Zeno's Conscience Part 5

My complete lack of success with Ada became evident at the very moment when I judged that I should finally speak out clearly. I received the evidence with surprise and, at first, with incredulity. She had not uttered one word indicating her aversion toward me, and I had meanwhile shut my eyes so as not to see those little acts that suggested no great liking for me. And yet I myself hadn't said the necessary word, and I could always imagine that Ada didn't know I was there ready to marry her and she might believe that I-the eccentric and not very virtuous student-was seeking something quite different.

The misunderstanding kept being prolonged because of my intentions, which were too decidedly matrimonial. It is true that now I wanted all of Ada, whose cheeks I had a.s.siduously polished, whose hands and feet I had made smaller, whose figure I had thinned and refined. I desired her as wife and as lover. But the way a woman is approached the first time is decisive.

Now for three times consecutively it so happened that I was received at the house by the other two girls. Ada's absence was explained the first time with the excuse of a call that had to be paid, the second with an indisposition, and the third I was given no excuse at all until, alarmed, I inquired. Then Augusta, whom I had addressed, didn't answer. In her place Alberta, at whom she had glanced as if seeking help, replied: Ada had gone to their aunt's.

My breath failed me. Obviously Ada was avoiding me. Even the day before, I had still tolerated her absence and had indeed prolonged my visit, hoping that in the end she would appear. This day, on the contrary, I stayed barely another few moments, unable to open my mouth, and then, pleading a sudden headache, I rose to leave. Strange: as I encountered Ada's resistance that first time, my strongest feeling was fury, outrage! I even thought of appealing to Giovanni to call the girl to order. A man who wants to marry is capable of such actions, repet.i.tions of those of his ancestors.

This third absence of Ada was to become even more significant. By sheer chance I discovered she was in the house, but shut up in her room.

First of all I must say that in the house there was another person I hadn't succeeded in winning: little Anna. She no longer attacked me in the presence of others, because they had scolded her sharply. Indeed, at times she actually joined her sisters and listened to my stories. But when I left, she would overtake me at the door, politely ask me to bend down to her, then stand on tiptoe, and when she was actually able to press her little mouth to my ear, lowering her voice so that only I could hear her, she would say, calling me tu: "You are crazy, really crazy!"

The funny thing is that when the others were there, the little minx addressed me formally. If Signora Malfenti was in the room, the child would promptly take refuge in her mother's arms, and the Signora would stroke her, saying: "How polite my little Anna's become! Hasn't she?"

I never protested, and the polite Anna often would call me crazy again in the same fas.h.i.+on. I received her a.s.sertion with a cowardly smile that could have looked like thanks. I hoped the child wouldn't have the nerve to tell the grownups of her aggressions, and I was unwilling to inform Ada of her little sister's opinion of me. In the end that child really embarra.s.sed me. If, when I was speaking with the others, my eye met hers, I immediately had to find an excuse to look elsewhere, and this was difficult to do with any naturalness. I blushed, certainly. It seemed to me that the innocent little creature, with her opinion, could do me harm. I brought her presents, but they didn't mollify her. She must have been aware of her power and of my weakness, and in front of the others she looked at me, studying me with insolence. I believe we all have, in our conscience as in our body, some tender, concealed spots that we do not like to be reminded of. We don't even know what they are, but we know they're there. I turned my eye away from that childish gaze that wanted to delve into me.

But on this day as, alone and dejected, I was leaving the house, she overtook me, to make me bend down and hear the usual compliment, I leaned over to her and held out toward her my hands contracted into talons, with a face so distraught, a real madman's, that she ran off weeping and screaming.

So I managed to see Ada also this day, because it was she who came running at those cries. The child, sobbing, told her I had threatened her terribly because she had called me crazy.

"Because he really is crazy and I want to tell him so. What's wrong with that?"

I didn't listen to the girl, amazed to see Ada was at home. So her sisters had lied, or rather only Alberta had, to whom Augusta had handed over the duty, exempting herself! For a moment I had justice on my side, I was totally aware, guessing the whole story.

I said to Ada: "I'm glad to see you. I thought you had been at your aunt's for three days."

