls did you have tonight, fifteen?”
“Nineteen,” said Maria automatically.
“Nineteen. Do you think that anybody out there even noticed your stumble? You are adored here. Surely you don’t want to disappoint all those fans.”
It was the only argument, as Ghiringhelli knew, that was likely to change her mind; and for a second Maria wavered. There was something in the applause that gave her strength; it was a feeling impossible to find elsewhere; it was the strongest love she had ever known. But she was not foolish enough to think that the love was unconditional—she would not sing if she could not fulfill the audience’s expectations. Antonio might think that they would not know the difference, but he would not be the one standing on the stage, putting his reputation at risk.
She started to rub the cold cream on her face and then wipe it off with savage strokes.
Tita broke the silence. “Why don’t you have a day of silence tomorrow and then see how you are on Tuesday?”
Maria caught Bruna’s eye in the mirror. “Are we packed, Bruna?”
“Yes, madame.”
Ghiringhelli shook his head. “Have you forgotten how when that Time magazine article came out, I stood up for you. Told everyone that asked how unfair it was, and how easy you were to work with?”
“I remember that you said I was always punctual for rehearsals and that you had no cause for complaint on that score.” Maria took off her false eyelashes.
“It would be unfortunate if I had to revise my opinion publicly and tell the world how unreliable you are.” Ghiringhelli cracked his knuckles.
“So that is how you demonstrate the undying gratitude of La Scala? By threatening me? When it is your mistake, not mine,” cried Maria.
Ghiringhelli opened the door. “I just want you to be aware of the consequences of your actions. I will leave you now to talk it over with your husband. I am sure that together you will make the right decision.”
After the door closed the silence was broken only by the sound of Maria screwing on the lid of the cold cream jar.
Battista opened his mouth to speak, but Maria silenced him with a hand. “Don’t even try. I am not going to change my mind.”
Battista came to stand right behind her. “No, you must do exactly what you please even if it means humiliating me in front of a man like Ghiringhelli.”
Maria turned round to look him in the face. “You think that’s humiliating? What about standing in front of an audience of a thousand people and being unable to sing? That is real humiliation.”
Lowering her voice a little, she said, “You should have told them I wouldn’t do it when you discovered their mistake. That is your job, after all.”
Her tone was soft, but Tita looked as though she had slapped him. “My job?” he said almost in a whisper.
“Yes! And one for which you are paid handsomely.” She stood up, looming over him, bending her face to his. “You think I don’t know about all the money you are squirreling away in secret accounts.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about,” he protested.
“It’s no use pretending, Tita. Rossi has told me all about your little arrangements for your family. And I decided that I would think of the money you have stashed away secretly as your wages, not a man stealing from his wife.” She jabbed him in the chest with her finger, and he rocked back a little.
“So I may have helped my family out a little. That’s what normal families do—they help each other. I didn’t tell you because I knew you wouldn’t understand.”
The injustice of this made Maria close her eyes momentarily. Tita, of all people, knew how badly her mother had treated her.
“Perhaps I don’t know how normal families behave, but that is not my fault. You know how it was. My mother used me for her own ends—she always preferred my sister—and even my father has never stood up for me. Why should I help them? They never loved me. All they do is exploit me.”
But Tita did not soften. He said quietly, “So you say, Maria.”
“What does that mean?”
“Maybe there was fault on both sides. You are not always an easy person to love, Maria.”
Maria remembered her mother, in the kitchen in the Patission Street apartment in Athens, saying the same thing. Then she had not known how to answer, but now she had found the words.
“But I don’t think you have ever loved me, Tita, only my voice.”