A Life

by Italo Svevo

  When Francesca was present, Alfonso talked a lot about matters indifferent to him. Annetta, he realized, was following the sound of his voice with real vivacity; Macario thought her incapable of that, and here she was showing it to Alfonso. But this sensation did not seem linked to his actual words.

  And yet, though he was acting with a morbid sense of exaltation which made him live in a continual dream for days on end, he was calculating coldly, as someone conscious of what he wanted.

  He waited impatiently for Francesca to go away, but her leaving the library was not enough; she must be outside the house. She was the only person who could disturb him, and he wanted to feel reassured about her. He controlled himself for one or two evenings and, hot with impatience, observed every movement of Francesca’s as she left the room frequently only to return at once. She was behind all this, he thought afterwards. Finding him incapable of being cold as she had advised, she was forcing him to keep within certain limits by her continual presence, and the behaviour thus imposed on him had already been enough to take him where she wanted.

  One evening he appeared unexpectedly. Annetta and he had arranged not to see each other that day, but after a long struggle he had been unable to stay away. The two women had said they wanted to go out if the weather was good, and now it had been overcast for some hours, so they had probably given up their outing.

  On the stairs he met Francesca going out alone. She greeted him more politely than usual and, looking him in the eyes with that scrutinizing gaze when she deigned to pause, said that she was surprised to see him and then, with an air of frankness, asked if Annetta had invited him when they had been left alone the evening before. The unexpected question embarrassed Alfonso, and he could think of no better way out than to pretend he could not remember arranging with Annetta for them not to see each other that day. So he let her think that Annetta had given him an appointment without Francesca’s knowledge.

  “Annetta’s waiting for you in the library,” said Francesca, more dryly after learning what she wanted, and went on down the stairs. “I’ll be back in half-an-hour,” she said again.

  Alfonso’s legs trembled as he went on up. Would he pluck up the courage within half-an-hour to do what he intended? The action itself agitated him less than the thought of compressing it into so short a time.

  “Alone at last!” he said, and as soon as he entered, he drew her towards him, but not violently, rather as if he wanted to shake hands.

  She dropped her head on his chest and, in rebuke for the position he’d put her into, said seriously but in a voice too calm and steady to be natural, “We were alone quite recently.”

  “Forgive me,” stuttered Alfonso. He did not want to be more agitated and kissed her gently on the eyes, calculating how far this abandon of hers could take him.

  The library was lit only by an oil-lamp on the table, and its light, enclosed in its shade, projected itself in a wide halo on the green tablecloth and in a strip of light running towards the floor. The austerity of that room made it a good place for love, amid simple black cupboards and serious books with broad spines and gold lettering. The contradiction spurred on Alfonso’s desire. Some large roughly bound volumes, perhaps collections of newspapers, piled up in a corner, were emanating a strong smell of glue.

  Holding her by the hand he drew her out of the light. Seeing him so calm she had no suspicions and sat down next to him on the ottoman. They had been like that at other times, sitting next to each other or embracing in the same place. He felt a regret that she was sitting by chance where the sofa had no back. But still he was uncertain. He pressed her backwards, hugging her tightly. He wanted to find out how she would resist and seemed to be asking a timid but clear question; if Annetta did not react, he could then refer to that question as an excuse. From cowardice he also murmured, “May I …?” but so faintly that he could not know if she had heard. It was this that warned Annetta of her danger. She begged and threatened him but in gentle tones, and defended herself with arms so loosely crossed on her breast that they prevented nothing. But he had expected no resistance at all, and, weak as it was, it annoyed him. Brusquely, hurriedly, brutally, he forced her into what seemed a betrayal, a theft.

  On regaining his composure he again noticed the strong smell of glue permeating that room to which he seemed to be returning after a long absence. She was the first to speak: “My God, what have we done?” Her words rang of surprise and despair. She looked at the objects around him as if hoping they would call her back from what she hoped was a dream. The disorder of her dress, which she was only now trying to settle, confirmed that she had come to her senses. She got up, not without dignity, called all her forces to her aid but could find no refuge or even suitable attitude to adopt. Then she regained control of herself, silently dried her tears and moved up to the table away from him.

