episode 10-II | Ultimatum

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sensitive issues

I didn't realize Angelo was feeling so lonely, and isolated.

In my mind, I had done what he expected from me. I had decided to follow him to America, and I had communicated it to my mother. My own expectation was that he would then take over everything else. He had gathered information about the whole process of applying to the American universities. He had the addresses, the phone numbers -- but what he did not have was money to start and carry on with that bureaucracy.

When Edoardo refused to help him, Angelo wanted me to talk to my mother to help the two of us. Reluctant, I wanted to hear from Catherine first. I thought once she agreed to help me, she wouldn't mind helping my boyfriend, too.

But in the meantime, she and Edoardo arrived to a decision. They were going to care for their respective sons only, and not interfere in the other's decisions -- that settled, they never again fought.

Of course they knew what that meant. If Angelo couldn't go anywhere without getting his father's financial aid, it meant I wasn't going anywhere either, even if Catherine would help me. I was just accompanying him, and had no will of my own to move towards our future in America.

"You don't love me, do you, Laurent?"

"Of course I do!" I protested. 

"No. I'm just another toy for you. I get it now. You just like my body. You like my ass. You use me for sex, for fun."

"Don't be ridiculous, Angelo." I almost said 'melodramatic', but it would sound too much like Catherine.

"You don't understand me. You don't respect me. You don't care about my needs. My dreams."

"Of course I do." I repeated myself.

"No, you don't. And that's why you don't want to help me."

"Don't be unfair, Angelo. I've done everything I could..."

"No you haven't. And you know it."

Angelo had come up with another idea. He wanted me to ask for my grandmother Celeste's help.

He was aware that she sent me money every Christmas and birthday. With that, I had gathered a considerable amount in savings. That money could have helped us -- but Angelo himself had helped me to spend it all. We -- or I -- had bought a new music player, and plenty of long-plays, shirts, jeans, tennis shoes, and junk food. Actually, he was responsible for us having no money, having exchanged it for fun.

"Your grandmother is rich, Laurent. You could convince her to sell one of the paintings in her collection, or her jewelry. Then we would have the money we need."

But I knew Celeste did not have to sell anything to have money. That was Angelo's family history -- how they had sold all the artifacts from his archaeologist grandparents, even the furniture and finally the apartment in Rome, to go to the United States for his mother's treatments.

"I can't do that, Angelo." 

And I'm glad I never did, even if it led to tragedy in our household. But how could I? I hadn't seen Celeste again in eight years, though we every once in a while spoke over the phone. Catherine would sometimes visit her in Paris, on her trips to Belgium, but I was never again invited to her house.

"Of course you can. She has never denied you money, has she?"

"No. Simply because I have never asked her for money. Do you get it?"

It would have been funny to see what Celeste's reaction would be, had I asked her to sell one of her paintings. What would the painting be? Her Picasso? Her Renoir? Or the Monet? She could get rid of her Bonnard, or the Leger. She owned at least one painting from most French painters starting with the Impressionist period, and also of those foreigners that had made Paris their home for a while. Not that I knew any of that when I was eighteen. And I knew nothing about Monsieur de Montbelle either, who had bought her many of those paintings, and from whom she had inherited several others. 

*****

Seeing so much art at my grandmother's apartment had confused me, when I was ten years old.

"Maman, why does... grandma--" I recall whispering the word, afraid that Celeste would hear it, "live in a museum?"

"Oh, mon cher. This is not a museum. Though Celeste's apartment is just as full of preciosities."

But I had never been to major art museums before visiting Paris, and to me they were no different from my grandmother's apartment -- except, perhaps, in scale. 

Catherine tried to enlighten my ignorance. When I elected two paintings I had liked best, she proceeded to explain who had been their painters, Chagall and Matisse. At some point, she said they were very famous.

"Not more famous than my papa!" I declared in triumph.

"Oh, much more famous than Carlo, mon cher."

"Certainly not, maman. I had never heard of them before. And I have know my father is a painter since... forever!"

*****

"Besides," I continued my argument with Angelo, "we don't need so much money to go to the US, do we?" I was starting to doubt his intentions. Any of those paintings would have sold for millions of francs. (*)

"You will always need money in this life, Laurent. As much as you can have. Don't be silly."

"How can I ask her such a thing? Grandma," she would kill me at calling her that, "why do you need two Matisses? Why don't you sell one of them?"

"That would be perfectly fine. Because these paintings are yours already. Don't you see? You don't have to wait until she dies to sell them. Or are you going to keep all her old stuff?"

