All Our Yesterdays

by Natalia Ginzburg

  They asked him many questions but he had no desire to tell stories. He had not regretted having gone to the war because he had always had a wish to know what sort of a thing war was, now he knew it was a bad thing but he had not regretted going, he wanted to be like other people, he wanted to be neither better off nor worse off than others. He said that Emanuele, when he himself was on the point of going off to Russia, had made an angry scene with him, he was too young to be called up and he could have stayed at home, and instead of that he was going as a volunteer to fight in a Fascist war, he was going to help the Fascists not to lose this war of theirs, because he had perhaps taken to loving his country, he had perhaps believed all that rubbish about his country that Fascism taught in the schools. But there wasn’t a grain of truth in it, said Giustino, he had never dreamed of loving his country, he never thought about any country whatever when he was at the war, firing at the enemy. Moreover, none of the men that were with him did think about it. Nor did anyone ever remember that it was against the Russians that they were firing. It was just firing, neither for anybody nor against anybody, just firing with your feet like pieces of ice in your boots, and with your eyes dazzled by the snow. When he went away he had simply wanted to know what sort of a thing war was, and then too he was fed up with being at home with Signora Maria, and then there was another story as well that wasn’t worth mentioning. But little by little he had realized that he was at the war in order to be like other people, in order to have cold feet too, and to wait for things from home, and to fix on a point in the snow and then fire. He did not believe he was helping the Fascists to win the war, what difference did it make, one person firing more or less, surely the war was already hopelessly lost for the Fascists, they had America against them as well now, obviously America was coming into the war too, in a short time. But Cenzo Rena said the war would go on a long time yet, you couldn’t see the end of it yet, when Russia had come in he had thought it would end quickly, and instead of that Germany had taken big pieces of Russia. And he said that Giustino had done well to go to Russia thinking as he did, that he was a person like the others fighting for no particular country but for the innocent people who were there on the spot, and that, in fact, was his country, his country was the poor devils sent off to Russia from a great many villages like San Costanzo, poor devils who had cold feet and were firing neither for nor against anybody. Anna looked and looked at Giustino and kept on thinking that he would be killed in the war, she looked at him as he was now with his curly beard and Ippolito’s smile, she looked at him because she remembered that she had never looked properly at Ippolito and then all of a sudden he was dead. She was holding the baby in her lap and Giustino for a moment took the baby’s fingers in the tips of his own fingers, and he said she was much better than Concettina’s baby, which was petted and spoilt and tiresome, what with Concettina herself and Signora Maria and all those grandmothers and old women that were always hovering round for fear it should come to some harm. Signora Maria and Concettina quarrelled over the baby and what it should eat, Signora Maria complained of her ankles and of a backache that she had because she had tired herself out with working; she also complained that the Sbrancagnas’ villa was damp, and that there was very little to eat and that the servants ate up everything. She said that one of these days she would come to San Costanzo but Giustino did not believe she would come, she had grown very old and everything frightened her. Giustino had also seen Emanuele and they had made it up again, Emanuele had asked his forgiveness for all the unkind things he had said to him when he was going away to the war. Emanuele was full of troubles at the soap factory, and besides, he was worried about Giuma who had been thrown over by that so-called fiancée of his and had taken it in a tragic manner, and he was always going and sitting on Ippolito’s seat and was always going and looking at a picture of Ippolito on Emanuele’s desk, Emanuele was afraid he was thinking of doing what Ippolito did, some time or other. He had let himself be persuaded to study commercial sciences but he never uttered a syllable now at home, he never went either to ski or to play bridge and he dressed untidily and behaved like a poète maudit. Giustino said that in Russia he would have learned how to ski very well.

