by Francis King
But, had he known it, it was precisely that shouting which gave Ross the energy to drive himself onward like a flogged horse, pass the Florentine, and fling himself, breathless, exhausted, but first, at the feet of the children. ‘‘Oh, well done!’’ Pamela said, in admiration. ‘‘But I knew you would win.’’
‘‘That current,’’ Ross gasped. ‘‘Judged it all wrong. Should have known better.’’ He rose to his feet to greet the Florentine as he came from the water. ‘‘Well done,’’ he said in Italian, and he gripped both his hands, put an arm round his shoulder, and led him up the sand. ‘‘ You nearly beat me,’’ he said. There was a real cordiality in his voice, for in Enzo he had found what he always sought in men; a physical prowess which almost, but not quite, matched his own. He hated easy victories; he even more hated defeat.
Rodolfo came from the river a sulky third. He massaged his leg, pulled faces, and gave an excellent performance of someone who has cramp. But no one, except Pamela, took him at all seriously.
‘‘You swim beautifully,’’ Enzo said to Frank Ross in naïve admiration. ‘‘ Doesn’t he?’’ he turned to Rodolfo.
Rodolfo waggled his right hand loosely from the wrist as he always did when he wished to indicate a superlative; then he again doubled himself in simulated agony.
‘‘Beautiful,’’ Enzo repeated, lying on his naked side in the sunlight and looking at the Englishman. He closed his eyes and at once, like a dog, fell asleep.
Colin experienced an agony of jealousy. The Florentine, stretched still and glistening in the dust, had forsaken him for the enemy; they had all forsaken him, Pamela had forsaken him, he was along. The iron rang out on the stone as he turned over on his stomach and lay with his face in a clump of grass.
Frank Ross sprinted up and down the bank three or four times to get dry and then began to pull on his clothes. As the watch covered the white patch on his wrist, Pamela suddenly asked: ‘‘Did you find us here just like that—by accident?’’
He laughed, but he seemed unusually clumsy, for one so deft by nature, as he fastened the strap. ‘‘ Of course. Did you think I’d followed you? I often bathe here. And I don’t get diphtheria or typhoid or any other of those diseases,’’ he added, as if to taunt her.
‘‘That’s what I told Colin,’’ Pamela said.
‘‘Oh, shut up, shut up!’’ her brother shouted, suddenly raising his face.
‘‘Told him—told him what?’’ Ross asked.
‘‘Nothing,’’ Pamela said.
‘‘Well, I must be going to my lunch.’’ He felt in his pocket, took out a cigarette, broke it in two with scrupulous exactness, and then dropped a half by each of the sleeping Italians. ‘‘Tell them,’’ he said, before he sauntered away.
‘‘He might have given them one each,’’ Colin said.
‘‘Perhaps he isn’t rich,’’ Pamela said. ‘‘In fact I’m sure he isn’t. His clothes are terribly shabby, have you noticed?’’
‘‘You like him,’’ Colin said.
‘‘Yes, I do like him.… Is there any harm in that? Well, is there?’’ Her brother did not answer.
Chapter Seventeen
‘‘THAT’S where Enzo lives,’’ Rodolfo said, pointing down the tight, claustrophobic Borgo.
‘‘There?’’ Colin looked at the plaque, blue lettering on white, and read out ‘‘Borgo Canto Rivolto.’’
‘‘What does that mean?’’ Pamela asked. ‘‘The Street of the Revolting Song?’’ She alone laughed at her own joke.
‘‘Can we go down there?’’ Colin asked. Then, when the Tunisian appeared to hesitate, he addressed himself to Enzo: ‘‘È possibile andarvi?’’
‘‘Dove?’’
‘‘Alla sua casa.’’
The two Italians looked at each other and Rodolfo said: ‘‘But why?’’
‘‘It would be interesting.’’
‘‘There’s nothing to see.’’
‘‘It’s always fun to see where others live.’’
‘‘But this street is ugly.’’
‘‘Brutto, brutto,’’ said Enzo.
‘‘That doesn’t matter.… Oh, come on,’’ Pamela said, already striding down the Borgo. ‘‘It’s a shorter way to the hotel anyway. Come on, do!’’
After the Italians had followed her for some yards, Colin said apologetically: ‘‘If you’d rather not, let’s turn back.’’ He knew now that he had forced them to do something which, inexplicably, they did not wish to do. ‘‘ Let’s turn back,’’ he repeated.
