“No. He’s doing a series of these books—last year we went to Perugia. It’s just that he’s interested in it. As a matter of fact, at Oxford he read classics,” she added, not urging this bond. A little wedge of cake, crumbling between her fingers, fell to the floor, and she bent to pick up the pieces. “Your lovely rug,” she said.

“Do you work, too?” he asked.

“Not very much, I’m afraid. I keep card indexes, and that sort of thing, and I go round with Jonathan, though sometimes he prefers to be alone. We’ve hired a Seicento, and we usually drive somewhere in the mornings—the book is on Siena and the surroundings. Yesterday we went to Rosia; the church there has a painting by…” She paused.

“Matteo di Giovanni,” he supplied, pleased by her ignorance. In England, he had taught Latin at a girls’ school for a short time, and he sketched to himself her education—a little implausible history, some disproportionate geography, and a muddled, lasting familiarity with the poets. The Latin, he knew through his own defeat, he could discount completely. He saw again rows of pale, virtuous faces inclined over blotched books.

There was a short silence. Vittorio put down his cup. “I should tell you about the house,” he said, “or, rather, show it to you. You would have the bedroom and the salotto. The bathroom is next to the bedroom. I would, you see, move in here, into this room, so you wouldn’t be disturbed. No, really,” he said as her look deepened to protest, “I’d be much happier. I often sleep in here, when my brother comes from Rome. Unfortunately, being immediately under the roof, the apartment is quite warm in summer, but my father—the whole house was once his own—kept the top floor because of the view. What else? Well, there is hot water, but in the mornings only, I’m afraid.” He hesitated again, and then mentioned uncertainly the price he had proposed to ask.

“It seems so little,” she said.

“I thought it was too much,” he answered, matching her ineptitude.

Jonathan Murray was so tall that he stooped to enter Vittorio’s apartment, and so thin that sinews and veins were plainly seen on his taut, bare arm, which was weighted with a suitcase. He was in his middle thirties, a handsome, deliberate man with somber eyes and straight brown hair. Depositing the suitcase in the entrance hall, he turned to shake hands with Vittorio. His look, as far as courtesy would allow, held all things in abeyance, and it was Isabel, coming in behind him with a rug and a portable typewriter, who spoke first.

“The hotel wanted our room before lunch—I hope we’re not too early.…” She let Vittorio take the typewriter. “Thank you. This is Jonathan.”