Not impressed by the museum she instead describes some people she observes: a threesome also on their way to San Martino. Ulla, ever intrigued by anybody who questions the norm, identifies the group as two female prostitutes and a watchmaker/traveling salesman/waiter on an outing.
The novel is no masterpiece, however, I want to translate a part of it here since it's about one of Ulla's own outfits.
Ulla Bjerne was a notorious cross dresser at a time when notoriety was well established, cross-dressing was not. During the 1910's she would live and travel around Europe wearing pantsuits and pantskirts long before those words were invented and more than a decade before la garçonne entered the fashion scene.
I have known her to systematically dress in menswear, smoke the pipe, wear a monocle and even a tophat. Here I have found a description in her own words of some of her clothing.
Before I left the museum I had a new experience. In a cabinet I discovered a torn, red shirt and a pair of very worn trousers with a hole in the behind. These garments had once clothed the grand hero of freedom Garibaldi. In my memory I made a sketch of the shirt, which I am wearing at this moment, not without success on Capri.
Again, the year was 1920. The same year, incidentally, that the picture above was taken, although I don't think it shows the Garibaldi shirt.
