132 / ANNE RIVERS SIDDONS
brow of the hill in the Forum, arms around each other, dwarfed by the columns that shone in the evening sunlight, smiling up at their party, who were standing behind Joe and me. It was, I suppose, the juxtaposition of all that hopefulness and sheer youngness, that all-suffusing living love, with the implacable bones of the dead empire, that sent the tears coursing hotly down my cheeks. I wanted terribly, in that moment, to know that nothing would corrode them, change them, diminish them. Poor Roman children, there seemed little in their lives that would not. The other couple held court in the flyspecked, dusty little caffè where we finally found a seat. They were older, but their entourage was no less jubilant, no less loving. The groom wore truly splendid white tie and tails, and his bride, dusky and handsome with her flashing white eyes and teeth and black hair cut modishly short on her neck, wore a skintight, strapless, short gown of scarlet satin with long gloves, high heels, and pillbox to match. She looked to be at least seven months pregnant. She felt us looking at her and turned, flashed me a smile and lifted her glass of wine to me, and called, “Voianche! Congratulizioni!” I smiled perplexedly at her and lifted my glass in return, and Joe pulled out his phrase book and thumbed it and began to laugh. “She either thinks you’re pregnant too, or about to be married, or maybe both,” he said, and I looked down at myself and grinned. “She thinks we’re a cute little old bride and groom,” I said, looking at the great bouquet of lilies and baby’s breath I held. I had wanted to give Maria something to wear at her wedding, something borrowed or blue, per