“All Respectably Done” (“Tutto per bene”)

Translated by Caterina Agostini

How to cite this work:

Pirandello, Luigi. “All Respectably Done”, tr. Caterina Agostini. In Stories for a Year, eds. Lisa Sarti and Michael Subialka, Digital Edition, www.pirandellointranslation.org, 2024.

This story first appeared in two separate issues of the Rivista popolare di politica, lettere e scienze sociali, on June 15 and 30, 1906, and was later included in the collection Naked Life (La vita nuda), published by Treves in Milan in 1910. In 1922, the story became part of the second Collection of Stories for a Year, which was likewise titled Naked Life.

In “All Respectably Done,” the plot centers on the gradual unfolding of a shocking truth that the protagonist, Martino Lori, has managed not to understand until the very end of the story. The narrative thus requires an intricate and quite long arc to display the characters’ shifting emotions and behaviors so as to trace out the protagonist’s slow process of dawning awareness. Ultimately, Lori’s wife Silvia and best friend Verona are exposed for having deployed a sordid but perfectly “respectable” plan at the expenses of naïve Lori, whose only fault is to have given them his unconditional trust. The story thus also engages in a critical depiction of the two-faced social conventions of upper class, supposedly respectable, society; fittingly, distinctions of status thus become very important in the narrative. These include titles, the formality of address, and various forms of social hierarchy portrayed in the characters’ interactions – all elements that Pirandello plays with in many other stories, as well. Similarly, Lori’s epiphanic moment is portrayed in a typically Pirandellian “humoristic” twist that suddenly reverses the protagonist’s perceptions, allowing things to be seen in retrospective for what they truly are. This model of exploring a character’s reaction to discovering a truth that had been indecipherable until that moment is often central in Pirandello’s fictional work. Other stories built around such a model include: “Best Friends” (“Amicissimi”, 1902), “I nostri ricordi” (“Our Memories, 1912), and “La morta e la viva” (“The Dead and the Living,” 1910); likewise, similar devices are at work in his novels, such as The Late Mattia Pascal (Il fu Mattia Pascal, 1904) and plays like As You Desire Me (Come tu mi vuoi, 1930).

The linear, progressive unfolding of the plot in “All Respectably Done,” with its chapter division into a sequenced tableau, made it a perfect dramatic text for stage adaptation. Between 1919 and 1920, Pirandello turned his short story into a three-act play by the same title, which he wrote for Ruggero Ruggieri, an actor he deeply admired for his passionate interpretations of characters. The play’s premiere took place on March 2, 1920, at the Quirino Theater in Rome.

The Editors

I

Miss Silvia Ascensi, who had come to Rome to request a transfer from the Scuola Normale of Perugia to any other location--whatever and wherever it was, even to Sicily, even to Sardinia--asked the young deputy of her district, the Honorable Marco Verona, for help. Verona had been a devoted student of her poor father, Professor Ascensi, a prominent physicist from the University of Perugia who died a year earlier from a tragic accident in the laboratory.

She was certain that Verona, knowing well the reasons why she wanted to leave her hometown, would support her cause through wielding the great influence he had gained quickly in Parliament.

Verona, indeed, welcomed her not only politely, but with true goodwill. He even went out of his way to remind her of when he, as a student, visited the late professor, because during some of those visits, if he was not mistaken, she was there, a young girl, but not certainly not a little girl, if then––for sure!––if she was already serving as a secretary for her father...

Miss Ascensi, remembering, blushed intensely. A little girl? Not at all! She was already fourteen years old, then... And he, Deputy Verona, how old could he have been? Twenty, twenty-one at most. Oh, she could have repeated still, word by word, all that he had come to ask her father during those visits.

Verona was evidently deeply sorry that he had not completed his studies, considering how Professor Ascensi had inspired him with such enthusiasm at the time; he then urged the young lady to take heart, since she had not been able to hold back tears when she remembered the recent tragedy. Lastly, to advocate for her more effectively, he wanted to take her––(but why bother to go to all that trouble?)––yes, yes, he insisted that he would take her himself to the Ministry of Education.[1]

In the summer, though, everyone was off from work that year in Minerva Palace [2]. Deputy Verona expected not to find the Minister and the Vice Minister, but he was surprised not to find the Division Head or even the Section Head... He had to make do with Cavalier Martino Lori, a first-tier secretary who oversaw the whole division at that time.[3]

Lori, a most conscientious employee, was held in high regard by his supervisors and by his subordinates for his extraordinary politeness and gentle nature, which one could perceive from his eyes, smile, gestures, and for the outward rectitude of his clean stance, which was well-kept and showed deliberate care.

