by Elsa Morante
Since she knew that no living soul can sin fewer than seven times a day, the girl prepared for a long wait, considering that her fiancé had to recite all the sins committed in the course of an entire life: and given his age! But instead that confession lasted a much shorter time than expected: maybe six or seven minutes had passed, and no more, when he rose from the confessional and joined her, telling her to leave her pew, because he had finished. She obeyed; but on seeing him heading confidently toward the door of the church she whispered in astonishment, “You want to leave right away? And . . . the penance?” “What penance?” he asked. “What! Penance for contrition . . . I mean . . . prayers . . . the priest didn’t order you to recite some Our Fathers . . . some Hail Marys . . .” “Oh, yes, it’s true,” he answered, “he told me in fact to say two Hail Marys, but there’s time, before tomorrow: I’ll say them later.”
They were now outside the church, at the bottom of the steps; and she stood suspended, with one foot on the step, the news of that penance seemed to her so extraordinary. “What!” she exclaimed, confused and surprised. “Two Hail Marys! Only two Hail Marys after a general confession!”
At her wonder, he looked offended. “Well, then, Nunziata,” he said, “what are you surprised at? Maybe you expected he’d give me a heavier penance? But that’s a sign that you take me for a sinner!”
“No, you mustn’t think that . . .” she apologized, “but all Christians, even if they’re good, always find some failing in their life . . .”
“You insult me! Comparing me to all others! Remember, girl, that I’m a rare example of perfection on this earth: I deserve compliments, not penances! And in fact my confessor should feel remorse for those two Hail Marys! Apart from some lies and some bad words that I might have said in my life, I have nothing else to confess! And to give me a penance for a few lies, even big ones, enormous . . . and a few curse words . . .” Suddenly at that point he was overcome by a spontaneous joy. And sitting down on the step he burst into laughter, so fresh and irresistible that he couldn’t stop, and she herself would have started laughing frivolously with him, if they hadn’t been in front of a church, and in such a solemn situation.
In the girl’s eyes, that laughter, like a mysterious veil, further obscured the already mysterious person of her fiancé, making him (it seems strange) even more authoritative to her. “Why are you laughing?” she finally dared to ask. “Because,” he answered, “speaking of lies and swear words I remembered some that a friend of mine once said . . .” That very plausible explanation was enough for her; and so the discussion between the two of them ended.
Still, the fact of that laughable penance left her puzzled. She, at all events, spent part of the night reciting entire rosaries for the intention of all the sins that her fiancé, maybe because of a poor memory, might have forgotten to say in confession. And when her mother, whose sleep was disturbed by that constant murmur, began to protest, she was obliged, to justify herself, to describe to her the entire scene in the church. (In fact, it was her mother who then told it to me. And in large part I owe not only this last scene but also the preceding account of my father’s conversion—along with other, less important scenes, which I’m leaving out here—to Violante, not to Nunz. Nunz, on that subject, didn’t say much, held back by an extreme reserve, the same that she had, at other times, for the things of Heaven. And the few words she said were in a tone of solemn and extreme respect, as if she were recounting a legend of Sacred History.)
Then one day after Violante’s departure, returning to the subject with N., I couldn’t keep from pointing out to her that, in my opinion, my father’s conversion meant nothing. In fact, from what I could grasp, I seemed to understand that he had converted without changing his ideas, and almost out of amusement, as if he were playing a meaningless game or making a bet. And that, in my view, shouldn’t satisfy the Church but rather offend it, and also (admitting that he exists) God! At this speech of mine, N. looked at me with a profoundly serious expression (even in its unconscious childishness). And in an absolutist tone, which did not admit response, she answered that she, too, had at first had some similar thoughts; but then she had understood that they were bad thoughts, which would betray the first thought of God. And the first thought of God is the sacraments. It would truly have offended God had my father married without the nuptial sacrament; but he had had the sacrament—that was the important thing! Here, to demonstrate to me the true intention of God in the sacraments, she offered the example of baptism, which is usually given to infants, who understand as much as cats: and yet it saves them! And as for their extreme ignorance, she cited the case of a boy from Capua who was an acquaintance of hers, named Benedetto. He, at the age of one month, was brought to church to be baptized, wearing nothing but a little shirt (because his family was poor) that left his legs free; and the first thing he did, at the moment of the ceremony, was give the priest a kick on the chin! And yet the priest didn’t consider himself offended, and baptized him just the same: because although that child, in his simplicity, didn’t understand the great intention of the sacrament, the priest did; and God understood it—that was the important thing!
CHAPTER 5
Tragedies
Tragedies
My father reappeared after Christmas, when Carmine Arturo was already more than a month old. Arriving unexpectedly, he found three or four women friends of N.’s, who had come to see her. One might have thought that he would be surprised, or maybe even irritated, by that novelty; but instead he found nothing to criticize in the presence of those women and seemed barely to notice them. Although Carmine Arturo didn’t know him and had never seen him before, he welcomed him with joyful laughter: more than anything, I think, because, having just learned to laugh, he laughed at any excuse, thinking that he was performing some great feat! But my father didn’t even bother to pick him up, in order to appreciate his weight, as N.’s friends eagerly urged him to do; and while they, in chorus, praised that new son, his attention was dull and distracted, that of an unsociable boy who has grown up outside the family, and whose younger sisters are showing him their doll. That behavior toward the child consoled me a little, since I had expected new sufferings from an encounter between the two, and for one reason above all: that C.A. was blond! But, luckily, not even that remarkable characteristic of my stepbrother seemed to merit any particular regard on the part of my father.
