vanity as Tonio had once surmised, and he was also beyond routine nasty behavior. But he was not friendly to others, and sometimes in a rather clever way he was mildly abusive, especially to other eunuchs.
Yet there he was night after night inviting Tonio’s hot cruelty.
Tonio was more than slightly ashamed of it. Why did he fall over and over into this gentle assault, why did he feel both pride and shame that others must know of it?
When he heard quite casually from the eunuch Piero that Domenico’s last “very good friend” had been one of the regular boys, a violinist named Francesco, he was surprised how much this little bit of news amused him and satisfied him. So he was performing the “office” as well as that hairy, whole, and rough-looking violinist from Milan, was he?
Yet he was ashamed. And when he thought of Guido knowing of all this, he was so ashamed that he could find no explanation for it.
It would have helped had he and Domenico ever conversed, or shared some other pleasures. But they hardly ever spoke to each other!
Domenico was out of the conservatorio more than he was in it, singing in the chorus at the San Bartolommeo, and more often than not when he and Tonio did see each other in a fully lighted room it was during some ball or supper after the opera.
Because Tonio had commenced going to these again whenever Guido invited him.
Guido was obviously pleased with this. He had remarked quietly once that he thought all of this would be a pleasure for a boy of Tonio’s age. Tonio had smiled. How could he tell Guido of the life he had lived in Venice? He found himself saying simply that these southern aristocrats did not impress him very much. “They care so much about titles,” he murmured, “and they seem so…well, self-satisfied and idle.”
He was immediately sorry. This smacked of rudeness and snobbery. Guido would become furious. But Guido didn’t. Guido appeared to reflect on this as if it did not occur to him to be offended.
And one night after a particularly lavish supper at the house of the Contessa Lamberti, where there had been servants everywhere—a man behind each and every seated guest, others along the painted walls, to fill a glass, touch a candle to a Turkish cigarette—Tonio had an unusual glimpse of Guido among women he obviously knew, conversing with them somewhat naturally.
Guido was dressed in red and gold, his brown eyes and hair remarkably well set off, and he was completely at ease as if absorbed in some particular question. At some point he smiled; then he laughed; and in that moment he looked as young as he was, and gentle, and full of some capacity for feeling that Tonio had never guessed before.
Tonio could not take his eyes off him. Even Domenico, who had commenced to sing at the harpsichord, didn’t distract him. He watched Guido’s response to the boy’s voice; and he had been watching Guido for the longest time when suddenly Guido’s eyes found him in the crowd, and Guido’s face toughened and grew cold, and then slightly angry.
Tonio flinched before he could look away. He fixed his eyes on Domenico; and when Domenico had finished, when the room resounded with applause, he threw to Tonio one of his most gracious looks, full of the knowledge of Tonio’s possession of him.
Ah, disgraceful, Tonio thought.
He hated himself and everyone around him. Why think of all this, he murmured to himself. He wandered off alone to some dark room where the stones seemed damp, perhaps because it was always shut up, and he walked there in the moonlight from the high arched windows, thinking, Why does he despise me and why do I care? Damn him.
An ugly shame overwhelmed him. That he was lovers with another boy? Ah, this was appalling. And yet he knew why he did it. He knew that every time he did it with Domenico he proved to himself that he could do it, and therefore he could do it with a woman if he wanted to.
He was surprised to hear the click of the door behind him. So some servant had found him out even here; it’s a wonder every dark corner was not full of them.
But when he turned he saw it was Guido.
Tonio felt a rush of hatred for him. He wanted to wound him. Wild and stupid thoughts came to him. He’d fake the loss of his