approximately the third chakra, the Tuscan sun bursts forth.
The bartender goes back to washing glasses. In the rear, some guys are throwing darts. The stool beside me remains empty. I stare at an endless motorcar race on the flat-screen. Who is this doll, Muriel, alone at a bar doing shots in the afternoon? I’m imagining she’s a solitary painter with a history of failed relationships, so she moves to Siena, a place so beautiful just walking out the door can give you an eye orgasm. She’s rail-thin, worn- looking, a couple of years older — way too fast for a sixteen-year-old, but what does Giovanni know? The race cars go around another dozen laps, along with the rum in my brain.
A high-pitched female voice shrills at us: “Saved my spot?” A short aging Englishwoman with kinky gray hair hauls herself up onto the stool. She is in her sixties, round like a barrel and eager as a toddler.
“Good man!” she cries, downing the rum and pear, one two.
The bartender says, “We thought you were a goner.” “I was in the loo,” declares Muriel Barrett theatrically. “Having a nice bowel movement.” The bartender cracks a smile and offers another round. I am thinking it might be a good time to switch to Foster’s.
“This lady has been waiting for you,” he explains to Muriel.
Muriel, apparently playing the Queen of Rum, inquires imperiously, “Who is she?”
I introduce myself as Giovanni Nicosa’s aunt and ask if she knows him.
“Yes, of course I know Giovanni. You’re his aunt?” And that kicks off the whole saga of how I came to be in Siena. I leave out the part about being an FBI agent.
Muriel Barrett has the face of a beagle, complete with errant whiskers, but she is not stupid. Her large brown eyes take in everything and hold it for future use. I ask how she knows Giovanni.
“Everybody knows everybody in Siena. Especially the English-speakers.” “Knows them, how?”
“Oh, the occasional game of darts.” “In a pub? He’s sixteen years old. What’s the drinking age in Italy?” “I don’t think there is one, is there, Chris?” the cloud-painter asks the bartender.
“The drinking age in Italy is when you’re old enough to see over the counter,” Chris replies.
“I’m his
Muriel’s voice has dropped a key. Gone is the imperious bullshit. The eyes have adjusted to the line of questioning: cautious and indignant.
“He came to see you last night.” “Really? When was this?” “Around ten-thirty. Were you home?” “No, as a matter of fact, I was here. Wasn’t I, Chris?” Chris raises an eyebrow.
“His car is still outside your apartment.” Genuine surprise: “It is? I didn’t notice.” Then, “How do you know where I live?” “Giovanni was attacked last night.” “Attacked!”
“He’s in the hospital.”
Muriel stares.
“What happened to him?”
“Tower on Goose,” Chris pronounces flatly.
“Not necessarily.”
“Really?” he mimics, sarcastic now. “Like the Sienese aren’t all fucking nuts?” “But — why did you come to my studio?” “I wasn’t looking for you, Muriel. I was looking for Giovanni’s car. I asked around and met your landlady. She said he was there last night. He knocked on your door.” “I had no idea.”
“His parents are at the hospital. I’m trying to help them understand what happened.” “Will he be all right?”
“We don’t know. He was hurt pretty badly.” Chris is paying attention now. “This doesn’t happen in Siena.” I look at my watch. “I should call the hospital.” “No worries; I’ll take care of it,” he says. “You don’t want to deal with Italian phones.” Muriel uses a cocktail napkin to blot her tears. We wait in silence as Chris engages with someone at the hospital. He thrusts the phone at me. “Tell them you’re a relative.” My mind stalls. I can’t think of one word in Italian.
“How do you say it?”
I repeat the phrase like a dummy. Chris takes the phone and listens deeply. Now he’s thanking them. His tone has become polite. Muriel and I wait uneasily. He clicks off and speaks in that calm, eerie monotone.
“The boy is being taken to the operating room.” “For the leg?”
“Nothing regarding a leg. His heart is failing.” “Did he have a cardiac arrest?” “Might have. She said it’s critical.” “I’ll drive. I’m perfectly able,” Muriel announces crisply, and slips her purse beneath her arm.
ELEVEN
Even before I get to Giovanni’s room, there is a jam-up of nurses and technicians in the hall. As I peer at the huddle of green scrubs, listening to instructions ordered back and forth in Italian, the truth of being a foreigner has never been clearer. The huddle starts to move as one, and then the gurney shoots out the door, trailing IV stands and monitors. They veer left, and Giovanni passes right beneath my eyes. It is almost indecent to look at him, helpless and exposed, unconscious, pure white skin, his beautiful head in a blue paper cap lolling as they turn a corner. My jaw aches. I have been clenching my teeth.
Muriel, who has been arguing with someone at the nursing station, wobbles toward me looking flushed and unsteady.
“He has to have an operation on his heart. It’s all I could get out of her, the cheeky little snit. And why does she insist on wearing that God-awful smock?” Muriel sways on her feet. I grab her fleshy biceps and ease her into a chair, wondering if the rum e peras have finally hit.
“Are you okay?”
“I’ve been through several bouts of cancer with my partner, Sheila. As a result, I tend to have a hard time in hospitals.” In the car I learned that Sheila works for a bank in Piccadilly, and only comes to Italy for three weeks in spring. Nevertheless, their ten-year relationship has endured across the channel. Winters in Siena, Muriel is happy to roost like a hen among her cloud paintings. “It works out,” Muriel assured me, while speeding to the hospital along a commercial shortcut through the sunflower fields, past storage silos and water treatment plants.
“How are you feeling?” I ask.
“Like what the bloody cat dragged in. Look, I’m sorry, but it’s just too many bad memories. I’ve got to get out of here.” She gets to her feet and totters toward the nearest exit, adding incongruously, “Give my best to Giovanni.” Crowded with immigrants from defunct communist nations, the hallway resembles a Balkan bazaar. Tough, shaven-headed Albanian janitors are pushing mops. A Yugoslav family argues over the slumped head of a matriarch in a wheelchair. Somehow I convince the cheeky little snit in the God-awful smock (dinosaurs) to page Dr. Cecilia Nicosa, and moments later she appears in a crisp white lab coat with a stethoscope in the pocket. Her eyes are shrunken and exhausted. We kiss each other’s cheeks and sit side by side on a couch that matches the royal blue of the walls.
“Giovanni developed an irregular heartbeat,” she reports. “He was going into hypotensive shock. Nobody could understand it. I told you Dr. Ciardi fixed the artery in the leg, but the blood pressure kept going down and the danger is that if the new blood supply continues to drop, he could lose the leg. We did two tests — an angiogram and echocardiogram — and they both showed that blood was extravasating from the heart.” “What does that mean?” “There is a hole in the heart, and it is leaking blood.” “Was the hole there all along?” “No,” she snaps. “He was stabbed.” “I know that, but—”
“When we first examined the stab wounds, we did not realize that the tip of the knife had lacerated the pericardium. The sack around the heart. So now he will need a second surgery to sew up the tear.” “You were right. This is not about some boys fighting over a flag.” “All I care about now is that we have the best thoracic surgeon working on my son.” Despite fatigue, her eyes are defiant. Her composure is a skill that results from learning how to judge the degree of danger — not unlike our shoot/don’t shoot scenario in the Bureau, where you have a split
