The car turned out to be a very new-looking, large people carrier with three rows of seats which easily accommodated the cases in its cavernous boot. Before Emma could say anything, Rich climbed into the back and left the front passenger seat to her.
They picked their way through the airport traffic and out onto the main road and were soon on a modern highway heading towards the centre of the city. Emma was relieved to find that Marina didn’t have the habit common to so many drivers she had come across during her time in Rome: a compulsion to drive as fast as possible at all times and with a near-Kamikaze death wish on occasions. Marina was doing just fine and Emma was able to relax and look around. The surroundings were part rural, part industrial, but certainly not by any stretch of the imagination romantic. As they went along, she and Marina talked.
‘Where were you thinking of taking us tomorrow, Marina?’
‘I was told you wanted to start in the mountains. Is that right?’
‘Yes, the main character, Emily, and her governess have travelled down from London by train and they start their Italian tour in the high mountains just this side of the railway tunnel at, I think, Bardonecchia. Does that sound right?’
‘That’s right. The problem with that valley is that since then they’ve built a road tunnel alongside the old railway tunnel and there’s now an autostrada running up the middle of the valley, so I thought we should go for somewhere a bit quieter, but still in the Alps.’
That sounded perfect to Emma. She nodded in agreement and Marina carried on.
‘The valleys north of here leading into the Alps are very pretty and they’re well off the normal tourist trail. I’ve earmarked a few places I hope you’ll find suitably scenic and romantic and I’ve arranged for a local man to meet us up there and show us around. Is there anything specific to the plot of the movie that you need to have? I don’t know… a church or a fountain or some such?’
‘Let me see… the scenes in the mountains are right at the beginning of the story and the heroine, Emily, is still furious and bitterly resentful of the way she’s been effectively banished from England by her domineering father. So probably not so much charming Alpine pastures and big brown-eyed cows with bells round their necks looking cute, but something a bit more stark, a bit more melancholy. Okay?’
‘I’ll tell Cesare, the man who’s meeting us up there, and we’ll see what he can come up with. As far as Turin’s concerned, I haven’t set anything up as I was told you weren’t interested in the main cities. That is right, isn’t it?’
‘Absolutely.’
‘Anyway, if you do decide to take a look around Turin while we’re here, you’ll find it’s a fine historic city – and the shops are great – but I wouldn’t really place it particularly high on my list of romantic places.’
‘That’s pretty much what I’d thought. As you know, our route over the next two weeks should take us down from here to the Mediterranean coast, from there into Tuscany and then we start curling back northwards, ending up in Venice. If you can come up with some suggestions for places along the way, that’ll be great.’
They chatted about the route and Emma definitely got the impression Marina knew what she was talking about. It emerged that her father had been an officer in the Carabinieri and so the family had moved around all over northern Italy as she was growing up. As a result, she was familiar with a lot of the areas of interest for the film. Emma nodded in silent satisfaction. It looked like Dexter had done it again. She resolved to buy him a little present when the time came to return to LA. She might even get something for Elliot if things went smoothly on the set of Sweet Memories.
The hotel was a very modern conversion of a fine, old building right in the heart of the city. The city itself, once they had crawled in through the very unprepossessing suburban industrial sprawl, was charming. Marina had obviously been doing her homework as she gave them a brief history of the city as they drove in.
She told them that Turin had been home to the House of Savoy and the first King of Italy and it exuded prosperity and power. The magnificent wide boulevards with their covered arcades were lined with imposing eighteenth- and nineteenth-century buildings, reflecting the wealth the city had accumulated in the wake of Italy’s industrial revolution, culminating in the birth of FIAT, the Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino. Emma had never realised what the acronym stood for before and, certainly, there was no shortage of modern-day Fiats everywhere she looked.
Their hotel was set in the middle of a very classy shopping area with big-name fashion houses lining the arcaded walkways. Emma resolved to reserve a few hours for some retail therapy. She had always loved Italian shoes and she was determined to look for replacements for her scruffy, if comfortable, sandals.
Once they had checked in, Emma sat down in her room and checked her work email account. There were a couple of emails that needed urgent action for Sweet Memories, so she forwarded them on to Elliot with detailed instructions. It wasn’t, she repeated to herself, that she didn’t think him capable, but she just wanted to be sure that he would do the right thing. She almost believed herself. Once she was finally as sure as she could be that things in Hollywood were sorted, she went down to meet the other two in the stylish hotel bar. Rich looked up as she came in.
‘Finally finished work for the day, boss?’
‘Hopefully.’
Rich glanced across at Marina and explained. ‘Emma never really stops. Every time I looked at her on the plane she was on her laptop, and not watching movies.’
Emma shook her head slowly. ‘I’m not really a workaholic, but I’ve got another movie about to start shooting on Monday and I need to be sure everything’s in order.’ An image of herself, sitting at her desk in an echoing, empty building came to mind and she found herself wondering just who she was trying to fool. With her, work always had come first, to the detriment of almost anything else, starting with her personal life. Still, it had all been worthwhile, hadn’t it?
Marina looked mildly surprised. ‘Haven’t you got an assistant?’
Rich was quick to clarify the situation. ‘Emma’s got a replacement covering for her and she’s scared he’ll screw up.’
This was a bit too close to the truth so Emma didn’t comment. She just ordered herself a glass of mineral water like Rich and Marina and changed the subject to Italy, listening with interest as Marina brought them up to speed with Italy’s current political and financial problems. Apparently back at the time of Dreaming of Italy, things hadn’t been brilliant either, especially out in the country, away from big industrial hubs like Turin. Emma made a note to add this to her report. It might be worthwhile including a mention of rural poverty in the movie.
They went up to the top-floor restaurant for an early evening meal after which Emma had every intention of crashing out. Sitting down to an Italian meal brought a host of memories flooding back to her and she wondered what sort of thoughts it might awaken in Richard. He hadn’t done a lot of talking downstairs in the bar and she could see he was still a bit tense. As she got to know him better, she found she liked him more and more and she resolved to be as supportive as she could. He had a long, hard road ahead of him and if she could help, she would. Hopefully, he would gradually relax more and more as he got over the jetlag.