A Life (23 page)

When he was close to the little square, he began to run, fearing he had arrived late. Annetta was not there yet. According to what she had written, she was to be in front of the library by the Law Courts. That evening he did not want to stand still for fear of indiscreet eyes and twice went slowly up and down the little slope. As he was beginning to climb it again, he heard a voice calling: “Signor Alfonso!”

It was Francesca, not Annetta. She came towards him, her face slightly flushed, and greeted him in her usual level voice that was apt to sound wooden.

“Up there,” and she pointed towards Villa Necker, “I’ve a carriage in which we could talk calmly, but I prefer to walk. Anyway, no one will recognize me.”

Actually she was wrong, in spite of a heavy veil covering her face, and Alfonso thought that even at a great distance he could have recognized that thin body with its lithe movements in its flowing black dress.

“What about Annetta?” he asked at last, remembering to show disappointment.

She had begun to walk with small but quick steps towards Villa Necker up the slope where he had been breathless once before.
She was two steps ahead so as to make passers-by think she was not in his company. Only after the Law Courts did she wait for him and answer his question. Annetta could not come and asked him to excuse her; her father had by an unfortunate coincidence taken it into his head to remain with her at the very time of the appointment. Francesca handed him a note from Annetta, a few words written hurriedly at the last moment.

“I’ll read it afterwards,” he said impatiently when she showed that she wanted him to open it at once.

“I don’t know what you think of me,” she said without blushes or hesitation, “but I’ve had the part of intermediary imposed on me; it’s the best I can do now for Annetta. We must reach the desired result as soon as possible.” This desired result must be marriage; it was her only hint and in no way necessary.

“Annetta says …” went on Francesca, and the opening was enough to show that the message she had been charged to give would be followed by her own ideas and advice. Obviously Francesca had thought over all she wanted to tell him, and if she were to show doubts or surprise later, that would be because Alfonso’s attitude was so different from the one foreseen.

Annetta had merely asked her to repeat what she had written. To avoid his having to face affronts, she wanted him to leave town for a while until he found everything settled on his return. The only new fact was that she had had occasion to talk to Cellani who would be giving him the required leave.

Francesca interrupted herself, noticing Alfonso’s silence, which she interpreted with her usual quickness.

“You’re against this plan, are you?” and with calm satisfaction she added, “Oh I foresaw that!”

“No, I’m not against it,” exclaimed Alfonso, hesitating. What worried him most was his fear of Francesca noticing that he was not as interested in the whole matter as he should be. In a voice which tried to sound sad he added, “Will it be hard for Signorina Annetta to take the steps you mention?”

“Why?”

“Oh well! She might have some harsh words said to her?”

He sounded angry because to one pretending it is particularly annoying not to be understood at once.

“Annetta won’t care a bit about any harsh words on a matter so important to her, though it may not seem so to you, Signor Alfonso.”

Her voice lent itself to irony. He felt that she had no suspicion how close she was to the truth in that rebuke, but her irony
offended
him all the same.

“How important this matter is to me you can easily imagine, but I don’t like leaving Signora Annetta all alone battling here on my account!”

She gave him a careful look.

“So you don’t want to leave, then?”

“I don’t want anything, but I’m allowed, I hope, to express what I like or don’t like”

She looked disappointed.

“Oh, so that’s how it is? … Listen, I’ll be frank. I see no reason why you should leave. Annetta is mistress at home, and at her first words, if she says them properly, any opposition will collapse. So neither Annetta nor you need fear any affronts.” Then seeing him hesitating and surprised, “I don’t know how to win your trust in so short a time, but I need to. You are about to do something silly, and I want to prevent it. So listen to me, follow my advice, don’t leave.” She told him how fond she was of him, how she always remembered his village and the year she had spent there and his mother whom she had so loved, all in her gentle, calm, cold voice that was incapable of pretence. “So trust me, don’t leave.” And she went on talking. She told him that because it was him she had been pleased to learn that Annetta loved him, but had Annetta given herself like that to anyone else, she would never have
forgiven
herself as it could only have happened because she had not had the courage to ask Maller to intervene and cut short a flirtation which she knew had already begun. “I made a mistake, but if the result of my mistake is to be your marriage to Annetta, I can’t say I regret it. I’ll find myself rewarded for my own mistake.”

They were at the top of the slope. Instead of looking where they were going their attention was all on each other. Almost instinctively Alfonso made to cross the square because if they went straight on they would be going through a busy street, but she made him turn aside.

“The carriage is waiting for me there.”

“But why should I act against Annetta’s express wishes?”

“Well, as you yourself have said, a man doesn’t leave his post like that.” She was accepting an argument whose flimsiness she would have destroyed a short time ago. “And what is more, to do so would not be wise.”

So she was advising him to remain in case of any danger to a match which she had already shown was much wanted by herself. For the second time she was giving advice, becoming worse than an accomplice, an instigator. He felt turned to ice.

“I can never oppose Signorina Annetta’s wishes. I shall obey her orders or desires most scrupulously.”

He spoke in the tone of someone wanting to cut short the
conversation
. He brought up no arguments himself; he had made up his mind and did not bother to think where the passive obedience of which he spoke would get him.

She looked at him in astonishment, not quite sure of
having
heard properly. Then she spoke again, and for the first time Alfonso heard her voice angry; it was still faint but now broken by panting and when it rose lost all sweetness.

“But suppose that by following Annetta’s advice you expose to great danger the happiness you’re so sure of? What sort of love d’you think you’ve inspired in her, that of the ladies of old which resisted all obstacles and lasted for ever,” and she gave a forced laugh. “You’re confident enough to leave her here exposed to her father and to her relatives’ advice, are you? Do go if you want to, and return after only a week. You’ll find yourself just a little
petty-clerk
at the Maller bank again, and Annetta won’t even remember she ever knew you.” The words came from her mouth compact as a cry. She went on more calmly, “I know what the Mallers are like. D’you think that when Annetta is told what she has forgotten today, just for one day, d’you think she’ll still remain faithful?”

