It was odd that she asked, a rich lady like this. Running into a strange man in the dark. And looking at him with a spark in her eye. Ladies, he’d found, especially the beautiful ones who liked danger, could mean trouble for him.
He kept his answer guarded. “Bergamini.”
The lady’s gaze dropped to Nico. “Your son?”
“My brother.”
She raised an eyebrow, assessing him. “So then, what precisely are you doing here, Mr. Bergamini? I assume you work for Mr. Vanderbilt if you are on his land.” It was a challenge, he knew. Her saying he could not be here legitimately.
“I am hired in the stables of Mr. George Vanderbilt.”
Nico’s head jerked at the lie. But he said nothing.
Sal patted the tube of paper as if the stables could somehow be found inside.
“Well, then. I am a guest of Mr. Vanderbilt’s. I assume you were hired in his stables because you are so very adept at controlling horses that others are riding.”
Stupido, Sal berated himself. Cosi dannatamente stupido. So stupid to lie to someone who could so easily prove it wrong.
So now, even if he and Nico could find their way to whatever person made the decisions about hiring, what were his chances of being taken on? Even if he could hide all evidence of his past—with a dead chief of police at his feet.
Even if he could prove how George Vanderbilt had promised him a job long ago, he might be barred from employment if this guest of Biltmore talked to her host. Because no one hired a liar on purpose.
Not to mention a murderer.
With a nod, Sal enunciated the proper words: “I wish you the good evening.”
Then he swung Nico up to his back and, not looking to see if the rider was watching, slogged on down the Approach Road.
A shiver shook Nico—perhaps from the cold. Perhaps also from fear.
Sal would not allow himself a shiver from the cold. From his time in the Pennsylvania quarries, he’d learned you could never allow yourself to admit just how dangerously cold you’d become.
“Grit-a the teeth against it,” an older Italian advised. “And do not complain in the words. Senza parole. The cold, it’ll hear you and come harder the more.”
As he squished through the mud, Sal’s back ached from the oak bench of the train and from carrying Nico. By what little moonlight glowed behind the scrim of fog that remained, he could find his way through the murky dark. His feet on the wet leaves, each step was a soft, sodden slap.
Moisture clung in elongated beads to the jagged tips of the maples—it must be close to freezing. Just as the Aunt Rema from the train had said, this Approach Road twisted back on itself. Over stone bridges. Under trees that did not grow in Palermo.
It made no sense to keep going into the dark. But after all these years, Sal had to see the house he’d watched being built with only a pen. Had to see it, even here with little light but a veiled moon’s and Nico clinging to his back like a barnacle on their steamship to this country.
“Biltmore,” he said aloud. And then, for Nico’s amusement, he added, “The place of work—and the home—of the gifted Salvatore Francis Catalfamo and Nicholas Peter Catalfamo. Sicilians. Poets. Horsemen. Gentlemen.” He paused. “E fuorilegge. Al tuo servizio.”
And outlaws. At your service.
How many times he’d said that each day at the pensione. Not the outlaw piece—that was before he’d become one. But the At your service.
Back when he’d had to leave his mother and Nico in Palermo to find work, he’d said it to the two American gentlemen who’d come to Florence for inspiration. All through the night, they’d bent over the large sheet of thick paper, its upper-right corner brindled in coffee rings.
The gray-bearded one of the two had kept his fountain pen poised over the paper and did not turn to make his request. “The best wine you have, garçon. Mr. Vanderbilt and I both prefer a good burgundy before dinner.”
Garçon. Though they were in Florence, not Paris, and Sal spoke little French. He understood even less English, though he’d been studying with Father D’Eridita in case the chance arose someday to leave Italy.
The younger gentleman, his dark, serious eyes still narrowed in concentration above high cheekbones and a neatly trimmed mustache, glanced around. “Merci.” Then flushing, he switched from French to a nearly flawless Italian: “Perdonami. Sono appena arrivato in Francia. Grazie per aver portato il vino. Thank you for bringing the wine.”
Sal addressed the men in halting English. “We have only left today for the wine the best of the Chianti. But it is the most cost.”
A flicker of amusement passed between the two men.
The older one chuckled. “If you mean it is expensive, that is no matter. By all means, bring us whichever wine is the house best.” His eyes under shaggy gray brows twinkled. “Mr. Vanderbilt’s tastes appreciate the most cost.”
The one with the dark mustache might’ve been even younger than Sal had initially guessed. When he bit a lower lip, it made him look more like an intelligent but unconfident boy than the man of great wealth he apparently was.
Since Sal had become one of the few able-bodied males working for the local pensiones, as so many of the others had already emigrated to America, he’d been saddling Mr. Vanderbilt’s horse for him each morning. Already Sal had noticed the man knew how to pick the best horse in the stable. Of course cost would be of no consequence in his choice of wine.
The younger man, Vanderbilt, strained his neck toward the paper. “I don’t quite see, though, Richard, what you mean by moving the grand stairwell to one side and having it appear more fully as a major feature of the front aspect.”
The older man gripped the barrel of his pen over the paper. Then sent its nib back to the page.
Spires. And wings. And parapets.
Sal stood transfixed, mesmerized, longer than any good server should have.
Murmuring over the structure that was emerging on the piece of paper beneath the older man’s pen, both gentlemen paused. Glanced up at Sal.
“Perdonami,” Sal apologized. “Chiedo scusa.” He hurried away for the Chianti.
The two men, Vanderbilt and the one with the pen, talked late into the night. Called for more Chianti. More pecorino cheese and a platter of red-globed grapes they popped by twos and threes into their mouths, often both talking at the same time. Then, around three in the morning, two espressos.
They had circled a spire here, drawn arrows there, added windows. As a rosy dawn nudged at the edge of the vineyards, they had risen and stretched.
The younger man, Vanderbilt, offered a tired smile. And again the flawless Italian. “Grazie. Grazie mille. Non avresti dovuto rimanere sveglio con noi.” You should not have stayed awake with us.
Sal shook his head and risked a response in English. “At your service.” That much he knew by heart. The next he cobbled together. “I am good . . . I am the happy to be awake as I . . . as you work.”
Vanderbilt’s mouth lifted again under the mustache. “Bene. Your English is coming along very nicely.”
Bashfully, Sal took his risk then. Without stopping to think how presumptuous it was, he pointed to the oil painting in the front parlor over the fireplace, the landscape of Monte Bianco and its reflection in a shimmering lake, then bent to the table and sketched in more lines, the roofline higher—a fair match for the Alps—and reflecting in a fountain pool he drew in front.