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A limousine with SI insignia takes the foursome
to the SI hotel. There, an elevator with the SI monogram sand-blasted
on its glass walls, lifts them in respectful silence to the suite
reserved for the SI VIPs.
"I'll wager that you and I are the only
non-members of the Solidarity who ever put their foot inside
this building, let alone this suite," Peter comments when,
for the first time in three days, they find themselves alone.
Ruth and Peter are given a three-room apartment
with a western exposure. If the view is not intentional, then,
par-ticularly in Peter's eyes, it is prophetic. The hotel soars
twenty stories over the east bank of the Tiber, at the corner
of Via di Monte Brianzo and just off Lungo Tevere Manzo. There
is one aspect that makes this location unique in all of Rome.
Thus, unique in the world. It is the only site which, looking
West, points directly over the Piazza Pia and along the full
length of the Via della Conciliazione.
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