“I do!” said Alfonso calmly.

This was a solution he had not thought of during the long day, but as soon as Francesca brought it up, he realized it to be likeliest and best. Was it not almost certain in fact that Annetta’s
ambition
, forgotten for a short time, would soon regain the place it had always occupied till then? It was a good solution because, while
before he had feared being forced into the part of betrayer, now all of a sudden he became the betrayed with no other obligation than to grant a generous pardon, which was easy and agreeable to do.

“Then all is lost for you!” said Francesca in a voice calm for an instant to make her words more serious. “I don’t understand your reasons for acting like this, and I don’t care to; if you leave town even for a few days, you’ll never see Annetta again.”

“I must leave if Annetta orders me.”

“What I’m telling you is so obvious that either you don’t care about Annetta at all, or you have suddenly lost the use of your reason.”

She spoke at random without reflecting much on what she had said, and Alfonso sensed that, but it did not make him forget to answer words which had struck him on the raw.

“Annetta is as important to me as the light in my own eyes,” he was pleased with the phrase. “But I don’t want to steal her love; I want it to be given spontaneously.” Then he managed to find the right intonation and words. “A love which could cease in a week would be of no use to me, and now that you’ve brought up the doubt, if Annetta hadn’t suggested this journey, I would have myself.”

She laughed contemptuously.

“You’ve found a way of calling your own coldness ‘dignity’ .”

She was right again; she had hit by chance on the word which most offended him and to give herself the satisfaction of
offending
him again insisted on it blindly.

He remained utterly calm. Only once did he become agitated when, tired of seeing the argument always repeating itself, he made the mistake of declaring that discussion between them was useless because if he did not leave, he would have to find good reasons to convince Annetta. In one breath she suggested ten. Alfonso was alarmed, as the possibility flashed into his mind that he could be forced to stay; he recognized his error, and
without
losing himself in refuting Francesca’s suggestions, went on protesting with an obstinacy like that of people with few ideas, such as peasants, that he would just carry out Annetta’s wishes without probing into whether she was right or not. He was making a love-match, he repeated in order to go on talking longer, he was
making a love-match and did not want to be shrewd about it like someone acting from self-interest.

She was walking two steps ahead of him again and seemed to have given up trying to convince him. Suddenly she slowed down, wondering again if he distrusted her. It was not a reasonable
supposition
, but she had been thrown off balance by the shock of
having
to leave him without obtaining what had seemed to her so easy. She acted without consideration, following her first impulse.

She began to explain why she was taking such an interest in his fate, and her calm voice must have hidden the great inner
agitation
that had brought her to such a confession.

“It’s quite true that I’m fond of her and her family,” she began with a coldness which made her phrase sound ironic. “But it’s not only my affection that makes me act. This marriage might have such consequences for me that my life’s happiness could depend on it. Have you understood or d’you still wonder if my advice was given in good faith?”

He could no longer doubt it; he had understood. In the delirium of the night Annetta had confessed that it was she herself who had opposed Maller’s marriage, and she had also hinted that by accepting him as a husband she could no longer persist in that opposition. So Francesca had a great stake in this marriage, and her fury was understandable at finding, when so close to her goal, something now unforeseen and unreasonable arising to put her victory in doubt.

So shaken was he by this confession that he deviated once more from his method of defence; he wanted to convince her that his departure could not be such a great danger to his relations with Annetta. Annetta loved him, she had repeated it to him in every tone, given proof. Why then should he be so offensive as to doubt the seriousness of her affection?

She was the first to give up the struggle. She walked another ten steps or so beyond the carriage, whose coachman was keeping the door open; not replying to Alfonso’s long speeches, perhaps not following them. Suddenly she looked at him, raising her head with a quick movement.

“Either you don’t love Annetta or you’re afraid of her father.”

He thought it more dignified not to reply.

As she returned to the carriage she stuttered: “Never have I seen such a thing.”

Before leaving, she turned to him and put her small cold hand in his, ready to shake it with the friendship which she would otherwise have been unable to show, saying: “Anyway, I shall do all I can to spare you the misfortune you deserve. I’m sorry.”

She jumped into the carriage and helped the hesitant
coachman
shut the door.

He was free at last. No one could any longer try and change his mind; he would leave knowing that by this step he was renouncing Annetta. Francesca had convinced him; departure was
equivalent
to renunciation. He felt calm and happy. If what Francesca foresaw took place, he was free from all doubt and remorse. She had said that if Annetta abandoned him he would go back to being a wretched petty-clerk of the Maller bank. No! He would be superior even to the position that Annetta wanted to give him, a superiority shown precisely by his renunciation.

Next day at the bank he felt better. He worked willingly because, knowing nothing unexpected could happen to him, he felt calm, free from the fears which had torn at him the day before; the need he had felt to confide in someone for advice or support amazed him. Now he had tucked his secret away, and it merely seemed like an interesting episode in his life.

Cellani was to talk to him, not he to Cellani, so he did not even fear that interview. Finding he was not called by midday he had but one fear, which was that Francesca, unable to convince him of the need to stay, had managed to convince Annetta that it was better not to let him leave. He would be in their hands, have to put up with rebukes from Maller that he deserved, and then, what was much worse, assume the part of an amorous lover.

At midday little Giacomo came to tell him that the assistant manager was waiting to see him in his room. Alfonso lost a little of his calm because he had doubted whether he would be called, and the unexpected always agitated him.