A Life (20 page)

Alfonso drew the coverlet up to his chin and at the conclusion of a long reflection on human destiny murmured: “Man should be able to live twice; once for himself and once for others.”

If he’d had two lives, he thought, he would dedicate one to the Lanuccis’ happiness.

O
NE EVENING
Annetta announced to Alfonso that her brother Federico was to arrive a few days later. She was warning him beforehand so that he should be ready to behave as prudently as possible. Federico was devoted to her and while he was in town would be unlikely ever to leave her side. So Alfonso was to be very careful, because to arouse the slightest suspicion in Federico would mean their having to stop seeing each other.

Alfonso promised all that she asked him. That evening she had allowed him much, and he wanted to be equally yielding; he even asked if she would prefer him to suspend his visits during that time and declared himself ready to agree. She did not ask as much as that, because such a sudden interruption might itself arouse
suspicions
. She did not find it necessary to say that she would be sorry not to see him all that time.

In a way Alfonso and Annetta’s relations had become less
affectionate
. She had never told him that she loved him. He had let himself say so, but even he no longer felt a need to repeat it, nor did she notice the lack. It seemed because of this that their
bearing
had become more frank and that they were in a tacit
agreement
which did not really exist—for Alfonso was still hoping for something else and had realized, regretfully, that the road he was taking could lead to the conquest of a concubine but not of a mistress or a wife.

In other people’s presence he had the air of a suitor, shooting glances, paying compliments or asking to be alone with her for a second to say a word. When they were alone at last, she would tell him with a smile that he sometimes thought faintly ironical, that he could speak. Without opening his mouth he would draw her to him and kiss her frantically. She defended herself at a certain point, but with the calm energy of self-confidence. After Alfonso became more prudent in the presence of those whose suspicions Annetta feared, they never had a dispute. She almost seemed readier to become his mistress than his wife; his behaviour angered her in public, not when they were alone.

When Alfonso was told in the office of Federico’s arrival, the news produced a strange impression of alarm in him. Gradually he had won the friendship of all those who frequented the Mallers. It had been a slow and difficult conquest which seemed to have succeeded mainly by luck, by Macario’s gift of his esteem, rather than by the respect accorded him by that little ignoramus Annetta. Now someone new intervened, a person used to making decisions according to unknown criteria. He was to be feared since Annetta feared him on Alfonso’s account. Federico was certainly a man of ambition who would start by despising him.

That evening he did not go to Annetta’s; he did not want to show himself too soon. By next evening it seemed a century since he had seen her, and, ingenuously thinking that it must seem so to others, he went to call at the Mallers.

He found only Francesca and made a face, as if finding a liquid bitter after swallowing it. Francesca understood.

“For just one evening,” she said to him with a smile, “you must put up with talking to me about Annetta. She’s had to go out with Signor Federico. Now listen! Tell me something about your
relations
with Annetta.” She waited in silence for him to talk, while he remained silent, surprised by the strange preamble which Francesca seemed to be hoping would draw confidences from him.

“I thought you’d like to talk about Annetta, and you can with me, since, as I hope you’ve realized, I’m her confidante.” She tried to give him a proof of her knowing all. “But never do that on the landing again!” she said with a laugh, threatening with her white hand, the best feature of her body. She was alluding to the embrace which long ago Alfonso had stolen from Annetta on the landing.

This proof that she had given was enough, particularly because he felt a strong need to talk about Annetta and to complain about her. So he said that he was not at all satisfied about his relations with Annetta, as Francesca called them: Annetta was not as he had hoped.

“You’ve really no reason for complaining,” observed Francesca in a tone which sounded to him ironical. “You don’t seem to
appreciate
your good luck as much as you should.”

He did appreciate his good luck as he should, but it did not seem to him very great. He asked Francesca to tell him the exact
terms in which love had been spoken, on that occasion at least. Francesca asserted that she could not remember and so could not do as he asked.

