-*-
52
尽管《团结报》的编辑对我充满了热情，但他们并没有很快刊登我的文章。我非常不安，害怕那篇文章再也出不来了。但正好是我陪莉拉去看了精神科的第二天，我一大早跑到报刊亭，拿到了一份报纸，我快速翻阅了一下，终于看到了那篇文章。我想着，他们可能会把这篇文章穿插在地方栏目中间，但我却看到，文章出现在全国发行的那几页里，占了一整版，我看到我的名字被引出来，我感觉好像有一根长长的针刺到了我。彼得罗马上就给我打电话了，他非常高兴，阿黛尔也很振奋，她说她丈夫很喜欢那篇文章，就连马丽娅罗莎也说好。最让我惊异的是，我的出版社的总编，还有和那家出版社合作了很多年的两个名人也打电话给我，向我表示祝贺，弗朗科·马里也给我打了电话，他从马丽娅罗莎那儿要到了我的号码。他是带着敬意和我说话的，他说他为我感到高兴，说我完整展示了工人的处境，那篇文章堪称典范。这时候，我很期望能通过某种渠道，获得尼诺的认可，但他一直都没有出现，我有些难过。就连帕斯卡莱也没有露脸，但我知道，因为政见不同，他早已不看这个党派的报纸了。无论如何，《团结报》的主编给我带来了很大的安慰，他向我表示，他非常喜欢我写的文章，但用的还是那种不恭的语气。他建议我买一台打字机，再写点类似的东西。
In spite of the editor’s enthusiasm,
l’Unità put off publishing my article. I was anxious, afraid that it wouldn’t
come out at all. But the day after the neurological exam I went out early to
the newsstand and scanned the paper, jumping rapidly from page to page,
until, at last, I found it. I expected that it would run, heavily cut, amid
the local items, but instead it was in the national news, complete, with my
byline, which pierced me like a long needle when I saw it in print. Pietro
called me, happy about it, and Adele, too, was pleased; she said that her
husband had liked the article very much and so had Mariarosa. But the
surprising thing was that the head of my publishing house, along with two
well-known intellectuals who had been connected to the firm for years, and
Franco, Franco Mari, telephoned to congratulate me. Franco had asked
Mariarosa for my number, and he spoke with respect, he said that he was
pleased, that I had provided an example of a thorough investigation into the
condition of workers, that he hoped to see me soon to talk about it. I
expected at that point that through some unforeseen channel Nino would
communicate his approval. But in vain—I was disappointed. There was no word
from Pasquale, either, but then out of political disgust he had long ago
stopped reading the party newspaper. The editor from l’Unità, however,
consoled me, seeking me out to tell me how much the editorial office had
liked the piece, and encouraging me, in his usual teasing way, to buy a
typewriter and write more good articles.
我得说，最虚伪的电话是布鲁诺·索卡沃打来的。他让秘书拨通了我的电话，然后他过来接。他说话的语气很忧伤，就好像那篇文章——但刚开始，他从来都没提到那篇文章——狠狠地打击了他，让他失去了所有活力。他说，我们在伊斯基亚时，我们在沙滩上散步的那些天，他非常爱我，他从来都没有像那样爱过任何人。他对我倾诉了所有的爱慕之情，因为我年纪轻轻，就做出了那么了不起的事情。他发誓说，他父亲把工厂交到他手上时，工厂已经困难重重，而且有很多糟糕的做法。他是唯一的继承人，他自己也看不惯工厂的事情，但他没办法。最后他说，我的文章——他终于提到了——对他很有启发，他想尽快纠正自己，改变之前习以为常的错误做法。他说和莉拉之间的误会让他觉得很遗憾。他说他的管理人员正在和我找的律师解决所有问题。最后他小声总结说：“你认识索拉拉兄弟，在这个紧急的关头，他们正在帮助我，让索卡沃工厂改头换面。”最后他补充说：“米凯莱向你致以亲切问候。”我也问候了米凯莱，并且谢谢他的好意，然后就挂了电话。我马上打电话给马丽娅罗莎的律师朋友，告诉他关于这通电话的事情。他向我确认说，钱的问题已经解决了。几天之后，我在他的事务所见到了他。他比我大不了几岁，除了嘴唇有点儿薄，人很可爱，他穿得很得体。他想带我去喝杯咖啡，他对圭多·艾罗塔充满了崇敬，他也记得彼得罗。他把索卡沃给莉拉的钱交给我，让我小心不要被小偷偷走了。他提到了学生、工会的人，还有警察在工厂门口制造的混乱。他说他去了工厂，劳动监察员也去了，但我感觉他不是很满意。只有到告别的时候，他才在门口问我：
I have to say that the most disorienting
phone call was from Bruno Soccavo. He had his secretary call me, then he got
on the phone. He spoke in a melancholy tone, as if the article, which he
didn’t even mention at first, had hit him so hard that it had sapped his
energy. He said that in our time on Ischia, and our beautiful walks on the
beach, he had loved me as he had never loved. He declared his utter
admiration for the direction that, although I was very young, I had given to
my life. He swore that his father had handed over to him a business in a lot
of trouble, beset by evil practices, and that he was merely the blameless
inheritor of a situation that in his eyes was deplorable. He stated that my
article—finally he mentioned it—had been illuminating and that he wished to
correct as soon as possible the many defects inherited from the past. He was
sorry about the misunderstandings with Lila and told me that the
administration was arranging everything with my lawyer. He concluded softly:
you know the Solaras, in this difficult situation they’re helping me give the
Soccavo factory a new face. And he added: Michele sends you warm greetings. I
exchanged the greetings, I took note of his good intentions, and I hung up.
