Scent of a Woman

by Giovanni Arpino

  We dashed ahead through the corridor, steps in sync, our pace faster and faster, with my right shoulder planted against his arm, and the cane held out crosswise to gauge my knee. Every few feet I felt the bamboo tip waiting to check my moving leg. After three laps back and forth he stopped abruptly.

  ‘It’s not working. No way,’ he decreed, without removing his arm from mine. ‘You’re not walking. All you’re doing is dragging your 130 pounds. If you don’t move your legs with some energy, they’re almost rigid, get it? You lose your behind, you leave it half a yard away, and you end up worn out after not even half an hour. You’re not at a funeral. Come on. Push with your gluteus, for God’s sake. Do you know what the gluteus is? Are you afraid to use it?’

  We started all over again, and now his cane twirled at regular intervals from my knee to my rear end, checking them in rapid, rhythmic semicircles. At the fifth lap I saw a strip of light appear along the kitchen door and realized that the old woman was watching us intently.

  ‘Once more. And plant your heels on the ground. What are you afraid of? The waxed floor? Plant your heels. Leave their imprint on the wax.’

  He stopped suddenly, making me lurch.

  ‘Another thing,’ he said, stock-still, the cane raised. ‘No wandering in your head. We’re walking. There’s no need to think. You think sitting down. You have to start and stop exactly in step with me. Understood? Like clockwork. And no sashaying like a streetwalker out for a stroll.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ I said, somehow managing to swallow a comment about the corridor being too dark.

  We were back in his room, or maybe his study, where various massive components of a stereo system peered out from the corners. The cat was breathing loudly from beneath the couch. At the cabinet, he poured two glasses of whisky to the brim, and immediately held one out, his right hand extended in space.

  ‘Drink up.’

  ‘Actually I rarely drink. Almost never,’ I replied, taking the glass.

  ‘Really? I couldn’t care less. Five days plus two: with me you’ll drink. And no objections. When you can’t take any more, dump it out somewhere. In your pocket maybe. As long as I don’t notice.’ He laughed soundlessly.

  I barely took a sip, then twisting my arm with the utmost caution, tried to set the glass on the table.

  ‘Hang on, Ciccio. Are you trying to be smart?’ He smiled calmly from the centre of the room. ‘Not with me, boy. Never with me. Finish it, now. And hand it back empty. A twelve-year-old whisky, you must be kidding.’

  I drank some more, on my feet as well, a few steps away from him. I tried not to look at him, taking advantage of the darkness that made him seem transparent. His face had faded away towards the top, a grey film with no geometry.

  ‘Does it burn?’

  ‘No, sir,’ I replied.

  ‘You’re skinny. A skeleton. Bones are too sharp. I’ll get bruised up walking with you. I’ll fatten you up with whisky. However, I must admit that you don’t stink. The other Ciccio, your predecessor with typhus: ghastly. Every day before we went out I had to pour half a quart of cologne down his back. He smelled like a pigsty, like reheated minestrone.’

  Ten minutes later I was out in the street, my eyes heavy, unable to orient myself. I had time before having to return to the base. I cursed the nothingness outside and inside me.

  Standing on the sidewalk, before taking a step in the moist, sticky air, I looked for a friendly sign, a café.

  2

  ‘If only it would rain. Damn it. A million bucks for a deluge,’ he kept muttering.

  We were sitting opposite each other on the shaded side of the compartment. The wind drove scorching breaths through the lowered windows. Another hour to go, then Genoa. The flat countryside, at times swelling abruptly with bristling hills, whirled by in the morning light as though under an ashen umbrella.

  He had been complaining and disparaging from the beginning: the vile, odious summer, the scratchy velvet seats, the deserted coach. The high speed of the express train, which shook the cars, prevented any attempt at walking in the corridor.

  He sat motionless, smoking one cigarette after another, his gloved hand on the armrest, a faint layer of perspiration on his forehead. In the bright light the marks on his face no longer seemed like real scars but like blotches and traces of smallpox. And yet, during certain imperceptible movements, that head appeared more than handsome: a prism that picked up and fashioned not so much the external luminosity as the leaps and moods, the odd angles of his thoughts.

  He held out his right hand.