She didn't answer me at first because she bent over the weeping child. That delay in obtaining the explanation to which I felt ent.i.tled made my blood rush violently to my head. I was speechless. I took another step in the direction of the front door, and if Ada hadn't spoken to me, I would have gone away and would never have come back. In my wrath, this seemed an easy step, this renunciation of a dream that by now had gone on too long.

But at this point she turned to me, her face flushed, and said she had come in just a few moments before, because she hadn't found her aunt at home.

That sufficed to calm me. How dear she was, how maternally attentive to the child, who went on screaming! Ada's body was so supple that it seemed to have become smaller the better to reach the child. I lingered, admiring her, considering her again mine.

I felt so rea.s.sured that I wanted to make them forget my previous vexation, and I was very polite with Ada and even with Anna.

Laughing heartily, I said: "She calls me crazy so often that I wanted to show her a lunatic's real face and att.i.tude. Do forgive me! You too, poor little Anna, don't be afraid: I'm a nice madman."

Ada, too, was very, very polite. She scolded the still-sobbing child, and apologized to me for her. If I had really been in luck, and, if in her anger, Anna had run away, I would have spoken. I would have uttered the sentence that is perhaps found even in certain foreign-language phrase books, ready-made, to facilitate the life of those who don't know the language of the country where they are staying: May I ask your father for your hand? This was the first time I wanted to marry, and so I found myself in a totally foreign land. Until then I had dealt differently with any women I encountered. I a.s.saulted them, laying my hands on them right at the start.

But I didn't manage to say even those few words. Even they required a certain length of time! They had to be accompanied by a pleading facial expression, difficult to a.s.sume immediately after my conflict with Anna and also with Ada, and from the end of the hall Signora Malfenti was already advancing, summoned by the child's howls.

I held out my hand to Ada, who cordially and promptly gave me hers, and I said to her: "I'll see you tomorrow. My excuses to your mother."

I hesitated, however, to release that hand, resting trustfully in mine. I could sense that, leaving now, I would be rejecting a unique opportunity with this girl so intent on showing me every courtesy, compensating for her sister's rudeness. I followed the inspiration of the moment, I bent over her hand and brushed it with my lips. Then I opened the door and went out very quickly, after having seen that Ada, who until then had given me her right hand while her left supported Anna, clinging to her skirt, now looked with amazement at the tiny hand that had been subjected to the contact of my lips, as if she wanted to see if something were written there. I don't believe Signora Malfenti had glimpsed my action.

I stopped for a moment on the steps, amazed at my own absolutely unpremeditated act. Was it still possible to go back to that door I had closed behind me, ring the bell, and ask to be allowed to say to Ada those words she had sought in vain on her hand? No, I thought. My dignity would have suffered if I showed too much impatience. Besides, having informed her that I would come back, I had heralded my explanations. Now it was simply up to her to receive them, creating the opportunity for me to express them to her. Finally I had stopped telling stories to three young ladies and, instead, had kissed the hand of only one of them.

But then the day became rather unpleasant. I was restless and uneasy. I kept telling myself that my restlessness derived only from my impatience to see this matter resolved. I imagined that if Ada were to refuse me, I could then quite calmly go off in pursuit of other women. My attachment to her was totally the result of my own free determination, which now could be annulled by another woman, who would erase it! I didn't then understand that for the moment there were no other women in this world for me, and that I needed Ada and only her.

The night that followed also seemed to me very long; I lay awake for almost all of it. Since my father's death I had abandoned my noctambulist habits and now, when I had determined to marry, it would have been odd to resume them. I had therefore gone to bed early, wis.h.i.+ng for sleep, which makes time pa.s.s so quickly.

During the day I had accepted with absolute blind faith Ada's explanations of those three absences from her living room in the hours when I was there, a faith born of my firm conviction that the serious woman I had chosen was incapable of lying. But during the night that faith was weakened. I suspected it was I myself who informed her that Alberta-since Augusta refused to speak-had supplied the excuse of that visit to her aunt. I didn't recall exactly the words I had addressed to her, my head aflame, but I believed I could be certain of having repeated that excuse. Too bad! If I hadn't, perhaps she, to excuse herself, would have invented something different, and having caught her out in a falsehood, I would already have had the clarification I was yearning for.