  It was his duty to try and console her, he realized. He went up to her and kissed her on the forehead. It was a duty, but apart from that action he could think of nothing else. What was he to say?

  She let him be, but again sorrow overwhelmed her, and once more she wept and repeated her desperate phrase. She did not say a word of reproof, which showed that in the circumstances she was relatively cool. He himself had nothing to regret because he had done what he had aimed to do for a long time and which she knew to be his goal.

  Finally, Alfonso found words. He said he loved her, would have given his life for that moment and so could not regret his action.

  She, allowing herself to be embraced, cried, “Yes, but we’ll never see each other again, never again!”

  Then for a second his lucidity clouded. She did not understand that an irrevocable step had been taken and seemed to think it could be cancelled by that exclamation!

  “As you wish!” cried Alfonso ingenuously.

  He felt ill at ease with this weeping girl and, had he not feared to displease her, would have left at once, maybe even promising never to return. He was surprised to feel so calm and far from the desire which had led him to such risky action ten minutes before.

  Francesca came and was at once able to guess what had happened, since Annetta was not yet in a state to hide it or even to try. Her eyes were red with weeping, and she was staring obstinately into a void, forcing herself to think. On her side Francesca asked nothing and gave no occasion for lies. Alfonso in his embarrassment tried to leave. Francesca said goodbye with a shake of the hand and a friendly, even respectful bow.

  “Honour to merit!” she seemed to be saying.

  On the landing he was stopped by Annetta, who had run after him on the spur of the moment.

  “Here, here,” she said harshly, “I must speak to you.”

  Certainly the tone of her voice did not reveal that these words were any invitation to a night of love, and he realized afterwards that she had not intended them to be. In the utter darkness, motionless in the middle of the room, not daring even to sit down for fear of making a noise, he was assailed by strange thoughts. Some drama was being enacted for him, the scene of a penitent girl; he resolved to put up with it all resignedly. He knew he deserved all Annetta’s possible reproofs.

  Instead she came towards him, her eyes without a trace of tears. She had paused at the door with a finger to her lips listening for any movement in the passage, smiling like a boy hiding from someone in a game, and the sight of her thus was enough to take away all Alfonso’s fears. He had already understood; once more her senses had won.

  She was an obliging, passionate lover. She asked him to forgive the brusque words she had pronounced a short time before.

  “I did think all that, but realize now it was silly of me.”

  Without his being able to guess her thought-processes she then gave him her definition of life. Life was when he kissed her; nothing else was worth a thing. She was expressly renouncing all else for his kiss, he thought. As he kissed her to show his gratitude, it occurred to him that she must despise him if she considered herself to have lost th
e right to all other happiness by giving herself to him. She repeated her declaration a number of times during the night, changing its form. “What, marry that logician, my cousin Macario, because he’s rich!”

  She smiled at such a notion, which somebody must have held.

  Alfonso’s happiness, if it existed, was diminished by a fear. Had this woman whose feelings and opinions had changed in a single hour maybe lost her senses? He felt himself reasoning as usual, calm, pulled along by his senses for short periods then satiated, and he could not imagine that in others emotion could always be maintained with equal intensity.

  Only once with a quick change of mood did she give an impression of sadness, even of despair, as she had an hour before. She mentioned a noble family with whom the Mallers had recently become on visiting terms. It was only for a second, then she made every effort to forget it and have it forgotten.

  The pink curtain on the window had become visible in the first ray of dawn, and, although little light filtered from outside, it paled that of the candles they had left alight.

  “Already!” exclaimed Annetta, snuggling up closer.

  Hypocritically he repeated the same word.

  From the floor above was heard the sound of a bare foot.

