On the day that the cats decided that Jenny should stay, she ventured into the village for the first time. San Martino was tiny — maybe two dozen stone houses, most of them scattered across the fields. Its one street ended with a tabacchi bar opening onto a small, square piazza. The tabacchi bar, which sold groceries, cigarettes, and cappuccino, belonged to Marieangela, a stout gray-haired woman with a penchant for matching sweater sets and coral jewelry. Very little happened in San Martino without Marieangela’s approval; fortunately, Marieangela approved of Jenny. Speaking no English, she made it understood that Jenny was welcome to cappuccino in the mornings, Chianti in the evenings, and as much food and chocolate as she needed because Jenny was la ragazza che abita con i gatti. Marieangela was the first to use the phrase, but Jenny soon realized it was a title of sorts: the Girl Who Lives with the Cats.
Her title was a self-evident fact. Jenny couldn’t go anywhere without a stream of cats trailing after her. They followed her through the village and across the fields. They led her to San Martino’s well, to the vegetable garden and grapevines, and to the wide grassy yard that was home to an assortment of ducks, rabbits, and chickens. They crossed the bridge with her and chased each other while she studied the old tombstones in the tiny village cemetery. They sat with her when she drank her morning cappuccino and gave her what they considered to be the choicest bits of local gossip.
From the cats Jenny learned that the dapper gent who’d sent her on to their home was named Alfredo, and it was he who grew San Martino’s catnip. That Marieangela had seven grandchildren living in Ravenna, all of whom showed a great talent for playing with string. That Ermelina, the woman who kept the keys to the church, smelled like a delicious fish. That the rooster had a foul temper, but it was the old mallard who dominated the farmyard. That Livio’s sheep were always going missing because he didn’t have a sheepdog, and (the cats admitted regretfully) they really were to blame for this. It had been years since a dog had been fool enough to cross the bridge into the village. Pappa Gatto, they explained, didn’t care much for dogs.
If the cats gave Jenny the word on the villagers, they most assuredly gave the villagers the word on her. Though Jenny had never mentioned him, everyone in San Martino knew about Carl. “Suo ragazzo, peccato!” Ermelina told her within seconds of meeting her. Jenny had to ask the black and white to translate, and then found herself blushing as he said matter-of-factly, “Your boyfriend, what a shame!” And on the morning that Jenny found herself staring morosely into her cappuccino, Marieangela said briskly, “Un perso, centi trovati.” This, the black and white explained, was an Italian proverb that meant: “One loss, one hundred gains.” It was perfectly true, Jenny reflected. She’d lost one boyfriend and gained a hundred cats.
It happened for the second time on the day that Jenny sat in the old Byzantine church. Ermelina had insisted that sitting in the church would heal her cuore straziato, which after much gesturing Jenny understood to mean “broken heart.” So she sat, watching the dust motes filter down from the clerestory because she couldn’t bear to look at the agonized Christ on the cross that dominated the altar. It was while studying dust motes, and presumably healing her heart, that Jenny became aware of movement at the corner of her eye. Movement and the knowledge that something was wrong. There couldn’t be anyone else in the church. She and a ragtag assortment of kittens were the only ones Ermelina had let inside, and she hadn’t heard the heavy wooden door open since. But now she turned and saw that a nun cloaked in a black habit was moving silently up the aisle.
“Buon giorno,” Jenny said.
The nun turned, arms tucked into her sleeves, and bowed her head toward Jenny, her rosary brushing the wooden pew. She straightened, and Jenny saw that the severe black habit framed Sasha’s pale face, her beauty as tranquil and pious as if she’d actually become a Bride of Christ.
Jenny would have run screaming, but at that moment Pappa Gatto sprang from the rafters. Her voice paralyzed with shock, Jenny pointed toward the aisle.
Sasha was gone, the aisle of the church empty.
Jenny grasped the pew in front of her, needing to touch something solid. “D-Did you see her?” she stammered.
In the dark church Pappa Gatto’s eyes glowed like molten gold. “I see only you, Jenny,” he answered. “And you look frightened. Where are those little mischief-makers of mine who are supposed to keep you company?” He made a guttural sound, and the kittens tumbled out from behind the altar and came to sit before Pappa Gatto, looking unusually subdued.
“Did I imagine her?” Jenny asked. “I mean, Sasha. She’s—”
“You’ve been sitting in this gloomy church too long,” Pappa Gatto cut her off gently. “What was Ermelina thinking? Go outside, child. I promise you will feel better.”
The human inhabitants of San Martino were a curiously homogeneous group. From what Jenny could tell, they were all well over sixty, and all seemed to have lived their entire lives in the village. The men liked to sit in the tabacchi bar and smoke and play cards. The women gathered in the piazza, exchanging what Jenny guessed was local gossip. None of them spoke English, but most made a good-natured effort to understand her attempts at Italian. No one in San Martino, it seemed, had either a phone or a car. The closest thing to transport was Livio’s geriatric donkey. And no one had any advice for getting to Florence, other than, E lontano. Firenze de molte lontano. It is far. Firenze is very far.
As one day ran into the next Jenny became accustomed to talking cats; to villagers who supplied her with food, drink, and firewood but no help in leaving; to a life completely cut off from the one she’d always known. Her closest companions were the cats. They were not, she learned, herd or pack animals, and yet each was always conscious of the others. They played together, groomed each other, and slept together, most of them having relocated to Jenny’s bed. Though they reserved speech for communicating with her (except for the occasional challenge, they rarely spoke to their own kind), each cat always seemed to know exactly what the others thought and intended.
What Jenny found unnerving was that they read her as clearly as they read each other. This was particularly awkward when it came to the one subject she couldn’t stop thinking about: Carl. A stubborn, delusion-loving part of her psyche refused to believe that it was really over. She told herself that Carl’s falling for Sasha had been a mistake, a temporary obsession, that he’d since come to his senses and was searching the countryside for her. In her more rational moments Jenny knew that these thoughts were counterproductive, not to mention unbearably stupid; still, she held endless imaginary conversations in which she told Carl what a jerk he’d been, in which he confessed his abiding and eternal love for her, in which he got down on his knees and begged for her forgiveness — and for her hand in marriage. This, in fact, had become Jenny’s favorite fantasy, a scene she mentally enacted over and over again.
Carl, I’m sorry but I need time to think about it, she silently rehearsed one day while untangling a ball of yarn that Marieangela had given her for the kittens. I just don’t know if I can trust you anymore, but I’ve always loved you and—