The mockery was becoming brutal. Leonia felt that she was being ignominiously mocked, with utter impunity. When would the great day arrive? She was out of practice as a cook, having been reduced to repeating the same old dishes year in, year out, with the accuracy of a chronometer. She felt out of sorts, offended and worried at the same time.

More plates, and more glasses were brought to the house by the master: two large silver-handled carafes engraved with foxes, a little jug of eccentric design, a baroque soup tureen, a small vegetable dish and a pale-violet sauce boat in the shape of a tulip. It was immediately obvious that the master harboured a particular weakness for this trinket; a predilection, a favouritism, a genuine tenderness: holding it gently on his fingers he seemed as if he wished to play with it; bringing it close to his face he seemed inclined to kiss it, or even to eat it, he liked it that much. One day he seemed about to drop it, but with an agile twisting of his whole body managed at the last moment to catch it again. If only it had fallen: what joy! To see it shatter into smithereens: what satisfaction – what happiness! She would never agree to serve mayonnaise in a tulip.

The pleasure of taking these objects in and out of the cupboard seemed to exude from this man’s every pore.

And some time later he brought home a box so heavy that he came in panting, bathed in sweat, exhausted. Leonia did not rush to help him.

The box contained a gilded silver cutlery service fit for a prince. Followed by a tablecloth as fine as butterfly wings, and twelve dainty napkins of cloth so thin and delicate they seemed to have been cut from the air itself: in his hands they seemed on the point of floating away, and were covered with posies of flowers so delicate in colour and design that they regaled the eye with all the freshness and vitality of a garden. And then, with a final flourish, a great bunch of roses made in mother-of-pearl and another in silver, obviously intended to complete a sumptuous table for a feast.

The cupboard was completely full. Benedetto Vai was constantly coming and going, opening and closing it, in order to arrange, dust and admire each object, with an insatiable pleasure and exacting touch. Every so often he would extract one to admire it particularly and comprehensively. He would carry the piece to the window, only deciding with tiresome slowness to return it to its place again.

Leonia watched him with a look that seemed to be getting more rebellious by the day. She would track him with the suspicious glare of a wild animal, and circle around him.

Benedetto Vai, who throughout his long existence had enjoyed exceptionally robust health, began to feel unwell. He had retained the physique and complexion of his youth, but succumbed now to an unforeseen and sudden collapse.