Angel got into the back with Sam. She was still happy, but the first edge of her joy had gone. If only he had recognised her, just this one time. But he just needed a little time, she assured herself. She talked brightly, holding his hands between hers, telling him about their new home, asking him questions about how he’d been without her.
Vittorio, listening, was torn with pity for her. He couldn’t see her face but he knew from her voice how determinedly she was refusing to recognise the blank nothingness that was coming from the old man.
‘I’ve missed you so much, Sam. It was lovely when you called me the other night.’
‘What are you talking about? I never called you.’
‘Yes, you did, and we talked about how it would be when you arrived. You’re going to love your new home.’
‘Where are we?’
‘This is Italy, and we’re going to a lovely house, and-’
‘I want to go home. Who are you? Why are you making me go with you?’ His voice rose higher. ‘Let me go.’
He began to struggle with the car door, growing more upset by the moment.
‘Sam,
‘This is dangerous, we’ve got to stop,’ Vittorio said, pulling over onto the hard shoulder, and watching his mirror to see that the other car had stopped behind them. ‘Get one of those lads, quick.’
Roy was already running towards them, pulling open Sam’s door, taking the old man into his arms.
‘Help me,’ Sam wept.
‘Let me take him with us,’ Roy said to Angel. ‘He’ll calm down.’
‘Yes, do what he wants,’ she said raggedly.
‘Come and sit beside me,’ Vittorio urged her, patting the front passenger seat.
‘No, thanks, I’ll stay back here,’ she said bleakly. ‘It’s not far.’
She wouldn’t budge on this, and he was forced to drive the rest of the way trying to imagine what was happening in the back seat. Was she all right? Was she badly upset? He strained his ears but he could hear nothing.
After a while she said in a normal voice, ‘I should have known better than to separate him from the lads. Of course he’s confused, after not seeing me for a while, and then the journey-I expected too much. That’s all it is. Everything’s going to be fine.’
Her determined cheerfulness was more painful to him than tears would have been, but there was no comfort he could offer, and he could only say, ‘Of course it is.’
After that she didn’t speak again for the rest of the journey.
CHAPTER SEVEN
VITTORIO ate in the kitchen that evening, waiting until the house was quiet. He would have given a great deal to know what was happening, but although he could hear the others moving about it was impossible to guess details.
Berta, who served their meal, was cheerful because Sam seemed to have a hearty appetite. ‘He’s gone to bed,’ she told Vittorio when she’d collected the coffee cups. ‘One of the nurses has gone too, and the other one is talking to the
Later she took them more coffee and returned with the information that the other nurse had retired for the night. Vittorio lingered awhile, then strolled out into the garden, where he could see Sam’s darkened windows.
As he’d half hoped, Angel was there, sitting on the sloping lawn that led down from the terrace, looking up at the rising moon, and the stars that were just beginning to appear in the softly darkening sky.
‘So that’s Sam?’ he observed, dropping down beside her.
‘Yes, that’s my darling Sam.’
‘Did it get any better after he arrived?’
‘Not really,’ she said despondently. ‘He’s all right when he’s with the boys, but he doesn’t know me.’
‘How long has he been this way?’
‘About nine years, maybe a little more. He’s not always like today. Like I said, I handled it badly.’
That was probably true, yet it hurt him to hear her finding reasons to blame herself. He risked saying gently, ‘Is he ever very much better than today?’
‘Oh, yes, he often knows who I am.’
‘And he often doesn’t,’ Vittorio said shrewdly. ‘That must be hard for you.’
‘Yes,’ she said a little huskily. ‘But I know he’s all right with Roy and Frank.’
‘It must cost you a fortune to pay their salaries, and I expect there are other expenses.’
‘Yes, the extras add up. But I don’t want Sam to go without anything he needs. He never let me go without.’
‘Is this where Joe came into the equation?’
Angel nodded. ‘I told you I married him for his money. It was a fair bargain. I got what I wanted for Sam, Joe got a trophy wife to flaunt. I did all I promised him, jumped through every hoop he wanted, acted sexy, gazed at him adoringly. It was quite an act but, if I say it myself, I put on a good show, because I keep my word.’
‘For pity’s sake, you don’t have to justify yourself to me.’
She looked at him quizzically and he had the grace to blush.
‘I supposed I deserved that,’ he grunted.
‘I didn’t say anything.’
‘You didn’t have to. From the first day I acted as though you owed me explanations. I judged you in ignorance, and-’
‘Hey, that’s enough,’ she said, reaching over and taking his hand. ‘We’ve put all that behind us.’
‘So I thought, but I keep learning new things about you, and discovering again how wrong I was.’
‘It’s all right,’ she said, squeezing his hand tightly. ‘Friends.’
Angel thought Vittorio hesitated a long time before agreeing, ‘Friends.’
They were both silent for a while, their hands tightly clasped.
At last he said awkwardly, ‘Go on telling me about Sam.’
‘He brought me up after my parents died, and he was always lovely to me. He had such plans for my future. You wouldn’t think it to look at him now, but he was quite a slave-driver. He decided that I was going to college, and that was that.’
‘You didn’t get a say?’
‘Oh, yes, I was allowed to choose what I wanted to study, but even then he had to take control. I said I’d like to do the history of art, and Sam said, “In that case you’ll need to learn Italian”. So I did.’
‘You tamely did as you were told?
‘Well, I actually liked the idea a lot. I loved art, and I pick up languages easily, but I hadn’t thought about college because we weren’t an academic kind of family. Sam knew better. He simply took over, making me do my homework, and no nonsense. Then he declared war on junk food and insisted that I eat plenty of fruit.
‘He also started doing a second job so that he could save money for me. He shouldn’t have done that, it tired him out, but he was determined that I should have a nest-egg.’
She fell silent, looking into the distance.
‘What happened?’ Vittorio asked quietly.
‘I took my exams, did well, won a place at a good college. And then-then Sam had a stroke. It wasn’t very severe, and he recovered, but something had changed. He’d been getting absent-minded for some time, but only in little ways that we could joke about. Suddenly it was serious. He was forgetful about everything. I put off college, said I’d go next year, but I think I knew in my heart that it wouldn’t happen.
‘I got a job to support us, but I soon had to give that up. He kept leaving things on the stove. When he set fire to the house for the second time I left the job and stayed at home with him. We lived on his savings for a while.’
