The Savage Garden

necktie. She turned as Adam entered, a flicker of alarm in her eyes. She recovered quickly, though, smiling warmly as she wandered over to greet him.

    'How are you?'

    'Good.'

    'How's life at the villa?'

    'Good.'

    'Do you want to eat?'

    'No thanks.'

    'Something to drink, then? A beer?'

    'Why not?'

    His arrival had disconcerted her. Maybe she didn't want to be reminded of their tryst. Or worse still, maybe she thought he had dropped by in the hope of a replay upstairs. Before he could set her mind at rest, she was gone, heading for the kitchen.

    She really was very beautiful, more beautiful than he remembered, and he wondered, not for the first time, what on earth had induced her to share herself with him.

    He took a sip of beer and pressed the chill glass to his cheek. It was good to get out, away from Villa Docci, to slip its grip for a while. That's what he told himself. He knew in his bones he'd done no such thing.

    Villa Docci had not released him. If it had, he'd be wandering the streets of Florence right now, dipping into churches, galleries and museums with Harry. Why was Harry the one down there doing it? The Renaissance was his thing, not Harry's. All that seminal art right on his doorstep, destined to go unseen by him, masterpieces callously ignored. And in favor of what, exactly?

    He tried not to think too hard about why he had allowed himself to be drawn back into the dark abyss of his suspicions. The reasons flew in the face of common sense, they violated the laws of logic by which he liked to think he operated. This was uncharted territory for him, instinct his only guide.

    It occurred to him that he wouldn't be sitting there on a bar stool in the Pensione Amorini if that same instinct hadn't served him so well in the memorial garden. As ever, all things sprang from and returned to the garden.

    Signora Fanelli served the lone gentleman his food, then joined Adam at the counter. Was it significant that she had tied up her hair while in the kitchen?

    'It's nice to see you.'

    'I came to say goodbye. I'm leaving soon.'

    'Before the party?' she asked.

    'You know about the party?'

    'Everyone does. The children here always go and watch—from a distance, of course. I used to when I was young.'

    'I also want to say goodbye to Fausto, but I don't know where he lives.'

    She drew him a map on a paper napkin. He'd forgotten that she was left-handed.

    When he pulled some coins from his pocket to pay for the beer, she said, 'Don't be silly, I don't want your money.'

    She accompanied him outside to his bicycle. 'You won't tell him about us, will you? Fausto, I mean.'

    'Don't worry, I'm too embarrassed.'

    She smiled apologetically. 'I didn't mean that. But you won't, will you?'

    'No.'

    She cast a fleeting look at the stonemasons before kissing him on both cheeks.

    'Goodbye, Adam.'

    'Goodbye.'

    'Hello.'

    Fausto looked up, squinting. 'You?' 'Me.'

    Fausto was mixing mortar in an old tin pail. He was stripped to the waist, revealing a wire-and-whipcord body. Wiping the sweat from his brow with the back of his forearm, he rose to his feet.

    'You like it?' He nodded at the low stone, tile-roofed structure he was working on. The building itself was finished; he was erecting the walls of a small yard out front.

    'For the pig?'

    'For a whole family of little pigs.'

    'It's beautiful.' Adam looked around him. 'It's all beautiful.'

    He wasn't being polite. The modest farmhouse was set among a run of terraces carved out of the wooded hillside just south of San Casciano. It was an isolated spot, accessed by a precipitous dirt track barely passable on foot, which probably accounted for the old U.S. Army jeep parked beside the farmhouse.