‘‘Turn back? But why turn back?’’ Rodolfo asked; and his tone was one of such astonishment that Colin wondered if he had been mistaken after all. ‘‘But why?’’ Rodolfo said.
‘‘Oh, nothing.’’
The street was deserted and there was no movement either outside or within the narrow, bare house where the Rocchigianis lived. ‘‘That’s it,’’ Enzo said.
‘‘That? It looks big.’’
Rodolfo explained that others lived there also and then, to amuse his English friends, he tried to tell them about the epileptic girl; but their French was not equal to it and he had to give up. A pity, he thought. A good story that.… But—perhaps Bella was in?
‘‘Ecco!’’ he jerked his head up to one of the windows, unable to point because his hands still supported Colin.
‘‘Ecco, ecco!’’ Bella sat at her usual place, her sewing in her hands, and she was looking down at them, her face held in profile so that the shrivelled half where she had burned herself could not be seen. Rodolfo whistled and she quickly turned away.
‘‘Oh!’’ Pamela exclaimed. ‘‘She looked so beautiful before, and now.… Look, Colin.’’
‘‘I’ve seen.’’ The crimson, puckered skin had made him feel slightly sick. ‘‘Who is she?’’
‘‘A lodger, I suppose.’’
The boys were about to carry. Colin on when Signora Rocchigiani appeared at a downstairs window, her head bound in what appeared to be a dish-cloth. She asked Enzo a question in Italian, he answered, there was much use of the word ‘‘Inglese’’, Rodolfo joined in, and eventually Signora Rocchigiani came out carrying a rocking-chair in which they deposited Colin. A moment later she brought another chair, one leg mended with two splints of wood, and motioned Pamela to it. ‘‘S’accomodi,’’ she said. ‘‘S’accomodi.’’
‘‘What is going on?’’ Pamela giggled. But she nevertheless sat down.
‘‘Un momentino,’’ Signora Rocchigiani said. They noticed for the first time that she was wearing no shoes.
Rodolfo and Enzo squatted on the steps, and Rodolfo cleared his throat and spat at two flies that were locked together on the cobbles. He laughed and nudged his friend; then he blew his nose between two fingers.
‘‘Daddy said that was how the Indians did it. I tried once, but it didn’t work. There was an awful mess,’’ Pamela said.
Signora Rocchigiani emerged carrying two cups which seemed to have come from a doll’s tea-service, and handed one to each of the two children. Colin sipped his cautiously and restrained himself from pulling a face. ‘‘I think it’s coffee,’’ he said. ‘‘But it’s awfully bitter.’’
Pamela tried hers and said: ‘‘Oh, Colin, I can’t!’’
‘‘You must.’’
‘‘It’ll make me sick.’’
‘‘You must,’’ he repeated. ‘‘ She’ll be awfully hurt. Gulp it, in one.’’ He put back his head and poured the thick mixture down. ‘‘It’s not so bad like that,’’ he said. ‘‘Go on. Don’t be a coward.’’
Pamela gulped, looked as if she were about to retch, and then somehow returned Signora Rocchigiani’s questioning smile with a smile of her own. ‘‘Buono,’’ she said.
‘‘Buono?’’
‘‘Molto buono.’’
‘‘Sì, molto buono,’’ Colin said.
‘‘That teaches you not to be inquisitive about other people’s houses,’’ Pamela said, as they moved off again. ‘‘But it was kin
d of her, wasn’t it? Enzo takes after her, they have the same voices and the same blue eyes. She looked awfully ill and tired though.’’
‘‘She works, in the hotel laundry. Rodolfo told me.’’
‘‘Our hotel laundry?’’
‘‘Yes.’’
