Page 126 of The Island of Lost Girls

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Sergio takes two days to come home. And, when he does, he doesn’t speak. They’ve had no confirmation of where he’s been. He’s not been in the bars or in the neighbours’ homes. The last they saw of him, he was running up the church steps as the duke and the priest retreated inside. Last they saw, he had slipped inside as they closed the door.

Confirmation comes with his arrival. The castle limo enters the docks and he steps out with a huge suitcase to drag behind him, and then they know where he’s been. Traitor. Filthy traitor. They kill his daughter and he throws his lot in with them.

He comes home through the restaurant. The women, at the family table in the shade on the terasa, watch him pass, and no one speaks. And he vanishes into the interior and Paulina puts a hand over Larissa’s and presses down, and they wait.

Twenty minutes later, he emerges, suitcase dragging over the tiles and a duffel thrown over his shoulder. He looks sulky. Adolescent. And yet so full of his own pomp that they already know what’s coming.

‘I’ve been given the restaurant on the hill,’ he announces.

Silence. Blood money. He’s taken blood money.

‘It’s a fine restaurant,’ he says. And the women watch him like a bug.

‘You can come, if you like,’ he says, and to Mercedes’ surprise she realises that he actually thinks they might agree.

They watch him standing there and no one speaks. He shrugs.

‘Or stay here. Whatever. Stay small. If that’s all you think you’re worth.’

Larissa speaks at last. ‘And what was your daughter worth, Sergio? What was she worth?’

For a second – for a split second – he looks ashamed. We know what you did, say the women, though they do not speak. We know who you are, Sergio Delia. And then the shame is wiped from his face and he puffs his chest out and walks on. Loads his luggage into the waiting limousine and drives away.

Larissa gazes down at her hands for a long time. Takes hold of her wedding ring and twists it off. She’s lost so much weight since her daughter died that it’s loose, and comes easily. She drops it into an unemptied ashtray, among the stubs. Then she gets to her feet and picks up her apron. ‘Right,’ she says. Ties the apron on and goes out to serve the tables.