Nino no longer had the thick beard I had seen years earlier in the bookstore, but his hair was long and disheveled. Otherwise he had remained the boy of years ago, tall, skinny, his eyes bright, his appearance unkempt. He embraced me, he knelt to greet the two girls, he stood up, apologizing for the intrusion. I murmured some cool words: Come in, sit down, what on earth are you doing in Florence? I felt as if I had hot wine in my brain, I couldn't give concreteness to what was happening: Nino, Nino himself, in my house. And it seemed to me that something was no longer functioning in the organization of internal and external. What was I imagining and what was happening, who was the shadow and who the living body? Meanwhile Pietro explained: We met at the university, I invited him to lunch. And I smiled, I said Yes, it's all ready, where there's enough for four there's enough for five, keep me company while I set the table. I seemed tranquil but I was extremely agitated, my face hurt with the effort of smiling. How is it that Nino is here, and what is here, what is is? I surprised you, Pietro said, with some apprehension, as when he was afraid of having been wrong about something. And Nino, laughing: I told him a hundred times to call you, I swear, but he didn't want to. Then he explained that it was my father-in-law who had told him to introduce himself. He had met Professor Airota in Rome, at the Socialist Party congress, and there, one thing leading to another, he had said that he had work to do in Florence and the professor had mentioned Pietro, the new book his son was writing, a volume that he had just obtained for him and that he needed urgently. Nino had offered to take it in person and now here we were at lunch, the girls fighting for his attention, he who was charming to both of them, obliging to Pietro, and had a few serious words for me.

…

…

…

 

>> 网页版功能未完善，完整内容，请扫码微信小程序。