"You are out of your mind, Angelo!"

"Then don't sell anything. Just ask for her spare change. She is filthy rich, didn't you say so? She shall have enough francs to help us coming from her purse only. How much money do you think she keeps at home?"

"I can't do that, Angelo. And you're sounding like you want to rob my grandmother."

"It's not that you can't. The truth is you don't want to, Laurent."

"Let's wait."

"Wait for what, Laurent?"

"Your father might change his mind..."

"I can't wait, Laurent." Angelo had expected we would be studying in the US in the second semester of 1993 already, but we hadn't moved any closer to that. "Not in this hole." And then he threatened me again. "I am leaving, Laurent. No matter what, no matter how, I am leaving."

Angelo stormed out of the room.

We had discussed those issues several times, and I did not get that his threat was indeed an ultimatum.

Not until very late that evening did I start worrying. It must have been 3, maybe 4 AM. When we fought, both Angelo and I liked being alone, and we could spend hours not speaking to one another. But we hardly skipped sex, and the previous weeks, full of tension and expectations, we were doing it at least twice a day to dilute the stress.

I confess I was horny, more than worried, when I went looking for him. First, I checked the room in the back, where I had slept when we had guests, and where Carlo would seek refuge when he fought with Catherine. To keep the tradition, it was Angelo to occupy it now, when he wanted to get away from me.

I opened the door slightly, enough to peek into the room and check that he was not in there. I closed it again, and decided I would not go after him into the fields. Or could he have ran away? His words about leaving suddenly sounded more serious than usual to me. But he wouldn't have ran away without taking a backpack, would he? At least I wouldn't. But when I thought my father had disappeared just like that, to never ever send any news, I had icy goose bumps. I couldn't bear the perspective of being abandoned once again.

I opened the door again. The room was unusually stinky. In the dark, I saw the undone bed. Hoping Angelo had at least written a message, I walked towards the side table, where he had left a book open.

I screamed when I saw him lying in his own vomit. Incredibly pale, his body tense, fists clenched -- he was frozen with pain. Reminding me of one of those petrified inhabitants of Pompeii, his face was twisted in a clownesque grimace. I shouted again, and again, as I collapsed onto the floor, crawling next to him, to take him in my arms. His body was lifeless and covered in cold sweat. I shivered. I had never seen a corpse before, but as I held Angelo, I knew he was dead.

Catherine did not scream when she arrived in the room, taking in the scene of Angelo's suicide. To her, life was only a tragedy in books. She dealt rather coolly with reality, as if it were an experiment in a laboratory. There was always something she could use in a future book -- even her own son's misery at the death of his boyfriend.

But she did shout at me when I fought Edoardo, as he tried to fetch Angelo from me.

"Please let go of him , Laurent! We need to take him to the hospital!"

As Edoardo ran away with Angelo in his arms, Catherine stayed behind with me. Patting me on the shoulder, she tried to reason me out of my shock, but I don't recall her words. 

I did not cry, as I realized I was being abandoned again. It was useless, I knew. I had cried for Carlo, but my tears hadn't brought him back.

*****

For several months after the incident at the country club, that led to my decision of quitting the swim team, I had contemplated the practical problems of suicide. At fourteen years old, suicide was a thing from books, and that's where I researched my possibilities. 

Catherine was a very well organized writer, and she kept lists for everything -- from names for characters to a thorough table of colours. In her archives, I found under S a list of suicides in books, and that's where I learned that Romeo drank poison, Heathcliff starved to death, Othello and Juliet stabbed themselves, Werther shot himself, Mme Bovary ingested arsenic. As I went through my mother's list, I learned about those who had hanged themselves, and drowned. 

Some suicides seemed noble, like Plato's, and other were beautifully tragic, like Anna Karenina's, who stepped on the train track. And in the company of so many suicidal characters, my desperation eased and I realized how my own death would only seem pathetic. I also understood I was a coward, and inflicting death upon myself seemed harder than coping with my shame and guilt.

Unlike me, Angelo was brave, full of determination and will to live -- or to die. Whatever he chose, he would accomplish. If he couldn't leave France, he could leave this life. Whichever direction he favored, he would travel. 

Unlike me, he did not seem to fear death as his final destination.

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(*) this in Laurent's memories is the year of 1993, and French franc was the currency then.

Episode 89 | Listening to your silence

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Listening to my father, I concluded my mother had achieved what she had intended from the beginning. At the Île du Blanchomme still, she had started turning him into her servant, in all aspects. Even sexually -- and the correct word in this case is 'slave'.

