“My love,” Iles said to her, “you are going to be very, very happy.”

“Really?”

He put his arm around her without replying; he nodded. The shooting was almost over. The rushes, he said, were the best he had ever seen. Ever.

“As for this fellow…” he said, reaching for Guivi.

The producer joined them.

“I want you for my next picture, both of you,” he announced. He was wearing a suit a size too small, a velvet suit bought on Via Borgognona.

“Where did you get it?” Guivi said. “It’s fantastic. Who is supposed to be the star here anyway?”

Posener looked down at himself. He smiled like a guilty boy.

“Do you like it?” he said. “Really?”

“No, where did you get it?”

“I’ll send you one tomorrow.”

“No, no…”

“Guivi, please,” he begged, “I want to.”

He was filled with goodwill, the worst was past. The actors had not run away or refused to work, he was overcome with love for them, as for a bad child who unexpectedly does something good. He felt he must do something in return.

“Waiter!” he cried. He looked around, his gestures always seemed wasted, vanished in empty air.

“Waiter,” he called, “champagne!”

There were twenty or so people in the room, other actors, the American wife of a count. At the table Guivi told stories. He drank like a Georgian prince, he had plans for Geneva, Gstaad. There was the Italian producer, he said, who had an actress under contract, she was a second Sophia Loren. He had made a fortune with her. Her films were only shown in Italy, but everyone went to them, the money was pouring in. He always kept the journalists away, however, he never let them talk to her alone.

“Sellerio,” someone guessed.

“Yes,” said Guivi, “that’s right. Do you know the rest of the story?”

“He sold her.”

But half the contract only, Guivi said. Her popularity was fading, he wanted to get everything he could. There was a big ceremony, they invited all the press. She was going to sign. She picked up the pen and leaned forward a little for the photographers, you know, she had these enormous, eh… well, anyway, on the paper she wrote: with his finger Guivi made a large X. The newsmen all looked at each other. Then Sellerio took the pen and very grandly, just below her name: Guivi made one X and next to it, carefully, another. Illiterate. That’s the truth. They asked him, look, what is the second X for? You know what he told them? Dottore.

They laughed. He told them about shooting in Naples with a producer so cheap he threw a cable across the trolley wires to steal power. He was clever, Guivi, he was a storyteller in the tradition of the east, he could speak three languages. Later, when she finally understood what had happened, Anna remembered how happy he seemed this night.

“Shall we go on to the Hostaria?” the producer said.

“What?” Guivi asked.

“The Hostaria…” As with the waiters, it seemed no one heard him. “The Blue Bar. Come on, we’re going to the Blue Bar,” he announced.

Outside the Botanical Gardens, parked in the cold, the small windows of the car frosted, Lang sat. His clothing was open. His flesh was pale in the refracted light. He had eaten dinner with Eva. She had talked for hours in a low, uncertain voice, it was a night for stories, she had told him everything, about Coleman the head of publicity, Mirella, her brother, Sicily, life. On the road to the mountains which overlooked Palermo there were cars parked at five in the afternoon. In each one was a couple, the man with a handkerchief spread in his lap.

“I am so lonely,” she said suddenly.

She had only three friends, she saw them all the time. They went to the theater together, the ballet. One was an actress. One was married. She was silent, she seemed to wait. The cold was everywhere, it covered the glass. Her breath was in crystals, visible in the dark.

“Can I kiss it?” she said.

She began to moan then, as if it were holy. She touched it with her forehead. She was murmuring. The nape of her neck was bare.

She called the next morning. It was eight o’clock.

“I want to read something to you,” she said.

He was half-asleep, the racket was already drifting up from the street. The room was chill and unlighted. Within it, distant as an old record, her voice was playing. It entered his body, it commanded his blood.

“I found this,” she said. “Are you there?”

“Yes.”

“I thought you would like it.”

It was from an article. She began to read.

In February of 1868, in Milan, Prince Umberto had given a splendid ball. In a room which blazed with light the young bride who was one day to be Queen of Italy was introduced. It was the event of the year, crowded and gay, and while the world of fashion amused itself thus, at the same hour and in the same city a lone astronomer was discovering a new planet, the ninety-seventh on Chacornac’s chart….

Silence. A new planet.

In his mind, still warmed by the pillow, it seemed a sacred calm had descended. He lay like a saint. He was naked, his ankles, his hipbones, his throat.

He heard her call his name. He said nothing. He lay there becoming small, smaller, vanishing. The room became a window, a facade, a group of buildings, squares and sections, in the end all of Rome. His ecstasy was beyond knowing. The roofs of the great cathedrals shone in the winter air.

LOST SONS

All afternoon the cars, many with out-of-state plates, were coming along the road. The long row of lofty brick quarters appeared above. The gray walls began.

In the reception area a welcoming party was going on. There were faces that had hardly changed at all and others like Reemstma’s whose name tag was read more than once. Someone with a camera and flash attachment was running around in a cadet bathrobe. Over in the barracks they were drinking. Doors were open. Voices spilled out.

“Hooknose will be here,” Dunning promised loudly. There was a bottle on the desk near his feet. “He’ll show, don’t worry. I had a letter from him.”

“A letter? Klingbeil never wrote a letter.”

“His secretary wrote it,” Dunning said. He looked like a judge, large and well fed. His glasses lent a dainty touch. “He’s teaching her to write.”

“Where’s he living now?”

“Florida.”

“Remember the time we were sneaking back to Buckner at two in the morning and all of a sudden a car came down the road?”

Dunning was trying to arrange a serious expression.

“We dove in the bushes. It turned out it was a taxi. It slammed on the brakes and backed up. The door opens and there’s Klingbeil in the backseat, drunk as a lord. Get in, boys, he says.”

Dunning roared. His blouse with its rows of colored ribbons was unbuttoned, gluteal power hinted by the width of his lap.

“Remember,” he said, “when we threw Devereaux’s Spanish book with all his notes in it out the window? Into the snow. He never found it. He went bananas. You bastards, I’ll kill you!”

“He’d have been a star man if he hadn’t been living with you.”

“We tried to broaden him,” Dunning explained.

They used to do the sinking of the Bismarckwhile he was studying. Klingbeil was the captain. They would jump up on the desks. Der Schiff ist kaputt!they shouted. They were firing the guns. The rudder was jammed, they were turning in circles. Devereaux sat head down with his hands pressed over his ears. Will you bastards shut up! he screamed.

Bush, Buford, Jap Andrus, Doane, and George Hilmo were sitting on the beds and windowsill. An uncertain face looked in the doorway.

“Who’s that?”

It was Reemstma whom no one had seen for years. His hair had turned gray. He smiled awkwardly. “What’s going on?”

They looked at him.

“Come in and have a drink,” someone finally said.

He found himself next to Hilmo, who reached across to shake hands with an iron grip. “How are you?” he said. The others went on talking. “You look great.”