Then I began to fall in love again with Alberto, and the realization of it frightened me. I trembled now at the idea of his going away, and the sight of the zinc case became painful. When I typed to his dictation I was afraid of going too slowly, and when he looked at me I imagined that he didn’t like my face. I reflected how easy everything was for other women—Francesca and Giovanna, for instance, who never seemed to have known even the shadow of my great fear. How easy life is, I thought, for women who are not afraid of a man. I stared for a long time at my face in the mirror. It had never been very pretty, and now it seemed to me that every trace of youth and freshness was gone.
Alberto and I were always at home, and I understood now how a man and woman live together. He never went out, and I saw him from one end of the day to the other. I saw him get up in the morning and drink the cup of coffee I had made for him; I saw him bend over and dig into the zinc case and make notes on the margins of his books. We made love on his couch in the study and lay awake in the darkness while I felt him breathing calmly beside me. Before going to sleep he always told me to wake him up if I felt sad. I didn’t dare actually wake him, but the thought that I could if I wanted to was a great consolation. He was so very kind that now I knew what a man’s tenderness could be. It was my own fault, I realized, if even now I wasn’t altogether happy with him. I was always worried about my face and body, and when we made love I was afraid he might be bored. Every time I had something to say to him I thought it over to make sure it wasn’t boring. When he read me the notes he wanted to make into a book occasional comments came into my mind. But when one day I finally said something he seemed displeased and explained to me at length why I was wrong. I could have bitten off my tongue for having spoken. I remembered the time before we were married when we sat endlessly in cafés and I babbled on without stopping. Then it was easy enough for me to talk. I said whatever came into my head and moved before him with all the confidence of youth. Now that I had had the baby and the baby was dead I couldn’t bear the idea of his leaving me.
‘Why don't you go away?’ I said. ‘I know it’s just that you’re sorry for me. Why don’t you go?’
‘I don’t like the idea of your being here alone,’ he replied.
‘I never expected you to be so kind,’ I went on. ‘I didn’t dream you’d try to help me as much as you’ve done. I didn’t think you cared much for the baby or for me either. I thought you cared only for Giovanna.’
He chuckled quietly, as if to himself. ‘Sometimes I think I don’t care for anyone,’ he said.
‘Not even for Giovanna?’
‘No, not even for Giovanna,’ he said. ‘She and her husband have gone to their country house near the lakes, and I don’t know when she’ll be back. When I don’t see her I hardly ever think of her at all. Queer, isn’t it?’
We were silent for a few minutes. He lay at my side breathing quietly, toying with my hand on the bedcover. He opened my fingers and closed them suddenly; he tickled my palm, then put my hand down and drew away.
‘It’s difficult to know what we have inside of us. We’re here to-day and gone to-morrow. I’ve never understood myself properly. I was very fond of my mother, for instance, and terribly sad to see her go. Then one morning I walked out of the house with a cigarette in my mouth, and just as I was striking a match to light it I had a sudden feeling of relief. I was almost glad that she was dead, that I would never have to play draughts with her again or hear her irritated tone of voice when I put too much sugar in her coffee. That’s how it is that I don’t really know how much I care for Giovanna. I haven’t seen her for several months now, and I can’t say I’ve thought very much about her. I’m lazy, when you come down to it, and I don’t want to suffer.’
‘And when she comes back,’ I said, ‘do you think you’ll want to go away?’.
‘I don’t know,’ he answered. ‘I might, at that.’
As I lay awake I remembered that he had told me to call him whenever I felt too sad. But I didn’t have the nerve to do it, and besides I was beginning to realize that there was no use counting on him for anything. It was absurd to expect anything from a man like Alberto. Even Giovanna couldn’t really count on him. I looked at his sleeping face, with the immobile lips that gave no answer. Would he stay or go? Did he really want to have another child? I lay there with my eyes wide open and said to myself: ‘I’ll never know what he really wants. I’ll never know.’
It was then that I remembered the revolver. I began to think about it in somewhat the same way as I had thought of nursing another baby. The idea of it calmed me and I thought of it while I was making the bed or peeling potatoes or ironing Alberto’s shirts or going up and down the stairs. If I were to have another baby I’d be in constant fear that it might take ill and die. I was tired of being afraid, and now that I understood him there didn’t seem to be much point to bearing a child for Alberto.
Francesca came occasionally to see me, and she told me that she had a new lover. He was a man she had met with the countess at San Remo, and she had given up painting in order to spend all of her time with him. She said she had a weakness for him, but nothing too serious, and that he was somewhat of a gangster, so that I shouldn’t be surprised if I read in the paper one day that he had strangled her in her sleep. He was strictly no good, she said, and every time he left her she went to make sure he hadn’t broken into her jewellery. But he was a handsome devil, and she liked to be seen with him, because women all turned their heads to stare, and for quite some time he had been a fancy man to the countess. She said that the countess was an old bitch and a dreadful miser because she wouldn’t buy the picture she had painted of her. When the countess had come back from San Remo they had had a terrible row over Francesca’s new lover. Francesca didn’t want to hear any more of Augusto, and Augusto didn’t want to hear of her either. But Augusto came to see us very seldom because he was working hard to finish his book on the origins of Christianity.