He welcomed Deputy Verona with deference, blushing with joy, not only because he anticipated that this deputy would, no doubt, one day be his highest supervisor, but also because for years he had admired his speeches at the Chamber. Turning his head to look at the young lady and knowing that she was the daughter of the late, famous Professor of the University of Perugia, Cavalier Lori was equally overjoyed.

He was a little past thirty years old, and Miss Silvia Ascensi had a funny way of speaking: it looked as if with her eyes––a bizarre, almost glowing, green color––she let her words sink deeply into the soul of her listener; she lit up completely. She showed, while speaking, a bright and precise ingenuity, a commanding will; that clarity, little by little, was shaken, and that commanding attitude was overcome and overpowered by an irresistible grace that emerged in her face, blushing. She noted, with vexation, that little by little her words, her reasoning, were no longer effective because those listening to her were drawn instead to admire that grace and delight in it. Then, in her blushing face, a little from the annoyance, a little from the thrill that the triumph of her femininity caused in her, instinctively and against her will, she felt confused. The smile of those admiring her reflected itself, without her wanting it to, in her lips; she shook her head with a hint of anger, shook her shoulders, and would stop the conversation, stating that she could not speak, could not express herself.

“Well, no! Why? It seems to me, instead, that you are expressing yourself very well!” Cavalier Martino Lori rushed to say.

And he promised Deputy Verona that he would do everything in his power to accommodate the young lady and to have the honor of assisting him.

Two days later, Silvia Ascensi went back to the Ministry alone. She had immediately noticed that, as far as Cavalier Lori was concerned, she no longer needed anyone to pull strings for her at all. And with the greatest naivety in the world, she went to tell him that she absolutely could no longer leave Rome: she had been sightseeing so much in those three days without ever getting tired, and she had admired the solitary villas flanked by cypresses, the silent sweetness of the gardens on the Aventine and Caelian hills,[4] the tragic solemnity of the ruins and certain ancient streets, like the Appian Way,[5] and the clear freshness of the Tiber…[6] She had fallen for Rome, in short, and she wanted to be transferred there, definitely. Impossible? Why impossible? Come now, it might be difficult. But not impossible. Ve-ry-dif-fi-cult, so there! But where there’s a will, come now... Even if she were ordered to take some additional courses... Yes, yes. He owed her this favor! She would have otherwise come many, many, many times to bother him. She would not have left him alone! An order was easy, wasn’t it? Therefore...

Therefore, the conclusion was another one.

After six or seven of those visits, one day after lunch, Cavalier Martino Lori left the office, got all dressed up as if for a grand occasion, and went to the Montecitorio Palace to ask to meet Deputy Verona [7].

He checked his gloves, he checked his fine shoes, and he straightened up his cuffs with the tips of his fingers, fidgeting while he waited for the doorman to let him in.

As soon as he was let in, to hide his embarrassment, he started telling Deputy Verona, excitedly, that his protegee was demanding the impossible, that’s it!

“My protegee?” Deputy Verona interrupted him. “What protegee?”

Lori, acknowledging with the greatest regret that he had used, without any hint of malice though, a word that could lend itself, really, to a... well, a negative interpretation, rushed to say that he meant to say Miss Ascensi.

“Ah, Miss Ascensi? Then, yes, protegee!” Deputy Verona answered him, smiling and causing more embarrassment to poor Cavalier Martino Lori. “I forgot that I had entrusted her to you, and I could not guess, at first, who you were talking about. I revere the memory of the illustrious professor, the young lady’s father, and my mentor, and I would like for you, too, Cavaliere, to protect his daughter––protect, truly, and make her happy in any way, because she deserves it.”

But, well, that was why Cavalier Martino Lori had come to meet with him! Transferring her to Rome, however, was not something he was able to do at all. If it were allowed, well, he would have liked to know the real reason why... why the young lady wanted to leave Perugia.

