A Life (4 page)

“Let him in, let him in!” cried Annetta joyously, “he’ll give us a laugh.”

Avvocato Macario was a good-looking man of about forty, dressed with great care, tall and strong, with a brown face full of life, and he greeted Annetta in imitation of Serravilla, “Even
lovelier
than usual today … ah!” He shook hands with Francesca, who at once introduced Alfonso and, instead of giving the lawyer’s name, said: “The finest moustaches in town!”

“If you knew what a bother it is to keep them like this; I must say that before the Signorina says it!”

Alfonso’s mouth tried to smile; he felt worse than before. Macario’s ease did not relax his embarrassment or make him feel any better.

Annetta had put down the newspaper. She leaned both her elbows lazily on the table.

“There’s some news, my dear cousin! It’ll surprise you!”

She had an air of deriding him.

Macario pretended to look put out.

“I know it already. In fact I’d never have believed it. Uncle
leaving
town at the height of the business season! Are these walls so solid that they don’t fall down from surprise? I met him on the stairs, and he told me the news, though with quite a different expression to yours now.”

He gesticulated as he spoke; at intervals he put his hands up close to his ears, as though hinting with an outstretched finger at things of which Alfonso knew nothing.

“I can understand your not being pleased about it,” said Annetta. “When one wants it here though,” and she touched her forehead with her forefinger, “that’s enough.”

Macario asserted that Paris was even more boring in the winter than in the summer. He seemed to be taking revenge for some
little
defeat; obviously he had tried to prevent this journey.

“In winter the Parisians always have their heads abuzz with something that makes them unbearable. Each year everyone in Paris, every single person, latches on to one subject. One day it’s the fall of the Ministry, another a Deputy’s speech, a third a
murder
. Always a bore!” he added.

Annetta recognized a novelist’s Paris in this description and exclaimed “Always charming!”

On a former journey she had searched in vain for that side of Paris.

“Each to his taste. If one visits a friend, he’ll talk about
nothing
but a pistol-shot fired at Gambetta; one arranges some
business
-deal, and the client is worrying about the pistol-shot and Gambetta; even the shoemaker talks of nothing but Gambetta. Maybe that’s all the better.”

At this joke Alfonso gave a loud laugh because he could find no words to put into the conversation and thought it a duty to show he was taking part.

“The Paris theatre’s all right in winter; a good première is worth the journey.”

Now Macario had set aside any attempt to diminish Annetta’s triumph and spoke seriously, turning to Alfonso, perhaps in thanks for the laughter.

“We’ll go to the première of
Odette
,” cried Francesca delightedly.

They would telegraph next day for seats.

Macario asked Alfonso whether he was employed by his uncle and for how long. On receiving a reply, he explained how on the stairs his uncle had told him he would find someone who dealt with correspondence in any number of languages. Alfonso replied in monosyllables and, when told of Maller’s praise, bowed in surprise, attributing it to a misunderstanding. Yet it must have been of him Maller spoke. Macario knew Alfonso’s home village and asked if he suffered from homesickness.

“A little,” replied Alfonso. He tried to complete the phrase with the expression on his face, and succeeded.

“You’ll get over it, you’ll see!” said Macario. “One becomes used to everything very easily, I think; to living in town after the country.”

Annetta did not find this conversation amusing and interrupted it without further ado. At the sound of her voice Alfonso raised his head, thinking that she wanted to ask him a question too, but was at once disappointed and so tried to hide the reason for gesture with the assumption of an air of close attention.

“D’you know, I’ve learnt some songs which are popular in Paris so as to act the
Gavroche
in the streets with Federico?”

Federico was Annetta’s brother. Miceni, who knew him, had described him to Alfonso as a very haughty man. He was in the consular service and was vice-consul at a French port.

“Could we hear one of these songs?” asked Macario.

“Why not?” and she got up. “Would you care to accompany me?” she said to Francesca. “Come on! Macario’s such a bore this evening that this is the best way of passing the time, I think.”

“That’s for us to judge, don’t you think?” replied Macario impertinently.

Alfonso forced a smile. The continual effort to appear at ease tired him. If he could have found a way, he would have left at once.

Francesca, sitting at the piano, had taken a bundle of music on her knees and was telling Annetta the titles. Annetta rejected each with a shake of the head, keeping a hand to her cheek as a sign of reflection. Finally she cried with a burst of laughter: “That one! That one!”

