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By Root 686 0

again and again to certain details until he was completely certain that he had exhausted all their possibilities. The result, alas, was that special sort of naturalism, photographic, labored and too highly finished, that you can see in the paintings shown in so-called art exhibitions at very commercial galleries. These pictures were perfect of their kind, with the hideous perfection that belongs essentially to pornography. In other words, Balestrieri’s world was a concrete, coherent world without any cracks or pollutions in it, and little did it matter if it gave the impression of madness. Balestrieri himself had been perfectly happy in this world, right up to the moment of his death, without ever doubting it or trying to get out of it. Perhaps he had indeed been a sort of madman, but he was a madman whose madness consisted in an illusion of having a relationship with reality, that is, of being a wise man, as his paintings bore witness; whereas I—as I could not help saying to myself—was possibly a wise man whose wisdom consisted, on the contrary, in a profound conviction that such a relationship was impossible, that is, a wise man who believed himself mad.

As these thoughts were passing through my mind I had been going all around the walls, looking at the canvases one by one and not finding any in which it was possible to recognize the features of the girl with the childish face. I said to myself that it must have been like that: Balestrieri had never painted his little mistress, he had been content merely to make love to her; exactly the opposite of what might have been expected in view of his advanced age. I was on the point of going away when a sound from above made me raise my eyes. Balestrieri’s girl came out of one of the small doorways leading on to the balcony and started down the stairs, in a leisurely manner and evidently unconscious of my presence; her eyes were cast down, she had one hand on the banister and the other up to her chest, supporting a large bundle.

When she reached the foot of the stairs she raised her eyes and seemed to be frightened at seeing me standing there in front of her, beside the table in the middle of the studio. But only for an instant; immediately afterward a look of relief and calm spread over her round face, as though the encounter were no surprise to her and she had in fact been prepared for it for some time. I said, in embarrassment: “I live in a studio close by; perhaps you may have seen me sometimes. I came in to have a look at the pictures.”

Indicating her bundle, she answered: “And I came to get my belongings, before the studio is let. I was his model; he had given me a key, so I was able to get in.”

I noticed her speech was completely devoid of any kind of accent that might make it possible to guess where she had been born or the social class to which she belonged. Her voice was colorless and neutral, with a preciseness and economy of tone that suggested a certain reserve. Not knowing how to go on, I asked casually: “Did you come and see Balestrieri often?”

“Yes, almost every day.”

“But when did he die?”

“The evening of the day before yesterday.”

“Were you there when he died?”

She looked at me for a moment with her big dark eyes that seemed not so much to observe things as to reflect them without seeing them. “He was taken sick while I was sitting for him,” she said.

“He was painting you?”

“Yes.”

I could not help exclaiming in surprise: “But where’s the canvas on which he was painting you?”

“That’s the one,” she said, pointing to the easel.

I turned, glanced quickly at the canvas and then, more lingeringly, at her. In the half-darkness that seemed to dissolve and absorb her contours, her figure appeared more than ever slender and childish, with the wide skirt hanging over the thin legs, the narrow torso and the pale face swallowed up by the great dark eyes. I asked incredulously: “Was it really you who sat for that picture?”

She, in turn, appeared astonished at my astonishment. “Yes,” she said. “Why? Don’t you like the way he’s painted me?”

“I don’t know whether