Well! It wasn’t pretty, unfortunately, that reason. Professor Ascensi had been cheated on and abandoned by his wife, a most evil woman, very wealthy, who had moved in with another man of her status and had two or three children with him. Ascensi had kept his only daughter with him, of course, giving her everything that he owned. A great man, but lacking any common sense at all, Professor Ascensi had a very troubled life, with problems and sorrows of every sort. He bought books, books, and more books, instruments for his laboratory, and then he could not explain to himself why his salary was not enough to sustain what such a small family might need. In order not to trouble her father with financial burdens, Miss Ascensi found herself forced to take up teaching as well. Oh, that girl’s life, until her father’s death, had been a constant exercise of patience and virtue. But she was proud, and rightly so, of her father’s fame, which allowed her to hold her head high despite her mother’s disgrace. Now, however, with her father’s tragic passing and having no protection, quite poor and alone, she could not bear living in Perugia anymore, where her rich and shameless mother lived, too. That was all.

Martino Lori, touched by that story (touched, really, even before listening to the authoritative words of a deputy with a great future ahead), in leaving the meeting, suggested his intention to compensate that young woman as best he could, both for her sacrifices and sorrows and her marvelous filial devotion.

And so it was that Miss Silvia Ascensi, coming to Rome to obtain a transfer, found herself, instead, a husband.

II

The marriage, though, at least in the first three years, was very miserable. Stormy.

In the passion of the first days, Martino Lori gave all of himself, so to speak; his wife, instead, gave very, very little of herself. Once the flame merging souls and bodies died down, the woman that he believed had become all his by then, as he had become all hers, turned out to be very different from what he had imagined.

Lori realized, indeed, that she did not love him, that she had let him marry her as if in a weird dream, from which she was now waking up bitter, gloomy, and restless.

What had she dreamt?

As time went by, Lori realized that she, actually, not only did not love him but was incapable of loving him because their natures were completely opposite to each other. Between them even mutual tolerance was impossible. This was because he, loving her, was willing to respect her extremely lively disposition and independent spirit, she, not loving him, could not even stand his personality and ideas.

“What ideas!” she shouted at him, shrugging in disdain. “You cannot have opinions, my dear! You are spineless...” [8]

What did a spine have to do with ideas? Poor Lori was speechless. She considered him to be hard and cold because he was quiet, right? But he was quiet to avoid arguing! He was quiet because he was shut in a state of mourning, already resigned to the collapse of his beautiful dream, that of having a loving and caring companion and a clean little house blessed with peace and love.

Martino Lori was surprised at how his wife, bit by bit, was forming her opinion of him as she interpreted his actions and his words. Certain days he doubted himself, wondering if he wasn't really who he'd always thought he was and whether indeed, unbeknownst to him, he did have all the flaws and vices she held against him.

He always had an open road in front of him; he had never entered life’s obscure and deep turns , and perhaps, thus, could not distrust himself or anyone. His wife, on the contrary, had seen horrible things happen since her childhood and had learned, unfortunately, that everything can be evil, that there is nothing sacred in the world, if even a mother, a mother, my God... “Yes, of course”: poor Silvia, she deserved excuses, sympathy, even when she saw evil where there was none, and thus acted unfairly toward him. But the more he, with meek goodness, tried to get closer to her, to inspire her to have more trust in life, to persuade her to make fairer judgments, the more she would become sour and resist.

But if not love, good God, at least some gratitude for him who, after all, had given her back a house, a family, and took her away from a life that was nomadic and treacherous! No; not even gratitude. She was arrogant, fully confident of being fully able to support herself with her work. And six or seven times, in those first three years, she threatened him that she would start teaching again and separate from him. One day, finally, she acted on that threat.

Coming back from the office that day, Lori did not find his wife at home. That morning, he had another, worse argument with her over a slight rebuke that he had dared to address to her. But the storm that exploded that morning had been building up for a month already. She had been very bizarre and rude all that month and had even shown disgust for him.

Without a reason, as usual!

Now, in the letter that she left at home, she announced her firm intention to leave him for good, and do everything she could to get her position as a teacher back; and, at the end, so as not to have him do anything needlessly crazy and go to the trouble of looking for her, she also left a note about the hotel where she was temporarily staying; but that he should not visit her, because it would be pointless.

