I said, "This afternoon, I noticed the physical similarities, too. Cinzia has the same strong features and dark coloring as all the Bartolini boys, especially Tomaso. Anna has light coloring and soft features, probably very much like her cousin's, if I'm not mistaken?" I looked to Anna for confirmation of my educated guess.

  The woman smiled and said dryly, "Ethnic and religious groups don't mix easily in Yugoslavia, not when I was a child and not today. My cousin looked like he could have been my brother." She laughed lightly. "No one's ever questioned the story about my cousin being Cinzia's father. I think they enjoyed the idea that I was not only a foreigner having a child out of wedlock, but that I was depraved enough to have a child with my own cousin."

  "They probably saw it as double proof of the foreigner's bad nature," I agreed with Anna. "Actually, the physical similarities struck me only after the similarities in character had struck me. Everyone who's spoken to me about Egidio has mentioned the same character trait, his cruelty in using people for his own pleasure or gain. All his children share this trait, including Cinzia."

  Ovidio jumped up and yelled, "You've no right to speak like this about Giovanna's children!"

  "Sit down, Signor Olvidi!" The nervous man obeyed Franco's command immediately, but he continued to speak his mind. "She's no right! I don't see what this woman has to do with anything. She's causing all this pain! Please, stop her from insulting Giovanna's family!"

  "It's alright, Ovidio." Giovanna quieted him down. "Go on, Bert. Say what you have to say."

  "Thank you, Giovanna." I turned to Anna and said, "Antonio was Cinzia's half-brother. That's the real reason you were against their relationship."

  "Yes, of course," Anna agreed.

  "I remember that your first reaction to their engagement was shock and then something I thought was horror. Knowing what I do now, that makes sense."

  "What did I tell you was the reason we opposed they're relationship?" Anna tried to recall her excuses. "Secrecy? That doesn't matter to me. If Cinzia had kept a relationship secret from me, I would have thought it normal. She hides everything from me. Besides, secret or not, I'd be happy to know she was in a relationship with someone, just not her half-brother!"

  I looked with concern to Laura. Neither of us wanted to be the one to tell Anna about Cinzia's relationship with her other half-brother, Tomaso.

  Anna asked, "I said we objected because of Antonio's past, didn't I? If I objected to that, I'd have to object to Tomaso marrying Laura. Tomaso's past is not much better than Antonio's. I'm sorry, Giovanna, dear, but it's true."

  Giovanna nodded her sad agreement. She glanced in Laura's direction with a look of apology, and said, "He's different, now. I don't know what I would have done without him this past week." Giovanna's conviction was not as strong as it could have been, and she looked disappointed when Laura failed to agree with her. Giovanna turned to Ovidio for his support, but he seemed to doubt Tomaso's transformation, too.

  "Some people never change," he muttered. His head hung down so he did not see Giovanna's surprise at his failing to support her on that point.

  "Bert," Cecilio said warily, "you're not suggesting Anna killed Antonio to keep him from marrying her daughter, and to keep from having to tell Cinzia who her real father was, are you?"

  "That's ridiculous!" Giusi came to her friend's defense. "Anna would have just told Cinzia the truth! Tell her, Anna!"

  "Yes, I was going to tell Cinzia the truth, but I couldn't find her. I followed her from the house that day and then lost her along the way. The truth was long overdue, but when it came to the moment to tell her, when I saw her coming past the pool, I just couldn't do it." Anna's voice became weak as she said, "I lost my courage. I told myself I should talk to Giovanna, to check with her, first."

  "Giovanna?" Ovidio asked in disbelief. "You were going to tell Giovanna rather than tell your own daughter? Why would you hurt your best friend like that? After all she's done for you and Cinzia, why would you hurt her like that?"

  "Hurt her? But she already knew the truth. Giovanna's always known the truth." Anna looked affectionately at her best friend.

  "It's true, I've always known, Ovidio. Egidio told me the day we heard of Anna having given birth to a little girl. He said he'd made the daughter I'd always wanted with another woman, a beautiful woman, Anna." Giovanna took her friend's hand in hers.

  Ovidio cried out, "Cruele! So cruel! Egidio was a cruel, cruel man!"

