by Umberto Saba
Yes or no? Wanting to experience the feelings that Bernardo had inadvertently activated in him with that ill-timed, premature shave, Ernesto decided to surrender to fate. He would walk down the street where the woman lived. He would walk by three times. If one of those times she was at the window, he would signal to her and go up. If it didn’t work out, he’d go home. His afternoon was essentially free. He didn’t have to be back at the office as there were no carts to load or unload that day. He just had to get some errands done and be back there in the evening to settle the day’s accounts with penny-pinching Signor Wilder. So he had plenty of time. He knew that people usually went to prostitutes secretly and at night, but he didn’t feel like putting it off. He wanted to experience everything head-on, immediately, in broad daylight. (It was even a bright sunny day.) If he stopped to think about it, he would lose what little courage he had.
The woman was at the window and immediately noticed his nod. With his heart beating in his throat, Ernesto climbed the steps and found her waiting at her door. She didn’t look quite as young as she’d looked from the street. But it didn’t matter. In fact, he had the feeling that things might work out better for him this way. What he did notice was a light growth of hair over her upper lip. “How about that? Is she going to sprout a mustache?” he wondered. The thought amused and cheered him.
As he entered the small room, he was struck by its odor, the odor of freshly trimmed linen, the very same that he had liked so much in his nursemaid’s home. The nursemaid, who had a sick husband and had to earn a living for both of them, would sit at her sewing machine every afternoon making various articles of linen, which she sold, or attempted to sell, mornings in Piazza del Ponterosso. But she didn’t have a permit (just as the woman Ernesto was visiting probably didn’t), so she could only sell while walking about. (Many times when Ernesto, walking through the piazza on his way back from the Dante Alighieri school, wanted to stop and talk to his “second mother,” to at least tell her about his scholastic successes, she would chase him off immediately. She was afraid of the police. Under Austrian emperor Franz Joseph’s rule, no one could stop her from walking around with linen under her arm. But the moment she and a customer spotted each other, the two would have to disappear into a doorway, where the customer would exploit the woman’s need for stealth to obtain the item cheaply.) This woman, too, was sewing linen, but she was doing it for herself and for her clients. She was particular about cleanliness. Perhaps she, too, was a kind woman with suppressed maternal instincts. If so, this strange customer who had dropped in on her in broad daylight, and who acted less mature than he looked, would seem to be particularly fashioned to draw them out. Another thing which struck Ernesto and also recalled his nursemaid’s home was the small lamp burning under an image of the Madonna not far from the large double bed with its freshly laundered sheets.
“I’ll bet that you’re still your mama’s little boy,” said the woman, perceiving Ernesto’s discomfort. He was neither undressing nor approaching her.
He understood yet didn’t understand what she meant.
“This’ll be my first time with a woman,” he confessed.
“Oh, my darling,” the woman blurted. And she looked more closely at Ernesto. He was a good-looking boy, so different from the men who regularly visited her at night. Of course, she didn’t understand all the circumstances, but she sensed something. She sensed that on that afternoon, fate had bestowed a strange and unexpected gift upon her.
“Well, don’t be scared,” she told him, “I’ll take care of everything. You just get yourself undressed.”
And as she spoke, the woman began undressing.
Ernesto did so, too.
“Should I take off my stockings?” she asked submissively. Ernesto gestured vaguely, as if it was a matter of indifference to him. The woman did not remove them. He was so timid that for a moment, the woman wondered if he’d been stricken with juvenile impotence. But one glance—and the discovery pleased her—told her her diagnosis had been incorrect. After having undressed, Ernesto got to his feet, and completely naked, his arms dangling at his sides, stood before the woman, who was seated on the bed.
“Why don’t you lie down here on the bed next to me?” the woman asked, then changed her mind and gestured to stop the boy, who was about to do as she’d asked. “No,” she went on, “we’ll do it a different way. It will be easier, if this is really your first time.”
