Seasons of Love (13 page)

He sighed. ‘Well, at least that stuff is filling. When I've recovered from this damned cold, I'll find some way of picking up a bit of money and then we can eat properly. There must be a few fellows around who like a game of cards.’

And sure enough, since he was tired of poor men's food, Robert made it his business to hunt around for kindred spirits. He soon met ‘a good fellow, Italian, but speaks a little English’. Paolo introduced Robert to some others with similar tastes. ‘Rum bunch, but they know their cards. That Conte they all fawn over comes down to play sometimes, they tell me. Useful, eh? He won't be short of money. He owns half the town.’

As usual, Robert was successful at first, then more and more unsuccessful. Helen had enough students by now to cover the cost of the little house and food for herself and Harry, but only just.

She entrusted her small emergency fund to Francesca, explaining that her husband was a gambler.

She flushed as she added that he sometimes took her money, and that she wanted to save some

‘per il piccolo Harry'
.

Francesca swore that the devil could tear out her entrails before she would surrender one single coin to signor Perriman. And she would personally see that Harry and his mother never went hungry again.

Helen couldn’t help hugging her. It was wonderful to have a friend once more. She wrote a letter to Roxanne and another to the Hendrys, telling them where she was and trying to sound optimistic.

The seasons passed and summer came again. Robert's brief run of luck was long past now. He was becoming very nasty about the food she served him and had gone through her things several times searching for money. She retaliated by refusing to make him an evening meal unless he gave her the money to buy food.

She was very embarrassed when she visited Francesca one week, because of a bruise Robert had given her, when he slapped her hard on the face. Her friend fingered it, clicked her tongue in dismay and found her some evil-smelling ointment to anoint it with.

Harry now went and hid in the attic whenever his father was in a bad mood.

One hot summer night, Robert came home in the foulest of tempers.

‘Is something wrong?’ Helen asked. It must be money. Surely, oh surely, they wouldn't have to move again! She didn't think she could face it. She had grown to like Serugia and to love her little house. And there was Francesca, too. Not to mention some boys with whom Harry had made friends.

‘Oh, no, everything's wonderful!’ Robert sneered. ‘What do you think it is, you fool? The damned cards won't fall for me lately. Never had such a bad run. Never!’ He started gnawing on a piece of bread which had been intended for Harry's breakfast. ‘Not even a smear of jam to put on it! What sort of a housekeeper are you? I don't know why I keep you around, I really don't!’

‘You're very welcome to leave us. Go and try your luck elsewhere!’

‘Oh, yes, you'd like that, wouldn't you? Like to get out of all your marital duties.’

She tensed. Was he going to demand that she share his bed? Because she wouldn't. Whatever he said or did, she would not lie with him willingly again. She couldn’t bear him to touch her and she wasn’t risking him fathering another child on her, for it was hard enough to feed the one they had got.

‘Don't worry.
I
don't want to touch you! But I do think it's about time you helped me.’

‘What do you want me to do?’ she asked, puzzled.

‘See that chap for me - il Conte.’

‘Why?’

‘He's getting a bit nasty, that's why. We'll see if
you
can soften his heart a little. Play the poor little woman, who can't feed her child. That might get to him. Though I wouldn't rely on his being sympathetic. He's no gentleman, I can tell you, whatever stupid Italian title he gives himself!’

‘Do you - owe him money?’

‘Some. Nothing I can't pay off, if he'll only give me more time.’

Her heart sank.

‘So,’ he said, with what she recognised as assumed casualness, ‘you'll have to go and see him for me tomorrow. It's a long way up that hill. It'd make me cough.’ He avoided her eyes. ‘And anyway, your Italian is quite good now. Think of that damned brat. Play on il Conte’s conscience.’

She was horrified. ‘I won’t go! Why should I? The debt is your concern.’

‘Will you not, madam? Will you not?’ He raised his fist to her. ‘You'll do as you're told!’

She backed away. ‘But I don't even know the man, Robert! And it's
you
who owes him money!’

‘Doesn't matter. Wear something pretty. That green thing. Go and weep buckets all over him.

