Bruno, Count Portomaggiore

Bruno, Count Portomaggiore, is an aristocrat who serves Mussolini as Minister of Culture and secretly works for British Intelligence in Italy. His marriage to Marilee Kemp, ordered by Mussolini and framed as proof of the count’s heterosexuality, becomes instead a generous companionship founded on dancing and mutual affection. The marriage grants Marilee the title and a life in Italy, but its inheritance terms limit her rights; after the count’s death, she discovers his espionage and understands that her deepest attachment has been to the Italian people rather than to wartime symbols or secrets.

Position in Fascist Italy

After Dan Gregory and Fred Jones are killed, Marilee is celebrated in Rome. The count, described as handsome, Oxford-educated, unmarried, and Mussolini’s Minister of Culture, becomes her regular escort. He tells her that he is sexually interested only in men and boys, a preference that could bring a capital offense if acted upon. He nevertheless feels secure because he believes Mussolini will protect him: he is the only member of the old aristocracy to have accepted a high government post, and he openly admires the dictator.

The account places the count in a double position. People laugh at what they perceive as his cowardice, vanity, and effeminacy, yet Marilee calls him the perfect head of British Intelligence in Italy. The contrast is central to his role: a public figure dismissed as foolish conceals a dangerous political occupation, and Mussolini’s confidence in his harmlessness helps keep that secret intact.

Marriage to Marilee Kemp

The count and Marilee share a warm social life. They shop and dance together, and he enjoys listening to her. Marilee recalls him as consistently courteous and flattering; he does not threaten her or make demands until Mussolini orders him to marry her. The order arises because the count’s enemies have told Mussolini that he is homosexual and a British spy. Mussolini knows of the count’s attraction to men, but does not suspect that he could also be an effective agent.

The marriage is therefore imposed as political proof, not initiated as a conventional romance. Mussolini gives the count a document for Marilee to sign, designed to reassure aristocrats who would object to an American actress inheriting ancient property. Under its terms, she may use the count’s property during her lifetime but cannot sell it or leave it to anyone else; after her death, it passes to his nearest male relative, an automobile dealer in Milan. The document preserves the estate’s eventual descent through the count’s family even as Marilee becomes its titled custodian.

Marilee refuses the proposal before the United States enters the war. She thanks the count for a happiness she had never known, but says the proposal and document have awakened her from what felt like a dream. She decides to return to the United States and confront who she is, despite having no home there. The account also identifies her as the Contessa Portomaggiore, showing that the marriage did take place; it does not narrate the precise intervening circumstances of her acceptance.

Death, Espionage, and Marilee’s Memory

Marilee does not learn that her husband was a British agent until the war is nearly over. His disclosure makes little impression on her. His uniforms and medals had never interested her, and she regards the symbols of military distinction as irrelevant to what they shared. She says the espionage had almost nothing to do with either of them as people: the secret changes what the reader knows about the count, but scarcely changes how Marilee remembers him.

The count dies after being shot. A painting over the fireplace in Marilee’s library depicts him refusing a blindfold before a firing squad, a gift from the people of Florence. Marilee acknowledges that the scene did not happen exactly as shown, observing that events never do. The heroic image is thus a memorial representation rather than a precise account of his execution; the narrative gives no further details of how he was shot.

Marilee expects to feel an emptiness after his death but does not. Instead, she recognizes the Italian people as her true lifelong companions: they had welcomed and loved her, and she had returned that affection. The count’s marriage had brought her into Italian society, but her sense of home outlasts both his life and the revelation of his secret work.

Narrative Significance

The count’s story is mediated through Marilee’s recollections, which distinguish public image from private attachment. Mussolini’s propaganda presents Marilee, Gregory, and Jones as celebrated Americans endorsing Italy; the count’s official role and marriage likewise serve political purposes. Yet Marilee’s account centers on ordinary companionship—conversation, kindness, and dancing—rather than on the political meanings attached to uniforms, titles, or espionage.

That contrast also shapes the surviving image of the count. The Florence painting turns his death into a dramatic public scene, while Marilee openly qualifies its accuracy. Her memory preserves him neither as the foolish aristocrat his critics mocked nor only as the hidden British agent, but as the courteous companion who made her happy. His life joins performance and secrecy; his significance in Marilee’s story rests on the affection that those roles could not fully explain.