“It’s one of the things I love about this country. You can be in a crumbling alleyway one moment, then turn a corner and you’re in the most beautiful, glowing square filled with life.” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Lottie turn to him.

“Didn’t…didn’t your father write a poem about that?”

Alec gave a reluctant nod even though he knew he should be grateful for the subject change. Nothing dampened the mood quite like his father. Edward Gresham had found both fame—and infamy—writing about his beloved adopted country. “‘And as I stood in Saint Mark’s Square, with the pantomime of life all ’round, I saw how little I had lived before and how much was left unbound.’”

Lottie smiled. “That’s it.”

“I thought Edward Gresham was considered much too vulgar for proper young ladies.”

Lottie clucked her tongue. “Perhaps that was true a decade ago, but he’s considered something of a romantic hero now.”

Alec couldn’t stifle his derisive snort. He had seen firsthand the devastation that had come from such love. There was nothing remotely romantic about it.

“Besides,” she went on, “I refuse to limit my reading to what is considered ‘proper.’ That would be incredibly boring.”

“I can’t argue with that.”

Lottie tilted her head, considering him. “Did you really not know of his reputation?”

He shrugged and turned back to the view. “I left all that business to your uncle. What do I know about poetry?” It had been a relief to have someone else manage the copyright. Sir Alfred had always talked of putting together a collection of his father’s work, and Alec happily gave his blessing to keep Edward Gresham’s short, tragic life from being stripped of all meaning. As long as he had nothing to do with it.

“I’d say you know quite a lot. More than most people,” she added.

Alec’s hands tightened on the railing, but he didn’t respond.

Lottie cleared her throat. “The edition Uncle Alfred released of the collected poems sold out its entire first printing. The second went even faster.”

Alec vaguely remembered that his payments had increased for a time, but his focus had been on how the money would be spent.

“And I helped put it together.”

At that he faced her. “I didn’t realize you were such an acolyte.”

A faint blush stained her cheekbones. “I wasn’t. It was merely something to do at first. Something more interesting than making calls, anyway. But the way your father wrote about Italy with such passion, such love, as if he were writing about a person…” She paused and shook her head. “I had always wanted to visit the village, you know, because of my parents. But after I read his poems, I wanted to come here for the rest of the country as well.”

Spurred by her words, a memory suddenly surfaced: Alec traipsing over a bridge on a warm spring afternoon, his father’s large hand clutching his own. They were swinging their arms back and forth while Alec repeated lines of poetry back to him. It won’t stand up on the page if it cannot stand up to life, his father had explained. The conviction in his voice still rang out across the decades. They had spent so many days just like that: wandering around the city while his father worked out rhythms.