Nightwork

'What a bore,' she said impatiently. "The mails these days! '

'I'm sorry,' I said, touching the letter in my pocket, 'I didn't quite get that. I mean, what about the mails?'

'No matter,' she said. The waiter was putting the drink on the table in front of her. I would not have been surprised if he had knelt to do so. My own drink was put before me without ceremony. The lady raised her glass. 'Cheers,' she said. She plainly had no girlish prejudices against talking to strangers in bars.

'Are you here for long?' I asked.

'One never knows, does one?' She left a lipstick stain on her glass. I longed to ask her name, but something told me-not to rush matters. 'Beautiful old Firenze. I've been in gayer towns.' As she talked, she kept turning her head toward the door. A German couple came in and she frowned again. She looked impatiently at her watch. 'You're sunburned,' she said to me. 'Have you been skiing?'

'A little.'

'Where?'

'St Moritz, Davos.' It was a small lie.

'I adore St Moritz,' she said. 'AU those amusing cheap people.'

'Have you been there?' I asked. This season, I mean.'

'No. Disaster intervened.' I would have liked to ask her about the health of her husband, to keep the conversation going on a friendly basis, but thought better of it. She looked around her with distaste. 'This place is gloomy. They must have buried Dante in the front hall. Do you know of any brighter spot in town?'

'Well, I had a very good meal in a restaurant called Sabattini's last night. If you'd care to join me tonight I'd be...'

At that moment a page came in, calling, 'Lady Lily Abbott,

Lady Lily Abbott...'

Longingly, L., I remembered, as she crooked a finger at the page. ''Telephone per la signora,' the page said.

'Finalmente,' she said loudly and stood up and followed the boy into the lobby. She left her handbag on the chair, and I wondered how I could manage to look through it while she was busy on the phone without being arrested for theft. The German couple kept staring at me. Oddly, I thought. They would certainly report all suspicious activities to the proper authorities. I didn't touch the bag.

She was gone about five minutes, and, when she came striding back into the bar, her expression could have been described as peevish if it had been on the face of another woman. On her it was noble displeasure. She slumped down in her chair, her feet sticking out straight under the table.

'I hope it wasn't bad news,' I said.

'It wasn't good.' She sounded grim. 'Absent me from felicity awhile. Rearrangements of schedules. Someone will suffer.' She slugged down her gin and began to stuff her cigarettes and lighter into her bag.

'If that means you're free...' I began. 'What I was saying, when you were called to the phone. Lady Abbott...' It was the first time in my life that I had called anybody Lady Anything and I nearly stuttered over the words. 'Well, I was about to invite you to have dinner with me at this very

nice...'

'Sorry,' she said. That's sweet of you. But I'm not free. I'm taken for dinner. There's a car waiting for me outside.' She stood up, gathering in her coat and bag. I stood up gallantly. She looked hard at me, squarely in the eyes. A decision was made. The dinner will be over early,' she said. 'All the poor old dears have to go beddy-bye. We can have a nightcap, if you'd like that.' 'I'd like it very much.' 'Shall we say eleven? Here, in the bar?' I'll be here.'

She swept out of the bar, leaving waves of sensuality quivering in the air behind her, like the reverberations of the last notes of an organ in a cathedral.

* * *

I spent the night in her room. It was as simple as that. 'I came to Florence all primed to sin,' she said as she undressed, 'and sin I shall.' I don't believe she even asked my name until about 2.30 am.

Despite her imperious manner, she was a gentle and charming lover, undemanding, grateful, and pleasantly lacking in chauvinism. There is a large, untapped reservoir of sexual talent in America,' she said at one point. The New World to the aid of the diminishing Old. Isn't that nice?'

I was happy to discover that my fears about impotence, nourished by the dreadful Mrs Sloane, were unfounded. I did not think I had to mention to Lady Abbott that my pleasure in her company was heightened by perverse overtones of vengeance.

She was the least curious of women. We talked little. She asked me no questions about what I did, why I was in Florence, or where I was going.

Just before I left her room (she insisted I get out before the help started stirring about), I asked her if she would lunch with me that day.

'If I don't have a telephone call,' she said. 'Kiss the lady good night.'

I bent over and kissed the wide, dear mouth. Her eyes were closed, and I had the impression that she was asleep before I went through the door.