On the morning of the fourth day, we returned to déjeuner parched and footsore from exploring the stifling alleys which lie back of the Rialto. The air was heavy and sultry. The water seemed to boil in the canals. Every stone flung back the steady glare. Blue lagoons, polished as reflectors, mirrored the blue of the cloudless sky. From where we sat at table, we could see crowded steamers draw in at the pier and crawl like flies across the bay to Lido. Fiesole made a queer little face at me. “Stupid old sober-sides!” “What’s the matter?” She flung herself back in her chair, regarding me with a languid, arch expression. “I’m tired of fudging in and out of old palaces and churches. I came here to enjoy myself. If I promise to be a good girl, will you take me to Lido to bathe? We’ll have one dear little afternoon all to ourselves.” A warm breeze caught us on the steamer. What ripe lips Fiesole had, and what inscrutable eyes! Since that first night of our arrival, she had prevented me from treating her with any of the privileges of her sex. She had walked when and where she liked. She had insisted on paying her share of everything down to the last centesimi. Now she changed her mood and slipped her arm through mine. We had both grown tired of pretending she was a man. “You needn’t be afraid to be nice to me,” she said. There were lovers all about us: girls from the glass-factories in white dresses, bareheaded, with tasseled black shawls; sailors from the Arsenal with keen bronzed faces and silky mustaches. Venice was taking a day off and giving us a lesson in happiness. The self-consciousness of the Anglo-Saxon, which makes the expression of pleasure bad taste and distressing, was absent. Each was occupied with him or herself, sublimely unconscious of spectators. “Haven’t I been nice?” She patted my hand, entirely the woman now. “You’ve been trying to be correct. Why can’t you be your own dear self?” Taking the tram across the island, we came to the Stabilimento dei Bagni. We walked through the arcade and down on to the terrace. The sea rolled in flashing, green and silver, in a long slow swell. Leaning over the side, we watched the bathers. Men, with costumes unfastened at the shoulders, sifted golden sand through their fingers on to their naked chests. Women lay beside them, buried in the sand, laughing and chatting. I noticed a blond young giant standing at the water’s edge. His face kindled. I followed the direction in which he was looking. A dark-eyed girl had come out of her cabin. She wore a single-piece, tight-fitting suit of stockingette, which displayed her figure in all its splendid curves. Her face was roguish and vivid as that of Carmen. On her head she wore a scarlet turban. Her costume was sky blue.