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As the problems connected with the buying of her land, and permission to build upon it, proved somewhat long—for the Government, if honest, was somewhat
dilatory—Piers persuaded Martine to build an encampment of mock Indonesian huts on her land where she could live during the summer and see her house emerge from the scrub and arbutus of the little promontory. The island, we discovered, produced an excellent rush matting in several thicknesses and the heaviest proved tough and weatherproof for walls and roofing. The idea was miraculous in its simplicity—the local carpenters could run up a whole room in a day. It was like playing at dolls' houses; for a couple of hundred pounds Martine built herself a temporary matting house with room enough to invite her summer guests, with kitchens and bathrooms—everything, for there was water on the land which Piers could later draw off for the big house.

Intoxicated by this discovery, she at once launched into what gradually turned into a miniature village almost, with a main square from which all the huts led off, with grouped water points and drainage and septic tanks. Piers, the born architect and planner, was lost in admiration and envy at this freestyle building and often, when he ran into problems with the big house, would swear and ask her why the devil she could not live forever in a matting house, repairing it at little cost as fast as it deteriorated? There were times when she almost agreed, when the big house seemed too solid and too consciously thought out—for at heart, like all the family of Gainsboroughs, Martine was something of a gipsy. The instinct had perhaps worn itself out a little—though her father, old Sir Felix, had expressly
chosen a traveling profession—diplomacy—which sent him to a new country every few years. She had been marked by this wandering life, and she spoke with eloquence and insight of what it had meant to her and to her brother, in terms of actual domicile, to inhabit buildings which were beautifully appointed but in which nothing belonged to one—everything belonged to the Office of Works, even the choice plate. One brought one's books and pictures into play to be sure, but an embassy for all its comfort could never be a home. But this was how she knew Rome, Moscow, Buenos Aires: and this was how she had become a linguist. But her childhood had been full of this strange sense of not belonging; lying awake at night listening for the official Rolls which wheeled on to the gravel after midnight, bringing their parents back from some boring reception—so fatigued by their social duties that they could hardly exchange a word and often even dined alone in silence; simply to recover from the deep wasting fatigue of a life which was a mirror life. Only at holiday times did things seem to come alive, but then the cottage in Devon was
owned
, it was theirs like the mill in Ireland and the flat in Capri. The subtle difference cut very deep; but was it really necessary to own the house one lived in in order to feel happy? Surely there was something false about the proposition? Then perhaps it was simply the artifices and limitations of the diplomatic life? She had begun to look upon diplomats as kindly lampreys gesturing
in the dark pools of the profession among the fucus and drifting weeds of protocol and preciousness. Nor was this really fair—for Sir Felix was far from being a mountebank, hence no doubt his frequent relegation to quite minor missions in the role of a lifesaver or life-giver—to ginger them up, or to create new openings as he had in Latin America. But Martine in a dim incoherent way wanted a different life: and here it was.

These long-lost events, which my memory had so carelessly and capriciously stored away, came back to me now with full force as we munched our stale pizzas and drank heartening draughts of Chianti; it was a memory touched off by the fact that here, like in Cyprus, we were seated on the hot time-worn stones of a vanished Greek civilization, in the drowsy heat of the Mediterranean sun. Sacked temples, quake-shattered citadels, ruined fortresses, exhausted wells … the old tragic pattern was the same, a long barren lesson in history which seeks always for the stable and is undermined by the shifts and betrayals of man's consciousness itself as reflected in the ebb and flow of temporal events. And yet—what was he not capable of, man? Any benevolent tyrant who could enjoy a thirty-year rule was capable of launching humanity on a new vector, on to the peaceful pursuits of husbandry and art and science. Then, abruptly, like the explosions from some Etna of the mind, the whole thing overturned and both guilty and innocent were drenched in blood. One would have to believe very deeply in Nature to
expect a meaning to emerge from all this senseless carnage; if one were really truthful one could not help but see her as some frightful demented sow gobbling up her own young at every remove. But Martine, underneath the spoilt playgirl or fashion plate, was hunting after some absolute belief in the Tightness of Process—and only the philosophy of the Indians seemed to offer that.