 After all I had heard about her that evening, I wondered whether she would have been capable of denouncing Carlo. Hadn't she envisioned that possibility with her 'friend' from the Tax Administration, and set an strategy under course? But why get rid of my father like that, risking sending him to jail?

I did not have a watch, nor did Carlo -- in that matter it was indeed like father, like son. No matter the hour, I was feeling the urge to call Catherine in Russia and confront her about what I had learned. But I let my mobile rest dead in my pocket -- under those circumstances, it might have been the only appropriate way to torture her. How many times she must have tried to call me during that long evening?

"Honey, I don't know if this was such a good idea after all. You might get hurt again..." She had said over the telephone. It wasn't "such a good idea" just because it hadn't been hers, I thought. But I had nevertheless appreciated her concern -- to find out she was worried only about herself, and how Carlo's sincerity might destroy her carefully constructed story line, all based on lies. I was about to find more, and worse.

"I was aware that our fights were affecting you, son."

Catherine and Carlo had never, ever shouted at me, not even to reprimand me. But I recall my parent's screams and shouts at each other coming from their room next to mine, and then the sudden bang of a door, or more than one door -- if Catherine would retreat into the bathroom and Carlo should leave the room, and sometimes they did it concomitantly --, followed by a haunting silence.

And I remember that silence announced the tragedy that was to come, more than the screams. That heavy silence was the harbinger of my father's absence, and my own anxiety attacks.

"I tried to stay away from Catherine," Carlo continued with his recollections, "but she would come into my workshop to discuss the gipsy girl. I guess she had never expected I would cheat on her... and I want to stress I wasn't cheating on her! But she was obsessed with Jaella and her son. Finally, I contacted a lawyer to go through the process of asserting that the boy was not my son. No, Jair is not your brother, Laurent. And I didn't leave home to move in with another family."

"With my escape to England, this process of recognition, or actually the opposite, since that child was not mine, took even longer than expected. With the passing of years the stress between your mother and me eased into indiference, and we fell further apart. When at last the case was closed, she had already found another mate, as you well know..." Carlo stared at me, but I just nodded and made no comment, not even to encourage him to continue. Edoardo was an issue I was never willing to bring up. "And there was no going back to Catherine any more."

"But it is not true that I never called you, Laurent. I called home before crossing to England."

*****

"I want to talk to my son, Catherine! Now!" 

"I'm sorry, Carlo." They had fought so many times, but now that Carlo was away, Catherine felt very calm, and relieved. "But Laurent does not want to talk to you."

"I want to hear that from Laurent himself. Now let me talk to him, Catherine! You cannot do that to me..."

"What am I doing to you, Carlo?" 

"You cannot keep away me from my own son, Catherine... Please, let me talk to him!"

"Please do not call again today, Carlo! The police is still here. I am trying to convince them to leave before Laurent gets home. I have to go now. Bye!" And Catherine had not only hung up, but disconnected the telephone as well.

I called several times from Davez Drew's house in London, where I stayed for a few months before renting my own apartment and studio in the city. He and his girlfriend at the time, Layla, were very generous and patient with me. 

To Davez, it was particularly shocking that I had parted from my 'Sunrise Son'. 

"Man, there is a worldwide legion of fans of the Sunrise Son... Should we get them to fix this for you? I mean, they could do a manifestation in front of your house... They could actually bring your son here to you, any moment you say you want it done..." Unfortunately, Davez was doing drugs again, and he was often out of his mind. Kidnapping my own son was not an option.

"Laurent is not home, Carlo." Catherine actually felt sorry for Carlo, and sympathized with him when she thought he was going to start his own personal exile. 

"Of course he is! I know he is. He is doing his homework in his room. I know his schedule, Catherine. Better than you do! Please do not lie to--"

"You are offending me, Carlo! I'm not lying." Catherine did not even try to sound indignant, for she was so relieved with Carlo's absence. "Laurent is not home. You used to know his schedule, you're right. But things have changed." She actually tried to show some empathy towards Carlo's suffering. He wasn't a bad man and had been rather useful. She was still trying to figure out how she would manage the household chores without him. "He has asked me whether he could spend more time at the club, and I thought it was a good idea." Catherine was celebrating taking decisions about Laurent without listening to Carlo's opinion, even if in the past she had already often made up her mind before he spoke out. "This empty house seems to sadden him." While Catherine was quite content to have the whole house all to herself, without the two men in it. "So now he goes to the club for lunch even, right after school. Then he has his training, and after it's finished he stays there doing his homework and studying. I believe he is even making new friends."