Lori paused to reflect for a long time with that letter in his hands, perplexed.

He had suffered too much and unfairly. Yes, breaking free from that woman would perhaps have been a relief, but an unspeakable sorrow as well. He loved her. And, thus, a temporary relief, and then a great sorrow and an immense void for all his life. He knew, he felt certain that he could never love any other woman. And additionally, the scandal, which he did not deserve; he, so correct in everything, separated from his wife, exposed to malicious gossip from people who could have suspected who knows what faults in him, when God was his witness how generous, how forgiving he had proved in those three years.

What should he do?

He decided not to take action that night. The night would bring counsel to him, and perhaps remorse to her.

The next day, he did not go to the office and waited all morning at home. In the afternoon, he was getting ready to go out, without having really made up his mind either way, when he received Deputy Marco Verona’s invitation from the Chamber of Deputies.

There was a crisis in progress at the Ministry; and for the last few days at Minerva Palace, Verona’s name had been repeated insistently as a probable Vice-Minister, and someone even predicted that he would become Minister.

Lori, among his many ideas, had even considered going to Verona for advice. He had decided against it, imagining well what troubles Verona was facing in those days. Silvia, clearly, did not have that restraint, and knowing that he would oversee the Ministry of Education, she might perhaps have gone to be reinstated as a teacher into teaching.

Martino Lori’s expression dimmed once more, thinking that possibly Verona, now using his authority as immediate supervisor, might want to order him not to interfere in any business against his wife’s wishes.

But, instead, Marco Verona welcomed him into the Chamber with much kindness.

He looked very bothered having been caught, as he said, in a trap. Minister, no, no, luckily! Vice-Minister. He would not have wanted this minor position either, given the political circumstances at that moment. Loyalty to his party had forced him. Well, he would have at least wanted, in his Cabinet, the help of a man who had proven to be honest and well-prepared, and he had thus immediately thought of him, Cavalier Lori. Would he accept?

Pale with shock, his ears blushing, Lori did not know how to thank him for the honor he was bestowing upon him, for the trust he was showing; but while professing that appreciation, he had in his eyes an anxious question; he let it be understood with his eyes that he, truly, was waiting for something else to be discussed. Didn’t Deputy Verona, or better His Excellency, really want anything else from him?

He smiled, getting up, and let his hand rest slightly on his shoulder. Well, yes, he wanted something else: patience, and forgiveness for Silvia. Come now, those shenanigans!

“She visited me and stated her ‘proud’ intentions to me,” he said, still smiling. “I talked to her for a long time, and... Yes, of course! Yes, of course! There is really no need for you to apologize, Cavaliere. I know well that the fault is hers, and I told her, you know? Frankly. I will tell you more, I made her cry... Yes, because I talked to her about her father, how much her father suffered because of the sad misfortune in the family... and I spoke to her of other things, too. You may leave without a worry, Cavaliere. You will find your wife at home.”

“Excellency, I do not know how to thank you...” Lori tried to say, touched, while bowing.

But Verona immediately interrupted him:

“Do not thank me; and, above all, do not call me Excellency.”

And, letting him go, Verona assured him that Silvia, a woman with a strong personality, would no doubt keep the promises that she had made to him and that, not only would those unhappy confrontations not occur again, but she would in every way demonstrate remorse for the unfair sorrows that she had caused him up to then.

III

And so it was.

The evening of the reconciliation marked an unforgettable date for Martino Lori; unforgettable for many reasons that he understood, or better guessed immediately, from the way that she fell into his arms as soon as she saw him.

How much, how much she cried! And how much and what joy he drank in from those tears of remorse and love!

His true nuptials he celebrated then; from that day on he had the companion he had dreamed of; and another, secret, very big dream of his was certainly achieved in that first reunion.

When Martino Lori could no longer doubt his wife’s condition, and when she then gave birth to a baby girl, he understood and explained many things to himself by seeing what gratitude, what devotion for him, and what sacrifices for the daughter she had embraced through motherhood. She wanted to become a mother. Perhaps she could not understand and explain it to herself, those secret needs of her nature; and that was why she had been so bizarre earlier, and life had seemed so meaningless and empty before. She wanted to become a mother.

