“That’s the den,” Berto said.
Under the tarp a man was sitting at a wobbly table, lighting a cigar. He was surrounded by two or three boys stretched out on the sand. Berto broke into a run and dropped to the man’s feet, shouting, “Den!” Feeling somewhat embarrassed, Agostino approached the group. “And this is Pisa,” Berto said, pointing to Agostino, who was amazed at the nickname given to him so quickly. It had only been five minutes since he told Berto he was born in Pisa.
Agostino lay down on the ground, too. The sand under the tarp was not as clean as on the beach. Watermelon rinds, wood splinters, green pottery shards, and all kinds of debris were strewn together. In places the sand was hard and crusty from buckets of dirty water tossed out of the shack.
Agostino noticed that the boys, four in all, were dressed in clothes that were ragged and torn. Like Berto, they must have been the children of boatmen and lifeguards. “He was at Speranza beach,” Berto said in one breath, still speaking about Agostino. “He says he wants to play cops and robbers with us . . . but the game is over, isn’t it? I told you the game was over.”
Suddenly there were shouts of “It doesn’t count! It doesn’t count!” Agostino looked and saw running toward them from the sea a group of boys, probably the cops. The first was a boy of about sixteen, short and stocky, in a bathing suit. Then, to Agostino’s great surprise, came a black boy. The third was a blond, and from his bearing and the beauty of his body, Agostino thought he must be of more noble origin than the others. But when he drew near, his torn and threadbare bathing suit and a certain simplicity in his handsome face with its big blue eyes showed plainly that he, too, was poor. The first three boys were followed by four more, all about the same age, between thirteen and fourteen. The stocky one was by far the oldest, and at first impression it was surprising that he would be hanging around with such a young crowd. But his pasty face with its dull, inexpressive features provided, in its brutal stupidity, the reason for this unusual association. He had almost no neck, and his smooth, hairless torso was as wide at the waist and hips as it was at the shoulders. “You hid in a cabin,” he shouted violently at Berto. “Try to deny it. The rules said no cabins.”
“I did not,” Berto replied just as violently. “Tell him, Pisa,” he added, turning to Agostino. “It’s not true that I hid in a cabin. Me and him were behind the corner of the Speranza stand. We saw you going by, didn’t we, Pisa?”
“Actually,” said Agostino, who was incapable of lying, “you were hiding in my cabin.”
“See, I knew it!” the older boy shouted, shaking his fist under Berto’s nose. “I’ll smash your head in, you big liar.”
“Squealer,” Berto shouted in Agostino’s face. “I told you to stay where you were. Go back to your mamma.” He was filled with an uncontainable, animal violence that amazed Agostino in some obscure way. But while he was shouting, one of the cigarette packs fell out of his pocket. He went to pick it up, but the older boy was quicker. Diving to the ground, he grabbed it and shook it in the air triumphantly. “Cigarettes, eh,” he shouted, “cigarettes.”
“Give ’em back,” Berto shouted, throwing himself at him furiously. “They’re mine, Pisa gave them to me, give ’em back or I’ll—”
The other boy took a step back and waited till Berto was within range. Then he stuck the cigarette pack between his teeth and started methodically pounding Berto’s stomach with his fists. Then, tripping him, he sent him sprawling to the ground. “Give ’em back,” Berto shouted again as he squirmed in the sand. But the other boy shouted with a dumb laugh, “He’s got more. Get busy, guys . . .” and with a unity that shocked Agostino, the boys piled on top of Berto. For a moment there was a tangle of bodies in a cloud of sand at the feet of the man, who continued to smoke while leaning against the table. Finally the blond, who appeared to be the most agile, disentangled himself from the pile, stood up, and waved the second cigarette pack in the air triumphantly. One by one the rest of them stood up. Berto was last. His ugly freckled face was twisted with rage. “You dogs . . . you thieves,” he shouted, shaking his fist and sobbing. He was crying angry tears, and it had a strange effect on Agostino to see the tables turned on his tormentor and Berto treated just as ruthlessly as Berto had treated him. “You dogs . . . you dogs,” Berto cried again. The older boy approached and delivered a hard slap to Berto’s face, which made the other boys jump for joy. “Are you ready to cut it out?” Enraged, Berto ran to the corner of the shack and stooped down to grab with both hands a huge rock that he threw at his enemy. The other boy dodged it easily with a derisive whistle. “Pigs!” Berto cried, sobbing, but keeping a cautious distance from behind the corner of the shack. His body was wracked with sobs. The fury was even in his tears, which seemed to release a pent-up bitterness, vulgar and repellent. But his companions had already forgotten him and lain back down on the sand. The older boy opened one pack of cigarettes and the blond opened the other. All of a sudden the man sitting at the table, who had observed the fight without making a move, said, “Hand ’em over.”
