The Rich Shall Inherit by Elizabeth Adler

Author:Elizabeth Adler [Adler, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 978-0-307-57507-4
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2010-07-07T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 29

1899, ITALY

Instinct sent Poppy back to the small, welcoming pensione on the shores of Lake Como, and the Rossis, the kindly Italian couple who had looked after her and Aunt Melody so well. Even though she wore the thin gold wedding band she’d purchased in Venice, she knew by the look in Signora Rossi’s eyes that the woman didn’t believe her story of sudden sad widowhood. Still, the Signora took her to her heart and looked after her with the same motherly kindness she lavished on her own grown-up children and grandchildren.

Poppy was treated with the proper respect due to a guest, so that on Sundays when the large family gathered, she would sit alone at her table in the window and Signora Rossi would hurry to serve her first. Then she’d excuse herself and hurry off to attend to the demands of yet another small grandchild.

Poppy tried not to watch as the excited children ran in and out, while their mamas lavished them with food and attention and love and their adoring papas looked on fondly; but they would come and peek around the door at her, laughing, and she’d feel a pang of jealousy for the family’s simple happiness. She’d hurry through her unwanted lunch and then wander into the little town of Bellagio, lingering in the dim candlelit church, searching for answers that didn’t exist, and finding only temporary peace.

As the long days drifted into weeks and weeks into months, she had endless time on her hands to contemplate Felipe’s revenge. Though she hoped each day for a letter, there was no word from Angel, and on the long, dark winter nights loneliness would engulf her. She’d doze restlessly, dreaming of home and Greg, whom she knew she loved so dearly now and whom she would never see again. On the sharp gray afternoons she would brave the icy winds blowing across the lake, pacing the leafless gardens restlessly, wondering how she could ever have been so foolish.

Her meager supply of money began to run low, and anxiously, she cut back on her meals at the pensione, taking only supper. Her body was growing clumsier as the baby grew, but she made no attempt to consult a doctor or to provide for her confinement. Signora Rossi looked worried, questioning her in her few halting English phrases, but Poppy just shook her head and pretended not to understand. It was almost as if, despite the evidence of her distorted body, she still wanted to believe it really wasn’t happening.

Showery April slipped into the soft balmy days of May and, as the pensione’s gardens bloomed with vines and scented blossoms, she contemplated her future with dread. She tossed and turned at night, wondering where she would go, and what she would do. She had only a vague idea of when the child was due and, when the first pain stabbed tentatively at her lower back in the middle of a warm May night, she just lay there not wanting to believe it.

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