‘It’s a dog.’
‘Gina, come and meet—’
‘I…I brought you this…’ Riccardo heard himself stumble over his words and he looked to Charlotte for help.
‘It’s gorgeous, isn’t it, Gina? Come in. Look at this dog! It’s the biggest stuffed animal I’ve ever seen! It’s almost as big as your room, honey. Where are you going to put it? You should thank your…your…’
‘Dad,’ Gina said, one eye on the dog, one eye on Riccardo. She smiled shyly and took the dog, and all at once Riccardo felt foolishly, ridiculously happy. Nothing like the sort of happy he felt when he closed a deal or staged a takeover. This was a feeling that penetrated through to parts of him he hadn’t known were there.
‘Why don’t you go upstairs and show…show your dad where you’re going to put that wonderful dog.’
It was as easy as that. The door closed behind him, he removed his coat and followed his daughter up to her room. Both threw Charlotte a look of hesitancy, but Charlotte ignored that. She had told Gina about her father, had glossed over the whys and wherefores, and had left so many threads dangling that it was a wonder she hadn’t become entangled in her own story. But Gina had not asked any awkward questions. Her childish eyes had lit up, and for the first time Charlotte had realised how much of a disservice she had done her daughter, although every decision made had been made in good faith.
She closed her eyes and sagged against the banister, then after a few minutes up she went, hearing their voices before she appeared in the doorway.
Gina was showing him her handheld games console, which had been her last birthday present, and explaining how it worked while Riccardo listened in what appeared to be fascinated silence.
For a few seconds Charlotte watched the scenario, then she cleared her throat and they both looked round at her.
‘I thought it might be nice if we went out for a meal,’ she said.
‘Fish and chips?’ Gina asked hopefully. ‘Do you like fish and chips, Dad?’
‘I…I love it.’
‘Nice try,’ Charlotte said dryly. She looked at Riccardo in a moment of unthinking shared honesty at the wiles of an eight-year-old. ‘We try and limit the greasy food, so we’ll take you to the Italian on the corner. They do a very nice, and very healthy, pomodoro pasta.’#p#分页标题#e#
‘Mum hates junk food. Do you hate junk food?’
‘Junk food?’ Riccardo asked.
‘That’s not something your dad’s probably ever had in his life before.’
‘You’ve never had junk food? Ever?’ On which subject Gina maintained a steady and incredulous conversation as they gathered up their coats and headed out of the house, Riccardo on one side, Charlotte on the other and Gina between them.
‘What do you eat, then?’ she demanded as they perused the menu and she perused them.
‘Oh, all sorts of things.’ Riccardo smiled, liking her directness but alarmed by it as well. ‘Mostly I eat out.’
‘Isn’t that very expensive?’
‘Gina, please!’
‘Mum says you’re not married. Do you have a girlfriend?’
‘Well, no.’
Gina smiled triumphantly at both of them, but before she could really and truly put her eight-year-old feet firmly in it Charlotte said hurriedly, ‘And let’s just leave it there.’
She looked at Riccardo and could see him processing his daughter’s stray remark, putting it somewhere safe for future reference.
Later, with an overtired and overexcited Gina finally in bed, Charlotte made her way downstairs to find Riccardo in the kitchen, scrutinising all the childish bits of schoolwork that had been stuck to the noticeboard on the wall behind the kitchen table.
‘I thought that went okay,’ she said cautiously.
‘I think we need to talk.’
‘What about?’ Charlotte had seen hundreds of sides of Riccardo in the past, all the bits and pieces that went to make up this complex man, but she now realised that she had only ever seen a fraction of what he was all about—because tonight had been a revelation. She had watched him listen with humour and consideration, and ask questions to which he patently knew the answers. It had been a bizarre situation, a brush with true domesticity that she had never had. There had been times during the course of the evening when she had had to remind herself that they weren’t a happy little family unit straight out of The Waltons, but two people united in a false situation for the sake of their child.