A Life (32 page)

Even before talking to her father she had repented of her slip, and if there had been violent scenes at home, as Francesca had written, they had been about something quite different. Perhaps while Francesca had thought that Annetta was fighting for him, Annetta was really fighting to marry her cousin, who would
himself
not be entirely satisfactory to old Maller because he was not rich. That would have been fine. Her affair would have left no
consequences
except in memory. And for him it need not be a nasty memory, he had now to admit. Its consequences could become so, but in itself, cut off short in that manner, the affair had been only an enjoyable experience. In his later years, in that old age to which he looked forward, he would be able to describe having ‘lived’ in the sense that that word was used by others.

Santo, the first person he ran into in the corridor of the bank, greeted him in a most friendly way and told him that he had been much talked of during his absence. He was sorry to hear of his mother’s death.

Alfonso thanked Santo very warmly, because this friendship shown him by Maller’s personal servant could be an indication of the feelings Maller himself had for him.

Signor Maller was not in, and his absence seemed also a piece of good luck to Alfonso. The idea of facing his chief without knowing what the latter thought of him gave him goose bumps; in any case it would be easier to go to him after some preparation and after studying what attitude to take.

The blow fell unexpectedly and came from Cellani, his best friend among his superiors, who greeted him very coldly indeed. He did not stop writing and did not raise his head except once to stare him blankly in the eye.

“Let me advise you to work hard,” he said to the flustered Alfonso. “Try to regain time lost.” Alfonso had already opened the door to leave when he was called back. “Signor Nitti!” He re-entered full of hope, expecting from Cellani, with that gentle and expansive
character
, some friendly word of greeting or polite one of sympathy. Instead, Cellani, after making sure Alfonso was standing once again in front of him, told him, as coldly as ever, that he had been charged by Maller to give his condolences and to say he need not visit the managing
director
as was usual after a long absence. His whole mind seemed to be concentrating on writing because his voice was modulated according to the movements of the pen. “Signor Maller is very busy!” he added in an even tone, as if this explanation was really unnecessary.

Alfonso, realizing clearly what consequences he must draw from Cellani’s attitude, again felt a need to be alone and reflect. He left that office undecided; he should certainly have said something, he felt that, but did not know what. And as he closed Cellani’s door, he had a second’s regret. He could not turn back, and he had
certainly
not behaved as he should.

How he happened to be in the despatch department, the office facing Cellani’s, he did not know. Starringer in his stolid, safe but unpleasant voice was consoling him on his mother’s death and shook his hand vehemently. Then, not knowing that he had just arrived at that moment and had not yet got to work, he asked, “Did you put this letter on my desk?”

“I’ve only been in the office five minutes,” replied Alfonso.

Ballina stopped him in the little passage by his room.

“These things happen to all of us,” he said. “It’s sad but …” and he ended by shaking Alfonso’s hand vigorously, perhaps for fear of saying something silly.

In his room he was alone for a few minutes. Then Alchieri came in to offer his condolences. The latter also wanted to know how Signora Carolina’s illness had developed and what were the symptoms; he had heard it said that she had died of a heart attack and, being very frightened of the same thing happening to
himself
, wanted to take advantage of this chance to gather
information
. Alfonso replied in monosyllables, and Alchieri attributed this apparent indifference to sorrow and repugnance in talking about that subject.

Alfonso on the other hand had one thought on his mind; to find out what could have made a once polite man like Cellani be so rude. Not distraction, and not sorrows of his own, for obviously that coldness and offhand manner were put on.

He settled down at his desk, which looked unchanged, just as he had left it, with in the middle drawer a sheet of paper, a botched letter which he had not sent off, to the right a calendar cancelled on that last day in the office when Cellani had offered him his leave with such laughing courtesy.

He was hated by Maller and Cellani. Before jilting him Annetta had denounced him to her father. Who knew in what terms she had described him. Annetta, when she decided to leave him and marry Macario, must have come to loathe him; he might well have really seemed to her a seducer, even a violator, for nothing is easier to cancel from the mind than a fault of one’s own which has been neither spoken nor written about. He would have been represented as the only one to blame; Maller and Cellani must certainly think that he had taken Annetta by treachery.

How would he defend himself if he was allowed to speak? Simply describe sincerely all that had happened since Annetta first welcomed him so kindly into her home. He had loved her and in return had not been loved but tolerated; that had contributed to his exasperation. He would alter the truth only to avoid accusing Annetta, not to diminish his own blame—for it had actually been she who had made him lose his head by her coquetry and she who had first trod the path that led them astray.

Alchieri asked him if he had greeted Sanneo. He had
forgotten
to do so and went to his superior’s room at a run, terrified of suddenly meeting Maller or Cellani again. He had feared for an
instant to find Sanneo treating him in the same way as Cellani. He was very soon disabused, for Sanneo greeted him with the exaggerated courtesy which he used in dealing with matters
outside
office routine. He gave him his condolences in a friendly tone, said he did not look at all well and added that he hoped his health would soon recover with the quiet routine of work in the office. That was sincere; he had not said it to make his clerk work harder. Then as soon as he went on to speak of work, his tone became colder. He had been waiting impatiently, he said. He wanted Alfonso to take on work assigned to him in the last days before he left, that of assessments and also some of the German correspondence.

Alfonso accepted. He knew it was too much, but he did not mind that. By his work he would make himself indispensable at the bank; into his mind flashed the hope of getting Maller to like him as a clerk since he loathed him as a man. Later he thought of this again. What had business to do with family matters? For to Alfonso relations with Annetta were family matters.