“You know,” inquired Alfonso very seriously, “that she’s never told me she loved me? I really don’t know if Annetta loves or despises me.”

Francesca seemed about to laugh at Alfonso’s confidence, then became very serious and let drop a thought spoken out loud: “All the Mallers are like that. Coldness is a family characteristic.”

Alfonso did not forget this phrase, which seemed to him a
confirmation
of the rumours about Francesca and her relations with Maller. Who else in the family could she have known to be cold in love?

“But this much is certain,” went on Francesca, “Annetta is not making fun of you, and I can say that I’ve never seen her as she is now.” Then she at once changed the subject, apparently wanting Alfonso too to consider her as a kind of attentive governess. “If I don’t tell Maller all about it, as is my duty, it’s because I trust your and Annetta’s honesty of character.” But she warned him not to flatter himself too much about Annetta’s love which, she hinted, could suddenly die. It was the first love affair of the kind she had had, but its conclusion could be foreseen, and again Alfonso thought he noticed something bitter in her smile.

“I never flatter myself nowadays, I know it’s only a joke.” He was playing the strong man, but speaking with difficulty.

Francesca exclaimed with maternal compassion: “Is this not a moment for you to return home? Haven’t you realized yet that this city is not for you?”

“Why?” asked Alfonso, touched at this sympathy.

“If you don’t understand, I can’t explain. I’d willingly live in the country too, and would give much, oh so much, never to have left your village, which is our village, isn’t it?”

They looked at each other with sudden tenderness. The
similarity
of their fates drew them together and stirred them.

Francesca said she wanted to give him some advice and asked him to listen to it and follow it as if it came from his mother. This preamble made Alfonso very hopeful, and he was greatly
disappointed
when she merely said that she could not understand
why he went on worrying his head about Annetta, when he was bound to recognize in the end that it took quite other arts than his to infuse life and passion into such a statue. She advised him to behave exactly as Annetta asked him to, coldly.

Was this her great piece of advice? It was advice already given by Annetta herself though not in the same words; and he
presumed
it was being repeated by her desire. Perhaps Francesca took her duties as chaperone more seriously than he had
previously
recognized, and was telling him this in order to lessen the danger threatening Annetta.

As they were saying goodbye, Francesca’s language changed and she said two or three short phrases whose importance he did not at once understand.

“Can’t you see that caresses not followed up destroy all
influence
over us women of the men who give them? All that kissing! Just the way to get no further!”

She gave him a searching look to see if he had understood, and winking to explain what she had said, she smiled—an
accomplice
’s smile.

This was her advice! Alfonso had not understood it yet but already realized that his suppositions of Francesca’s intentions were mistaken. This amazed him. Perhaps these last phrases had been pronounced thoughtlessly, but it was more likely that all the other phrases had been said to mask these same ideas and to give the impression of a person only making a mistake in language. That aspect had been betrayed by her diffident searching glance and by her sly smile. Alfonso had been given some advice, and its purpose was obviously not to draw him away from Annetta but to show him a way of winning her.

He was not being advised to do something entirely new to him; and this reminded him of the pretence of coldness which Annetta had wanted to give the hero of their novel, which she said would conquer their heroine’s hesitations. It was just the sort of coldness suggested by Francesca. The advice was good. It would be
pleasant
to follow it because, even if it did not lead him to the victory foreseen by Francesca, he did at least hope to achieve what he wanted, the conquest of Annetta’s affections. At once he began hoping to achieve more by the behaviour suggested than by the
aggressive one he had followed so far. For a long time the pleasure of being able to hug and kiss Annetta had not compared to the bitterness of her brusque word or cold greeting. The mere
intention
of his assuming such a bearing reduced his nervous tension and released him from the daily struggle in which he had been engaged for a year, a struggle always with the same result, neither victory nor definite defeat.

It was a long time before he could put his intention into action.