The happiness of finally achieving his dream was only shaken by the sudden fall of the Ministry to which Deputy Verona was affiliated, as was Martino Lori, his personal secretary, to some small degree––in the shadows.

Lori appeared possibly more upset than Deputy Verona himself due to the violent aggression of the coalition of opposition factions aiming to overthrow the Ministry, almost without a reason. Deputy Verona, as far as he was concerned, stated that he was done with politics, and that he wanted to retire so that he could resume his interrupted education, this time with better results and greater satisfaction.

Indeed, at the new elections he managed to resist the electors’ insisting demands, and he did not run for office. He had taken great interest in a remarkable scientific work that Professor Bernardo Ascensi had left incomplete. If the daughter, Mrs. Lori, granted him the honor of completing it, he would try to carry on his mentor’s experiments and complete the work.

This made Silvia very happy.

In that year of devoted, fervid collaboration, her husband and Verona had become close friends. Lori, however, looked shy and a bit clumsy; and though Verona had never imposed on him with the weight of his own status and worth, and now treated him with the highest trust, with the greatest cordiality––to the point of addressing him informally and asking to be addressed informally––Lori saw his friend as his superior. [9] Verona was sorry to see that, and he often teased him. Lori laughed at that teasing, but with a secret affliction because he noted in his friend’s attitude a certain sorrow that grew bigger day by day. He attributed it to his undignified retirement from politics and the fights in Parliament; and he talked about it with his wife, and he advised her to use that influence she seemed to have over him to persuade him, to push him, to dive into life again.

“Oh sure! He’ll want to listen to me!” Silvia answered. “When he has said no, that’s it; you know that. Otherwise, I don’t think so. He worked with such energy, such passion...”

Martino Lori shrugged.

“It will have to be!”

It seemed to him, though, that Verona only regained the peace he had before when he joked with their little Ginetta, who grew up so quickly, healthy and full of energy.

Marco Verona really did pay certain tender attentions to that child, moving Lori to tears. Verona told him that he should look out because, one day or another, he would take her away from him. Seriously, you know! He was not joking. And Ginetta didn’t need to be told twice: she would leave her dad, her mom, wouldn’t she? Even her mom, to go away with him... Ginetta agreed: bad girl! For the gifts, right? For the gifts he gave to her on whatever occasion. And what gifts! Lori and his wife suffered on account of them, every time. Indeed, she could not avoid letting Verona see that she was upset. Humiliation because of pride? No. Those gifts were too many and too expensive, and she did not want them! However, enjoying Ginetta’s joyful reaction to those toys, Verona shrugged, hurt by their complaints and protests, and he even rudely rebelled, demanding that they shut up and let him enjoy the little girl.

Silvia started, little by little, to get tired of those manners of Verona’s, and when her husband went on justifying his actions by saying that it had been in sum a great insult to his friend to retire from politics, she answered that was not a good reason for him to express his discontent being rude in their home.

Lori would have wanted to point out to his wife that, after all, Verona expressed that discontent by making their child happy; but he kept quiet so as not to compromise the peace that had been established between them since the first day of their reconciliation.

What in the first years he had found hostile in her had now become a quality and a virtue in his eyes. He felt all filled and sustained by her temper, firmness, and energy, which were no longer turned against him. And life looked so full to him now, and so securely founded, with that woman by his side––his, all his, all for their house and young daughter.

Yes, in his heart he appreciated Verona’s friendship, and so he would have liked for there to be no impression in his wife’s mind that he had become annoying and bothersome due to that excessive affection for Ginetta; on the other hand, though, if that affection, too intrusive, were to disturb his household’s peace, his good harmony with his wife... But how could you get Verona to understand that, when he did not even notice the coldness with which Silvia, now, welcomed him?

As years went by, Ginetta started showing a very strong inclination for music. And there you have it: Verona, two, three times a week, ready in his vehicle to take the girl to this or that concert; and often, during the opera season, he came to conspire with her, to convince her, so that she would ingratiate herself to mom and dad and they would take her to the theater, in the box already booked for her.

