The Magic Barrel

by Bernard Malamud

  ‘I appreciate your concern.’ Carl left, embittered.

  However, they sometimes called him to witness an occasional ‘miracle.’ One man showed him a pleasant apartment overlooking some prince or other’s formal garden. The rent was sixty thousand, and Carl would have taken it had he not later learned from the tenant next door – he had returned because he distrusted the agent – that the flat was heated electrically, which would cost twenty thousand a month over the sixty thousand rent. Another ‘miracle’ was the offer by this agent’s cousin of a single studio room on the Via Margutta, for forty thousand. And from time to time a lady agent called Norma to tell her about this miraculous place in the Parioli: eight stunning rooms, three bedrooms, double service, American-style kitchen with refrigerator, garage – marvelous for an American family: price, two hundred thousand.

  ‘Please, no more,’ Norma said.

  ‘I’ll go mad,’ said Carl. He was nervous over the way time was flying, almost a month gone, he having given none of it to his work. And Norma, washing the kids’ things in the hotel sink, in an unheated, cluttered room, was obviously unhappy. Furthermore, the hotel bill last week had come to twenty thousand lire, and it was costing them two thousand more a day to eat badly, even though Norma was cooking the children’s food in their room on a hotplate they had bought.

  ‘Carl, maybe I’d better go to work?’

  ‘I’m tired of your working,’ he answered. ‘You’ll have no fun.’

  ‘What fun am I having? All I’ve seen is the Colosseum.’ She then suggested they could rent an unfurnished flat and build their own furniture.

  ‘Where would I get the tools?’ he said. ‘And what about the cost of wood in a country where it’s cheaper to lay down marble floors? And who’ll do my reading for me while I’m building and finishing the stuff?’

  ‘All right,’ Norma said. ‘Forget I said anything.’

  ‘What about taking a seventy-five thousand place but staying only for five or six months?’ Carl said.

  ‘Can you get your research done in five or six months?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I thought your research was the main reason we came here.’ Norma then wished she had never heard of Italy.

  ‘That’s enough of that,’ said Carl.

  He felt helpless, blamed himself for coming – bringing all this on Norma and the kids. He could not understand why things were going so badly. When he was not blaming himself he was blaming the Italians. They were aloof, evasive, indifferent to his plight. He couldn’t communicate with them in their own language, whatever it was. He couldn’t get them to say what was what, to awaken their hearts to his needs. He felt his plans, his hopes caving in, and feared disenchantment with Italy unless they soon found an apartment.

  At the Porta Pinciana, near the tram, Carl felt himself tapped on the shoulder. A bushy-haired Italian, clutching a worn briefcase, was standing in the sun on the sidewalk. His hair rose in all directions. His eyes were gentle; not sad, but they had been. He wore a clean white shirt, rag of a tie, and a black jacket that had crawled a little up his back. His trousers were of denim, and his porous, sharp-pointed shoes, neatly shined, were summer shoes.

  ‘Excuse me,’ he said with an uneasy smile. ‘I am Vasco Bevilacqua. Weesh you an apotament?’

  ‘How did you guess?’ Carl said.

  ‘I follow you,’ the Italian answered, making a gesture in the air, ‘when you leave the agencia. I am myself agencia. I like to help Americans. They are wonderful people.’

  ‘You’re a real estate agent?’

  ‘Eet is just.’

  ‘Parliamo italiano?’

  ‘You spik?’ He seemed disappointed. ‘Ma non è italiano?’

  Carl told him he was an American student of Italian history and culture, had studied the language for years.

  Bevilacqua then explained that, although he had no regular office, nor, for that matter, a car, he had managed to collect several exclusive listings. He had got these, he said, from friends who knew he was starting a business, and they made it a habit to inform him of apartments recently vacated in their buildings or those of friends, for which service, he of course tipped them out of his commissions. The regular agents, he went on, demanded a heartless five per cent. He requested only three. He charged less because his expenses, frankly, were low, and also because of his great affection for Americans. He asked Carl how many rooms he was looking for and what he was willing to pay.

  Carl hesitated. The man, though pleasant, was no bona fide agent, probably had no license. He had heard about these two-bit operators and was about to say he wasn’t interested but Bevilacqua’s eyes pleaded with him not to say it.