"Can you ask him to phone me when he gets home, Catherine? I want to talk to him, please..." It was almost a supplication.

"I don't think Laurent wants to talk to you, Carlo. But I'll inform him that you have called. And if he wishes to call you, he will. Can we agree on that? I really don't want you to call us any longer, Carlo. Now that you've left us, will you please give us some time... and space? We deserve another chance, Laurent and I, we deserve another life! Please don't ever call again, Carlo. If Laurent wants to talk to you, he will call you, have you understood it?"

*****

That was true enough, I thought. It had actually happened. Catherine had indeed 'informed' me about one of my father's telephone calls -- but in a moment when my anger was so great that I had simply sent Carlo to hell.

After he left, I had been saddened for days. I cried and cried, and I had questioned Catherine on his reasons. So insistently that I had infuriated her. WHY? WHY? We finally had a serious quarrel. And since I had never had a fight with Catherine before, it was a horrible, terrifying experience. When she had walked out of my room, pissed off and slamming the door behind her, I drew my breath as I felt the floor failing to sustain me. My father had left, and now... my mother was abandoning me, too?

In my teenage years, or maybe since I had arrived in France, my mother had grown closer to me. And with Carlo's absence, we would become even closer.

"You are close to being a real person now, Laurent. I mean, your opinions are increasingly interesting, in comparison to those childish jokes of yours." At thirteen years old, that had seemed like a big compliment coming from my ever demanding mother. By then, I had mastered my writing, and though she thought my compositions had no style nor interest, they used to be grammatically flawless. She was then investing in my conversational skills, for I knew I often embarrassed her before her illustrious intellectual guests. I stressed to learn, until my mother and I were able to engage in proper conversations. And though Catherine was still condescending, I gradually felt much closer to her, as I grew older. 

Yet, I feared losing her, much more now that I had already lost my father.

Or actually, I feared never conquering her.

Then, only a week or maybe many weeks later, after Carlo had left, I stopped crying.

That's when my sadness turned into anger. And the longer I suppressed and repressed my sadness, the stronger and wilder my anger grew -- and somehow, the stronger and wilder I felt to be, too. Sadness was my natural state, making me soft, vulnerable, fragile. But anger strengthened me. And thus fortified, I felt I could handle the bullies at school much better. Not one of the major and usual bullies, I had slapped this one guy in the ear so hard, to keep him from pinching me, that he had fallen disorientated to the floor. Since then, he was keeping distance from me. That's the point in my life when I started repressing my sadness, identifying it as a weakness. And instead cultivating anger, that I reputed as a good ground to grow my self-confidence. 

I recall having tried to destroy the very few paintings from Carlo that existed in our house -- one portrait of Catherine, and two depicting me. 

I still remember when Carlo painted Catherine's portrait -- she had been teaching a seminar in Belgium, and Carlo and I had had the best of times together, just the two of us for a month or more. And Carlo had taken to painting naked, since he had read somewhere the anecdote that Renoir told a journalist about sometimes painting with his penis. Don't we say "In Rome, do like the Romans"? Carlo had joked. "I guess when in France, do like the French, haha!" I always wondered if Catherine had ever learned that little detail about her portrait -- though I don't think Carlo had ever actually painted it with his penis. 

"Stop it now, Laurent!" My mother walked in on me just as I had started scratching one of the paintings in my bedroom. "That's so childish of you!" Catherine had understood well that I was in an age when being called 'child' was what I dreaded most, being the best way to reprimand me. "Carlo has painted very few portraits in his entire career. Actually, there are only these three, as far as I know! They must have some value. So don't be foolish! Keep them and sell them someday, but do not waste them! Later, you'll probably make good money and still get rid of them. Do you understand me? Don't ever touch those paintings again!"

Another incident stands out from that period. One Sunday, when I had stayed home, since we would not train at the club, I had dragged Carlo's easel and thrown it into the pool. It made a bigger splash than I had expected.

"Laurent, what do you think you're doing?" My mother had heard the noise and come to check from the veranda on the first floor. "That thing does not belong to you... to us." I must have looked at her puzzled, because I wasn't sure she was addressing the easel or the swimming pool. My father had built it, for me. Maybe Catherine had plans of emptying it, and burying it again? Or was she going to forbid me to use it? "Put it back in that stupid atelier. Now!" And after having clarified her marching orders to me, my mother had gone back to her reading and writing.

