Congratulating her on the way she speaks his tongue, she shyly denying her facility with language, telling him she needs… Mi bisogna un po di pesce fresco per il mio gatto… fresh fish for her cat every day, two fish a day, in the morning, one at night. She feeds him only a day, but the fish must be absolutely fresh my Irina is very fussy," she says in Italian, with girlish wink that tells him she must once have been very beautiful woman. Even at her age, there is still something elegant about the way she walks, a long graceful stride, as if she is crossing a stage; he wonders, sometimes if perhaps she was once an actress.
He first realizes she is in constant pain when, one early morning at the fish market, she can scarcely hold her handbag to pay for her purchase.
This is September, and the weather is mild and sunny, but she is struggling nonetheless with the catch on the bag, and he notices for the first time the gnarled hands and twisted fingers.
She is having such difficulty with the catch on her bag that the pain contorts her face and she turns away from him in embarrassment, continuing her struggle in silence, her back turned to him. When at last she frees the stubborn interlocking metal pieces, she turns to him and he sees that tears are running down her face as she hands him the several dollars for the two fish. "Are you all right?" he asks.
"Puoi alzare la voce?" she asks. "Sono unpo sordo."
Asking him to speak a little louder as she is a little deaf.:
He repeats the question, and she answers, in Italian, "Yes, fine, I'm fine."
He learns one day, early in October, that she is originally from Russia and at once a stronger bond is forged, these two immigrants in a city of immigrants, he an Italian seller of fish, thirty-four years old and adrift in a foreign land, she a Russian expatriate in her eighties, a former actress, perhaps, or dancer perhaps, or perhaps even a princess, who knows, seeking fresh seafood for "mio piccolo tesoro Irina."
My little treasure Irina.
She. reminds him somehow of his gentle and cultivated Aunt Lucia who married a greengrocer from Napoli when Lorenzo was only twelve, breaking his heart when she moved to that beautiful but barbaric city so very far to the south.
Their daily exchanges are no longer than ten or fifteen minutes, each, but during this time they each learn much about the other, and he finds that he looks forward to her early morning visits to the market, pretty silk scarf on her head now that winter is" approaching, woolen gloves on her twisted hands; a worn blue woolen coat, he senses she was once a woman of elegance and taste who has now fallen on hard times here in this harsh city.
One day he tells her why he left Milano.
"I am a gambler," he says. "I owed money."
"Ah," she says, and nods wisely.
"A lot of money. They threatened to kill me. In Italy, this is not an idle threat. I left."
"Do you still gamble?" she asks.
"Ehh," he says, and shrugs, and smiles saying with the slight lifting of his shoulders and faint grin, Yes, signora, every now and then, che fare? "And you?" he asks. "Do you have any habits?"
"I listen to old records," she says.
A week or so later, he learns that she once played piano on the concert stage, often performing at La Scala in Milan, which is where she learned Italian… "But no! La Scala? Veramente?"
"Yes, yes!" Excitedly.
"Not only in Milan," she says, "but also in New York and London and Paris…"
"Brava," he says.
" Budapest' Vienna Anvers, Prague, Liege, Brussels, everywhere. Everywhere." Her voice falling. "Bravissima," he says. "Yes," she says softly.
They are silent for a moment. He is wrapping the fish he recommended to her. "And now?" he says. "Do you still play?"
"Now," she says, "I listen to the past."
Just before Thanksgiving, she comes to the market one morning and tells Lorenzo she had been to see her ear doctor yesterday and he made some tests… "Audiometric tests," she says. "Non so il parole Italiano.. ." she doesn't know the Italian word for the tests, they reproduce various sounds in each ear. The results weren't good, she tells him, and now she is fearful there may be something else wrong. She has lately begun to hear ringing in her ears, she is afraid… Lorenzo tells her that tests aren't always accurate, and doctors often make mistakes, they think they're God, they think they can play with a person's emotions, but she keeps shaking her head and saying she knows the tests were correct, her hearing is getting worse and worse every day of the week. What if there comes a time when she can no longer listen to her own recordings? Then even the past will be gone. And then she might just as well be dead.
It is not until he delivers the fish to her, on the morning she got sick..,
Q: What do you mean, sick?
A: Nothing serious. A cold. Although, for an old woman…
Q: When was this?
A: The beginning of the month.
Q: This month? January?
A: Yes…
Q: How'd you know she was sick?
A: She telephoned me.
