THE CICERONE
cocktail for the Dr.-Livingstone-I-presume that would discover them
in this dark continent. And now on the train that was carrying them
into Italy, the European illusion quickened once more within them.
They eyed every stranger with that suspension of disbelief which, to
invert Wordsworth, makes its object poetical. The man at the next
table had talked all through lunch to two low types with his mouth
full, but the young man remained steady in his conviction that the
chewer was a certain English baronet traveling to his villa in Florence,
and he had nearly persuaded the young lady to go up and ask him
his name. He particularly valued the young lady today because,
coming from the West, she entered readily into conversation with
people she did not know. It was a handicap, of course, that there
were two of them ("My dear," said the young lady, "a couple looks so
complete"), but they were not inclined to separate-the best jockey
in a horse race scorns to take a lighter weight. Unfortunately, their
car, except for the Bounder at the other end, offered very little scope
to his imaginative talent or her loquacity.
But, as they were saying, Continental standards were mysteriously
different; at the frontier at Domodossola a crowd gathered on the
rainy platform in front of their car. Clearly there was some object
of attraction here, and, dismissing the idea that it was herself, the
young lady moved to the window. Next to her, a short, heavy, ugly
man with steel-rimmed spectacles was passing some money to a person
on the platform, who immediately hurried away. Other men came
up and spoke in undertones through the window to the man beside
her. In all of this there was something that struck the young lady
as strange-so much quiet and so much motion, which seemed the
more purposeful, the more businesslike without its natural accom–
paniment of sound. Her clear, school-teacher-on-holiday voice in–
truded resolutely on this quarantine.
crQu'est-ce que se passe?"
she
demanded.
crRien,"
said her neighbor abruptly, glancing at her and
away with a single, swiveling movement of the spectacled eyes.
"C'est des amis qui recontrent des amis."
Rebuffed , she turned back
to the young man. "Black market," she said. "They are changing
money." He nodded, but seeing her thoughts travel capably to the
dollar bills pinned to her underslip, he touched her with a cautioning
hand. The dead, noncommittal face beside her, the briefcase, the
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