For days, I let the easel sit at the bottom the pool. My newly discovered rage lend me a strength where I could disobey Catherine, even. When I swam, I tried once to kick it. The easel was standing on the swimming pool's floor, and in that position, it still looked menacingly defiant to me. It was as if I hadn't defeated it. With my kick, I tried to finally knock it down -- but instead, I only hurt my toes.

My mother never said another word about it -- until, one day, I came back from my long days at the school and the club, to find the easel was gone from the pool -- and from the house.

 Nowhere to be seen. Without the easel, and his sports car parked in front of our house, it seemed like Carlo had barely existed in our lives. He had always been discreet, shy and economic, owning few possessions -- even in the atelier, his sacred space in the house, to where he would often retreat to let Catherine enjoy her guests. A few Art books, that like his remaining clothes, Catherine gave or threw away -- a sure indication, to me, that my father would not return. She trashed his oil paints and brushes along with the pasta left in the kitchen, and let his Mediterranean herbs dry in the vases, until she got rid of them, too. I just observed and never commented her demeanor, guessing she was finding her own ways of revolting against his abandonment. And I never tried to rescue anything, because in my own rage I had wished to erase all of Carlo's traces from our lives, too. Catherine was fast, and before the first hints of melancholic hope and longing for my father sprung in my heart, he had been expunged from our rural home.

Midst those measures, rather precise and coldly executed, within a couple of weeks, Catherine had refurbished the atelier and turned it into her home office, vacating the room right behind the fireplace which had constituted her writing bunker all along. 

And in time, just like all Carlo's traces disappeared from our home and lives, my rage subsided and vanished. Resentment replaced it. 

And that's what I had cultivated for the last twenty years, along with the firm determination to forget my father, and to live a life where he wouldn't be missed, nor make any difference. 

But my present need for atonement told me I hadn't succeeded in leaving Carlo behind, nor out of my heart. WHY, I would every now and then ask, when some events were too heavy to bear alone, and I had wished my father was by my side. WHY?

What Carlo was now telling me is that he would have tried to come back, had I called him. 

But I had not known about that condition imposed by Catherine. The harder life seemed, and the more problems I had, the lonelier I felt, since Carlo was no longer there to advise and guide me. Therefore, the more I resented him.  Until he had become an annoying memory that I forcefully pushed away whenever it sprang in my mind. 

Two years later after Carlo's departure -- and it's funny that what I called 'departure', Carlo had called 'escape' --, Angelo had entered my life. To rule it, and to become l'homme de ma vie, the man of my life, taking the chore that my father had left vacant. 

Surprisingly at ease with both his masculinity and femininity for a teenager, with his determination and assertiveness, Angelo had grabbed and dragged me at his own will and convenience. And I didn't feel I was being manipulated. I had so happily, eagerly obliged to let him take care of me -- clinging to him even when he had dumped me already, addicted to his body as much as to his fierceness, that I had always lacked, in taking decisions.

Suddenly, I woke up from my recollections at Carlo's voice echoing in The Dark Room. He had himself just emerged from one of his long silences. We had taken one of the black benches at the far end of the room, opposite to the entrance towards where my father had just twisted his body. Giving his back to me, what was he trying to hide?

"It was not just that you would not speak to me on the phone, Laurent..." He chocked, his voice caught, and though I could only see his back, I realized his whole body had started to shake. "You never, ever called me back. And I understood it as a sign that you felt the same as your mother... that I was making your life small and miserable, and that like her you wanted to forget me..." I tried to face my father, as rare were the occasions in my life I had watched him surrendering to his own emotions. He was a bit embarrassed, and so was I -- with my voyeuristic curiosity. Carlo simply went on. "You were willing to have 'time and space' to grow into a new life, like Catherine had said. You know," Tears had welled in his eyes, "sometimes I think I could never have been a good father... because I never had one myself. And... I have survived the loss of my father... and mother... since I had no other chance but to survive it." It was disconcerting to see an old man holding back his tears, ashamed to cry. "And I thought you'd survive my loss too, Laurent." It was perceptible the effort Carlo was making not to collapse, physical and emotionally. He sat rigidly, attempting to keep his posture straight, and his emotions under control. His meditative practice was in use at that very moment, I guessed. "In fact, your silence made me think you actually wanted to survive my loss... to live without me," He gulped, "as if I were actually dead. Just like my father had been for me..."

