Conjugal Love (11 page)

But, before he turned away and after I had spoken, he had not been able to resist a final whisk to the lather on my right cheek. I noted this gesture of his as an act of disobedience which, I felt, came very near to insolence, and my irritation grew.

He took a moment to strop the razor, then bent over me and started shaving me. With his usual lightness and skill he removed the greater part of the lather from my right cheek, and then stretched forward to start on the left. In so doing, he pressed with his body against my arm, and I, for the first time since he had been shaving me, was aware of this pressure and at the same time could not help remembering Leda's accusations. There was no doubt about it, as he bent over me he pressed his body against my arm and shoulder, and I, at this contact, was conscious of a feeling of frantic repugnance, I could feel the softness of the lower part of his stomach, which I pictured to myself as hairy, muscular and sweaty, and enveloped in linen of a doubtful cleanliness ; and all at once, through my shudder of disgust, I seemed to understand that of my wife. It was a disgust of a particular kind, such as is inspired by this type of promiscuous, sensual contact which, though entirely casual, cannot but arouse, because of some quality in itself, the suspicion that it is deliberate.

I waited a moment, hoping that he would move. But he did not, nor, indeed, could he; and suddenly my disgust overcame my prudence. With a quick movement I drew back. At the same moment I felt the coldness of the razor as it cut into my cheek.

Immediately, from whence I know not, there descended upon me a fury of hatred against Antonio. He had at once drawn back the razor and was looking at me in astonishment. I leapt to my feet, raising my hand to my cheek from which blood was already spurting, and shouted: 'What on earth are you doing? Are you mad?'

'But, Signor Baldeschi,' he said, 'you moved . . . you moved violently.'

'That's not true,' I yelled.

'Signor Baldeschi,' he insisted almost beseechingly, with the respectful, as it were heartbroken, moderation of a social inferior who knows he is in the right, 'how could I possibly have cut you if you hadn't moved?'

'Believe me, you
did
move . . . but it's nothing much - just wait a moment.' He went to the table, uncorked a little bottle, took a piece of cotton-wool from a packet and soaked it in the spirit.

Beside myself with rage, I shouted: 'What d'you mean, it's nothing much? . . . it's a very bad cut'; and, snatching the cotton-wool out of his hand, I went over to the mirror. The burning sensation of the spirit gave the final touch to my exasperation. 'So it's nothing much, eh?' I shouted, throwing away the blood-stained cotton-wool in a fresh access of fury. 'You don't know what you're talking about, Antonio . . . and look here - you'd better clear out.'

'But, Signor Baldeschi... I haven't finished shaving you . . .'

'That doesn't matter. . . . Clear out and don't show yourself here again,' I cried. 'I don't want to see you here again - d'you understand?'

'But, Signor Baldeschi . . .'

'That's enough ... go away and don't let me see you again . . . never again . . . get out - d'you understand?'

'Am I to come tomorrow?'

'No - not tomorrow nor any other day. . . . That's enough, I tell you.' I stood shouting in the middle of the room, the towel still tied round my neck. Then I saw him make a slight bow - an ironical bow, I dare say - murmuring 'As you wish'; then he went to the door and disappeared.

Once I was alone, my anger gradually calmed down. I took off the towel, wiped away the small amount of soap that remained on my face and looked at myself in the mirror. Antonio's cut had been inflicted at the moment when he had almost finished shaving me, so that my face, apart from the long red wound, was smooth. I soaked another piece of cotton-wool in spirit and disinfected the cut thoroughly. I was thinking, in the meantime, about the strange impulse that had driven me to dismiss Antonio, and I realized that the cut had been merely a pretext. I had in truth been wanting to dismiss him all the time; and at the first opportunity I had done so. But it did not escape me that I had dismissed him only when his dismissal no longer harmed me - that is, after I had finished my story. I was aware that, in consequence, I could not represent the barber's dismissal to Leda as a homage to her wishes; for, just as I had kept Antonio, in spite of her accusations, for selfish reasons, so now, for similar reasons, I had got rid of him. At this thought I was conscious of a certain remorse; and for the first time I understood that, perhaps without realizing it, I had not behaved well towards my wife. Meanwhile I was dressing and, when I was ready, I went downstairs.

She was already in the dining-room, sitting at the table. We ate in silence for some time, and then I said: 'You know, I've sacked Antonio . . . really and truly.'