It was, unfortunately, the only satisfaction I had on his return. In fact, this time he had disembarked on the island in a mood so preoccupied and dark that he was indifferent not only to Carmine but also to the rest of the family and every other thing. He seemed estranged from all the objects around him, as if he didn’t even recognize them; and he himself (if I thought of how he was when I’d said goodbye to him, on his last departure, in the month of August) seemed unrecognizable. In the course of my life, I had grown used to seeing him vary frequently, like the clouds; but this time anyone who had looked at him with faithful eyes would have seen that he concealed in himself some absolutely new fantasy. During this last long absence, an unusual change had taken place in his expression. A kind of inert mask, as rigid as death, had descended over his face.
Not that he was ugly; rather, he was perhaps more handsome than usual! But that inner vain satisfaction that returns every so often to smile on the face of the beautiful was suddenly lost! When he said I, his mouth was slightly contorted, as if he were naming a person who scarcely concerned him. He was thinner and dirty; around his neck he still wore the pretty bright-colored kerchief he had acquired the previous summer, but it was all twisted like a rope, reduced to a rag; and his clothes were so wrinkled you would think that he’d slept in them for days.
He spent the rest of the afternoon and part of the evening lying on the sofa in his room, without even bothering to turn on the light. And when, seeking his company, I decided to go and see him, and turned the light switch, he looked at me distraught, as if the light, or my presence, offended him. His suitc
ase had remained in the kitchen, still closed, and I asked if he wanted to unpack it; but, in a tone of desperate impatience, he answered no, it wasn’t worth the trouble, since he would be leaving again right away. And meanwhile I discerned a flicker of tears in his oblique, glittering pupils.
At dinner, he barely touched his food, and afterward he sat near the heat of the coals, without saying a word. Crouching there, like an animal, with the kerchief knotted at his neck, he seemed frozen and lost. It was clear that a single, uninterrupted thought, inscrutable to us, occupied his mind, without relief. His face was fixed, ashen; and every so often he drew weary, long breaths, as if he were suffocating. Sometimes a passionate, inexpressibly sorrowful shadow appeared in his eyes, softening his pride. But he immediately hid them with his fists, as if he were jealously protective of that shadow, and considered us unworthy of seeing it.
With the start of the new year (I didn’t know that it was to be the last year I spent on the island!), he began to show up again fairly often. But never in the past had his visits been so futile! As soon as he arrived at home, he seemed sorry to be there, to the point of despair: so he hurried to leave again, and then, at the moment of farewell, parted from Procida unwillingly and, two or three days later, might reappear among us again! It seemed that he sought our company and, at the same time, couldn’t bear it. One thing was certain: we had all become dull and insignificant for him (and most of all N., whom he now treated like an ancient relative of no account who has grown old in the house, and whom it’s natural to forget). Mostly, he seemed to regard us from an anguished isolation, or not to notice us at all, but sometimes you might have said that he could scarcely forgive us for being alive, and that, by merely speaking or moving about freely, we were committing a breach of discipline and an offense. At such moments, a cry from Carminiello or the voice of N. singing in other rooms was enough to make him break out in mad invectives, in which he elaborated a dark fantasy!
On some days, though, finding no other outlet for his solitude, he could spend hours and hours in the kitchen, in the midst of the family, perhaps along with N.’s acquaintances. He sat apart, shut up in himself, and, with his unshaved beard, which grew over his whole face, he resembled an exile or a deserter. He neglected to shave for entire weeks; and when finally he decided to do it, he used the razor with such brutality that he always ended up with small cuts. He appeared almost to take pleasure in doing violence to himself, in making himself bleed: he who had once nearly fainted after colliding with a jellyfish!
When he didn’t come down, he stayed in his room in a kind of lethargy. He remembered me only to send me to buy cigarettes, which he never had enough of and which he nevertheless insisted were bad. In his room there was a suffocating stench of smoke and stale air; yet he appeared to enjoy that, and sometimes closed the shutters so as not to see the light of day. What extraordinary events, after his departure of last summer, had affected him, reducing him to this suffering? What was the mysterious unchanging thought that for months had given him no rest?
One day, passing through the hall, I saw him, through the half-open door, sobbing hysterically and biting the bars of the bed. I got away quickly, on tiptoe, afraid that he would be offended if he knew I’d seen him sobbing like a woman. I recall, too, that I found him, perhaps more than once, lying on his back like a dead man, with one arm folded over his eyes, and smiling to himself. His lips moving in the smile seemed to sketch an absurd, sublime dialogue; but at the same time the smile had a bitter, sick twist: as if, in that dialogue, his questions received only refusal for an answer.