But right away I called Mariarosa’s lawyer friend to tell him about that
phone call. He confirmed that the money question had been resolved, and I met
him a few days later in the office where he worked. He wasn’t much older than
me, well dressed, and likable, except for unpleasantly thin lips. He wanted
to take me out for coffee. He was full of admiration for Guido Airota, he
remembered Pietro well. He gave me the sum that Soccavo had paid for Lila, he
urged me to be careful not to have my purse snatched. He described the chaos
of students and union members and police he had found at the gates, he said
that the labor inspector had also showed up at the factory. And yet he didn’t
seem satisfied. Only when we were saying goodbye, he asked me at the door:
“你是不是认识索拉拉？”
“You know the Solaras?”
“他们就是我们城区的人，我在那个城区长大。”
“They’re from the neighborhood where I
grew up.”
“你知不知道，索卡沃的背后是他们？”
“You know that they are behind Soccavo?”
“我知道。”
“Yes.”
“你不担心吗？”
“And you’re not worried?”
“我不明白，你想说什么。”
“I don’t understand.”
“我想说：你一直都认识他们，但你多年在外面上学，也许你现在不是很了解那不勒斯的情况。”
“I mean: the fact that you’ve known them
forever and that you studied outside Naples—maybe you can’t see the situation
clearly.”
“我非常清楚。”
“It’s very clear.”
“最近几年，索拉拉家族扩张了，成了这个城市非常重要的人物。”
“In recent years the Solaras have
expanded, in this city they’re important.”
“然后呢？”
“And so?”
他抿了抿嘴唇，向我伸出一只手说：
He pressed his lips together, shook my
hand.
“也没什么。我们现在要到钱了，都没问题了，代我向马丽娅罗莎和彼得罗问好。你们什么时候结婚？你喜欢佛罗伦萨吗？”
“And so nothing: we’ve got the money,
everything’s in order. Say hello to Mariarosa and Pietro. When’s the wedding?
Do you like Florence?”
-*-
53
我把钱给了莉拉，她心满意足地数了两遍，想马上把我借给她的钱还给我。恩佐回来了，他和那个懂计算机的人会面了。他看起来很高兴，但还是一副不动声色的模样，或许他学会了遏制自己的欲望、情感和语言。莉拉和我很难从他嘴里获得信息，但最后，我们还是得到了一个比较清晰的结论：那个电脑专家对恩佐非常热情。刚开始，他强调恩佐在苏黎世函授课程上是白花钱，但他发现，尽管恩佐学了那些没用的东西，还是很懂行。他说IBM公司要开始在意大利生产，要在维梅尔卡泰的工厂里生产一种全新的电脑，他们在那不勒斯的分部急需一批穿孔员、检验员、操作员、程序员和分析员。他向恩佐保证，公司一开始培训课程，就会通知他，并记下了他的所有信息。
I gave the money to Lila, who counted it
twice with satisfaction and wanted to give me back immediately the amount I
had lent her. Enzo arrived soon afterward, he had just been to see the person
who knew about computers. He seemed pleased, naturally within the bounds of
his impassiveness, which, maybe even against his own wishes, choked off
emotions and words. Lila and I struggled to get the information out of him,
but finally a fairly clear picture emerged. The expert had been extremely
kind. At first he had repeated that the Zurich course was a waste of money,
but then he had realized that Enzo, in spite of the uselessness of the
course, was smart. He had told him that IBM was about to start producing a
new computer in Italy, in the Vimercate factory, and that the Naples branch
had an urgent need for operators, keypunch operators, programmer-analysts. He
had assured him that, as soon as the company started training courses, he
would let Enzo know. He had written down all his information.
“你觉得，他是一个可靠的人吗？”莉拉问。
“Did he seem serious?” Lila asked.
恩佐为了证明那个人很可信，就指着我说：
Enzo, to give proof of the man’s seriousness, nodded at me, said:
“他知道莱农未婚夫的所有事儿。”
“He knew all about Lenuccia’s fiancé.”
“也就是说？”
“Meaning?”
“他跟我说，莱农的未婚夫是一个非常重要的人物的儿子。”
“He told me he’s the son of an important
person.”
莉拉做出了一个厌烦的表情。很明显，她知道这场会面是彼得罗张罗的，艾罗塔这个姓氏决定了这场会面的成功，她反对恩佐把这件事情当真，并采取行动。我觉得，她一想到现在恩佐也欠我的人情，她一定觉得很不安，就好像那种人情，在我和她之间是不存在问题的，也不会有感恩或者内心的亏欠，但对恩佐可能会造成伤害。我马上说，我公公的地位没什么作用，那个电脑专家跟我说的是：如果恩佐真的懂电脑的话，他才会帮忙。这时候，莉拉做了一个比较夸张的赞同手势，她强调说：
Annoyance showed in Lila’s face. She
knew, obviously, that the appointment had been arranged by Pietro and that
the name Airota counted in the positive outcome of the meeting, but she
seemed put out by the fact that Enzo should notice it. I thought she was
bothered by the idea that he, too, owed me something, as if that debt, which
between her and me could have no consequence, not even the subordination of
gratitude, might instead be harmful to Enzo. I said quickly that the prestige
of my father-*-law didn’t count that much, that the computer expert had
explained even to me that he would help only if Enzo was good. And Lila,
making a slightly excessive gesture of approval, said emphatically:
“他真的很厉害。”
“He’s really good.”
“我连一台计算机都没有见过呢。”恩佐说。
“I’ve never seen a computer,” Enzo said.
“那又怎么样？那人还是一下就明白了你很在行。”
“So? That guy must have understood anyway
that you know what you’re doing.”
他想了一下，带着敬仰对莉拉说，那种欣赏的态度一时让我很嫉妒：
He thought about it, and turned to Lila with an admiration that for an instant made me jealous:
“你让我做的练习，让他很震动。”
“He was impressed by the exercises you
made me do.”
“是吗？”
“Really?”
“是的，尤其是那些模式，比如说烫衣服，敲打一颗钉子。”
“Yes. Especially diagramming things like
ironing, and hammering a nail.”
