‘I found that I loved the idea of being a father. That took me by surprise. I’d never thought of it before, but suddenly I wanted it so much, and Lisetta was the woman who was going to give me my heart’s desire. Yes, I think I gave her some happiness then. I hope so, anyway.’
The heavy note in his voice made her ask, ‘What happened?’
‘She lost the child in the sixth month. That would have been bad enough but my father also died. His health had been on a knife edge while he held on to see his grandchild, and the shock of seeing that hope collapse brought on his last heart attack.
‘Lisetta was devastated by what she considered her failure. I tried to reassure her but what could I say? She knew I’d married her for my father’s sake and my child’s, and now they were both dead. That was when I wished I’d told her some polite lies when I proposed. If I’d said then that I loved her, I might have been able to give her some hope when she was in despair. But I was useless-useless.’
He dropped his head into his hands.
When Pietro spoke again his voice was husky.
‘I did my best to console her, but it was a pretty useless best. She kept saying that she was sorry she’d let me down, and she’d have another child soon. With every word I felt like a monster, a man who’d destroyed a woman who loved him for his own convenience.
‘The worst thing was that she was pinning all her hopes on another baby. She didn’t know that the doctor had said she mustn’t try again. She wasn’t strong enough. I delayed telling her because I knew what it would do to her, but in the end I had to.’
‘Poor woman,’ Ruth murmured.
‘Yes, poor woman,’ Pietro said bitterly. ‘She had nothing then. Whatever I could give her wasn’t enough. She turned to her husband for help, and he failed her.’
‘How did she cope?’
‘She wouldn’t accept it. She said she just needed time to regain her strength, and everything would be fine. I didn’t argue because at least it left her some hope, but I had no intention of risking her life with another child. She began taking the pill-’
He broke off and made a helpless gesture, full of despair.
‘She swore that she was taking it-that there was no danger of-I shouldn’t have believed her. I should have taken better care of her.’
‘What happened?’
‘She came off the pill, and I only found out when she told me she was pregnant again. I can still see her face, how delighted she was, looking at me for approval.
‘I tried to make her understand how dangerous it was, but she wouldn’t listen to me or the doctor. He begged her not to go through with it. I told her I’d agree to that, but she wouldn’t listen to either of us.’
‘Of course not,’ Ruth murmured.
‘Of course not,’ he echoed with a bitterness that was aimed at himself. ‘She gave me a love I didn’t deserve, and all she cared about was pleasing me. All through her pregnancy she grew weaker, but she was actually happy. There was a time when we thought she might have a chance to come through, and the baby. But then she collapsed.
‘Our child was born alive, and she held him in her arms just once before she died. I’ll never forget the way she looked at me then, with such joy in her eyes, and such triumph. She’d given me a living child, and that was all she cared about, although she knew her own life was slipping away.
‘But then our baby died too, only a few hours after his mother. Her sacrifice had been for nothing. When she was in her coffin I kissed her and told her how sorry I was. Then I put him in her arms again, and now they’ll lie together always. Now and then I go back to see them, and always I ask for her forgiveness, but it’s too late. I’d give anything to reach her, but I never can.
‘Now do you understand why I feel little better than a murderer? I took her life-for nothing.’
Ruth didn’t answer at first. Pietro’s agony of self-reproach seemed imprinted on the air. She would literally have done anything to heal this wound, and it was dawning on her that, incredibly, she had the power to bring him out of this nightmare. But every step must be taken with care, using her mysterious understanding of Lisetta that had come with her own confusions. One wrong move-she shivered.
It could be done, but only if the dice were thrown exactly right.
Taking a deep breath and sending up a prayer, she tossed them into the unknown.
CHAPTER TWELVE
‘BUT you didn’t take her life,’ Ruth said softly.
Pietro stared at her, puzzled. ‘What did you say?’
‘You didn’t take her life. She gave it up.’
‘There’s no difference.’
‘There’s every difference. You talk about your father’s nineteenth-century attitudes, but then you speak as though Lisetta was a helpless little female caught up in the machinations of the men, with no chance to stand up for herself, and that’s nineteenth century, if you like.’
‘I understand what you’re saying, but it doesn’t change the fact that I married her for my convenience, and my father’s-’
‘And she married you because she wanted to be your wife more than anything in the world. More than her pride. More than her safety. More, even, than her life.’
‘Am I supposed to feel flattered by that? I might if I thought I was worth it, but no man is,’ Pietro replied.
‘That was for her to decide. You were worth it to her and you should respect her right to make her own decision. You said your father chose her. There must have been other well-born girls he could have picked. Why her? Maybe because she was already in the house, looking after him?’
‘Among other things. I told you he had old-fashioned ideas about suitability, and her father was a visconte as well as being a family friend.’
‘And this college professor just happened to be there, caring for him? What about her career? Did she put that on hold?’ Ruth questioned, hoping she was getting through to him.
‘It was the summer vacation. What are you saying?’
‘That she guessed the way your father’s thoughts were drifting and she made sure his choice lighted on her. She knew you didn’t love her, but it didn’t matter because anything was better than life without you.’
‘You make her sound like a schemer.’
‘No, I don’t. I make her sound like a woman in love who focussed on the man she wanted because the thought of living without him was unbearable. Millions of women do that every day. Men too. It makes the world go around. That’s what I think she did, and good for her! She had a purpose, and she followed it through to the end.’
‘How can you be so sure? You didn’t know her.’
‘I think I’m beginning to, and to admire her. You had the clue all the time in that story about the dice game, how even as a child she’d risk everything on one throw. I saw it in the picture, and it’s only now that I fully understand it. That was her nature. She was a risk-taker. You didn’t stand a chance.’ Ruth smiled. ‘You thought you were the one in charge, the one making conditions, but she was ten times the player you were.’
‘I don’t know-’
‘She wasn’t a child when you married her, Pietro. She was strong and clear-eyed, and your marriage didn’t come about because you controlled or manipulated her. It happened because she was a mature woman who made her own decisions.
‘And there’s something else, that I found out about recently. I’ve been reading the history of her family, and there’s an inherited weakness in the women. Many of them have died in childbirth, far more than in other families; not so much recently because medical science has improved, but it’s there.’