Jassy had died the night before after an illness of a few days, half of which he had spent in the office. The poor man had always thought himself indispensable and died with that conviction, for the illness had not even left him time to realize how little his absence mattered to Maller and Co. Marlucci the Tuscan gave Alfonso the news of the death and asked him to contribute towards a
communal
funeral wreath with which all the clerks wanted to honour the memory of their old colleague.

Not all the clerks knew of Afonso’s month-and-a-half of absence. When he told Marlucci that he knew nothing of Jassy’s death, as he had been away, he did not hide his surprise, and, on hearing that Alfonso’s mother had died during this time, he did not even remember to console him. As he waited for Alfonso’s signature to dry, taking his time to avoid blotching, he told Alfonso that Jassy’s funeral would be taking place the next day.

Shortly afterwards, Sanneo came in bringing a packet of letters, all the pending ones which he had been unable to get through during Alfonso’s absence.

“I’ll get down to work at once,” said Alfonso, but so hesitatingly that it was an obvious request to be left free that day. He had to
get his room in order and, what was more important, wanted to deposit his money in another bank.

Sanneo agreed and said that there was no hurry about those pending letters, but looked rather put out so that Alfonso quickly decided to get straight down to work. He was starting at once on his policy of ingratiation with his superiors.

Miceni came to greet him and was the first to use the genuine tone of a sympathetic friend. He said that he felt Alfonso’s grief deeply as he had recently had the identical misfortune himself, and gave a touching description of his own mother’s death.

Then he changed tone and told Alfonso the town gossip, the same things told him by Prarchi. Fumigi was ill and Annetta engaged. He had no intention of making Alfonso jealous or
paining
him at all and seemed to have quite forgotten that at one time he had considered Alfonso as a suitor to Annetta’s hand.

He said he thought Annetta’s marriage to Macario an
excellent
thing, in view of the social position of the engaged pair, and ingenuously wanted Alfonso to agree.

“Oh it’s certainly an excellent marriage,” said Alfonso with
conviction
.

Laughing, Miceni added, “You’ll have some bothers now. As a friend of the family you’ll have to pay a congratulatory visit, perhaps give a wedding present.”

He left Alfonso more disturbed than ever. If nothing had been said to him directly, surely that meant they wanted him to behave in a way that aroused no suspicion, as if nothing had happened. So he should pay one visit at least to the Mallers’ which would be as
embarrassing
as his first one. When the chance came, he would also have to go up to Macario and shake his hand. All this froze his blood.

Work distracted him. He was in it up to his eyes. He still knew how to go about it but was out of practice, so that to make any haste he had to give all his attention to it. When towards evening his pen finally began moving a little faster, he felt almost grateful for the humdrum work which had helped him to pass a day that he was already considering one of the worst in his life. Even when work stopped he felt calmer than in the morning. He was able to present Sanneo with a big pile of answered letters for which he at least expected gratitude.

In fact Sanneo was most polite. He made some comments on the drafting of one or two of the letters, but explained gently and did not raise his voice, interpolating words of praise with the few of blame. For a second or two Alfonso felt really happy; they were the first kind words he had heard in the bank since his return.

When he was out in the open, on the spot where he had often made a little effort of will to walk towards the civic library,
suddenly
the horror of his position struck him fully. What importance was Sanneo’s sympathy compared to all the hatred there must be against him among his superiors? His working hard and
intelligently
was not enough to diminish that hatred. He said to himself that the only way to get out of it all was to resign his job, but he did not feel like doing that. It was the hatred and contempt which dismayed him, not the fear of any victimisation that could come from it. Once more he was not being sincere with himself and did not reach a clear realization of why he was not leaving his job. He did not tell himself that his only hope was to attenuate that hatred and get those who despised him to respect him, but he tried to convince himself that he was staying on at Maller’s because he did not yet know if that hatred would show or even if it really existed. Perhaps another tacit renunciation such as he wanted to make would be enough.

Just as he was about to enter Lanucci’s door, he heard himself called. It was Francesca, who had been waiting for him in the street.

“I’ve been waiting half-an-hour for you.” She called him
without
moving, then walked only a little way towards him with her firm unhurried step.

“I am charged by Annetta to tell you to forget her; she will do the same.”

The brevity of the announcement had certainly been thought out to give him the most surprise and pain. But he was prepared for the worst now and greeted almost joyfully someone who had finally come to give him explanations.

“I’m resigned to it!” he replied and found nothing else to say. Then he hesitated so long that Francesca began moving away, but he stopped her; she was the only person from whom he could hope to have exact information on how they felt about him at
the Mallers, and once this chance of talking with her was lost, he knew that he would not easily find another.

“But why, why?” he asked in a strangled voice. That was not the question he had intended; he would have liked to ask straight out what was required of him, but thought it too abrupt.

“You must know the reason; I’d explained it more or less before it even happened.” Her voice was trembling now, but with anger. “You left as if you were escaping from a woman out to trap you, and Annetta was quite right.”

“But my mother died!” protested Alfonso. “Isn’t that enough to explain my absence?”

Francesca remained cold.

“You didn’t know she was ill when you left, or you’d have told me. You were escaping from the consequences of your good luck, that is how I explained your flight.”

Her small face was always composed, its pale features always the same, but she was growing more and more heated without making any gesture to show it. He could hear the anger in that voice; she was saying things that only anger could have made her confess so explicitly.

She considered the battle lost and was leaving the field. Her first great disaster, she realized, had been to have people like the Mallers to deal with; then it was Alfonso who had decided her fate.

“I’d be Maller’s wife by this time if you hadn’t suddenly turned up. You’re a sort I hope there are very few of, a swine!”

He already knew that Francesca was Maller’s mistress, and her revelations surprised him only because they came from her own lips, but that was enough to make him forget to draw from her the news he so much wanted. He stood listening to her with his mouth open, amazed at this vital woman who in misfortune felt nothing but anger at her own failure.