But, unfortunately for her and for me, it seemed a small-minded act. Thinking it would be for her good, I would not restore her to the bleakness of the Cerullo house, and so a single idea became fixed in my mind and all I could do was tell her over and over again, with gentle persuasion: Silvio Solara, Lila, isn’t Marcello, or even Michele; it’s wrong to confuse them, you know better than I do, you’ve said it yourself on other occasions. He’s not the one who pulled Ada into the car, he’s not the one who shot at us the night of New Year’s, he’s not the one who forced his way into your house, he’s not the one who said vulgar things about you; Silvio will be the speech master and will help Rino and Stefano sell the shoes, that’s all—he’ll have no importance in your future life. I reshuffled the cards that by now we knew well enough. I spoke of the before and the after, of the old generation and of ours, of how we were different, of how she and Stefano were different. And this last argument made a breach, seduced her, I returned to it passionately. She listened to me in silence, evidently she wanted to be helped to compose herself, and slowly she did. But I read in her eyes that that move of Stefano’s had shown her something about him that she still couldn’t see clearly and that just for that reason frightened her even more than the ravings of Rino. She said to me:
“Maybe it’s not true that he loves me.”
“What do you mean he doesn’t love you? He does everything you tell him to.”
“Only when I don’t put real money at risk,” she said in a tone of contempt that I had never heard her use for Stefano Carracci.
In any case she returned to the world. She didn’t appear in the grocery, she didn’t go to the new house, in other words she was not the one who would seek to reconcile. She waited for Stefano to say to her: “Thank you, I love you dearly, you know there are things one is obliged to do.” Only then did she let him come up behind her and kiss her on the neck. But then she turned suddenly and looking him straight in the eyes said to him, “Marcello Solara must absolutely not set foot in my wedding.”
“How can I prevent it?”
“I don’t know, but you must swear to me.”
He snorted and said smiling, “All right, Lina, I swear.”
57.
March 12th arrived, a mild day that was almost like spring. Lila wanted me to come early to her old house, so that I could help her wash, do her hair, dress. She sent her mother away, we were alone. She sat on the edge of the bed in underpants and bra. Next to her was the wedding dress, which looked like the body of a dead woman; in front of us, on the hexagonal-tiled floor, was the copper tub full of boiling water. She asked me abruptly: “Do you think I’m making a mistake?”
“How?”
“By getting married.”
“Are you still thinking about the speech master?”
“No, I’m thinking of the teacher. Why didn’t she want me to come in?”
“Because she’s a mean old lady.”
She was silent for a while, staring at the water that sparkled in the tub, then she said, “Whatever happens, you’ll go on studying.”
“Two more years: then I’ll get my diploma and I’m done.”
“No, don’t ever stop: I’ll give you the money, you should keep studying.”
I gave a nervous laugh, then said, “Thanks, but at a certain point school is over.”
“Not for you: you’re my brilliant friend, you have to be the best of all, boys and girls.”
She got up, took off her underpants and bra, said, “Come on, help me, otherwise I’ll be late.”
I had never seen her naked, I was embarrassed. Today I can say that it was the embarrassment of gazing with pleasure at her body, of being the not impartial witness of her sixteen-year-old’s beauty a few hours before Stefano touched her, penetrated her, disfigured her, perhaps, by making her pregnant. At the time it was just a tumultuous sensation of necessary awkwardness, a state in which you cannot avert the gaze or take away the hand without recognizing your own turmoil, without, by that retreat, declaring it, hence without coming into conflict with the undisturbed innocence of the one who is the cause of the turmoil, without expressing by that rejection the violent emotion that overwhelms you, so that it forces you to stay, to rest your gaze on the childish shoulders, on the breasts and stiffly cold nipples, on the narrow hips and the tense buttocks, on the black sex, on the long legs, on the tender knees, on the curved ankles, on the elegant feet; and to act as if it’s nothing, when instead everything is there, present, in the poor dim room, amid the worn furniture, on the uneven, water-stained floor, and your heart is agitated, your veins inflamed.