I'll look after the boy.’

‘No.’

‘You will go, you know. He's expecting you. I sent him a message. And he replied to it. He's expecting you tomorrow at three.’

They argued for a while longer, then he turned violent and started to hit her. She could hear Harry sobbing quietly in his room, and in the end she capitulated, for the boy's sake, and also because she didn't want to move from Serugia. But she didn't leave Harry with his father. She would never trust Robert again. She left the boy with Francesca and, face burning with embarrassment, she asked her to hide Harry if his father came looking for him. Thank goodness, her friend couldn’t see the bruises on her body.

Francesca watched her walk away up the hill.
‘Poverina!’
she said without thinking.

‘Papa è cattivo!’
announced Harry, whose Italian was coming along fast.
‘Picchia la mamma.’

‘To think a child of his age should know such things!’ Francesca told her husband later. ‘What a villain that man is! He’s been beating her.’

Helen arrived at the palazzo, feeling ashamed as well as hot and tired. It was a hard pull up the hill and she knew her face was red and her skirt dusty, though she tried to shake off the worst of the clinging white dust before she went in. There was no one at the tiny gatehouse, so she walked slowly and reluctantly up the drive to the big house. She summoned up her indignation at having to come here and that helped overcome her embarrassment and her strong desire to run away.

At the big house, she pulled briskly on the bell.
‘La signora Perriman,’
she said loftily to the footman who opened the door.

He grinned, a knowing grin that sent a shiver of apprehension up her spine. Did even the servants know why she’d come? To her surprise he led her towards the stairs and she hesitated for a moment. Surely the
salone
couldn't be up there?

‘Il Conte L'attende
,’ said the man, using the polite form of address, but still leering at her in a way that was definitely not polite.

She hesitated, then followed him, but stopped dead on the threshold when he tried to show her into a bedroom. ‘No!’

Without more ado, he pushed her inside, threw a piece of folded paper after her and slammed the door.

She heard a key turn in the lock and with a gasp of horror, she ran across to bang on the door and shout to be let out. It was a very solid door and didn't even shake under her blows. Nor was there any noise from the other side of it.

Catching her breath on a sob, she flew across the room to the window, but that, too, was locked. What was Robert up to now?

As she turned round and began to pace up and down the room, the crackle of paper underfoot reminded her that the footman had thrown a piece of paper at her. She bent to pick it up, smoothed it out and icy horror shivered along her veins. The paper bore Robert's handwriting. Why should he need to write her a note when she had just seen him? It was a moment before she could bring herself to spread it out and read the message.

If you want to stay in Serugia, be sensible for once. Think of Harry and be
kind to the Count. R.

He’d underlined the word ‘kind’. Disgust and panic held her motionless, then she looked at the large bed and had to gulp back a sob. She didn’t want to believe that Robert would offer his own wife in payment for his debts, but he’d broached the matter before and why else would she have been sent to the palazzo and locked in this bedroom?

She walked across the room to rattle the handle of the big french window that led out on to the balcony, but it held firm. Should she try to break a pane of glass? But she couldn’t see a key on the other side, so what good would that do? For a moment, she leaned her head against the coolness of the glass, but she couldn’t seem to think clearly.

When a voice spoke behind her and she jumped in shock and twisted round.

‘He say you shy, but not that you go back on your word.’

A thin, grey-haired gentleman whom she recognised as il Conte, though she had never spoken to him, stood there. He inclined his head as she stared at him.

How had he got in? She looked round, saw an open door behind a curtain, connecting the room to another one and with a sob of desperation, she ran towards it, only to be tripped up by the long cane upon which the Conte had been leaning. She lay there for a moment, winded, then struggled to her feet, keeping as far away from him as she could.

‘Please - why have I been brought here? I don't understand.’

He frowned at her, looking intently at her face. Something he saw there made the frown deepen. He rapped the cane on the floor. ‘There is something wrong, I think. Please to come with me.’ Seeing how she hesitated, he bowed to her. ‘We talk. I not touch you. Is some mistake, I think.’

She swallowed hard, then followed him next door into a sitting room. She sat where he indicated, her trembling hands clasped tightly together in her lap and waited for him to explain.

