242
WILLIAM
PHILLIPS
soft underneath. He was short and finicky . He looked too clean, as ifhe
was scrubbed by his mother. The fact he was born and brought up as an
aristocrat was written all over him. He must have been pampered and
groomed to look like a dandy.
Arbuto, who was always looking for recruits to the movement,
wanted me to meet him because he was enormously rich and knew im–
portant people. He thought he could help us, but I wondered how–
besides money. It struck me right away that he was an incurable roman–
tic. He had the eager eyes of a child, looking for a new toy. Arbuto said
he was always looking for something new.
When Algie was twenty, he became a communist. But, for him, the
communists, the Italian ones, were too cautious, too scared to take
chances. They were like his father, he said, too practical. He didn't think
they were revolutionary. He began to look for more excitement. He
found Arbuto.
I found him attractive, I don't know why. Maybe because women
like men who have something wrong with them, men they can rescue.
And I sensed immediately that he was looking for help. I guess he liked
me because I was new and promised something different. Maybe in some
mysterious way I could supply what his life lacked. He told me I was like
a combination of Passionara and Mata Hari, which pleased me, and like
his mother, which didn't please me, and which, I suspected, he didn't
care for either.
We made a number of dates, eating in posh restaurants, and going
on picnics in the mountains, and to small, secret political meetings,
which excited him so much that his legs were twitching. Then, one day,
while we were having lunch in a garden restaurant, with a fountain in
the center, and a violinist serenading us, Algie said, "Let's get married."
"It's a crazy idea," I said, though I too was carried away by the ele–
gant atmosphere, "but why not, if it doesn't work what have we lost?"
We were married by a radical priest in Arbuto's safe house, and we
went on a political honeymoon to the Hotel Praha in Prague, where I
always had felt at home.
When we got to our room, he was fidgety and sweating. I was so
nervous I felt dizzy. Algie ordered a bottle of Russian vodka. I wondered
why two people who weren't afraid to die were so scared.
I knew why I was scared. But why was he scared? We sat down on
the bed next to each other. He kissed me on the cheek but immediately
pulled back, looking to see what I would do . I did nothing. He started
to fidget with his fly. He had trouble opening it. I couldn't wait any
more. I had to tell him the truth about myself, that I was a lesbian. I had
been taught to lie to the police but to tell the truth to each other. Just
to look at a penis, especially an erect one, I told him, made me sick. But
