021 Port Operating Coy., R.E.  C.M.F.
No. 160

Dearest,
My second day in Rome has ended and before going to bed a letter to you will do as much as is possible to be near having you with me. Lets be chronological.  First I went to the Opera House and booked one seat for La Wally -whatever that is – tomorrow and two for The Barber for Thursday to take with me La Signorina Gamerra.  Then I pottered to the centre of the town, the Fora Romana and went up the Torre di Militzia and surveyed Rome from the top. My next move was to see the Pope but I couldn’t pass the Palazzo Venezia and went in again and feasted my eyes on the pictures.  I strolled towards home for lunch and found a bookshop full of lovely books, among them one entitled Leonardo da Vinci, huge and complete; everything and only five thousand lire, £25; but I was strong minded and then found in a corner an exquisite little book Disegni di Leonardo, with all his sketches and drawings for 35 lire, l/9d. The same thing, done small. I also bought a collection of Velasquez for you but they’re pretty poor reproductions.  I’m going to that shop again tomorrow.  Then back to lunch and after, I read Shirley, washed and changed and to the Quirinale, the Royal Palace. There Generale Gamerra’s card did wonders; sentries passed me to palace servants in livery and to a kindly palace official who took me all round; into the corridors, the chapels; the reception halls, the Throne Room, the piccolo dining room, the State dining room; ball room and so on, and also the private apartments.  You can’t imagine the wealth of parquetry, of mosaics, of tapestry; of silken hangings; of painted ceilings; of vast glittering glass candelabras, (all rooms were lit up for me) and the Ming vases, the renaissance chairs; the caskets and the marble; the galleries and the gold and silver.  It was shatteringly rich and splendid.  Armed guards all over the place springing to attention; in renaissance uniforms with drawn swords. Hell of a place. Sweeping stairways, acres of carpets, and history to everything.

Afterwards flunkeys handed me on and took me through the Prince’s apartments to the Gamerra suite. Here I dallied and chatted for an hour all friendly and polished. He is tall and like an ambassador; his wife is very sad and beautiful and mourns her revolvered son, and the daughter is nice and Yarnoldish with a Palace reserve and breeding. They produced in an exquisite cup coffee of doubtful quality, and from an ancient enamelled silver box, of choicest workmanship a dreadful coughy cigarette and from another jewelled silver box an unreliable match. But the panelling of the stately room, the gilt and crimson of the chairs; and delicate excellence of the sparse furniture made up for it all. I departed with grace and compliments and made my way to the Opera it being after five.  There, despite notices saying Tosca was sold out and the disgruntled queue, I suggested to the box office man that it could not be that he had not one seat in the Stalls for me and he had – they always have if you dare.  I sat down in that lovely modern theatre, fifth row of stalls gangway seat and in came another solo man, khaki trousers and white shirt.  We got talking; he is the director of the Ensa company out here, knows the theatre, BBC and writing world and we drank cognac-and-vermouth in the intervals and Revelled in Tosca and talked writing shop. He had started writing when he got this job.  He was impressed with the names Cape, Guardian and Post and lives in Leamington,  knows Tyrone Guthrie and this and that whom I don’t.  Came back to dinner with me here and stayed till now drinking and talking and is calling for me in a carozza at half past nine to go to St. Peters with me and lunch at the Pincio Gardens, Villa Borghese.   He’s quite nice, forty and friendly and definitely in the trade.   Odd, is it not, to meet such a one here.  I feel he’ll be one of ours.   Wants me to join the Authors Club after the War.  Knows the secretary.  Useful London address and pied a terre. Shall I?  Five guineas a year and full club facilities. Whitehall Court.  He looks very literary and tall and handsome but would, he says, give his ears to be one of Cape’s team, and write for the Guardian and Post.  Just shews.

Tosca was splendid, fine singers in good voice. Gosh; how they sang, and the production was truly terrific.  It was a great experience. But I like my Mimi best, still- La Wally will be interesting; no one knows anything about it at all. It was nice talking shop to this bloke, I must get his name again; it was vaguely familiar.  He knows a lot of writers but doesn’t sell much. I’d rather know only you and Jim Jeffs and sell plenty.  Even drop the Jim and the selling so long as I knew you.  How you would love this Rome, how you would love to sit with me in a carozza.  Walking back from the opera with this new bloke we saw a poor horse struggling up a steep hill slithering on the steps, it was dark and he was so thin and unhappy. So we took his head, turned him round in spite of the traffic, pulled the cabby out, made the American and his fat slut get out and walked he horse back to the level again. The American looked so silly and the horse so grateful;  Goodbye… L David XXX