Here, too, I might have realized the importance Ada had for me by now, because to recover some calm I kept repeating to myself that if she wouldn't have me, then I would renounce marriage forever. Her refusal would thus change my life. And I went on daydreaming, comforting myself with the thought that perhaps this rejection would be a stroke of luck for me. I recalled that Greek philosopher who predicted regret both for those who married and for those who remained single. In short, I hadn't lost the capacity to laugh at my adventure; the only capacity I lacked was for sleep.

I dozed off as dawn was already breaking. When I woke up it was so late that only a few hours separated me from the time when I was allowed to visit the Malfenti house. Thus there would be no further need to daydream and collect other clues that might clarify Ada's thoughts for me. But it is hard to restrain one's own mind from brooding on a subject that is too important. Man would be a happier animal if he could do that. In the midst of the attentions to my person, which on that day I exaggerated, I thought of nothing else: In kissing Ada's hand, had I done the right thing? Or had I been wrong in not kissing her also on the lips?

That same morning I had an idea that I believe caused me great harm, robbing me of what little manly initiative my curiously adolescent state would have granted me. A painful suspicion: What if Ada were to marry me only because her parents prompted her to, without loving me or, indeed, feeling an aversion to me? For surely all the family, that is to say Giovanni, Signora Malfenti, Augusta, and Alberta, were fond of me; I could entertain doubts only about Ada. On the horizon the usual cheap novel was looming up: the young girl forced by her family into a hateful marriage. But I would never have allowed that. Here was another reason why I had to speak with Ada, indeed with Ada alone. It wouldn't be enough to say to her the words I had rehea.r.s.ed. Looking into her eyes, I would ask: "Do you love me?" And if she said yes, I would clasp her in my arms, to feel the vibration of her sincerity.

So I seemed to be prepared for everything. But, on the contrary, I was to realize that I was about to be given a sort of exam, but had forgotten to go over the very pages of text on which I would be interrogated.

I was received by Signora Malfenti alone, who asked me to sit down in one corner of the great drawing room, then immediately began chattering vivaciously, preventing me even from asking for any news of the girls. I was therefore quite bewildered, but I reviewed my a.s.signment to make sure I wouldn't forget it when the right moment came. All of a sudden I was recalled to attention as if by a trumpet blast. The Signora was delivering a preamble. She a.s.sured me of her friends.h.i.+p and her husband's, and of the affection of their whole family, including little Anna. We had known one another for such a long time. We had been seeing one another daily for four months.

"Five!" I corrected her, having counted them during the night remembering that my first visit had taken place in autumn, and now it was full spring.

"Yes, five!" the Signora said, thinking it over, as if to check my calculation. Then, in a reproachful tone: "It seems to me that you are compromising Augusta."

"Augusta?" I asked, believing I hadn't heard her correctly.

"Yes," she confirmed. "You lead her on, and you are compromising her."

Ingenuously, I revealed my feelings: "But I never see Augusta. "

She made a gesture of surprise and, indeed (or was it just my imagination?), of pained surprise.

I was trying, meanwhile, to concentrate my thoughts in order to arrive rapidly at an explanation of what seemed to me a misunderstanding, whose importance, however, I had immediately grasped. In my mind, I saw myself again, visit by visit, during those five months, intent on studying Ada. I had played music with Augusta, and indeed at times I had talked more with her, who listened to me, than with Ada, but only so that Augusta could then explain my stories, enhanced by her approval, to Ada. Should I speak openly to the Signora and tell her of my designs on Ada? But a little earlier I had resolved to speak with Ada alone and plumb her heart. Perhaps if I had spoken openly with Signora Malfenti, things would have taken a different turn and, unable to marry Ada, I wouldn't have married Augusta, either. But following the resolution I had made before seeing Signora Malfenti, and hearing the surprising things she said to me, I was silent.

