Naturally there were disputes. The shoe store that the Solaras had undertaken to open in Piazza dei Martiri had to be furnished at Stefano’s expense, and he, alarmed by the fact that no written contract had ever been drawn up, squabbled a lot with Marcello and Michele. But now it seemed that they were arriving at a private agreement that would set out in black and white the figure (slightly inflated) that Carracci intended to invest in the furnishings. And Rino was very satisfied with the result: while his brother-in-law put down the money, he acted like the boss, as if he had done it himself.
“If things continue like this, next year we’ll get married,” he promised his fiancée, and one morning Pina decided to go to the same dressmaker who had made Lila’s dress, just to look.
The dressmaker welcomed them cordially, then, since she was crazy about Lila, asked her to describe the wedding in detail, and insisted on having a large photograph of her in the wedding dress. Lila had one printed for her and she and Pina went to give it to her.
As they were walking on the Rettifilo, Lila asked her sister-in-law how it happened that Stefano hadn’t done his military service: if the carabinieri had come to verify his status as the son of a widowed mother, if the exemption had been communicated by mail from the recruiting office or if he had had to find out in person.
Pinuccia looked at her ironically.
“Son of a widowed mother?”
“Yes, Antonio says that if you’re in that situation they don’t make you go.”
“I know that the only certain way not to go is to pay.”
“Pay whom?”
“The people in the recruiting office.”
“Stefano paid?”
“Yes, but you mustn’t tell anyone.”
“And how much did he pay?”
“I don’t know. The Solaras took care of everything.”
Lila froze.
“Meaning?”
“You know, don’t you, that neither Marcello nor Michele served in the Army. They got out of it owing to thoracic insufficiency.”
“Them? How is that possible?”
“Contacts.”
“And Stefano?”
“He went to the same contacts as Marcello and Michele. You pay and the contacts do you a favor.”
That afternoon my friend reported everything to me, but it was as if she didn’t grasp how bad the information was for Antonio. She was electrified — yes, electrified — by the discovery that the alliance between her husband and the Solaras did not originate in the obligations imposed by business but were of long standing, preceding even their engagement.
“He deceived me from the start,” she repeated, with a kind of satisfaction, as if the story of military service were the definitive proof of Stefano’s true nature and now she felt somehow liberated. It took time before I was able to ask her, “Do you think that if the recruiting office doesn’t give Antonio an exemption the Solaras would do a favor for him, too?”
She gave me her mean look, as if I had said something hostile, and cut me off: “Antonio would never go to the Solaras.”
13
I did not report a single word of that conversation to my boyfriend. I avoided meeting him, I told him I had too much homework and a lot of class oral exams coming up.
It wasn’t an excuse, school was really hell. The local authority harassed the principal, the principal harassed the teachers, the teachers harassed the students, the students tormented each other. A large number of us couldn’t stand the load of homework, but we were glad that there was class on alternate days. There was a minority, however, who were angry about the decrepit state of the school building and the loss of class time, and who wanted an immediate return to the normal schedule. At the head of this faction was Nino Sarratore, and this was to further complicate my life.
I saw him whispering in the hall with Professor Galiani; I passed by hoping that the professor would call me over. She didn’t. So then I hoped that he would speak to me, but he didn’t, either. I felt disgraced. I’m not able to get the grades I used to, I thought, and so in no time I’ve lost the little respect I had. On the other hand — I thought bitterly — what do I expect? If Nino or Professor Galiani asked my opinion on this business of the unused classrooms and too much homework, what would I say? I didn’t have opinions, in fact, and I realized it when Nino appeared one morning with a typewritten sheet of paper and asked abruptly, “Will you read it?”
My heart was beating so hard that I said only, “Now?”
“No, give it back to me after school.”
I was overwhelmed by my emotions. I ran to the bathroom and read in great agitation. The page was full of figures and discussed things I knew nothing of: plan for the city, school construction, the Italian constitution, certain fundamental articles. I understood only what I already knew, which was that Nino was demanding an immediate return to the normal schedule of classes.
In class I showed the paper to Alfonso.
“Forget it,” he advised me, without even reading it. “We’re at the end of the year, we’ve got final examinations, that would get you in trouble.”
But it was as if I had gone mad, my temples were pounding, my throat was tight. No one else, in the school, exposed himself the way Nino did, without fear of the teachers or the principal. Not only was he the best in every subject but he knew things that were not taught, that no student, even a good one, knew. And he had character. And he was handsome. I counted the hours, the minutes, the seconds. I was in a hurry to give him back his page, to praise it, to tell him that I agreed with everything, that I wanted to help him.
I didn’t see him on the stairs, in the crush of students, and in the street I couldn’t find him. He was among the last to come out, and his expression was more morose than usual. I went to meet him, cheerfully waving the paper, and I poured out a profusion of words, all exaggerated. He listened to me frowning, then he took the piece of paper, angrily crumpled it up, and threw it away.
“Galiani said it’s no good,” he mumbled.
I was confused.
“What’s no good about it?”
He scowled unhappily and made a gesture that meant forget about it, it’s not worth talking about.
“Anyway, thank you,” he said in a somewhat forced manner, and suddenly he leaned over and kissed me on the cheek.
Since the kiss on Ischia we had had no contact, not even a handshake, and that way of parting, utterly unusual at the time, paralyzed me. He didn’t ask me to walk a little distance with him, he didn’t say goodbye: everything ended there. Without energy, without voice, I watched him walk away.
At that point two terrible things happened, one after the other. First, a girl came out of a narrow street, a girl certainly younger than me, at most fifteen, whose pure beauty was striking: she had a nice figure, and smooth black hair that hung down her back; every gesture or movement had a gracefulness, every item of her spring outfit had a deliberate restraint. She met Nino, he put an arm around her shoulders, she lifted her face, offering him her mouth, and they kissed: a kiss very different from the one he had given me. Right afterward I realized that Antonio was at the corner. He was supposed to be at work and instead he had come to get me. Who knew how long he had been there.
14