  I noted that Ovidio was crushed by this revelation. He barely listened to Giovanna's explanation.

  "Anna had lied to protect my honor. Rather than tell them the truth, that my husband of three years had fathered her child, she lied to protect me from his betrayal. She told people her cousin was the father of her child, and they believed her. She could have sought financial help from him if she'd told the truth. I understood that, so when Giusi contacted me, telling me Anna needed help, I agreed immediately."

  Ovidio gazed with loving admiration at the woman sitting next to him. I saw that his devotion seemed renewed with the knowledge of Giovanna's compassion for the woman who had born her husband's illegitimate child.

  "I accepted the responsibility that Egidio refused to accept. I gave Anna a job so she could support Cinzia and herself. I tried to include her in our lives, my life with the boys. Over the years, Anna became my closest friend and ally against Egidio's cruelties. She kept me sane all those years with that horrible man. Later, after Egidio was gone, I had them live with us. We'd always hoped the boys would treat Cinzia as a relation they should protect from harm, the way older brothers protect their younger sisters."

  "You should have told me," Ovidio said to both women.

  Giovanna was surprised. "Why? It was something between Anna and me."

  Ovidio looked hurt. "So I could have loved you even more."

  "Ovidio? You've never told me you love me. You've finally found the courage?" Giovanna spoke to him as if he were an emotional child, which I suspected was the truth.

  "I found the courage in your goodness." Ovidio did not take his eyes off Giovanna's face. He seemed transfixed by the woman he now loved more than ever before.

  This inspired me to continue, "You have a problem, ladies, and I would suggest that the truth is the best solution."

  Anna and Giovanna looked startled by my seriousness.

  "Cinzia has been Tomaso's lover, off and on, for over a year. She became involved with Antonio hoping to make Tomaso jealous, to force him to leave Laura. Instead, Tomaso tried to keep both Laura and Cinzia, one as his wife, the other as his lover."

  Giovanna cried out to Laura, "Oh, my dear girl, I'm so sorry!" Giovanna began to cry.

  Anna said forcefully, "It's time to tell everyone the truth!"

  *****

  "Why didn't you tell us before?" Ernesto was the first to speak after hearing the truth about Cinzia's father.

  "She wasn't in his will!" Graziella muttered under her breath to her husband who stood at her side.

  Tomaso stared at Cinzia, but the young woman avoided looking at him. I watched as she fixed her gaze on her mother with an expression that changed each second from disbelief, to anger, to disgust, and back again to disbelief. Tomaso pointed an accusing finger at his mother. "You should have told us sooner!"

  "Don't talk to your mother like that!" Ovidio startled Tomaso with his angry outburst. The small artist stood threateningly between Tomaso and his mother. "How was she supposed to know that you and Antonio would disobey her wishes and have romantic relations with Cinzia?"

  "So you told her!" Tomaso glared at Laura in raw anger.

  "I told her!" I spoke up to take Tomaso's anger on myself. I noticed that I had beaten Franco by a split-second to Laura's defense.

  Giovanna tried to explain the situation to her children, but the frustration she felt was clear. "It was Anna's choice to tell her daughter, not mine, and it wasn't much of a choice! Society dictated what she could, and could not, say. Cinzia's shame would have been greater if it were known she was Egidio's bastard child. You children don't understand how things were then, or how they can be today. You just don't understand!" She shook her head in disappointment.

  Tomaso said in disbelief, "Cinzia's shame? You were only thinking of your own shame, the shame of your husband sleeping with another woman!"

  Giovanna had to restrain Ovidio from jumping up again in anger. "Leave it to me, Ovidio." She turned to face Tomaso and spoke slowly and clearly so he would understand every word. "My shame? What could you know of my shame, Tomaso?"

  Her son lost his newfound nerve, and I thought he shrank visibly before my eyes. He looked at the ground in embarrassment, perhaps thinking of all the shame he had caused his mother in his brief lifetime.

  Giovanna asked again, "My shame? Your father had so many lovers during our marriage that I lost count! It wasn't for me to feel shame for his disloyalty. He was the one who should have felt ashamed!" Giovanna looked at Tomaso as if she were seeing him for the very first time. "And what about you? You wanted to treat Cinzia and Laura just as your father had treated Anna and me. You used Laura to get things from me, and you used Cinzia for your pleasure, lying to her about your intentions. Like father, like son! I've heard it said that egoism, laziness, and conceit are the only human traits that are constant. Now I know that's true. You'll never change, Tomaso!"

