‘Coffee?’ Janet didn’t wait for a reply. She knew Annie well by now. ‘So, what’s on the cards today?’
‘I’ve got a visit to the accountant first thing and then it’s into the school to see how all the work’s going.’ A series of builders, decorators and other tradesmen had been transforming the first-floor apartment into a school and seriously depleting Annie’s bank balance for the last few weeks. She was just hoping that she would have enough money to pay for all the work. Yet again, she felt a shiver of apprehension. ‘Oh, yes, and I’m probably getting a visit from Matt.’
Janet glanced back over her shoulder, her hands occupied with the coffee machine. ‘Matt? You mean Matt Brown? We haven’t seen him for a while. Is he still living down south?’
‘Yes, he’s been in Florence, but he says he’s planning on moving up here.’
‘To Santorso?’ Annie nodded and Janet grinned at her. ‘It would be good to see Matt again. He was in Turin for years and then he moved away, but he still came up here to climb. At least up until a year or two ago. Is he still as gorgeous as ever?’
Annie smiled back. ‘Karen certainly thought so.’ She went on to relate their chance meeting with Matt and his girlfriend. Janet was impressed when she heard about the girl from the TV.
‘So he’s still the same old Matt. I suppose the leopard doesn’t change his spots that easily. So why’s he moving up here?’
Annie told her what he had said and explained about his maybe renting a room at the school from her. Thought of room rental reminded her of the ever-more pressing matter of finding somewhere to live. ‘I’m going to spend this week seriously looking and, if I haven’t found anywhere by the weekend, I’ll move out of here and back into the school.’
‘You could always share a flat with Matt.’ Janet’s grin was positively mischievous.
‘Yes, and be kept awake every night by the bedsprings in the room next door. I don’t think so, thank you.’
‘Well, if he’s got time, bring him up here for a coffee this afternoon. It’ll be so good to see him again.’
When Annie got to the school around mid-morning, she found that there was now a fine new sign on the wall by the front door advertising the fact that the Santorso English Academy was on the first floor of the building. Even better, upstairs on the first-floor landing, the new illuminated sign was now hanging over the door. Even if there still wasn’t any furniture in the classrooms, at least it was looking like a school from the outside. She pressed the bell and Paolina buzzed her in.
A light dusting of snow had fallen while she had been with the accountant. After shaking her jacket off, she hung it on a hook by the door and headed for the room marked Reception, the only properly decorated, furnished and finished room in the school at the moment. The heating in the reception area was full on and the place was boiling hot. This was no doubt because Paolina, oblivious to the weather outside, appeared to be wearing little more than a lacy top and a short summery skirt that day. Annie walked in and set her bag down on the front desk.
She had discovered a few weeks back that Paolina’s hobby was scavenging local junk shops for old clothing that she then transformed into outfits for herself. So far, Annie had seen her in everything from a nineteenth-century ballgown to an ancient fireman’s uniform. She was a very pretty girl, in her mid-twenties, with long dark hair, and she somehow managed to carry off all but the most outrageous outfits. Today’s blouse was charming, although the moths had clearly had a go at it and either Paolina or her mum had embroidered colourful Alpine flowers over the worst of the holes.
‘Ciao, Paolina, how’s it going?’
‘Ciao, Annie. Everything’s fine. There was a phone call from a Signor Lagrange who wants to speak to you. He’ll be here in half an hour.’
At first, the preponderance of French names everywhere had come as a surprise to Annie. Santorso was in Italy, but its roots were French, going back to the time of the Kingdom of Savoy, and many of the locals still spoke a French-based patois. Annie didn’t recognise the man’s name and she wondered what he might want.
She changed from her lovely warm, fur-lined boots into indoor shoes and returned to her office to check her messages. There was a short text from Karen telling her she was just arriving in Geneva, and an email from her mother, asking if she was coming home for Christmas. Annie glanced at the calendar and sat back in thought. Christmas was less than a month away and she knew she had to make a decision. On the one hand she knew she should make the effort to go and see her mum, but on the other there was the fear that something terrible might happen here while she was away. Still, the longer she waited to make a decision, the more expensive the flights would become.
She stared out of the window. The school occupied the first floor of a fairly modern building and she had chosen the location because of the large, free car park right outside. It was still snowing, but not very hard, but with the overcast sky it looked, and was, cold out there. Trees, pavements and flower beds were dusted with white, while the roads were a mucky brown mess of salt, grit and ice. As she watched, the unmistakable noise of the snowplough scraping along the tarmac reminded her she needed to get the antifreeze level checked in her car. Although they were only at just over a thousand metres here in Santorso, she knew it could get very, very cold.
She had only had that one cup of coffee for breakfast, and she realised she was hungry and thirsty. A glance at the clock on the wall told her she just about had time for something before the arrival of this Signor Lagrange.
The bar was directly opposite the school, right alongside its sister establishment, the pizzeria. Crossing the slushy road without soaking her feet wasn’t easy, but Annie managed. At the bar she ordered a cappuccino and picked up a croissant filled with apricot jam. As she consumed her belated breakfast, she chatted to Signora Toniolo who owned and ran the place together with her husband, Beppe. Although Annie had only been in Santorso for a few months, she knew them both very well by now and liked them a lot.
She glanced around the room. Although it was the ground floor of a modern block, the walls had been lined with rough logs to give an Alpine chalet effect, and huge cow bells hung above the bar. Only a few of the tables were occupied this morning, but Annie knew this was only a temporary seasonal lull. As soon as the ski lifts opened and the winter sports season started in earnest, this bar and all the other town-centre bars would be packed with tourists from all over Europe and even as far afield as Russia and China. Brits made up a high proportion of the numbers and were responsible for an even higher proportion of the alcohol consumed. But, in spite of the recent snow, only the highest ski lifts were open at the moment and the season proper wouldn’t start until they had a real good dump of fresh snow.
Her phone started ringing. It was Matt.
‘Hi, Matt, how was the Grand Hotel and the show?’
‘Hi, Annie, the show was awful, but I was expecting that. I’ve never been a fan of Italian music, at least not since Puccini. As for the hotel, it was… you know me. I’ve never been one for these flashy places. All just a bit too glitzy, really.’
‘And the company?’
‘Nice.’
Annie thought she knew him well enough to recognise his choice of vocabulary for what it was. ‘Just nice? Nothing a bit special? Beautiful girl, luxurious surroundings, snowflakes fluttering down from a starry sky?’ Just for a moment she found herself wondering how it would feel to be with Matt underneath a starry sky. There had been a time, if she were totally honest with herself, way back when she first met Steve, that she had rather liked the look of Matt. He was tall, he was undeniably handsome and he had always been so very friendly to her. But she had chosen Steve and had no regrets. That was unless you counted Steve’s fatal obsession with danger.
‘You don’t get snowflakes and starry skies together. And, yes, it was a good night.’
‘So