I gasped. I might have wished my father was dead, in my teenager anger, but I had never meant it. All I ever wished was that he had never left.

"I've been listening to your silence, Laurent. Since the day I left home. For twenty years now." The way he said it, sounded like he had been counting each day. "And I left it not because I wanted, I hope you now understand it... And if I never returned, it was because you didn't seem to want it. I was so sure you wanted nothing more from me... until a few months ago, when you called inviting me for your vernissage. I was so happy, my son!"

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Author's note: having been imported from a former version of the story, some of the comments below are dated previous to this post. Once the plot has not been altered, just the pagination, I am keeping them since they are very dear and precious to me.

Episode 87 | Just another ordinary day

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"That was supposed to be just another ordinary day." It would be typical from my father, if he might not remember what year it was. I needed not ask, for I knew it perfectly well -- 1988. I was thirteen years old. "But it became a memorable morning in my life." I couldn't agree more, as Carlo began reminiscing.

"I was feeling lazy, and I did not want to leave the house. But I had so many errands to do in town... go to the post, pay bills, shop for groceries... I usually got bored doing them, and talking to people did not entice me much. But I did enjoy driving my sports car around, and those ordinary things were actually the only justification I had to go out. Otherwise, I'd rather stay in my studio, painting all day long. Sometimes, I wish I were back at my hermitage... the abandoned factory in Paris." Carlo smiled tenderly. As if approaching the past with great care, he spoke very slowly.

He sat at the edge of the sofa, though, and I could see he was not comfortable within himself, and the memories he was about to evoke. The Dark Room was also getting warmer, from our prolonged permanence in it without air conditioning. In other circumstances I might have worried about my paintings, but at that moment, I just hoped Carlo didn't suffer from low blood pressure or something. He looked old, but also healthy, and determined to finally share with me about the day he had left home.  

"I was in the shower," Carlo recalled, "when the phone started ringing insistently. Worried it might be something important or urgent, I ran downstairs and picked the receiver, if just to silence it."

"Carlo! Get out of the house! NOW!" Catherine sounded very agitated.

"What's happened, Catherine?" I could sense her urgency, and I immediately knew the dreaded moment had arrived.

"They are coming after you!" She was screaming, and I could hear her high heels hitting the pavement on the other side of the line. Catherine must be walking very fast, almost running, as if she was the one being chased. "An order for arrest and imprisonment has been issued against you! They might be on their way, already. You have to leave! NOW!"

I gasped. "Arrested, Carlo?" After I spoke, I had to dry my mouth with the back of my hand, because like a child I had drooled. "What for?" It was surprising and confusing. I hadn't expected anything like that. And I could not imagine my father revealing that, after all, he was a drug dealer, or a mafioso. Nor that he had murdered someone.  He probably just didn't have a valid passport or something like that.

"Tax defrauding." My father spoke so low that I felt like approaching him, going to sit by his side on the sofa. But I could not move, afraid of the abyss that still opened its gargantuan mouth between us. "From the very first time, when I had sent the paintings over to Davez in London, I had failed to declare and pay taxes. I confess that, having been so poor, and a simpleton like your mother liked to point out, I did not even cogitate about things like that. And for our remaining two years in Punaouilo, after Davez launched my career, and then in France, when I got frequent commissions, I continued doing it, since no one had never pointed any problem. I sent my paintings overseas, I received the money -- and to me, that was that."

"When we were in the Apennines, Laurent, visiting Tarso in our ancestral farm, two officers visited Catherine at home. They said they had tried to contact me many times -- but I never got any notification, because I still held Punaouilo as my official address. With the passing of years, the amount I owed ​​to the Tax Authorities had become quite astonishing. Since in the records I had always avoided court, I was not plainly under investigation any longer -- I was to receive exemplary punishment, in an attempt to frighten other offenders."

"Catherine made ​​friends," That's how Carlo would commonly refer to Catherine's lovers, "with one of the officers, and thus the investigation slowed down a little bit. And prolonged, since it was in the young man's interest to have free and justifiable access to our house, as often as possible. Not to investigate anything, of course. The man had been married, and a formal alibi was much appreciated. But because I was a foreigner, my case turned into an international affair and was taken to a different office, where Catherine's friend could not get hold of things anymore."

"That one morning, the 'friendly' officer had learned I was going to be arrested. He phoned Catherine, and she phoned me. I left the house with just my passport and a bag of dirty clothes I had planed to leave at the laundry that afternoon. For hours and hours I drove straight away to the Northern coast, where I crossed to England."