Nearby in a mulberry tree, half-dead and desiccated by the sun, there was a great concourse of ravens or rooks—I could not tell which. They were like Methodist parsons holding one of their amusing conventions in some Harrogate hotel. They submitted with modest attention to the theological addresses of two obvious elders of the church. Almost they made notes. We watched them with wonder and curiosity, trying to imagine what could be the subject of their grave colloquy. In vain. After a long moment, and in response to no immediately visible signal, the whole company wheeled suddenly up into the sky and performed several slow and rather irresolute gyrations—as if they were trying to locate a beam of light or sound, an electrical impulse which would orient them. They wheeled several times in a most indecisive manner; then suddenly a breakaway group detached itself and headed northward, and the rest, their minds set at rest, wheeled into line and followed them. Direction assured they broke into several clusters the better to talk; one could hear their grave club chatter as they diminished in the
distance, leaving the field clear for the drone of bees and the sharp stridulations of the cicada. I was dozing. I was nearly asleep in fact. It was a good way to start off, with a siesta in Sicily.

It had become very hot up there in the dusty foothills, hotter than Provence at this hour in summer. The light wind which had cooled us all morning had subsided and the whole of nature, it seemed, was itself subsiding into the death-like composure of the siesta hour. Sensible men in such places preferred to sleep in a shuttered room until almost sunset when the coolness once more started and when a walk upon the Gorso and a Cinzano at a cafe became imperatives. I lay for a while in the shade with my eyes closed, recalling another anecdote which had emerged from the casual conversation of Martine. Once upon a time, as children in a foreign capital, she and her brother had been sent to play with the children of a fellow diplomat whose little girl and boy were about the same age as they were. They were accordingly decanted by their nurse at the Japanese Embassy where the two Japanese children waited for them with friendly politeness. Introductions once effected, their small hosts led them to their playroom—a large studio with high bright windows. “You must not forget that we, like all English children, had a playroom stuffed with toys, from rocking horses to bicycles and model cars—just about everything. But when we entered the Japanese playroom we were struck dumb, we were thunderstruck. There was nothing in it save for one solitary
object on the windowsill against the studio window. This was a great white ship, a fully rigged Japanese galleon in full sail. Just that and nothing more in this spotless shining room. We stood still in front of our Japanese hosts feeling suddenly terribly ashamed.”

Sleep had almost wrapped me up when I felt a restraining hand upon my arm, and Roberto stood smiling before me. “We are off,” he said, and as if to underline the thought the far-off bus gave a little whiffle of sound. Languidly we returned to it to find Mario sitting on the step sorting out his first aid kit with pensive attention. “Yes,” said Roberto catching my eye, “we must take every precaution. You tourists are capable of anything from dysentery to sunstroke, from fever to broken bones. And it's always our fault! That is why we carry a full medical kit with us.” He had hardly uttered the words when the American dentist advanced and requested a Band-Aid as he had cut his finger in some mysterious way. More classical was the wasp sting incurred by one of the French ladies. Pleased to show his medical prowess, Roberto whipped out his tweezers and drew the sting before drenching the wound in ammonia. “He's right,” said Deeds, “people are such fools anything could happen.” And so we rolled down the dusty inclines towards the far off blue promise of a first sea bathe, though truth to tell the little beach was not the prettiest I had ever seen, and there was quite a disturbed little sea running. Beddoes would have things to say about it!

But no. He just sat and scowled upon the shingle, sucking at his pipe. The rest of us showed a commendable burst of energy, changing into our bathing costumes in a nearby thicket and advancing intrepidly towards the sea, which frolicked about in a disconcerting manner—at least for those who did not, or could not, dive through the waves which broke on the shore, in search of the relative calm beyond. The American dentist's lady friend behaved too irresolutely, too pensively, and was knocked down in a heap—or perhaps she had decided to fall in just this beautiful soft waxen way. We all rushed to help in order to get our hands on that beautiful form but her man was there ahead of us, alive to every eventuality. Deeds bumped his toe. The pebbles were blazing hot and we all scuttled about with burning soles, to cool them at last in the innocent surf. I swam a little, regretting that I was not in better shape physically: a winter of French cooking had done me in. Perhaps the modest fare of Sicily—if one could defeat its copiousness—might do the trick? But no, because when one traveled this way one was always famished, and the only choice lay between spaghetti and rice.…

