The Tuscan Tycoon’s Wife

‘If I had to sell the shirt off my back you’d sell the shirt off yours, and we’d fight the world together and be happy. But if I’m rich, that means trouble. You turn away from me and wonder if I’m worth loving.’

‘It’s not like that,’ she cried.

‘I’m the same man, rich or poor, but you can only love me if we have the life you want. But I want that life too. I don’t want all this either.’

‘Then leave it. Tell them you won’t accept. Let’s go back to the farm and be happy.’

‘You don’t understand. It can’t be done like that. All this is now my responsibility, to my family, to the people who work for us and depend on us. I can’t just turn my back on all that.’

He took her gently by the shoulders and looked into her face. ‘My darling, it’s still a fight, just a different one. Why can’t you stand by me in this one, as you would have done the other?’

‘Because we’d each be fighting a different enemy, and we’d end up fighting each other. In a sense we already are.’

‘This is just a little argument-’

‘But you fired the first shot in the war a moment ago, didn’t you notice? You said, “You don’t understand”. You’re right. And as we go on there’ll be a million things I don’t understand, but you will. And more and more you won’t understand the things that are important to me, and in the end we’ll be saying “You don’t understand” to each other a dozen times a day.’

They were silent with fear, each seeing the cracks in the ground beneath their feet that would soon become a chasm that love couldn’t bridge.

But not yet. They couldn’t face it just now.

‘Don’t let’s talk any more tonight,’ Leo said hurriedly. ‘We’re both in a state of shock. Let’s leave it until we’re calmer.’

‘Yes, we’ll do that. We’ll talk when we get home.’

That put it at a safe distance. In the meantime they could hide from what was happening.

He took her back to her room and kissed her cheek at the door.

‘Try to sleep well,’ he said. ‘We’re going to need all our strength.’

As soon as she had closed the door he walked away. He hadn’t tried to go in, and she hadn’t said, ‘Stay with me’.

Leo spent the next day closeted with his uncle, Guido and a brace of lawyers, while Dulcie and Harriet showed Selena Venice. For an hour she tried to make the right noises, but the truth was the narrow alleys and canals suffocated her.

They went into St Mark’s where Dulcie and Guido had married recently, and where Harriet and Marco would marry soon.

It was like being an ant, Selena thought, looking up into the ancient, echoing building. It was magnificent, splendid, beautiful. But it turned you into an ant.

She thought of the little parish church at Morenza, and was glad that her own wedding would be there, and not in this place that crushed her.

Dulcie seemed to understand, for as they left she took a close look at Selena’s face and said, ‘Come with me,’ and shepherded them both to the nearby landing stage, where there were vaporetti, the boats Venetians used as buses.

‘Three to the Lido,’ she told the man in the ticket booth. To Harriet and Selena she said, ‘We’re going to spend the rest of the day on the beach.’

Selena’s spirits had perked up as the boat headed out for the forty-minute journey across the wide lagoon. After all those alleys she was in the open at last. And when they reached the Lido, the long thin island that bounded the lagoon and boasted one of the best beaches in the world, she caught her first ever glimpse of the sea, and it cheered her even more. Now that was some open space!

They bought bathing costumes and towels in the beach shops. When they’d changed they hired a huge umbrella and sat beneath it, rubbing each other with sun cream. Dulcie told of the day she’d come here with Guido.

‘He rubbed me with sun cream and I still managed to get burned, so he took me to his little bachelor flat and I was poorly for days.’ She smiled reminiscently. ‘It was very romantic.’

‘But if you were poorly-’ Selena said.

‘He looked after me wonderfully.’

‘But you didn’t-he didn’t-?’

‘No. We didn’t. That’s what made it so romantic.’

Later they ran down the beach to swim in the sea. Selena loved it. All work and no play had been the pattern of her life, and fooling around in the sun and the waves with no purpose but to enjoy herself was a novel experience. She began to think there might be something to be said for Venice after all.

But when the day was over and it was time to return, the great palace seemed to loom, waiting to swallow her up. It was actually very well lit, with huge windows that let in the light, but in her present mood the shades seemed to fall on her as soon as she entered.

She found Leo depressed but resigned.

‘There’s no way out,’ he said. ‘I’ve spent the day looking over my future with lawyers and accountants until my eyes have crossed. They’re trying to work out a way for me to compensate Guido financially, without having to sell the farm.’

‘Can it be done?’

‘If I spread it over several years.’

‘How is Guido about that?’

‘Great. He just shrugged and said, “It’s cool. Whatever.” He doesn’t care. He’s so happy to have dumped it on me that he’s like a kid out of school. And behind that juvenile charm he’s a very astute businessman. What he really lives off is his souvenir business and it’s making him a fortune. But of course I’ve got to do the right thing by him.’

‘And you’ll keep the farm?’

‘Yes, but life’s going to change for us.’

She nodded. ‘For us. Maybe I should have been in there too instead of being sent off to play.’

‘I don’t think anyone was trying to exclude you, it’s just that we were all talking Italian, and you wouldn’t have understood.’

He could have bitten his tongue off as soon as he said the last words, but she only smiled and said, ‘Sure.’

‘I mean, neither the lawyer nor the accountant speak any English, so we’d have been translating-’

‘It’s all right. You were absolutely right. It doesn’t really concern me, does it?’

‘Everything that happens to me concerns you,’ he said emphatically. ‘I’m sorry, darling, maybe you should have come in, despite the practical problems.’

She nodded, still smiling but still keeping her distance. But his face looked so desperate and weary that she couldn’t stand it.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said huskily, throwing her arms around him. ‘I’m a bitch to nag you when you’re unhappy.’

‘Just stay with me,’ he said, holding her tight. ‘Don’t leave me to struggle through this alone.’

‘I won’t, I won’t.’

He sighed. ‘I’ve got a confession to make. Uncle started on again about our wedding. According to him it has to be St Mark’s. I told him it was up to you.’

‘Oh, great! Blame me!’ She managed to smile. ‘You’d better say yes. You can’t start your new life by fighting with your family.’

‘Thank you carissima.’ He held her fiercely. ‘We’ll be out of here tomorrow.’

‘It’ll be all right when we’re home,’ she insisted.

But her words sounded hollow even to her own ears. She was full of dread, and she could sense that his own dread matched it.

She kept repeating to herself that everything would be all right when they were away from here. It was a mantra that kept her going as they packed their things next morning. Just a few more hours, a few more minutes- Even then she knew there was no real escape. They would have to return in a couple of weeks for Leo to sign