The stuffy studio apartment is too hot. Sleep punctuated by jumbled and oppressive dreams in which the image of Cristina is mixed up with scenes from the prison. Guards and fellow prisoners are brushing against him, jostling him. Strangely, they are all somehow Cristina. They beat him. He runs and escapes. Then during the exercise period Cristina confronts him alone in the prison yard, and attacks him with a screwdriver. He feels nothing, but it is Carlo who falls into his arms, dead, the screwdriver through his heart. His hands are sticky with blood. Cristina shouts at him, ‘You killed Carlo.’ He is no longer certain that the body is that of Carlo, or that he is in the prison yard. Cristina leans over the corpse which could be Carlo’s, her chignon comes undone and her long, coppery hair brushes his bloody hands. Is she Cristina or the girl who kissed Carlo in the mountains? At this point, he prefers to wake up. The presence of the live Cristina alongside the dead Carlo in the same dream, the confusion between Cristina and the girl in the mountains is deeply disturbing. He waits, his eyes wide open, for the images to recede, to fade, and lose their oppressive intensity. He convinces himself that he will forget them, that he has already forgotten them, then gets up, takes a cold shower and makes himself a very strong coffee.
27 June
Adèle invites Filippo to lunch at a restaurant in Saint-Germain that is a favourite haunt of the Paris publishing world. She says she has something she needs to discuss. Filippo is delighted to accept her invitation. He sees her less frequently now, and he realises he misses her. She has become part of his lifestyle.
He arrives at the restaurant where he is clearly expected. A maître d’hôtel holds the big swing door open for him and, without a word, shows him to his table. The restaurant’s interior has been carefully designed to meet the needs of its clientele. In the vast dining room, all the tables are hedged by antique mahogany partitions at half-height and topped with copper rails, so conversations can take place in complete privacy. But the partitions are just low enough for diners to see who comes in, with whom, and who goes to sit where.
The table Adèle has reserved is at the very back of the restaurant, and so the maître d’hôtel has him cross the entire room. Conversations stop as he passes. And the same whispers can be heard from one table to the next.
‘Did you see who just came in? Filippo Zuliani.’
‘I can understand why Jeanne Champaud fell head-overheels for him. He’s such a cute and charming young man.’
‘Have you read Escape? Apparently it’s in the running for a prize.’
‘Overrated.’
‘First novel, let’s wait for the second.’
‘The gamble’s certainly paid off for the publisher.’
They have reached the table. The maître d’hôtel pulls out the chair, Filippo sits down and orders a Perrier with a slice of lemon. Talk at the other tables has resumed.
Adèle, pirouetting from table to table, greeting people, stopping for a word here, a smile there, waves at him across the room: ‘I’m here, I’m coming’. He nods and quietly digests what has just happened: nothing less than his entrance into the literary world. Recognition from readers, recognition from people in the industry, can he still have any doubts?
Adèle puts off coming over to their table and starting a conversation that she knows will be tricky. The lawyer warned that Filippo might panic and run away or even disappear. What should she do in that case? She finally brings herself to sit down facing him, with a smile.
‘I’m working on your behalf.’ She contemplates the glass of Perrier. ‘You’re drinking water?’
‘I’ve only just woken up.’ Slight embarrassment.
‘Oh … true. Of course.’ She doesn’t look at the menu, she knows it by heart.
‘I recommend the veal chop with spinach. It’s one of their signature dishes.’ She signals to the waiter. ‘Two veal chops, Henri. And a Saumur-Champigny, as usual.’
Slowly she unfolds her white napkin. Now to prepare him for the bad news. First of all, flatter the ego of the man and the writer. An age-old female ploy which, curiously, still works. She leans towards Filippo.
‘Let’s talk business. Did you hear the whispering when you came into the restaurant?’
He laughs.
‘Yes. I felt as though I was being wafted to the table by the buzz.’
Adèle glances at him covertly from beneath her fringe. Cleverer than he’d have me believe.
‘Your book is number two in this week’s bestseller list.’ A pause, no reaction from Filippo. ‘And it’s still on the up. I had a call from Pivot’s secretary. It looks as though you’ll be a guest on his September programme.’
Filippo still says nothing, he has never heard of Bernard Pivot, and has no idea of the audience that a book programme like Apostrophes attracts. Adèle takes Filippo’s silence for an affectation of cool, which makes her task harder, and goes on, dropping her voice.
‘Are you aware that you’re now a bestselling author?’
‘Yes, I’ve just realised that. Only one question: are you sure that there hasn’t been a mistake, that it really is me?’
She stares at him, bemused. Too bad, she has to carry on — it’s what she came here to do.
‘I’ve also got to talk to you about Italy. It’s not such good news on that front. To be brutal, the Italian press is accusing you of being an accomplice — the word makes Filippo bristle — in the fatal Piemonte-Sardegna bank hold-up in Milan and of being a fugitive from the Italian justice system. You look surprised. Don’t you read the Italian press?’
‘No, I don’t.’ He has regained his composure and is smiling blissfully. ‘They’re saying that I’m an accomplice. Are those the words they use?’
She realises that in all the time she’s known him, she’s never seen him smile like that, with a sort of calm assurance. What had the lawyer said? Wasn’t he supposed to panic?
‘Yes, that’s what they’re saying. Aren’t you worried?’
‘Why should I be? I tell a story set in Italy, the Italians are interested in it, and what’s more, they fall for it. They find the story convincing, they even think and say it’s true. I think that’s brilliant, don’t you?’
‘Maybe … well, I don’t know…’
‘As a writer I felt a fraud, I needed some sort of endorsement, and I’m getting it from Italy, I couldn’t dream of more.’
Adèle is flummoxed by his reply. She clings to her role as hostess and refills their wine glasses. An oblivious guy, unpredictable. She is completely out of her depth in this situation, but she has delivered the message, so mission accomplished. Not long till the holidays. She relaxes, and hastens the end of the meal.
The minute she has finished her coffee, Adèle makes her getaway. ‘Other urgent meetings … We’ll touch base soon. Are you staying in Paris over the summer? I’ll call you.’
Filippo makes his way back to Neuilly on foot along the banks of the Seine and the Champs-Élysées, a glorious walk, which takes him nearly two hours. He is a writer, someone people talk about, who has flesh-and-blood readers — he’s met them. He feels light, walks rhythmically and smiles at passersby in summer dress who cross his path. He has told a simple story in his own words, a story in which he is neither betrayed nor abandoned, a story with friends and accomplices, one whose pace he controls. He gives a passing girl the eye, without slowing down. An accomplice of criminals, the words go round and round in his head. Accomplice, an echo of the press articles he’d read in Bologna, over a year ago. ‘Accessory to a jailbreak … Accessory to a bank robbery…’ At the time the word and the thing had felt too heavy to bear, and he fled Bologna in a panic, as he later fled the Café Pouchkine. But now, no more frantic running away. He has found his place, that of the accomplice, and he is recognised for what he says he is. He’s come to terms with it.