The main hall of Milan Airport looked very much as it had done when I passed through it on my way down to Foggia in May, 1945, after the German capitulation. The same air maps sprawled across the walls publicising Mussolini’s empire. But now the sun shone through the tall frosted windows on to the motley of civilian dress and the public address system announced the flights in Italian and French as well as English.
I checked baggage and passports and was just going out towards the waiting bus when I saw Reece. He was over near the airfield entrance talking to a small, bearded Italian. Our eyes met across the heads of the crowd. I saw sudden recognition and the shock of surprise in his eyes. Then he deliberately turned away and continued his conversation with the Italian.
I hesitated. I had a message to give him and the sooner he got it the better. But somehow I couldn’t face it. The blankness that followed that sudden glance of recognition seemed to block me out. I found I was trembling and I knew then I must have a drink before I faced him. I went quickly out to the bus and climbed in. ‘Dove, signore?’ The attendant stared at me suspiciously.
‘Excelsior,’ I answered.
‘Excelsior? Bene.’
A few minutes later the bus moved off. I knew then that I ought to have gone over to Reece and given him Maxwell’s message. I cursed myself for letting my nerves get the better of me. After all it “was a long time ago and … But all I remembered was the blank look that had followed recognition. It had taken me straight back to that little room in the Villa d’Este. He didn’t seem to have changed at all. A bit fuller in the face perhaps, but the same broad, stocky figure and determined set of mouth and chin. Well, I’d got to face it sooner or later. I’d have a drink or two and wait for him at the hotel.
The Excelsior is in the Piazzale Duca d’Aosta, facing the Stazione Centrale, that exuberant monument to Fascist ideals that looks more like a colossal war memorial than a railway station. A porter took my two suitcases and I climbed the steps and entered the marble-pillared entrance hall of the hotel. At the reception desk the clerk said, ‘Your home, please, signore?’
‘Farrell,’ I answered. ‘I have accommodation booked.’
‘Si si, signore. Will you sign please. Numero cento venti.’ He called a page. ‘Accompagnate il signore alcento venti.’ The room was small, but comfortable. It looked out across the Piazzale to the railway station. I had a bath and I changed and then went down to the lounge to wait for Recce. I ordered tea and sent a page for my mail. There wasn’t much; a letter from my mother, a bill for a suit I’d bought before leaving England and the usual packet from my firm. The last included a letter from the managing director. We expect big things of you in Italy…. When you have been in Milan a week send me a report on the advisability of establishing a permanent agency…. You have my permission to take a holiday there as and when you please and trust you will be able to combine business with pleasure by making social contact with potential customers for our machine tools. It was signed Harry Evans. I folded the letter and put it away in my briefcase. Then I sat back,’ thinking of the possibilities of a holiday in Italy, and as I did so my eyes strayed over the room and riveted themselves on the far corner.
Seated alone at a small table by the window was Alice Reece. The sight of her hit me like a blow below the belt. As though drawn by my gaze, she turned her head and saw me. Her eyes brightened momentarily as they met mine across that dimly-lit lounge. Then they seemed to go cold and dead, the way her brother’s had done, and she turned away her head.