"Italy was closer but I had legal problems there, too, with my Army duties. I had suddenly become a criminal in both countries where I had lived." Carlo sighed, and examined the bruise in his hand, the spot where he had applied a burning frame on his own skin. "And for the second time I saw myself leaving France by sea, with very few belongings. Though, that second time, a car was considerably more valuable than my easel, some 15 years ago."

"I did not think of leaving you a note, Laurent, because I did not have time for considerations. Might I have pondered, it ought have been better to go to jail for one or two nights, maybe a couple of months even, but to have stayed in France to try to solve the problem. But that possibility had been discussed with Catherine, and she did not want to suffer the humiliation of seeing me in jail, she said. She thought you did not deserve it, either, and I had to agree with her."

"How did that happen, Carlo?" I was perplexed. "Why all of a sudden? Did this friend of Catherine denounce you? Or was it... herself?"

"No! Your mother tried to help me!" It seemed odd that Carlo was always so vehemently defending Catherine.  "But someone else might--"

"Who?" I blurted. Though I was actually thinking how Catherine must have helped herself on the young officer, too. It was an interesting diversion for her, who had always preferred artists as lovers -- with the exception of Edoardo, her longest love relationship, who had been a cuoco, an Italian chef.

"Something else, much more wicked, had happenned to me in Punaouilo, Laurent. Remember I told you Danny Douxis, the island's only art dealer, never sold any of my works? I mean, what are just three paintings in almost eight years?! And how he got mad when I had sold them directly to Davez?" Carlo took a deep breath, and catapulted us to the Pacific Ocean. "Will, Joanna's husband, or uncle Will as you'd call him, had already alerted me. We were good mates, and we used to go in the sauna together, almost daily when the owners and guests were not occupying the mansion. His brother worked at Danny's house. I had been curious on who had bought two of my paintings at once... I believe it was in 1978 or 79..." Carlo counted his fingers, like a little boy, and that gesture melted my heart, "...and I know I should remember the date of such an extraordinary event in my otherwise meager career... but when I questioned Danny, he just dismissed me, saying the buyer had demanded secrecy. Well, Will's brother had seen a couple of my paintings at Danny's house... to find out, the next day, the dealer had burned them."

"Burned them!" I gulped, and finally moved closer to my father. I felt like embracing his legs, placing my head on his knees, wishing him to lovingly caress my hair -- like he never had. "Why would he do that?" I didn't remember Douxis, nor ever visiting his gallery in Punaouilo. So much had been kept hidden from me.

"It's inconceivable, right? When Will told me, I had to doubt him, and I guess he was hurt. But when, a couple of years later, another single painting was sold, what I regarded as my best work yet, I asked Will's brother to investigate its destination for me. And he said the painting had never gone elsewhere but Danny Douxis' house... and into his fireplace. Of course I could not confront Danny, because that could have harmed the job of Will's brother. It took me many years to realize the signification of those events. Since I never believed that story, I had almost already forgotten it. Until one day, in London, I met a gentleman who had been to Danny's gallery, while we still lived on the island. And his words were shocking!"

"Unfortunately, I did not buy your painting in Punaouilo, young man. It would certainly have been a good deal. But the dealer disavowed your work, saying it was plain bad, amateurish even, and he would not let me buy it. I insisted, since I thought it a pretty good piece, and wanted to nevertheless acquire it. But the dealer was determined not to sell. An art dealer who doesn't care about money, nor selling the artists he represents? Rather wicked, I thought, but what could I do? I hope Darius is treating you better, here in London.  Yes, I'm sure he is, from the prices he is charging for your works!" And the British gentleman, patting me on the shoulder, had laughed to his tropical holidays best anecdote, while I, being at the center of it, was petrified.

"So I asked for Davez' help. A friend of his, who was an investigator, discovered that, during all those years, Danny Douxis had received sums of money from an account in Switzerland. It could be for any reason, but we believe that Danny was being paid not to sell my paintings." Carlo studied my face to watch my reaction. "He was receiving a salary to boycott me, do you understand it now, Laurent?"

"Mon Dieu..." And, exploding like a flash in my brain, I saw Celeste's astute, white smile full of small teeth in a frame of dark red colored lips. A smile that had fascinated, intrigued and terrorized me, remaining my strongest memory of her. "Was it... my grandmother?"

