Chapter 1
MARIA. grew up in the bleak, uninspiring surroundings of the West Riding, far from the hot Italian sun which had shone above her on the day of her birth. But she retained much of the warmth of that sun in her temperament, some people would say too much of it. Most of all the dour, hard-working, money-grubbing people of Leeds where her people had settled when they came to~England at the end of the war.
John Hardisty had fallen in love with the beautiful Neapolitan, and despite the advice of his Commanding Officer and the opposition of his family he had married her and brought her back to England.
He had returned to Yorkshire early in 1946, bringing his Italian wife and a baby whom they had called Maria. Maria Hardisty I Not exactly a euphonious or romantic combination : the two names seemed to be a loggerheads with each other, but the conflict somehow symbolized the two sides of the girl's nature. The two aspects of her temperament fought with each other, fought to possess and dominate her; in the end it might be said that one of them triumphed.
But this story is largely about this struggle and the reader will judge for himself whether the harsher Northern qualities or the softer, life-accepting South Italian aspects of her nature came out uppermost.
The early years of Maria's life were pretty grim ones: her father working ten or more hours at the mill, her mother at home scraping to make ends meet in an environment alien and unfriendly. Her mother gradually became sour with the struggle and the disappointment, for everything had seemed full of promise when she first reached these islands: the promise of a life free of war and dictatorship, the promise of a beautiful home and numerous children; instead the hard facts of near poverty, the daily struggle to make ends meet and the disappointment of a series of miscarriages. It was very different from the large peasant family in which she had been nurtured with its crowd of bambini, its feast-days, its olive-covered slopes, and the friendliness of the neighbours.
And when John took to staying at the pub on the way home instead of returning for the dinner she had cooked, leaving her alone with the child, her pent-up resentment gave way to open antagonism and bitterness. Still quite beautiful she began to think of other men, began to respond to some of the searching glances the local men gave her. At least she'd get some fun out of life before it was too late. Her longing to be made love to, to be cherished by a man who could give her some of the good things of life, tempted her from the straight and narrow path that was the exemplar for the wives of Italian peasants. For after all she was in England, where women behaved differently, where it did not seem to a terrible crime to be unfaithful.
She was aware, of course, that if her husband found her to be unfaithful he would never forgive her. He wanted her to sit at home and wait for him, not to enjoy herself with another man. Just like any other man. But it was not quite the same. For one thing, she thought, it was possible to do things in England without everybody else knowing about it. And that was impossible in Italy where the family was made up of a crowd of grandmothers and grandfathers, aunts and uncles, and goodness knows how many children. Nothing could be done without the whole family and even the whole village knowing about it.
Maria had begun to go to the local elementary school and that meant that she was alone at home most of the day. John went off at half-past seven in the morning and rarely returned before nine or ten at night. Only once in a while would he seem to notice her, and suggest an outing, perhaps to the nearby cinema. It seemed that her chance for some sort of happiness had come at last.
Gina Fanfani, as she had been before her marriage to John Hardisty, began to look at herself in the mirror with a new kind of scrutiny. She saw that her face was still attractive', that her figure, though a somewhat fuller, still caused men to look round at her in the streets. Indeed she hod once been described, by a friend of John's, as spectacular and no wonder for she had large, prominent breasts that jutted enterprisingly through the dark sweaters she had taken to wearing,a slight waist, and legs that were still the envy of her neighbours. It was, however, the curvaceous buttocks and hips that made the most instant appeal to the men who admired her as she walked down Briggate or along the Headrow on the days she went to the city to shop or, perhaps, to have coffee at Powolnys or Collinsons. As she looked at herself in the long mirror she s-aw that she was attractive still, though she could see the faint wrinkles at the corners of her eyes. These, she felt sure, she could get rid of. But there would be no need to do anything about her splendid nose and her full, sensual lips, her shapely chin, and above all her dark-brown enigmatic eyes that her daughter Maria had also inherited. She looked at her bosom and smiled to herself as she remembered how the local women in the shops looked down their noses at the way she displayed it, and no bra at that. She had fed Maria herself but her breasts were still conical and symmetrical. No one looking at her breasts, at her flat stomach, or at her upper thighs, would have had any idea that she had ever been pregnant:
She pulled off her sweater and looked at her naked breasts. They stood out, two perfectly shaped hemispheres in the middle of which her large pink nipples wire surrounded by darker, almost brown areoles. She knew how much some of the men that admired her in the streets would like to caress them, bury their heads in them.
