The Fiat, driven by Fulco, appeared at the corner of the villa. It had been cleaned off on top and looked like some humped animal that had waded in red dust up to its haunches. When they walked over to it, Mrs. Drew saw that someone had put, on the front seat, half a dozen small gauze bags of lavender, tied with violet ribbon.

“A little souvenir,” the Contessa said, taking her hand.

The Conte gave directions. “A destra, a sinistra, poi dritto. Then you come to a tiny track of stones, and you think, It can’t possibly be this—and that’s how you’ll recognize it, because that’s it!”

Mrs. Drew laughed. The Conte kissed her hand. She got in the car and leaned on the window sill, thanking them. “I’ve loved seeing your house,” she said.

“If you come this way again,” the Contessa told her, “be sure to let us know. We’re here until September. It’s too far from Perugia to come for weekends, but we spend the summers here now.”

The Conte smiled his permanently rueful smile. “So it does get some use, after all.”

THE STATUE AND THE BUST

“Can you all hear me?” the teacher was asking, not because the group was large—there were only nine or ten girls—but because of the traffic roaring through the square.

“Yes, Miss Ingram.” One or two girls at the rear muttered, “Yeah, yeah,” in long-suffering undertone, but only to be funny, Michele supposed, since they looked reasonably contented.

Michele was sitting on the steps of the Hospital of the Innocenti. He had parked his car in the square while he did some business in Via de’ Servi. Returning to the car, he had seen the group of girls enter the piazza, and had sat down on the steps to watch. He judged them to be about fifteen or sixteen years of age. Their summer dresses, too short for Florence, agreeably revealed long arms and legs. They all wore the same kind of sandal—bought, possibly, on a group excursion to UPIM. One girl was very plump, another had freckles, another carried her arm in a sling: after a few moments, he could tell them apart quite easily. Sitting there in the sun, he dwelt disinterestedly, like an artist, on the texture of their hair, the tones of their flesh, the curve of lip or shoulder, the waists sketchily defined by the shiftlike dresses. The color of the eyes was in every case concealed behind dark glasses; it was as if some custom, the converse of wearing the veil, compelled them to hide their eyes.