Death Do Us Part By Robert Silverberg It was her first, his seventh. She was thirty-two, he was three hundred and sixty-three: the good old May / December 1 number. They honeymooned in Venice, Nairobi, the Malaysia Pleasure Dome, and one of the posh 2 L-5 resorts, a shimmering, glassy sphere with round-the- clock sunlight and waterfalls that tumbled like cascades of diamonds, and then they came home to his lovely sky-house suspended on tremulous guy-wires 3 a thousand meters above the Pacific to begin the everyday part of their life together. Her friends couldn’t get over it. “He’s ten times your age!” they would exclaim. “How could you possibly want anybody that old?” Marilisa admitted that marrying Leo was more of a lark 4 for her than anything else. An impulsive thing: a sudden impetuous leap. Marriages weren’t forever, after all—just thirty or forty years and then you moved along. But Leo was sweet and kind and actually quite sexy. And he had wanted her so much. He genuinely did seem to love her. Why should his age be an issue? He didn’t appear to be any older than thirty-five or so. These days you could look as young as you like. Leo did his Process 5 faithfully and punctually, twice each decade, and it kept him as dashing and vigorous as a boy. There were little drawbacks, of course. Once upon a time, long, long ago, he had been a friend of Marilisa’s great-grandmother: They might have even been lovers. She wasn’t going to ask. Such things sometimes happened, and you simply had to work your way around them. And then also he had an ex-wife on the scene, Number Three, Katrin, two hundred and forty-seven years old and not looking a day over thirty. She was constantly hovering 6 about. Leo still had warm feelings for her. “A wonderfully dear woman, a good and loyal friend,” he would say. “When you get to know her, you’ll be as fond of her as I am.” That one was hard, all right. What was almost as bad, he had children three times Marilisa’s age and more. One of them—the next-to-youngest, Fyodor—had an insufferable and presumptuous way of winking 7 and sniggering 8 at her. “I want you to meet our father’s newest toy,” Fyodor said of her once, when yet another of Leo’s centenarian sons, previously unsuspected by Marilisa, turned up. Someday Marilisa was going to pay him back 9 for that. Still and all, she had no serious complaints. Leo was an ideal first husband: wise, warm, loving, attentive, and generous. She felt nothing but the greatest tenderness for him. And then too he was so immeasurably experienced in the ways of the world. If being married to him was a little like being married to Abraham Lincoln or Augustus Caesar, well, so be it: They had been great men, and so was Leo. He was endlessly fascinating. He was like seven husbands rolled into one. She had no regrets, none at all, not really. In the spring of eighty-seven they go to Capri for their first anniversary. Their hotel is a reconstructed Roman villa on the southern slope of Monte Tiberio: alabaster wall frescoed in black and red, a brilliantly colored mosaic of sea creatures in the marble bathtub, a broad travertine terrace that looks out over the sea. They stand together in the darkness, staring at the awesome sparkle of the stars. A crescent moon slashes across the night. His arm is around her; her head rests against his breast. Though she is a tall woman, Marilisa is barely heart-high to him. “Tomorrow at sunrise,” he says, “we’ll see the Blue Grotto 10. And then in the afternoon we’ll hike down below here to the Cave of the Mater Magna. I always get a shiver when I’m there. Thinking about the ancient islanders who worshipped their goddess under that cliff, somewhere back in the Pleistocene. Their rites and rituals, the offerings they made to her.” “Is that when you first came here?” she asks, keeping it light and sly. “Somewhere in the Pleistocene?” “A little later than that, really. The Renaissance, I think it was. Leonardo and I traveled down together from Florence.. .” “You and Leonardo, you were like that?” “Like that,

yes. But not like that, if you take my meaning.” “And Cosimo di’Medici. Another one from the good old days. Cosimo gave such great parties, right?” “That was Lorenzo,” he says. “Lorenzo the Magnificent, Cosimo’s grandson. Much more fun than the old man. You would have adored him.”

