Romantics
There was something about the smell of a closed restaurant – the combination of cold grease and cleaning products – that took Nina straight back to her commercial cooking days. How many meal breaks had she spent in grubby lanes, having a quick bite while trying to ignore the stench leaking from oil traps in need of emptying? Add to that the smell of moist cardboard boxes delivered to back doors with their contents of fresh fruit and vegetables slowly warming from sitting too long in the sun and she was there again. This back alley of the inner-city restaurant strip that ran between Brisbane’s Cordwell and Langland Lanes was unfamiliar, so it was good to have Miriam along for moral support. Not that she’d had much choice with her friend involved in solving the mystery in the portrait.
‘Through here.’ Miriam led the way, beyond the restaurant’s back door and through a sunny courtyard where high brick walls muted the roar of city streets. Up a steep flight of stairs, they came to a sunny, glassed-in veranda. A little way along, a woman – immaculately dressed in black trousers and a red shirt – was nursing a small dog the colour of honeycomb.
‘Come, come.’ She waved, pushing the stylish red-rimmed reading glasses over a thick bob of gun-metal grey hair. ‘You are Nina and Miriam. Sit.’
‘Thank you so much for seeing us.’ Nina hoped to get straight to the point.
‘Visitors are a welcome addition to the otherwise quiet life of an old lady,’ she said, her accent thick. ‘And I am told you show interest to know about Peppi’s pearl-ring myth, no?’
Disappointment fell over Nina. ‘We were led to believe it wasn’t a myth.’
‘Ah, sì, this is correct. I know it to be so.’
‘You do?’ Nina took a breath to slow the rush. ‘Will you tell me how you know?’
‘This is simple.’ Bony shoulders rose, tipping the edges of her hair, then dropped back. ‘It was I who spoke with the young man that day.’
‘And you remember him from all those years ago?’
Sonya smiled. ‘Such a handsome and charming young man is hard to forget. A boy, really. Such a boy and so much in love that I recall thinking… How wonderfully romantic for one so young and not even italiano. So, I ask him, “Why do you choose Peppi’s?” And do you want to know what he says back?’
Nina nodded. ‘Um, yes, please.’ Sonya was lovely, but if she strung the story out too long Nina was certain she’d burst.
‘He tells me that by coming to Peppi’s he is re-enacting his grandfather’s proposal of sixty years earlier when he used the same ring. It is at this time he shows me the family ring that is handed down through the generations from his great-great-grandmother, and I understand it is very important that everything stays to plan. Even back in those days, however, Peppi’s is booked out in advance most nights. I tell him this and his face is sad. The poor boy is very nervous and sweating, and from the counter he picks up one of Peppi’s… how you say in English… tovagliolo?’ Sonya demonstrated by dabbing the scrunched cotton handkerchief over her lips.
‘You mean napkin?’ Miriam matched the demonstration, minus the hankie.
‘Sì, sì. And on his face when he smiles, realising it is the finest linen, he has on his cheek, here,’ she pointed to her own, ‘the biggest fossetto…’ Sonya’s recollections lightened her eyes.
‘You mean his dimple?’
She nodded. ‘How can I turn one so sweet away? Instead I sneak an extra table on the floor that night. Do you want to know what else I do?’
Sensing Miriam’s impatience, Nina grabbed her friend’s hand and clung tight, willing her to stay silent, to let Sonya tell her story. ‘Yes, please.’
‘Wait,’ Sonya said, and the pair breathed a collective sigh of frustration that the woman didn’t seem to notice. ‘Pass me this silver frame.’ She pointed a crooked finger and Nina stood up to grab the picture standing in the corner bookcase. ‘Before he leaves, I invite him to take a seat and I show him pictures of Peppi’s as it would have been at the time his grandfather proposed. And I show him this. A photograph that is when Peppi’s is the very first true trattoria in town.’
Sonya’s thoughts seemed to drift.
‘The ring, Sonya,’ Miriam prompted. ‘We want to know about the pearl ring.’
