The Woman of Rome (Italia)

by Alberto Moravia

  I had told him I knew who was the father of my child. Actually, at that moment I only suspected it, instinctively rather than by any real calculation. But when I was out in the street again, counting the days and examining my memories, this suspicion became a certainty. I remembered the long, plaintive cry of agony and pleasure wrung from me in the darkness of my room by the mixture of terror and attraction I had felt for him, and I was sure that the father of my child could be no other than Sonzogno. It was dreadful to know that I had conceived a child by a brutal and monstrous murderer like Sonzogno, particularly since there was a danger that the son might take after his father and inherit his characteristics. On the other hand, I could not help feeling there was some justice in Sonzogno’s paternity. Sonzogno was the only one of all the many men who had made love to me who had really possessed me, beyond any sentiment of love, in the darkest and most secret core of my flesh. The fact that he horrified and frightened me and that I was forced to give myself to him against my will did not alter but confirmed the fact that his possession of me had been complete and profound. Neither Gino nor Astarita nor even Mino, for whom I felt a completely different kind of passion, had aroused in me the sensation of such a legitimate possession, even though I loathed it. All this seemed strange and terrifying; but so it was. Feelings are the only things one cannot reject or deny or even, in a certain sense, analyze. I came to the conclusion that some men are made for love and some for procreation; and if it was only right that I should have a child by Sonzogno, it was no less right for me to detest him and flee from him and to love Mino instead, as I really did.

  I climbed the stairs slowly, thinking of the living weight I was bearing now within my womb; when I was in the hall I heard voices in the living room. I looked in the door and was surprised to see Mino sitting at the head of the table talking peacefully to Mother, who was seated near him sewing busily. Only the central light was burning and most of the room was in darkness.

  “Good evening,” I said languidly as I came forward.

  “Good evening, good evening,” said Mino in a grating, hesitant voice. I looked at his face, saw how bright his eyes were, and felt sure he was drunk. One end of the table was spread with a little tablecloth and silverware for two, and, knowing that Mother always ate on her own in the kitchen, I realized that the second place was for Mino. “Good evening,” he repeated, “I’ve brought my suitcases. They’re in the other room. And I’ve made friends with your mother. We understand each other perfectly, Signora, don’t we?” he said to her.

  I felt faint at heart as I heard his sarcastic and grimly playful voice. I slumped down into a chair and shut my eyes for a moment. I heard my mother reply to him. “That’s what you say. But if you speak badly of Adriana, we’ll never get along together.”

  “But what have I said?” exclaimed Mino, feigning astonishment. “That Adriana was born for the life she leads. That Adriana thinks a whore’s life is wonderful. What’s wrong about that?”

  “It isn’t true,” retorted Mother. “Adriana wasn’t born for the life she leads. She deserved something better, much better, with her beauty. Don’t you know she’s one of the most beautiful girls in the neighborhood, if not in all Rome? I see lots of other girls who aren’t nearly as good-looking as she is, who strike it lucky. But for Adriana, who’s as beautiful as a queen, nothing … But I know why.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she’s too good, that’s why. Because she’s beautiful and good. If she were beautiful and bad, you’d see how differently things would go.”

  “Oh, stop it,” I said, feeling embarrassed by this discussion and more particularly by Mino’s tone of voice, for he seemed to be making fun of Mother. “I’m hungry. Isn’t dinner ready yet?”

  “It’s ready now.” Mother put her sewing on the table and went out hurriedly. I followed her into the kitchen.

  “Are we running a boardinghouse now?” she grumbled. “He walked in as if he were the master, put his suitcases in your room, and gave me some money to go out shopping.

  “Well, aren’t you glad?”

  “I liked it better before.”

  “Well, pretend we’re engaged. Anyway, it’s only a temporary arrangement, he’s only here for a few days, he won’t stay forever.” I said one or two other things of the same kind in order to put her into a good humor, hugged her, and then went back into the living room.

