the past tense comes easily, she notices, the note of nostalgia and regret. Perhaps he’s had more practice; Federico isn’t the first person he’s lost, after all. His tone is filled with pity that strikes her as self-pity; Giacomo coming to terms with what has been lost as personal loss. Before he can say any more about friendship, about her, she changes the subject.
“Yvonne’s never been to Rome before?”
“Oh yes, dozens of times. She used to model. She’s planned a shopping trip. As though Paris doesn’t provide her with enough opportunity for it. I told her she didn’t have to come to the conference. She thought I’d gone mad.” He laughs wanly. “It hadn’t entered her head. I don’t think she’s heard of Iraq, never mind the war.”
“How old is she?”
He glances up at her from his mobile. “I know how much you like Stefania,” he says, “but things weren’t easy.” He looks sheepish and she remembers the two of them on a Corsican beach, she and Giacomo, no more than fifty yards from Stefania and Federico, lying between two beached pedalòs, fucking as though their lives depended on it.
She looks down at her watch.
“I have to go to the hospital. You will come with me?”
“Of course.”
“As though there were any doubt it’s Federico.” She stands up. “Apparently, it’s a formality. Which means it has to be done.” She pauses. “Perhaps they’ll have made a mistake. Perhaps it won’t be Federico at all.” She is torn between a nervous need to giggle at the horror of what awaits her and the return of tears, because she half believes what she has just said. That she might find a man she has never known. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. More words she will need. This time she holds out her arms and Giacomo comes to her, as he should have done before; but this time they are alone. He folds her to him, his stomach and hips against hers, his chin on the side of her head; he bends a little to kiss her hair, comforting kisses, and she lets herself cry into his neck in a gentler, almost resigned way. They stand together, embracing for a minute or two, more like old friends than lovers, until she becomes aware that he is no longer kissing her, that his arms are stiff and posed. She breaks away.
“We have to go. They’re waiting.”
“I’ll need to tell Yvonne.”
“You can call her from the car. She’ll understand.”
“Oh yes,” he says. “She’ll understand.”
7
She hadn’t expected journalists, let alone a television troupe milling outside the hotel. She recognises the nearest interviewer from a national news channel just as he recognises her. In a jaw-snapping double-take that might have amused her in any other circumstance, he also recognises Giacomo. For a long indecisive moment, with an instinct for the larger story, he seems to consider holding the microphone out not to Helen Di Stasi, the grief-stricken widow, but to Giacomo Mura, the terrorist redeemed; but he pulls himself together as she walks towards the gaping door of the waiting car. He pushes the microphone into her face; behind him, as if attracted by the scent of her, people she thought were guests or passers-by also gather and she understands that she is about to be mobbed by reporters, a scene she has witnessed so often on TV but can barely believe is happening to her. The jostling begins as tape recorders are poked towards her, followed by questions she can’t quite catch. Federico always manages – managed – to avoid this somehow, she thinks, and she feels a wave of envy and loss so crippling she reaches out to steady herself against Giacomo. Enclosed by babble, the only question she clearly hears is asked by a woman she sat next to once at a dinner some months ago, whose high-pitched grating voice rises above the rest. She wants to know what it feels like to have lost one’s husband, a question so fatuous Helen finds it difficult not to burst into appalled laughter.
“Yvonne’s never been to Rome before?”
“Oh yes, dozens of times. She used to model. She’s planned a shopping trip. As though Paris doesn’t provide her with enough opportunity for it. I told her she didn’t have to come to the conference. She thought I’d gone mad.” He laughs wanly. “It hadn’t entered her head. I don’t think she’s heard of Iraq, never mind the war.”
“How old is she?”
He glances up at her from his mobile. “I know how much you like Stefania,” he says, “but things weren’t easy.” He looks sheepish and she remembers the two of them on a Corsican beach, she and Giacomo, no more than fifty yards from Stefania and Federico, lying between two beached pedalòs, fucking as though their lives depended on it.
She looks down at her watch.
“I have to go to the hospital. You will come with me?”
“Of course.”
“As though there were any doubt it’s Federico.” She stands up. “Apparently, it’s a formality. Which means it has to be done.” She pauses. “Perhaps they’ll have made a mistake. Perhaps it won’t be Federico at all.” She is torn between a nervous need to giggle at the horror of what awaits her and the return of tears, because she half believes what she has just said. That she might find a man she has never known. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. More words she will need. This time she holds out her arms and Giacomo comes to her, as he should have done before; but this time they are alone. He folds her to him, his stomach and hips against hers, his chin on the side of her head; he bends a little to kiss her hair, comforting kisses, and she lets herself cry into his neck in a gentler, almost resigned way. They stand together, embracing for a minute or two, more like old friends than lovers, until she becomes aware that he is no longer kissing her, that his arms are stiff and posed. She breaks away.
“We have to go. They’re waiting.”
“I’ll need to tell Yvonne.”
“You can call her from the car. She’ll understand.”
“Oh yes,” he says. “She’ll understand.”
7
She hadn’t expected journalists, let alone a television troupe milling outside the hotel. She recognises the nearest interviewer from a national news channel just as he recognises her. In a jaw-snapping double-take that might have amused her in any other circumstance, he also recognises Giacomo. For a long indecisive moment, with an instinct for the larger story, he seems to consider holding the microphone out not to Helen Di Stasi, the grief-stricken widow, but to Giacomo Mura, the terrorist redeemed; but he pulls himself together as she walks towards the gaping door of the waiting car. He pushes the microphone into her face; behind him, as if attracted by the scent of her, people she thought were guests or passers-by also gather and she understands that she is about to be mobbed by reporters, a scene she has witnessed so often on TV but can barely believe is happening to her. The jostling begins as tape recorders are poked towards her, followed by questions she can’t quite catch. Federico always manages – managed – to avoid this somehow, she thinks, and she feels a wave of envy and loss so crippling she reaches out to steady herself against Giacomo. Enclosed by babble, the only question she clearly hears is asked by a woman she sat next to once at a dinner some months ago, whose high-pitched grating voice rises above the rest. She wants to know what it feels like to have lost one’s husband, a question so fatuous Helen finds it difficult not to burst into appalled laughter.