Something about Ernesto’s manner convinced her that the boy hadn’t lied to her. Why, in fact, should he have? Youngsters generally try to pass themselves off as sophisticated rather than inexperienced. And the harder they pretend to be the former, the more likely they are to be the latter. But that was not Ernesto’s way. His strength and his weakness lay in trying as much as possible to present himself as he really was. It wasn’t a deliberate decision, it was the way he was, his way of protecting himself—and it was just as effective, perhaps even more so, than the opposite approach, except that to be effective, it had to be genuine. Like all boys his age he liked praise, but unlike most others, he had to feel he merited it. There were times his relationship with the man was a torment to him. It would occur to him that if people whom he knew, who were repelled by such behavior and used insulting terms for it, were to learn what he had done, many who now liked him would no longer do so. His young soul suffered at the thought that he was “stealing affection” under false pretenses.
Meanwhile, to arouse him, the woman had begun caressing him. Completely nude, he seemed to her not more than a child. And as if he were a child, her hand stroked his buttocks. They were soft and tender and her hand lingered there for a moment. But that moment was enough for Ernesto to recall the man. And his image there, in that place, was frightening. “What could she want with my ass?” he thought.
“You’re pretty good-looking, cute,” the woman said. “But still too much like a kid. It don’t matter. I like you better this way. What’s your name?”
Prostitutes don’t ever ask their client’s names. And if they give their own, it’s never the real one. But Ernesto wasn’t an ordinary client.
“Ernesto,” he replied and added his surname as well. The woman smiled.
“Mine’s Tanda,” she said. “Back when I lived at home” (she didn’t say where) “and was like other girls, it was Natasha.” Clearly, she was a Slovenian from the Territory, another thing she had in common with his nursemaid. It’s possible these coincidences were adding to his discomfort.
“Come on, it’ll be better for you this way,” the woman said. And falling back at the edge of the bed, she drew the boy towards her.
Ernesto experienced great pleasure, but one that didn’t seem new to him. It seemed to him that he had experienced it before, even before his birth. He felt like a man who, after a long, adventurous journey, returns home where he knows and recognizes everything: the way the furniture is set out, the way the closets are arranged, that is, every little thing. When he stood up, feeling brighter, the woman filled a basin with water, added a liquid that tinted it pink, and washed Ernesto’s abashed member. It was an ex post facto practice, a precaution against disease, which her clients enjoyed and expected. Ernesto, no longer worried about himself, inquired about it.
“It’s a disinfectant,” the woman answered. “I don’t have any of those diseases. If I did, I’d have told you. Or I’d have given you a condom. But men, they want me to do it, and if I want to make a living, I’ve got to keep them happy. If I got you sick with anything, I’d feel like a murderer.”
“Well, I’m not afraid of getting sick,” Ernesto answered. And, as he was anxious to get away (to think quietly about what he had just experienced), he reached into his pocket for money. It was the first of the month, the first of the week. He was rich. He gave the woman (who charged only a florin) everything or almost everything he had, including the money he’d forgotten to give Bernardo.
“That’s too much,” she said, stunned by the boy’s generosity. (It was
what only the old or impotent paid. Besides, the pleasure she’d had in the boy, though not so much physical, was more than enough payment.) She offered to give him some money back, but he refused.
“If you feel like seeing me again,” she said, when Ernesto was already at the door, “come back even if you don’t have money that day. Just remember my name is Tanda, and be careful not to go to the wrong door. She’s a nasty one next door, stay away from her. And remember, a kid like you don’t always have to pay. I’d be glad to see you anytime, money or no.” Carried away by emotion she felt like kissing him, but perceiving his eagerness to leave (she knew that eagerness of men) she didn’t dare.
Two problems were troubling Ernesto as he set off to do his errands for Signor Wilder. He was unable to undo the twisted tangle of his thoughts, and he was very thirsty. It would be many years before he could even begin to undo the tangle. However, the thirst (which, for physiological reasons, afflicts all men after coitus with a prostitute) could be satisfied immediately. He would have liked to do it with a raspberry crush but had given so much of his money to the woman that after counting it up, he didn’t have enough to enter a sweetshop even if he forswore pastries and restricted himself to a drink, which, to intensify his sufferings, he was imagining as ice-cold. So there was nothing else to do but drink at a public fountain. He found one in an outlying area, a highly populated outskirt of the city, which had been growing in every direction. Ancient hovels that Ernesto knew from childhood, and which he thought would surely last forever, were being razed to make way for new buildings.