The door opened and Maria, with her face flushed, ran into the room, putting her arms round her mother's legs. "Oh, mama, it has been such an exciting afternoon. We went to the swimming-baths, and I have to get a new costume. Will you get me one?"
Gina looked down at her daughter and saw that she was even more beautiful than she had been herself. She had the same oval face the same sensual lips, the same lovely almost black hair. Already, her mother realized, she had a bewitching look about her that made an appeal to men, even though she was a mere child, not yet seven years old. She would certainly have to be protected, especially in the years to come. Tears came into her eyes as she thought how much her daughter would be loved by her family back at home, while here her father did no more than provide her with the barest necessities, never giving way to her lit le whims and her greed for affection.
"Yes, of course, I'll-buy you a new costume. We'll get it before your next lesson and then you'll be like all the other children." Cina spoke with a Neapolitan accent, but unless she was under some emotional stres she spoke grammatically for she had taken language classes during her first two years in England. She certainly made fewer mistakes than her husband whose education had ended after two years at the secondary school.
Maria left her mother and went into the large kitchen to find something for tea. Her mother pulled on her sweater, now more determined than ever to break out from the confines of her home, from the imprisonment imposed on her by a feckless husband and the miserable pittance he gave her for housekeeping. Though she wanted to take a lover just for the sake of the sex, the admiration and possibly the affection she might get in return, she also had at the back of her mind the future of her child. She did not want her to spend the whole of her childhood and girlhood amidst the surroundings provided by one of Leeds's dreariest suburbs. She wished to see her having a proper education with all the opportunities for advancement that it could provide in a country like England. Gina's peasant background had been a handicap to her but it had not prevented her from assessing shrewdly the advantages of education. If she had to surrender something very precious to get it for Mario, she was quite prepared for it.
It was with thoughts of a similar kind that Gina left the small suburban house the following morning to take a bus into the city. She had put on her favourite two-piece suit, her most elegant nylons and her best high-heeled shoes, and she cut a strikingly attractive figure as she walked along Leeds's Commercial Street for coffee at Powolnys.
Two or three times she had noticed a well-dressed man, well into his fifties, sitting at a table in the far corner, who had plainly been impressed by her. He had smiled pleasantly and invitingly at her on her last visit but almost about to return his smile she had thought better of it and, at the last minute, had turned away and buried her head in the magazine she was reading. She had now made up her mind that she would let him get into conversation with her.
As soon as she entered the cafe she saw him, sitting in his usual place. He looked up and gave her his usual friendly smile. She smiled back and seeing that very few tables were free near to the door she went over in the direction of his table and sat down at one of the tables to his. He half rose, bowed and then sat down again, but continued to look in her direction. She was hoping that he. would speak to her, but she supposed, he was what the English call a gentlman: the kind of man who did not push himself onto a woman uninvited. Well, she thought,how ever did such men get to know a woman?
She ordered and a few minutes after she caught his glance again and this time she looked him frankly in the eyes. He seemed to acknowledge the way she looked at him by a slight lowering of his eyelids, andthen by a glance in the direction of the door.Oh, well, if it was to be that way, she was quite ready though she would have much preferred it if he had come over to her table.
A moment later he got up to leave and almost as soon as he reached the door she began to follow him. As soon as she walked into the street he came up to her and,raising his hat, he spoke to her:" I am sorry to act so unconventionally. But I thought you would prefer it that way. I was not sure whether you would have approved of my speaking to you inside. My name is Richards, David Richards."
She had never spoken to an English gentleman before -for she supposed he was a gentleman -but she rose to the occasion. How glad she was now that she had learned to speak English reasonably well. She was not en ordinary peasant girl now, nor even the wife of a man who worked in't mill.
