176
PARTISAN REVIE
vided by a mustache of recent vintage that looked, Fidelman thou
as if it had been sculptured there, adding to his dignified appea
although he was stockily built and not tall. But almost at the
moment, this unexpectedly intense sense of his being-it was
In
than appearance-faded, exaltation having gone where exaltati
goes, and Fidelman became aware that there was an exterior so
to the strange, almost tri-dimensional reflection of himself he
felt as well as seen. Behind him, a short distance to the right,
he
had noticed a stranger-give a skeleton a couple of pounds-loitcFo
ing near a bronze statue on a stone pedestal of the heavy-duggal
Etruscan wolf suckling the infant Romulus and Remus, the man co.
templating Fidelman already acquisitively so as to suggest to
the:
traveler that he had been mirrored (lock, stock, barrel) in the oth
gaze for some time, perhaps since he had stepped off the tram.
Casually studying him, though pretending no, Fidelman beheld
person of about his own height, oddly dressed in brown knickers
and
black, knee-length woolen socks drawn up over slightly bowed, broom–
stick legs, these grounded in small, porous, pointed shoes. His yellowed
shirt was open at the gaunt throat, both sleeves rolled up over
skinny, hairy arms. The stranger's high forehead was bronzed, .
black hair thick behind small ears, the dark, close-shaven beard
ti
on the face;
his
experienced nose was weighted at the tip, and
the
soft brown eyes, above all,
wanted.
Though
his
expression sugg
humility, he all but licked his lips as he approached the ex-painter.
"Shalom," he greeted Fidelman.
"Shalom," the other hesitantly replied, uttering the word-tO
far as he recalled-for the first time in his life. My God, he
though~
a handout for sure. My first hello in Rome and it has to
be
a
schnorrer.
The stranger extended a smiling hand. "Susskind," he
sai
"Shimon Susskind."
"Arthur Fidelman." Transferring his brief case to under his I
arm while standing astride the big suitcase, he shook hands
witla
Susskind. A blue-smocked porter came by, glanced at Fidelman's
bag,
looked at him, then walked away.
Whether he knew it or not Susskind was rubbing
his
p
contemplatively together.
"Parla italiano?"