The chimney of a nearby factory was emitting thick smoke that permeated the air. Workers, walking double file, lunch boxes in hand, were already leaving their buildings. “Comrades, all Socialists,” thought Ernesto, wishing he were one of them. But seeing them reminded him how late the time was. Suddenly he felt a strange desire to be back at the office, even to see Signor Wilder. There was no work for the man that day, so he wouldn’t be there. Ernesto was almost pleased that he wouldn’t have to see him. To get back sooner, he decided he would use the remainder of his money to take the tram into town and bill it to miserly Signor Wilder.
The fountain rose in the middle of a tree-lined field between a barracks and a church, both painted yellow. Many women, most of them young, some still merely girls, were waiting their turn. They bore basins, pitchers, and various other water receptacles on their heads, as most houses had no water supply (to have it in one’s home then was considered a great luxury). Despite his desperate thirst, Ernesto waited patiently in line. Who knows how long he might have waited there if a white-haired old woman hadn’t shouted out to the others in line, “Let this darling boy get a drink. Can’t you see he’s dying of thirst?”
It reminded him of what the prostitute had called him—this new association startled him. The women moved away quickly, and after thanking the old woman, Ernesto approached the fountain. He had to bend his body almost in half to reach the spout. The movement and resulting position of his body roused an intrusive memory. At just that moment, he heard laughter all around him.
“They know everything,” he thought. “They know about the man, they know where I just came from. There must be something weird about my looks that’s making them laugh at me.” He stopped drinking before his thirst was satisfied and, blushing, began walking away from the fountain. His agitation was so overwhelming that he didn’t realize that most of the women who were laughing (not at him, but for him) were very young, some even very pretty. They continued staring at Ernesto, who, with his eyes to the ground, was trying to escape the wretched fountain as quickly as he could.
Ernesto was misjudging himself badly. There was nothing about his appearance to induce laughter. Nothing effeminate. The young women were laughing because they were about Ernesto’s age and had no other way of attracting his attention. There probably wasn’t one who wouldn’t have been happy to receive a compliment, even the smallest indication of his interest to store in her heart for a few days or hours. But Ernesto interpreted their subdued laughter very differently. The day that had begun with Bernardo’s deceitful shave was finishing badly. It seemed to Ernesto as if an incalculable amount of time had passed since his first experience with a woman. And an entire epoch separated him from the time he had begun his strange relationship with the laborer, who—he was at least sure about this—had (in his own way) loved him. And perhaps (if Ernesto wanted him to) would go on loving him.
And only one month had gone by.
FOURTH EPISODE
THE FOLLOWING day there was a surprise at the office. A boy clearly younger than Ernesto was sitting with his back to the window on the opposite side of his desk. Ernesto sized up the situation in a flash: “Competition!”
Apprentices were in great demand in Trieste in those days and likely in businesses throughout the world as well. No matter how much or how little work they did, they didn’t cost anything, at least for a while. So there were daily ads in the employment offered and sought section in The Piccolo and other local papers (though not in The Worker) reading, “Unpaid apprentice with excellent handwriting seeks responsible firm in ——” or “Must know German. For information apply to ——,” etc.
An apprenticeship would last for six months to a year, during which time the boy didn’t earn a cent. At the end of the period (if he hadn’t been fired or found a better job and quit on his own by then), he’d be put on the payroll for ten crowns a month. The boy seated across from Ernesto must have come from one of those want ads, and Signor Wilder would likely have chosen him from a large group of applicants, perhaps yesterday afternoon or some other time when Ernesto was out of the office.