I thought hard, and therefore with a bit of confusion. I wanted to understand, I wanted to divine, and quickly. You see things less clearly when you open your eyes too wide. I could glimpse the possibility of their wanting to throw me out of their house. But I thought I could dismiss that. I was innocent, since I wasn't paying court to Augusta, whom they meant to protect. But perhaps they ascribed to me intentions regarding Augusta to avoid compromising Ada. And why protect Ada in this way, when, after all, she was no longer a child? I was sure I had seized her by the hair only in my dream. In reality I had done nothing more than touch her hand with my lips. I didn't want them to forbid me access to that house because, before leaving it for good, I wanted to speak with Ada. And so, in a tremulous voice, I asked: "Tell me, Signora, what I must do in order to offend no one."

She hesitated. I would have preferred to deal with Giovanni, who thought at the top of his lungs. Then, firmly, but with an effort to seem polite that was obvious in her tone of voice, she said: "For a while you should visit us less frequently-not every day, but perhaps two or three times a week."

Certainly, if she had told me curtly to leave and never return, I would have clung to my resolution, begging them to tolerate me in that house at least for another day or two, until I could clarify my situation with Ada. But instead, her words gave me the courage to display my pique: "Well, if you wish, I'll never set foot in this house again!"

What I had hoped for then occurred. She protested, again declaring the respect they all felt for me, and begging me not to be angry with her. And I made a display of my magnanimity, promising everything she wished, namely to stay away from that house for four or five days, then to come back regularly two or three times every week and, above all, not to harbor any resentment.

Having made these promises, I decided to show I meant to keep them, and I stood up to leave.

Laughing, the Signora protested: "With me there can be no compromising of any kind, and you may remain."

I begged her to allow me to leave, pleading an engagement I had only just remembered, while the truth was that I couldn't wait to be alone in order to ponder more comfortably this extraordinary adventure that had befallen me. The Signora actually implored me to stay, saying that I would thus give her the proof that I wasn't angry with her. So I remained, subjected constantly to the torture of listening to the idle chatter the Signora now indulged in, all about female fas.h.i.+on, which she didn't want to follow, about the theater, and also about this dry weather that was ushering in spring.

A little later I was glad I had remained, because I realized I needed a further explanation. Without any ceremony I interrupted the Signora, whose words I no longer heard, to ask her: "Will the whole family know that you have asked me to stay away from this house?"

At first she seemed not even to remember our agreement. Then she protested, "Away from this house? But only for a few days, mind you. I won't mention it to anyone, not even to my husband; in fact, I'd be grateful if you would use the same discretion."

I promised this, too, and I further promised that if I were asked to explain why I wasn't seen there so often, I would invent various excuses. For the moment I believed the Signora's words, and I imagined Ada might be amazed and grieved by my sudden absence. An attractive picture!

Then I stayed on, still awaiting some further inspiration, while the Signora talked about food prices, which had lately risen sky-high.

Instead of further inspiration, Aunt Rosina appeared, Giovanni's sister, older than he, but much less intelligent. She did possess some aspects of his moral physiognomy, enough to identify her as his sister. First of all, she had the same awareness of her own rights and of the duties of others-a fairly comical att.i.tude, since she lacked any weapon with which to enforce it-and she also had the bad habit of abruptly raising her voice. She thought that in her brother's house her rights were such that-as I learned later-she considered Signora Malfenti an intruder. She was a spinster, and she lived with just one maidservant, of whom she spoke always as her greatest enemy. When Aunt Rosina was dying, she charged my wife to keep an eye on the house until the maid, who had nursed her, was gone. Everyone in Giovanni's household put up with Aunt Rosina, fearing her aggressiveness.

Still I didn't leave. Aunt Rosina's favorite among her nieces was Ada. I felt a desire to win the old woman's friends.h.i.+p, too, and I searched for some engaging remark to address to her. I remembered vaguely that on the last occasion when I had seen her (or, rather, glanced at her, because then I had felt no need to look at her), the nieces, as soon as she had left, had remarked that she wasn't looking well. Actually, one of them had said: "She must have poisoned her blood in some rage with her maid."

I had found what I had sought. Looking affectionately at the old lady's broad, wrinkled face, I said to her: "You look much better, Signora."

I should have kept my mouth shut. She stared at me, amazed, and protested: "I'm the same as always. Better than when, according to you?"