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Death Do Us Part

Asignatura: Avanzado 11

11 Documentos

Los estudiantes compartieron 11 documentos en este curso

Instituto: Instituto Cultural Peruano Norteamericano - Miraflores

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Death Do Us Part

By Robert Silverberg

It was her ﬁrst, his seventh. She was thirty-two, he was three hundred and sixty-three: the

good old May / December 1 number. They honeymooned in Venice, Nairobi, the Malaysia

Pleasure Dome, and one of the posh 2 L-5 resorts, a shimmering, glassy sphere with round-the-

clock sunlight and waterfalls that tumbled like cascades of diamonds, and then they came

home to his lovely sky-house suspended on tremulous guy-wires 3 a thousand meters above

the Paciﬁc to begin the everyday part of their life together. Her friends couldn’t get over it.

“He’s ten times your age!” they would exclaim. “How could you possibly want anybody that

old?” Marilisa admitted that marrying Leo was more of a lark 4 for her than anything else. An

impulsive thing: a sudden impetuous leap. Marriages weren’t forever, after all—just thirty or

forty years and then you moved along. But Leo was sweet and kind and actually quite sexy. And

he had wanted her so much. He genuinely did seem to love her. Why should his age be an

issue? He didn’t appear to be any older than thirty-ﬁve or so. These days you could look as

young as you like. Leo did his Process 5 faithfully and punctually, twice each decade, and it kept

him as dashing and vigorous as a boy.

There were little drawbacks, of course. Once upon a time, long, long ago, he had been a friend

of Marilisa’s great-grandmother: They might have even been lovers. She wasn’t going to ask.

Such things sometimes happened, and you simply had to work your way around them. And

then also he had an ex-wife on the scene, Number Three, Katrin, two hundred and forty-seven

years old and not looking a day over thirty. She was constantly hovering 6 about. Leo still had

warm feelings for her. “A wonderfully dear woman, a good and loyal friend,” he would say.

“When you get to know her, you’ll be as fond of her as I am.” That one was hard, all right. What

was almost as bad, he had children three times Marilisa’s age and more. One of them—the

next-to-youngest, Fyodor—had an insuﬀerable and presumptuous way of winking 7 and

sniggering 8 at her. “I want you to meet our father’s newest toy,” Fyodor said of her once, when

yet another of Leo’s centenarian sons, previously unsuspected by Marilisa, turned up. Someday

Marilisa was going to pay him back 9 for that. Still and all, she had no serious complaints. Leo

was an ideal ﬁrst husband: wise, warm, loving, attentive, and generous. She felt nothing but

the greatest tenderness for him. And then too he was so immeasurably experienced in the

ways of the world. If being married to him was a little like being married to Abraham Lincoln or

Augustus Caesar, well, so be it: They had been great men, and so was Leo. He was endlessly

fascinating. He was like seven husbands rolled into one. She had no regrets, none at all, not

really. In the spring of eighty-seven they go to Capri for their ﬁrst anniversary. Their hotel is a

reconstructed Roman villa on the southern slope of Monte Tiberio: alabaster wall frescoed in

black and red, a brilliantly colored mosaic of sea creatures in the marble bathtub, a broad

travertine terrace that looks out over the sea. They stand together in the darkness, staring at

the awesome sparkle of the stars. A crescent moon slashes across the night. His arm is around

her; her head rests against his breast. Though she is a tall woman, Marilisa is barely heart-high

to him. “Tomorrow at sunrise,” he says, “we’ll see the Blue Grotto 10 . And then in the

afternoon we’ll hike down below here to the Cave of the Mater Magna. I always get a shiver

when I’m there. Thinking about the ancient islanders who worshipped their goddess under that

cliﬀ, somewhere back in the Pleistocene. Their rites and rituals, the oﬀerings they made to her.”

“Is that when you ﬁrst came here?” she asks, keeping it light and sly. “Somewhere in the

Pleistocene?” “A little later than that, really. The Renaissance, I think it was. Leonardo and I

traveled down together from Florence . . .” “You and Leonardo, you were like that?” “Like that,