The Broker

As they settled into their seats Marco noticed what was left of two fully smoked cigarettes in the ashtray. Luigi his water glass was almost completely empty. The two had been sitting there for at least twenty minutes. In very deliberate Italian, Luigi said to Marco, "Signora Ferro is a language teacher and a local guide." Pause, to which Marco offered a weak "Si."

He glanced at the signora and smiled, to which she responded with a forced smile of her own. She appeared to be bored with him already.

Luigi continued in Italian. "She is your new Italian teacher. Ermanno will teach you in the mornings, and Signora Ferro in the after noons." Marco understood all of it. He managed a fake smile in her direction and said, "Va bene." That’s good.

"Ermanno wants to resume his studies at the university next week," Luigi said.

"I thought so," Marco said in English.

Francesca fired up another cigarette and crunched her full red lips around it. She exhaled a huge cloud of smoke and said, "So, how is your Italian?" It was a rich, almost husky voice, one no doubt enriched by years of smoking. Her English was slow, very refined, and without an accent.

"Terrible," Marco said.

"He’s doing fine," Luigi said. The waiter delivered a bottle of mineral water and handed over three menus. La signora disappeared behind hers. Marco followed her lead. A long silent spell followed as they contemplated food and ignored each other.

When the menus finally came down she said to Marco, "I’d like to hear you order in Italian."

"No problem," he said. He’d found some things he could pronounce without drawing laughter. The waiter appeared with his pen and Marco said, "Si, allora, vorrei un’insalata di pomodori, e una mezza porzione di lasagna." Yes, okay, I’d like a salad with tomatoes and a half portion of lasagna. Once again he was very thankful for transatlantic goodies such as spaghetti, lasagna, ravioli, and pizza.

"Non c’e male," she said. Not bad.

She and Luigi stopped smoking when the salads arrived. Eating gave them a break in the awkward conversation. No wine was ordered, though much was needed.

His past, her present, and Luigi’s shadowy occupation were all off-limits, so they bobbed and weaved through the meal with light talk about the weather, almost all of it mercifully in English.

When the espressos were finished Luigi grabbed the check and they hurried from the restaurant. In the process, and while Francesca wasn’t looking, he slid an envelope to Marco and whispered, "Here are some euros."

"Grazie."

The snow was gone, the sun was up and bright. Luigi left them at the Piazza Maggiore and vanished, as only he could do. They walked in silence for a while, until she said, "Che cosa vorrebbe vedere?" What would you like to see?

Marco had yet to step inside the main cathedral, the Basilica di San Petronio. They walked to its sweeping front steps and stopped. "It’s both beautiful and sad," she said in English, with the first hint of a British accent. "It was conceived by the city council as a civic temple, not a cathedral, in direct opposition to the pope in Rome. The original design was for it to be even larger than Saint Peter’s Cathedral, but along the way the plans fell short. Rome opposed it, and diverted money elsewhere, some of which went to the founding of the university."

"When was it built?" Marco asked.

"Say that in Italian," she instructed.

"I can’t."

"Then listen: ‘Quando e stata costruita?’ Repeat that for me."

Marco repeated it four times before she was satisfied.

"I don’t believe in books or tapes or such things," she said as they continued to gaze upward at the vast cathedral. "I believe in conversation, and more conversation. To learn to speak the language, then you have to speak it, over and over and over, just like when you were a child."

"Where did you learn English?" he asked.

"I can’t answer that. I’ve been instructed to say nothing about my past. And yours too."

For a split second, Marco came very close to turning around and walking away. He was sick of people who couldn’t talk to him, who dodged his questions, who acted as if the whole world was filled with spies. He was sick of the games.

He was a free man, he kept telling himself, completely able to come and go and make whatever decision he felt like. If he got sick of Luigi and Ermanno and now Signora Ferro, then he could tell the whole bunch, in Italian, to choke on a panino.

"It was begun in 1390, and things went smoothly for the first hundred years or so," she said. The bottom third of the facade was a handsome pink marble; the upper two-thirds was an ugly brown brick that hadn’t been layered with the marble. "Then it fell on hard times. Obviously, the outside was never completed."

"It’s not particularly pretty."

"No, but it’s quite intriguing. Would you like to see the inside?"

What else was he supposed to do for the next three hours? "Certamente," he said.

They climbed the steps and stopped at the front door. She looked at a sign and said, "Mi dica." Tell me. "What time does the church close?"

Marco frowned hard, rehearsed some words, and said, "La chiesa chiude alle sei." The church closes at six.

"Ripeta."

Chapter Nine

He repeated it three times before she allowed him to stop, and they stepped inside. "It’s named in honor of Petronio, the patron saint of Bologna," she said softly. The central floor of the cathedral was big enough for a hockey match with large crowds on both sides. "Its huge," Marco said, in awe.

"Yes, and this is about one-fourth of the original design. Again, the pope got worried and applied some pressure. It cost a tremendous amount of public money, and eventually the people got tired of building."

"It’s still very impressive." Marco was aware that they were chatting in English, which suited him fine.

"Would you like the long tour or the short one?" she asked. Though the inside was almost as cold as the outside, Signora Ferro seemed to be thawing just a bit.

"You’re the teacher," he said.

They drifted to the left and waited for a small group of Japanese tourists to finish studying a large marble crypt. Other than the Japanese, the cathedral was empty. It was a Friday in February, not exactly peak tourist season. Later in the afternoon he would learn that Francesca’s very seasonal tourist work was quite slow in the winter months. That confession was the only bit of personal data she divulged.

Because business was so slow, she felt no urge to race through the Basilica di San Petronio. They saw all twenty-two side chapels and looked at most of the paintings, sculptures, glasswork, and frescoes. The chapels were built over the centuries by wealthy Bolognese families who paid handsomely for commemorative art. Their construction was a history of the city, and Francesca knew every detail. She showed him the well-preserved skull of Saint Petronio himself sitting proudly on an altar, and an astrological clock created in 1655 by two scientists who relied directly on Galileo’s studies at the university.

Though sometimes bored with the intricacies of paintings and sculptures, and inundated with names and dates, Marco gamely held on as the tour inched around the massive structure. Her voice captivated him, her rich slow delivery, her perfectly refined English.

Long after the Japanese had abandoned the cathedral, they made it back to the front door and she said, "Had enough?"

"Yes."

They stepped outside and she immediately lit a cigarette.