This programme met with warm approval and a lively hour was spent in the kitchen with a delighted Flavia, who enjoyed the impromptu Italian lesson as much as her students. Afterwards she said her farewells, wished them a happy time in Greve the next day and set off down the road on her bicycle with all the panache of a competitor in the Tour de France.
‘She’s so jolly and nice,’ said Lowri, and gave Hester an impish grin. ‘A lot different from Grandma’s Mrs Powell.’
Since Flavia had already laid the table on the loggia and the pot of chicken merely needed heating when they were ready to eat, Hester suggested it might be a good idea to sit quietly in the salone with a book until it was time for supper.
‘Will you sit with me?’ said Lowri quickly.
‘Of course.’ But as they settled down together Hester felt troubled. Lowri was becoming far too dependent on her. Which was delightful in one way, because Hester was very fond of the child. But when the day came to say goodbye, as it always did, the parting would be even more painful than in the past. The other children she’d cared for had cried bitterly when she’d left, but unlike Lowri they’d had their mothers to comfort them. Although Lowri had Connah and her grandmother, Hester consoled herself. Children were resilient. She would soon recover once she was back in school with Chloe and all her friends.
The supper was a great success. On instruction from Flavia, Hester served a first course of Parma ham with ripe figs bursting with juice. The savoury cacciatore that followed tasted as delicious as its aroma, but it was so substantial that when Hester offered the depleted selection of cakes for dessert not even Lowri had room for one.
‘Gosh, I’m full,’ she said, yawning.
‘In that case, to let your supper go down you’d better stroll round the garden for a while with Daddy while I clear away,’ said Hester, collecting plates. ‘You can watch the moon rise over the pool.’
‘I’ll make coffee when you come down after Lowri’s in bed, Hester,’ said Connah. ‘Come on then, cariad,’ he said, holding out his hand to his daughter. ‘Quick march.’
Later, when the kitchen was tidy and Lowri seen safely to bed, Hester went down to join Connah. The scent of freshly made coffee mingled deliciously with the garden scents of the night and she resumed her chair with a sigh of pleasure.
‘How beautiful it is here.’
‘But it gets cold in the winter when the tramontana blows,’ said Connah, pouring coffee. ‘I was here once with the Andersons for New Year’s Eve. By the way, that was a very meaningful look you gave me regarding the stroll in the garden with Lowri.’
‘Yes.’ Hester braced herself. ‘Forgive me if I’m overstepping the mark, but I think you should spend more time with her on your own. Not,’ she added hastily, ‘because I want time off or because I don’t enjoy her company. I do. So much that Lowri won’t be the only one to feel sad when we say goodbye. But instead of always having me around I think, or at least I’m suggesting, that you should take her out now and again on your own, just the two of you. Maybe take her to visit the Castello, or walk with her into the village.’
‘Is that why you seemed abstracted over our wonderful dinner?’
‘Yes. She wouldn’t sit and read earlier unless I did too.’ Hester raised worried eyes to his. ‘If she’s with me all the time, it will be even more painful when I leave. As I know from bitter experience. The Herrick twins sobbed so much when I left it tore me in pieces. Julia had chickened out of telling them I wasn’t going with them to America, so when they found out at the very last minute it was rough on all of us.’
Connah sat in silence for a while, sipping his coffee. ‘If,’ he said at last, ‘you find this part of your job so painful, isn’t it time you found some other way to earn a living?’
‘I’ve been thinking of it quite a lot lately, but though I’m top of the tree at what I do, I’m not qualified for anything else. Besides,’ she added with a sigh, ‘it was always a vocation for me rather than just a way of earning my living.’
‘So that’s the reason for your sober mood tonight? I thought it was something quite different,’ said Connah casually. ‘Like being addressed as “darling” this afternoon, maybe.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE silence which followed this statement grew too long for comfort. Hester drained her coffee cup and set it down, then refilled it. ‘More for you?’ she asked politely.
‘Thank you. So tell me. Were you annoyed?’ Connah said bluntly.
‘Surprised, not annoyed.’ She shrugged as she poured his coffee. ‘You don’t strike me as someone who bandies meaningless endearments about, so I assumed you had a practical reason.’
‘You assumed right.’ Connah leaned back in his chair, watching her, his long legs crossed at the ankles. ‘I didn’t like the way Luigi Martinelli was looking at you.’
Hester stared at him blankly. ‘How was he looking at me?’
‘You were wearing a few bits of green silk and a transparent shirt. How do you think he was looking at you? He’s a man, for God’s sake, and Italian at that.’
Hester was glad the covering darkness hid the rush of indignant colour in her face. ‘I would remind you that I was not expecting a stranger to appear in the garden when Lowri coaxed me to wear the bikini.’ Her chin lifted. ‘Don’t worry, it won’t happen again!’
‘Pity. That green colour looks spectacular against your tan. No wonder Luigi couldn’t take his eyes off you. But you won’t have any trouble from him,’ Connah added with satisfaction. ‘He knows the rules.’
‘Which are?’ she demanded.
‘No mention was made of your official role in the household so now, naturally, he thinks the role is more personal—’
‘Than the one I’m paid for,’ she said stonily.
‘Are you saying you’d have welcomed Luigi’s attentions?’
She glared at him. ‘Certainly not. He’s a total stranger, also married. You mentioned his wife, remember.’
‘Mainly because he’d rather forget he has one,’ said Connah, shrugging. ‘Luigi possesses a meaningless title but a very old name and impeccable lineage. Sophia inherited a pile of money from her wheeler-dealer Papa. She wanted Luigi’s aristocratic pedigree and he needed her cash, which just about sums up the relationship, according to Jay Anderson. Since the birth of their son, they lead separate lives.’
‘How sad.’
He shot her a look. ‘You, I assume, would only marry for love.’
Hester was silenced for a moment. ‘The subject has never really come up,’ she said at last, ‘but if it did, respect and rapport would be my priorities. Loving someone to desperation is not for me.’
‘But you were willing to spend a holiday in the South of France with the actor.’
Hester nodded serenely. ‘The offer was too tempting to turn down.’
‘Then I gave you the chance of one in Tuscany instead. And there was no backing out of this one at the last minute,’ he added.
‘But that’s different,’ she protested.
‘Why?’
‘It’s my job. I’m very grateful you asked me to come here with you and Lowri, of course, but you’re paying me to work for you wherever we are.’
‘A very cold-blooded way to look at it,’ he said morosely and shot her a look she didn’t care for. ‘If the trip to France had come off, would you have shared bed as well as board with your Romeo?’