Boredom - Alberto Moravia [134]
“Yes, it was good.”
“Very good or rather good?”
“Very good.”
“Better than usual?”
“Yes, perhaps better than usual.”
“Are you happy?”
“Yes, I’m happy.”
“Do you love me?”
“Yes, you know I love you.”
These were words I had used countless times, but never with a feeling so utterly desperate. As I said them, I was thinking that Cecilia would now go away to Ponza and that her departure, the concrete symbol of her elusiveness, would inevitably give new strength to my love and to my consequent longing to free myself from her by possessing her. When she came back everything would begin all over again, just as it had been before she went away, but worse than before. I felt a sudden desire not to stay with her any longer, to get away from her. I said, as gently as I could: “It’s time we went away. Otherwise my mother might come and find us here, and that would be a nuisance.”
“I’ll get dressed at once.”
“Don’t be in too much of a hurry. I said it would be a nuisance, but no more than that. It isn’t really important. At most, my mother would protest not so much at the thing itself as at the way it was done.”
“How d’you mean?”
“My mother attaches great importance to what she calls good form. That’s what we’ve failed to observe, by making love in her bedroom instead of in my studio.”
“What is good form?”
“I don’t know. Probably it’s the result of thinking a great deal about money.”
We finished dressing in silence. Then I collected the banknotes that were lying scattered over the bed, went into the bathroom and wrote in pencil on the envelope: “Have taken the 70,000 lire. Thank you. Dino”; and I put the envelope back in the safe. Cecilia was rearranging the bed covers. She asked: “Where are we going now?”
A sudden impulse of rage swept over me. “We’re not going anywhere,” I said; “it wouldn’t be any use now, anyhow. I’ll take you home.”
I almost hoped she might show displeasure or regret in face of this abrupt change in our program. Instead of which she answered, with indifference: “Just as you like.”
“Just as I like?” I insisted. “No, it’s as you like; it’s you who is going away tomorrow. It’s up to you to say whether you want us to stay together until midnight or not.”
“It’s all the same to me.”
“Why is it all the same?”
“Because I know I shall see you again in two weeks’ time.”
“Are you sure of that?”
“Yes.”
“Well...I’ll take you home.”
During this little discussion we had left the bedroom and gone down to the ground floor. We walked along the passage; an intense hubbub, like the clamor of a disturbed beehive, could be heard on the other side of the closed doors; the party was still going on. We followed the passage into the hall and went out in front of the house.
The unexpected freshness of the summer night made me look up instinctively at the sky as I opened the door of the car: the storm which had been hanging over the city all day long had burst elsewhere; the sky had now cleared and stars were shining brightly, and here and there a few light clouds mingled their whiteness with the luminous whiteness of the Milky Way. Cecilia, I thought, would have fine weather for her trip to Ponza; and again I was conscious of jealousy gnawing at my anxious heart. Yes, I would be counting the days, the hours, the minutes