Ernesto had no special love for his employer, but tricks and caricatures notwithstanding, he didn’t hate him, either. As far as work was concerned, he was a loyal employee. He thought of Signor Wilder almost as family, a somewhat comical, not very interesting person, whom he saw every day. The reader will perhaps remember that the previous evening, when he was approaching that wretched fountain, he was suddenly taken by a longing for his presence, almost a desire to see him. In short, Signor Wilder was a kind of object to Ernesto, something you see every day, the sight of which can be reassuring, can even, if need be, avert an anxiety attack. For his part, Signor Wilder had never shown any sort of dislike toward him. He had even, for whatever reason, once given him a cane with a silver handle. And Ernesto’s salary (which by reason of the wear and tear on his legs, the boy considered well earned) was fairly high, in view of both the going wages and his boss’s stinginess. It made it all the more distressing to think that without a word of warning, Signor Wilder had hired someone to compete with him. He felt betrayed, an “innocent” victim of what he feared more than anything else (Ernesto was a dog—not a cat). However, before condemning Signor Wilder he wanted to know more about what the newcomer was doing there.
“And you are?” he asked.
The boy stood up before answering.
“So I’m his boss,” thought Ernesto, who harbored two secret contrasting ambitions, neither of which he would ever fulfill. Although a clerking career had no appeal to him, in fact, he thoroughly disliked the idea of one, he also dreamed (the human heart has its mysteries) of becoming chief clerk of a major company, preferably one that dealt in colonial trade (perhaps in recollection of his old stamp album). He also dreamed of being a famous concert violinist. It goes without saying that of the two, he’d have preferred the second—the life of a concert artist—with its travels, applause, adoring crowds, which he imagined an earthly paradise. Deep in his heart, however, he had barely any hope for it. He wasn’t that crazy; he knew that aside from the relatively late age at which he began studying the instrument, it would be hard going for someone who after two years still couldn’t tune his violin (one string was always a little sharp or flat) to rival the famous Bohemian artist, whose perfect intonation was universally praised.
“I’m the new apprentice.” The boy was still stand
ing. “Signor Wilder hired me yesterday and told me to come this morning. He also told me to sit here at this desk.”
Ernesto was appalled. The more he looked at the boy, the more he disliked him. He had washed-out blond hair, a triangular face, and gray eyes that flitted here and there like trapped mice. Even at a distance he gave off the scent of something wild. Had Ernesto been a more expert physiognomist, he would immediately have understood that he was dealing with the kind of person who is destined to “succeed in life”—that is, someone who doesn’t just dream but who in reality, and what’s more to his complete satisfaction, becomes a chief clerk by the age of forty.
“Sit down,” Ernesto ordered. And after giving his name, asked the boy’s. His first name was Stefano. His second indicated a Slavic background.
“What a kid!” Ernesto thought, but not because of his background. Ernesto was loyal to Italy, but not over the top. Nowadays you’d call him a patriot, but not a nationalist. Furthermore, he was also a Socialist, and perhaps influenced by his “second mother” unlike others of his own background (for example, his cousin), he didn’t feel any hatred toward Slavs. He disliked the boy for other reasons. The newcomer sat down immediately and answered all of Ernesto’s questions, though without animation and without ever looking at him except fleetingly. Then to give himself something to do (likable or not, he was after all a boy and a boy on his first day at work), he began to straighten up his side of the desk; pen and pencils on one side, inkstand in the middle, writing paper arranged by size one on top another on the opposite side. (Perhaps, too, the profusion of stationery supplies overwhelmed him.) Clearly he was uneasy, not only about where to keep his eyes but what to do with his hands and how to behave toward Ernesto. Did he really rank above him? What if he were a relative of Signor Wilder, even a protégé? Innate caution warned him to behave with utmost respect (it certainly couldn’t cause him any harm) toward a boy about his own age, with whom using tu and grousing about the boss would have been the most natural thing in the world. Ernesto, too, after having asked about his studies, whether or not he knew much German, couldn’t think of what else to say. But convinced that it was indeed Signor Wilder who had told the boy to sit precisely there (so that he, Ernesto, would always have to face him), he had a brilliant idea. He would teach him how to deal with the letter book, which he knew was the first thing all apprentices were expected to learn.