They had told us their names the first night we met them, of course, and if we had known that we would see them every day, some times multiple times in the day, we would have made an effort to memorize them, but we carelessly rejected them as needless information, and now we had seen them too often to ask them again. We were familiar to them and we had to act as if they were friends. We were not friends. We didn’t know each other. We began to call them Mr. and Mrs. Brit, Frank and I, but only to each other. We didn’t know what to call them to their faces, so we resorted to formalities, “sir” and “ma’am,” which we hoped they would accept as respect and not a moronic cover. It must have worked, as they seemed to gravitate toward us at dinner and breakfast, always sitting at the next table. And every morning he mentioned tennis, and commented on my absent skills. “You really need to play,” he said. Mr. Brit never came to breakfast in his tennis gear. She was equally dressed, in summer dresses or slacks that always seemed to elevate the room. She knew what to wear and probably laid out his clothes for him. She had fine, modest jewelry, except a vintage Cartier Tank watch, gold with diamonds, that Frank spotted immediately. “That’s a thirty-thousand-dollar watch,” he said. “Easy.” I gave him a look, the one he liked to use. “Just a professional observation,” Frank said.

—

The wind came from Africa, just like Mr. Brit said it would and we were quickly done with the heat and the blowing sand on the beach and decided to take a boat ride. We stood on line for the ferry, or what passes for one in Italy, on the wide stone pier, the sun searing above us, and the heat radiating off the stones from below. We felt like Shadrach and Meshach when Abednego and his bride, Mr. and Mrs. Brit, appeared out of the throng, happy to see us. We were dripping with sweat, in swim trunks and t-shirts, while Mr. Brit appeared cool and dry in a crisp linen blazer and trousers. Mrs. Brit was in white linen slacks and starched cotton shirt with a wide-brimmed summer hat. Her Cartier was clasped over the left cuff of her shirt.