  Carl figured he had nothing to lose. Maybe he does have a place I might be interested in. He told the Italian what he was looking for and how much he expected to pay.

  Bevilacqua’s face lit up. ‘In weech zone do you seek?’ he asked with emotion.

  ‘Any place fairly decent,’ Carl said in Italian. ‘It doesn’t have to be perfect.’

  ‘Not the Parioli?’

  ‘Not the Parioli only. It would depend on the rent.’

  Bevilacqua held his briefcase between his knees and fished in his shirt pocket. He drew out a sheet of very thin paper, unfolded it, and read the penciled writing, with wrinkled brows. After a while he thrust the paper back into his pocket and retrieved his briefcase.

  ‘Let me have your telephone number,’ he said in Italian. ‘I will examine my other listings and give you a ring.’

  ‘Listen,’ Carl said, ‘if you’ve got a good place to show me, all right. If not, please don’t waste my time.’

  Bevilacqua looked hurt. ‘I give you my word,’ he said, placing his big hand on his chest, ‘tomorrow you will have your apartment. May my mother give birth to a goat if I fail you.’

  He put down in a little book where Carl was staying. ‘I’ll be over at thirteen sharp to show you some miraculous places,’ he said.

  ‘Can’t you make it in the morning?’

  Bevilacqua was apologetic. ‘My hours are now from thirteen to sixteen.’ He said he hoped to expand his time later, and Carl guessed he was working his real estate venture during his lunch and siesta time, probably from some underpaid clerk’s job.

  He said he would expect him at thirteen sharp.

  Bevilacqua, his expression now so serious he seemed to be listening to it, bowed, and walked away in his funny shoes.

  He showed up at the hotel at ten to two, wearing a small black fedora, his hair beaten down with pomade whose odor sprang into the lobby. Carl was waiting restlessly near the desk, doubting he would show up, when Bevilacqua came running through the door, clutching his briefcase.

  ‘Ready?’ he said breathlessly.

  ‘Since one o’clock,’ Carl answered.

  ‘Ah, that’s what comes of not owning your own car,’ Bevilacqua explained. ‘My bus had a flat tire.’

  Carl looked at him but his face was deadpan. ‘Well, let’s get on,’ the student said.

  ‘I have three places to show you.’ Bevilacqua told him the first address, a two-bedroom apartment at just fifty thousand.

  On the bus they clung to straps in a tight crowd, the Italian raising himself on his toes and looking around at every stop to see where they were. Twice he asked Carl the time, and when Carl told him, his lips moved soundlessly. After a time Bevilacqua roused himself, smiled, and remarked, ‘What do you think of Marilyn Monroe?’

  ‘I haven’t much thought of her,’ Carl said.

  Bevilacqua looked puzzled. ‘Don’t you go to the movies?’

  ‘Once in a while.’

  The Italian made a short speech on the wonder of American films. ‘In Italy they always make us look at what we have just lived through.’ He fell into silence again. Carl noticed that he was holding in his hand a wooden figurine of a hunchback with a high hat, whose poor gobbo he was rubbing with his thumb, for luck.

  ‘For us both,’ Carl hoped. He was sti
ll restless, still worried.

  But their luck was nil at the first place, an ochre-colored house behind an iron gate.

  ‘Third floor?’ Carl asked, after the unhappy realization that he had been here before.

  ‘Exactly. How did you guess?’

  ‘I’ve seen the apartment,’ he answered gloomily. He remembered having seen an ad. If that was how Bevilacqua got his listings, they might as well quit now.

  ‘But what’s wrong with it?’ the Italian asked, visibly disappointed.

  ‘Bad heating.’

  ‘How is that possible?’

  ‘They have a single gas heater in the living room but nothing in the bedrooms. They were supposed to have steam heat installed in the building in September, but the contract fell through when the price of steam pipe went up. With two kids, I wouldn’t want to spend the winter in a cold flat.’

  ‘Cretins,’ muttered Bevilacqua. ‘The portiere said the heat was perfect.’

  He consulted his paper. ‘I have a place in the Prati district, two fine bedrooms and combined living and dining room. Also an American-type refrigerator in the kitchen.’