After a few introductory notes the Signorina started up a rudimentary but lively accompaniment.

Annetta began to sing in a sweet level voice, then to Alfonso’s great surprise she began to sway to the rhythm and pretend to run. Francesca roared with laughter; Macario laughed too, and even the singer could not contain herself, to the grave detriment of the song itself which broke off again and again. Then she became serious again, and so did Macario: Alfonso had only laughed in order to do as the others did.

As Annetta sang, she assumed various postures, pretended to be tired, crossed her arms over her breast as if to run better, avoided an obstacle which she cleverly mimed, asked pardon of a person she had bumped into as she ran.

Alfonso knew French, but he had a poor ear, so he found it difficult to understand. Macario, staring fixedly at Annetta and speaking in one phrase at a time in order to interrupt the song less often said:

“It’s a song sung … by a man … running after a bus,” he
interrupted
himself and murmured admiringly: “You’re doing it splendidly!”

Now Annetta really was tired; she was still pretending to run but jerking around less. She put a hand to her breast, and her voice broke into gasps.

“I can’t do any more,” she said and stopped.

Francesca, laughing, started the accompaniment again. After a few moments of standing still Annetta began to sing again. Her voice sounded fresh and sweet. She was now singing less
vivaciously
and pausing on a note or two, prolonging it with such feeling that Alfonso, who had not understood the words, began to find this song sad.

Those sweet notes showed him why he felt so miserable. They made him long to hear a friendly word from the superb creature with such a fine voice and realize that so far he had not had one. She had greeted him brusquely, interrupted ruthlessly when he had begun to speak, and not addressed a word to him. Why? She had never seen him before. It must all be contempt for an inferior, someone badly dressed; now he knew how badly dressed he was compared with Macario.

When Annetta stopped, Macario clapped with enthusiasm and Alfonso joined the applause. He rather overdid it, and soon
realized this, but did not want them to know he was offended. The pretence made him suffer greatly and he realized that he had definitely lost all the small store of ease which he had brought with him. Macario in his enthusiasm held for a long time a hand which Annetta left in his.

“The Signorina speaks French very well!” said Alfonso as if
asking
a question. No one bothered to reply, and he was silent, feeling himself a stupid bore.

Annetta served tea, helped by a maid. She insisted on Macario also taking something else, and told the maid to carry a cup over to Alfonso, whose eyes were agleam with anger. He began to feel he should react; what worried him most was a fear that Macario,
seeing
him put up so humbly with such impertinence, would despise him. He would have given his eye tooth to hit on a suitably caustic phrase.

“I never take tea,” he said then in courteous tones as if asking to be excused, nettled at finding no other phrase and at being unable to give the words any other intonation.

“Would you care for some brandy?” asked Annetta, without looking at him.

“No,” was all he said, but an involuntary bow made even this monosyllable sound courteous.

Macario now began addressing himself more and more to Alfonso, who thought that he might have noticed Annetta’s odd behaviour and wanted to make up for it by his own attentions. Alfonso answered Macario more calmly but still in monosyllables.

“D’you play an instrument?”

“No.”

Macario congratulated him; there was nothing worse than a dilettante strummer.

“Singing, as my cousin does, is all right. One can’t understand all her words, but she has quite a pleasant voice. It pleases even me: my enthusiasm a short time ago was genuine.”

Annetta thanked him ironically, but it was obvious that she was more offended by the reproof than she wished to appear. This was also realized by Alfonso with deep satisfaction. Now she too was searching, without finding, for an answer to wound with or defend herself by.

Her tone had been jesting for some time, but as Macario
continued
to pay her compliments on her beauty and grace but did not withdraw what he had said, eventually she showed her annoyance openly. Looking serious and even a little pale she cried: “Tell me definitely where I went wrong? As criticism,” she was trying to be pungent, “joking’s not enough.”

Macario began laughing so heartily that Alfonso envied him.

“D’you set so much store by your reputation as a performer? Forgive my comment, I withdraw it!”

Alfonso was the first to get up. Francesca also rose to her feet and asked him to give her good wishes to Signora Carolina. Annetta remained seated, arguing with her cousin. But the latter now also decided to go and called to Alfonso: “If you wait a moment, I’ll come with you.”

