The Bottle Factory Outing - Beryl Bainbridge [36]
‘That’s nice,’ said Brenda.
‘Let go of me,’ hissed Freda. ‘For God’s sake, get lost.’
Seeing the deserted promenade lined with stone seats, she urgently wanted Rossi and Aldo and Brenda to go away and leave her alone with Vittorio.
Brenda didn’t know what to do. She tiptoed selfconsciously around the square and trusted that Rossi would follow.
‘Lovely,’ she murmured in a little more than a whisper. ‘How old it all is.’
She went at a slightly increased pace along the southern flank of the cloister, relieved to hear the footsteps behind her. She turned left, fearful of coming back to Freda and found herself in the west wing of the Chapel. High on the wall was the fresco of a king with a white beard and eyes corroded by dampness. She paused and was joined by Rossi, his face pretentiously solemn as he stared upwards at the faded painting.
‘Where’s Aldo?’ she whispered.
‘He is somewhere.’
He made as if to retrace his steps, and she seized him by the arm. She had to think of something. Freda would never forgive her if they reappeared. After all she had ruined her assignation with Vittorio the night Mrs Haddon had called with her gun.
‘I’m going to be sick, Rossi,’ she said. And she pulled him down a dark passage set with little wooden doors and half-ran with him out into the open air and the cobbled forecourt. She headed towards a distant gateway, her arm in his, and found herself on a terrace overlooking a sunken garden.
‘I’m weary,’ announced Freda, and she flopped down on the convenient stone bench. Vittorio stretched his long legs and loosed the hood of his duffel coat. Small flecks of dandruff alighted on his shoulders. Aldo Gamberini, fretting at an archway, stared at the billiard cloth of grass. He cleared his throat. He wished he was working in his garden or helping his eldest son to oil his motorbike. After a moment he walked hesitatingly away in the direction of the Chapel.
‘We will all be lost to one another,’ said Vittorio.
‘Ah no,’ she said, ‘not you and I.’ And she leaned her blonde head on his shoulder.
‘You and I,’ he said, ‘are birds of a tree. You do not let me be the man.’
Now that they were alone he did not mind talking to her freely. His impending engagement to the girl from Casalecchio di Reno was his own concern. At this distance, and with Rossi so obviously in pursuit of Mrs Brenda, he was content to lay his heart bare to the large English girl who treated him with such familiarity.
‘I don’t what?’
‘You are always shouting. Giving orders.’
‘I’m not.’
‘You are never tranquil.’
‘Oh I am,’ said Freda. ‘Don’t you feel like a man?’ And unfairly she laid her pale hand on his trouser leg and stroked his thigh. ‘You and I,’ she warned, ‘could be something. I know about you.’
‘What do you know of me?’
She brought her face closer to his until the hairs of his moustaches tickled the edges of her mouth.
‘You see,’ she confided, ‘I’m not what I seem. I know I’m aggressive, but I’m not entirely. I’m surrounded perpetually by fools. Given the right opportunity, I could follow. If someone was strong enough to lead.’
She was staring at his mouth, her eyes veiled by the golden sweep of her lashes.
‘Ah well …’ he said, and his lips quivered.
‘I need something serious. Something I can get my teeth into.’
He brought his hand protectively to the collar of his red jumper.
‘I’m not fooling. I mean it for real. If I want something I go after it.’ She looked at him boldly. He was mesmerised by her blue eyes, the creamy texture of her cheeks, her tinted nails moving softly across his leg. ‘I’d do anything for you.’
‘I cannot,’ he said, ‘be less than truthful with you. I have other commitments.’
She had not heard the concluding words of his sentence. She had heard him say he could not be less than true to her, and all else was drowned and deafened in the flood of joy that filled her heart and suffused