Yes, she said. Things.
You are mysterious.
Isn’t life?
He thought about this. He said, Truth be told, I only feel at home in Cambridge. University life. I feel safe there.
The waiter came out and placed the drinks in front of them.
Cin cin, they both said and clinked glasses.
Do you know R. H. Hobart Cust, the art scholar? said Forster. Author of The Pavement Masters of Siena? Published earlier this year?
Evelyn shook her head. No, I don’t.
He has a flat on Via de’ Bardi and fills his rooms with viewy young men to hear them talk on art. I visited him two days ago.
How was it?
The tea party was pleasant, the talk on art dull and the men awful.
Oh dear, said Evelyn.
But Cust has found an Italian teacher for me at last. A priest of all things. I saw him yesterday. L’ho visto ieri. We talked about wine and oil and the occasional view. Oh, and eggs.
That sounds … promising?
I suppose if I ran a restaurant in the Apennines, I would think so too. Mother said he looked like a man who’d have fleas. She checked me over on my return.
And?
None, I’m happy to report. And you yesterday?
Botticelli’s Primavera at the Accademia.
Forster sipped his drink and said, The painter Roger Fry liked to lick the dirt off that painting whenever the custodian wasn’t looking.
Really? said Evelyn. And she wanted to know why Roger Fry did that. But not wanting to appear unsophisticated, said instead, Ah, so that’s why Flora looked so clean.
Forster laughed. Oh, very good.
They watched as a chain of paintings were carried from an art restorer towards the Palazzo Pitti.
I often wonder, Mr Forster, when I see paintings carried to and fro like that, if in those arms is a Leonardo, or an Artemisia Gentileschi, or happenstance a Rubens.
Oh Lord, not a Rubens. I don’t care much for Rubens.
Do you not?
Much too prudish for me. His nudes look absent-minded, as if they’ve carelessly lost their clothes and need to go and search for them.
Evelyn smiled. But to have a masterpiece in my arms. I’d cradle it like a child.
I’d be worried I’d drop it.
You would, wouldn’t you?
Yes, I would. Four hundred years of genius destroyed by butterfingers me.
He shuddered, as if he was reliving the humiliation, rather than imagining the worst.
He said, Mother has probably awoken from her siesta by now, and is bracing herself for dinner. Gobbling down the charcoal as we speak.
The food really is rather ghastly, isn’t it? said Evelyn. Outside the Simi, food is life. It’s a celebration. But inside, it’s— It’s Dante’s third circle of hell! Our punishment for the past sin of gluttony! said Forster. Midway in the journey of our life, I found myself in the Pensione Simi, as the straight path was lost!
You are funny, Mr Forster.
Am I?
Yes. Wonderful company.
I have to say, I’ve never viewed myself that way.
They paid the bill, stood up and made their way towards the bridge.
But have you noticed, said Evelyn, how well even the poorest seem to eat? They’re very knowledgeable about vegetables. You should see them at the markets.
We’ve tended to stay away from the markets, Miss Skinner, on account of the beggars. When I shoo them away they laugh at me. Mother thinks I’m very ineffectual. Outside Santissima Annunziata, a poor wretched soul threw herself prostrate onto my shoes. I had to empty my pockets into her tin before she released me.
So what do you like to eat, Mr Forster?
Forster thought long and hard. Beetroot, he said. I really like beetroot. And he smiled, and his face lit up, his eyes shone, and the bells began to ring out across the impending dusk. Across terracotta roofs, past green and grey shutters and the ochre frontages and the jewellers on the bridge, far out to the dark, dark hills and spaces beyond.
Will I see you tomorrow, Miss Skinner?
’Fraid not, Mr Forster. Last Italian lesson.
Ah. Well, buona fortuna with that.
They said nothing more on their walk back to the pensione. Forster glancing at men, Evelyn at women. Their respectability and middle-class Englishness a perfect foil for their hidden desires.
Come back to mine—
Livia had only needed to say it once for Evelyn’s sail to change tack. They were taking a chance, but they were young and in love and about to part and if not now, then when? The door opened onto a steep flight of stairs dense with the smells of waste and cooking. The soft climb up to the second floor, skirts hoisted, the alibi of an Italian dictionary cradled in the crook of Evelyn’s arm.