然后他们两个开起玩笑来，用的那些语言我完全不懂，我被排除在外了。忽然间，我觉得他们是一对很相爱的恋人，非常幸福，他们的秘密是那么深奥，以至于他们自己也不懂。我又一次回想起我们小时候待的院子；我又一次看到她和恩佐在奥利维耶罗老师和校长的注视下，进行数学竞赛。我看到他——那个从来都不会哭的男孩，在看到自己用石子儿打中她时的惊慌。我想，在城区里，他们会更好地在一起，也许莉拉想回去是对的。
Then they began joking with one another,
resorting to a jargon that I didn’t understand and that excluded me. And
suddenly they seemed to me a couple in love, very happy, with a secret so
secret that it was unknown even to them. I saw again the courtyard when we
were children. I saw her and Enzo competing to be first in arithmetic as the
principal and Maestra Olivieri looked on. I saw Lila, who never cried, in
despair because she had thrown a rock and injured him. I thought: their way
of being together comes from something better in the neighborhood. Maybe Lila
is right to want to go back.
-*-
54
我开始关注大门前的布告栏，上面会写着要出租的房子。这时候，我收到了一个邀请——是我自己，而不是我的全家人受到了邀请，我被邀请去参加吉耀拉·斯帕纽洛和米凯莱·索拉拉的婚礼。短短几个小时之后，我又收到了另一份请帖，是玛丽莎·萨拉托雷和阿方索·卡拉奇的“婚礼邀请。无论是索拉拉还是卡拉奇家，都对我充满敬意，都称我为尊贵的埃莱娜·格雷科女士”。参加这两场婚礼，对于我来说是一个很好的机会，我可以借此搞清楚，莉拉回城区是不是一件好事儿。我计划去找米凯莱、阿方索、吉耀拉和玛丽莎，表面是向他们表示祝贺，另一方面是向他们解释，我不能参加他们的婚礼，他们结婚的日子，我已经离开那不勒斯了。实际上我想知道，索拉拉一家和卡拉奇一家有没有放过莉拉。我觉得，阿方索是唯一一个能用平淡的语气告诉我，斯特凡诺对他妻子的怨气还没有消的人。至于米凯莱呢，尽管我很恨他，我还是可以平心静气地侧重谈谈莉拉现在的健康问题，我想让他明白，无论他觉得自己有多么了不起，他认为我还是之前的那个小姑娘，但假如他继续迫害我的朋友的话，我有足够的力量能让他的生活和生意变得复杂。我把那两张请帖都放在包里，我不希望我母亲看到生气，觉得他们是给我面子，而不是给我父亲还有她面子。我用了一天时间来完成那些会面。
I began to pay attention to the “For
rent” signs fixed to the building entrances, indicating apartments available.
Meanwhile, an invitation to the wedding of Gigliola Spagnuolo and Michele
Solara arrived, not for my family but for me. And a few hours later, by hand,
came another invitation: Marisa Sarratore and Alfonso Carracci were getting
married, and both the Solara family and the Carracci family addressed me with
deference: egregia dottoressa Elena Greco. Almost immediately, I considered
the two wedding invitations an opportunity to find out if it was a good idea
to encourage Lila’s return to the neighborhood. I planned to go and see
Michele, Alfonso, Gigliola, and Marisa, apparently to offer congratulations
and to explain that I would not be in Naples when the weddings took place but
in fact to discover if the Solaras and the Carraccis still wanted to torture
Lila. It seemed to me that Alfonso was the only person capable of telling me
in a dispassionate way how resentful Stefano still was. And with Michele,
even though I hated him—perhaps above all because I hated him—I thought I
could speak with composure about Lila’s health problems, letting him know
that, even though he thought he was a big shot and teased me as if I were
still a little girl, I now had sufficient power to complicate his life, and
his affairs, if he continued to persecute my friend. I put both cards in my
purse, I didn’t want my mother to see them and be offended at the respect
shown to me and not to my father and her. I set aside a day to devote to
these visits.
天色看起来不妙，我带上了伞，但我心情很好，我想边走路边思考，向这个城区还有整个城市告别。按照一个勤奋女学生的习惯，我从最难的会面开始，我先去找索拉拉。我去了他们的酒吧，我没有找到米凯莱和吉耀拉，也没有看到马尔切洛。店里的人对我说，他们可能在大路旁边的新商店里。我迈着散漫的步伐，东张西望地往那里走去。堂·卡罗的商店——以前那个黑暗深幽的地窖，我们小时候在那儿买肥皂还有其他日用品——那个破商店一点儿影子都没有了。那栋楼的第四层窗户外，挂着一个巨大的牌子——“无所不有”！这是一个竖挂着的牌子，正好在商店的入口上方。尽管是白天，但商店里灯火通明，里面有各种各样的东西，非常丰富。我在那儿看到了莉拉的哥哥里诺，他胖了许多，他对我很冷淡。他说，他是里面的老板，他不知道米凯莱在哪里，如果你找他，你可以去他家里找。他很不客气地说完，然后转过身去，好像有什么着急的事情要做。
The weather wasn’t promising, so I
carried an umbrella, but I was in a good mood, I wanted to walk, reflect,
give a sort of farewell to the neighborhood and the city. Out of the habit of
a diligent student, I started with the more difficult meeting, the one with
Solara. I went to the bar, but neither he nor Gigliola nor even Marcello was
there; someone said that they might be at the new place on the stradone. I
stopped in and looked around with the attitude of someone with nothing better
to do. Any memory of Don Carlo’s shop had been utterly erased—the dark, deep
cave where as a child I had gone to buy liquid soap and other household
things. From the windows of the building’s third floor an enormous vertical
sign hung down over the wide entrance: Everything for Everyone. The store was
brightly lit, even though it was day, and offered merchandise of every type,
the triumph of abundance. I saw Lila’s brother, Rino, who had grown very fat.
He treated me coldly, saying that he was the boss there, he didn’t know
anything about the Solaras. If you’re looking for Michele, go to his house,
he said bitterly, and turned his back as if he had something urgent to do.
