‘Sit down, Clotilde. Cassanu has spent more than twenty-four hours in Calvi hospital. He won’t have eaten anything, just think, their vacuum-packed ham, their yoghurts and purées …’ She looked at the clock. ‘Not once in seventy years, Clotilde, not once, has Cassanu sat down at the table without a meal being ready for him.’

She smiled as she washed her hands.

‘Is that hard for you to understand, my darling? It’s not how things work in Paris. But it’s how it is here, and it’s not even the men’s fault, we’re the ones who bring them up like that, from when they are little.’

‘Where is my mother, Mamy? Where is Palma?’

Lisabetta looked at the clock again, then picked up a huge knife.

‘You sit where you are, my darling, and I’ll tell you everything. Before your grandfather arrives. Corsican women know how to do that, I assure you, take care of the house and talk at the same time.’

Perhaps Lisa could do that, but not Speranza. Head down, the housekeeper was resolutely cutting the panzetta into cubes.

‘It’s a long story, Clotilde. It’s your story too, even if it started long before you were born.’ She took her eyes off her knife to look over at the witch, who was neatly separating meat from fat, before going on. ‘Fifty years ago, Speranza was already working at Arcanu, although perhaps working isn’t the right word. She lived here and, as she does today, she helped me take care of everything – the household, the food, the garden, the animals. Speranza’s daughter, little Salomé, was born at Arcanu in 1948. Three years after your father. Salomé and Paul grew up together, they were inseparable.’ She stared again at Speranza, who seemed to be concentrating on the size of the cubes of smoked meat that she was chopping. ‘Everyone here knew that they would end up getting married. That was how it was, it was written … As each year passed, the more beautiful Salomé became. Tall, dark, with hair down to her waist. Eyes like the does in the forest of Aïtone, the grace of a kid and a laugh that would have cracked Calvi citadel. A fairy story, my darling, Paul the prince, the heir to eighty hectares of maquis, and Salomé the lovely Cinderella, penniless, but we don’t care about that here, all that matters is the clan, rank isn’t so important. From the age of fifteen we’d married them off to each other. Yes, my darling, a fairy tale: once upon a time in La Revellata, Paul and Salomé would get married and have many children.’

She stopped. Her firm fist cut the figatellu into four exactly equal parts.

Another glance at the clock.

11.27 a.m.