The Wedding Arrangement

From his place on the shelf Gianni seemed to follow her around the apartment with his eyes. She smiled at him, trying to find reassurance in his presence as she had so often before. But this time she couldn’t sense him smiling back.

The kitchen table was scattered with papers. Reluctantly she sat down to finish her work, but her mind couldn’t concentrate. It was a relief when her cellphone rang.

‘Charlie! Mamma’s been worrying about you. Where have you got to? You’re where?’

CHAPTER TWO

THE young policeman looked up with admiration as Signora Minerva strode into the station.

‘Buona notte,’ he said. ‘It’s always a pleasure to see you here, signora.’

‘Be careful, Rico,’ she warned him. ‘That remark could be construed as harassment. You’re reminding me that my relatives are always in some sort of trouble.’

‘No, I was saying how pretty you always look,’ he replied, hurt.

Minnie laughed. She liked Rico, a naive country boy, overwhelmed by his assignment to Rome, and wide-eyed about everything, including herself.

‘Always?’ she teased.

‘Every time your relatives are in trouble,’ he said irrepressibly. ‘How an important lawyer like yourself comes to be related to so many criminals-’

‘That’s enough!’ she told him sternly. ‘I grant you, they can be a little wayward, but there’s never anything violent.’

‘Signor Charlie has been in something violent tonight. His shirt is torn, he’s bleeding. Huge big fight. The fellow with him is even worse. He’s a big, bad man with a nasty face.’ Rico took a deep breath as he came to the real crime. ‘And he doesn’t have any papers.’

‘What, nothing?’

‘No identity card. No passport.’

‘Well, we don’t all carry our passports around with us.’

‘But this man speaks Italian with an accent. He is a foreigner.’ He added in a low, horrified voice, ‘I think he’s English.’

‘So was my mother,’ Minnie said sharply. ‘It’s not a hanging crime.’

‘But he has no papers,’ Rico said, returning to the heart of the matter. ‘And he won’t say where he’s living, so he’s probably sleeping in the streets. Very drunk.’

‘And he was fighting Charlie?’

‘No, they were on the same side-I think. It’s hard to be sure because Charlie’s drunk too.’

‘Where is he?’

‘In a cell, with this other fellow. I think he’s afraid of him. He won’t say a word against him.’

‘Does “this fellow” have a name?’

‘He won’t give his name, but Charlie calls him Lucio. I’ll take you to him.’

She knew the way to the cells by now, having come here so often to help her relatives, who were as light- fingered as they were light-hearted. Even so, she was aghast at the sight of her young brother-in-law, seated lolling against the wall, scruffy, bruised and definitely the worse for wear.

Rico vanished to find the key, which he’d forgotten to bring. Minnie stood watching Charlie, wishing he didn’t look so much like a down-and-out. But his companion was even worse, she realised, as though he’d fought ten men.

Tall, muscular, unshaven, he looked strong enough to deal with any number of opponents. Like Charlie he wore a badly torn shirt and his face was bruised, with a cut over one eye. But, unlike Charlie, he didn’t look as if it were all too much for him. In fact, he didn’t look as though anything would be too much for him.

So this was Lucio, a thoroughly ugly customer, brutal, with huge fists to power his way through the world-a man used to getting his own way by the use of force. She gave a shudder of distaste.

Then Charlie seemed to half wake up, rub his eyes, lean forward with his hands between his knees and his head bent in an attitude of dejection. ‘Lucio’ came to sit beside him and put a hand on his shoulder, shaking him slightly in a rallying manner.

Charlie said something that she couldn’t catch and Lucio replied. He, too, was inaudible, but she sensed that he spoke gently. Then he grinned, and the sight surprised her. It was ribald and full of derision, yet with a hint of kindness, and it seemed to hearten the boy.

Rico returned. ‘I’ll let him out and you can talk with him in an interview room,’ he said, ‘well away from that one.’

The sound of the key turning made both men look up. Rico opened the door and addressed Charlie in a portentous tone.

‘Signor Pepino, your sister is here. Also your lawyer.’ Trying to be witty, he added, ‘They came together.’

Out of the corner of her eye Minnie saw Lucio stiffen and throw a sharp look at Charlie, then at her. He stared as though thunderstruck. His eyes contained both a frown and a question as they looked her up and down in a considering way that was almost insulting.

In this she did him an injustice. Luke was beyond thinking anything except that this couldn’t possibly be happening.

Pepino? A lawyer?

She was Signora Pepino? This dainty fair-haired creature was the dragon? And he, who’d laid such plans for gaining the upper hand, found himself in a police cell-dishevelled, disorderly, hung-over and, worst of all, dependent on her.

Great!

Charlie tried to fling his arms about her, hailing her emotionally as his saviour.

‘Get off, you ruffian!’ she told him firmly. ‘You look as if you’ve been rolling in the gutter and you smell like a brewery. I suppose you’re relying on me to get you out of here?’

‘And my friend,’ Charlie said, indicating Luke.

‘Your friend will wish to make his own arrangements.’

‘No, I’ve told him you’ll look after him too. He saved my life, Minnie. You wouldn’t abandon him to his fate when he’s poor and alone and has nobody to help him?’ Charlie was in an ecstasy of tipsy emotion.

Minnie groaned. ‘If you don’t shut up I’ll abandon you,’ she told him in exasperation.

‘I’ll take you to an interview room,’ Rico said.

‘No, thank you, I’ll stay here and talk to both of them.’

‘Stay here?’ Rico asked, aghast. ‘With that one?’ He pointed to Luke.

‘I’m not afraid of him,’ she said crossly. ‘Perhaps he should be afraid of me. How dare you do this to my brother?’

Luke leaned against the wall, regarding her ironically through half-closed eyes.

‘Look,’ he said, sounding bored, ‘bail your brother out or do what you have to. Then go. I can manage for myself.’

‘Lucio, no!’ Charlie exclaimed. ‘Minnie, you must look after him. He’s my friend.’

‘He’s a lot older than you and should know better,’ she said firmly.

‘That’s right, it’s all my fault,’ Luke said. ‘Just leave.’

He promised himself that when they next met he would be washed, shaved and well-pressed. With any luck she might not even recognise him.

‘What did you mean about saving your life?’ she asked.

Charlie launched into an explanation which was more or less accurate considering the state he was in. The