‘Ah, the ring. It is, how you say… unico. The young man… He insists the ring go in the dessert to surprise. To this Peppi says no, no, no.’ A gnarled finger flicked. ‘I agree. What if the chef he confuses the desserts while they set and the one with the ring is delivered to the wrong woman? And then the boy says to use a Peppi’s tovagliolo, like the one I hand him earlier, to… er…’
‘Make the plates different?’ Miriam piped up, her restlessness showing. ‘Avoid confusion for the chef?’
‘Sì.’
‘Even then,’ Miriam added, ‘the woman might’ve ordered something different for dessert. What if she preferred the tiramisu?’
‘She always orders the panna cotta.’ Nina smiled.
‘This is what the young man tells me, too, and Peppi’s panna cotta is…’ Sonya raised the tips of all four fingers and her thumb to her lips, throwing a noisy kiss into the air.
‘But neither showed up for the reservation that night, right?’ Miriam confirmed. ‘And because the ring was never collected, the modern-day myth says Peppi would one day hide it in a panna cotta for another lucky diner to find.’
‘Sì, this is the myth – and such a rumour over the years has not been bad for Peppi’s business, of course, but there is no truth in such rumour, never. This is why it is called a myth, no?’
‘Then what is the truth?’ Nina was finding it impossible not to sound too eager. ‘That’s what I was hoping to find out, Sonya. What happened to the pearl ring? Please, this is so important.’
Sonya’s eyes narrowed. ‘I am ready to hear your story now. Only then I will determine if it is truth or a myth in the making.’
Nina sat tall, took a deep breath and glanced at Miriam for support. ‘I can assure you, Sonya, what I’m about to tell you is everything I know to be true. I understand you might be reluctant to take a stranger’s word. In fact, I’m glad, and I expected as much, which is why I prepared something to show you. My mother taught me about the importance of facts. My mother is also, I believe, the woman who should have received this ring thirty years ago.’
‘Go on.’ Sonya sat back and patted the cute little Cavalier King Charles. ‘Coco and I are listening.’
Nina had rehearsed a version of the story in summary, knowing she’d need to convince Sonya her story was true but without too much detail. She opened the folder containing printouts of the photographs she’d taken when helping Blair hang the frames in the cabins and the lodge. An entire wall was dedicated to the property’s history and to the five generations who had worked the land before Blair. She’d also asked Miriam to use the work printer to print out a copy of the actual portrait, including a close-up of the painted pearl ring.
Nina could tell by Sonya’s expression that the photo of a young John might have been confirmation enough, but she showed her a later picture from a magazine article about the artist that explained his memory loss after a fall in a Brisbane hotel. In both photos the same distinctive dimple showed and the same coquettish grin. The final clincher was a picture of Blair’s great-great-great-grandmother on her wedding day, the unusual pearl and diamond cluster ring uncannily clear. Nina ended by telling Sonya about the engraved inscription Blair had mentioned: For ever, Ivy May.
‘That is a story indeed,’ the old woman said, clearly touched and so intent on the photographs that she’d pushed Coco from her lap so she could look closely at them.
‘What about the other part of the myth you said isn’t true?’ Miriam piped up.
‘That my father would one day send out the ring to a lucky couple who orders the panna cotta? As I say, this is indeed not true. Now, if you will help me up and hand me my cane?’
Oh, no! Was that it?
‘Why are you waiting there? Come,’ Sonya said. ‘Follow me.’ Nina and Miriam looked at each other, clearly having thought the same thing.
Sonya made her way from the veranda, through a neat kitchen, and into the back of the apartment, the girls close behind her. In a room filled with filing drawers in varying sizes and colours and an entire wall of dusty books, an old-fashioned safe stood on a two-drawer cabinet.
As Sonya retrieved a small ring box from inside and flipped the lid back on its miniature hinges, Nina’s heart pounded.
‘I find this box to keep the ring safe. It is like the stars dance around the moon, no?’
‘No, I mean, yes, very unico.’ Nina ached to touch the unusual design, to know the ring was real and that finding Sonya wasn’t a dream.