我又走了出去，到了新城区，我知道索拉拉一家几年前在那儿买了一栋非常大的房子。米凯莱的母亲曼努埃拉——那个放高利贷的女人给我开的门，自从在莉拉的婚礼上见过她之后，我就没怎么见过她。我感觉，她透过猫眼在审视着我，她看了很久，然后拉开了门上的保险栓，出现在了门框那里，她身体的一部分还在暗处，另一部分被从楼梯间的大窗户射进来的阳光照亮。她更干瘦了，皮肤紧紧地绷在骨头上，显得骨头很突兀。她的一颗眼珠子很明亮，另一颗很昏暗。她耳朵、脖子上还有深色的衣服上，都有亮闪闪的金首饰，好像她要去参加一场宴会。她对我很客气，她想邀请我进去喝一杯咖啡。米凯莱不在，我得知，他还有一套房子在波西利波区，他婚后会搬到那里去住，现在他在和吉耀拉一起装修。
I started walking again, and reached the
new neighborhood, where I knew that the entire Solara family had, years
earlier, bought an enormous apartment. The mother, Manuela, the loan shark,
opened the door; I hadn’t seen her since the time of Lila’s wedding. I felt
that she had been observing me through the spyhole. She looked for a long
time, then she drew back the bolt and appeared in the frame of the door, her
figure partly contained by the darkness of the apartment, partly eroded by
the light coming from the large window on the stairs. She was as if dried up.
The skin was stretched over her large bones, one of her pupils was very
bright and the other as if dead. In her ears, around her neck, against the
dark dress that hung loosely, gold sparkled, as if she were getting ready for
a party. She treated me politely, inviting me to come in, have coffee.
Michele wasn’t there, did I know that he had another house, on Posillipo,
where he was to go and live after his marriage. He was furnishing it with Gigliola.
“他们会离开这个城区？”我问。
“They’re going to leave the
neighborhood?” I asked.
“当然了。”
“Yes, certainly.”
“去波西利波区去？”
“For Posillipo?”
“那里有六个房间，莱农！三个房间面朝大海。我更愿意选沃美罗区，但米凯莱喜欢按着自己的想法来。无论如何，早上风吹着，太阳晒着，你都无法想象有多舒服。”
“Six rooms, Lenù, three facing the sea. I
would have preferred the Vomero, but Michele does as he likes. Anyway,
there’s a breeze, in the morning, and a light that you can’t imagine.”
这对我来说是一件很意外的事情。我从来都没有想过，索拉拉会离开他们的地盘，离开他们藏匿战利品的老巢。但正是米凯莱——他们家里最聪明、最贪婪的男人，却搬到别的地方住了，在高处，在波西利波区上面住，面对着大海和维苏威火山。他们兄弟俩的地盘真的扩大了，那位律师说得有道理，但当时我觉得挺高兴的，我觉得米凯莱离开城区是好事儿——莉拉如果回城区的话，这是一件好事儿。
I was surprised. I would never have
believed that the Solaras would move away from the area of their trafficking,
from the den where they hid their booty. But here was Michele, the shrewdest,
the greediest of the family, going to live somewhere else, up, on the
Posillipo, facing the sea and Vesuvio. The brothers’ craving for greatness
really had increased, the lawyer was right. But at the moment the fact
cheered me, I was glad that Michele was leaving the neighborhood. I found
that this favored Lila’s possible return.
-*-
55
我向曼努埃拉太太要了地址。和她告别之后，我穿过城市，先是坐地铁到了梅尔杰利纳火车站，又走了一段，最后坐公共汽车到了波西利波。我觉得自己文化层次很高，已经属于拥有权力的阶层，像是戴上了桂冠，受到整个世界敬仰，我非常好奇，我想看看，我从小就看到的那股恶势力，现在变成了什么样子——他们那种欺压别人的低俗乐趣，逍遥法外的犯罪行为、对法律的阳奉阴违——披上了什么样的华丽外衣。索拉拉兄弟生来就爱炫富，爱排场。米凯莱住在一栋楼的最高层，那是一栋刚修好的楼房，但米凯莱再次躲开了我。我只见到吉耀拉，她看到我时，一方面明显很惊异，一方面带着敌意。我意识到，我借用她母亲的电话的那个阶段，我一直对他们一家都很客气，但当我在我父母家装上了电话，斯帕纽洛一家就从我的生活里消失了，我甚至都没有意识到这一点。现在是正午时分，在没有事先通知的情况下，在一个灰暗的、可能会下雨的时刻，我出现在波西利波区，一下子闯进了她还没收拾好的婚房，这算什么做法？我觉得很羞愧，我装出一副高兴的样子，想让她原谅我。刚开始，吉耀拉有些不悦，可能有些警惕，她不知道我想干什么，后来她炫耀起来，她希望我嫉妒她，希望我觉得她是我们这些姑娘中最幸运的。因此，她一直在关注着我的反应，我的热情让她很享受，她让我看了一间又一间房间，给我看了那些昂贵的家具、奢华的吊灯、两个很大的洗手间、超大的热水器、冰箱和洗衣机。他们有三台电话，但现在还没有开通，还有一台我不知道多少寸的大电视。最后，我们来到了阳台上，那不是一个阳台，而是一个空中花园，上面种满各种各样的花，只是天气不好，没法好好欣赏花朵鲜艳的颜色。
I asked Signora Manuela for the address,
said goodbye, and crossed the city, first by subway to Mergellina, then on
foot, and by bus up Posillipo. I was curious. I now felt that I belonged to a
legitimate power, universally admired, haloed by a high level of culture, and
I wanted to see what garish guise was being given to the power I had had
before my eyes since childhood—the vulgar pleasure of bullying, the
unpunished practice of crime, the smiling tricks of obedience to the law, the
display of profligacy—as embodied by the Solara brothers. But Michele escaped
me again. On the top floor of a recent structure I found only Gigliola, who
greeted me with obvious amazement and an equally obvious bitterness. I
realized that as long as I had used her mother’s telephone at all hours I had
been cordial, but ever since I’d had the phone installed at home the entire
Spagnuolo family had gone out of my life, and I’d scarcely noticed. And now
without warning, at noon, on a dark day that threatened rain, I showed up
here, in Posillipo, bursting into the house of a bride where everything was
still topsy-*-water heater, the refrigerator, the washing machine, three
telephones, unfortunately not yet hooked up, the I don’t know how many-inch
television, and finally the terrace, which wasn’t a terrace but a hanging
garden filled with flowers, whose multicolored variety the ugly day kept me
from appreciating.