He limped across to another chair. ‘I sit, too. Bad leg.’ He studied her, still looking puzzled.

‘You are the wife of il signor Perriman?’

‘Yes.’

‘He send you here?’

‘Yes. To speak to you. About the money.’

‘Your husband owe me much money. Play cards. No luck. Say you pay in other ways.’

Helen blushed a fiery red. ‘I knew nothing of this, Conte, nothing!’ Her voice broke. ‘I can't believe that even
he
would do such a thing. Or that you would want a reluctant woman!’

‘I am bored. Is nice to have a young woman. But I do not,’ he struggled to find the right words,

‘take woman who not want me.’ A look of pride came on his face. ‘I never need to force women.’

She let out a long shuddering breath of relief. She believed him. Suddenly she couldn’t bear to look him in the face. Robert’s behaviour had embarrassed her so deeply she could only cover her face with her hands and try to hide the tears she could no longer hold back. ‘I'm ashamed, so very ashamed! And I have no money to give you.’

‘No.’ His voice was slow and thoughtful. ‘But I am a lonely man. You shall give me company instead. I like you to share a
merenda
with me - same as the English tea.’

She looked at him warily.

‘How old are you, signora?’ he asked gently, tapping the top of the cane with one fingertip.

‘Twenty-one, sir.’

‘And I am - near to sixty - and lame. My wife, she is dead long time. My daughters are marry.

My son,’ he snapped his fingers in a gesture of dismissal, ‘he prefer to live in Roma. I have think -

you are like your husband.
Ma non è vero
. You are what the English call - a lady. Is true?’

She smiled reluctantly. ‘I was brought up a lady, Conte, but my family are very poor. And since my marriage I haven’t led the life of a lady.’

He nodded. ‘Not with that one. You make bad mistake, to marry him, I think.’

‘Yes.’

‘So. You teach English - and you sew to earn money for your child.’

He laughed at her surprise. ‘I stay home much, but news come to me. I know many thing. How much you charge for teach English?’

She named a modest sum. ‘Per hour, sir.’

‘Good. You come teach me - two times a week - speak English, take meal - two hours each time. I pay.’ He tapped her hand lightly with the end of the cane. ‘Not look like that. Is not trick to get you in bed. Bring the son too. We talk about,’ he shrugged, ‘life, books. You read much books?’

She felt suddenly more at ease with him. ‘When I can.’ Which was not often lately. You didn’t buy books when you could barely afford food.

His eye fell on a small table with a board set open on it. ‘You play chess?’ His voice did not sound hopeful, but he brightened visibly at her response.

‘Yes, sir. But I haven’t done so for a long time.’ Strangely, it had been her mother's one passion, chess, and the two women had played it sometimes when her father was out of the house.

‘Good.’

She shook her head. ‘I can’t come here like that, Conte. People will - will say - ’ She couldn’t finish the sentence and she could feel how flushed her face was.

His face fell. ‘Ah.’ He leaned his head on one side, like a bright-eyed bird, then snapped his fingers together and beamed at Helen. ‘I know. My housekeeper is
very
respectable. She sit with us, tell everyone what happen. Then all town know you are respectable. Maria play with boy. You talk English with me - play chess, too. I pay you for this.’

Helen bowed her head and tried to wipe away the tears that had filled her eyes at this offer.

‘Sir. You are generous indeed.’

He smiled and shrugged slightly. ‘So. I get value for money, I think.’ The smile became a smirk. ‘I still like other sort of woman, too. Not too old for that. But you, we keep respectable.’

She chuckled. You couldn’t help liking him. Then she remembered the debts. ‘You must take the money I earn off what my husband owes you, Conte.’ She hated having to say this, for she found it hard to manage on what she earned. But the debt still lay between them.

‘No. Not so. I make your husband to work for me. I send him off to deliver messages, do small businesses for me. He pay back debts like that. You keep money you earn.’ He looked down at her arm and frowned.

She glanced down and say that her sleeve had pulled up enough to show one of her bruises. She was grateful when he didn’t comment on it.