The Italian's Christmas Miracle

He led her into the kitchen, a shining temple to the latest hi-tech cooking equipment, incongruous against the rest of the house. In a moment he had the coffee perking, and brought some spicy rolls out of the cupboard. He’d made the right move. Alysa felt herself growing calmer as she ate and drank.

‘Thank you,’ she said as he refilled her cup. ‘I don’t normally lose my temper.’

‘Tonight’s been hard on you,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t really have put you through it, but I’m clutching at straws.’

‘We all do what we must to survive. I was never going to let this get the better of me.’

‘But you’ve paid a price.’

‘Yes, all right, I have. There’s always a price to be paid, but anything’s better than giving in.’

‘You’re a very strong person. I admire that. I’ve often felt it was getting the better of me.’

‘Did you mean what you said about crying?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ he said quietly. ‘I meant it. What about you? You said you never cried.’

‘I can’t. And, if I could, I wouldn’t.’

‘How did you get to be so strong?’

‘Through my mother. When I was fifteen my father walked out on us, and it finished her. She never recovered. I can still hear her sobbing, night after night. Three years later she died of a heart attack. She had no strength to fight it.’

‘Poor soul.’

‘Yes, and you know why she went under? Because my father was all she had. She was an actress before she met him—a good one, people said. But she had to choose, and she chose him. She wouldn’t take jobs that took her away from him, and in the end the offers stopped coming. She became a barmaid, a shop assistant, any number of dead-end jobs. He left her with nothing. That’s where I’m different. When I lost James, I didn’t lose everything.’

He gave her a quick look and seemed about to speak, but thought better of it and poured some more coffee.

‘Did your father stay in touch?’ he asked at last.

‘He contacted me after she died, said he thought we could repair the past. I told him to get out of my sight and never come back. And he did. I’ll never forgive him for what he did to my mother, and I’ll never let myself go under as she did.’

He nodded slowly. ‘And you have no other family?’

‘My mother has a couple of sisters, but they more or less deserted her when she hit the bad times. I suppose they couldn’t cope with her depression, and perhaps I ought to be understanding, but they weren’t there when she needed them.’

‘Maybe it would have made no difference,’ he mused. ‘Other people can’t always help, unless it’s exactly the right person. And you may never meet that person.’

‘You sound as though you had a lot of experience with the wrong ones.’

‘One or two. It wasn’t their fault. They tried to sympathise over her death, not knowing that the real grief lay elsewhere.’

‘How did you hear that Carlotta was dead?’

‘From the press. Somebody recognised her body and called me. I don’t recall exactly what I said, but I think I recited the line about her being away to visit clients. If I did, I was on automatic. Then there were more calls, as the press began to sniff something out.’

‘How ghastly!’ she said in genuine sympathy.

‘I think I went off my head for a while. I was in a rage—I can be really unpleasant.’ He gave a faint, self-mocking smile. ‘Though you might not believe that.’

‘I’ll try,’ she said lightly. ‘Did you actually hit anyone?’

‘There was one moment with an editor—but he gave as good as he got. Then I told him if he slandered my wife I’d have his paper closed down.’

‘Could you do that?’ Alysa asked, remembering what the young journalist had told her.

‘Who knows? I’d have had a good try. But he believed it, and that was all I needed. Are you shocked?’

‘No. I’ve done that too. Not the punch-up, but making the other side think you’re stronger than you are. It’s very useful. What about the rest of the press? Did you have to get tough with them?’

‘No need. The word got around, and after that nobody would challenge me.’ He regarded her satirically. ‘I dare say your reputation goes ahead of you as well?’

‘Well, I’m in line for a partnership.’ She too became self-mocking to say, ‘So there are some advantages to renouncing my femininity.’

‘Look, I shouldn’t have said that. Will you please forget it?’

‘Of course.’ But it had struck home, and Alysa knew she wasn’t going to forget any time soon.

‘What about you?’ Drago asked. ‘How did you hear?’

‘I got a call from Anthony Hoskins, James’s lawyer. He said he’d been contacted by a man who wouldn’t say who he was, but was asking about James.’

‘That was me. I found a letter from Hoskins in their apartment. I didn’t get anywhere talking to him, so I simply passed his name on to the undertakers.’

‘They called Hoskins too, and he called me again,’ Alysa remembered. ‘He said they wanted burial instructions. James had no family.’

‘What did you tell them to do about the burial?’

‘Nothing. I was in a dreadful state, so I said I didn’t know him and put the phone down. I never heard any more. I don’t know what happened to his body.’

‘I can tell you that. He’s near the Church of All Angels, the same place where Carlotta is buried. There’s going to be a ceremony there tomorrow.’

‘I didn’t know. I only discovered about today’s gathering by accident online. There was no mention of anything else. Do you go to the cemetery often?’

‘I take Tina to visit her mother, and sometimes I go to see her alone.’

‘You visit her, after what she did to you?’

‘I have to. Don’t ask me why, because I couldn’t tell you. I always look at his stone when I’m there. Then I can tell him how much I hate him. I enjoy that. I only wish I could picture him. When I went to identify Carlotta I made them show me him as well, because I wanted to see his face.’

‘What did you think of it?’ she asked, almost inaudibly.

‘Nothing. It was badly damaged, so I still don’t really know what Carlotta saw when she looked at him. But you can tell me. Would a woman think he was handsome?’

‘Yes,’ she said with a touch of defiance. Something about his tone was making her defensive. ‘He was very handsome. Do you want to see?’

He stared. ‘You’ve actually got his picture? You still take it everywhere?’