“你看，你见过这样的大海吗？这样的那不勒斯，还有维苏威火山？看看这天空？在我们的城区里，从来都没见过这样的天空吧？”
“Look, have you ever seen the sea like
that? And Naples? And Vesuvius? And the sky? In the neighborhood was there
ever all that sky?”
从来没有。天空是铅色的，海湾像巨大的熔锅，从边上挤压着天空，浓密的乌云翻滚着，向我们涌来。但在天边，在大海和乌云中间，天空中有一道长长的、铅白色的、非常耀眼的裂痕，映衬着维苏威火山的紫色影子。我们在阳台上欣赏了很长时间，风很大，衣服紧紧贴在身上。我全然被那不勒斯的美景迷住了，甚至是在几年前，在加利亚尼老师家的阳台上，我也没有看到过这样的美景。这些水泥建筑修建在优美的景区之中，非常煞风景，但价格极高，米凯莱买了一套纪念版的房子。
Never. The sea was of lead and the gulf
clasped it like the rim of a crucible. A dense churning mass of black clouds
was rolling toward us. But in the distance, between sea and clouds, there was
a long gash that collided with the violet shadow of Vesuvius, a wound from
which a dazzling whiteness dripped. We stood looking at it for a long time,
our clothes pasted to us by the wind. I was as if hypnotized by the beauty of
Naples; not even from the terrace of the Galianis, years before, had I seen
it like this. The defacement of the city provided high-cost observatories of
concrete from which to view an extraordinary landscape; Michele had acquired
a memorable one.
“你不喜欢吗？”
“Don’t you like it?”
“简直太棒了！”
“Marvelous.”
“莉娜在城区的房子，和这套简直没法比，不是吗？”
“There’s no comparison with Lina’s house
in the neighborhood, is there?”
“是呀，真没法比。”
“No, no comparison.”
“我说的是莉娜，但现在是艾达住在那里。”
“I said Lina, but now Ada’s there.”
“是呀。”
“Yes.”
“这里要阔绰得多。”
“Here it’s much more upper-class.”
“是呀。”
“Yes.”
“但你却做出那副表情。”
“But you made a face.”
“没有啊，我为你感到幸福。”
“No, I’m happy for you.”
“人各有志，你上了学，写了书，可我拥有眼下这些。”
“To each his own. You’re educated, you
write books, and I have this.”
“是呀。”
“Yes.”
“你不这样觉得吗。”
“You’re not sure.”
“我很赞同。”
“I’m very sure.”
“如果你仔细看看门牌，这栋楼里住的全是一些工程师、律师还有大教授。这些风景和便利是要付钱的，如果你和你丈夫省吃俭用，我觉得你们也可以买一套像这样的房子。”
“If you look at the nameplates in this
building, you’ll see, only professionals, lawyers, big professors. The view
and the luxuries are expensive. If you and your husband save, in my opinion
you could buy a house like this.”
“我觉得我们做不到。”
“I don’t think so.”
“他不想来那不勒斯生活吗？”
“He doesn’t want to come and live in
Naples?”
“我可以排除这种可能。”
“I doubt it.”
“一切都有可能啊，你很幸运。在电话里，我好多次听到彼得罗的声音，我从窗户里也看到过他，能看出来他是个好男人，他肯定会按你说的来，不像米凯莱。”
“You never know. You’re lucky: I’ve heard
Pietro’s voice on the telephone quite a few times, and I saw him from the
window—it’s obvious that he’s a clever man. He’s not like Michele, he’ll do
what you want.”
这时候，她把我拉进屋里，想让我吃点儿东西。她打开纸包，里面有火腿和香肠，她切开了面包。她对我表示歉意说：“房子还没收拾停当，但将来，你和你丈夫来那不勒斯的时候，你们可以来这里，我给你看看房子收拾好的样子。”她非常兴奋，眼睛瞪得很大，眼眸很亮，她很努力想让我对她的富裕和阔绰深信不疑。但那个不太可能实现的未来——我和彼得罗来那不勒斯，来这里拜访她和米凯莱，应该让她有一丝疑虑。她有一点儿分心，她可能联想到一些糟糕的事情。她又开始炫耀时，对自己说的话失去了信心，她的语气变了，她开始列举——但她说这话时，并不是很满意，甚至带着一丝自嘲的语气说：“我很幸运，卡门和大路上那个加油的在一起了，皮诺奇娅被里诺那个傻瓜给毁了，艾达当了斯特凡诺的姘头，但我有米凯莱，真是福气，他很帅，也很聪明，所有人都听他的，他终于决定要娶我了，你看到他让我住在什么地方了吧？你知道他准备了一个什么样的婚礼吗？我们要搞一场盛大的婚礼，比波斯沙阿迎娶索拉雅时的婚宴还盛大。是的，还好我从小就和他在一起，我是最有眼光的。”她接着说，先是带着自嘲赞美自己的精明，通过索拉拉，她获得的富裕生活，慢慢地变成了倾诉——作为新娘的她的处境的孤单。她说，米凯莱从来都不在，就好像她要一个人结婚。她忽然问我，就好像真的需要一个确认：“你觉得我存在吗？你看看我，你觉得我存在吗？”她用张开的手拍了拍自己丰满的胸脯，她这么做就是向我展示，她的身体在米凯莱眼里是不存在的。米凯莱得到了她的一切，那时候，她还几乎是个孩子。他消耗了她，撕裂了她，现在她快二十五岁了，他已经习以为常了，连看她一眼都不会看。“他在外面，想上谁就上谁，真是让我太恶心了。有人问他想要多少孩子，他就会信口开河说：‘你去问问吉耀拉吧，我已经有蛮多孩子了，我都不知道有多少。’你丈夫会跟你说这些事情吗？你丈夫会说：‘我和莱农要生三个孩子，跟其他女人我就不知道了？’他当着所有人的面那样对我，就像我是一块擦脚布。我知道为什么。他不爱我。他跟我结婚，是想要一个忠诚的奴仆，所有男人结婚都是为了这个。他不停地对我说：‘我他妈找你干吗啊，你什么都不懂，你很笨，也没有品位，这个漂亮的房子给你住，简直是浪费，什么事儿搭上你，就变得很闹心。’”她哭了起来，一边抽泣一边说：
At that point she dragged me inside, she
wanted us to eat something. She unwrapped prosciutto and provolone, she cut
slices of bread. It’s still camping, she apologized, but sometime when you’re
in Naples with your husband come and see me, I’ll show you how I’ve arranged
everything. Her eyes were big and shining, she was excited by the effort of
leaving no doubts about her prosperity. But that improbable future—Pietro and
I coming to Naples and visiting her and Michele—must have appeared perilous.
