‘That’s a long way off,’ she said, suddenly serious. ‘The new woman is only skin deep, for the moment.’
‘I hope this doesn’t mean you won’t have any time for me. I could really do with you in the shop.’
‘I still want to work there. I can translate in the evenings. When do I start?’
‘How about this morning?’ His tone became joking again. ‘I’d better get some work out of you before the rest of the world beats a path to your door.’
‘They want me,’ she breathed. ‘They want me and nobody else.’
‘Of course they do. You’re the best. They know that because you told them.’
Ruth aimed a swipe at him and he ducked, grinning. Minna, entering at that moment, nodded as though she’d seen something that confirmed what she already believed. Understanding her, Pietro grimaced, wishing it were possible to explain that she’d got it wrong. Ruth had reached out to him in her need and vulnerability, and in caring for her he’d found a strange kind of peace. But he knew Minna would never understand this.
Like everyone who worked for him she was just waiting to celebrate the day when he found another wife and emerged from the darkness that too often engulfed him. But none of them understood how far from happening that was, and how determined he was to keep a distance between himself and all women.
Ruth was different. Her unique situation meant he could care for her without dread of the outcome.
By now Ruth was beginning to know the way to St Mark’s, down this
Mario, forewarned of her arrival, was lyrical in his relief. Together he and Pietro showed her the ropes, but then Pietro wisely stood back and let them put their heads together. Free from his employer’s eye, Mario admitted that his French was patchy.
‘I just about get by,’ he said, ‘and so far there have been no disasters, but if you-’
He broke off with a pleading look.
‘Don’t worry,’ she told him, smiling. ‘French is one of my languages.’
But her first chance to prove her worth came, not with a foreign language, but with an Englishman who spoke with a strong regional accent. Seeing Mario floundering Ruth stepped in, becoming a conduit again until the man was out of the shop.
‘He said he spoke English,’ Mario protested.
‘He did,’ Ruth said. ‘But you have to come from a certain part of England to understand it. Never mind. We sold him an expensive package, and that’s what really matters.’
‘Spoken like a true entrepreneur,’ Pietro said appreciatively.
‘You have a gift for finance,’ Mario agreed.
‘I never knew that before. I’m just a language teacher-why, that’s it!
She struck her head and did a little dance of delight.
‘Now I remember, I was friendly with one of the other teachers, and I used to visit her at home. She had a dog with epilepsy.’
‘That’s excellent,’ Pietro said. ‘Bit by bit, we’ll win. Now you and Mario had better go off and have lunch together before we confuse the poor fellow any more.’
From the first she’d been at ease with Mario. Over lunch she explained briefly that her memory was sometimes vague, owing to an accident. There was no need to mention Gino.
‘That’s why some of the things you hear me say don’t seem to make sense,’ she said.
‘Like about the dog? Thank you for telling me.’
He told her about his life, which might be described as sedate. He still lived with his family, under his mother’s thumb from the sound of it. He’d worked in the shop for five years and his admiration for Count Bagnelli was enormous.
‘Mind you, he’d be annoyed if he heard me call him that,’ Mario admitted. ‘He never uses the title if he can avoid it. In fact I think he actually dislikes it, says it’s more trouble than it’s worth.’
‘Now that sounds like an affectation,’ Ruth said decidedly.
‘Oh, no, he’s never gone in for a lot of display. He started the business because he preferred to work for a living. He doesn’t consider administering his estate working.’
‘You mean, he doesn’t have to do it?’ Ruth asked. ‘I thought the Bagnellis must have lost all their money.’
‘He’s one of the richest men in Italy.’
‘But that great empty palace is like a building that’s been abandoned and left to rot.’
Mario shook his head vigorously.
‘You can’t have seen much of it, or you wouldn’t say that. It’s kept in perfect condition. Any crack is mended at once, before it can spread. Every piece of furniture is protected by dust covers. But it’s empty, except for a few rooms where he lives alone, or as much alone as he can manage. There used to be dozens of servants in the palazzo, but he sent them to work on his estate, and shut most of the rooms up.’
He gave an envious sigh.
‘You should have seen it ten years ago, when the old count was still alive. He was a man who enjoyed the high life, and Pietro was the same. The reputation he had! Casanova lived again! I was in my teens and I lapped up the stories. I swore I’d be the same when I was older but-’
He shrugged and looked down at his unimpressive person. Ruth smiled in sympathy.
‘So Pietro had a big reputation with women?’ she said curiously.
‘The biggest,’ said a voice just behind her, and Ruth turned to see a large middle-aged woman with a motherly face.
‘Hallo, Jessica,’ Mario greeted her. ‘This is Ruth who’s coming to work in the shop. Jessica owns this place.’
When greetings had been exchanged Jessica got back to the subject that clearly fascinated her.
‘I’ve lived in Venice all my life, and you never saw anything like it. There wasn’t a woman in town who wouldn’t have taken him to her bed. But he only slept with the best, very stylish ladies.’
‘I suppose they were all aristocrats, like him,’ Ruth suggested.
‘No!’ Both her companions shook their heads vigorously as though to advance such an idea was to miss the point.
‘He didn’t care about titles,’ Jessica said. ‘Why should he, when he has one of his own? But they had to be outstanding, not just beautiful, but with a certain “something extra”, to make him proud.’
It was clear that she considered Pietro a credit to Venice.
‘The Palazzo Bagnelli was the best place in town to be entertained,’ Mario agreed.
‘They took on extra staff for parties,’ Jessica added. ‘I’ve worked there myself many times.’
‘But now there’s only Minna and Celia,’ Mario observed, ‘and people say he only keeps them out of kindness, that he’d prefer to be completely alone.’
‘But how can any man live like that?’ Ruth wondered. ‘And why?’
‘It’s been that way since his wife died. She loved entertaining too. The place was always full of people and light. Then she died and the lights went out.’
‘I knew he was a widower,’ Ruth says, ‘but he avoids all mention of her. What was she like?’
But before he could answer there was a cry of ‘Hey, Mario!’ from a couple of his friends who had come in, and in the flurry of introductions the subject was lost.
Ruth was left wondering. There were so many things she wanted to ask about Pietro, but everything she learned only seemed to deepen the mystery. It was impossible to connect the light-hearted playboy of Jessica and Mario’s description with the man who now lived like a monk in dark solitude.
She took some papers home to continue studying the firm. Pietro explained a good deal to her, and they spent a pleasant evening working. But when she’d gone to bed she remembered how Mario had said she couldn’t have seen much of the palazzo. Gino had taken her over the building, showing it off with a proprietorial air that she now realised had been part of his performance. She hadn’t noticed much about the condition of the place. She had been too dazzled by the young man.
Now she realised how little she’d thought of him today. Pietro had occupied her thoughts more. Mario’s words, ‘Then she died and the lights went out,’ were haunting.
The building had never seemed so dark and silent, as though the man whose heart had died with his wife had turned it into a tomb, where he could wait until the day he would be with her.
She went to the window, looking out to where the landing-stage bobbed in the water just below her, then ran
