“So you and Alberto have decided to part company,” he said.
“No,” I said. “It’s his idea, really. Perhaps it’s all for the best.”
He filled his pipe with tobacco from his pouch, which he was holding between his knees, and looked down at the ground, shaking his head.
“There’s just one thing I’d like to ask you,” I said. “Do you ever see Giovanna?”
“Every now and then,” he said. “Why?”
“I wish you’d tell her to come and see me some day. Not for the reason you may think. I don’t want to make a scene or arouse her pity. I just want to speak to her, that’s all. After that I think my mind would be at rest. I’ve thought about her so often and tried to imagine what we’d say to one another if we were to meet. It’s not healthy to be completely in the dark and let one’s imagination run riot. If I could really see her at last, perhaps I might be able to put the whole thing behind me.”
“I don’t think Alberto would be very pleased,” he said.
“I know that,” I admitted. “He wouldn’t like it at all. He hates even to speak of her to me. He hates to think that we both exist and that one day we might even meet. He has to shuttle quite independently between us and live a double life. But I’m sick of thinking of things that it hurts him to have me think about. And I’m sick of not hurting him, too. I’m sick of being alone and in the dark, analysing my own thoughts.”
Augusto puffed at his pipe and looked into the distance. The air was unusually clear, the wind blew in warmer gusts, and the clouds hovered over the mountaintops. Augusto’s scarf blew fitfully now, and his serious, stolid face gave me a feeling of stability. We went back down the hill, and I looked back at the woman with the sheaf of wheat, raising her bronze breasts into the bright clear air. I would remember her, I said to myself, and think of this day if Augusto and I ever became lovers.
“I was in love with Giovanna myself years ago,” he said. I didn’t answer right away. It was as if I had always known something of the sort. “That was when I got the revolver,” he added.
“What revolver?”
“Alberto and I each bought one. We were all for committing suicide. We decided to shoot ourselves, each one of us in his own room, at exactly the same minute. I stared all night long at that revolver lying on my table and couldn’t screw up my courage to go through with it. In the morning I went with my heart in my boots to Alberto’s. But lo and behold, he was just getting ready to come and find me! We looked at each other and burst out laughing! Ever since then we’ve kept our revolvers loaded in our desks. I look at mine every once in a while, but I haven’t any wish to shoot myself. All that was years ago. There are times when you’re fed up with everything, but then the days and years sweep you along with them and you acquire some understanding. You understand that there’s some meaning to even the stupidest things, and you don’t take them as hard as you did before.”
I realized that he was speaking in this vein for my benefit and trying in his own way to console me. I was grateful, but there was nothing I could say.
“Yes, it was a long time ago,” he repeated. “All night long I stared at that revolver. Giovanna was going with someone else then, an orchestra conductor, and I couldn’t stand the thought of her being crazy about him. I wanted her to leave her husband and the other man, too, and come and live with me. Alberto was in love with her, too, and we wandered around the city like madmen, stopping to drink in every bar. What fools we were! Well, we didn’t kill ourselves; we just went on raving together. Finally one day it dawned on me that the orchestra conductor had dropped out of the picture and Alberto was his successor. He didn’t have the nerve to tell me himself and wrapped the whole thing in mystery the way he does with you now. But I was past caring. I decided it wasn’t worth while losing my head over anybody, and I began to study and write a book about the Polish wars of secession. I thought Alberto wouldn’t last long with her either, and instead they’ve gone on with it until today. When I saw Giovanna again we became good friends, and I stayed friends with Alberto too. We reminisce quite often about that day when we had an urge to commit suicide. We’re the damnedest fools when we’re young!”
When we got back to the centre of town I said good-bye to Augusto and went home. Gemma was away and I had to cook supper, so I put the meat and potatoes on the stove. I missed the baby and wished I could sing to her about Le bon roi Dagobert. I hummed the tune while I was setting the table. When Alberto came in I asked him when he intended to go away. He sat down at the table and propped the newspaper up in front of him without making any reply. Finally he said in a low squeaky voice:
“Are you so anxious to get rid of me?”
“No,” I said, “take your time.”
But after supper he went into the study and began to pack his belongings in a zinc case. He dusted his books one by one as he put them in and took down the bust of Napoleon and his fleet of miniature ships. I watched him from the door. At a certain point he felt bored and sat down to read. I swept the kitchen and then went to bed.
She came on a Sunday. Augusto phoned me in the morning to tell me she would come, and in the afternoon he took Alberto to his apartment to listen to some new Negro records. I combed my hair and powdered my face and sat down to wait. All of a sudden I heard the ring of the bell at the garden gate. I pressed the button and heard the click it made when it opened. My hands were covered with a cold sweat; I clenched my teeth and swallowed hard. Then Giovanna walked in and we sat down in the drawing room face to face.
I saw that she was embarrassed, and this simplified everything. There was a blush on her cheeks, which gradually faded away, leaving her skin pale and of a cold, flourlike consistency. “So this is Giovanna,” I said to myself as we sized each other up. She was hatless and had on her mouton fur piece, which appeared old and worn now that I could see it from close by. She held her gloves in her hands and sat with her legs crossed in the armchair near the window. I had imagined her as a vulgar sort of woman with a great deal of makeup and a violent cut to her features and body. Of all the mental pictures I had made of her the definitive one was violent and garish. But in real life there was nothing vulgar about her. Only after several minutes did I see that she was actually beautiful. Her face was pale and cold and her full, unpainted lips were smiling silently. She had small, white teeth, blue eyes, and her long narrow head with the grey-streaked black hair pinned up on top of it was turned slightly to one side.
“Where’s the baby?” she asked.
“She’s not here,” I answered. “She’s with my mother in the country.”
“Too bad,” she said. “I’d like to see her.”
“I asked you to come here,” I said. “Perhaps you’re thinking it was an odd thing to do…. As a matter of fact, I haven’t anything in particular to say. I was curious to see you, that’s all. It was a pointless sort of curiosity, when you come down to it.” She listened quietly, with her legs crossed and her worn gloves between her long fingers. “I have no intention of hurling accusations in your face or of getting down on my knees and begging you for mercy. I don’t hate you, at least not so far as I know. There’s nothing to do about it, I realize that. Alberto’s going away. Then you’ll be able to meet more often without his telling me lies. He says he hates to lie, but I don’t know whether he really means it. We don’t get on well together, that’s the truth. Perhaps it’s not your fault. I’ve done all I could to make a go of it, but with no luck. It’s been a mess.”