  ‘Has the apartment been advertised in the papers?’

  ‘Absolutely no. My cousin called me about this one last night – but the rent is fifty-five thousand.’

  ‘Let’s see it anyway,’ Carl said.

  It was an old house, formerly a villa, which had been cut up into apartments. Across the street stood a little park with tall, tufted pine trees, just the thing for the kids. Bevilacqua located the portiere, who led them up the stairs, all the while saying how good the flat was. Although Carl discovered at once that there was no hot water in the kitchen sink and it would have to be carried in from the bathroom, the flat made a good impression on him. But then in the master bedroom he noticed that one wall was wet and there was a disagreeable odor in the room.

  The portiere quickly explained that a water pipe had burst in the wall, but they would have it fixed in a week.

  ‘It smells like a sewer pipe,’ said Carl.

  ‘But they will have it fixed this week,’ Bevilacqua said.

  ‘I couldn’t live a week with that smell in the room.’

  ‘You mean you are not interested in the apartment?’ the Italian said fretfully.

  Carl nodded. Bevilacqua’s face fell. He blew his nose and they left the house. Outside he regained his calm. ‘You can’t trust your own mother nowadays. I called the portiere this morning and he guaranteed me the house was without a fault.’

  ‘He must have been kidding you.’

  ‘It makes no difference. I have an exceptional place in mind for you now, but we’ve got to hurry.’

  Carl half-heartedly asked where it was.

  The Italian looked embarrassed. ‘In the Parioli, a wonderful section, as you know. Your wife won’t have to look far for friends – there are Americans all over. Also Japanese and Indians, if you have international tastes.’

  ‘The Parioli,’ Carl muttered. ‘How much?’

  ‘Only sixty-five thousand,’ Bevilacqua said, staring at the ground.

  ‘Only? Still, it must be a dump at that price.’

  ‘It’s really very nice – new, and with a good-size nuptial bedroom and one small, besides the usual things, including a fine kitchen. You will personally love the magnificent terrace.’

  ‘Have you seen the place?’

  ‘I spoke to the maid and she says the owner is very anxious to rent. They are moving, for business reasons, to Turin next week. The maid is an old friend of mine. She swears the place is perfect.’

  Carl considered it. Sixty-five thousand meant close to a hundred and five dollars. ‘Well,’ he said after a while, ‘let’s have a look at it.’

  They caught a tram and found seats together, Bevilacqua impatiently glancing out of the window whenever they stopped. On the way he told Carl about his hard life. He was the eighth of twelve children, only five now alive. Nobody was really ever not hungry, though they ate spaghetti by the bucketful. He had to leave school at ten and go to work. In the war he was wounded twice, once by the Americans advancing, and once by the Germans retreating. His father was killed in an Allied bombardment of Rome, the same that had cracked open his mother’s grave in the Cimitero Verano.

  ‘The British pinpointed their targets,’ he said, ‘but the Americans dropped bombs everywhere. This was the advantage of your great wealth.’

  Carl said he was sorry about the bombardments.

  ‘Nevertheless, I like the Americans better,’ Bevilacqua went on. ‘They are more like Italians – open. That’s why I like to help them when they come here. The British are more closed. They talk with tight lips.’ He made sounds with tight lips.

  As they were walking towards Piazza Euclide, he asked Carl if he had an American cigarette on him.

  ‘I don’t smoke,’ Carl said apologetically.

  Bevilacqua shrugged and walked faster.

  The house he took Carl to was a new one on Via Archimede, an attractive street that wound up and around a hill. It was crowded with long-balconied apartment buildings in bright colors. Carl thought he would be happy to live in one of them. It was a short thought, he wouldn’t let it get too long.

  They rode up to the fifth floor, and the maid, a dark girl with fuzzy cheeks, showed them through the neat apartment.

  ‘Is sixty-five thousand correct?’ Carl asked her.

  She said yes.

  The flat was so good that Carl, moved by elation and fear, began to pray.

  ‘I told you you’d like it,’ Bevilacqua said, rubbing his palms. ‘I’ll draw up the contract tonight.’

  ‘Let’s see the bedroom now,’ Carl said.