  When Giustino had gone away again Cenzo Rena clapped his hand to his forehead, again this time he had forgotten to introduce the Turk, the Turk who set so much store on being introduced to people who came from outside. La Maschiona said how handsome Giustino was now with his beard, a fine young man he was, what a pity he had to go back to the war and perhaps be killed. Cenzo Rena shouted at her to be quiet and not to bring misfortune, he touched a big horse-shoe that the farrier had given him, which he kept hung up on the wall in the dining-room. Once again there was the question of the pigs that had to be killed and La Maschiona was always running off in search of salt and of ox-gut to make the cases for the sausages, then came the things that are eaten as soon as the pig is killed, black puddings and the little fried curls of fat which they called sfrizzoli, and the sausages that have to be eaten at once, which they called salsicce pazze or “crazy sausages”, perhaps because they jump about and explode in the pan while they are frying. But everyone was complaining about the pigs which it had been impossible to fatten up properly that year, because neither bran nor vetch could now be got and they had had to bring them up entirely on grass and potatoes. But still, anyone who had a pig was lucky, said La Maschiona, because even with these lean pigs you had something to eat anyhow till the end of July, and yet a great number of people in the village had neither pigs nor anything else and scraped along with nothing but the rationed stuff, with the grey pasta that tasted of mud and the maize bread that was made at the communal bakehouse, but still they were lucky to have that little bit of yellow bread because you knew what there was in it, there was maize flour in it and that was all right, whereas with the grey bread they had in the town you didn’t quite know what there was in it, they put a bit of everything into it and possibly even the vetch that ought to have been given to the pigs.