‘Let’s see, shall we?’ Sonya slipped her glasses from the top of her head to her nose. Turning the gold band to the light she squinted and read aloud, ‘For ever, Ivy May.’
‘You believe me?’ Nina’s heart thudded.
‘You have delighted a foolish romantic.’ Sonya pressed a hand to her left breast. ‘I have always wondered what happened that night. I planned to place the ring on the plate myself and deliver the panna cotta so I could witness the happy event and cue my uncle who had come in with his accordion.’ Sonya’s smile faded. ‘But the young man did not arrive and I knew only that his name was John. Foolishly, I had been more interested in his tale than in his booking details. Let me see. I find the reservation book.’ Her finger searched spine after spine of the bound books that took up several shelves.
‘You mean… you have a record of the reservation?’
‘Here.’ The book’s brown cover featured stamped gold lettering. Sonya found the page with little effort, like a novel opening at a favourite scene. At the very bottom were the words Extra table x 2 and the booking name, John/pearl ring/panna cotta.
‘May I take a photo of that?’ Nina had her phone out of her pocket before she’d finished asking.
‘Sì.’ Sonya stepped to one side and opened the curtains. Sunlight and dust motes danced over the old book. ‘For weeks I search the newspapers for notice of his death, thinking it must be something very terrible to keep him away. I so wished for a happy-ever-after.’
‘Oh, me too, Sonya, which is why I’m here.’
Nina was telling the details Ava had shared only the other day, and Marco’s wish that she travel to Italy, love deeply and be loved in return. Sonya had asked about Marco’s heritage and it turned out she had been born in a town not far from Positano. It was the first time Miriam had been privy to every detail. It was also the first time Nina’s girlfriend had ever been stunned into silence.
‘Did your mother find these things?’ Sonya asked. ‘Did she travel and love deeply?’
‘Yes, she travelled, and she had my brother and me. She says she was well loved.’
‘But?’
‘I don’t believe Mum ever found her place. What happened to John that night deprived her of the ultimate happy-ever-after.’
‘And you wish to give this ring to your mother after all these years?’
‘No, I would never do that, and she’d kill me for even being here. Besides, she knows nothing about any marriage proposal. She only told me her story about meeting John Tate because I saw the portrait. She says it’s too late for her, but I thought if I could return the ring to John it might help him remember. Never in a million years did I think I’d find it. But now I’ve met you and I’ve seen the booking sheet and the ring I know it’s all true.’
Nina, Miriam and Sonya were all dabbing away tears.
‘You have surprised and delighted an old romantic,’ Sonya said again. ‘Thank you for visiting and for sharing your story.’ She closed the box on the ring and shut down Nina’s optimism. ‘I think it is time I see you out.’
‘Oh, yes, of course. Thank you for your time.’
‘Time I have.’
All three hugged goodbye and Sonya waved a final farewell from the veranda as Nina and Miriam negotiated the tight staircase. Once on solid ground, Nina turned for the last time. Sonya waved and called, but Nina didn’t hear what she said.
‘Hang on, Miriam.’ Nina took the stairs back up, at the same time patting herself down for what she’d left behind: handbag, check; mobile phone, check; folder, car keys, sunnies, check, check, check.
Sonya stood in the same place, one arm outstretched and palm facing up, the small velvet box at its centre. ‘Take the ring, Nina.’
‘Really, Sonya?’
‘I believe there are no lies in your story. The young man is still alive. It belongs with him. I trust you to see he gets it.’
‘Oh, he will, he will, I promise.’ They hugged again.
‘And tell your mother this, Nina. While there is breath in our bodies it is never too late.’
‘Can I write to you, Sonya?’
‘Si, I would enjoy this.’
After another hug, Nina floated through the courtyard and back to the car.
‘Oh, m’God, oh, m’God, oh, m’God!’ Miriam squealed, as they slammed the doors. ‘We got it, we got it, we bloody got it!’
‘I know.’ Nina sat riveted to the driver’s seat of their hire car in utter disbelief.
‘What now, Neens?’
‘I have no idea, Miriam.’ Her phone beeped a message. It was her mother. ‘Or maybe I do.’