  But first the maid led them onto a broad terrace to show them the view of the city. The sight excited Carl – the variety of architecture from ancient to modern times, where history had been and still, in its own aftermath, sensuously flowed, a sea of roofs, towers, domes; and in the background, golden-domed St Peter’s. This marvelous city, Carl thought.

  ‘Now the bedroom,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, the bedroom.’ The maid led them through double doors into the ‘camera matrimoniale,’ spacious, and tastefully furnished, containing handsome mahogany twin beds.

  ‘They’ll do,’ Carl said, to hide his joy, ‘though I personally prefer a double bed.’

  ‘I also,’ said the maid, ‘but you can move one in.’

  ‘These will do.’

  ‘But they won’t be here,’ she said.

  ‘What do you mean they won’t be here?’ Bevilacqua demanded.

  ‘Nothing will be left. Everything goes to Turin.’

  Carl’s beautiful hopes took another long dive into a dirty cellar.

  Bevilacqua flung his hat on the floor, landed on it with both feet and punched himself on the head with his fists.

  The maid swore she had told him on the phone that the apartment was for rent unfurnished.

  He began to yell at her and she shouted at him. Carl left, broken-backed. Bevilacqua caught up with him in the street. It was a quarter to four and he had to rush off to work. He held his hat and ran down the hill.

  ‘I weel show you a terreefic place tomorrow,’ he called over his shoulder.

  ‘Over my dead body,’ said Carl.

  On the way to the hotel he was drenched in a heavy rainfall, the first of many in the late autumn.

  The next morning the hotel phone rang at seven-thirty. The children awoke, Mike crying. Carl, dreading the day, groped for the ringing phone. Outside it was still raining.

  ‘Pronto.’

  It was a cheery Bevilacqua. ‘I call you from my job. I ’ave found for you an apotament een weech you can move tomorrow if you like.’

  ‘Go to hell.’

  ‘Cosa?’

  ‘Why do you call so early? You woke the children.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ Bevilacqua said in Italian. ‘I wanted to give you the good news.’

  ‘What goddamn good news?
’

  ‘I have found a first-class apartment for you near the Monte Sacro. It has only one bedroom but also a combined living and dining room with a double day bed, and a glass-enclosed terrace studio for your studies, and a small maid’s room. There is no garage but you have no car. Price forty-five thousand – less than you expected. The apartment is on the ground floor and there is also a garden for your children to play in. Your wife will go crazy when she sees it.’

  ‘So will I,’ Carl said. ‘Is it furnished?’

  Bevilacqua coughed. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Of course. Have you been there?’

  He cleared his throat. ‘Not yet. I just discovered it this minute. The secretary of my office, Mrs Gaspari, told me about it. The apartment is directly under hers. She will make a wonderful neighbor for you. I will come to your hotel precisely at thirteen and a quarter.’

  ‘Give yourself time. Make it fourteen.’

  ‘You will be ready?’

  ‘Yes.’

  But when he had hung up, his feeling of dread had grown. He felt afraid to leave the hotel and confessed this to Norma.

  ‘Would you like me to go this time?’ she asked.

  He considered it but said no.

  ‘Poor Carl.’

  ‘“The great adventure.”’

  ‘Don’t be bitter. It makes me miserable.’

  They had breakfast in the room – tea, bread and jam, fruit. They were cold, but there was to be no heat, it said on a card tacked on the door, until December. Norma put sweaters on the kids. Both had colds. Carl opened a book but could not concentrate and settled for Il Messaggero. Norma telephoned the lady agent; she said she would ring back when there was something new to show.

  Bevilacqua called up from the lobby at one-forty.

  ‘Coming,’ Carl said, his heart heavy.

  The Italian was standing in wet shoes near the door. He held his briefcase and a dripping large umbrella but had left his hat home. Even in the damp his bushy hair stood upright. He looked slightly miserable.

  They left the hotel. Bevilacqua walking quickly by Carl’s side, maneuvering to keep the umbrella over both of them. On the Piazza Navona a woman was feeding a dozen stray cats in the rain. She had spread a newspaper on the ground and the cats were grabbing hard strings of last night’s macaroni. Carl felt the recurrence of his loneliness.