The sea tasted of oysters and brine when I inadvertently swallowed a mouthful. Some anxiety was now caused by the German beauty who had apparently decided to swim over to Piraeus, so far out was she. (She explained later that she was simply keeping pace with the sinking sun.) But how was Roberto to know this, as he stood shouting at her on the brink
and wringing his responsible hands? She was finally persuaded to come back to us, which she did at a smart crawl—to be fiercely rebuked by the guide who said he would post no more letters for her unless she showed more good sense. But she seemed unaware that she had done anything to cause alarm and annoyance. She shook out her blonde hair and of course the gallant soul of Roberto melted, his wrath cooled like lava. But the sun was already behind the hills and the night had begun to fall. We should arrive after dark in Syracuse—the town which Martine had esteemed superior to all the towns of Sicily. We dressed once more, relaxed into happy fatigue by water and sun, and recovered the saturnine Mario and our little bus—together with all the belongings we had left in it. The atmosphere of the interior was now becoming ever so faintly disorderly—the disorder of gypsies who have no time to be tidy when they are on the road. Binoculars, scarves, Thermos flasks, picnic baskets and cameras; we carried all this lumber with us like all modern pilgrims do, and Mario watched over it all while we were absent, sitting to play himself a hand of patience on a little board erected over the wheel; or else to study a Sicilian paper with great care and slowly while he sucked a match stick which he had carved into a toothpick.

Darkness fell while we were on the road; the familiar daylight forms receded and melted slowly away into the tenebrous hinterlands around us. We put on coats and scarves and settled into our seats, glad of
the warmly lighted bus which we could feel burrowing its way through the darkness towards Syracuse. Mario played his chuckling horn, sometimes it seemed for pure pleasure as there was hardly any traffic on the road. It was a horn on two notes, like a magpie's rattling call. In silent villages he let out this pretty call sign to register our presence. Answer came there none. Then as we climbed a hillock and took a smooth curve Roberto announced that we had reached Augusta and this was well worth sitting up for.

It was of an extraordinary beauty, this little oil port. A thousand tulips of light and colored smoke played about its derricks and towers and drums—a forest of refineries whose beauty was made quite sinister by the fact that the whole was deserted. There was not a soul in the whole place, not a dog, nor a cat: there wasn't even a guard post. Yet the light played about in it, the smoke gushed and spat, as if it were the very forge of the Titans, and a thousand invisible trolls were hard at work in it. Its beauty was quite breathtaking. I watched it in diminishing perspective, reflected in the windows of the bus, and it seemed like a thousand wax lights afloat on the waters of chaos. Two days later we were to pass it in daylight and to have our ardor quenched by its hideous ugliness, its ungainly spider-like instruments. But indeed it was an important guarantee of Sicily's economic progress. No more would she be a poor relation of the north. Roberto spared us statistics tonight out of sheer tact, and because he knew that in
two days' time he could spout them all out by daylight. “Augusta,” said Deeds shaking his head. “All through the damn war we tried to shell it, with never a single hit. How could it have escaped? But it did.” I thought I knew the answer. “Every time the Fleet Air Arm tried to bomb Augusta or even Catania the Italians came back and knocked a piece off my balcony in Alexandria. Finally there was no balcony left.” The little spots of light receded into the rolling hills, until Augusta looked like a small forest fire, or the brindles on a tiger's hide. It hung for a while like a sinking constellation and then extinguished itself while ahead of us, more warming but less spectacular, glowed the lights of Syracuse. We had begun to feel hungry and watched with a certain envy the Americans who poured out coffee from a vacuum flask and ate a sandwich in a lingering way. I thought that, after all, I would sleep like a lead soldier tonight once I had had dinner and a drink.