Authors: Jane Arbor
Roman Summer (3 page)
‘
Not yet,
’
said Ruth. ‘I thought I’d find out whether her chief bent is architecture or sculpture or history or whatever, and begin with that.’
‘
And supposing her bent leans principally towards the nearest pop joint or the Lido
?’
Ruth laughed. ‘It may well, of course, and I may be hard put to it to sugar the pill of “culture”. But when she goes home, she’s going to want to come back to Rome, or I’ll know the reason why
!’
‘Determined to earn your fee, or because you’re jealously attached to Rome yourself
?
’
‘Both, I suppose,’ Ruth admitted. ‘I only know I’d hate anyone with whom I’d had any influence to leave Rome without feeling nostalgia for some aspect of it that’s unique to it
.
’
Erle
leaned back in his chair, regarding her beneath his lowered lids. ‘You’re an idealist, aren’t you?’ he commented. ‘Or an angel with a flaming sword. Could I have picked better for young Cicely’s higher education, I ask myself? Sounds as if, though, I may have to temper the cultural wind a bit by taking her out to the odd night-club or orgy. And supposing
I
admitted to seeing Rome as no more than a good central base for my operations, would you feel impelled to sell your enchantment with it to me too?’
Suspecting from his tone that she was being baited, Ruth determined she would not ‘rise’. ‘It would depend on whether I was being paid the rate for the job,’ she retorted lightly.
He laughed, confirming for her that he hadn’t been serious. ‘In other words, you wouldn’t do it for love?’
‘Would you expect me to?’ she parried.
‘Only for money, h’m? Though perhaps you might agree to payment in kind?’
Pretending suspicion of the offer, Ruth said, ‘What kind of kind?’
‘Well, say dinner for two at Alfredo’s in exchange for a conducted tour of the Vatican, or a box at the Opera rating a day at the Borghese Museum. What do you say?’
‘I think—that we’re talking a lot of nonsense, and hypothetical nonsense at that,’ she returned.
He wasn’t to be squashed. ‘Oh, I don’t know. What is so hypothetical about it? You may yet find me sitting in at your lectures to Cicely, saving myself either money or kind, and gaining for you two converts for the price of one
!’
he retorted, and by the immediate announcement of the arrival of the flight they awaited, Ruth was spared having to find a reply.
It was not difficult to identify
Ci
cely Mordaunt, for she was the only girl coming through alone from the Customs Hall, and her bright fair hair lay across her shoulders like a cloak. Moreover, she ran straight to
Erle
, slinging her handbag far up her arm in order to embrace him and to plant a kiss firmly on his
li
ps.
‘
Erle
darling,
I’
m
here! I’m here!’ she announced unnecessarily, while for Ruth the thought flashed—‘People have to be sixteen, like Cicely, or as poised and assured as Stella Parioli, in order to kiss as uninhibitedly as that...’ She watched as
Erle
held
Ci
cely off and tweaked her cheek.
‘So one sees,’ he agreed. ‘Dyed in the wool and a
yard wide
—
’
Indignantly Cicely smoothed her slim hips. ‘I am
not
a yard wide!’
‘All right. Just a figure of speech.’ He turned to Ruth. ‘Meet Cicely, will you, Ruth? Cicely—Mrs
.
Ruth Sargent.’
They shook hands. Cicely said, ‘I’m to stay with you? D’you know, I’m awfully glad you’re young? I thought you’d be the dowager type, or gove
rn
essy, which would be worse. Does
Erle
call you Ruth because you know each other madly well, or because he once knew you at school, as he told Mummy when he phoned about you? And how long ago would that have been, for goodness’ sake?’
Erle
answered that. ‘About when you were in your cradle,’ he told her.
‘Oh,
aeons
back! Anyway, may I call you Ruth too?’
‘If you want to, I hope you will,’ said Ruth as
Erle
led the way to the car park.
Arrived there, she would have given up the front seat to Cicely, but
Erle
put the girl in the back, at which she giggled happily, ‘Talking to me, you’re afraid you won’t concentrate on your driving!’ to which he retorted cryptically, ‘Be sure of it, that’s it.’
Cicely sat forward, and as soon as the featureless airport approach roads were left behind, she was rapturous over a scene where elegant cars purred, where the pavement caf
e
s were crowded with customers, where there was busyness and light and shops still open as Rome dressed itself for its gay evening hours.
‘I can hardly wait
!’
she crooned. ‘I’ve always heard that Rome is
swinging
—all those film people who live here, and all those
dreamy
fashions, ’way beyond beyond—
Erle
, d’you think you could get us introductions to a really
super
fashion show? Could you?’
To which he promised laconically, ‘I daresay I could try,’ then cocked an eyebrow at Ruth.
‘What did I tell you?’ he murmured, scarcely moving his lips. ‘The Vatican and Borghese up against some stiff competition—no?’
He left them at Ruth’s flat, saying he would be in touch the next day. Ruth opened the door and went in, but Cicely lingered in the doorway, looking after the car.
‘He’s dreamy, isn’t he—
Erle
, I mean?’ she murmured. ‘I’ve been in love with him since I don’t know
when
—
’
an extravagance which startled Ruth and
which she thought it best to ignore.
S
he showed Cicely to her room, with which Cicely professed to be delighted, then donned an apron and set about preparing the supper she had planned. She was putting out a bottle of wine when Cicely came into the room, her face falling at sight of the laid table.