  In the winter the baby began crawling about the house on all fours, and her knees were always red with rubbing against the bricks of the floor. Her cheeks were red and rough from the wind and the snow, because Cenzo Rena was always taking her off into the pine wood, and La Maschiona would shout from the kitchen window that there were wolves in the pine wood, and would ask if they wanted to make the child die of cold. Cenzo Rena went on up into the wood with the baby on his shoulder, but when they were some distance away from La Maschiona he took off his scarf and wrapped it right round the baby’s head, and he asked Anna whether it was really too cold, after all what did he know about babies, this was the first baby he had ever happened to carry on his shoulder. Anna said she didn’t know either, after all when had she ever had to do with a baby? But Cenzo Rena said there were certain things that women ought to know, she knew nothing because she had always lived like an insect. She had always lived like an insect in a swarm of other insects, said Cenzo Rena, and Anna unwrapped the scarf a little from round the baby’s face and Cenzo Rena wrapped it round again, and then all of a sudden he flew into a rage and handed her the baby and ran on ahead, but he stopped because he remembered that there were wolves in the pine wood. Who were all this swarm of insects, Anna asked him. Concettina, said Cenzo Rena, Concettina and Signora Maria. Only Giustino was not an insect, Giustino was a real person, just as their father, with all his oddities and his follies, had been a real person. And Ippolito too, in his own way, had been a real person, even though he had come to that insect-like end. Why an insect-like end, asked Anna and she started crying, he ought not to speak like that about Ippolito. Why not, said Cenzo Rena, you ought to talk about the dead as if they were living, you ought to judge them as you judge the living, he, when he died, did not wish to be adored on bended knees, he wished to be judged. The wind was blowing violently and they went back to the house. Anna sat down with the baby and gave her something to eat, the baby now ate La Maschiona’s bread soaked in milk
from the mayor’s cow. Cenzo Rena watched the baby eating for a bit and said that the only good thing about the mayor was the milk from his cows, as a mayor he was worthless. He went over to the window and waited for the contadini. But the contadini had not been coming so much for some time now, they came only if they had need of something but not just for conversation; Cenzo Rena said they came less because they were afraid of the police-sergeant, now that the police-sergeant was hostile to him. It really wasn’t worth troubling yourself about this rotten village, said Cenzo Rena, he now had only one friend left and that was the contadino Giuseppe, he always came, every evening. The contadino Giuseppe wore a green hat which he never took off, and he always told the story of how he had been a bricklayer in Rome and in the cemetery had seen written on someone’s tomb : “Lived and died a Socialist”; and that was what they ought to write on his tomb when he died. And then he talked about a book he read at night while his wife was asleep, Jack London’s The Iron Heel, Cenzo Rena wanted to lend him other books but Giuseppe did not believe that anything could be as fine as The Iron Heel. Cenzo Rena sat with him listening to the radio and drinking wine, and he explained to him what he would have to do when Fascism went up in smoke and they made him mayor, Giuseppe said he was not sure that he would make a very good mayor, it would be better to make Cenzo Rena mayor, they discussed which of them ought to be mayor. Anna had already been asleep for some time when Cenzo Rena came up to bed, but he woke her up because he was incapable of undressing in silence, he walked up and down the room and hurled garments and shoes into the air and poured water into the jug and flung open the cupboards. He put on his striped pyjamas and made the whole bed bounce up and down as he slipped between the sheets, and he said what a fine chap the contadino Giuseppe was, one of the dearest friends he had ever had. Anna’s father had been a very dear friend of his, too, they had quarrelled only because he had given him his book of memoirs to read and Cenzo Rena had been unable to tell a He, he had said that the book of memoirs was a thing quite without any sense. And so they had quarrelled and had said words to each other that they had never been able to wipe out. To Ippolito, too, he had said words which he would have liked to be able to wipe out, he did not recollect them very well now but he recollected that they had been intended to mortify him, he could still see Ippolito under the pergola at Le Visciole with the dog between his knees, he had mortified him so deeply and now he was dead and he could never ask his forgiveness. Now he wanted to take care never to mortify anyone again, there were times when he wanted to fly into a rage with Giuseppe for his everlasting reading of The Iron Heel, never anything but The Iron Heel, there were evenings when he longed to tell him that really and truly The Iron Heel was not of any importance, and that he was also sick of hearing him always repeat: “Lived and died a Socialist”. However he said nothing. He did not wish ever to mortify anyone again, there was the war going on and the contadino Giuseppe might go to it and be killed, and to himself too, to him, Cenzo Rena, it might happen somehow or other that he might be killed in the war, the war would not always be so far off, at any moment, even there where they were, something might come about that would cause people to be killed, revolution or war. He asked Anna whether she still thought all the time about revolution. Anna said she still thought about it when the baby was asleep, however when the baby was awake the only things she could think about were the things that were good for babies, sun and fresh air and milk and bread and butter, and long monotonous days with no one firing. But as soon as the baby went to sleep she immediately started thinking again about all the things she used to think about before, she herself, Anna, firing on the barricades, she climbed with her rifle on to the barricades as soon as the baby went to sleep. Cenzo Rena asked with whom did she climb on the barricades, she said that she climbed up with him, with the Turk and with the contadino Giuseppe. Cenzo Rena laughed a great deal at the thought of the Turk on the barricades, he himself believed that the Turk would shut himself up in the house the moment there was even the smallest revolution. They lay talking in the dark till late, and in the morning when they woke up Anna found that the head beside hers on the pillow no longer seemed so very strange. La Maschiona came in with the baby, since the baby had been born Cenzo Rena had forbidden her to go down and sleep at her mother’s. She came in and threw down the baby on their bed, she was always very untidy and fierce-looking in the morning, she was very much annoyed with them because they no longer allowed her to go home to her mother’s at night. She banged down the tub with the hot water on the floor and started sweeping out the rooms with a grim look on her face. Cenzo Rena fumed with rage at this grim face, he got into the tub and floundered about in it for a little, and then he went outside in his bath-gown to look at the morning, at the big dark patches of grass that were appearing amongst the snow on the ridges of the hills, at the man with the corkscrew leg who was passing with his cart, at the Turk who was going to ring at the door of the police station, he had to ring every so often to show that he was still there. Cenzo Rena poked about round the house in his bath-gown and breathed in the morning, and he said that he felt happy, bored to death with this village that was always there in front of his eyes, bored to death and happy, he did not understand how one could be so bored and so happy at the same time.

  6

  During the summer Anna had a letter from Signora Maria in which she stated, in obscure terms, that she never wished to see Concettina again, nor Concettina’s mother-in-law either, she had come away from that house for good. She wrote from Turin, she was in a boarding-house at Turin and was very ill, she would have come to San Costanzo but she was unable to move. Cenzo Rena said to Anna that she must go and fetch her, Concettina was really a monster to let a poor old woman go and die in a boarding-house at Turin. He himself could not leave San Costanzo because the dysentery season was just on the point of beginning, and he did not trust either the doctor or the chemist, he had to stand over them both all the time. And besides, he had started teaching English in the evenings to the contadino Giuseppe. He told her to leave the baby and go off alone and free, it was the first journey she had ever taken by herself in her whole life and very likely she would quite enjoy it.