As they came out into the Signoria, they saw ahead of them a grey alpaca coat, with horizontal creases from armpit to arm-pit, a protruding rump below it and a bush of grey hair above. ‘‘ Signor Commino,’’ said Pamela. Both shoes, once black but now grey for want of cleaning, had split their seams at the heels, and one of the shaggy socks had a hole the size of a florin. Under one arm was a parcel, wrapped in newspaper, while the other swung vigorously, fist clenched with the thumb between the fingers. Suddenly, as if he had seen them in a mirror, Signor Commino turned. His two rabbit-teeth were revealed in a grin; the fist was unclenched and extended to greet them. The spherical stomach seemed to swell with good nature, as he shouted: ‘‘Coleen, Coleen.… I was coming to speak with you.’’ He nodded briskly to the two Italians and then held out his parcel. ‘‘It is for you, Coleen—a loan,’’ he added quickly, in case of misunderstanding. ‘‘I cannot give it, because it is antique and therefore costly and belongs to my mother.’’ He began to tear off the sheets of newspaper with a reckless disregard for the tidiness of the city, backing at the same time towards the Loggia de’ Lanzi. Once there, he placed his treasure on a stone seat, and the last sheet of the Corriere della Sera was ripped off and away. There was a box.
‘‘What is it?’’ Pamela asked. A crowd was collecting.
‘‘Wait.’’ Signor Commino raised the lid, touched something within, and after a grind, a whirr and a series of clicks, a tune, infinitely faint and tinny, penetrated to their ears.
‘‘Bravo!’’ someone exclaimed.
‘‘Listen.’’ His head tilted to one side, so that his neck made a roll of fat against his stiff collar, Signor Commino raised a hand. They were silent. And the small, golden comb continued to yield up its melody at the touch of the revolving pins.
‘‘What is it?’’ Pamela whispered.
‘‘ ‘The Bluebells of Scodand,’ ’’ Colin whispered back.
But the music had ceased. Hands were clapped; there were shouts, laughter and calls for an encore.
‘‘This must have belonged to an English lady,’’ Signor Commino said, making his familiar gesture of scratching with his forefinger at the single tuft of hair on the front of his scalp. ‘‘The machine is Swiss, the music is English. No?’’
‘‘Scottish,’’ said Pamela.
But he took no notice of the correction. ‘‘And therefore it seemed just to me that I should give—lend it to your brother. There is also’’—he stooped to examine the inside of the lid which framed a list of the tunes in the handwriting of the early nineteenth century—‘‘ there is also—ah, yes—‘Drink to me only’, ‘Cherry Ripe’, and—but you may see for yourself. See, see?’’ His stubby forefinger, with its thick, spade-shaped nail and tuft of black hair, pointed to the list, while he drew Pamela closer. ‘‘See?’’ he repeated.
She squirmed away from his grasp; she could not bear to be touched by him.
‘‘Take good care of it, young miss, young master.…’’ He began scrabbling for the paper off the floor of the dusty loggia and twisted it untidily round the box. ‘‘There! And a speedy recovery, a speedy recovery.’’ He pulled off his trilby hat and his grey bush of hair opened out like an umbrella and flopped about his ears. ‘‘Arivederci,’’ he said; and he continued to back away from them, repeating ‘‘Arivederci … young miss, young master … speedy recovery …’’ until he had disappeared from sight. The children all burst into extravagant laughter in which the spectators soon joined.
‘‘But it’s bad to laugh,’’ Colin said at last. ‘‘It was kind of him to bring it after the way we behaved that night.’’
‘‘Oh, he’s only trying to smarm up, because he knows that Lena takes notice of what we say and wouldn’t marry him if we said we didn’t like him. I bet you it’s that.’’
‘‘No, I don’t think so,’’ Colin said.
‘‘You don’t want Lena to marry him, do you?’’ Pamela challenged.
‘‘No—no, I don’t,’’ Colin had to admit. ‘‘But I like him all the same.’’
‘‘You didn’t that night.’’
‘‘Well, I do now. I’ve changed my mind.’’
‘‘Because he brought you a musical-box?’’ Pamela said with contempt. ‘‘A loan,’’ she added, imitating his accent. ‘‘Because it is antique and therefore costly and belongs to my mother.’’
‘‘You don’t understand,’’ Colin said. And that was always to be his complaint against her; there was so much she did not understand.
‘‘I must eat now,’’ Colin announced when the boys had carried him up to his bedroom. ‘‘I suppose you both must eat too.’’ Rodolfo and Enzo looked at each other and laughed, and Colin said: ‘‘Don’t you eat now?’’
Enzo pulled out his unemployment card. ‘‘Monday, Wednesday, Saturday,’’ he said.
‘‘And Rodolfo?’’
‘‘I have a hundred lire.’’ In fact he had three hundred.
‘‘But that’s nothing.’’
Rodolfo shrugged his shoulders.