  I was surprised when Tomaso, after such a searing analysis of his faults by his own mother, did not react with more shame. Instead, he raised his head, looked at Giovanna and said, "Mamma, don't be angry with me. I love you and would do anything for you."

  "For me?" Giovanna did not seem softened by the childlike plea for mercy. "What did you do for Antonio? He took your mistress. He could have ruined your engagement to Laura with what he knew. Did you kill your brother, Tomaso?"

  "No, Mamma! No!" Tomaso started to cry.

  "Stop crying, Tomaso!" Giovanna's tone was the harshest I had ever heard her use with her sons. "Act like man. Be a man! Face your mistakes and accept your responsibilities!"

  I saw both Franco and Laura watching Giovanna Bartolini in amazement. I judged this to be the best moment to confront Antonio's killer with the truth. "Marshal Tadeucci and I believe Antonio's murder was a direct consequence of Anna's secret. Only six people knew that secret: Egidio, Anna, Giovanna, Giusi, Cecilio, and Ovidio."

  "Ovidio?" Giovanna looked at Ovidio in surprise. "You knew?"

  "Ovidio was once a friend of Egidio's," I answered for him. "Egidio bragged about all his affairs, including his affair with Anna, to his friends. Ovidio told me he was sure Anna could convince Cinzia to give up Antonio. He could only believe that if he knew the truth, because only the truth about Cinzia's father could convince her to end the engagement. Giovanna knew the truth because Egidio had told her about his affair to hurt her. Anna told the truth to her close her friend, Giusi, who told her husband, Cecilio."

  "We never told anyone," Giusi swore to me.

  I continued, "Both Anna and Giovanna were prepared to reveal the truth if it became necessary, so they had no reason to kill Antonio. As Giovanna has said, the shame was Egidio's, not theirs. As for protecting Cinzia, they thought that the pain to Cinzia from the truth, might be compensated in part by her newfound name and position in the family."

  Cinzia did not agree or disagree. She stood at the back of the room near the door to the sitting room watching the others as they reacted to my revelations, but revealing little of what was going through her mind.

  "Anna and Giovanna had only one question after learning of Antonio and Cinzia's engagement. Was telling them the secret the only way of ending the relationship? The answer to that question depended on whether Antonio could be bribed to end the relationship."

  "That's what I wanted to check with Giovanna," said Anna.

  Giovanna explained, "We'd agreed when Egidio died that we wanted to avoid telling the children the truth for a little while longer, but we were going to tell them, eventually. I was thinking about that when I was trying to collect myself outside the oil shed that day."

  "I was thinking about that as I sat by the pool." Anna smiled at her friend.

  "Giusi and Cecilio knew you were going to tell the children, eventually."

  Giusi nodded in agreement.

  "They told me they knew Anna could convince her daughter to end the relationship with Antonio. I honestly couldn't understand their confidence. I'd never seen Cinzia listen to her mother. She'd only ever shown disrespect to the poor woman." I had no qualms about speaking the truth concerning the unpleasant Cinzia.

  "We thought it was time to tell Cinzia the truth." Cecilio spoke directly to Anna. "We thought it might make her treat you better, with more respect."

  "Giusi and Cecilio didn't kill Antonio to stop the secret from becoming known," I said. "They thought it was better to have the secret known." I turned to Ovidio. "But Ovidio did not want the secret known. Isn't that right?" I held my breath as I waited for the volatile man's reaction to my question.

  Ovidio continued to look lovingly at Giovanna as if he had not heard anything I had said. When he did speak, it was to Giovanna. "I didn't know you knew the secret. I thought I could protect you from more pain."

  "What are you saying?" Giovanna looked startled by this turn of events.

  "I helped you once, long ago, to stop some of the pain. It was a little thing, and I should have done more, but I was a coward. When Egidio bragged about getting Anna pregnant after only one night together, I asked him what he was going to do for Anna and the baby. He got angry with me and called me an idiot and a coward. He was right. I was an idiot to be his friend for so long, and I was a coward not to help you and Anna before then. I'm sorry."

