over, scattering mess everywhere. Sibilla was ordered to sit on a velvet stool before a velvet chair, in which was seated the largest person she’d ever seen. He looked like a taller, thicker tree than the ones who had thrown stones at her, or as Mama was now calling them, i demoni. The big man listened, his black moustache teetering with curiosity. This was reassuring, as were the bright buttons on his jacket, and the way his fingers massaged the air when he spoke. For some reason, Sibilla desperately wanted to sit on his knee. As if sensing this, he turned to her.
‘Do you know,’ he said in a deep voice that made his moustache buzz, ‘whenever a draught blows through here, your hair is like the ribbons of a Chinese dancer.’
‘What is a Chinese?’ she asked.
‘Ah! What a question! You know,’ he remarked to the Signora, who was stretched out on a chaise longue. ‘It really is a question now, after the war.’
The Signora murmured vaguely, then stood up and wandered off, stepping casually over the mess on the floor. Sibilla wanted to ask more about wars and ribbons and the Chinese but the man was too busy admiring the Signora from behind as she departed, and Mama was no longer Mama. She had become a blinky, twitchy thing, rising halfway from her seat when the Signora returned with a tray of drinks. The Signora handed Sibilla one filled with something clear and sweet and fizzy. It bit Sibilla’s tongue and stranded ticklish bubbles above her lips and her interest narrowed to figuring out how to drink it politely. By the time it was finished, her fate had been decided.
Sibilla would live at Villa Serra with the Signora, for ‘safety’, and she would help her mother clean every day, for ‘personal development’. On his part, the Colonel would write to a doctor friend of his about her ‘condition’. Sibilla was about to ask about her nonna when the Colonel stretched his hand out to her. She extended her hairless palm to shake. But then his other hand rose and he reached them both towards her face. Sibilla glanced at her mother, who nodded gravely. Her fists at her sides, Sibilla tipped her face up to the Colonel. He put his palms to her cheeks and smoothed the hair back. She could see his eyes glinting from the caves under his bushy eyebrows, a mole winking from behind a fork of his moustache. He grunted and stretched her hair back harder, pulling it tight across her face. Sibilla winced and exhaled bravely.
‘Yes,’ the Colonel’s moustache buzzed. ‘Now I can see you.’
‘Enough,’ the Signora flustered between them. ‘It is time to show the girl her quarters.’
These were in the kitchen larder, a tall, narrow room that smelled of wheat and coffee and vinegar. There was one window high up and a door with an outer lock. The Signora tossed a pillow on the floor, a square thing with a complicated pattern that the Colonel called ‘orientals’. This was to be Sibilla’s new bed. She tucked her hair under her bum and sat on it. Her mother knelt before her.
‘Sleep,’ she whispered to Sibilla.
And she did. It was still morning but Sibilla was exhausted from yesterday’s adventure. She dreamt of the Colonel, his moustache and eyebrows growing thick and wide until they covered his face completely.
* * *
Sibilla never saw her nonna again. A month after Sibilla had moved to Villa Serra, Giovanna sat up with a bolt in the middle of the night, waking Adriana up with a strange jumble of words about prezzemolo. Years ago, during the last months of her pregnancy, Adriana had developed a craving for it, and Giovanna had started growing it in the tomato garden to save money, collecting leftover hair from the barbiere to fertilise the soil. Only now did Giovanna realise what she had done, she said. She had planted the hair in the ground along with the seeds. And as Adriana had devoured sprig after sprig to satisfy her craving, she must have swallowed the fur right along with the parsley.
‘I put the hair right in your belly!’ Giovanna cried. ‘Sibilla was bound to end up a tarantola!’
Then she crossed herself, lay back down, and fell asleep. Assuming it was a spot of senility, Adriana said nothing of it the next morning. A few days later, while harvesting tomatoes in her garden, Giovanna sat down and died. Adriana buried her with the