Widow - Anne Stuart [76]
But Charlie had been protecting herself for too long to fall for it. So Olivia was having some sentimental backwash about her only offspring. It was probably just hormonal and would pass as soon as she set her sights on some new young man. In the meantime, Charlie had too much on her plate to start bringing her mother into the equation.
She’d had five minutes alone, letting her anger dissipate into the dough, when Tomaso appeared in the open door, his sun-beaten face creased with concern. “No one’s going to want to eat that, Signora Charlie,” he said. “Lauretta would tell you that you’ve put so much anger into making it that it would probably poison people.”
“Too bad Maguire’s gone, or we could feed it to him,” she growled.
“I wanted to talk to you about that.”
Charlie sighed. “Not you, too, Tomaso! I’ve already had to put up with the police and my mother. I really don’t even want to think about Maguire, much less discuss him….”
“Not Maguire, Charlie. It’s everyone. I think you all should leave, and quickly.”
Charlie looked down at the dough. Tomaso was right—she could feed it to Henry and Gia, but she found she didn’t even care enough. She dumped the dough in the compost bucket, and for a moment she remembered doing the same thing a week ago, when she first heard that Pompasse had died. Maybe she’d better stop making bread. That, or stop getting upset.
She turned her attention back to Tomaso. “Leave? But why? We haven’t even buried Pompasse yet. And where would everyone go?”
“It’s Madame Antonella. She’s getting very troublesome, cara. She hasn’t been well these last few months, and the master’s death has hit her very hard. You’ve heard her—she keeps talking about murder, and whores, and the like. I can’t be sure that she’ll be safe as long as there are strange people around. Once everyone leaves she’ll calm down and be fine. But I’m afraid she’ll hurt herself or someone else as long as there are so many strangers here. And to madame, in her condition, almost everyone is a stranger.”
Charlie sighed. “I can’t kick everyone out, Tomaso, even if I wanted to. I think part interest in this place was left to Gia. If you really think Madame Antonella has deteriorated that much then perhaps we should find someplace to put her. She’s only in her seventies, but at times she seems much older. She needs a kind of home, or assisted living, where she can’t hurt herself.”
“Charlie!” Tomaso was shocked. “Don’t let Lauretta hear you talking like that! The master promised madame a home for life. He was devoted to her. You can’t send her away!”
“I don’t want to send her away, I just want her to be safe,” Charlie said wearily.
“She would never…” Before Tomaso could finish his sentence Madame Antonella tottered into the kitchen.
Her rheumy eyes slid over Charlie, dismissing her, and fastened on Tomaso. “Where’s Lauretta? I want to go home now,” she said in autocratic tones.
“Lauretta is already up at your cottage,” Tomaso said in a soothing, deferential voice. “I’ll take you up there. Say goodbye to Charlie.”
“Charlie?” The old lady looked confused for a moment. “Who’s Charlie?”
“The master’s wife. You remember Charlie, Madame Antonella. She lived here with us.”
Antonella stared at Charlie for a moment, then shook her head. “She’s not his wife,” she said flatly. “Now, stop annoying me. Take me back home.” Not bothering to wait, she started out the back door to the winding gravel path.
“She didn’t hear me, did she?” Charlie whispered, worried.
Tomaso shook his head. “She’s deaf, and we were speaking English. Besides, few things make sense to her nowadays. But I meant what I said. Lauretta and I are worried about her, and there’s no way we can move her. The rest of you will have to leave. Soon.”
And he followed the old woman’s slow, fragile progress up the hillside.
18
It was going to rain. By the time Charlie finished cleaning up the devastation she’d created in the kitchen the sky had turned a dark, ominous gray. Odd, but in the seven years she