Without raising her eyes from her plate, she asked: 'And what will you do about shaving?'

'I shall try and shave myself,' I answered; 'anyhow, it's only for a few days, because we shall be leaving here, shan't we? . . . I don't know what came over him today, he gave me a cut as long as my finger . . . look.'

She raised her eyes and scrutinized the wound. Then, apprehensively, she asked: 'You put some antiseptic on it?'

'Yes . . . And I must tell you that the cut was only an excuse . . . actually I couldn't bear Antonio any longer. . . . You were quite right.'

'What do you mean by that?'

I saw that I could not produce Angelo's information without deferring the time when I had received it. And so I lied: 'This morning I talked to Angelo about Antonio ... I discovered that he's an unbridled libertine ... it seems he's extremely well known as such throughout the whole district ... he annoys all the women. So I thought that maybe you were right . . . although there's still no proof that in your case he acted with intention . . . and I took advantage of the cut to get rid of him.'

She said nothing. I went on: 'It's odd, all the same. You'd never think ... really, I don't know what women can see in him - bald, yellow, short, fat. . . . He's not exactly an Adonis.'

'Did
you
find your paper in the town?' she asked.

'Not exactly . . . but I got some foolscap paper - that'll do.' I saw that the subject of Antonio was displeasing to her and willingly changed the conversation, following her lead. 'I shall begin the typing today,' I said. 'I want to do it in the afternoons and evenings as well.... I shall get it done more quickly like that.'

She was silent and went on eating in a composed manner. I talked a little more about my book and about my plans, and then said: 'I'm going to dedicate this book to you, because without your love I should never have written it'; and I took her hand. She raised her eyes and smiled at me. This time, the goodwill of which I seemed to catch a glimpse every now and then in her attitude towards me was so obvious that even a blind man would have noticed it. I was struck dumb, and sat holding her hand, my enthusiasm chilled. She was smiling at me just as a mother smiles at a small child which, at a moment when she does not want to be bothered with it, runs up to her panting and says: 'Mummy, when I'm big I want to be a general.' Then she said: 'And what will the dedication be?'

Mentally I translated this into: 'And which branch of the army d'you want to be in?' I answered, rather embarrassed: 'Oh, something very simple . . . for instance,
To Leda
... or,
To my wife . . .
Why? Would you like a longer dedication?'

'Oh no, I didn't mean anything.'

Her attention was certainly elsewhere. And I, withdrawing my hand, fell into an absorbed silence, gazing through the window at the trees outside. I was thinking that one or other of us ought to break this silence, but nothing happened. Her silence, one would have said, was decisive and final; she seemed shut up in her own thoughts and in no way desirous of coming out of them. In order not to show my disappointment, I tried to joke, and said: 'D'you know what dedication a certain writer once made to his wife?
To my wife, without whose absence this book could never have been written.'

She gave a faint smile and I added hastily: 'But of course our case is just exactly the opposite. ... I could never have written it without
your presence.'

This time she did not even smile. I could not restrain myself any longer, and said: 'Well, if you don't want it, we won't put any dedication at all.'

Some bitterness must have been discernible in my voice, for she seemed to recollect herself with an effort and, taking my hand again, she replied: 'Oh, Silvio, how can you imagine that I don't want it?' But this time again the goodwill was too obvious; it was just like that of a mother whose child, discouraged, says: 'Well then, if you don't want me to, I won't be a general,' and she answers: 'Oh, but I do want you to be one . . . and I want you to win lots of battles.' I saw that this conversation was profitless, and I was seized again by the same irritation that I had felt with Antonio and which I had then attributed to hunger. I rose brusquely, saying: 'I think Anna's already taken the coffee outside.'

12

L
ATER
, when she left me to rest, I went up to my study to begin my typing. I arranged my typewriter on the desk, opened it and put the cover down on the floor. On the right of the machine I placed my manuscript, on the left the blank sheets and the carbon paper. I took three sheets of paper, inserted two sheets of copying paper between them, put them into the machine and tapped out the title. But I had not arranged the paper rightly, and the title, as I at once saw, was all to one side; besides, I had forgotten to type it in capital letters. I took out the three sheets and inserted three more. This time the title came out right in the middle, but on examination I found that I had put the carbon paper in back to front, so that the two copies were spoiled.