"Oh, I wondered whether you might speak to me...I was not certain, you see I am Italian and do not know your customs..." she paused, suddenly feeling embarrassed. What, after all, was she doing here in the centre of the city, talking to a strange man?
"Well, if you are Italian," the tall, grey-haired man was saying, "I must say you speak English very well." He looked down and saw her wedding-ring on her hand. Then he said: "Shall we go for a drink, I know a nice little pub round the corner where we shall not be -er -so conspicuous." He took her by the arm and began to lead her towards the pub She offered no kind of resistance and soon found herself in the warm atmosphere of a pub with a glass of wine in front of her.
"So, you are Italian, you live in Leeds and you are married," he laughed,adding "But it's no business of mine unless you want to tell me about yourself." He had rather sharp, but not unpleasing features and looked rather younger than she had thought at first "But, perhaps I can ask your name?
"Yes, of course, it is Gina -er, Gina Fanfani, and I come from Naples."
He praised her name and then it seemed that he became immersed in his thoughts for he was quite silent for three or four minutes. Then, looking into her eyes, he said "Look, can I take you to my flat? I live vary near to here, just up past the Infirmary.It1s ten minutes walk but we can jump into a taxi. What do you say?"
Gina felt her heart beat faster; it seemed to be thumping under her suit. She was going to do it at last, do it with someone else -unless she said "No" immediately. 5he thought of her husband working in the mill, her daughter at school, neither of them having any idea of what she was up to, of the sin she was about to commit. She looked back at the man, felt that she would be safe with him, and said she would go with him.
He said nothing in the taxi, and, though he sat close to her, ho refrained from touching her. They mounted the stairs to his top-floor flat and when he threw open the door she saw at once that he was a man with adequate means. It was well and tastefully furnished, the kind of flat that Gina dreamed about when she looked through magazines they sent her from home. He invited her to take off her jacket, and then he brought out a sim liar wine to the one they had been drinking in the pub. He gave her a glass and then sat in the chair facing her.
"Well, Gina, I guess you know why I asked you here. Are you willing? We are quite safe up here, nobody needs to know that you have been here," he paused, becoming a little uncertain how to continue. At the back of his mind was the question of money, but he hesitated to suggest it for she did not seem to be that kind of a woman. And yet he could hardly expect her to come to his rooms for nothing. After all she was a very beautiful woman, perhaps only about twenty-seven or eight, and he was almost an old man, grey and balding. Whet possible motive could She have for coming to his place, except money?
"I understand," said Gina, her accent now betraying her Italian background, "I well understand, and I want it that way." She had managed to say it as her heart went on thumping under her blouse, and as she felt the first thrill at the thought of another man -an English gentleman -making love to her* It had been such a long time since she had felt that thrill go through her body. And it was a thrill tinged with a certain excitement at doing something that she knew she should not be doing, but something that John would never know about.
"Let us go to my bedroom," the man said, and he got up from his chair, put out his hand to help her from her chair, and then led her to his bedroom.
It was sumptuously furnished but Gina could not have described it in detail afterwards. She remembered only the heavy curtains that he pulled across, the soft,deep carpet and the massive bed. She began to undress almost automatically and as she bent down to take off her shoes she saw that the man was looking at her, his face full of curiosity and anticipation.
The man undressed rapidly and as Gina unbuttoned her blouse she suddenly saw that he was naked at the other side of the bed. Oh, if her husband saw her now he would kill her! Here she was in a room with a man she had never met before, and he was standing there naked as she undressed herself! Well, she had made up her mind and John could go to hell. She almost tore off her blouse, untied the bra she had put on because she had come to town, and then pushed her skirt down her legs and then, shyly and turning away from the man's gaze, she pushed her panties off, then her suspender-belt and finally her nylons. She was naked. With her hands covering the part of her body she had never shown to anyone else but John she walked across the room and got into the bed at the side of the man.
He at once took her in his arms and pressing his chest against her large, full breasts he brought his lips to hers as he questioned her strange, dark, enigmatic eyes.