  I will remember that first meal of Mino’s in my own home, with Mother and me, for a long time to come. He kept on joking and had an excellent appetite. But his jokes seemed to me to be colder than ice and more bitter than a lemon. It was clear that he had only one thought in his head, and that it was lodged in his conscience like a thorn in the flesh, and his jokes only served to drive the thorn deeper and renew the agony. It was the thought of all he had said to Astarita, and really, I never saw anyone so deeply repentant. As a child, the priests had taught me that repentance washes away sin, but in Mino’s case the repentance seemed to have no end, no outlet, and no beneficent result. I realized that he was suffering dreadfully and I suffered for him to the same extent, and perhaps even more, because my suffering was increased by my inability to help him or lighten his burden.

  We ate the first course in silence. Then Mother, who was standing up to serve us, said something about the price of meat. “Don’t worry,” said Mino, raising his head. “From now on I’ll provide for you. I’m going to get a good job.”

  I felt almost hopeful as he made this announcement.

  “What job?” asked Mother.

  “A job with the police,” said Mino with exaggerated seriousness. “A friend of Adriana’s is getting me the job — a Signor Astarita.”

  I put down my knife and fork and stared at him.

  “They’ve found out that I’ve got the very qualities they’re looking for in the police.”

  “Maybe,” said Mother, “but I never liked the police myself. The son of the laundress who lives below us became a policeman, too. Do you know what the young men who work next door in the cement works said to him? ‘Stay away, we don’t know you anymore.’ And anyway, the work’s badly paid.” She made a face and changed his plate, then offered him the dish of meat.

  “That’s not what I mean,” retorted Mino as he helped himself. “What I’m talking about is an important job, something very delicate, very secret. What the devil! I haven’t studied for nothing! I’ve almost got my degree. I know modern languages. Poor people become mere policemen, not people like me.”

  “Maybe,” repeated Mother. “Take this,” she added, pushing the largest piece of meat onto my plate.

  “Not maybe at all,” said Mino. “It’s true.”

  He was silent for a moment. Then he said, “The government knows that the country’s full of people opposed to it, not only among the poorer classes but among the rich, too. They need educated people to spy on the rich, people who speak as they do, dress as they do, have the same manners, and inspire their confidence. That’s what I’ll do. I’ll be very well paid, I’ll live in first-class hotels, travel in a sleeper, eat in the best restaurants, get my clothes from a fashionable tailor, visit luxurious seaside resorts and famous holiday spots in the mountains. Who did you take me for?”

  By now Mother was gaping at him. She was dazzled by such splendor. “In that case,” she said at last, “I’ve nothing to say.”

  I had finished my meal. I suddenly found it impossible to go on assisting at such a lugubrious comedy. “I’m tired,” I said brusquely. “I’m going into the other room.” I got up and left the living room.

  When I was in my own room I sat on the bed and huddled over myself, then began to cry silently through my fingers, spread across my face. I thought of Mino’s grief, of the baby that I was going to have, and both these things, the grief and the baby, seemed to be growing by themselves, independently of me, out of my control, and they were alive and there was nothing more to do. After a while Mino came in, and I got up at once and turned away from hi
m so that he would not see my eyes full of tears before I had time to dry them. He had lit a cigarette and threw himself down flat on the bed. I sat down beside him. “Mino,” I said, “please don’t talk like that to Mother ever again.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she doesn’t understand what you’re doing. But I understand, and every word you say is like a needle piercing my heart.”

  He said nothing and went on smoking in silence. I took one of my blouses out of the drawer, picked up a needle and spool of silk, and began to sew without speaking, sitting on the edge of the bed near the lamp. I did not want to speak because I was afraid that if I did, he would begin to discuss the usual thing, and I hoped that if I kept silent, his thoughts would wander and he would stop thinking about it. Sewing requires a lot of visual attention, but leaves the mind free, as all women who sew for a living know.

