I am still looking at Rome, and admiring the pale golden hue of its buildings in the early morning sunshine, when suddenly without any warning Rome rises up from its proper place on the ground and looks at me . . . it looks straight in at the window in a most disconcerting manner.
“Goodness!” I exclaim.
“We’re banking,” says Mrs. Alston. “We’re circling round and getting ready to land. I know it’s rather alarming when you aren’t used to it—you feel as if the ground had risen up and hung itself on the wall. Of course what really happens is that the plane leans over (just as you lean over when you turn a corner on a bicycle) but when you’re in a plane you lose your sense of balance. For instance when you loop the loop and you’re upside down in the sky you feel as if you were the right way up and everything else in the universe had suddenly gone mad. The ground seems up above and the sky down below. At least that’s how I felt,” says Mrs. Alston reminiscently. “You should get someone to take you up and show you.”
“Yes—er—yes,” I reply in doubtful tones.
“It’s very interesting.”
“I’m sure it must be.”
At Rome Mrs. Alston and I are obliged to part. She is staying with a friend and I have booked a room in a pensione recommended to me by my brother and his wife who stayed here last year.
Mrs. Alston seems doubtful about my ability to look after myself in Rome. Her last words as we shake hands are to warn me of pickpockets and to remind me that the traffic comes in the opposite direction from countries under British jurisdiction, and as I sit down to fill in a form (without which formality I cannot leave the airport) I can see her hovering in the doorway and looking back at me. It is obvious that if I show signs of wanting her help she will change her plans and come with me to the pensione and see me settled in. Mrs. Alston is extremely kind and I am suitably grateful, but by this time her solicitude has become a trifle boring, so I wave to her cheerfully and complete my task.
A taxi is chartered to take me to the pensione. It careers along at high speed and, although I am aware that it is conforming to the European convention by keeping to the right, the sight of vehicles approaching at high speed on (what seems to me) the wrong side of the road fills me with anxiety. We pass the ruins of the old Roman aqueducts—a broken line of arches stretching across fields and orchards—we pass wide squares and churches built of honey-coloured stone. There are trees in their summer greenery and slopes of green grass amongst the buildings and masses of brilliant flowers. We pass old buildings and new buildings, streets wide and streets narrow, streets with shops full of all sorts of fascinating merchandise and, coming at last to the Piazza di Spagna, we discover a steep little cobbled street in which is the entrance to the Pensione Scarlatti.
The pensione consists of a large flat in an old Roman palace. It is on the third floor and is reached by a fine staircase of white marble. Probably long ago this whole building belonged to some great Roman family (it is large enough to house a regiment) and as I toil up the marble stairs, suitcase in hand, I try to imagine what it must have been like to live like a prince in magnificence and luxury and to have more servants than one could count. In those far-off days life was colourful and romantic, hospitality was on a gigantic scale; these old walls could tell of revelry, of the whisper of silken dresses and the clash of swords.
Signora Scarlatti opens the door of the flat herself and welcomes me effusively but incomprehensibly in a spate of Italian to which I reply, “Si, si, buon giorno,” which is the only Italian I know. I then enquire in my own tongue whether she can speak English.
“Spika no Inglis!” she exclaims, shaking her head sadly.
Things are now at a complete standstill and we look at one another helplessly . . . until suddenly I have a brilliant inspiration and try how she reacts to French.
“Parlez-vous Français?” I ask somewhat diffidently for as I have not spoken French for years (nor even heard French spoken) I have grave doubts of my ability to sustain a conversation in that language.
“Si, si!” exclaims the Signora. “Et vous, madame? Vous parlez le Français?”
“Si, si,” I reply.
“Ah, bon!” cries Signora Scarlatti, her dark eyes flashing with delight and excitement . . . and she proceeds to welcome me all over again in French. Unfortunately, however, she speaks that language with an Italian accent so I find it almost as difficult. Gesticulation helps, of course, and by dint of signs and broken phrases we manage to communicate with one another and to achieve understanding.
The flat is large and has an old-worldly air. It consists of a wide hall with a beautiful parquet floor, which stretches from the front door at one end to the kitchen at the other. This hall—or sala as the Signora calls it—is furnished with sofas and easy chairs and standard lamps with orange-coloured shades. All the rooms open off the sala, some on one side and some on the other.
Signora Scarlatti conducts me round talking volubly and pointing out the comforts and amenities of her establishment. She shows me the bathroom, a gloomy and somewhat sinister apartment with an enormous bath which looks as if it had not been used for years; she opens another door and shows me a spacious roof-garden with plants in boxes and pergolas covered with vines (here some of my fellow guests are sitting, sunning themselves in deck chairs); she shows me the dining room, with eight or ten small tables set for the mid-day meal. Finally she leads me to the room she has reserved for me, which is a pleasant room, clean and bright, with a comfortable bed. It is the bed that interests me most and I explain to the Signora in my halting French that I shall sleep all day and get up to supper.
“Vous n’avez pas faim?”
“Non,” I reply shaking my head.
“Vous êtes fatiguée?”
“Oui,” I reply nodding violently.
All is clearly understood. She goes away and I crawl into bed.
I awake in plenty of time to unpack and prepare myself for supper, and supper seems desirable for I am now extremely hungry. There is a fixed basin in my room, a basin with two taps upon which are inscribed CALDO and FREDDO. These words mean nothing to me so I try them both to find out which is which; but this plan though reasonable in theory gets me no further for cold water flows from both taps in a reluctant trickle. As I wait for the basin to fill I reflect upon ancient Rome and her enormous aqueducts (the ruins of which impressed me so much this morning) and come to the conclusion that the Romans of today are not so enthusiastic about their water supply as their ancestors. Fortunately it is very warm, so washing in cold water is no hardship.
I wash thoroughly and am partially dressed when there is a discreet knock on the door and a pretty girl in a black dress and white muslin apron looks in and says a long liquid rigmarole in an enquiring tone of voice. She is probably asking if I am nearly ready for supper. The girl smiles so sweetly and has such lovely dark eyes and such gleaming white teeth that I am enchanted with her and am filled with regret that I am unable to talk to her.
All I can do is to smile and nod in a friendly manner and say, “Si, si!” This obviously pleases her enormously. “Si, si, signora!” she cries, and opening the door widely ushers in a guest.
“Hullo, Hester!” exclaims the well-known voice of Tony Morley and he walks into my room.
“Tony!” I exclaim, seizing my dressing-gown and enveloping myself in its folds. “Goodness! I was washing!”
“So I see,” replies Tony calmly. He takes my hand in his and smiles down at me in his usual friendly way.
“Where have you sprung from?” I cry. “What on earth are you doing in Rome? How did you know I was here?”
He laughs and says, “The same old Hester, asking three questions at once! I’ll sit down and tell you all about it.”
“But Tony, you can’t. I’m awfully glad to see you, but this is my bedroom.”
“I shouldn’t worry about that.”
“But, honestly—”
“Now don’t fuss,” says Tony.
Buy
Mrs. Tim Flies Home now from Amazon.com
Buy Mrs. Tim Flies Home now from Amazon.co.uk
A Furrowed Middlebrow Book
FM24
Published by Dean Street Press 2019
Copyright © 1947 D.E. Stevenson
Introduction copyright © 2019 Alexander McCall Smith
All Rights Reserved
The right of D.E. Stevenson to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her estate in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in 1947 by William Collins
Cover by DSP
ISBN 978 1 912574 56 8
www.deanstreetpress.co.uk
Mrs. Tim Gets a Job Page 26