Lori, troubled, embarrassed, smiled. He could not say no, so as not to displease his friend and daughter; but, for the love of God, Verona should have understood that he could not afford it so often. The expenses were not just for the box and the vehicle. Silvia still had to dress up; she could not make a bad impression. Yes, Lori was by then the Division Head and already had a good enough salary, but he certainly did not have money to waste.

So great was his passion for that girl that Verona did not notice those things, and he did not even realize the sacrifice Silvia had to make, certain evenings, by staying at home alone with the excuse that she was not feeling well.

If only she had always stayed home! One of those evenings, she came back from theater with unending cold chills. The morning after, she was coughing with high fever. And within five days, she was dead.

IV

Because of the shock of that rapid death, Martino Lori was at first almost more dismayed than grieved.

By that evening, Verona, as if hurt by that anguishing numbness, that gloomy mourning, which looked like imminent stupidity, pushed him out of the morgue and forced him to go to his daughter, assuring him that he would stay there awake all night.

Mr. Lori allowed himself to be sent away; but then, late at night, as silent as a shadow, he went back to the morgue and found Verona there, with his face sinking deep into the bedside where the corpse lay stiff and grey.

At first, Mr. Lori thought that Verona, overwhelmed by sleepiness, had reclined his head over there inadvertently; then, looking closer, he noticed that Verona’s body was shaken at moments, as if by repressed sobs. Then the tears, the tears that up to that point were unable to emerge from his eyes, took Mr. Lori over angrily, at seeing his friend crying so. But Verona suddenly opposed him, trembling, transfigured, and as soon as Mr. Lori, shaking, reached out to hug him––Verona rejected him, he really rejected him with bleak harshness, with anger. Verona had to feel in great part responsible for that tragedy, because it was really him, five nights earlier, who had forced Silvia to go to the theater, and now he did not have the strength to see his friend suffer like that. That is what Mr. Lori thought, to explain that brutality; he thought that sorrow has different effects on minds: some, it depresses; others, it angers.

And neither the endless visits of his subordinates, who loved him like a father, nor the pleas of Verona, who pointed out how his daughter was confused by his sorrow and worried for him, had any power to shake him from that sort of annihilation into which he had fallen, as if the dark and raw mystery of that sudden death had surrounded him, thinning out life around him.

It seemed to him, now, that he saw everything differently, and that noises reached him as from a distance, and the voices, even the voices most familiar to him––his friend’s, his daughter’s–– sounded in a way that he had never noticed before.

From that numbness came a sort of new curiosity, though without passion, for the world surrounding him, that had never appeared to him before, and he had not known, thus, either.

Could it be that Marco Verona had always been the way he now saw him? Even his body, his facial expressions seemed different to him. And his own daughter? Oh my! Had she really grown that much? Or, after the tragedy, had another Ginetta sprang forth, so tall, petite, a little cold, in particular with him? Yes, she looked like her mother, but she did not have the grace that highlighted and brightened his Silvia’s beauty in her youth; thus Ginetta often did not even look pretty. She had the same imperious attitude as her mother, however, without those frank bouts and without sudden changes.

Now Verona visited Lori's home more informally, almost every day. He often stayed to have lunch or dinner. He had finally completed the monumental scientific work conceived and started by Bernardo Ascensi, and he was already waiting to publish it in a wonderful edition. Many newspapers presented the first news about it, and the leading journals, not only in Italy but also abroad, had also taken to discussing some of its most important conclusions, thus giving a glimpse of the very high fame the work would soon enjoy.

Verona's merit at having achieved it and drawing ingenious conclusions from the first idea was, after the publication, acknowledged unanimously as being equal to Ascensi's own. It was a reason for glory for Ascensi, but much more for Verona. From everywhere, Verona was showered with praise and honor. Among these was the offer of a senator’s seat. He did not want to have it right after retiring from his position in Parliament; but now he welcomed it gladly, because it did not come to him through politics.

In those days, thinking about the joy, the triumph that his Silvia would feel had she seen her father’s name so glorified, Martino Lori lingered during the visits that he paid to his wife’s tomb every evening when he left the Ministry. He had taken up that habit and would go even in the winter, when the weather was bad, to take care of the plants around the family chapel and change the lights in the lamp; and he spoke softly to the dead woman. Seeing the cemetery daily and the reflections it inspired in him left a mark of gloom, ever more visible on his face.