For a moment she was distracted, she had bad thoughts, and when she resumed
her boasting she had lost faith in what she was saying, she began to change.
I’ve been lucky, too, she repeated, yet she spoke without
satisfaction—rather, with a kind of sarcasm addressed to herself. Carmen, she
enumerated, ended up with the gas pump attendant on the stradone, Pinuccia is
poisoned by that idiot Rino, Ada is Stefano’s whore. Instead, I have Michele,
lucky me, who is handsome, intelligent, bosses everybody, is finally making
up his mind to marry me and you see where he’s put me, you don’t know what a
celebration he’s prepared—not even the Shah of Persia when he married Soraya
had a wedding like ours. Yes, lucky I grabbed him as a child, I was the sly
one. And she went on, but taking a self-*-five he was used to her, he didn’t
even look at her anymore. He fucks here and there as he likes. The revulsion
I feel, when someone asks how many children do you want and he brags, he
says: Ask Gigliola, I already have children, I don’t even know how many. Does
your husband say such things? Does your husband say: With Lenuccia I want
three, with the others I don’t know? In front of everyone he treats me like a
rag for wiping the floor. And I know why. He’s never loved me. He’s marrying
me to have a faithful servant, that’s the reason all men get married. And he
keeps saying to me: What the fuck am I doing with you, you don’t know
anything, you have no intelligence, you have no taste, this beautiful house
is wasted, with you everything becomes disgusting. She began to cry, saying
between her sobs:
“对不起，我这样说，是因为你在那本书里写的内容。我很喜欢那本书，我知道你懂得这些痛苦。”
“I’m sorry, I’m talking like this because
you wrote that book I liked, and I know you’ve suffered.”
“为什么你让他对你说这些话？”
“Why do you let him say those things to
you?”
“那是因为如果不这样的话，他就不会娶我。”
“Because otherwise he won’t marry me.”
“在结婚之后，你要让他付出代价。”
“But after the wedding make him pay for
it.”
“有什么办法？他根本就不在乎我，我现在从来都见不到他，更何况以后了。”
“How? He doesn’t give a damn about me:
even now I never see him, imagine afterward.”
“这样我就不明白了。”
“Then I don’t understand you.”
“你不明白，是因为你不是我。你知道一个男人爱的是另一个女人，你会不会和他结婚？”
“You don’t understand me because you’re
not me. Would you take someone if you knew very well that he was in love with
someone else?”
我有些不安地看着她：
I looked at her in bewilderment:
“米凯莱有一个情人？”
“Michele has a lover?”
“有很多情人，他是个男人，到处都有情人，但这不是最关键的。”
“Lots of them, he’s a man, he sticks it
in wherever he can. But that’s not the point.”
“什么才是最关键的。”
“What is?”
“莱农，我告诉你，你不要对任何人说这件事情，否则米凯莱会把我杀了的。”
“Lenù, if I tell you you mustn’t repeat
it to anyone, otherwise Michele will kill me.”
我向她保证，我也遵守了我的诺言：现在，我写下这件事，那是因为她已经死了。她说：
I promised, and I kept the promise: I
write it here, now, only because she’s dead. She said:
“他爱莉娜，他从来都没有那样爱过我，也不会像那样爱任何人。”
“He loves Lina. And he loves her in a way
he never loved me, in a way he’ll never love anyone.”
“胡说。”
“Nonsense.”
“你不应该说我这是胡说。莱农，你不相信的话，你就最好走人。这是真事儿。他就是在莉娜把裁皮刀放在马尔切洛的脖子上的那天爱上她的，这难道是我自己编的？这是他亲口告诉我的。”
“You mustn’t say it’s nonsense, Lenù,
otherwise it’s better that you go. It’s true. He’s loved Lina since the
terrible day when she put the shoemaker’s knife to Marcello’s throat. I’m not
making it up, he told me.”