He was introduced to Federico Maller. He had already seen him at other times and from a distance, in the street, and thought him a handsome and elegant young man. Fair, tall, slim, with a thin oval face and big, gentle, intensely blue eyes, his appearance was aristocratic and slightly effeminate. From close up, on the other hand, his eyes lost their gentleness because they were restless and set in dark, parchment-like skin; wrinkles seemed already forming on the youthful face, its feminine aspect now not unlike a virago’s. Thin hair was carefully arranged to seem thicker.

Alfonso’s disillusion was increased by the brusque way Federico treated him. After being introduced Federico asked if he was happy working at his father’s and, expecting a eulogy of the Maller bank, was not too pleased at Alfonso’s stuttered reply. Alfonso, realizing he had already made a blunder, became speechless, and because of Federico that evening was very like his first evening at the Mallers.

On his way out he met Annetta in the passage.

“I’m very pleased with you,” she said, with a warm handshake. She wanted to reward him for his quiet bearing, which she thought must be due to her instructions. He tried to draw her to him, but she escaped with a cry of alarm and from a position of safety threatened him with a hand, saying: “You’re incorrigible!”

He went off feeling upset at not having shown ease with Federico and strength of will with Annetta. She had her own reasons to be pleased with him, and those had prevented her noticing how
awkward
he had been that evening. As for the mistake with Federico he soothed himself by thinking it was not of much importance. Before meeting him he had often thought of those aristocratic
features
and imagined them intervening decisively in his favour. Now he realized that none of the Mallers would take a step towards
him of their own accord; so he turned to considering Francesca’s plan more keenly.

It was difficult to show more coldness than Annetta required of him during Federico’s stay in town. When they were alone, there was not time for Alfonso to screw himself up to a pretence of
coldness
, and a look or a sweet word immediately led him to advances which he would later regret.

In compensation Alfonso had no reason to complain of Federico, who after that first evening treated him with aristocratic hauteur, but not brusquely. Shortly after his arrival Annetta asked Alfonso to make her brother think they had stopped work on the novel. It had been mentioned to Federico, and he had apparently shown no pleasure at their collaboration.

One evening with a smile intended to be friendly he asked Alfonso: “And why isn’t that novel finished yet?”

“It’s not my fault. One fine day Signorina Annetta took a
dislike
to the plot and dropped it all. Maybe she will start again one day.”

Federico spoke against collaboration. A book could not be
well-done
by two, and even if it did turn out to be good, that would be a sign that each of the two collaborators could do better, separately.

Alfonso did not feel up to sustaining a discussion.

“It all depends on cases and temperaments, I think,” he said modestly.

The two never became friendly. Alfonso felt particularly irritated by the way Federico never listened and only took an interest in what concerned his own small self or might show it in a better light. It occurred to him that even this aristocratic personage must be little used to society and its influence, to accepting its yoke, for the first result of constantly rubbing shoulders with equals, particularly if they are intelligent, is learning to put up with the boring ideas of others. This defect of Federico’s was alone enough to divide the two men, for Alfonso, due to his literary ambitions, expected to be listened to with attention at times. He suspected that Federico only behaved like that in his company, from contempt.

Even after recognizing that there was no possibility of
making
friends with Federico, from time to time he made attempts,
resulting only in disappointment. On the last evening spent by Alfonso with Annetta’s brother, in his joy at seeing him depart, he put himself out to be courteous and said sweetly as he shook hands: “
Au revoir
, Signor Federico!”

Federico gave him a look of impertinent surprise, not at all flattered by any courtesy from one of his father’s clerks. Then he bowed politely back but only said, “Good night,” which was too little not to seem rude in reply to Alfonso’s friendly remark.

Even after Federico’s departure Alfonso could not act as coldly towards Annetta as he intended. Left free again, alone with her, he felt so pleased at returning to their former relations that he was unable to renounce that happiness voluntarily. A warning hint by Francesca was not enough to fortify his resolution. She must have been much put out at seeing him unchanged, for one day when he could not guess the answer to a puzzle she said: “You’re less
intelligent
than I thought.”