forty, even a hundred or more deaths and instances of the disease, after which the existence of an epidemic was if not flatly denied then reduced to totally isolated cases introduced from outside. There was also a scattering of admonitions and protests against the dangerous game being played by the Italian authorities. Certainty was out of the question. And yet the solitary traveler felt he had a special claim on the secret and, though excluded, took a bizarre pleasure in approaching insiders with insidious questions and forcing them, pledged as they were to silence, to tell outright lies. One day at breakfast in the main dining room he confronted the manager, the light-footed little man in the French frock coat who would circulate among the diners, greeting them and ensuring that things were as they should be, and had stopped at Aschenbach's table for a few words. Why is it, the guest asked casually, as if by the by, why in the world have they been disinfecting Venice all this time? "It is a police precaution," answered the hypocrite, "an official measure designed to forestall any situation injurious to the public health that might arise as a result of the sultry and unseasonably warm weather." "The police are to be commended," Aschenbach replied, and after a brief exchange of meteorological observations the manager excused himself On that very day, in the evening, after dinner, it so happened that a small group of street singers from the city gave a performance in the front garden. The two men and two women stood by the iron post of an arc lamp, lifting their faces, white in the glare, to the large terrace, where the guests sat ready, over coffee and cold drinks, to submit to the exhibition of local color. The hotel staff-lift attendants, waiters, and office clerkshad come out to listen at the doors to the lobby. The Russian family, eager to enjoy everything to the hilt, had had wicker chairs moved down into the garden so as to be closer to the performers and sat there contentedly in a semicircle, their aged slave standing behind them in her turbanlike kerchief. Mandolin, guitar, accordion, and squeaky fiddle soon came to life under the fingers of the beggar virtuosi. Instrumental pieces alternated with vocal numbers, one of which featured the younger of the women with her harsh rasp of a voice and the tenor's sugary falsetto in a passionate love duet. But the true talent and leader of the ensemble was unequivocally the other man-the one with the guitar and a kind of baritone-buffo characterwho, though he had no voice to speak of, was a gifted mime and possessed of remarkable comic energy. He often broke away from the group, his large instrument in tow, and made his way forward, where his high jinks were rewarded with laughter and encouragement. The Russians in their front-row seats took particular pleasure in so much southern vivacity and exhorted him, clapping and cheering, to ever bolder and brasher antics. Aschenbach sat at the balustrade, occasionally cooling his lips with the mixture of grenadine and soda water sparkling ruby red before him in the glass. His nerves took in the vulgar tootle and soulful melodies with avidity, for passion dulls one's sense of discrimination and yields in all seriousness to charms that sobriety would treat as a joke or reject with indignation. The sight of the prancing jester had twisted his features into a fixed, almost painful grimace. He sat on, indifferent, while inwardly he was thoroughly engrossed: a mere six paces away Tadzio was leaning on the stone parapet. There he stood in the belted white suit he sometimes donned for dinner, inexorably, innately gracefulhis left forearm on the parapet, his feet crossed, his right hand on his hip-looking down at the minstrels with an expression that was not so much a smile as an indication of aloof curiosity, of courteous acknowledgment. From time to time he drew himself up and, puffing out his chest, pulled the white blouse down through the
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