The blonde woman was walking along the walls of Piazza Carolina, heading up towards Via Gennaro Serra. The cold wind from the sea drove her along, but her steps were dragging. In contrast to the rare passers-by scurrying to reach the warmth of their homes, she had no desire to face those eyes that bore into her, searching out her hidden feelings.
She had become good at dissembling, at concealing. She had to prevent anyone from knowing, had to keep what had happened from becoming common knowledge. In the uncertain light of the street lamps, walking more and more slowly, she felt her lover’s hands on her body; she recalled his face, his voice, the shallow breathing. She thought about the words that were said, the promises, the plans. How could it have happened? she wondered. And now, how could she hide it from her man’s eyes, that she loved another man, that she dreamed of leaving with him?
She ran her hand over her face, under the hat that hid her beautiful eyes. Tears. She was crying. She had to compose herself, she wasn’t far from home. She glimpsed the dark shape of the church of Santa Maria degli Angeli, at the top of Pizzofalcone hill. Soon she would have to face the man who loved her so much that he could read her thoughts. She was remorseful. She felt bad for him, for having betrayed him. She had to make sure no one found out, she had to protect him from scandal.
Quickening her pace, she wondered again what would happen.
Like every night, Ricciardi closed the door of his room behind him. Before going to bed he would open it a crack to hear his tata Rosa’s heavy breathing and be reassured by its regularity. He changed into his robe, and put a hairnet over his hair. With the lights turned off, he went to the window and parted the curtains. The patch of sky, swept clear and cloudless by the strong north wind, displayed four bright stars; Ricciardi wanted to be illuminated, but not by the stars.
The light that mattered to him was that of a dim lamp on a small table, behind the window across from his in the building opposite. The table was beside an armchair in which a young woman sat, embroidering. A cosy corner in the large room that was the kitchen. Ricciardi knew that her name was Enrica and that she was the eldest of five children: a large family. The father was a hat merchant. One of Enrica’s sisters, married and the mother of a young child, lived with her husband in the same apartment. The young woman was embroidering with her left hand, lost in thought. She wore tortoiseshell glasses. Ricciardi also knew that she bent her head a little when she was focusing; that her gestures were fluid and graceful, though she didn’t know what to do with her hands when she talked; that she was left-handed; that she would suddenly laugh when playing with her siblings or her little nephew; and that sometimes she cried, when she was alone and thought no one could see her.
There wasn’t a single night when he didn’t spend some time at the window, experiencing Enrica’s life vicariously. It was the only time he granted his tormented spirit a brief respite. He watched her at supper, serene and amiable with her family, seated to her mother’s left. Listening to the radio, her expression intent and engrossed, or to a recording on the monumental gramophone, spellbound, with a hint of a smile. Reading with her head bowed, moistening a finger to turn the page. Arguing, softly but stubbornly speaking up for herself. He had never spoken to her, but there was no one, surely, who knew her better than he did.
Indeed, he had never exchanged a word with her, nor did he think that would ever happen. One Sunday, when his tata wasn’t able to, he had gone to buy vegetables from the street vendor who came down from Capodimonte. He had paid, turned around with a bunch of broccoli under his arm, and there she was in front of him, face to face. He still shuddered at the memory of the extraordinary mixture of pleasure, awkwardness, joy and terror he had felt. Afterwards, in the drowsy state that preceded sleep, or at the moments when he woke up, he would see those deep, dark eyes hundreds of times. That day he had fled, his heart leaping in his chest, a loud pounding in his ears. Not turning around, dropping bits of broccoli along the way, his eyes half-closed to retain the image of those long legs and that faint smile that he had perhaps glimpsed. How could I speak to you? What could I offer you, except the distress of seeing me perpetually worn out?
In the small cone of lamplight, Enrica went on embroidering, unaware.
Before giving in to sleep, Ricciardi thought again about the clown and his desperate last song.
“Io sangue voglio, all’ira m’abbandono, in odio tutto l’amor mio finì . . . ” I will have vengeance . . . , and all my love shall end in hate.
What makes a man at the point of death sing? Was he getting ready to go onstage? Rehearsing his role? Why was he crying? Ricciardi clearly recalled the streak the tear had left on the white greasepaint. Or maybe the tears expressed an emotion related to the opera? And if so, what? What was unique about this performance? Why was the protagonist still in his dressing room putting on make-up while they had been singing for over an hour onstage? He had to learn more about it. He had to enter Vezzi’s life and his curious profession made up of fiction and make-believe. He would ask the priest for help.
And as the wind rattled the shutters, Ricciardi drifted into a muddled dream in which a left-handed girl embroidered in front of a weeping clown.