Later, I was to reflect on these things a great deal; but in those first months of the fateful year they were forgotten right away, passing, in their abstruseness, for lesser mysteries. I saw my father leave, return, as one sees a ghost; because, in that period, he wasn’t worth much more than a ghost! The sufferings of Wilhelm Gerace had become secondary for me: I was too bound to my own sufferings to be interested in his!
My principal character was no longer Wilhelm Gerace. Now that was certain (or at least it seemed to me).
Golden Locks
I wrote “my sufferings,” but I should rather have written: “my suffering,” because in fact the suffering, which had assailed me some time earlier, was one, and could be given only one name: JEALOUSY!
On another occasion, I had driven out as a wicked insult the suspicion, hinted at by someone, that I was jealous. But this time I had to yield to the evidence. Naturally, I would have died rather than confess it to others, but to myself I couldn’t deny it: I was sick with jealousy, because of a rival. Now, as I’m about to say who my rival was, I don’t know whether to be ashamed or to laugh.
It happened this way: as the weeks and months passed, Carmine Arturo, my stepbrother, who at first had seemed so ugly, was turning out to be beautiful: more beautiful than I was, I fear! His hair was not only blond but curly, and grew naturally in tiny tufts on his head, which perfectly imitated a little crown of gold. That gave him a look of valor and aristocracy, as if a title like Highness, or something similar, were due him, because of his curls. As for his eyes, they were mulberry-black, perfectly Neapolitan; but all around the irises they were infused by a deep, enchanted blue, so that his looks seemed to have a blue-black color. His complexion was fair and he was healthy and plump. His feet and hands, even in their diminutiveness, were shapely, with slender fingers and toes, and around his wrists and ankles were little sort of bracelets.
According to N.’s women friends, those small natural rings of flesh were a sure sign that he was born lucky. In fact, according to them, the good fortune of an infant could be guessed from the beauty and perfection of those bracelets, which most newborns have, since they’re usually fat. His were really perfect, and if you added up the ones he had at each wrist and ankle it came out to three, which is the king of numbers! That meant that he would grow up to be a great man, courageous and daring, and the victor in any undertaking. That he would defend the unfortunate with his fist and charm even his enemies. That he would live to the age of ninety, always as handsome as a youth, and those fine golden curls wouldn’t even go white. And he would travel over land and sea, under a rain of flowers, celebrated by all.
While N.’s friends contentedly counted and recounted his bracelets to confirm that exalted oracle, he was quiet, looking at them with a certain seriousness, as if he understood that this concerned his destiny. He seemed convinced that those women were a race of stupendous fairies, because they were friends of N., and he laughed when, seeing them again, he recognized them: as if yearning to fly he reached out from her arms toward them. But if, for some reason, she had to go somewhere, leaving him even for a single minute, he immediately burst into a desperate wail, as if from the most splendid triumph he’d been reduced to a wet rag. And in the arms of someone else he writhed ferociously, in a way that seemed to mean: “As for me, I might as well fall to the ground and die!”
In fact, the only true beauty for him was N. It was the presence of that unique beauty that like a magician made all others, even the ugly, as beautiful as saints; so that he loved the whole world and, being very flirtatious, made many conquests. But even his favorites, in the end, counted almost nothing for him. She was his passion. And, as the weeks and months passed, the more attached to her he became. And she returned that. Thus I saw another with that famous happiness that I had always longed for and never possessed!
He insisted that N. always be near him; without her, he refused even to go to sleep, and before sleeping he clutched a finger in his fist. While he slept, he kept his fists clenched, perhaps imagining that he was still holding on to her; and he stuck out his lips in an indignant yet loving expression, as if to say: “I’ve got you, I’ve captured you, and you can never escape!”
Now, when my father returned, it wasn’t as before: she didn’t immediately rush to bring her covers from the little room to the nuptial chamber! My father, to his satisfaction, slept alone, Silvestro’s old room was
abandoned forever, and her fear of the night had become a memory. I think that with Carmine she would have slept fearlessly even in a terrifying wilderness: as if that child of a few months were a heroic knight, who could defend her from any attack.
As for the present enigmatic tragedy of Wilhelm Gerace, one would have said that for her that tragedy, like all the other secrets of her husband, took place in a kind of mythic theater, whose signs and symbols were alien to simple reality. For a profane spectator, illiterate like her, it would be not only vain and futile but also disrespectful to attempt any explanation of the obscure legend represented. To intervene in it, then, would be a truly impious outrage. And, finally, it would be childishly insensitive to become seriously distressed for the great protagonist who there, on his unreal stage, plays out his inscrutable and necessary myth.
She was occupied with my father only to serve him and look after him (always, of course, in her rather rudimentary way, since she had never had the qualities of a capable housewife). She didn’t question his orders, and flew to his calls; but for the rest she left him to his thoughts, as if he were a tyrannical and solitary lodger. The natural submissiveness that she usually maintained toward him resembled not a human passivity but the trustful ignorance of animals, without doubt or anxiety.
And so the secret affairs of Wilhelm Gerace, who left and returned surrounded by suffering, did not darken her happiness with her Carmine.