Chapter 15: The Christmas Ball

The ballroom at the Amadori house held two hundred people and a six-foot Christmas tree hung with glass birds.

Luca's mother had decorated it herself.

She stood by the tree in dove-grey silk, and when I came down the stairs on Luca's arm she looked at us and put her hand on her mouth.

Luca was not coughing.

He had stopped in the front hall, in front of the first guest through the door, and he had not started again.

Heads turned as we crossed the floor.

A man from the council raised his glass to him, and Luca nodded back.

"They're staring," I said.

"They're counting," Luca said. "A dying man doesn't carry his wife's wrap."

He did, over his arm, and I could have kissed him for the small, calm vanity of it.

Carla arrived at nine.

She wore red, a low dress that left her back bare, and her hair was pinned up with a gold comb.

She came in on Nunzio's arm, bright and laughing, and she kissed my cheek.

"Sister," she said. "You look tired. Is the marriage hard?"

"It's a pleasure," I said.

"I'm so glad." She squeezed my hands, and her fingers were cold. "Nunzio has been so strange all day. He wants to make a speech."

"Does he?"

"Don't let him embarrass us."

I said nothing.

Nunzio did not look at me.

At ten the band stopped, and Luca's mother tapped a glass, and the room turned toward the tree.

Nunzio walked out to the middle of the floor in a black suit with his gold watch on his wrist, and he smiled around at the crowd.

"I'm not good at speeches," he said. "I'll ask my fiancée one question instead."

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