‘I dined well and slept well, and the next morning what was my surprise and pleasure when Antonio appeared at eight o’clock bringing my early morning tea and beaming at me like the sun. In his other hand he was carrying something else—a bottle. He did everything with a flourish.

‘ “What have you got there?” I asked, when he had gone through our morning salutations and inquiries which, so strong is habit, took the same form they had taken in pre-war years. “It isn’t time to begin drinking yet.”

‘His expression changed and became serious, even severe.

‘ “O signore,” he said accusingly, “what a lot of cognac you drank last night!”

‘He held the bottle up to the light; it was about three-quarters full. I was surprised that I had drunk so much and said so. “I was drinking a toast to my return to Venice,” I added, apologizing for excess.

‘He accepted my explanation graciously but still with a touch of disapproval in his manner; and then suddenly his face relaxed and became sunny again.

‘ “Good news,” he said. “Signor Gretton is in Venice, he is staying at the Grand Hotel.”

‘I was dumbfounded. It was anything but good news to me. Gretton was an old friend of mine of pre-war days, not a member of the colony but a constant visitor to Venice, as I was. I liked him but I didn’t want to see him, and he would bring the whole colony buzzing round my ears.

‘ “Yes, signore,” Antonio went on, “he was leaving to-morrow, but when he heard that you were here he put his departure off a day.

‘ “How did he know that I was here?” I asked—a silly question from someone who knew the workings of the Venetian bush-telegraph as well as I did; but I was so relieved that Gretton was so to speak on the wing that I hardly knew what I was saying.

‘Antonio shrugged his shoulders. “His gondolier must have told him,” he said—forbearing to add, “And I told his gondolier.” “And he wants to know if he may dine with you to-night. He thought you would prefer that to going to his hotel—I expect he is short of money like all the English, alas.” This was a reasonable inference, but quite groundless, for Gretton is the soul of hospitality.

‘So Gretton came to dinner and it wasn’t at all the flop I thought it would be. The moment I saw his tall, thin figure Venice seemed to become itself and I could scarcely believe that so many years had rolled by. Gretton is a man of generous impulses, quick enthusiasms and equally quick resentments. But I didn’t feel uneasy with him, still less quarrel with him, for the things that upset him were always personal matters—someone had treated him badly or had treated badly someone in whom he was interested. If he simmered with small resentments or flared up in sudden indignation these outbursts were like safety-valves, and no pressure of basic disagreement could form while they were spurting; he didn’t reawaken the slumbering feud I had with almost everyone. There was just one thing: his eyes didn’t light up when he saw me, and he didn’t smile; he looked surprised, and I know why. It wasn’t only that I looked much older; it was the sour expression I have now—you needn’t tell me I haven’t, I catch a glimpse of it in the glass sometimes.

‘Well, it was very hot and we sat on the terrace with the night above us and below us, sipping iced water—it was much too hot to drink anything else. I went back in Gretton’s gondola to his hotel, and walked home, revelling in the Venetian night which was like gold thread on black velvet: and it was nearly one o’clock when I reached the flat.

‘Next morning Antonio again appeared with my early tea and I remember not feeling surprised—for I was in the befuddled state between sleeping and waking, when one is disposed to accept everything as a matter of course—to see the brandy bottle in his other hand. Having greeted me he assumed a stem, even a shocked expression, and said:

‘ “O signore, what a lot of cognac you and Mr. Gretton drank last night! Ma quanto! Quanto! “What a lot, what a lot!” And he held the bottle up for my inspection: it was more than half empty.

‘ “But, Antonio,’ I said, now thoroughly mystified, “we didn’t drink any cognac. It was much too hot.”

‘He turned away, but not before I had seen his expression change, and went to the window and looked out.

‘ “Forse mi sbaglio,” he said. “Perhaps I am mistaken.”

‘ “But you can’t be mistaken,” I said. “Someone has drunk it.”

‘At that he turned away from the window and observed, significantly:

‘ “Signore, you were better off in your old flat.”

‘It was plain what he meant. He meant that if I hadn’t drunk the brandy, Giuseppina had. I didn’t answer, but I suddenly remembered how, all those years ago in my old flat, my stock of brandy sometimes used to dwindle, not in this sensational and dramatic fashion, but little by little. After breakfast I was still pondering upon this, and wondering who was the culprit, when in came Giuseppina. She said nothing but beckoned to me, and I saw that she was carrying in her hand a key. She led me from the room where I was sitting to the dining-room, where she fitted the key into the lock of the cellarette. Then she pursed her lips, raised her eyebrows, and withdrew.

‘Later in the morning Gretton called to say good-bye to me. I was so pleased to see him and thought it so good of him to come, on the morning of his departure, that I forgot the problem of the missing brandy. But when I was asking him if he would have a drink I remembered it and told him.

‘He was up in arms at once.

‘ “How monstrous! Let me see the bottle.”

‘I brought it and before I could protest, indeed before I knew what he was up to, he had taken out his fountain pen and scored a thick black line across the label to mark the level of the brandy.

‘ “That’ll teach him,” he said.

‘After Gretton was gone I wondered if I should lock the cellarette and take away the key. I couldn’t bring myself to do that; it was too flagrantly hostile an act, and against someone to whom I was very much attached. But all the same, my resentment mounted. I shouldn’t have minded so much if Antonio had just sipped the brandy on the sly; it was this ridiculous act he had put on this “commedia” as the Italians call it, imagining he could so easily throw dust in my eyes. You can’t throw dust in people’s eyes without getting some of it in your own; and that’s what had happened to him. And then, when he saw the first cock wouldn’t fight, to try to put the blame on Giuseppina! Was there every such a misguided piece of cleverness? What a fool he must think me! That is the Italians all over, I thought; they are not content with theft, they must give it a panache, an extra twist to make them feel how smart they are, what artists. No doubt Antonio was telling the story to his fellow-gondoliers at the traghetto, and it would lose nothing in the telling. In Italy, I thought, there is no public opinion against dishonesty; as long as a man is ingenious about it, and successful (for Italians adore success), they think the better of him.

‘I would willingly have given Antonio a bottle of brandy if he had asked me, but he would rather steal it than take it as a gift, because any nit-wit can have something given to him, but only the clever can steal it. I suppose you would say it’s one of the things that make Italians so human.’

It was time to break in.

‘I shouldn’t say so,’ I protested.

‘Well, I thought you might. But I couldn’t see it in that light. All through the war, in England, stopping at strange hotels and places up and down the country, and not only at hotels, I had been the victim of innumerable acts of pilfering—don’t tell me, Arthur, please don’t tell me, that the war has done our morals any good. All the little trinkets I possessed—yes, and necessities, too—were pinched from me—watches, watch-chains, cuff-links, travelling clocks—even the shirt off my back, when it was new enough. The war turned us into a nation of thieves—oh yes, it did, Arthur, whatever you may say. And to have this happening all over again in Venice it was too maddening.’ My friend looked away from me and the sour look came into his face.