她跟我讲的这些事情，让我内心深处很不安。她说没多久之前，就在那所房子里，有一天晚上，米凯莱喝醉了，就跟她坦白了自己有过多少女人，数字很精确：一百二十二个，有的是付钱的，有的是免费的。“你也在这一百二十二个女人里，”他强调说，“但你不属于那些让我很享受的女人之列。你知道为什么吗？因为你是一个白痴，就是在X的时候，要X得好的话，也需要智慧。比如说，你连口X都不会，你没有天分，跟你说也是白说，你做不到，我一下子就能感觉到，这让你恶心。”他就这样说了一会儿了，说的话越来越恶心，跟他在一起，粗俗是基本的原则。然后，米凯莱想跟她把事情说清楚：他娶她，是出于对她父亲的尊敬，还有他们多年的交情，她父亲是一个很有经验的点心师傅；他娶她，是因为男人总要有老婆和孩子，还有一个体面的家。但他不希望她有误解，对于他来说，吉耀拉什么都不算，娶了她，也不是把她供上祭坛，他最爱的人并不是她，她不要觉得自己有权管他，惹他心烦。这都是很难听的话，后来米凯莱自己也意识到了，他变得很忧伤。他嘀咕着说，对于他来说，女人都傻乎乎的，身上有一些可以玩的洞，所有女人都一样，除了一个。莉娜是在这个世界上，他唯一爱着的女人——他爱莉娜，就像电影里的爱情，他尊敬她。“他跟我说，”吉耀拉抽泣着说，“莉娜一定知道怎么这栋房子装修得很好，给她花钱，装修这套房子，那对于他来说是一种享受。他跟我说，和她在一起，他可以在那不勒斯变成一个头面人物。他跟我说：‘你记不记得，她是怎么处理那张婚纱照的？你记不记得她是怎么打理那家店铺的？你呢？皮诺奇娅还有其他女人，你们算什么，你们能搞出什么鸟？’”他跟她说了这些话，但还不止这些。他还说，他每天都想着莉拉，日日夜夜，但不是一种普通的欲望，对她的欲望不像他所熟悉的。实际上，他不想要她，也就是说，他不想像要普通女人那样要她，上她，把她翻过来，转过去，打开她，搞坏她，把她踩在脚下，凌辱她。他不是想得到她，然后忘记她，他想要她满脑子的主意，她充满创意的想法。他要小心翼翼地对待她，不损害她，让她发展下去。他想要她，不是干她——把这个动词用到莉拉身上，这让他很不安。他要她是想吻她，抚摸她。他想接受她的抚摸、帮助、引导和命令。他想要她，是想看着她一年年的变化，看她一点点变老。他想要和她交谈，在她的帮助下思考。“你明白吗？他就是这样跟我说莉娜的，我是要和他结婚的人，他从来都没有跟我这样说过话。我向你发誓，事实就是这样。然后他嘀咕着说：‘我哥哥马尔切洛，还有斯特凡诺那个混蛋，恩佐那个烂人，他们哪里懂得莉娜？他们有没有意识到自己所失去的，还有他们会失去的？不，他们没有这种智慧。只有我知道她是什么，她是谁，我能看出来，想到她白白被浪费掉了，这让我觉得痛苦。’他就是这样胡说八道，发泄自己的愤恨。我就在那儿听他说，我什么也没有说，后来他睡了过去。我看着他想：米凯莱真的是这样的男人吗？他能产生这种情感，这不是他在说话，是另一个人，是另一个我恨的人。我想：我现在趁着他睡着了，用刀砍死他，我要重新得到我的米凯莱。我一点儿也不恨莉拉。几年以前，我想杀死她，因为米凯莱不让我在城里的鞋店工作，让我回到甜食店的柜台后面，那时候，我感觉自己一文不值。但现在我已经不恨她了，这和她没有任何关系，她一直都想摆脱所有这一切。她不像我这样的笨蛋会嫁给米凯莱，她永远都不会嫁给米凯莱。相反的，因为米凯莱一直都能得到所有他想得到的，但对她却束手无策，他已经爱了莉娜很长时间了：至少有这么一个女人，会让他屁滚尿流。”
And she told me things that disturbed me
profoundly. She told me that not long before, in that very house, Michele had
gotten drunk one night and told her how many women he had been with, the
precise number: a hundred and twenty-two, paying and free. You’re on that
list, he said emphatically, but you’re certainly not among those who gave me
the most pleasure. You know why? Because you’re an idiot, and even to fuck
well it takes a little intelligence. For example you don’t know how to give a
blow job, you’re hopeless, and it’s pointless to explain it to you, you can’t
do it, it’s too obvious that it disgusts you. And he went on like that for a
while, making speeches that became increasingly crude; with him vulgarity was
normal. Then he wanted to explain clearly how things stood: he was marrying
her because of the respect he felt for her father, a skilled pastry maker he
was fond of; he was marrying her because one had to have a wife and even
children and even an official house. But there should be no mistake: she was
nothing to him, he hadn’t put her on a pedestal, she wasn’t the one he loved
best, so she had better not be a pain in the ass, believing she had some
rights. Brutal words. At a certain point Michele himself must have realized
it, and he became gripped by a kind of melancholy. He had murmured that women
for him were all games with a few holes for playing in. All. All except one.
Lina was the only woman in the world he loved—love, yes, as in the films—and
respected. He told me, Gigliola sobbed, that she would have known how to
furnish this house. He told me that giving her money to spend, yes, that
would be a pleasure. He told me that with her he could have become truly
important, in Naples. He said to me: You remember what she did with the
wedding photo, you remember how she fixed up the shop? And you, and Pinuccia,
and all the others, what the fuck are you, what the fuck do you know how to
do? He had said those things to her and not only those. He had told her that
he thought about Lila night and day, but not with normal desire, his desire
for her didn’t resemble what he knew. In reality he didn’t want her. That is,
he didn’t want her the way he generally wanted women, to feel them under him,
to turn them over, turn them again, open them up, break them, step on them,
and crush them. He didn’t want her in order to have sex and then forget her.
He wanted the subtlety of her mind with all its ideas. He wanted her
imagination. And he wanted her without ruining her, to make her last. He wanted
her not to screw her—that word applied to Lila disturbed him. He wanted to
kiss her and caress her. He wanted to be caressed, helped, guided, commanded.