Alberto read his notes to him and tried to interest him in his writing, but Augusto hardly paid any attention. He seemed to prefer being with me and often he hung about watching me iron shirts. I thought of the windy day when we had gone for a walk together and I had imagined making love with him. When I looked at his face I felt that he was a little like me, with his eyes continually staring into a well of darkness within him. For this reason I thought that we might be happy as lovers and that he might understand and help me. But then I told myself that it was too late, too late to start something new like falling in love or having another baby. It was too hard work, and I was tired. Looking at Augusto, I remembered the night at San Remo when the baby was taken ill and the night after, when I had lain clutching his hand. There are other things in life, I told myself, than making love or having children. There are a thousand things to do, and one of them is writing a book on the origins of Christianity. My own life seemed to me meagre and limited, but it was too late to change it, and back of all my thoughts now there was always the image of the revolver.
Alberto had begun to go out again. He said that he was going to the office, but I was sure that Giovanna must be back. He said that she wasn’t, but I didn’t believe him. Then one day Giovanna came to see me. It was in the morning, and Alberto had gone out, leaving me to type his notes.
This time Giovanna was dressed in grey with a round, straw hat and a sort of cape over her shoulders. Her hat and dress were new, but she was wearing the same worn gloves as she had worn before. She sat down and started immediately to speak of the baby. She said that she had written me a letter and then torn it up because it seemed silly to send it. I had been very much in her thoughts, she said, but she hesitated a long time before coming to see me, until finally she had put on her hat and come. I looked at her hat, and it didn’t seem to me like a hat that had been put on in a hurry. It was a stiff little hat, and I wondered if it didn’t press against her forehead. She spoke quietly and simply, as if she were trying not to give me pain. But I didn’t want
to talk to her about the baby.
‘It’s very odd,’ she said, ‘but I dreamed about your baby for two or three nights in succession just before she died. I dreamed that we were in this drawing-room, and Alberto’s mother was here, too, lying on the couch, wrapped in a blanket. She said that she felt cold and I threw my fur over her and she thanked me for it. The baby was sitting on a little stool, and she was afraid the baby might get a chill and asked me to shut the window. I had bought the baby a doll and I wanted to take it out of the package, but I couldn’t seem to untie the string.’
‘The baby didn’t play with dolls,’ I said. ‘She played with a ball and a camel.’
‘I thought the dream was a strange one,’ she went on. ‘I woke up in a state of anxiety, which I couldn’t explain. Then a few days later I got a letter from Alberto about the baby.’
I looked at her hard and tried to make out whether she had really had any such dream. I had a strong suspicion that she was making the whole thing up.
‘He wrote only a very few words,’ she said. ‘We had guests that day and I had to talk to them and entertain them. And all the time I was in distress. Strange to say, I wasn’t thinking of Alberto as much as I was of you.’
She sat in an armchair with her slender legs crossed, her hands folded underneath her cape, and her hat perched stiffly on her head.
‘That hat must hurt you,’ I said.
‘Yes, it does,’ she answered, pulling it off and revealing a red mark on her forehead.
I looked at her hard. She had a kind and peaceful expression on her face, and her body was peaceful and cool in her new spring dress. I imagined her picking it out of a fashion journal and ordering a dressmaker to make it. I thought of the succession of peaceful days that made up her existence and of her body that knew neither uncertainty nor fear.
‘Do you hate me?’ she asked.
‘No,’ I said. ‘I don’t exactly hate you. But I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t see any point to our being in the same room. I think it’s stupid and ridiculous. Because we’ll never speak of really important things or be honest with one another. I don’t really believe you had that dream, you know. I believe you made it up on your way here.’
‘No,’ she said, and began to laugh. ‘I can’t make things up. Hasn’t Alberto told you that I have no imagination?’
‘No. We don’t talk much about you. Once when we did talk about you he said that he didn’t think of you often when you were away. That should have made me feel better, but it only made me feel worse. It means that he doesn’t love anyone, not even you. Nothing is sacred to him. Once upon a time I was jealous and hated you, but now all that’s gone. Don’t think for a minute that he’s unhappy without you. He refuses to be unhappy. He just lights a cigarette and walks away.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘You can’t tell me anything about him that I don’t know. You forget how long I’ve known him. Time has gone by and now we’re no longer young. We’ve grown old together, he in his house and I in mine, but together just the same. We’ve said good-bye over and over, but we’ve always come together again. He didn’t make the first move, that’s true. I did. But he was always very glad. We get on well together. You can’t understand him because you started off on the wrong foot.’
‘Please go away,’ I said. ‘If you stay any longer I shall begin to hate you.’
‘Hate me, if you like,’ she said. ‘You’re quite within your rights. Perhaps I hate you too. But I’m sorry your baby died. I have a child myself and I feel sorry for any woman who loses one. After I had read Alberto’s letter I couldn’t think of anything else all day. I was stunned.’
‘I don’t want Alberto to write you,’ I said. ‘I don’t want you to meet and take walks and trips together and talk about the baby and me. After all, he’s my husband. Perhaps I shouldn’t have married him in the first place, but I did, and we had a child and lost her. This can’t be wiped out just because you two enjoy making love together.’