‘Oh, couldn’t we go out somewhere tonight—my first night?’ she pleaded. ‘Somewhere gay. Wouldn’t
Erle
take us?’
‘I
f he’d meant to, he’d have invited us when we were with him.
’
Ruth demurred.
‘
I don’t know. He might have thought you had something planned for me. Could I ring him and see what
he says?’
Ruth thought of the offices she had visited, and had
begun
,
‘I doubt if he’ll be there
—
’ when she
realized
Cicely meant to ring his apartment, the address of which she did not know. When told so, Cicely said, ‘Well, he’ll be in the book, won’t he? May I look? How do you ring up in Italy anyway? Will you do it for me?’
Ruth got the number for her, handing her the receiver. ‘If you say
“
Pronto
”
when he answers, he’ll think you’ve begun to learn some Italian already,’ she smiled, and left the room.
When she came back a few minutes later Cicely, looking crestfallen, had rung off. ‘I didn’t get him,’ she announced.
‘He was out?’
‘I don’t know. An Italian woman answered.
She
said “
Pronto
” and
then what sounded like her name—Stella Somebody—and waited. Then, when I said—in Eng
l
ish, of course—was
Erle
there, she said, in English too, but with a foreign accent, “He is not free” and hung up on me. Shall I try again?’
‘I shouldn’t, if I were you,’ Ruth advised.
‘Well, will you?’
‘No.’
‘Why not? And who was that woman?’
‘Because if he’d wanted me to reach him at his private address he’d have given it to me. And “Stella”, I think, must be Stella Parioli, a famous singer who’s one of his clients. She sings mezzo-soprano roles like Carmen.’
‘Never heard of her,’ said Cicely blun
tl
y. ‘I suppose that makes me a philistine. But what was she doing in
Erle
’s apartment?’
Ruth’s gesture was of supreme ignorance. ‘My dear girl, how do I know? Perhaps she could say he wasn’t free because she knew they were going on somewhere.’
‘Or were spending the evening there, just the two of them,’ forecast Cicely darkly. ‘Anyway, what do we do now?’
Ruth said briskly, ‘I suggest we have our supper as I planned—it’s just ready. And afterwards we’ll go for a walk round the houses and you can have your first taste of Rome. We won’t have coffee here, we’ll have it out.’
‘Oh, O.K.’ But Cicely could not leave her grievance. ‘In
Erle
’s apartment at night; answering his telephone; sounding as if she owned him! “He is not free”,’ she mimicked the accent cruelly. ‘So what do you suppose that makes this Stella person? His current girl-friend at least?’
Ruth said, ‘Again I don’t know.’ As she went to bring in the dishes she was wondering at her reluctance to feel sure just what was the relationship between
Erle
and Stella Parioli.
Jam
...?
CHAPTER TWO
As
Erle
had warned, Cicely showed no warm interest in the antiquities of Rome. It was the city of the luxurious shops, the shabby
palazzos
of the district across the river, the thousand fountains, and the teeming crowds who lived a large part of their lives on the sunny streets which intrigued her most.
Ruth was disappointed, for it was the blending of the ancient and the
modern
which fascinated her—the ruins of the Colosseum and of the Forum at the very heart of the
ci
ty centre; the noisy scooters and the fussy runabout cars darting about on streets and squares paved and worn to pebble smoothness by two thousand years of use. Where her eyes were for the majesty and history of age-old things,
Ci
cely’s were for people and children and the changing kaleidoscope of the ordinary street scene.
She would watch, fascinated, the commonest of Roman sights—a street-
corner
argument in which gesticulating hands and lifting shoulders were as expressive as the busy tongues, and she would join the audience for a Punch and Judy show in the Borghese Gardens simply for the pleasure of watching the children entranced. After a time Ruth realised she must come to a compromise between her duty to
Ci
cely as she saw it and
Cicely
’s own idea of the use to be made of her summer in Rome. But that was after a particularly disastrous morning at the Vatican Museum and
following a somewhat heated argument with
Erle
.
Ruth had warned that their sightseeing would involve, first, a long queue-wait outside and then at least hour-long walking through the magnificent Raphaelite gall
eries
with the prize of the Sistine Chapel at the end of the tour.
Ci
cely had complied, though none too enthusiastically. She took considerably more pleasure in glimpses of the Vatican gardens than she did of the myriad-coloured frescoes and paintings; she even viewed the Sistine Chapel as a duty, and by the end of the morning her relations with Ruth were considerably strained.
She was sulky at lunch and afterwards said she was going to take a book into the nearby Borghese Gardens. Ruth had a lesson to give to a pupil, who had only just left when
Erle
called. They hadn’t seen much of
him
since Cicely’s arrival and he came unannounced today. He asked where
Cicely
was and Ruth, telling him, added: ‘We “did” the Vatican Museum this morning, and in consequence we’re not on the best of terms, I’m afraid.’
Erle
laughed. ‘What did I tell you? The child is only sixteen and you’ve probably been cramming culture down her throat.’
‘It’s what her mother sent her here
for
,”
objected Ruth.
‘You should still dilute the dose.’
‘But if you’re going to see the Vatican Museum, you’re going to
see
it, and it takes hours from start to finish. I think Cicely was cross principally because her feet in sandals hurt her. Yet I’d told her to wear sensible shoes.’
