Livia and Cosimo still met every day – once on their way into university and again in the evening, when he would walk her home. Sometimes they would stop to buy a bag of steaming chestnuts from one of the traders who had set up small braziers at the side of the road. Between mouthfuls, they would warm their hands on the hot paper bag. Before they reached her apartment, he would pull her to one side, and wrap his arms around her. When he kissed her, she felt as if her body was melting into his. But knowing that her mother would be waiting for her, she would reluctantly pull away.
‘I must go in,’ she would say.
‘Stay a little longer,’ he would plead.
On the last day of term, they stood together, out of sight of the apartment, dreading the moment when they would have to part.
‘I have to go back to the country tomorrow, with my family,’ she blurted out. ‘I wish we didn’t have to, but my grandfather is all alone.’
‘I understand,’ said Cosimo, holding her heart-shaped face in his hands and kissing her gently on the mouth. ‘But I will miss you.’
‘And I’ll miss you – desperately,’ she replied. ‘I can hardly imagine not seeing you every day. But we’ll be back early in the New Year. Perhaps you could come to dinner and meet my parents. I’m sure you’d get on with my father very well, and I know he would love you.’
‘I’d like that.’
‘Why not come in with me now?’ she suggested. ‘It’s so cold today. I’m sure my mother could make us something nice and warm to eat.’
‘No,’ he replied. ‘When I meet your parents, I’d like to do it properly. It’s not fair on your mother – she may not have enough food.’
‘That’s very thoughtful of you.’
‘I have a mother too, you know – I know what they are like – and they don’t enjoy surprises.’ He laughed and kissed her again. ‘Can I write to you while you’re away?’
‘Of course, I’d love that.’
When they finally parted and she walked towards her apartment building, she instantly missed him. She was about to run back to him, to kiss him one more time and feel his arms around her, but he had already gone – swallowed up in the Christmas crowds.
Three
Rome
December 1941
The stars of Cinecittà were expected to support the war effort over the Christmas period. Isabella had invited her grandmother and aunt to join Giovanna and herself on Christmas Eve. The women arrived early and set to work in the kitchen preparing meat sauces and pasta, while Isabella retreated to the sitting room where a huge bag of fan mail had been deposited by the studio. The letters were predominantly from soldiers heading off for the front in Russia, or North Africa. As she dipped into them, laying them out on a long table overlooking the garden, she was touched by their simple faith that a kind word and a photograph of her would ‘give them strength to go into battle’. And so in the days after Christmas, Isabella and her mother, together with her assistant Maria, sat at the dining table in Villa Rosa, piled high with stacks of letters, photographs and envelopes.
‘These boys,’ said her mother, putting a letter on the ‘answered’ pile, ‘they think they are in love with you, don’t they? It must be wonderful to be so adored.’
‘Not really,’ said Isabella, sensing her mother’s petty jealousy. ‘I feel sorry for them, to be honest. I mean, it’s not real is it, this passion they have? They don’t even know me, and I certainly don’t know them.’
Giovanna gave the impression that she thought her daughter’s life was one of lazy self-indulgence, which irritated Isabella. Her mother rarely acknowledged the hard work involved in being an actress – the weeks spent learning her lines, the gruelling early starts, the constant arguments with the company lawyers for better pay, better hours and better parts. Giovanna simply saw a young woman with a beautiful house, fabulous clothes and the admiration of men she didn’t even know. But what really irked Isabella was that her mother had never thanked her for their comfortable existence. Isabella had supported her mother financially since she was sixteen. She had given her a better life than she could ever have hoped for back in Buenos Aires, and it was hurtful that her mother could not be more grateful.
Giovanna pushed a letter across the table, signed by someone called Ludovico. Isabella’s heart stopped. Was it her Ludovico? As she quickly scanned the letter, she realised this man was not her lover but another young soldier with the same name. She was reminded of their last afternoon together, when she lay in Ludovico’s arms on the beach in the closing days of summer.
‘I’d love one of your photographs,’ he had said, kissing her hair. ‘You know, one of your official ones, with your signature.’
‘Don’t be so silly,’ she had replied. ‘They are for strangers. We are lovers. Wouldn’t you prefer a photograph of us together?’
‘I have photographs like that already,’ he’d insisted, ‘but I’d like one of your official ones… really I would. I can keep it with me always, next to my heart.’ He had laughed, dramatically tapping his chest. ‘And I could show it off to my friends. This is my girlfriend, the movie star!’
When they got back to the villa, she had reluctantly signed a photo and handed it to him: ‘To my love from your love, Isabella.’
‘Have you heard from that handsome soldier of yours?’ Her mother’s voice startled her. ‘You know, the one you were going out with in the summer? He was called Ludovico, wasn’t he?’
‘Yes,’ said Isabella evasively.
‘And?’ Her mother’s curiosity about her love life was irritating.
‘He wrote to me, yes. A lovely letter as it happens.’
In fact, the letter had haunted her. Written the day before he was sent to North Africa, the words were loving enough, but she had felt a distance – both physical and emotional. He had made no declaration; nor had he suggested a meeting. It sounded almost like a farewell.
I miss you and think of you constantly. We are moving off tomorrow. I shall be stationed in Libya – I don’t know for how long, nor do I know how easy it will be to write once I’m there. I’m sorry I had to leave so suddenly. You must understand – I am a career soldier and I have my duty to perform. But I regret how we had to part.
I keep your picture with me at all times, next to my heart – just as I promised.
Take care of yourself,
With love
Ludovico.
‘He was a good catch,’ said Giovanna, adding another letter to the pile. ‘I’m surprised he’s not arranged to see you over Christmas.’
‘Maybe he’s busy, fighting the war,’ Isabella replied sarcastically, pushing a photograph into an envelope and sealing it.
‘Still…’ her mother went on, ignoring her daughter’s tone, ‘you should keep up with his parents. Go and see his mother, the Baroness, and ask her how he is.’
‘No,’ said Isabella firmly. ‘She was never very friendly to me.’