Irritated, I tore the sheets out of the machine and put in others; this time I made two or three mistakes which made the title incomprehensible. All of a sudden a feeling almost of fear came over me. I rose from the desk and started wandering round the room looking at the old German prints that adorned the walls - 'The Castle of Kammersee', 'Panorama of the Town of Weimar', 'Storm over Lake Starnberg', 'The Falls of the Rhine'. The house was plunged in a profound silence, the shutters were half closed, and the dim light inside the room invited one to sleep. I reflected that I was tired, that the present conditions were not suitable for me to embark upon my task of copying; so I went and lay down on a very hard sofa, in the darkest corner of the room.

I stretched out my hand towards a little table laden with knick-knacks that stood beside the sofa, and took up a red leather, gilt-edged memorandum book: it was an old 'keepsake' of 1860. Its former owner had made, on each page, a pen-and-ink drawing of a little landscape - very similar, in their homely style, to the prints I had just been looking at. Beneath each landscape, in a cursive 'English' calligraphy, were reflections and maxims in French. I looked at the landscapes one by one and read through many of these extremely sentimental and conventional reflections. Meanwhile drowsiness was coming over me. I put the book back on the table and dropped off to sleep.

I slept for perhaps an hour. In my sleep I seemed, every now and then, to wake up, and I could see the desk, the chair, the typewriter, and thought I ought to be working, and was conscious of a bitter feeling of impotence. Finally, as though at a signal, I awoke completely and leapt to my feet.

The room was plunged in gloom. I went to the window, threw open the shutters; the sky was still luminous, but the sun was low and came in slantingly through the window. Without thinking of anything I sat down at the desk and started typing.

I tapped out a couple of pages mechanically and then, at the third, broke off and fell into deep meditation. Actually I was not thinking at all; merely I could not get the sense of the words that I had written with such ardour a few days before. I saw that they were words, but they remained mere words and it seemed to me that they had no weight, no meaning. They were parts of speech, not objects, parts of speech such as are drawn up in rows on the pages of dictionaries, parts of speech and nothing more. At that moment my wife appeared in the doorway, asking whether I wanted to have tea. I welcomed this proposal with relief, glad of some distraction from the feeling of remoteness and absurdity that I experienced in front of my manuscript; and I followed her downstairs. She was already dressed for our customary walk, and tea was on the table. I pulled myself together with an effort and began chatting in a self-possessed manner as I drank my tea. My wife now appeared less abstracted and preoccupied, and this pleased me. After tea we went out and strolled down the drive towards the gate.

As I have already said, there were few walks in that neighbourhood: and so we turned off down a lane that we knew extremely well, through the fields. I walked in front and Leda followed me. My mind, as I soon realized, was still bogged in that sensation of vagueness and lack of comprehension that my manuscript had aroused in me, but I made an effort - with, to tell the truth, only partial success - to thrust away this preoccupation and to talk lightly of unimportant matters. The lane wound about amongst the fields, according to the lay-out of the various farms, linking the groups of farm buildings together. Sometimes it would coincide with a threshing-floor, in front of an isolated cottage; and then it would start twisting about again between two hedges, or along a ditch beside a vegetable garden, or by the last row of vines at the edge of a vineyard. In the clear, even, brilliant autumn light the entire plain was visible, as far as the eye could reach - every field, every patch of cultivation - flat, luminous, with a few trees here and there, dark against their background of clear sky but with every leaf lit up in the sunshine. When we came to a little hump-backed bridge spanning a deep ditch I stopped to look at the view and my wife went on in front. I remember that she was wearing a coat and skirt of grey cloth flecked with red, green, yellow and blue. When I first glanced after her as she walked ahead I was frightened, because it suddenly seemed to me that she too, like the words of my manuscript, was nothing more than a speck in space. I said, gently: 'Leda', and felt I was saying the most absurd thing in the world. I went on: 'My name is Silvio Baldeschi and I married a woman whose name is Leda'; and I felt I had not said anything at all. It came into my mind, all of a sudden, that the only way I could escape from this atmosphere of unreality was by receiving or inflicting pain - for instance by seizing my wife by the hair, throwing her down on the sharp stones of the path, and receiving from her, in turn, a good kick on the shins. In the same way, perhaps I should awaken to the value of my manuscript by tearing it up and throwing it into the fire.