“I want to see something,” she said suddenly, turning toward the river. She drove to where all the neo-Renaissance villas were and stopped outside a two-story one surrounded by a vast garden. “Can you smell it?” she said as she got out of the car. “That’s the lilacs.” I knew the smell well, just as I knew that villa well. It was Sant’Elia’s. “Do you like it?” Arianna said. The last time I’d passed it, years earlier, I’d seen a red sign saying it was for rent. The windows had been repainted, and the garden was a lot better tended than it had been back then. It exuded an air of tranquility and privacy that hadn’t been there in my day. My general impression was that it was a different place. I didn’t like it. “Well,” Arianna said, “it may not be Combray, but it’s an acceptable substitute, don’t you think? Being in a house like this, all you feel like doing is listening to music, tending the lilacs, and making jam.”

As far as music was concerned, the place was more appropriate than she could possibly know, but I didn’t say anything about Sant’Elia’s grand piano, and in any case just then the light came on at the top of the steps and the sound of a Bach chorale reached us. Arianna was on the alert now. Before long, a man appeared in shirtsleeves at the top of the short flight of steps. He was tall and agile-looking, with a semi-halo of gray hair around his sinewy neck. He was like Picasso, only taller, younger, and harder. For a while he looked around, then gave a slight whistle. From the far end of the garden came the sound of loose gravel and barking, then two Great Danes appeared and ran up the steps. “Good boys,” the man said, but had to endure their assault. “Good boys,” he said again, more sharply, and the dogs crouched, whimpering with impatience, until the man gave them something to eat. “Off with you, now,” the man said. The dogs tried feebly to resist, while the Bach chorale grew louder through the open door. “Off with you, now!” the man said again and the dogs moved away, looking at him with infinite sadness, but he turned his back and in a moment it was all over—the man, the dogs, the light, the music. I looked at Arianna. “I come here every evening,” she said.

“Why?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe because it’s a ritual, and rituals always give you a sense of security. There are people who go to church for that. I come here.”

“Who is he?”

“Oh, a painter.”