She was free!
Presently she said to herself, more soberly, that nevertheless she must work somehow to gain her livelihood. Yes, she must find work soon. The Aquila Verde would shelter and feed her for six lire a day. Her last month’s salary of eighty lire had been paid her four days ago, and she had already spent more than half of it on things she needed, new boots, an umbrella, gloves, odds and ends. This month’s money had been given her last night, and she had left a few lire for the servant who had always brought up her dinner to her room, and had made Gigia a little present. The cabman had bullied her into giving him two lire. She had about one hundred remaining to her. Sixes into one hundred.... Working it out carefully on the back of an old envelope she found that she might live on her means for sixteen days, and then go out into the streets with four lire in her pocket—no, three, since she could scarcely leave without giving a mancia to the young man whom she now heard whistling “Lucia” in the corridor.
“The hot water, signorina.”
“A thousand thanks.”
Surely in a few days she would find work. It occurred to her that she might advertise. “Young English lady would give lessons. Terms moderate. Apply O. A., Aquila Verde.” She wrote it out presently, and took it herself to the office of one of the local papers.
“I have saved fifteen centesimi,” she thought as she walked rather wearily back by the long Via Cavour.
Three days passed and she was the poorer by eighteen lire. On Sunday she spent the morning at the Belle Arti Gallery. Haggard saints peered out at her from dark corners. Flora smiled wistfully through her tears; she saw the three strong archangels leading boy Tobias home across the hills, and Angelico’s monks and nuns meeting the Blessed Ones in the green, daisied fields of Paradise, and for a little while she was able to forget that no one seemed to want English lessons.
On Monday she decided that she must leave the Aquila Verde if she could find anyone to take her for four, or even three lire a day. She went to Cook’s office in the Via Tornabuoni; it was crowded with Americans come for their mails, and she had to wait ten minutes before one of the young men behind the counter could attend to her.
“What can I do for you?”
“Can you recommend me to a very cheap pension?”