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and dark trousers, both very much too tight. He was small and plump, bulging with little rolls of flesh under the arms, above the belly, all over; it seemed he had never even started to care what he looked like; Letizia introduced him as Marino Vesperelli, adding, for her father’s sake, that he was a Professor of Psychology. Dr Bernardini took him in good part, cast a hand to indicate a seat, rose to ask him what he would drink. At which Letizia took over, and the young man followed her to the wagon of bottles and ice at the far end of the room. Emilio Bernardini then murmured to Nancy, ‘I hate to think of him breathing all over my daughter.’
    ‘Maybe he’s just a friend.’
    ‘Where does she pick them up?’
    ‘I expect this one works with her in her welfare work.’
    ‘He needs a bit of welfare himself,’ said the father.
    However, as soon as the young psychologist had sat down with his drink Dr Bernardini tried to engage him in conversation as to his profession. The young man answered briefly and asked no return questions; plainly he felt that his odd-looking presence was sufficient social contribution to the evening; which, in its decided oddity, it rather was.
    ‘There’s a car arriving; it must be her ,’ said Pietro.
    Maggie Radcliffe was so much in the long, long habit of making heads swim when she came into view that she still did so. She looked somewhere in her late forties but the precise age was irrelevant to the effect which was absolutely imperious in its demands for attention; and what was more, Maggie achieved it carelessly. She cared only, and closely, about what was going on around her. And so, as soon as she had given her hand to everyone in the room, she started to admire the Bernardinis’ pictures whose authors she recognized, one by one. Still administering her entrance like drops of heart-medicine, she turned to the owner and reminded him how the Klimt over the mantelpiece had very nearly remained in the Austrian collection, thus establishing with him the higher market-place communion that exists between rich and rich.
    Nancy Cowan stood waiting for the special guest to sit down. She pulled, through her dress, at the top of her panty-hose, setting herself to rights like a schoolgirl. She then moved her finger under her hair at the nape of her neck. Maggie sat down. The men sat down. Maggie, on being asked what she would drink, turned to the uncomely young psychologist and asked what he was drinking.
    ‘Sherry on the rocks,’ he said.
    Maggie gave a soundless laugh, looking towards her host in merry collusion, and said she would have a vodka-tonic. She had overdressed very tastefully, with a mainly-white patterned dress brilliant against her shiny sun-tan. Her hair was silver-tipped, her eyes large and bright. She had a flood-lit look up to the teeth.
    The air-conditioner was turned off before dinner seeing that the evening was cool. The windows of the dining-room were opened to the breeze of the Alban hills. They sat at the long refectory table, spaced-out, murmuring pleasantly one to the other, waiting to be served. Emilio Bernardini at the top of the table had Maggie on his right, Nancy on his left. Letizia sat facing him with Pietro on her left and her boy-friend bundled in his chair on her right. Wine, water, avocado, sauce. ‘What do you think of your villa, Marchesa, now that we’re in it?’
    ‘You’ve made it charming, more delightful than I remembered having seen it before,’ Maggie said.
    ‘We made some alterations,’ Letizia said. ‘We had to get workmen. One of the garages is now a downstairs sitting-room. Otherwise, there wasn’t—’
    ‘I know,’ said Maggie. ‘My agent mentioned it.’
    ‘The Marchesa must see it later,’ said the father.
    ‘Yes, I must,’ said Maggie.
    ‘If we’re speaking English why do you say “Marchesa”,’ said Letizia. ‘ “Marchioness” is English.’
    Pietro said, ‘Because it sounds nicer.’
    ‘Oh, yes, it does,’