  “Poor woman!” murmured Annetta, “I caused her such great distress.”

  “Is that Francesca?” asked Alfonso in disquiet.

  “Yes,” said Annetta smiling. “But it can all be put right!”

  She embraced him to show that the good work she intended doing was due to him.

  He had time for curiosity now, and Annetta told him that Francesca had been the mistress of Maller, who had intended to marry her. “When I heard, I laughed in Francesca’s face and opposed it of course … it seemed an offence to my mother’s memory.” The father had managed never to exchange a word on this subject with his daughter. Only when Annetta advised Francesca to leave their house did Maller oppose explicitly. Relations between father and daughter were cold for some time and only improved when Francesca swore to Annetta that there was no longer anything between her and Maller. Till that night Annetta had believed this. “I bet they’re deceiving me,” she thought out loud and quite calmly. “Of course in love there’s no such thing as deceit.”

  At four in the morning she got up to accompany him to the door.

  In the dark hall she flung her arms round his neck again and told him they would not see each other again until they could do so in the full light of day. That was to come about as soon as possible. She began to laugh and with frank sensuality added: “We’ll have lots of days and lots of nights together!”

  He stood outside watching her efforts to turn the key in the lock; then he heard the slow heavy drag of her slippers on the stairs.

  “Goodbye!” he cried, moved.

  “Goodbye, goodbye!” replied Annetta’s low voice.

  In that greeting she had put all the affection she could, and he guessed she had blown him kisses.

  As he was moving hurriedly off homewards, he heard himself called. He turned. A white figure from the window of Annetta’s room was waving him greetings with a white handkerchief. He raised his hat in reply. The gesture was forced, but he lacked the corresponding sensation. The sight of Annetta at the window reminded him that that was the customary procedure in the game of love.

  Then he tried to feel as happy as his good luck deserved, and hummed a tune which did not sound particularly jolly in the empty streets faintly lit by an invisible sun in a lilac sky. Deep unease made him silent. He tried to explain it by doubts in his future relations with Annetta; even after that night these had not yet left him. But Annetta was his! Was not that a great deal, so much that he should feel the happiest man on earth? He had long desired, loved Annetta. It must be lack of sleep and exhaustion that had taken away the enjoyment of his happiness, and as he went up the slope towards the Lanuccis, he tried to persuade himself that the next day he would wake up full of love and longing to see Annetta again.

  He got into bed and fell asleep as soon as he put his head on the pillow.

  XV

  BUT ON WAKING he found himself with the same malaise. As he went over in his thoughts all the events of the night before, his revulsion grew. He disliked everything about it, from his first stolen embrace to that last greeting which he had answered by forcing himself to a pretence that had been an effort, however easy. He did not want to face up to the conclusion which he should evidently draw from this feeling; in spite of all his delight in possessing Annetta, he disliked the way he had won her. He did not believe Annetta loved him; she was bowing to the irrevocable.

  Some time before Macario had told him that he considered him incapable of fighting and seizing his prey; at that time he had gloried in this criticism as if it were praise. Now he had shown that Macario was mistaken.

  He looked with quite different eyes at his little room, lit by a ray of sun, the only one of the day that penetrated it at that hour. He had spent some happy hours there! It had been a strange happiness, continuously finding comforts for his pride in seeking weaknesses in others from which he was immune himself, by watching others struggling for money and honours while he remained calm, satisfied by the sense of talent burgeoning in his brain, by a sweeter emotion in his heart than falls to the lot of most human beings. He understood and pitied the weakness of others and felt all the prouder of his own superiority. When he entered the library or his own little room, he withdrew completely from the struggle; no one contested his happiness, he asked nothing of anyone. Now on the other hand the struggling people whom he despised had drawn him into their midst, and without putting up any resistance he had felt the same desires, adopted their weapons.

