“Exactly,” the Colonel said. “Let’s forget it.”
“All right,” she said. “I learned that word, or those two words from you. We have forgotten it.”
“Why do you like the hand?” the Colonel asked, placing it where he should.
“Please don’t pretend to be stupid, and please let’s not think of anything, or anything, or anything.”
“I am stupid,” the Colonel said. “But I won’t think of anything or anything nor of nothing nor of his brother, tomorrow.”
“Please be good and kind.”
“I will be. And I will tell you, now, a military secret Top Secret equals British Most Secret. I love you.”
“That’s nice,” she said. “And you put it nicely.”
“I’m nice,” the Colonel said, and checked on the bridge that was coming up, and saw there was clearance. “That’s the first thing people notice about me.”
“I always use the wrong words,” the girl said. “Please just love me. I wish it was me who could love you.”
“You do.”
“Yes, I do,” she said. “With all my heart.”
They were going with the wind now and they were both tired.
“Do you think—”
“I don’t think,” the girl said.
“Well try and think.”
“I will.”
“Drink a glass of this.”
“Why not? It’s very good.”
It was. There was still ice in the bucket, and the wine was cold and clear.
“Can I stay at the Gritti?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“It wouldn’t be right. For them. Nor you. The hell with me.”
“Then I suppose I should go home.”
“Yes,” the Colonel said. “That is the logical supposition.”
“That is an awful way to say a sad thing. Can’t we even pretend some things?”
“No. I’ll take you home and you sleep good and well and tomorrow we will meet where and when you say.”
“May I call the Gritti?”
“Of course. I’ll always be awake. Will you call when you are awake?”
“Yes. But why do you always wake so early?”
“It is a business habit.”
“Oh, I wish you were not in that business, and that you were not going to die.”
“So do I,” said the Colonel. “But I’m getting out of the business.”
“Yes,” she said, sleepily and comfortably. “Then we go to Rome and get the clothes.”
“And live happily ever after.”
“Please don’t,” she said. “Please, please, don’t. You know I made the resolution not to cry.”
“You’re crying now,” the Colonel said. “What the hell have you got to lose on that resolution?”
“Take me home please.”
“That’s what I was doing in the first place,” the Colonel told her.
“Be kind once first.”
“I will,” the Colonel said.
After they, or the Colonel, rather, had paid the gondoliere who was unknowing, yet knowing all, solid, sound, respectful and trustworthy, they walked into the Piazzetta and then across the great, cold, wind-swept square that was hard and old under their feet. They walked holding close and hard in their sorrow and their happiness.
“This is the place where the German shot the pigeons,” the girl said.
“We probably killed him,” the Colonel said. “Or his brother. Maybe we hanged him. I wouldn’t know. I’m not in C.I.D.”
“Do you love me still on these water-worn, cold and old stones?”
“Yes. I’d like to spread a bed roll here and prove it.”
“That would be more barbarous than the pigeon shooter.”
“I’m barbarous,” the Colonel said.
“Not always.”
“Thank you for the not always.”
“We turn here.”
“I think I know that. When are they going to tear that damned Cinema Palace down and put up a real cathedral? That’s what T5 Jackson wants.”
“When some one brings Saint Mark back another time under a load of pork from Alexandria.”
“That was a Torcello boy.”
“You’re a Torcello boy.”
“Yes. I’m a Basso Piave boy and a Grappa boy straight here from Pertica. I’m a Pasubio boy, too, if you know what that means. It was worse just to live there than to fight anywhere else. In the platoon they used to share anyone’s gonochochi brought from Schio and carried in a matchbox. They used to share this just so they could leave because it was intolerable.”
“But you stayed.”