"Congratulations, Laurent!" Carlo exclaimed, raising his eyebrows, truly haunted. "I confess that I was so very surprised when I found it out... but you don't seem to be. The money was coming from a joint account under the names of Monsieur de Montbelle and Celeste, but that was mainly used by her." Carlo sighed. His burnt hand was hanging limp between his thighs, and I had to refrain from the impulse of kissing it. I had the impression Carlo was a hero, for having survived the joint forces of the Mortinné and the De Montbelle families. "In the last year of his life, Monsieur was senile and could not have made ​​remittances, which leads us to be almost sure that Celeste was the one responsible from them... During all those years, she refused to send money to us in Punaouilo, claiming it was too expensive and complicated. But she had regularly wired it ​​to Danny's account. With the purpose that he did not sell and eventually destroyed my paintings..."

"God! Have you ever told this to Catherine?" The whole scheme was so cunning. I was not surprised that Celeste had ensued it, in order to keep Catherine away from France. Or maybe it had been Monsieur de Montbelle, ultimately imposing his vengeance on my father. Whichever way, it seemed monstrous that we had been kept in a state close to poverty, and my father's talents deliberately downrated, his works being destroyed, to prolong our exile.

"When I found it all out, in London, I finally understood why my paintings were never properly displayed in Douxi's art gallery. But at the time of my discovery, Celeste was already in the early states of demency, and there was no reason to try to confront her. I have actually never met her... you know that, don't you, Laurent? Furthermore, Catherine might have not believed me, despite all the evidence. And above all, I did not want to further indispose Catherine with her mother."

My mind was racing, and I tried to encourage my father's confession. "And do you think it might have been Celeste to report you to the Tax Authorities?" I hadn't known much about my grandmother -- she had always kept us at a distance --, but the impression I had of her did match such slyness.

"I don't know, Laurent." Carlo was not defending Celeste like he would if it were Catherine. But he wasn't accusing her, either. My father seemed incapable of attacking anyone. "Perhaps the process had been running its normal course. And after many years, they just decided to finally act. Maybe it was simple like that, and then it was solely my fault for having been so negligent... And of course, with my escape to England, it looked like I had in fact acted based on ill will."

"And why couldn't you return to France, Carlo?" It was hard to believe that the Tax Authorities and the Police Judiciaire could have separated my father from me for so long. Could a laughable comedy of errors have lasted two decades?

"This was the reason for my sudden flight. But there was something else, that had also been happening for a few years already. In fact, since you and I had arrived in France. You may not remember a gypsy girl who worked at our home for a few months, Jaella... Catherine turned her down, accusing her of stealing some clothes and bijoux."

"I needddy the woerrrrrrrk, madamey!" The girl had cried and begged on her dismissal. aAnd since it had ho effect on Catherine, she was very angry when she had finally gone away.

We had known the girl was pregnant, but Catherine didn't care the least. So I decided to help her. I kept giving her money, even after she had had a son. A lovely baby boy that she named Jair. I thought she was a good girl, but since Catherine disliked her, Jaella only came to our house to receive the money when you and your mother were not at home. 

"Merrrrrrrrrrci beaucouuuuup Carrrrrrrrlu!" The years passed, but her French remained quite simple, and her accent was lovingly musical.

During the weeks you and I were in Italy, Laurent, Jaella reappeared at our house. I had thoroughly forgotten about her, on account of the preparations for our trip. The girl used to call ahead and talk to me to set the day and hour when she could go to my studio. But for the first time she was unable to reach me for several days, and badly needing the money, she decided to show up unannounced. Perhaps fearing that I was trying to dodge her.

"Jaella met Catherine, who thought she had returned to rob us. Catherine ran inside the house to call the police, and Jaella ran after her. With the frightened child in her arms, the girl tried to explain that she had come to receive the money I gave her regularly. What a scene it must have been! And then Catherine -- not simply your mother but mainly the best-seller author --, let her imagination fly and foresaw I could be Jair's father... And when confronted, perhaps guessing this was the greatest idea that she had never had, Jaella decided to confirm the child was mine. Catherine was enraged when she phoned me in the Apennines, accusing me of having a second family. You may remember the serious and tense conversations I had with Tarso during those days, Laurent. A lot was about the threat of losing part of our lands to the National Park, but also on this supposed son I had... Unfortunately, Tarso, just like Catherine, doubted me."

"Do I have a half brother, Carlo?" I almost laughed at the irony of those news. It would not be as tragic as it would be funny. Catherine had a half brother, and throughout life, according to my father, my mother had suffered from feeling relegated as Monsieur de Montbelle's second family. Had my turn arrived? "Did you leave us for that other family, Carlo?"

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