and Umberto had been interned in Australia. Papà had explained they were better off interned far away in safety and relative comfort than here in this vile morass. He only wished he had sent all the children. As for internment, he said, every country did it. The day war was announced here in Florence, the police turned up at the door of Villa La Pietra to arrest Hortense Acton and all the other foreign residents of the city. The venerable Lady Acton was tossed into jail wearing only her summer dress and without so much as a toothbrush or an apology. The great difference, he said, was that here, many people were able to bribe their way out.
The declaration of war changed everything. Florence became a fortified city, not so much for its residents, but for its art. Florentines lived in a city of ghostly statues whose wrapping and padding made it seem they had grown fat while real people had grown thin. Glass was removed from doorways and barriers built. Walls were bare, with only the faded outlines of pictures taken down and packed for safekeeping. Blackout material gave the city an air of mourning. Most churches and major galleries were emptied, their contents stored in country villas and castles, like Castello Montegufoni, sequestered by the government from Sir George Sitwell. The Germans were shipping art treasures to Germany ‘to protect them’. By now, the hiding of art was not only for protection against possible bombing by the enemy Allies, but, said Achille, more against the depredation of our so-called friends. Annabelle was not interested; she just wanted to know what Enrico was doing and be doing it with him.
Rome 1943
Du-ce! Du-ce! Du-ce!
Clara was tired of being in bed, but she was still not well enough to get up. Ben would be here soon, loving and solicitous again now, after she had nearly died. Ectopic pregnancy. She had never heard of such a thing. It was nearly fatal, her father said.
She sighed, shifting her weight in the bed to ease the pain. Time was passing. Was thirty too old to have children? She said a quick prayer to Saint Rita. She had so wanted to have the baby.
‘Women are born for babies and blows,’ Ben once said, and God knows she had had enough blows. All his other women had borne him endless children. Why could she not give him that joy? She really had thought he was going to leave her the last time. If only she were the mother of his child, she would be guaranteed the place in his life of Rachele, or Alice and Rospilda and Angela Cucciati. Eleven children that she knew of. Ben did love children. He had even passed a law forbidding childless bachelors a place in the civil service.
He was being so nice to her now in the face of this terrible loss. He would never marry her; she knew that. Ben did not believe in marriage. He denied ever having married Ida Dalser, even though everyone knew he did and the courts decided the boy was his. He only married Rachele under protest before the second child was born – Edda was born out of wedlock. Even when he gave in to Rachele’s pressure, he refused to consider a church wedding, but married her in a civil ceremony. He said he was too ill at the time to argue, bedridden with typhus during the war. Ben cared nothing for religion or for convention, but then, neither did she really. There had been talk of bigamy but he assured her it was his political enemies spreading lies. No, Claretta would not want to be his wife. He’d had Ida Dalser locked up in the madhouse and her son too. Rachele, the harridan, might rule in Ben’s home but she had a terrible life, really. His mistresses fared much better. Clara would happily bear his child if only things went better the next time.
Doors, draughts, footsteps, voices: the fuss of arrival downstairs. ‘Richard’ was due at 4 pm, the usual message said, and Ben was always punctual. Clara sank back onto the pillows, studying the effect in the corner mirror, pleased to note that she was still quite pallid. She admired the impressive solitaire diamond glittering on her left hand. Ben would be a while, because her illness had brought him even closer to her family and he would stop to talk to her mother and to her sister Myriam – he was helping to further her acting career. Her father would be back from the Vatican soon and Ben would be pleased to see him. When he was actually here, she was happy – at least he was not out making love to other women. Though he found it boring for her to be the invalid.
She heard him mount the stairs with the energetic gait he used for outsiders, but once in the room, he deflated onto the chair at her side.
She held out a limp hand to him. ‘Amore’. She smiled wanly.
Ben took her hand, held it to his cheek then kissed her palm. ‘How is my angel today?’ He leaned towards her with concern. ‘I need to speak to your father. He has not come in from the hospital yet. My cold is not improving and the doctor has prescribed some new pills for me.’
More pills. Their life was a sea of pills. Sometimes she wondered if all these medicinals were really helping.
Ben was on the balcony and beneath him, the crowd roared. Du-ce! Du-ce! Du-ce! The twenty-first of April, the anniversary of the founding of Rome. From where she stood, it was obvious to Clara that the crowd was much smaller, but he seemed happy and that made her happy. She massaged her left shoulder where she had fallen against the table the other night. It was three days ago but the bruise was still tender. It was her own fault. She should not have provoked him. He would be nice this afternoon. They could have a peaceful time together, like earlier times when she used to stand here in the shadows, Ben performing for her, before the horde of adulators below. Afterwards they would make love like wild creatures – then her bruises were a pleasure. Or when, in the early throes of his infatuation, he would ensure she was seated at an angle to him at public events, so he could fix her with his eyes like a falcon.
‘See. They love me. A ring of the bell and everyone rushes under the balcony to hear me,’ he exulted as he turned back inside ‘These boots are too tight. Get Navarra to bring me the others.’
She sighed and turned to ring for Quinto.
‘Why are you sighing? You don’t agree with me? You don’t think they adore me as always?’
He was not happy, then. He had another cold too. She tried to deflect his ire, indicating the new painting Quinto had delivered, a gift from Ottone Rosai. Years before, Ben commissioned Rosai to paint two huge landscapes for the railway station of Santa Maria Novella. How many railway stations, he boasted, are adorned with original art? In private though, Ben was bored by paintings. He barely flicked the new picture a glance. Even on a state tour of the Uffizi with Hitler, who was obsessed with art, showing intense interest and curiosity about the Botticelli and the other famous paintings, Ben could barely suppress a yawn. Clara would need to come up with something else to distract him.
‘Have you had bad news from Africa, my pet?’ she soothed. The war was going badly – and not just in Africa, but Ben no longer seemed to care.
‘This war is not for the Italian people,’ he replied. For the looming humiliation of defeat in Tunisia, he blamed Rodolfo Graziani. He should have known better than to put Graziani in charge of the African campaign. ‘The Italian people do not have the maturity or the consistency for such a tremendous and decisive test.’
Ben had lost faith in Italians and in the war. His voice had the edge it got when losing his temper. Was he taking more pills she did not know about? Sometimes he took too many and sometimes new pills upset him. He was puffed with rage.
Ben rose on the balls of his feet, his body turned away from her. ‘The Grand Council met today.’
The Grand Council could only be convened by the Prime Minister, that is, by Ben. Clara had known nothing of a meeting today