She wanted to know when I had last seen her. I didn't remember that date exactly, and I had to remind her that we had spent a whole afternoon together, seated in that same living room with the three young ladies, not where we were now but on the other side. I had intended to show her my interest, but the explanations she demanded made it all last too long. My falsity oppressed me, producing genuine pain.

Signora Malfenti spoke up, smiling: "Surely you didn't mean to say that Aunt Rosina has put on weight?"

Good Lord! So this was the reason for Aunt Rosina's annoyance. She was very heavy, like her brother, and she hoped to grow thinner.

"Put on weight? No, indeed! I just wanted to say that Signora Rosina's color is better."

I tried to maintain an affectionate tone, whereas I had really to make an effort not to utter some piece of insolence.

Still, Aunt Rosina didn't seem satisfied. She had not been ill lately, and she couldn't see why she should have appeared ill. And Signora Malfenti agreed with her.

"Indeed, her color never alters: it's part of her," she said, turning to me. "Don't you think so?"

I thought so. Indeed, it was obvious. I left immediately. With great cordiality I held out my hand to Aunt Rosina, hoping to smooth her ruffled feathers, but she looked away as she gave her hand to me.

As soon as I had crossed the threshold of that house, my mood changed. What a liberation! I no longer had to ponder the meanings of Signora Malfenti, or make an effort to please Aunt Rosina. I actually think that if Aunt Rosina hadn't spoken up so sharply, that strategist Signora Malfenti would have achieved her purpose fully and I would have left that house, quite pleased with her cordial treatment. I skipped down the steps. Aunt Rosina had been a kind of gloss on Signora Malfenti. Signora Malfenti had suggested I stay away from her house for a few days. Too kind, dear lady! I would content her beyond her expectations, and she would never see me again! They had tortured me: the Signora, the aunt, and even Ada! With what right? Because I had wanted to marry? But I no longer gave it a thought! How beautiful freedom was!

For a good quarter of an hour I strode through the streets, accompanied by these feelings. Then I felt the need for an even greater freedom. I had to find a way to mark definitively my determination never to set foot in that house again. I rejected the idea of writing a letter in which I would take my leave. My abandonment became even haughtier if I didn't communicate my intention. I would simply forget to see Giovanni and his whole family.

I found the gesture, discreet and mannerly and therefore a bit ironic, with which I would thus seal my determination.

I rushed to a florist and selected a magnificent bouquet, which I addressed to Signora Malfenti accompanied by my card, on which I wrote only the date. Nothing more was needed. It was a date I would never forget thereafter, and perhaps Ada and her mother wouldn't forget it either: May 5, the anniversary of the death of Napoleon.

I insisted on immediate delivery. It was important for the flowers to arrive that very day.

And then? Everything had been done, absolutely everything, because there was nothing left to do! Ada remained separated from me, with all her family, and I had to live, doing nothing more, waiting for one of them to come seeking me, giving me the opportunity to do or say something else.

I rushed to my study to reflect and to shut myself away. If I had succ.u.mbed to my painful impatience, I would have immediately hurried back to that house, with the risk of arriving there before my flowers. There could be no lack of pretexts. I might even have forgotten my umbrella!

I didn't want to do anything of the sort. In sending that bouquet, I had taken a splendid stand, and it had to be maintained. Now I had to keep still, for the next move was up to them.

The introspection I achieved in my study, from which I had antic.i.p.ated solace, only made clearer the reasons for my despair, exacerbated to the point of tears. I loved Ada! I didn't yet know if that was the right verb, and I continued my a.n.a.lysis. I wanted her not only to be mine, but to be my wife: she, with that marmoreal face and that unripe body, but only she, with her gravity, that made her unable to understand my wit, which I would not impart to her, but would renounce forever while she would instruct me in a life of intelligence and work. I wanted all of her, and I wanted all from her. In the end I concluded the verb was correct: I loved Ada.

It seemed to me that I had thought of something very important, which could guide me. Away with all hesitation!