His daughter, as much as Verona, had tried to dissuade him from this habit. At first, he had denied it, like a child caught doing something wrong; then, forced to confess, he had shrugged, smiling palely. “It does not affect me... Actually, for me it is a comfort,” he had said. “Let me go.”

Anyway, if he had gone home right away, who would he have found there? Every day, Verona came and picked up Ginetta. He did not complain about it, no; indeed, Lori was very thankful to his friend for the distractions he offered his daughter. The certain bitterness he had noticed on some occasions in his attitudes along with other slight flaws of character had not managed to diminish his admiration, let alone his gratitude and devotion, for this man — a man who had granted him such an intimate and more than fraternal friendship despite both the brilliance of his mind and the fame and positions he held, though he was just a poor man who, except for his good heart, had no other virtue or evident quality to deserve it.

He saw now with satisfaction that he was not wrong when he told his wife that Verona’s affection would be a blessing for their Ginetta. He had the greatest proof of that when she turned eighteen. Oh, how he would have wished his Silvia could have been there that night, after the birthday party!

Verona, who visited purposedly without bringing any gift for Ginetta, as soon as she went to bed, took him aside, and solemn and moved, informed him that a young friend of his, Marquis Flavio Gualdi, was asking for his daughter’s hand, through his mediation.

On the spot, Martino Lori was astonished. Marquis Gualdi? A nobleman... Very wealthy... Ginetta’s hand? Yes, going with Verona to concerts, to conferences, for a stroll, Ginetta had managed to enter a world that she could not have approached by birth or social status, and she had been liked by some; but he...

“You know,” he told his friend, almost confused and troubled in his joy, “you know what my circumstances are... I would not want Marquis Gualdi...”

Verona interrupted him:

“Gualdi knows... knows what he needs to know.”

“I see. But, the difference such as it is, I would not want him... regardless of how good his intentions are, not to figure out many things...”

Verona interrupted him again, irritated:

“It seemed pointless for me to say this to you, but as you, forgive me, are now saying such silly things to me now, to reassure you I will say that, come now, being a friend of yours for so many years...”

“Heh, I know!”

“Ginetta spent more time with me than with you, one could say...”

“Yes... Yes...”

“Well, what is that, are you crying now? I do not want to be the go-between in this wedding for nothing. Come on, come on, stop it! I am leaving. You will mention it, tomorrow morning, to Ginetta. You will see, it will not be difficult for you.”

“Does she expect it?” Lori asked, smiling in tears.

“Well, didn’t you see that she was not surprised at all when she saw me arrive without a gift?”

Thus speaking, Marco Verona laughed happily, as Lori had not heard him laugh for many years.

V

A curious feeling, of intense coldness, at first. But Martino Lori would not have paid attention to it, since just as many other things in his life had found an explanation (his being persuaded of naive goodness), this too would be explained as the natural consequence of the anticipated difference in social status as well as the personality, education, and looks of his son-in-law.

Marquis Gualdi was not very young anymore: he was still blond, a clear blond, but already bald; bright and pinkish like an ornament of the finest enameled porcelain; and he spoke softly, with an accent that was more French than the dialect of Piedmont, softly, softly, modulating in his voice a certain condescending goodness that contrasted, though, in a bizarre way with the stiff glance of his blue glasslike eyes.

Lori had felt if not properly rejected, then almost removed by those eyes, and it had seemed to him that he could glimpse in them a pity that was slightly mocking him, his manners being previously perhaps too simple, now perhaps too cautious.

He also would have found an explanation for the completely different attitude that Gualdi had with Verona as well as Ginetta, to the degree that, come now, it seemed his wife had come to him through his friend and not from Lori, the father... Truly, that is how it went, but Verona...

Indeed, it was Verona who Martino Lori could no longer make sense of.

Now that he had ended up alone at home and did not even have an office anymore, since he had retired to please his son-in-law, shouldn’t Verona regale him more affectionately with the comfort of the fraternal friendship that he had wanted to grant him for so many years?