  While I was sewing, my thoughts whirled around in my head, or rather, I felt as if I were mending a tear or stitching a hem in my mind as I was in the work I held in my hands, pushing the needle rapidly in and out. I, too, shared Mino’s obsession by now and could not help thinking of what he had said to Astarita and the consequences it would have. But I didn’t want to think about it, because I was afraid that if I did, some mysterious influence would set him thinking about it, too, and I would be responsible despite myself for having increased his sorrow and keeping it alive. So I tried to think about something else, something clear, something light and cheerful, and I concentrated with the whole strength of my mind on the baby I was going to have, which was, in fact, the only joyous aspect in my life, now so full of terribly tragic prospects. I imagined what he would be like at two or three years of age, the best time of all, when children are at their most charming and beautiful. And as I thought of all the things he would do and say and the way I would bring him up, I grew cheerful again, as I had hoped I would, and forgot Mino and his pain for a moment. I had finished mending my blouse and as I took up another piece of work I reflected that during the next few days I could relieve the tension of the long hours spent with Mino by making the baby’s layette. Only I would have to hide from him what I was doing, or I would have to find an excuse. I thought I would tell him that I was making it for a neighbor of ours who was actually expecting a baby, and I thought it would be a good excuse, since I had already mentioned her to Mino and had referred to her poverty. I was so taken up with these ideas that, without noticing it, almost, I began to sing softly. I have a very good ear, although my voice is not very strong, and my accent is extraordinarily sweet, even in my speaking voice. I began to sing a song that was popular just then: “Villa triste.” When I raised my eyes, as I bit the thread with which I was sewing in two, I saw Mino looking at me. I thought he might reproach me for singing at a time that was so grave for him, so I stopped.

  “Sing some more,” he said, looking at me.

  “Do you like me to sing?”

  “Yes.”

  “But I can’t sing well.”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  I took up my sewing again and began to sing for him. Like most girls, I knew quite a number of songs; in fact, I had a fairly vast repertoire because my memory is excellent and I could even remember the songs I had learned as a child. I sang a little of everything, and as soon as I had finished one song I began another. At first I sang softly and then, as it grew on me, I sang aloud with all the feeling I could muster. One song followed another, and they were all different. As I sang one, I was already thinking of the next. He listened to me with a certain serenity in his face, and I was glad that I was able to distract his attention from the remorse he felt. But at the same time I remembered that once when I was a child I had lost some toy I was very fond of, and since I could not stop crying on account of the loss, Mother to console me had sat down on my bed and had begun to sing the few things she knew. She sang badly, out of tune; nevertheless, at first I was distracted and listened to her just as Mino was listening to me. But after a while the idea of the toy I had lost had slowly begun to distill bitterness into the cup of forgetfulness that Mother offered me, and at last it had poisoned everything and had made it, by contrast, utterly intolerable. So I had suddenly burst into tears again and Mother, out of patience with me, had switched off the light and gone away, leaving me to cry my heart out in the dark. I was sure that when the deceptive sweetness of my singing had vanished, he would inevitably feel once more the same pain, which would burn even more sharply by contrast with the sentimental superficiality of my songs; and I was not mistaken. I had been singing for nearly an hour when he interrupted me brusquely. “That’s enough,” he said. “Your songs bore me stiff.” Then he curled up as if he meant to go to sleep, with his back turned to me.

  I had foreseen that he would behave in this rude way so I was not too deeply hurt. In any case, I did not expect anything else now but unhappiness, and the opposite would have astonished me. I got up from the bed and went to put away the clothes I had mended. Then, still in silence, I undressed and slipped into the bed on the side Mino had left free. We lay for some time in silence like that, back to back. I knew he was not asleep and was thinking all the time of one thing; and this knowledge, together with the sharp sense of my own helplessness, provoked a storm of confused, desperate thoughts in my mind. I was lying on my side and staring in front of me into a corner of the room as I thought. I could see one of the two suitcases Mino had brought with him from Signora Medolaghi’s house, an old yellow leather case covered with the colored labels of different hotels. Among the rest there was one that showed a square of blue sea, a huge red rock, and the word Capri. In the half-light, among the dull, opaque furniture of my room, that blue spot seemed luminous, seemed something more than a mere spot; it was a hole through which I caught a glimpse of that strip of distant sea. I felt a sudden longing for the sea, so sparkling and lively, in which even the most corrupt and deformed object is purified, smoothed, rounded, fashioned into something beautiful and clean. I have always loved the sea, even the tamed and crowded beach of Ostia; and the sight of it always gives me a sense of freedom that intoxicates my ears even more than my eyes, as if I were listening to the notes of a wondrous, timeless music floating eternally on its waves. I began to think about the sea, yearning acutely for its transparent waves, which seem to wash not only the body but, with its liquid contact, also the soul, rendering it light and full of joy. I told myself that if I could take Mino to the sea, perhaps the immensity, the perpetual motion and sound would produce in him the effect my love alone could not achieve.