‘‘I haven’t any money,’’ Colin said. He always spent his pocket-money as soon as he was given it. ‘‘ How will you manage?’’
‘‘Oh, we can buy some bread—and perhaps some mortadella or some cheese.’’
‘‘But that’s not enough. Here, wait a moment.’’ Colin had seen the box of chocolates which Maisie Brandon had brought him that morning, and he now picked it up and held it out towards them.
‘‘No—no,’’ said Rodolfo, eyeing the box greedily.
‘‘Yes, you must take it. I want you both to have it.’’ (He wanted Enzo to have it; it was terrible that he should starve.) ‘‘Go on, take it.’’
Rodolfo put out a hand, but Enzo said sharply in Italian: ‘‘Don’t take it. We mustn’t take it. Thank him and say we can’t.’’
‘‘Yes, but——’’ Rodolfo said.
‘‘Don’t take it!’’
Colin was still holding it out. ‘‘Why shouldn’t you take it?’’ he asked, his usually precise French becoming ungrammatical as his excitement mounted. ‘‘You’ve spent the whole morning looking after me, and if it weren’t for you, my father would have to pay someone to do it. I want you to take this, as a return for what you’ve done.’’
‘‘He says it’s to pay us,’’ Rodolfo said. ‘‘That’s fair enough. We sweated our guts out carrying him to the river.’’
‘‘Pay us! Who does he think we are. We didn’t do it because——’’
‘‘Well, I’m going to take it anyway.’’ Rodolfo’s hand closed on the large and expensive box, and Colin smiled with relief.
‘‘I’m glad you’ve decided to be sensible,’’ he said. ‘‘It was so silly to refuse. I’ve got everything here, and you’ve—you’ve got so little.… Is work very difficult to find?’’ he asked as they prepared to leave.
Rodolfo laughed. ‘‘Impossible.’’
‘‘But you do really want to work?’’
‘‘Who, me?’’ Rodolfo pointed to himself, as if incredulous at what had been said. ‘‘Of course I want to work, I want nothing more.’’
‘‘And Enzo?’’
‘‘He, too. He’s strong, he’s a good lad. But there’s nothing for us. Damn all.’’ Using the English phrase he made a derisive gesture with both hands as if he were smoothing down a tablecloth.
Rodolfo sold the chocolates back to the sweet-shop where Maisie had bought them, for half the price she had paid, and then, after much argument, took Enzo to the Ristorante Popolare where they both gobbled two plates each of pasta al sugo between draughts of wine. Meanwhile Colin was letting his lunch-tray get cold, as he wrote a letter:
DEAR MRS. BRANDON,
it difficult to find servants. I have a friend, I think you have
seen him here with me, and I was wondering …
Chapter Eighteen
THEY had visited a monastery on a hill outside Florence, and having been shown innumerable paintings by Sodoma and Dolci, had now descended to eat an execrable dinner in a restaurant by the roadside.
‘‘Another Strega!’’ Chris exclaimed to Béngt. ‘‘You must have had a dozen.’’
‘‘Mind your own business.’’
Chris gave die laugh she always used when she had not the courage to appear to mean what she said. ‘‘But it is my own business—until your allowance arrives. Isn’t it?’’
‘‘You are vulgar,’’ Béngt said, turning the glass between his fingers.
‘‘And you’re drunk,’’ Chris retorted, again with the laugh.
‘‘Look here, old boy, I’m not going to have that sort of thing said to my wife,’’ Tiny Maskell announced. But he continued to draw on his pipe, scattering sparks into the dark corners of the terrace.
‘‘Oh, keep out of this, Tiny,’’ Chris said irritably. ‘‘ Please don’t do the heavy husband.… But seriously, Béngt,’’ she went on with a sudden, maternal softening in her voice. ‘‘You’re too young for so much drinking. It’ll grow on you. It’s awful to see a young man putting away glass after glass like that—it really is awful.’’ She tipped into her own glass a thimbleful of the green liqueur which a monk had persuaded her to buy at the monastery. She had bought a bottle of red liqueur, too; the monk had assured her they both tasted alike.
‘‘And how you can drink that stuff!’’ Béngt said contemptuously. ‘‘You are vulgar, I told you, and you have no taste.’’
‘‘That’s enough, Arbach,’’ Frank Ross said quietly but decisively, omitting the ‘‘ von”. ‘‘Hold your tongue, if you’ve nothing civil to say.’’