  ‘Do you have a wallet? Let me feel it.’

  I took it out, surprised, and placed it in contact with his fingers. He slid it into the palm of his hand.

  ‘How much money?’

  I told him the amount.

  With a single gesture he opened it, took out the few bills and handed them to me.

  ‘Here. Are your ID cards and driver’s licence in here?’ he continued brusquely.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I’ll hold on to it.’ He smiled, satisfied, relaxing and slipping the wallet into his pocket. ‘You can depend on me more. Right? I’ll give you a new one, at the end. Don’t worry. If you’re angry now, say so.’

  ‘No, sir,’ I replied.

  ‘Don’t give me that cock and bull.’ He chuckled softly. ‘I know very well you’re angry. Anyone would be. You might as well admit it.’

  ‘Okay. If it matters to you. I am.’

  He laughed more heartily.

  ‘Finally,’ he coughed. ‘But you have to admit that I also have to try and protect myself. You could get fed up, leave me high and dry in the middle of a street, a café, maybe here in the train. I don’t know you, after all.’

  ‘I’m not that type,’ I protested.

  ‘Maybe not. Who knows. And then you’d be punished. A nice stint in solitary confinement, as you know,’ he said, the cigarette wobbling between his lips. ‘So at least allow me the illusion of being able to protect myself. If you look at it that way: is it okay with you?’

  ‘Whatever you say, sir.’

  ‘It’s not at all okay with you, yet your “yessir” flows out easily just the same. You’re made of rubber, Ciccio. You take it and snap! you spring back the way you were. I bet your father was a peasant. Right?’

  ‘He’s a clerk,’ I said.

  ‘Then your grandfather was.’

  ‘He had a shop, my grandfather.’

  ‘Well, your great-grandfather then. Let’s not go on and on,’ he said irritably. ‘You’re too cautious. Too many peasant-like “yes, sirs”, I can tell. Peasants in fact always say yes, and while they’re digging for potatoes they’re also digging their grave. Forever complaining about it, of course.’

  I kept quiet, and for a long moment busied myself choosing, fingering and lighting a cigarette.

  ‘You’re not speaking any more? Good boy,’ he went on. ‘Tell the truth: if there had been someone else in this idiotic compartment, would you have said “yessir” and “nossir” like you did before, about the wallet? Or not?’

  ‘Why not? Other people mean nothing to me,’ I replied.

  He indulged in a broad, tolerant laugh, nodding spiritedly.

  ‘You’re opening up. Good for you.’ He coughed again. ‘So then, tell me, tell me: you’ve decided that it’s better to feel sorry, and so on, for this poor devil here. Right?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Look, look at me: don’t you pity me?’ He smiled, pouting ironically.

  ‘I don’t know, sir. I don’t think so.’

  ‘You see, I told you you’re made of rubber,’ he retorted, satisfied. ‘C’mon: you don’t feel sorry for me, sorry in the sense of pitying me, I mean, and besides that, you obey, you do your duty, you’re ready with a “yessir”, et cetera, et cetera, therefore you feel you’re doing the right thing. Is that it?’

  ‘What I meant was: you don’t make me feel sorry or pity you in some stupid way,’ I tried to explai
n.

  ‘Of course. Naturally. Let’s see then. Earlier I said: a million bucks for a deluge. What did you think I meant?’ He leaned forward a little, smiling curiously.

  ‘I thought you meant what you said. Something to relieve this heat,’ I replied.

  ‘Not at all, genius. Aside from the fact that a deluge, the deluge, would always be good. Aside from that I meant the light, not the heat. The heat is only a result. It’s the light I was talking about,’ he explained, stressing each syllable, ‘light is silent, horribly silent. Whereas rain produces sounds. With rain, you always know where you are. Shut up at home or huddling in some doorway. Do you get it? Now don’t you feel sorry for me?’

  ‘Yes, sir. For that, yes,’ I forced myself to respond.

  My head was spinning from those rapid-fire words of his. I could still hear them buzzing.

  He had relaxed against the padded seat back, suddenly bored.

  ‘Right. Drop dead,’ he then said slowly. ‘I meant me, not you. Why do I bother talking. I should cut out my tongue.’