Agostino looked at the man. He was big and fat, probably a few years shy of fifty. He had a sly and coldly benevolent face. Bald, with an odd saddle-shaped forehead, small squinting eyes, a red aquiline nose, and flared nostrils covered with purple veins that were disgusting to see. He had a drooping mustache over a slightly crooked mouth that was chomping on a cigar. He was wearing a faded over-shirt and a pair of turquoise cotton trousers, one leg down to his ankle, and the other rolled up to his knee. A black sash was wrapped around his belly. A final detail added to Agostino’s initial disgust. He realized that Saro, as the lifeguard was called, did not have five fingers on each enormous hand but rather six, making them look more like stumpy tentacles than fingers. Agostino studied his hands at length but could not tell whether Saro had two index fingers, two middle fingers, or two ring fingers. They all seemed to be the same length, except the little finger, which protruded from his hand like a thin branch at the base of a knotty tree trunk. Saro took the cigar butt from his mouth and repeated simply, “The cigarettes.”
The blond stood up and went to set the pack on the table. “Good boy, Sandro,” said Saro.
“What if I don’t want to?” the older boy shouted defiantly.
“Come on, Tortima. You’d better hand them over,” shouted voices from all sides. Tortima looked around and then at Saro who, with the six fingers of his right hand wrapped around the cigarette pack, was staring at him through narrowed eyes. Sighing, “All right, but it’s not fair,” Tortima stood up and put the other pack on the table as well.
“Now I’ll divvy them up,” said Saro in a soft and friendly voice. Without removing the cigar from his mouth, squinting his eyes, he opened one of the packs, took out a cigarette with stubby multiple fingers that seemed unable to clench it, and tossed it to the black boy, “Here, Homs.” He took another cigarette and tossed it to another boy. A third flew into the cupped hands of Sandro. A fourth hit Tortima straight in his stolid face. And so it went. “Want one?” he asked Berto, who having swallowed his tears had come back, as quiet as a mouse, to lie down among his buddies. Chastened, he nodded yes, and a cigarette was launched in his direction. Once each of the boys had received a cigarette, he started to close the still half-full pack, but he stopped and asked Agostino, “Hey you, Pisa. Want one?” Agostino would have said no, but Berto gave him a punch in the ribs whispering, “Ask for it, you dummy. Then we can smoke it together.” Agostino said yes and got his cigarette too. Then Saro closed the pack.
“What about the other ones . . . the other ones?” the boys all shouted.
“The other ones you’ll get in the next few days,” Saro answered calmly. “Pisa, take these cigarettes and put them back in the shack.”
No one breathed a word. Agostino clumsily took the two packs and, stepping over the reclining boys, made his way to the shack and entered. There appeared to be only one room, and he liked its smallness, like a house in a fairy tale. The ceiling
was low, with white beams and unpainted walls of rough planks. A dim subdued light entered the room through two tiny windows, complete with window-sills, small square windowpanes, shutters, curtains, and even a few flowerpots. One corner was occupied by the bed, neatly made, with a bleached white pillow and a red blanket. In another corner there was a round table and three chairs. On the marble top of a chest of drawers were two bottles containing miniature sailboats or steamships. The walls were covered with sails hung from nails, oars, and other boating equipment. Agostino thought anyone who owned a shack like this, so small and cozy, must be truly enviable. He approached the table, on which there was a large chipped porcelain bowl filled with cigar butts, set down the two cigarette packs, and then came back out into the sunlight.