It was no longer important to know if she loved me. I had to try to win her, and it was no longer necessary to speak with her if she was Giovanni's to bestow. Everything had to be cleared up promptly, to arrive at happiness at once or else to forget everything and be healed. Why did I have to suffer so much in this waiting? When I had learned-and I could learn it only from Giovanni-that I had definitively lost Ada, at least I would no longer have to battle with time, which would continue pa.s.sing slowly without my feeling any need to push it. What's definitive is always calm, because it is detached from time.

I rushed at once to look for Giovanni. I sped in two directions. First toward his office, located in that street we continue to call New Houses, because that's what our ancestors called it. Tall old houses darkened the street, so close to the seash.o.r.e, almost deserted at the sunset hour, and there I could proceed rapidly. As I walked on, I thought only of preparing as briefly as possible the sentence I would address to him. I had only to inform him of my resolve to marry his daughter. I didn't have to win him or convince him. That businessman would know what answer to give me the moment he had heard my question. Yet I was troubled by the problem of whether, on such an occasion, I should speak to him in dialect or in standard Italian.

But Giovanni had already left his office and had gone to the Tergesteo. I headed in that direction. More slowly, because I knew that at the Bourse I would have to wait longer to be able to speak to him alone. Then, arriving at Via Cavana, I had to slow down because of the crowd blocking the narrow street. And it was precisely when I 'was fighting my way through that crowd that I was finally granted, as if in a vision, the clarity I had been seeking for so many hours. The Malfentis wanted me to marry Augusta and didn't want me to marry Ada, and this for the simple reason that Augusta was in love with me and Ada didn't love me at all. Not at all, because otherwise they wouldn't have intervened to separate us. They had told me I was compromising Augusta, but on the contrary, it was she who had compromised herself, in loving me. I understood everything at that moment, with vivid clarity, as if some member of the family had told me. And I guessed also that Ada had concurred in my being sent away from that house. She didn't love me, and she would never love me as long as her sister loved me. On the crowded Via Cavana, therefore, I had thought more purposefully than in my solitary study.

Today, when I cast my mind back to those five memorable days that led me to marriage, I am dumbfounded by the fact that my spirit was not affected on learning that poor Augusta loved me. Now cast out of the Malfentis' house, I loved Ada wrathfully. Why did I derive no satisfaction from the clear perception that Signora Malfenti had driven me away in vain, since I continued to dwell in that house, and very close to Ada, namely in the heart of Augusta? I actually considered a further insult Signora Malfenti's appeal to me not to compromise Augusta and, instead, to marry her. Toward the ugly girl who loved me I felt the very disdain I could not believe was addressed to me by her beautiful sister, whom I loved.

I walked still faster, but I turned aside and headed for my house. I no longer had to speak with Giovanni, because I now knew exactly how to behave; I saw it with a clarity so disheartening that perhaps it would at last give me peace, detaching me from time, which moved too slowly. It was even dangerous to talk about it with that boorish Giovanni. Signora Malfenti had spoken in a way I would understand only there in Via Cavana. Her husband was capable of behaving differently. He might even have said to me: "Why do you want to marry Ada? Let's see! Wouldn't you be better off marrying Augusta?" Because he had an axiom I remembered, one that might guide him in this situation: "You must always explain clearly any business transaction to your opponent, that's the only way you can be sure of understanding it better than he does!" Well, now what?

An open break would follow. Not until then would time be able to proceed at its chosen pace, because then I would have no reason to meddle with it: I would have arrived at the still point!

I remembered, too, another axiom of Giovanni's, and I clung to it because it gave me great hope. I was able to hang on to it for five days, those five days that transformed my pa.s.sion into illness. Giovanni used to say you must never be in a hurry to close a transaction when you can't expect any gain: every transaction sooner or later arrives at its conclusion on its own, as is proved by the fact that the history of the world is so long and that so few transactions remain unsettled. Until the moment it is settled, any transaction may prove profitable.

I didn't remember that Giovanni had other axioms affirming the opposite, and I clung to that one. I had to cling to something. I made an ironclad resolution not to move until I learned that some new development had redirected my transaction to my advantage. And I was thus done such harm that, perhaps for this reason, no subsequent resolution of mine ever remained with me for so long a time.