  Again he cheered up in that wicked way of his, stuck his tongue out a little and with his right hand forming a scissor, made as if to snip it off, laughing the whole time.

  He stopped and made a face.

  Then: ‘Your hair, is it black?’

  ‘Not actually black. Brown.’

  ‘See how black mine is? A raven,’ he said proudly. ‘And women like black hair. It’s virile, they say.’

  Suddenly he bent his forehead down.

  ‘Hey. No white hairs by any chance?’

  ‘Not even one, sir.’

  I felt nauseous from the cigarettes I’d smoked and a little hungry too. I thought about the sandwich in my duffel bag, but I didn’t dare stand up, take it out and eat it there in front of him. He on the other hand took a slim metal and leather flask out of his breast pocket, unscrewed the cap, and drank.

  ‘Horrible at this hour.’ He shuddered. ‘If you see one of those railway bozos pass by, call him.’

  He leaned his temple to one side to rest, but instead a range of expressions flitted across his face.

  We passed through a succession of tunnels. The compartment was swept with currents of damp air. A large oily drop left a mark on my pants, another one grazed his forehead.

  ‘We’ll get off at Genoa. You can go nuts in here,’ he grumbled, still leaning sideways. ‘And you will also do me a blessed favour and take off your uniform. I mean, you must have civilian clothes.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘I’ll buy you some.’ He snorted. ‘I don’t want to appear to be in the care of the nation’s charitable hands.’

  He took out his watch, opened it and fingered it.

  The sea reappeared on the right, a thin layer of metallic grey beyond a jumbled group of houses.

  ‘A conductor,’ I told him.

  He raised his hand to stop him.

  The man stepped forward with a long, sad face. A gold stripe ran around his cap. He gave a sympathetic smile.

  ‘Mr Whatever-your-name-is,’ he assailed him in a quiet cutting voice, ‘is it obligatory to listen to this crap? Have they passed a law requiring it?’

  ‘Pardon me, sir?’ The man blinked.

  ‘I repeat: this crap. This public nuisance.’ With his gloved hand he gave a sharp blow to the padded seat near his temple.

  ‘The radio, sir?’ The man figured it out.

  ‘Loathsome. Turn it off right now,’ came the reply.

  ‘Of course. But you see, you have to turn them all off. The controls are in the dining car and at this hour …’ the man stammered.

  ‘Do you want me to shoot a pistol in it?’ He stretched out his neck, his voice a strangled hiss. ‘What does turn it off mean? It means off. So hurry it up.’

  ‘Certainly, sir, but at this hour …’ The man was dismayed. He tried in vain to meet my eyes to find some support.

  I felt myself blush. I remained rigid against the seat back.

  ‘I lost my eyes and a hand for the honour of this rotten country. Did I or didn’t I? Now you want me to lose my hearing too?’ he shouted suddenly.

  He had become livid, two saliva bubbles at the corners of his mouth.

  ‘Right away, sir, right away.’ The conductor fled, his fingers touching his cap in an awkward salute.

  Then he relaxed with pleasure, his right hand carefully assuring that the left one lined up precisely with the armrest. He was laughing quietly, in abrupt, self-satisfied little fits that finally erupted into short bursts of coughing.

  ‘Bastard that I am. The greatest one-of-a-kind bastard,’ he said, enjoying himself. ‘Who knows what he’ll tell them at home tonight, that poor devil.’

  I leaned my head back myself to absorb the sounds from the velvet that I had not noticed until then. Barely a wisp of music came out, which I could hear only by pressing my ear forcefully against it. Until I heard nothing more.

  Almost without being aware of it, I opened my mouth wide, savouring the syllables of the words I mutely swore at him.

  ‘Who knows how nervous the Baron must be.’ He cheered up again. ‘Without me in that house, they all immediately get addled.’

  Taking a long curve, the train slowed up as it came into Genoa. The sun flashed off the junctions of the tracks, and off the sidewalks of the station. Dusty pots of geraniums clustered along a wall.

  As I took down the suitcases, I saw him recompose himself, his hand feeling the knot of his necktie, then a handkerchief to wipe his forehead.

  He gave me some final orders.

