The Young Apollo and Other Stories by Louis Auchincloss Page B

patron was Sylvester Seton, a former classmate of mine at both St. Luke's and Yale, whom I had never particularly liked but who, in a town full of strangers, struck me as an oasis of friendliness. Even his homely, sarcastically grinning, equine countenance was welcome after a long day of daubing and wandering the streets with a guidebook, and as he had been living in Florence since the war, he was easily able and willing to identify the various characters at the bar and acidly spell out for me the reasons, often scatological, that explained their preference for life in Italy over life at home. Sylvester, or "Silly," as he was inappropriately known, for the nickname hardly suited his agile mind and mordant wit, exhibited a sly but unsatisfied curiosity as to my motives for being in Florence. Obviously, he harbored lurid suspicions, but he was amusing and instructive, and I had no one else to play with, so to speak.
    At Yale he had been considered something of a fairy or faggot—those were the terms we used—but as he was funny and genial and rigidly persistent in his flattering cultivation of the class leaders, and as he had no visible discreditable sexual attachments, he was accepted into the "in" circles, though never considered eligible for such "real" Eli honors as the sacred senior societies. But Silly was content to be a kind of court jester.
    In Florence, except with visitors from home, he made no pretense of concealing his sex life and lived quite openly with an Italian youth, who tactfully disappeared when a Seton relative or Yale classmate (other than myself) appeared in the Grand Hotel. His candor with me showed only too clearly that he suspected my inclinations, whether or not they happened to be repressed. "So long as you don't throw it in people's faces," he assured me, "it doesn't matter a hoot what they surmise or even know. Life can be a simple matter if you follow a few rules."
    It fascinated me that he felt not the slightest twinge of guilt at his behavior. In his opinion, to have exposed his habits to the gaze of convention would have been like going to a black-tie dinner in a blazer and white flannels. I even wondered if he were not wicked. Yet I found myself seeking his company nightly at the Excelsior Bar and listening fervently to his racy tales of all that went on in Florence. Was he trying to convert me? Why? Was he playing Mephistopheles to my Faust? He had rather the appearance of a devil. Or did he simply want to set me free to enjoy myself, to express myself? Or did he want to tie me to him by a bond that would enable him to dip his hand into my pocket? For Silly, though possessed of a modest trust income, had been well known among his many rich friends at home for being a constant borrower and not a constant repayer. It had been his one flaw as a successful social climber.
    At last, one night when he invited me for supper at his flat, which he rarely did, I usually being the host, I found there not only his Italian boyfriend but one of the latter's pals. He was a handsome olive-skinned youth of eighteen or nineteen called Tonio. We had a pleasant evening of much red wine and idle chatter—the boys were hardly intellectuals, and my Italian was still up to only simple expressions—but when I rose to take myself home, Silly took me aside and muttered, "Take Tonio with you. He's primed for anything. And be generous with the poor boy. He has to help support a mother and three younger sisters." He paused as he took in my gaping expression. 'Now look, Marvie. For once in your life don't be an ass. You're going to love it. Live it up, fella!"
    Well, of course I did take Tonio to my studio, and he started me on the career that has brought me to this couch. For a brief time my life was ecstasy. Those Italian boys are nothing if not sophisticated in sexual relations with either sex, and even when they do it for money they can still derive pleasure from it, provided that their partner is not