‘You know what happened next, my darling. Your father was probably reluctant to run after your mother, but he probably would have done so if he hadn’t had fifteen pairs of eyes fixed on him, including his father’s. He had just lost all of his dignity. He had been a mere toy in Palma’s and Salomé’s hands. And so he tried to regain the little authority he had left, and did what all men do when they are humiliated – they raise their voice to their children, sometimes their hands, although your father never did the latter, as you know. They issue orders, even unfair ones, to prove that they too can command obedience. The whole clan waited, as if watching a play, to see what your father, the heir to Arcanu, would do. His mistress was waiting for him in the car. Your father got to his feet and raised his voice to Nicolas, ordering him to go and find his sister, to get into the back of the Fuego and not to say a word.’

Lisabetta stopped for a moment and stared right into her granddaughter’s eyes.

‘I don’t know what your brother had planned to do that evening, perhaps an outing with some friends or his girlfriend. Oh, how disappointed he was. My God, when I picture his face, he looked as if he had been struck by lightning, as if his mother’s departure had been nothing in comparison. But he didn’t flinch. I didn’t know your poor brother well enough to be sure who he got his pride from, that sense of duty – your father or your mother, both, perhaps – but however great his disappointment, his rancour, his sense of injustice, he didn’t say a word, he didn’t try to negotiate and he went in search of you.’

Clotilde heard her brother’s last words as she sat motionless on her bench, she saw her father’s hand closing around her wrist, dragging her, hurting her, as he had never done before.

Now she understood.

‘You emerged, my darling, still in your dream world. No one said anything. How could you have suspected that the woman sitting in the car in your mother’s place, that woman whose hair was done like your mother’s, who was dressed like your mother, whose make-up emphasised feature for feature the striking resemblance with your mother; that woman who was holding your father’s hand; how could you have suspected that that woman wasn’t your mother?’

The images passed again before Clotilde’s eyes.