  “Have you ever been to Capri?” I suddenly asked him.

  “Yes,” he said, without turning around.

  “Is it beautiful?”

  “Yes — very.”

  “Listen,” I said, turning around in the bed and putting an arm around his neck. “Why don’t we go to Capri? Or some other seaside place? As long as you stay here in Rome, you won’t be able to think about anything pleasant. If you have a change of air, I’m sure you’ll see everything differently. You’d see lots of things that escape you for the moment. I’m sure it would do you a lot of good.”

  He did not answer at once and seemed to be thinking. “I don’t need to go to the sea,” he said. “I could see things differently, as you say, even here. All I have to do is to accept what I’ve done, just as you advised, and I’d begin to enjoy the sky, the earth, you, everything, at once. Do you think I don’t know the world is beautiful?”

  “Well, then,” I said anxiously, “accept it. What does it cost you?” He began to laugh.

  “I should have thought of that first … do as you do — accept right from the beginning. Even the beggars that sit warming themselves in the sunshine on the church steps have accepted it from the beginning. It’s too late for me.”

  “But why?”

  “There are some who accept and some who don’t. Obviously I belong to the second category.”

  I did not know what to say so I remained silent. “Now turn
out the light,” he added after a moment. “I’ll get undressed in the dark. It must be time to go to sleep.”

  I obeyed and he undressed in the dark and got into bed beside me. I turned toward him to embrace him, but he pushed me away wordlessly and curled himself up on the edge of the bed with his back to me. This gesture filled me with bitterness and I, too, hunched myself up, waiting for sleep with a widowed spirit. But I began to think about the sea again and was overcome by the longing to drown myself. I imagined it would be only a moment’s suffering, and then my lifeless body would float from wave to wave beneath the sky for ages. The gulls would peck at my eyes, the sun would burn my breast and belly, the fish would gnaw at my back. At last I would sink to the bottom, would be dragged head downward toward some icy, blue current that would carry me along the sea bed for months and years among submarine rocks, fish, and seaweed, and floods of limpid saltwater would wash my forehead, my breast, my belly, my legs, slowly wearing away my flesh, smoothing and refining me continually. And at last some wave, someday, would cast me up on some beach, nothing but a handful of fragile, white bones. I liked the idea of being dragged to the bottom of the sea by my hair. I liked the idea of being reduced one day to a little heap of bones, without human shape, among the clean stones of a shore. And perhaps someone without noticing it would walk on my bones and crush them to white powder. With these sad, voluptuous thoughts I finally fell asleep.

  11

  T HE FOLLOWING DAY, ALTHOUGH I tried to force myself to believe that rest and sleep had changed Mino’s feelings, I noticed immediately that he was the same as ever. In fact, if anything, he seemed decidedly worse. As he had the day before, he kept passing from periods of long, gloomy, obstinate silence to outbursts of rambling, sarcastic discourse about irrelevant things in which, however, the same dominant thought was always apparent, like the watermark in some kinds of paper. As far as I could see, his deterioration consisted also of a kind of willful inertia, apathy, and carelessness that were something quite new in him, for he had always been extremely active and energetic; it was a kind of progressive detachment from all the things he had done so far. I opened his suitcases and put his suits and other clothes in my closet. But when it came to the books he needed for his studies — I suggested temporarily putting them in a row on the marble-topped chest of drawers underneath the mirror — he said, “Leave them in the case. They won’t be any use to me anymore, anyway.”