“When girls get to a certain age,” Mom told me, “God begins to work a wonderful change in their bodies. One thing that happens is that they begin to grow a little extra hair on their legs. European women don’t mind having that little bit of extra hair on their legs and under their arms. But American girls like nice smooth legs, and we find underarm hair unseemly. So we shave our legs and under our arms too when we bathe. Janet has just started doing this because she is becoming a woman. When we go through certain physical changes, at first we are a little shy about them. So you mustn’t say anything about it anymore.”

That’s why I asked Janet what the rash was, what was wrong with her legs, if a jellyfish had stung her. I did it because I knew she would be angry and because I knew she couldn’t say anything back, because if she did, she would have to admit how she did it, how she didn’t use enough soap because she was always so slap-dash, impetuous about everything, and even though she was becoming a woman, she was still messy and careless so now she had a rash. Her rash went even deeper red when she put on her Bain de Soleil suntan oil. Then she stretched her legs out into the sun and ignored my question.

“You can tell we just got here,” Janet said. “Look how white we are compared to the English family. Judging by their tans they’ve been here at least a week.”

“Jennifer said they have a whole month of vacation this year. We’re only here ten days,” I said.

“You shouldn’t compare us to other people,” Janet answered.

Now the sun was high in the sky, the water was really warm. I put on my mask and fitted the snorkel into the side strap, then took the mouthpiece in my mouth and plunged in. On the right-hand side of the bay at Paraggi, where the raw sewage from the pensione came out of a pipe, there were fewer fish than on the left-hand side where there was no sewage. I would snorkel by the big rocks that lined the left-hand shore.