  He wanted to combat his own disgust which, when attributed to the reasons which he obstinately gave for it, was utterly unreasonable. As he dressed he thought that if he had heard such a story about anyone else he would have laughed. He had entered the struggle because he had never allowed himself entirely to leave it; even the modest happiness for which he had asked had never been accorded wholly. Oh come. Surely this victory of his did give him liberty. Even though his affection for Annetta was not what it should be as in parenthesis he had already confessed—with this marriage his life was just beginning, and he must surely be delighted at that.

  Signora Lanucci, seeing him with knit brow, grew worried and, knowing he had come home late, asked if he had spent the night gambling and lost. He laughed. Yes he had indeed gambled, but won.

  During the morning, working slowly and stopping to dream as he stared at a name or a set of figures, the strange idea came to him that maybe by that time Annetta’s love had already ended and he would never hear mention of it again. It was quite possible that a love born so fast, the product of necessity and resignation, could die with the same speed as that with which it had grown. He felt no fear of that. If someone had told him it had already happened, he would have felt neither surprise nor sorrow, though no pleasure either. He would have been liberated from doubts much graver than he could bear. He knew that in that case Annetta would not only cease to be his mistress but also even his friend, and that he would drop back among the mass of clerks from which he stood out only by this relationship. But before all else he wanted to get back his own peace and calm.

  A letter was awaiting him at home. It was from Annetta. He at once recognized her writing, the small round strokes which he had got to know while working on the novel with her. He opened it at once. Perhaps that letter had the words which would free him from his torture, either new pretences of love, or laboured excuses to free herself from him.

  He was wrong. There was nothing false in the letter.

  It was written to tell him something which he did not yet know; and the first part concentrated on a detailed explanation with a few little remarks intended to remove doubts or forestall opposition. Annetta began by the statement, in a few simple but affectionate words, that they now formed one single person in aims and interests, a
nd so she expected him to trust her completely. In consequence she would sometimes be taking action without telling him things, which she knew he could not find agreeable. But now she needed his help. She intended to go to her father at once and tell him everything. It would be a nasty scene, and that was not to be wondered at because old Maller’s surprise, even sorrow, might well be considerable, as he had hoped for something different for his daughter, quite wrongly, she hurriedly added. She could not promise to make her father change his mind at once—Alfonso, for a short time she was sure, might be exposed to rudeness and perhaps even to rough treatment. As she loved him she would suffer for every unkind word said to him; so for the sake of Maller’s dignity she suggested that Alfonso should leave town for a time. She had already told her father that Francesca wanted to send him to the country on a mission for her, and Maller himself had promised to see he was offered leave. She asked him to accept it.

  The letter ended there, but re-opened with a postcript, two more closely-written pages. She wanted to see him again just once more before his departure and asked him to be by the Civic Library on the evening of that same day, on the slope towards Villa Necker where she had seen him at other times. She did not want him to come to her home because she did not wish to be alone with him before their engagement. He must not dislike this. She had shown herself weak a first time when so many considerations and fears should have held her back; so she knew that she would give way just as soon a second time when such considerations no longer existed.

  The letter closed definitely with a phrase by which Annetta tried to explain and excuse her fall: ‘You know, my dear, it was love that made me yield so easily, not your courage, great though it was. I have loved you for a long time, and you knew it. When I abandoned myself to your caresses, I was just as much to blame as you. With you I have always yielded, but you did not always want what I did.’

  This letter, marked all over with strong affection, moved Alfonso, but in a completely different sense than Annetta might have hoped. In his eyes it seemed pointless to make all that effort to appear glad and not merely resigned, and to make him believe that if that step had not been taken already, she was ready to take it again when in full possession of her senses. No, she had fallen, and was acting like a person on the lookout for the most dignified posture in which to fall, after forgetting to stretch out her arms to protect her head. That little head, always borne so proudly on its neck, had hit the ground with a bang, and Annetta now renounced ever raising it again. That letter, it seemed to him, showed that where sensuality stopped the behaviour dictated by reasoned necessity began.