In my dream I saw Otmar as. a child, in the dining-room with his mother and father, Schweinsbrust on the table. There is a sudden crash, the battering down of the outside door; then four men enter the dining-room and greet the diners softly. The tears of Otmar’s mother drop on to the meat and potatoes and little stewed tomatoes. His father stands up; he knows his time has come. For a moment the only sound is the ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece, between the two bronze horsemen. Otmar’s mother does not cry out; she does not attempt to fling herself between the men and their prisoner. A long time ago she endeavoured to accept her husband’s fate in anticipation; she, too, knew the men would one day come.
For crimes committed in Hitler’s war he is the four men’s prey, and the clock still ticks when they have taken him away. It ticks even though there will be no trial; the execution will be discreet. It ticks as sportingly as ever, while the tears of Otmar’s mother fall on to the little stewed tomatoes, while she decides she does not wish to live herself. It ticks when she stands up and goes away, and when Otmar finds her, tied up to a light fixture in another room.
‘Otmar it is,’ an unhurried voice states, the children of the fathers locked in another turn of the wheel, a fresh fraternity of vengeance. Broken matchsticks are cast as lots. ‘Otmar is the chosen one.’
In Carrozza 219 he strokes her arm. She’ll carry the vengeance through Linata Airport, on to the plane that’s bound for Tel Aviv. The victim, as Otmar’s father was, is occupied now with other matters; the past is past. In the fields the sunflowers are brilliant against the pale sky. Is it Madeleine’s hand that is like an ornament in the air, the same hand that dislodged the stack of mustard jars?
When I pushed the shutters back from my window the next morning the first person I saw was Mr Riversmith. He was bending over a tiny apricot shoot I knew well, no more than five inches of growth, which Signora Bardini had marked with a bamboo cane. Signora Bardini suspected it had sprouted from a stone of the fruit, either thrown down or possibly dropped by a large bird. Clover rather than grass thrived in this area at the side of my house. Two circular beds had been dug by Signora Bardini, but nothing grew in them. Only the day before the General had noticed these beds and said he intended to plant roses in them.
Although it was early I poured myself a little something on my way through the salotto. I sat down for a moment, bracing myself. The memory of the telephone conversation was sharper than ever in my consciousness. I wanted to dull it just a little before I spoke, again, to Mr Riversmith. I poured myself a second glass, mostly tonic really, and felt much better when I’d drunk it. I lit a cigarette and put on my sunglasses.
Mr Riversmith had moved from the apricot shoot when I reached him, and was shading his eyes with a hand in order to admire the view of the hills. Naturally I wanted to say I’d been hurt by what had been said. I wanted to refer to it in order to clear the air immediately. I felt that, somehow, there might have been an explanation. But I knew it was far better to wait.
‘What a lovely morning, Mr Riversmith!’
‘Yes, indeed, it is.’
‘I love this time of day.’
He nodded so pleasantly in agreement that I wondered if I could possibly have misheard a thing or two on the telephone. It sometimes isn’t easy when you can’t see a person’s face. But his face was there now, and it seemed more disarming than I remembered it, certainly more relaxed than it had been in my private room. Perhaps he had indeed been suffering from jet-lag and was now recovered. I said what I had planned to say.
‘I’m afraid I was a nuisance to you when we talked on the terrace two evenings ago, Mr Riversmith.’
‘No, not at all.’
‘When I’m nervous I have a way of going round in circles. I’m sorry, it must have been disagreeable for you.’
He shook his head. I didn’t speak at once in case he wished to comment. When he didn’t I said:
‘Jet-lag can be horrid.’
‘Jet-lag?’
We had moved a little further away from the apricot shoot by now.
‘They keep searching for a pill to take, but I believe they haven’t had much success.’
He indicated his understanding by slightly inclining his head. He did not speak, and I permitted the silence to lengthen before I did so again myself.
‘You were tired and I delayed you. I offended you by presuming to address you by your Christian name. I’m truly sorry.’
‘It’s perfectly all right.’
‘You were not offended?’
‘No.’
‘It’s friendlier to call you Tom.’
‘By all means do so.’
‘Professor makes you sound ancient.’
It had occurred to me that in spite of his protests to the contrary on his first evening in my house, he might have been offended that this title was never used. I said the apricot plant had grown from a stone, dropped possibly by a bird, and again wanted to mention the telephone conversation. I wanted to get it out of the way, to be told I had misheard and then to leave the subject, not ever to think about it again. But I knew it was not yet the moment. I knew there would be embarrassment and awkwardness.
‘Let me show you where the garden’ll be,’ I said instead, and led him to the back of the house. In Italy you long for lawns, I said; in Africa too. I described all that the General and Otmar and their friend the Italian intended. I pointed to where the herb beds would be. The azaleas would be dotted everywhere, in their massive urns.
‘Should be impressive,’ he said. Would later he say to Francine that it was all an illusion? Would he say it was trash and only wishful thinking that an old Englishman intended to make a gift of a garden? Was he wondering now if the experience on the train had taken a greater toll of me than had been at first apparent? He looked away, and I thought it might be in case his expression revealed what he was thinking.
‘Let’s walk a little way, shall we?’
I led him along the dusty road I was so familiar with, by slopes of olive trees and vines. Endeavouring to keep the conversation ordinary, I was about to apologize for Quinty’s conversation in the car on the way back from Siena, but then I remembered I had already made an effort to do so.
‘I hope you find it peaceful here,’ I said.
‘Yes, indeed.’
‘There’s an Italian expression, professor – far niente. D’you know it?’
‘I don’t speak Italian, Mrs Delahunty.’
‘No more do I. Far niente means doing nothing. Dolce far niente. It’s nice to do nothing.’
‘Far niente,’ he repeated.
‘You’d say it about sitting in a café. As we did in Siena. Or doing as we’re doing now, ambling aimlessly. Enjoying the peace.’
‘I see.’
That brought another subject to an end. Nothing was said for a while: then remembering that my companion had revealed he’d been married twice, I asked something about that, whether he considered that divorce was like death in a marriage.
‘As great a sadness?’ I hinted.
‘Yes.’
‘It cut you up, Tom?’
‘Yes, it was painful.’
I dragged from him the name of his first wife: Celeste Adele. Sometimes there is not the slightest difficulty in visualizing a person spoken of, perhaps because of the intonation or expression that accompanies the reference. This was so now: the woman who appeared in my mind was kittenish and petite, dark-haired, much prettier than Francine.
‘When was your first wife’s birthday, Tom?’
‘Adele’s?’ He had to think. Then: ‘May twenty-nine.’
I stopped. ‘No wonder it didn’t work out, Tom.’
‘I don’t imagine our break-up had to do with her birthday!’
This opinion was delivered lightly, possibly intended as a joke. If it was, it was the first time he had endeavoured to make one since his arrival in my house.