The Wedding Arrangement

‘It short for Charlemagne, because the family name is Pepino, which was the name of Charlemagne’s father-’

‘And they’re descended from him?’ Hope said.

Luke grinned. ‘You’d never get them to admit that they weren’t. And one of the neighbours has a cat called Tiberius-’

‘After the Emperor Tiberius?’ Hope asked, her lips twitching.

‘Of course. It’s that sort of place.’

He began to laugh at the memory, unaware that his mother was looking at him with fascination.

‘So you and Charlemagne were brawling,’ she reminded him.

‘And Minnie came to bail him out, and that’s how we met. She ended up defending me in court as well.’

The two women burst into laughter.

‘How I wish I’d been there to see,’ Hope said at last. ‘My sensible, businesslike son, in a drunken brawl!’

‘I didn’t say drunken-’

‘Nonsense, of course it was!’ Olympia said firmly. ‘Oh, dear-’

They went off into more gales of laughter while Luke gritted his teeth. But after a moment he relaxed and grinned.

‘I remember the day you left here,’ Hope said, ‘full of plans to confront her in a businesslike fashion, not standing for any nonsense-’

‘And I did confront her, in a police cell, with my clothes torn. I didn’t have my ID card so she had to go to the hotel to collect it, and my phone. That’s how she came to answer it.’

‘You’ve been keeping a lot to yourself. You told me that you’d moved into the Residenza, but you left out the best things.’

‘Well, I wasn’t going to boast about my criminal record to my mother,’ he said defensively, but he was grinning again.

‘But the two of you have made friends now, since she was the one you went to when Toni called.’

He hesitated. ‘I didn’t have to go to her, Mamma. She was right there with me-’

‘In your bed?’

‘Her bed. I’ve been staying with her so that she could nurse me, but it wasn’t-as you think.’

‘I think nothing, my son, since nothing in your relationship with this young woman seems to follow a normal course. Where do you stand with each other?’

‘I only wish I knew. I feel closer to her than any other woman I’ve ever known, and I know that she needs me. But I’m not the man she loves.’

Hope’s eyebrows rose. ‘Loving another man, she shares your bed?’

‘Not in the sense you mean. For the last week she’s cuddled up to me at night as she might have cuddled up to an old dog. The man she loves is her late husband, Gianni Pepino. He’s been dead for four years but it might be yesterday, she’s still so tied to his memory. No, he’s more than a memory, he’s a ghost that she can’t escape. He’s in her thoughts, he’s there with us all the time. At night I’ve held her in my arms while she spoke of him.’

‘And that’s really all?’ Hope asked, incredulous and slightly scandalised at the same time.

‘Yes, it makes me sound like a wimp, doesn’t it? All right, I am a wimp, but it’s what she needs. She must talk of him or go mad, and she can’t tell the others, so it has to be me.’

‘And that is all the use she has for you, my son?’

Luke gave a wry laugh. ‘That is all the use she has for me. Tonight, I did briefly hope-but it wasn’t me. Not really.’

‘But why do you put up with it? There are many other women in the world.’

He said nothing for a moment, but at last he spoke as though with the words he had finally discovered the truth.

‘No, Mamma, there aren’t. There isn’t another woman whose smile can wring my heart as hers can, or make me want to throw aside everything else if only I can make her happy.’

Hope regarded him quizzically. ‘This is you talking-my son, whose life has been lived balancing the accounts, calculating what everyone and everything was worth to him, and taking the long view?’

He winced. ‘I’m not as bad as that, am I?’

‘You were. But not now, I think.’ Then, as though there were some connection, which perhaps there was, she added, ‘I passed on your message of thanks to Olympia, by the way.’

‘And I’m beginning to understand it now,’ Olympia said. ‘At one time you’d never have said the things you’re saying now.’

He nodded. ‘At one time, if a woman didn’t go my way, I went off in another direction,’ he mused. ‘You were the first one I stuck around for, although I knew I might be knocked back-and I was. So, when Minnie knocks me back, I’ll have some experience to help me cope.’

Olympia’s answer to this was to lean forward and kiss him lightly on the mouth.

‘I don’t think she’ll knock you back,’ she said. ‘Although you may have to come to your big sister for some advice.’

‘Now go on with the story,’ Hope commanded. ‘Tell us some more about this man she married.’

‘She feels guilty about his death because they were quarrelling, he chased after her and was run over in the road. He died in her arms. As a man-’ Luke shrugged. ‘He seems to have been a good-natured fellow, kind and affectionate. He was a truck driver, so I doubt if he’d ever have set the world alight, but he made her feel loved.’

‘Oh-ho!’ Hope exclaimed, regarding him with slightly scornful irony. ‘So a truck driver has thrown you into the shade! You, of course, know all about setting the world alight, but have you ever made a woman feel so deeply loved that she never recovered from your loss?’

‘Never,’ he growled. ‘There’s no need to labour the point, Mamma.’

‘No, because you’ve seen it for yourself, haven’t you? You spoke lightly of throwing everything else aside for her sake, but were they only words, or could you live up to them if you had to? You might make her love you in a way, but suppose you can’t also drive his ghost away? Can you live with him there, too, for her sake?’

‘That’s the thought that torments me. Does she love me, or does she merely cling to me from need?’

‘And, if it’s the second, can you love her anyway? Love isn’t like a book-keeping ledger, my son. You don’t always get equal repayment in return for what you give. Do you love her enough to settle for less, as long as she is happy?’

‘I wish I knew myself better. Tonight we were together out here, and there was a moment when I thought I could make love to her. But I didn’t. Something stopped me, something in here-’ He laid a hand over his heart.

‘What was it that stopped you, my son?’

‘He was there and I couldn’t get rid of him, and if I can’t, how can she? I told her I’d never make love to her until I came first, but-’

‘But suppose you never do?’ Olympia asked gently. ‘What then?’

He was silent for a long moment, before saying wretchedly, ‘I don’t know. Heaven help me, I don’t know!’

Minnie was packed and ready to go next morning.

‘Of course you must attend to your work,’ Hope told her kindly, ‘but you must return to us soon. Luke, I rely on you to arrange it.’

The others came to bid her goodbye, including Franco, who said, ‘You must forgive me for not remembering your name. I was jet lagged out of my mind last night.’

‘This is Signora Minerva Pepino,’ Luke said.

Only the most astute observer would have noticed the sudden frisson that went through Franco. Minnie was too occupied with her troubled thoughts to sense anything.

Luke walked her to the car. ‘I’ll be in Rome in a day or two,’ he said.

‘Your mother may want you to stay longer.’

‘I can’t risk it,’ he said lightly. ‘Who knows what legal mischief you’ll get up to in my absence? I’ll be there soon. Count on it.’

‘Let’s hope they’ve finished renovating your flat,’ she said lightly.