Flattered, Alfonso waited.

Macario, still very gay, said to Annetta as he shook hands: “Another time, dear cousin, don’t doubt it, I’ll give my criticism in detail.”

Joking but haughty, Annetta replied: “I don’t care; if I need
correction
I’ll find a way to correct myself.”

She offered her hand to Alfonso too; their two hands touched, both inert, and fell. Seeing her so pale, Alfonso had a second’s alarm followed quickly by a sense of satisfaction at having found a way of showing indifference.

In the street the two men stopped.

“Are you going that way?” asked Macario, pointing towards the sea.

“No,” replied Alfonso, “towards the Corso, actually.”

“Do please give me the pleasure of your company for a little of the way.”

He buttoned his fur coat, while Alfonso thrust his hands into the pockets of his overcoat with a shiver. Without waiting for a reply, Macario moved slowly towards the seashore.

“Is this the first time you have seen my cousin?” On hearing Alfonso’s “yes”, he asked “And the last time too, eh?” with a laugh which in the dark supplemented his habitual expression of
amusement
.

Alfonso thought he showed great courage by replying frankly: “I hope so!”

“It’s not worth being put out by women’s whims; my cousin’s a silly!”

“I didn’t think so!” replied Alfonso with some emotion.

Obviously Macario wanted to diminish the bad impression
produced
in Alfonso by Annetta’s behaviour.

“D’you know why you were treated so coldly? One of my uncle’s clerks recently had begun to pay court to Annetta almost as soon as he was introduced. Apparently he even boasted of a correspondence between them. My uncle heard of it and had a good laugh at his daughter for some time. That clerk was a dark little man with short curly hair, and no fool. Annetta always acts by general maxims, and will have nothing more to do with her father’s employees.”

They had reached the shore. The sea was rough, and there was the sound of waves crashing on the quay. In the darkness of the moonlit night, beyond buildings lined along the shore, the sea seemed a vast black emptiness. Only a revolving ray from the lighthouse was reflected in the water and lit its surface.

Macario drew Alfonso off to the right towards the railway station.

“I wish I hadn’t been invited. Anyway, you can be sure I won’t complain to anyone.”

He had a suspicion that Macario wanted this promise.

Macario began to laugh.

“Oh, you can tell everyone for all I care! D’you think I’m so fond of my dear relatives? Didn’t you see how I enjoyed my little cousin taking offence? Vain little thing!”

Obviously he was no longer thinking of Annetta’s bearing towards Alfonso, but speaking on his own account, and with some agitation.

“How could I praise her after hearing her sing that
Gavroche
song as if it came from Tosti? Very soon I’ll be able to lie about it, as I’ll have forgotten the song and will only
remember
her face looking so pretty in excitement. Don’t you feel that my cousin’s face isn’t lively enough, usually? Why—just as Napoleon was only really lucid on a battlefield, so my cousin is only really beautiful when she’s excited! It’s difficult to excite her though!”

By the light of a street lamp Alfonso noticed he had not made the usual gesture. With pleasant frankness Alfonso then asked Macario if he was not really very fond of his cousin.

“As for loving her …” he stopped to show he regretted his joke, and went on very seriously, “I love a different kind of girl. My cousin isn’t a girl, she’s a woman, and what’s more …” he gave a little laugh, “with so many gifts that at times she seems not to have done enough about them. She knows mathematics and
philosophy
, reads serious books for preference, and I wouldn’t be
surprised
to hear she understands them all, really understands them! She’s so scrupulously exact she might well be capable of telling me the whole contents. But an artist she’ll never be … Maybe during some instant of emotional disturbance …” Here he gesticulated so extravagantly that he might have been talking about some
revolution
. “She’s her father’s daughter … not her mother’s, who was a weak-minded ignoramus, pretty and nearly always attractive even when saying silly things. Annetta has an iron memory and outstanding mathematical qualities, a mind for the concrete and solid, like her father. They don’t understand character, they don’t appreciate music, they can’t distinguish an original picture from a bad copy. Now Annetta is interested in Chinese works of art; she’s the first to introduce them into our city, but she knows just as much as her authors tell her and understands nothing about them because she has no feeling for them. The only good picture they have in the house was bought by myself, of a road across rocks.”