He, Verona, visited Ginetta in Gualdi’s residence every day; while after the wedding he had not visited his friend, Lori, anymore, not even once by happenstance. Had he perhaps gotten tired of seeing him so closed off in his ancient mourning, and being by now elderly himself, did he perhaps prefer going to cheerful places where Ginetta, thanks to his actions, seemed happy?

Yes, that could also be the case. But then, when he went to visit his daughter and found him there at the table with her and his son-in-law, as if he belonged there, why was he welcomed by Verona almost with spite, coldly? Could it be that this cold feeling came from the location, from that vast dining room bright with mirrors, brightly furnished? That wasn’t it! No! No! Verona had not only moved away; the attitude, his attitude had really changed. He hardly shook his hand, hardly looked at him, and kept talking to Gualdi as if no one had entered.

Just to take things a little further, they might as well leave him standing there by the table. Only Ginetta spoke a few words to him from time to time, but like that, just for show, so that you could not say no one cared about him really.

With his heart squeezed by an inexplicable anguish, confused and humiliated, Martino Lori went away.

Shouldn’t the son-in-law really have some respect for him, some deference? Were all the parties and invitations for Verona, because he was wealthy and famous? But if it had to be that way, if all three of them wanted to go on and welcome him every evening like that, as an unwelcome guest, as an intruder, he would no longer go there. No, no, for God’s sake, he wouldn’t go any longer! He wanted to see what those fancy folks, all three of them, would do then.

Well, two days passed by; four or five; a whole week passed by, and neither Verona, nor the son-in-law, nor even Ginetta, no one, not even a servant, came to ask him if he perhaps was sick ...

With his eyes unable to see, wandering in the bedroom, Mr. Lori went on scratching his forehead with his restless fingers, almost as if to wake his mind from the anguishing languor into which it had fallen. Not knowing anymore what he should think, he revisited the past, he revisited it with his lost spirits...

All at once, without knowing why, his thinking got fixated on a remote memory, the saddest memory of his life. There were four candles shining that tragic night, and Marco Verona, with his face sinking by the bedside where dead Silvia lay, was crying.

It was suddenly as if, in his befuddled mind, those funereal candles flickered and lit a grey flash to illuminate horribly his whole life, starting from the first day on which Silvia had appeared before him, accompanied by Marco Verona.

He felt his legs faltering, and it seemed to him that all the room was moving around him. He hid his face in his hands, all huddled in himself:

“Could it be? Could it be?”

He raised his eyes to his wife’s portrait, at first almost appalled by what was happening inside him; then, he attacked that portrait with his glance, closing his fists and contracting all his face in an expression of hatred, disgust, horror:

“You? You?”

More than everyone, she had deceived him. Perhaps because afterward her remorse had been sincere. Verona, no... Verona, no... That one came to his home, there, like he owned it, and... Well, yes! Perhaps, he suspected that he was aware and turned a blind eye for his own gain.

As this hateful thought flashed in him, Martino Lori felt his fingers claw up and his kidneys crack. He jumped up, but another vertigo caught him. The anger, the pain released themselves in frantic, rushing tears.

He eventually recovered himself, feeble and empty inside.

It had taken more than twenty years for him to understand. And he would not have understood, if their coldness, their dismissive carelessness, had not shown him and almost said it clearly.

What more could be done, after so many years? Now that everything was over... Like that, for a while, quietly... Cleanly, as is common among people who are respectable, among people who know how things should be handled? Had they not implied, with grace, perhaps, that by then he had no role to play? He had acted as the husband, then as the father... And now, enough: there was no need for him, because they, all three of them, had understood each other so well among themselves...

The least evil of all, the least cruel, perhaps had been the one who had regretted right after her fault and had died...

And Martino Lori, that evening, like all evenings, following his ancient habit, found himself on the street leading to the cemetery. He stopped, gloomy and perplexed, wondering whether to move forward or go back. He thought about the plants around the family chapel that he had taken care of for so many years by then. There, in a little while, he would have been laid to rest as well. Down there, next to her? Oh, no, no: not now, not anymore... And yet, how that woman had cried then, coming back to him, and how much affection she had surrounded him with afterward... Yes, yes: she had repented... Her, yes, only her, he could perhaps forgive.

And Martino Lori resumed his way to the cemetery. He had something new to tell the dead woman, that night.