The Secret Legacy: The perfect summer read for fans of Santa Montefiore, Victoria Hislop and Dinah Jeffries
chasing behind my mother in search of something, food to sell, riches to dig up, laundry to deliver. We ran from my suffocating father and the dread of hunger. After my mother died I ran away from the memory of her.
As the shutters clattered against the wind, I wrapped Elizabeth in my arms and allowed my American daydream to ebb. I wanted to feel comforted by the realization that it was nothing but that – an ephemeral wish, another wisp of a life. Yet it smarted. It was so much easier to chase. Perhaps that way I might never get what I wanted and risk the chance of losing it?
I watched the Major take another sip of his tea, thin ribbons of steam lifting up into the furious air beyond the balustrade. Elizabeth grew heavy in my arms, her breath slowed. I didn’t realize I’d been rocking, soothing the both of us. She had fallen asleep. I walked through the dining room and up the stairwell to lay her down in the bed I still kept close to mine.
As I retraced my steps back to the kitchen, a draught curled up behind me. I knew I’d shut all the windows at the first darkening promise of a storm. I checked the Major’s – they were still closed.
I knocked on Adeline’s door. No answer. My stomach tightened. I hoped she was sleeping. I creaked the door open a little. The damp air blew on my face. The tall shutter door swung against the frame in the draught. Upon the roofless terrace stood Adeline. Her arms were outstretched. Rain pelted down her nightdress. Hair clung to her scalp, matted to the back of it. I fought the instinct to rush to her. I knew from experience that it would jar her into defensiveness, if not aggression. I ought to call the Major, but something stopped me. He seemed so peaceful down below on the kitchen terrace. This time I could handle Adeline. I stepped inside the room.
Perhaps I envied her abandon. She never did anything without entire commitment, to the detriment of herself. And yet, watching this woman, making tiny steps toward healing, standing fearless in the storm, filled me with an awkward admiration. All until I snapped back into myself and ran to gather towels so she might not catch her death. I stood in the doorway to the terrace, holding them. The water cut across the space between us, diagonal flights of tiny arrows.
‘Signora Adeline!’ I called out.
She turned toward me. Her face spread into a warm smile.
‘Please, come inside!’
I reached out a hand. She placed hers in mine. Her fingers were strong, still callused from her work. I didn’t want to pull her, but my forearm was already drenched. I began to regret my decision to take on the challenge of bringing her inside. Her grip tightened. She pulled. I took a step outside.
‘Come,’ she beckoned.
I didn’t want to fight. The sea shimmered silver as a vein of electricity splintered down from above. I didn’t want to be struck by lightning either.
She took my other hand and pulled. I stood opposite her. My face was drenched. The worn soles of my shoes blotted with rainwater seeping in at the edges.
‘Isn’t it glorious, Santina?!’ she yelled over the din.
I had no answer.
‘Do you remember when you came swimming with me?’
I nodded.
‘You’re so very good to me, Santina. You come from these mountains. It’s a blessing. Such power, don’t you think? Listen to the mountains roar!’
I was cold. I cared little to listen to silent mountains. The lightning and thunder were loud enough.
‘That rage! Pure energy. That’s all it is. That’s what we all are. I love you, Santina!’
Now her blue eyes deepened. For a moment I caught a flash of that woman jumping into the pond water in London. For a second she was there, in all her fiery glory. It made my heart hope and ache.
‘Signora Adeline – please let me wrap this around you now.’
‘I don’t need looking after, Santina. I need the water. I always have to be in water. Henry knew that. That’s why he brought me here.’
I tried to smile whilst easing a towel around her.
‘That’s how you tell if someone really loves you, Santina. If they give you what they know you need, whether or not they need it too. Do you understand that, Santina?’
I wanted to. I also wanted to be inside.
‘Stop pulling me, Santina!’ She flung off the towel and held my face with both her hands. ‘Look up! I mean really look!’
She lifted my face toward the sky. I half expected a shot of lightning to strike through me. Perhaps I would crisp in her arms.
‘How many colors?’ she asked.
‘Sorry?’
‘How many colors?’
Perhaps the Major would hear this outburst and rescue the both of us.
‘Grey?’
‘No – look closer. See the tinge of yellow? Can you see the hint of light green around the edge of that cloud just about the house? See how many greys there are, Santina – so many. Grey isn’t in between, it’s not simply neither white nor black. It’s not indecision, Santina. It’s full of blues and greens and browns and purples. So full. We only see the surface.’
And then she laughed. She wrapped her arms around me and squeezed me into her wet dress.
‘There’s no storm, Santina! We are it.’
Her laughter peeled into soft tears, ebbing and flowing between the two. She softened, so much so that I could actually lead her inside. I peeled her wet clothes off and wrapped another towel around her. She had grown thinner these past few months. I noticed the protrusion of her bones, the way the skin around it hung, a mournful ivory.
As I turned for another dry towel she walked away from me. I wasn’t quick enough to stop her. She stepped back out onto the wet terracotta tiles of the terrace, raised her arms up to the heavens, naked, stretching out her body, uncovered breasts for anyone to see. I was thankful that most Positanese would be shut away inside. I ran downstairs for the Major. No sooner had we returned than he stepped out into the storm to Adeline without a moment’s hesitation. I collected the wet towels.
As I turned to close the door behind me, my eyes were drawn back to the terrace. I’d expected him to lose his temper somehow, interrupted as he was from his meditative tea. Instead, he placed both his hands around Adeline’s face. He pulled her in close and placed his lips upon hers. She leaned back. Rain cascaded down her cheeks like tears. His mouth moved down her neck. I caught the tip of his tongue trace its brittle line. I closed the door, pretending I hadn’t seen his hands ease down her naked back. I pressed the door closed, wishing the feeling pulsing in my chest was closer to embarrassment.
Like a Neapolitan temper, the storm was swallowed out to sea as swift as it had erupted. Thankful that the rumbles of thunder had been nothing but that, and not prescient to an earthquake, the town resurrected to business with renewed gratitude. We had survived, once again. I pretended not to have noticed how long the Major stayed with Adeline before he returned to his abandoned tea and ordered a second pot. As I laid it down he looked up and caught my gaze.
‘I expect you are wondering when will be the appropriate time to discuss my letter?’
I straightened, trying my best to not allow his unexpected question leaving me hanging for a studied answer. I decided not to give in to mute embarrassment.
‘When would you like to discuss it, sir?’
‘This moment. I’m sure you’ve arrived at a decision. We always arrive at these sorts of decisions far quicker than we’d like to admit. It takes our stubborn brains longer to articulate it. Indecision is only the marker of resistance to our first impulse.’ He cleared his throat. If I didn’t know better, I would have sensed a sting of nerves. ‘No time like the present.’
I noticed he hadn’t done up the