have I done to him?’
‘What have
‘He’s changed. Grown up. Last night it was like talking to an old man.’ He sighed. ‘Whatever happens now, we’ll never see the Gino we knew.’
Alex forced herself to say the words that terrified her.
‘How can I stay here if it’s going to do this to him? If I go away-’
‘No,’ he said quickly. ‘I can’t live without you. I won’t let you go.’
‘I don’t want to leave you,’ she whispered, ‘but-’
‘No buts. We have the right to our love. Besides, your leaving wouldn’t solve anything. Gino and I can’t turn time back to before you came, and even if I could do that, I wouldn’t.’ His voice deepened, became tender. ‘Never to have known you, loved you, to return to the half-life where you didn’t exist-I couldn’t do it.
‘Thank heavens!’ she said huskily. ‘I was so afraid you’d want me to go.’
‘Then you don’t know me very well. I can’t live without you now. The only reconciliation my brother and I can have is when he discovers the woman who will really be his love.’
He took her face between his hands.
‘I told him we were to be married, although I hadn’t asked you.’
‘You know you didn’t need to ask me. All I want is to stay here with you.’
‘That’s all I want too. Please God, we’ll have many years together.’
They set the date of their wedding for three weeks ahead, and chose a small village church, on the edge of the farm. Many of the guests would be the farm-hands who, more than any others, had cause to rejoice at this marriage.
Wedding presents poured in, but the only gift they wanted was news of Gino, who had not returned.
He arrived unexpectedly one day while they were both out, and they reached home to find his car standing outside while he loaded luggage onto it.
His appearance shocked them. He had actually aged. His face, once so full of smiles, looked as though it would never smile again.
‘I came for the rest of my things,’ he said. ‘But I waited for you. I couldn’t leave without saying goodbye.’
‘You’re going for good?’ Rinaldo asked. ‘But this is your home.’
He did smile then, wanly and with irony.
‘What do you suggest?’ he asked. ‘That we all three live together? You know we can’t.’
They were silenced, knowing he was right.
‘Where have you been?’ Rinaldo demanded at last.
‘I’m staying with friends while I sort myself out. I think I’ll go abroad.’
‘But you own part of this farm,’ Rinaldo reminded him.
‘I know. We’ll have to make some kind of arrangement about that.’
‘We’ve got time,’ Rinaldo argued. ‘At least stay here until the wedding-’
Gino stopped him. ‘No,’ he said with finality.
‘But you will be there?’ Alex implored.
‘I don’t know. Don’t count on me.’
‘There’s something I’ve been wanting to tell you,’ Rinaldo said heavily. ‘I never thought it would be like this, but you must know. It’s about Poppa. You’ve often asked me what happened at the hospital, when I was alone with him, and I could never tell you, because I couldn’t remember. It was as though a curtain had been drawn across it, blotting it out from me. But that night-the night you came home-’
‘Go on,’ Gino said.
‘It came back, while I was asleep. He spoke to me, and he tried to tell me about the money. He couldn’t finish the words, but he tried. He didn’t want to leave us to discover it the way we did.’
Gino nodded. ‘Thank you,’ he said at last. ‘I’m glad you told me. It seems to give him back to us somehow.’
‘Yes,’ Rinaldo said at once. ‘That’s exactly what I felt.’
For a moment they were brothers again.
‘I’d better go now,’ Gino said. He hesitated before asking in a low voice, ‘May I speak to Alex alone?’
‘Of course,’ she said at once.
Rinaldo nodded, and turned away to go into the house.
‘It’s all right,’ Gino said. ‘I’m not going to embarrass you. I just wanted to say-I don’t know. I’d planned to say so much, and now it’s all gone out of my head.’
‘Forgive me,’ she pleaded.
‘There’s nothing to forgive. You had the right to make your own choice. You’ll never know how much I love you, because now I’m not free to tell you.’
‘I think you just have told me,’ she whispered.
He shook his head.
‘That doesn’t begin to say it. It was like a miracle to me to discover that such feeling could exist.’
‘You’ll feel it again, when you meet the right person for you.’
‘Perhaps,’ he said, and she knew he didn’t believe her. ‘But if that shouldn’t happen-thank you.’
It was a moment before she could speak.
‘You have nothing to thank me for,’ she said at last.
‘Oh, yes, I have everything to thank you for. And I do.’
She put out a hand to him but he flinched away, softening the gesture with a smile that it hurt her to see.
‘The truth was staring me in the face all the time, wasn’t it?’ he said. ‘That night when we had dinner, and I said you always brought the conversation back to Rinaldo. There was the clue, if only I had the wit to see it. It’s nobody’s fault but mine.’
‘Come in and stay for a while,’ she begged. ‘Don’t go like this.’
‘I think I’d better leave.’
‘At least come in and get your ring. You left it behind.’
‘You fetch it for me. I’ll wait here.’
She went into the house, turning in the doorway to see him standing beside the car, looking at her.
Upstairs she found Rinaldo and explained her errand. He followed her into her room and waited while she found the ring.
‘When I give this to him,’ she said, ‘perhaps we-’
She was stopped by the sound of a car engine.
‘Oh, no!’ she gasped.
From the window they saw Gino’s car vanishing in the distance.
She couldn’t help herself then. She hid her face against Rinaldo and wept.
The wedding was both sad and happy. If things had been different Alex and Rinaldo would have bickered lovingly about which of them would claim Gino’s services-she wanted him to give her away, and he wanted him as best man.
As it was, she was given away by Isidoro, her lawyer, and Rinaldo’s best man was his foreman.
But all other thoughts faded as they stood together before the altar. This was her moment of glorious fulfilment, the moment that would inspire the rest of her life. Looking at Rinaldo she knew that it was the same with him.
Suddenly she heard a faint whisper in the church. Turning her head a little she managed to look over her shoulder enough to see the door.
A young man was standing there, silhouetted against the light. Alex couldn’t see his face, but the sun just touched his hair, giving him almost a halo. He stood very still.
Then she thought she saw him move, coming forward to sit in a pew.
Of course he had come, she thought, happy and relieved. Whatever his pain, Gino’s warm heart wouldn’t let him stay away.
The priest was asking Rinaldo if he took her to be his wife. In a firm voice he declared his intention of doing so. Then it was her turn.
She forgot Gino. All her attention now was for the man she loved, making her his, as he was hers, for life.