No sooner had I made this resolution than I received a note from Signora Malfenti. I recognized the handwriting on the envelope, and before opening it, I flattered myself that my ironclad decision alone had sufficed to make her regret her maltreatment of me, inspiring her now to seek me out. When I found that the note contained only the letters p.r.,* which meant thanks for the flowers I had sent her, I was in despair. I flung myself on my bed and sank my teeth into the pillow as if to nail myself there and prevent myself from running out and breaking my vow. What ironic serenity emanated from those two letters! Far greater than that expressed by the date I had written on my card, which meant first a resolution and perhaps *p.r., for per ringaziamento: written on a calling card, these letters represented a correct but formal and cold way of saying thank you.

also a reproach. Remember, said Charles I, before they decapitated him, and he must have been referring to that day's date! I, too, had urged my adversary to remember and to fear!

Five terrible days and five terrible nights followed, and I observed the dawns and the sunsets that meant end and beginning and brought closer the hour of my freedom, the freedom to fight again for my love.

I was preparing for that combat. By now I knew how my fair maiden wanted me to be. It is easy to remember some resolutions I made then, first of all because I made some identical ones more recently, and further because I made a note of them on a sheet of paper I have kept. I was determined to become more serious. That meant not telling those jokes that made others laugh but discredited me, while they made the ugly Augusta love me and moved my Ada to contempt. Then there was the determination to be every morning at eight o'clock sharp in my office, which I hadn't seen for such a long time, and not to argue with Olivi about my rights, but to work with him and become capable of a.s.suming in due course the management of my affairs. This would be essayed in a period more serene than the present; similarly, I would also stop smoking later, namely when I had regained my freedom, because it wouldn't do to make this horrible interval even worse. Ada was ent.i.tled to a perfect husband. So there were various plans to devote myself to serious reading, and to spend a half hour every day in the salle d'armes, and to go riding a couple of times each week. The day's twenty-four hours were not too many.

During those days of isolation, the most bitter jealousy was my constant companion. I had made the heroic vow to correct my every fault in preparation for my conquest of Ada in a few weeks' time. But for the present? For the present, as I subjected myself to the sternest discipline, would the other males of the city remain inactive, or would they try instead to take my woman away from me? Among them there was surely one who didn't need all these exertions in order to make himself welcome. I knew-I thought I knew-that when Ada found the man suited to her, she would immediately consent, without waiting to fall in love. During those days, when I encounted a well-dressed male, healthy and carefree, I hated him because to me he seemed to fit the bill for Ada. The thing I remember best from those days is the jealousy that descended like a fog on my life.

The horrid suspicion that I would see Ada taken from me in those days is nothing to laugh at, now that we know how things turned out. When I think back to those days of pa.s.sion, I feel a great awe of my prophetic spirit.

Various times, at night, I walked beneath the windows of that house. Upstairs, they apparently continued amusing themselves as they had when I, too, had been there. At midnight or shortly before, the lights would go out in the living room. I would run off, afraid of being glimpsed by some visitor who would then be leaving the house.

But every hour of those days was torture also because of my impatience. Why did no one inquire after me? Why didn't Giovanni do something? Shouldn't he have been amazed, seeing me neither at his house nor at the Tergesteo? Was he, then, also in agreement about my banishment? I often interrupted my walks, day and night, to rush home and make sure no one had come asking for me. I couldn't go to bed if there was any doubt in my mind, so I would wake poor Maria and question her. I would spend hours waiting at home, the place where I was most easily found. But no one asked for me, and surely if I hadn't made up my mind to stir myself, I would still be a bachelor.

One evening I went to gamble at the club. For many years I hadn't put in an appearance there, respecting a promise I had made my father. It seemed to me the promise no longer had any validity, since my father couldn't have foreseen my painful circ.u.mstances and my urgent need for distraction. At first I won, but with a luck that grieved me because it seemed a compensation for my bad luck in love. Then I lost, and I grieved again because I seemed to succ.u.mb to gambling as I had succ.u.mbed to love. I soon became fed up with the play. It was unworthy of me, and also of Ada. That was how pure my love made me!