All of the boys, lying prone on the sand near Saro, were smoking with big demonstrative gestures of delight. They were talking about something he couldn’t quite grasp. “I tell you it was him,” Sandro was saying.
“His mother is pretty,” an admiring voice said, “the best-looking woman on the beach. Homs and me, we snuck under her cabin to see her getting undressed, but she lowered her dress right on top of where we were looking and you couldn’t see a thing . . . she’s got nice legs . . . and those tits . . .”
“Her husband’s never around,” a third voice remarked.
“Don’t worry. She knows how to console herself. You know who she’s doing it with? That guy from Villa Sorriso . . . the dark-haired one. He comes to pick her up every day with his boat.”
“You think he’s the only one? She does it with anyone that asks,” another boy said maliciously.
“Maybe, but I still say it’s someone else,” another one insisted.
“Hey, Pisa,” Sandro asked Agostino authoritatively, “isn’t your mother the lady at the Speranza beach? Tall, dark-haired, wears a two-piece striped bathing suit? With a beauty mark on the left, near her mouth?”
“Yes, why?” Agostino answered uneasily.
“It’s him! I knew it was him!” Berto said triumphantly. And in a fit of malicious envy, “You’re the third wheel, eh? Out on the boat it’s you, her, and lover boy. That makes you the third wheel.” His words were followed by gales of laughter. Even Saro was smiling beneath his mustache.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Agostino replied, blushing, uncomfortable and uncomprehending. He felt as if he should object, but these uncouth jokes aroused in him an unexpected, almost cruel feeling of pleasure, as if the boys had unknowingly avenged through their words all the humiliations that his mother had inflicted on him lately. At the same time he was horrified at how much they knew about his affairs.
“Don’t play stupid with us,” said the usual malicious voice.
“Who knows what they do. They always go so far out to sea. Tell me,” Tortima grilled him with mock seriousness, “tell us what they do. He kisses her, right?” He placed the back of his hand against his lips and planted a big kiss on it.
“Actually,” said Agostino, his face red with shame, “we go out to sea to go swimming.”
“Oh, to go swimming,” several voices said sarcastically.
“My mother goes swimming and so does Renzo.”
“Ah, so his name is Renzo,” one of the boys said confidently, as if he had discovered a lost thread in his memory. “Renzo . . . he’s tall, tanned, right?”
“What do Renzo and your mamma do?” Berto suddenly asked, emboldened. “They”—and he made an expressive gesture with his hands—”and you sit there watching them, right?”
“Me?” Agostino repeated fearfully, looking all around. Everyone roared, smothering their laughter in the sand. Saro was the only one to observe him attentively, without moving a muscle or saying a word. Agostino gave him a look of despair, as if imploring him for help.
Saro seemed to understand his look. He took the cigar from his mouth and said, “Can’t you see he knows nothing?”
A sudden silence followed the clamor. “How can he know nothing?” asked Tortima, who hadn’t realized it.
“He knows nothing,” Saro replied plainly. Then he turned to Agostino, lowering his voice. “Say, Pisa . . . a man and a woman . . . what do they do together? Do you know?”
Everyone seemed to be holding their breath. Agostino looked at Saro, who was smoking and studying him through half-closed eyes. He looked at the boys, who all seemed about to burst into laughter, then he repeated mechanically, as his eyes clouded over, “A man and a woman?”
“Yes, your mother and Renzo,” Berto explained brutally.
Agostino wanted to say, “Don’t talk about my mother.” But he was so confused by the swarm of sensations and dark memories aroused in him by the question that he was left speechless.
“He doesn’t know,” Saro interrupted, switching his cigar from the right to the left corner of his mouth. “Come on, who wants to tell him?” Agostino looked around, dismayed. It was like being at school, but with what teacher and what pupils? “Me, me, me,” all the boys shouted at once. For a moment Saro’s uncertain gaze scanned all those faces inflamed in emulation. He said, “You guys don’t really know either. You’ve only heard about it. Let someone who really knows about it do the talking.” Agostino saw the boys go silent and look at one another. “Tortima,” someone said. The boy’s face lit up in a vain expression. He started to stand, but a rancorous Berto called out, “He made the whole thing up. It’s a pack of lies.” “What do you mean it’s a pack of lies?” shouted Tortima, pouncing on Berto. “You’re the liar, you little bastard.” But this time Berto was too quick for him. He fled, poking his head out from behind a corner of the shack, making faces and sticking out his tongue at Tortima, who shook his fist at him threateningly and shouted, “Don’t you dare come back.” But Tortima’s candidacy had been somewhat diminished by Berto’s outburst. “Let Sandro tell him,” all the boys cried in unison.
