“Nino gave me his address,” I said to Lila. “If you don’t mind, when Stefano and Rino come I’m going to see him.”
I flushed.
“Well, if you’re with your husbands, what am I supposed to do?”
For a long moment there was only the noise of the engine and the mute presence of the sailor at the helm.
Lila said coldly, “Keep Mamma company. I didn’t bring you here to have fun.”
I restrained myself. We had had a week of freedom. That day, besides, both she and Pinuccia, on the beach, in the sun, during long swims, and thanks to the words that Sarratore knew how to use to inspire laughter and to charm, had forgotten themselves. Donato had made them feel like girl-women in the care of an unusual father, the rare father who doesn’t punish you but encourages you to express your desires without guilt. And now that the day was over I, in declaring that I would have a Sunday to myself with a university student—what was I doing, was I reminding them both that that week in which their condition as wives was suspended was over and that their husbands were about to reappear? Yes, I had overdone it. Cut out your tongue, I thought.
45.
The husbands, in fact, arrived early. They were expected Sunday morning, but they appeared Saturday evening, very excited, with Lambrettas that they had, I think, rented at the Ischia Port. Nunzia prepared a lavish dinner. There was talk of the neighborhood, of the stores, of how the new shoes were coming along. Rino was full of self-praise for the models that he was perfecting with his father, but at an opportune moment he thrust some sketches under Lila’s nose, and she examined them reluctantly, suggesting some modifications. Then we sat down at the table, and the two young men gorged themselves, competing to see who could eat more. It wasn’t even ten when they dragged their wives to the bedrooms.
I helped Nunzia clear and wash the dishes. Then I shut myself in my room, I read a little. The heat in the closed room was suffocating, but I was afraid of the blotches I’d get from the mosquito bites, and I didn’t open the window. I tossed and turned in the bed, soaked with sweat: I thought of Lila, of how, slowly, she had yielded. Certainly, she didn’t show any particular affection for her husband; and the tenderness that I had sometimes seen in her gestures when they were engaged had disappeared. During dinner she had frequently commented with disgust at the way Stefano gobbled his food, the way he drank; but it was evident that some equilibrium, who knows how precarious, had been reached. When he, after some allusive remarks, headed toward the bedroom, Lila followed without delay, without saying go on, I’ll join you later; she was resigned to an inevitable routine. Between her and her husband there was not the carnival spirit displayed by Rino and Pinuccia, but there was no resistance, either. Deep into the night I heard the noise of the two couples, the laughter and the sighs, the doors opening, the water coming out of the tap, the whirlpool of the flush, the doors closing. Finally I fell asleep.
On Sunday I had breakfast with Nunzia. I waited until ten for any of them to emerge; they didn’t, I went to the beach. I stayed until noon and no one came. I went back to the house, Nunzia told me that the two couples had gone for a tour of the island on the Lambrettas, advising us not to wait for them for lunch. In fact they returned around three, slightly drunk, sunburned, all four full of enthusiasm for Casamicciola, Lacco Ameno, Forio. The two girls had shining eyes and immediately glanced at me slyly.
“Lenù,” Pinuccia almost shouted, “guess what happened.”
“What.”
“We met Nino on the beach,” Lila said.
My heart stopped.
“Oh.”
“My goodness, he is really a good swimmer,” Pinuccia said excitedly, cutting the air with exaggerated arm strokes.
And Rino: “He’s not unlikable: he was interested in how shoes are made.”
And Stefano: “He has a friend named Soccavo and he’s the mortadella Soccavo: his father owns a sausage factory in San Giovanni a Teduccio.”
And Rino again: “That guy’s got money.”
And again Stefano: “Forget the student, Lenù, he doesn’t have a lira: aim for Soccavo, you’d be better off.”
After a little more joking (
I was incredibly disappointed. They had met Nino, gone swimming with him, talked to him, and without me. I put on my best dress—the same one, the one I’d worn to the wedding, even though it was hot—I carefully combed my hair, which had become very blond in the sun, and told Nunzia I was going for a walk.