In those days I also realized how my dreams of love had been annihilated by that harsh reality. Now my dream was quite different. I dreamed of victory rather than of love. My sleep was once embellished by a visit from Ada. She was in bridal attire and was coming with me to the altar, but when we were left alone, we didn't make love, not even then. I was her husband and I had gained the right to ask her: "How could you have allowed me to be treated like that?" No other rights mattered to me.

In one of my drawers I find drafts of letters to Ada, to Giovanni, and to Signora Malfenti. They date from that time. To Signora Malfenti I wrote a simple note, taking my leave before setting off on a long journey. I don't recall having had any such thing in mind, however. I couldn't leave the city when I wasn't certain no one would come looking for me. What a misfortune if they were to come and then not find me! None of those letters was sent. I believe I wrote them only to record my thoughts on paper.

For many years I had considered myself ill, but the illness made others suffer more than it did me. Now I finally came to know "painful" illness, a host of unpleasant physical sensations that made me genuinely unhappy.

This is how they began. At about one in the morning, unable to fall asleep, I would get up and walk around in the mild night until I came upon an outlying cafe, where I had never been and where I would thus not encounter any acquaintance: a welcome situation because I wanted to continue an argument with Signora Malfenti I had begun in bed, and I didn't want anybody interfering. Signora Malfenti had addressed further reproaches to me. She said I had tried to "play footsies" with her daughters. Actually, if I had attempted such a thing, I had surely done so only with Ada. I broke into a cold sweat at the thought that the Malfenti family was now reproaching me in such a fas.h.i.+on. The absent man is always wrong, and they could have taken advantage of my absence to band together against me. In the bright light of the cafe, I defended myself better. To be sure, there had been times when I would have liked to touch Ada's foot with mine, and once, indeed, I thought I had done so, with her acquiescence. But then it turned out I had pressed the wooden foot of the table, and that foot surely couldn't have told on me.

I pretended to take an interest in the billiards game. One gentleman, leaning on a crutch, came over and sat down right beside me. He ordered a lemonade, and since the waiter expected an order also from me, absently I also asked for lemonade, though I can't bear the taste of lemon. Meanwhile, the crutch, first propped against the sofa where we were seated, now slid to the floor, and I bent to pick it up with an almost instinctive movement.

"Oh, Zeno!" the poor cripple said, recognizing me as he turned to thank me.

"Tullio!" I cried, surprised, holding out my hand. We had been schoolmates, but hadn't seen each other for many years. I knew that, after finis.h.i.+ng high school, he had gone into a bank, where he now held a good position.

I was nevertheless so distracted that I curtly asked him what had happened to shorten his right leg, making the crutch necessary.

With great good humor he told me that six months previously he had begun suffering from rheumatism so severe that it had finally affected his leg.

I quickly suggested many treatments. This is the ideal, effortless way to feign lively concern. He had tried them all. Then I interfered further: "In that case, why aren't you in bed, at this hour? I don't believe exposure to the night air can be good for you."

He joked, still good-naturedly, replying that he didn't believe the night air was good for me, either, and he was sure that those who haven't suffered from rheumatism, as long as they remain alive, can still fall victim to it. The right not to go to bed until the small hours was granted even by the Austrian const.i.tution. For that matter, contrary to general opinion, heat and cold had nothing to do with rheumatism. He had studied his illness, and indeed he did nothing else in this world but investigate its causes and its remedies. He had been given an extended leave from the bank, not so much for treatment as for more thorough study. Then he told me he was following a strange cure. Every day he ate an enormous quant.i.ty of lemons. That day he had consumed about thirty, but with practice he hoped to be able to tolerate even more. He confided to me that lemons, in his opinion, were good also for many other diseases. Since he had begun taking them, he felt less irritation from the excessive smoking of which he, too, was a victim.

I felt a shudder run through me at the vision of all that acid, but immediately afterwards I had a somewhat happier vision of life: I didn't like lemons, but if they were to give me the liberty to do what I should do or wanted to do without suffering harm, freeing me from every other restraint, I would consume those countless lemons myself. Complete freedom consists of being able to do what you like, provided you also do something you like less. True slavery is being condemned to abstinence: Tantalus, not Hercules.