Handsome and elegant, his arms folded over a broad dark chest on which scattered blond hairs glittered like gold, Sandro stepped forward into the circle of boys reclining in the sand. Agostino noticed his strong tanned legs, which seemed enveloped in a cloud of gold dust. More blond hairs escaped from his groin, poking through the holes in his red swimming trunks. “It’s very simple,” he said in a strong clear voice. And speaking slowly and illustrating his points with gestures that were effective but not what might be considered vulgar, he explained to Agostino something he seemed to have always known and, as if in a deep sleep, forgotten. His explanation was followed by other less sober descriptions. Some of the boys made coarse hand gestures. Others repeated in loud voices words that were new and abhorrent to Agostino’s ears. Two of them said, “Let’s show him how to do it,” and fell to the burning sand in each other’s arms, shuddering and rubbing against each other. Sandro, pleased with his success, had withdrawn to the side and was finishing his cigarette in silence. “Now do you understand?” asked Saro, as soon as the hubbub had died down.
Agostino nodded. In reality he hadn’t so much understood as absorbed the notion, the way you absorb a medicine or a poison and don’t feel the effect immediately but know that the pain or the benefit will not be kept waiting much longer. The notion wasn’t in his vacant, aching, befuddled mind but in another part of himself, in his heart swelling with bitterness, deep inside his chest, which was surprised to welcome it. It was not unlike a bright shiny object whose splendor makes it hard to look at directly and whose shape can thus barely be detected. It was as if he had always known but never felt it in his bones the way he did now.
“Renzo and Pisa’s mother,” he heard someone saying behind him. “I’ll be Renzo and you be the mother. OK?” He pivoted around to see Berto who, with a coarse gesture and even more coarse formality, was bowing and asking another boy, “My lady, would it please you to go for a boat ride . . . to go for a little dip in the sea . . . Pisa will accompany us.” Blinded by a burst of rage, he pounced on Berto, shouting, “Don’t talk about my mother!” But even before he knew what
had happened, he was flat on the ground, held in place by Berto’s knee while fists showered down on his face. He wanted to cry, but knowing that tears would only lead to more teasing, he made a supreme effort to restrain them. He covered his face with one arm and lay there motionless, as if he were dead. After a little while Berto let him go, and Agostino, battered and bruised, went to sit at Saro’s feet. The voluble boys had already moved on to another topic. One of them asked Agostino, point-blank, “Are you rich?”
By now Agostino was so intimidated he didn’t know what to say, but he answered anyway. “I think so.”
“How much? One million? Two million? Three million?”
“I don’t know,” said Agostino, at a loss for words. “Do you have a big house?”
“Yes,” said Agostino. Reassured by the more polite tone the dialogue was assuming, he couldn’t resist boasting, “We have twenty rooms.”
“Twenty rooms,” an admiring voice repeated.
“Wow,” said another voice, incredulously.
“We have two living rooms,” said Agostino, “and then there’s my father’s study—”
“Get a load of him,” one voice said.
“I mean, it used to be my father’s,” Agostino hastened to add, almost hoping that this detail would attract the boys’ sympathy. “My father passed away.”
There was a moment of silence. “So your mother’s a widow?” Tortima asked.
“Well, yeah,” a few voices said jokingly.
“What difference does it make? She might have remarried,” was Tortima’s defense.
“No . . . she didn’t remarry,” said Agostino.
“Do you have a car, too?” another voice asked.
“Yes.”
“And a driver?”
“Yes.”
“Tell your mother I’m ready to be her driver,” one boy shouted.
“What do you do with all those rooms?” asked Tortima, who seemed more impressed by Agostino’s stories than anyone else. “Do you have balls?”
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