  She started off and during the journey her heart beat fast with the pleasure of travelling alone for the first time. She rather forgot Signora Maria and listened to the strong pulsating of the train as it went through fields and towns, and she was very happy not to have San Costanzo in front of her any more, but a swift flow of changing things in that strong pulsating movement. It was a long journey, she had to pass through a great part of Italy. Before leaving, Anna had had a dress made for herself by the San Costanzo dressmaker, a dress which, in the dressmaker’s room, she had thought beautiful but which she now saw was not beautiful at all, when she looked at the dresses of the ladies in the train; it did not resemble any of these dresses but instead it resembled a curtain. Anna thought that Signora Maria would think it beautiful because it so closely resembled the dresses she herself used to make for her. Signora Maria, however, did not consider it at all beautiful, she looked at it from every direction and said it was very badly cut, in any case it was crumpled from the train and needed ironing. Signora Maria was living in a boarding-house called the “Pensione Corona”. Anna met her in the street a few steps away from the boarding-house, with a string bag full of small green tomatoes. She was surprised to see her in the street, she thought she was ill in bed. Signora Maria said she had got up only that morning and had continual fits of giddiness, she put two fingers up to her forehead and swayed as though she were on the point of fainting, she had come out simply in order to buy three or four little tomatoes because at the boarding-house there was not enough to eat. They went up to her room and Signora Maria at once started cutting the tomatoes in slices and pouring oil upon them out of a small beer-bottle, but now and then she remembered that she had been ill and swayed slightly. The room was full of folded tablecloths and towels, all the things which Anna’s grandmother
had left to Signora Maria, and besides that there were Signora Maria’s dresses and coats and hats of which she had a very large number, there were some on the bed and on the chairs and even outside on the balcony. She wanted Anna to eat the tomatoes but Anna did not want to, so she started to eat them herself and all the time she talked about Concettina, she could never have believed that Concettina could be so unkind to her, of course she had been egged on by her mother-in-law who was a miserly, suspicious old woman and who always came into the kitchen to see what Signora Maria was cooking, sometimes she was cooking herself an apple to eat in her room before she went to sleep, because she slept better if she had eaten an apple. One day she had taken the baby out and it had started to rain slightly, she had gone with the baby into a doorway and he had hardly got wet at all, and when she came back home Concettina had started shouting that it was her fault if the child was always catching sore throats, she felt the child’s feet and said they were soaking wet, so she told her that she had gone into a doorway, but all of a sudden Concettina’s mother-in-law had come in and they both of them shouted at her, Concettina and her mother-in-law, and the mother-in-law said she was always in the kitchen brewing up mixtures and using up all the sugar, she had even come close up to her and given her a bit of a shaking, Signora Maria had said she was not going to allow anyone to lay hands on her. Signor Sbrancagna had been the only one to defend her, he had said that the child was not wet and that in any case it was a warm rain. But she had packed her bags and left, right up till the last moment while she was getting ready to go she had thought that Concettina would come and ask her pardon, but Concettina had stayed shut up in her room. Signora Maria recalled all the sacrifices she had made for Concettina, how she had gone to pawn the jewellery for her trousseau, and how she had made her trousseau for her all out of real linen, now, with the war on, you couldn’t find the smallest piece of real linen in all Italy. Signora Maria did not wish ever to see Concettina again, Concettina might drag herself on her knees to the Pensione Corona but now she could never forgive her. She was only sorry on account of the child who had grown so very fond of her, she chattered for a moment about the child but very soon stopped again. She said she was not coming to San Costanzo because she hadn’t the strength to walk up over those rocks, and besides, she didn’t want to become fond of Anna’s baby, she did not wish ever to become fond of anyone again because it only led to trouble. No, the Pensione Corona was the right thing for her now, it did not cost much and in any case Cenzo Rena sent her some money from time to time, he was a man who had understood her situation. Once upon a time she had made a will in which she left a great part of what she had to Concettina, but now she had torn up that will, now she wanted to leave what she had to Anna. She made a sweeping gesture in the direction of the shoes and towels scattered about the room and said, “After my death all this will be yours.”