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СКАЧАТЬ careers?’ Hope echoed, disbelieving.

      ‘Of course,’ he said lightly. ‘That was always going to be a problem.’

      ‘Can’t you tell me the truth, my son?’

      He sighed and gave up the pretence. ‘It was the age-gap. She made so much of it that—it was really an excuse. She didn’t want me.’

      ‘She rejected you? Rubbish!’

      He managed to laugh at that.

      ‘Unbelievable, isn’t it?’ he asked with a hint of teasing. ‘There’s actually a woman in the world who thinks I’m not up to standard.’

      ‘Well, she must be the only one,’ Hope declared, staunchly loyal. ‘She’s mad, and you’re better off without her.’

      ‘Yes, Mamma, if you say so.’

      ‘Don’t you take that tone with me,’ she snapped.

      ‘What tone?’

      ‘Meek and mild. I know what it means.’

      It meant that inwardly he had vanished to a place nobody could reach. Carlo, so soft-spoken and easygoing on the surface, had another self that he visited rarely and only he knew about.

      Hope glared at her son, furious with him, with Della, with the world that had dared allow her darling to be hurt.

      That night she confided in her husband.

      ‘But it’s what you wanted,’ Toni protested. ‘You never thought she was good enough for him.’

      ‘But I meant him to reject her,’ Hope said, outraged.

      ‘He was never going to do that,’ said Toni, who saw more than he said.

      As if to allay their fears, Carlo began to spend more time at the villa, often staying overnight, sometimes bringing female company, but always sending the ladies away in taxis. He seemed to become his old self, laughing, flirting, always ready for a party. And the more he enjoyed himself, the more Hope’s fears grew.

      Once she asked him, ‘Have you heard from her?’

      ‘Not a word. What is there to say?’

      ‘That project you were working on—?’

      ‘Nothing will come of that now.’

      ‘I thought—if it caused you to see each other again, then maybe …’ She trailed off, not sure what she’d hoped for, but ready to accept anything that would make him happy.

      ‘Mamma, there’s no point in talking about it. It’s over. Let’s forget it.’

      ‘Will you forget, my son?’ Hope asked pointedly.

      He smiled faintly and shook his head.

      ‘No, I never will. But that’s because I’m under a special kind of curse. Forgetfulness would be a blessing, but I’ll never have it, and I just have to accept that.’

      Hope nodded. She, too, knew about that curse. She never spoke of it, but now she wondered if her youngest child had suspected her secret. Part of her still thought of him as the baby of the family, but now she saw that this man had a painful wisdom that he, too, kept to himself.

      ‘Can you accept it?’ she asked quietly.

      ‘I can manage. And I’m damned if I’ll make everyone else suffer by going around in a black cloud. We’ve got a lot of good news coming in this family. Justin’s twins, for a start.’

      ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘And yet …’ She paused as she came to something that was hard to say.

      ‘What is it?’

      ‘I see you empty and hurting inside, and I wonder how much of it is my fault.’

      ‘How can any of it be your fault?’

      ‘I didn’t welcome her as perhaps I might have done,’ she forced herself to say. ‘She wasn’t what I wanted for you. Oh, I said and did all the right things. But she knew I was forcing myself, to conceal a lack of warmth inside. My son, did I drive her away and ruin your life?’

      ‘Of course not,’ he said, honestly puzzled. ‘Mamma, you don’t know how it was between us. Nobody could have driven her away from me—not if she didn’t want to go. We had our world, and it was everything. Except that I spoiled it by—’ there was a faint tremor in his voice ‘—by not being the man she wanted.’

      ‘But—?’

      ‘Try to understand this, and then never let us speak of it again. It wasn’t your fault, or anyone else’s except mine. In her eyes I just don’t measure up. That’s all there is to it.’

      She understood. He was telling her, gently, that even she was irrelevant when set against his love. His eyes were kind, softening the hint of rejection, but she had no doubt that he meant it.

      For a moment she hated Della with a ferocity that shocked her. All this might have been hers, and she’d tossed it away, breaking his heart, abandoning him in an endless desert.

      But the man he had become understood even this, and said quietly, ‘Don’t hate her, Mamma. For my sake.’

      ‘Very well, I won’t. In fact, I think you should go to England. Whatever is wrong between you put it right—if that’s the only thing that will make you happy.’

      It was a bad thing to say. Carlo’s face was hard and set.

      ‘Go after her?’ he echoed. ‘Beg from a woman who’s turned me down as not up to standard? What do you think I am?’

      ‘My dear, don’t let your pride get in the way.’

      He shrugged and made a wry face.

      ‘Let a man keep his pride. It matters.’

      ‘Well, can’t I help? If I talked to her—’

      She stopped before the anger that flashed in his eyes.

      ‘Never even think of such a thing. Not even for a moment. Do you hear me, Mamma?’

      ‘Yes,’ she faltered. ‘I won’t do anything you don’t want.’

      For a moment she had glimpsed the fierce will inside him, and it had almost frightened her.

      Carlo softened and put his arm about her.

      ‘Forgive me for speaking to you so,’ he said contritely. ‘But you mustn’t interfere. You can’t help this situation.’

      ‘Then what can help it?’ she cried.

      ‘Nothing,’ he said quietly. ‘Nothing at all.’

      Della’s СКАЧАТЬ