I repeated: "May I see Miss dell'Angela? I'm a Claims Adjuster for the
Company. I have some business with her in connection with her policies."
"Ha!" said the woman. She left it at that for a moment, pursing her
lips and regarding me thoughtfully. Then she shrugged apathetically.
"Momento," she said wearily, and left me standing outside the gate.
From inside there was a muttering of unfamiliar voices. I thought I
heard a door open, and the sound of steps, but when the fat woman came
back she was alone.
Silently she opened the door and nodded me in. I started automatically
up the courtyard toward the enclosed house, but she caught my arm and
motioned me toward another path. It led down a flowered lane through a
grape arbor to what might, at one time, have been a caretaker's hut.
I knocked on the door of the hut, comprehending where Rena dell'Angela
lived as a Class-E uninsurable.
Rena herself opened it, her face flushed, her expression
surprised--apprehensive, almost, I thought at first. It was the first
time I had seen her by daylight. She was--oh, there was no other word.
She was lovely.