  "It was so long ago, Ovidio. I didn't know you still thought about those things." Giovanna looked at him as if he were a different man than a few moments before.

  "I didn't think of those things much, not until Antonio announced his engagement to Cinzia. It all came back to me, then, all your pain. I was so angry, I even found the courage to yell at Antonio that day, when he announced the engagement!" Ovidio smiled at the memory of his rare assertiveness. "You offered me the cottage, a place to live and work in peace, Giovanna. That was soon after Cinzia was born. For once in my life, I was brave. I accepted it and made everyone think I was your lover. And for once in his life, Egidio was humiliated!"

  Cecilio said cautiously, "It was when Egidio started to show more respect for Giovanna, in public, anyway. You did a good thing, then, Ovidio."

  "Yes, it was a good thing, then," I agreed, "but this is now. Antonio announced his engagement to Cinzia, and the fighting began. Antonio was a lot like Egidio at that same age. He even looked like Egidio. He was hurting Giovanna just as Egidio had."

  Ovidio mused, "Just like Egidio in every way. Giovanna fought with Antonio, and Anna fought with Cinzia. They were very hurt."

  "You couldn't help Anna, back then. You felt very guilty about that, didn't you?"

  "I tried to make it up to her. I gave her work as a model, and I was always kind to her daughter." Ovidio's gaze clouded over. He was somewhere in the past when he said, "We laughed so hard when Egidio told us how he'd seduced Anna. We laughed at her pain. We told him he was the best, our hero. We worshipped him." The artist's face showed the disgust he felt for himself and his old friends.

  I looked to Franco to see if I should continue. We were heading for the admission of guilt we had been hoping for, but I was feeling very uncomfortable about it. Franco urged me on with a supportive nod. I said in a soft voice, as if Ovidio and I were the only two people in the room, "Ovidio, you love Giovanna deeply and have always loved her. I believe you have the courage to do anything to protect her from more pain in her life. You believed she would be very hurt to know that Egidio was Cinzia's father and to learn that the woman, who is today her best friend, betrayed her with Egidio so many years ago. You feared it would end their friendship, didn't you?"

  "Excusing evil is just as bad as committing evil! I understand that, now. I couldn't let him hurt her all over again. He'd hurt her for so long and then he was gone. But that day Egidio came back to hurt her more. He yelled at her just like he used to do. He stormed out just like he used to, but this time I was stronger and smarter and braver. This time I had the courage to protect them all!"

  "That's enough," Giovanna interceded. She said to Franco, "I don't think it's right to have him talk about this, here, in this way. Ovidio, don't say any more, please."

  "But I want to tell her what I did for you, Giovanna, and you, Anna. I want to tell her! I'm proud I was strong enough to help you." Ovidio patted Giovanna's hand to comfort her.

  "Marshal?" Giovanna pleaded with Franco to intervene.

  "I don't know how much of this we can use in court, Signora, but isn't it important for you to know the truth? Don't you want to know who took Antonio's life and why?"

  Before Giovanna could answer, Ovidio continued his story, as if he had heard nothing of our exchange. "I was going to talk with Antonio to tell him to stay away from Cinzia. If he didn't agree, I was going to make him agree! I followed him to the oil shed but saw Tomaso and that lady who writes about food for the paper. I waited behind the terrace wall until they were gone. But then Tomaso came back. He went inside and began to fight with Antonio, so I left. I thought that I'd talk to him another time. Then I saw Giovanna. She was on the other side of the shed listening to her sons fight. I saw you crying, mi'amor."

  Giovanna was crying as Ovidio spoke. Ovidio looked at Giovanna but did not seem to see the effect his story was having on the woman he loved. He was lost in the pride he felt in his own bravado. "I decided I had to act to help you! You went to Giusi's and that's when I heard Tomaso leave the shed. I went inside to deal with him once and for all! No more pain for you, my love." Ovidio turned to me and explained, "He laughed at me and called me an idiot. He walked back and forth calling me names and showing off his looks and bragging about his women. No, not his women." Ovidio thought a moment. "Antonio talked about Cinzia and how easy it was to get her and how he had no intention of getting rid of her, yet."