‘Perhaps what’s passed between Alberto and me can’t be wiped out either,’ she murmured as if to herself. She put on her hat, frowning, and slowly pulled on her gloves, looking at every finger.
‘I don’t know what there’s been between you two,’ I said. ‘Important things, no doubt, but not as important as the birth and death of a baby. Little trips you’ve had, haven’t you? And little walks together. But go away now, will you? I’m tired of seeing you there in front of me. I’m tired of your dress and hat. I’m saying things that don’t make sense. If you stay here any longer I may want to kill you.’
‘No, you won’t,’ she said with a shrill, youthful laugh. ‘You wouldn’t do a thing like that. You look like too much of a simple country girl. And I’m not the least bit afraid of you.’
‘So much the better,’ I said, ‘but go away.’
‘Very well, I’m going,’ she said. ‘But I shall remember this day. It’s a landmark, somehow. I don’t know exactly why. But I have a feeling that we’ve said a lot of honest and important things to each other. I’ll come to see you again, if you don’t mind.’
‘I’d rather not, thank you just the same,’ I said.
‘Well, you say what you mean, anyhow, don’t you?’ she said. ‘Don’t hate me too much.’ And she went away.
I went back to my typing, but I couldn’t keep my mind on it and made any number of mistakes. I went over to the mirror to see if I really looked like a simple country girl. By the time lunch was ready Alberto had come home. I asked him if I looked like a simple country girl, and he looked at me hard for a minute before he said no. Then he added that he didn’t know what a simple country girl would look like anyhow. He was nervous and distracted and immediately after lunch he went out again.
I wanted to phone Francesca or go and see her, but I remembered that she was probably with her new lover. Alberto went back to going out every day and sometimes in the evening as well. Now that I was sleeping in the study he no longer locked the door, so very often when I was alone in the evening I opened the desk drawer and looked at the revolver. To look at it like that calmed me down, and afterwards I shut the drawer very slowly and went to bed. I lay awake in the darkness, trying not to remember the time when the baby’s feeble and plaintive cry used to break the silence of the night. My thoughts carried me far away to the time when I was a child in Maona. I remembered a certain black cream that my mother used to put on my hands to cure me of chilblains, and I could see the face of an old school teacher with glasses who used to take us on picnics, and that of a monk who came every Sunday to ask charity of my mother and carried with him a grey sack full of dry crusts of bread. I thought of how I used to read From Slavegirl to Queen and how I had hidden in the coal cellar and wept one day when my mother had made me a pale blue dress to wear to a school party and I had thought it was very pretty and then discovered it wasn’t pretty at all. I realized that I was saying good-bye to all these things, as if I were about to take leave of them for ever, and, closing my eyes, I could smell the black cream on my hands and the odour of the baked pears that my mother used to feed us in cold weather.
When Alberto came home on nights like these we would make love together. But he no longer spoke of our having any more children. He was bored with dictating notes for his book and he glanced constantly at his watch all the time that he was in the house. Sometimes it occurred to me that soon he would be too old and tired to go out and then he would sit in an armchair and dictate to me and ask me to take his things out of the zinc case, to put the books back on the shelves and the miniature ships in their accustomed place. But Alberto was just the same as ever, older and yet incorrigibly young. He walked at a brisk pace and stuck his thin head forward as if to drink in the air of the street, with his open -raincoat flapping across his slight body and a lighted cigarette between his lips. Between the eyes I shot him.
He had asked me to put some tea in a thermos bottle to take with him on his trip. He had always said that I was good at making tea. I
wasn’t especially good at ironing or cooking, but my tea was the best he had ever tasted. He was slightly annoyed when it came to packing his bag because his shirts weren’t very well ironed, particularly between the sleeves and the collar. He packed his bag alone, saying he didn’t want me to help him. He put in on top several books from the zinc case. I suggested the poems of Rilke, but he turned them down.
‘I know them by heart,’ he said.
I put some books in my bag too. When he saw me packing he was glad and said it would do me good to go to Maona and have my mother bring me my coffee in bed in the morning. I asked him what he was going to do about the zinc case.
‘The zinc case?’ he said, and started to laugh. ‘I’m not going away for good, you know. Did you think I was? Is that why you have such a solemn face?’
I went to look in the mirror and said:
‘A very ordinary sort of face. The face of a simple country girl.’
‘Yes, a simple country girl,’ he said, and stroked my hair. Then he asked me to make him the tea, which he liked strong and very sweet.
‘Tell me the truth, Alberto,’ I said.
‘What truth?’ he echoed.
‘You’re going away together.’
‘Who are going away together?’ And then he added jokingly:
‘She seeketh Truth, which is so dear
As knoweth he who life for her refuses.’
When I came back to the study he had completed the sketch. He showed it to me and laughed. It was a long, long train with a big cloud of black smoke swirling over it. He wet the tip of the pencil with his tongue in order to make the smoke thicker. I put the thermos bottle down on the desk. He was laughing and turned around to see if I was laughing too.
The Road To The City Page 14
