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James leaned forward slightly. “Let’s start with your background. I heard you and Vittoria had some history back in academia. How did you two meet?”

“I was doing research on molecular reaction kinetics at the time,” Jonathan began, his voice steady, though laced with nostalgia. “Cambridge had just reopened parts of the lab after the last air raids. It was the spring of 1945, and the war was winding down, but the scientific community was already pushing ahead—especially in physical chemistry.”

He glanced down at his tea, then looked back up. “Professor Vittoria Mancini was presenting her findings on thermochemical properties of radical intermediates. It was at a small conference in Geneva, only a few dozen of us could attend, given the state of things. Travel was difficult, and most of us were still in uniform or just out.”

James leaned forward. “What was she like then?”

“She was the finest speaker I’d ever seen,” Jonathan said, a flicker of admiration in his voice. “Commanded the room with nothing but her clarity and conviction. Within seconds, she had them all listening—truly listening.”

He paused, smiling faintly at the memory.

"And she talked about entropy, reaction pathways, and the possibility of using spectroscopy to track transitions in real time. No one else was thinking that far ahead in 1945. Professor Mancini was a genius.”

“That's nice, and what happened after that?” James asked.

He nodded slowly. “We shared coffee and biscuits in the corner of the hall afterwards. I told her how amazing her presentation was, and expressed my interest to work with her, perhaps under her supervision.”