  ‘You’re not with me to be a porter. Get one outside: that’s what they’re there for. We’re off to the hotel right opposite the station. The one with the palm tree. One of the few that still has connecting rooms. You’ll have to plug your ears to sleep. You can hear a few thousand trains go by.’

  3

  Shortly after noon the wind picked up, sudden, torrid gusts that tore in, raising dense swirls of dust, paper, dry leaves, and ruffling the foliage of the trees in the middle of the piazza.

  ‘Marvellous!’ he said, delighted, taking in the first breath of air. But we soon withdrew inside the café.

  Through the windows, beneath a sky that was becoming more lively, I saw a sliver of the harbour, a crane, the stern of a rusty ship. Tiny flags fluttered in a row, straining against the wind’s constant lacerations.

  We had already been to a shop where, at vast expense, he had bought a pale blue suit and a shirt for me, a white linen suit for himself. They would be delivered to us at the hotel by that evening, after a few adjustments and stitching up the trouser cuffs. We had then walked swiftly down a sloping street, he cheerfully and silently waving the cane in front of him, his arm under mine, increasingly prodding me to step up the pace.

  ‘And this afternoon, a good barber,’ he said in a satisfied tone.

  By now, the receipts on the table for the various drinks formed a kind of fan anchored by the ashtray. The waiter arrived with a fifth of whisky.

  ‘Are we eating at one?’ I asked. My head was spinning from the two vermouths I had drunk shortly before.

  ‘Right. Food. You must be hungry,’ he replied, jiggling the ice in his glass. ‘Who knows if I was that hungry when I was your age. I can’t remember a thing. No recollection. I’ll give you an hour’s leave. For now I’m not eating. Go to the counter and see if they have any decent sandwiches. But don’t have them brought to me: just look.’

  I got up. There were sandwiches of various kinds under large plastic lids. Lettuce leaves peeked out from the edges. The young man behind the counter wore a stained, filthy apron. He was examining his hair, faithfully reflected in the bottles behind him. He glanced at me a second with that indifference that everyone displays towards a soldier: a transparent entity who doesn’t even disturb the view.

  ‘There are a few. Not very clean,’ I said when I returned.

  ‘A little dirt is the least of it in these parts. So then, scram.’ He sent me
off, handing me some money: ‘Here. Eat. Go to the port, so you can take a look at the girls.’

  ‘What girls?’ I asked, surprised.

  ‘The usual. Never heard of them?’ he mocked, but good-naturedly. ‘There are droves of them at every large port. Dark-skinned too if you want. In short, those girls.’

  ‘I’d rather eat!’ I laughed.

  He shrugged, annoyed.

  ‘I meant, while you’re walking. Or do you turn the other way when you see them? Born yesterday.’

  ‘All right, sir.’

  ‘Check out a few. You never know,’ he concluded drily. He snapped open his watch. ‘Be back here at two. No later.’

  Outside I bent over against the wind, exhilarated to be alone and by the thought of the new suit. But as I neared the port, that freedom already seemed unexciting. I realized to my surprise that I would have preferred to see him eat in front of me, I imagined his gestures at the table, the inevitable insolence towards the waiter.

  I had the sea to my right, obstructed by port machinery, and a scruffy wall on my left. Keeping close to the wall, I saw several eateries down some narrow steps. I stopped in front of baskets full of shellfish on display; further on a sluggish grey fish floated in two inches of water. A waiter quickly appeared and gave me the once-over, so I started walking again, turning around to glance down the length of the port: colours, prows, rows of smokestacks and cranes, even the wind seemed calculated to me, like a scene in a film. My eyes ached and even the distant din of noises and voices, perhaps from a market beyond the wall, hurt my head which was already pounding from the vermouth. At the next sign I decided to stop. The trattoria was deserted, and from the kitchen doorway the owner gave me an indifferent look.

  I felt like I had been gone too long, caught up in a bubble that was not uplifting but oppressive, and I felt vaguely homesick for my city, whether home or the base.

  A postcard for my mother, I thought.

  I chose quickly from the menu – anything to hurry it up – then sat and waited, looking at the dessert trolley.

  ‘I assure you, sir. Not one grey hair. Allow me …’ the barber repeated quietly, leaning over. ‘Even here at the top, a critical point, everything looks fine.’