A Family For Keeps

were ready. So you got worse again.'

'But to sleep for a week!'

'Or a hundred years,' he said ironically.

'Yes, now I know how the sleeping princess felt. I've even lost track of the date. Mind you, I often-'

She checked, as if about to reveal something, but then thinking better of it. Vincenzo's curiosity was heightened.

'You often forget the date?' he asked. 'How come?'

'Nothing. I didn't mean that.'

She met his gaze, defying him to disbelieve her openly, although she knew he wasn't convinced. He backed down first.

'Well, anyway, it's December second,' he said.

'That's weird, to fall asleep in one month and awake in another. And no newspapers or television. It's strange how nice life can be without them.'

'To shut the world out!' he mused. 'Yes, that would be nice. What is it?'

He asked because she had suddenly stopped in the middle of the floor, and her eyes became vague, as though she were listening to distant voices.

'I don't know,' she said. 'It's just that-I had such dreams-such dreams-'

'Can you recall any of them?' Nobody could have told from Vincenzo's voice that the answer mattered to him.

'I think so-there was-there was-'

She closed her eyes, fighting desperately to summon back a memory that lay just beyond reach. It was disturbing, and yet in its heart lay a feeling of peace, the very one she was seeking.

'Try,' Vincenzo said, unable to keep a hint of urgency out of his voice.

But it was a fatal thing to say. The minute she reached out for the dream it vanished.

'It's gone,' she said with a sigh. 'I hope it comes back. I think it was lovely.'

He shrugged. 'If you can't remember it, how do you know it was lovely?'

'You know how it is with dreams. They leave you with a kind of feeling, even when you forget the details.'

'And what feeling did this one leave behind?'

'It was peaceful and-happy-' She said the last word in a tone of astonishment. 'Oh, heck, it was probably nothing at all.'

'Nothing at all,' Vincenzo agreed.

She looked around. 'Where's Piero?'

'He's gone to the landing stage.'

'Looking for Elena? Perhaps she'll come today.'

Vincenzo shook his head. 'She'll never come. She died several years ago.'

Julia sighed. 'I wondered about that. I can't make him out. How does he come to be living like this?'

'At one time he was a university professor. Elena, his daughter, was everything to him, especially after his wife died. Then she died too and everything finished for him.'

'He lost a child?' she murmured.

She felt something tearing at her at the thought of Piero and his lost child. There was no pain like it. How could anyone recover?

'She was drowned while out sailing. They found her body three days later. I was on the quay when they brought her home, and I saw Piero, staring out to sea as the boat came in. But when it landed he didn't seem to see it, just walked away. He didn't even go to her funeral because he refused to believe she was dead.

'He's never accepted it. I've tried to make him understand. I've even taken him to the cemetery at San Michele, to show him her grave, but he won't look at it.'

'Of course not. You shouldn't have done that.'

'Isn't it better for him to face reality?'

'Why?' she asked quickly. 'What's so marvellous about reality?'

'Nothing, I suppose.'

'Let him cling to his hope. Without it he'd go crazy.'

'But he's already a little crazy.'

'Then let him be crazy, if that's the only way to stop his heart breaking,' Julia said, almost pleading with him. 'How can you understand?'

'Perhaps I can,' he said wryly. 'Anyway, I know what you mean. Tell me-are you crazy?'

'Oh, yes,' she said, almost cheerfully. 'I'm as mad as a hatter.'

'Because of the ghosts inside you? That's what you said.'

'If I did, I was feverish. I don't remember.'

'I think you do. I think you remember what you want to remember.'

Her relaxed mood vanished and his probing made her nerves taut again.

'I don't know who you are,' she said in a low, angry voice, 'but I can't see why you come here.'

'Must there be a reason?'

'Well, you don't need a place to sleep, do you? And why else would you be here except to patronise us? No,I I'm sorry-' She threw up her hand. 'I didn't mean to say that. But just don't start getting clever with me.'

'Not even to stop you hurting someone?'

'I'm not going to hurt anyone.'

'Except yourself.'

'That's my problem.'

'Mio Dio, it's like trying to argue with a hornet. I only said you picked your memories to suit yourself.'

She gave an edgy laugh.

'If I could do that I'd forget a lot of things. It's the ones I can't help remembering that are the problem. Piero's the wise one. He's found a way to choose what to remember.'

'Yes, I guess he has,' Vincenzo said wryly. 'And I think I hear him coming, so can we delay our hostilities for another time?'

She walked over to the window, annoyed with herself. For a brief moment she had been at ease with him, regaining human feelings that she had thought lost for ever. Then he had stepped over an invisible line, actually daring to understand her. And he had become an enemy again.

The door opened and Piero appeared.

'Not today?' Julia asked sympathetically.

'Not today,' he said brightly. 'Never mind. Maybe next time.'

Abruptly Vincenzo remembered that he had to be somewhere else, clapped Piero on the shoulder, and departed.

CHAPTER THREE

The next afternoon, while Piero was out, Julia spent the time looking around the great building. The sight was both melancholy and magnificent.

The grandeur was still there. The Counts di Montese had lived like kings, secure in their wealth and authority. Now it was all gone. The rooms were silent and draughts whispered down the corridors.

The walls of the grand staircase were lined with frescoes, leading to a large one at the top, that she now knew was Annina. Watching it gave her a vague sensation of disturbance that grew with every moment. She wanted to run away, but she forced herself to keep climbing until she was facing the painted woman with her wild hair and her tormented eyes. Her heart raced faster and faster; she was suffocating-

And then it stopped. As suddenly as it had started the suffocating misery and terror ceased, leaving her with a feeling of calm release, almost as though someone had laid a comforting hand on her, and said, 'I'm here. I'll make it all right.'