He wanted to see how she changed with the passage of time, how she aged. He
wanted to talk with her and be helped to talk. You understand? He spoke of
her in way that to me, to me—when we are about to get married—he has never
spoken. I swear it’s true. He whispered: My brother Marcello, and that
dickhead Stefano, and Enzo with his cheeky face, what have they understood of
Lina? Do they know what they’ve lost, what they might lose? No, they don’t
have the intelligence. I alone know what she is, who she is. I recognized
her. And I suffer thinking of how she’s wasted. He was raving, just like
that, unburdening himself. And I listened to him without saying a word, until
he fell asleep. I looked at him and I said: how is it possible that Michele
is capable of that feeling—it’s not him speaking, it’s someone else. And I
hated that someone else, I thought: Now I’ll stab him in his sleep and take
back my Michele. Lila no, I’m not angry with her. I wanted to kill her years
ago, when Michele took the shop on Piazza dei Martiri away from me and sent
me back behind the counter in the pastry shop. Then I felt like shit. But I
don’t hate her anymore, she has nothing to do with it. She always wanted to
get out of it. She’s not a fool like me, I’m the one marrying him, she’ll
never take him. In fact, since Michele will grab everything there is to grab,
but not her, I’ve loved her for quite a while: at least there’s someone who
can make him shit blood.
我在那里听着，并试图安慰她。我说：“假如他和你结婚，这就意味着，无论他说什么，他还是很在乎你的，你不要太绝望。”吉耀拉很用力地摇了摇头，用手指抹了抹脸颊上的眼泪。你不了解他，她说，没人像我那么了解他。我问：
I listened, now and then I tried to play
it down, to console her. I said: If he’s marrying you it means that, whatever
he says, you’re important to him, don’t feel hopeless. Gigliola shook her
head energetically, she dried her cheeks with her fingers. You don’t know
him, she said, no one knows him like me. I asked:
“你觉得，他有没有可能会失去理智，伤害到莉娜？”
“Could he lose his head, do you think,
and hurt Lina?”
她的反应有些激烈，她感叹了一声，介乎干笑和抽泣之间。
She uttered a kind exclamation, between a
laugh and a cry.
“他？伤害莉娜？他这些年是怎么做的，你没有看到吗？他可以伤害我、你、任何人，包括他父亲、他母亲还有他哥哥。他可能会伤害所有莉娜在乎的人——她儿子、恩佐。他可以肆无忌惮、冷血地对任何人，但是对莉娜本人，他什么都做不出来。”
“Him? Lina? Haven’t you seen how he’s
behaved all these years? He could hurt me, you, anyone, even his father, his
mother, his brother. He could hurt all the people Lina is attached to, her
son, Enzo. And he could do it without a qualm, coldly. But to her, her
person, he will never do anything.”
-*-
56
我决心走完我的探索之路，我继续步行，走到了梅尔杰利纳火车站，最后我来到了马尔蒂里广场，这时候乌云很低，好像就在楼顶上压着。向索拉拉那家高级鞋店走去时，我确信暴风雨随时都会从天而降。我看到了阿方索，他比我记忆中的还要帅气，大眼睛，长睫毛，嘴唇线条很精致，身体很纤细，但同时也很强壮。因为学过拉丁语和希腊语的缘故，他的意大利语有些不自然。他看到我很高兴，一种发自内心的高兴。我们一起经历了初中和高中艰苦的几年，我们建立起了一种坚固的友谊，即使很长时间没见面了，但我们马上就熟络起来了，相互开起了玩笑。我们畅所欲言，话题跳来跳去，聊到了学校里的事情、老师们、我出版的那本书、他的婚礼还有我的婚礼。是我跟他提到了莉拉，他有些迷惑，他不想说莉拉的坏话，也不想说他哥哥和艾达的坏话。他只是说：
I decided to complete my exploratory
tour. I walked to Mergellina and when I reached Piazza dei Martiri the black
sky was so low that it seemed to be resting on the buildings. I hurried into
the elegant Solara shoe store certain that the storm would burst at any
moment. Alfonso was even more handsome than I remembered, with his big eyes
and long lashes, his sharply drawn lips, his slender yet strong body, his
Italian made slightly artificial by the study of Latin and Greek. He was
genuinely happy to see me. The arduous years of middle school and high school
we’d spent together had created an affectionate bond, and even though we
hadn’t seen each other for a long time, we picked up again right away. We
started joking. We talked easily, the words tumbling out, about our academic
past, the teachers, the book I had published, his marriage, mine. It was I,
naturally, who brought up Lila, and he became flustered, he didn’t want to
speak ill of her, or of his brother, or Ada. He said only:
“事情到这一步，是可以预测的。”
“It was predictable that it would end
like this.”
“为什么？”
“Why?”
“你记不记得，我跟你说过，莉娜让我很害怕？”
“You remember when I told you that Lina
scared me?”
“是的。”
“Yes.”
“那不是害怕，我是很久之后才明白的。”
“It wasn’t fear, I understood much
later.”
“那是什么？”
“What was it?”
“一种陌生的吸引，一种又远又近的感觉。”
“Estrangement and belonging, an effect of
distance and closeness at the same time.”
“也就是说？”
“Meaning what?”
“这是很难解释的事情：我和你马上就成为了朋友，我很喜欢你，但和她就不可能建立这种友好的关系。她身上有一种可怕的东西，会让我想跪在她面前，告诉她我内心深处的秘密。”
“It’s hard to say: you and I became
friends immediately, you I love. With her that always seemed impossible.
There was something tremendous about her that made me want to go down on my
knees and confess my most secret thoughts.”
我开玩笑说：“很好啊，这是一种宗教体验。”
I said ironically: “Great, an almost
religious experience.”
他还是那么严肃：“不是，那是一种自愧不如的感觉。她帮助我学习的那段时间，那是很好的体验。她看一下课本，马上就明白了，然后用一种简单的方式给我讲出来。当时我经常想，我到现在也经常想：假如我生下来是个女孩子的话，我希望自己像她一样。实际上，在卡拉奇家里，我们俩都是外人，无论是我还是她，都不能久留，因此我从来都没有怪罪她，我一直是站在她那边的。”
He remained serious: “No, only an
admission of inferiority. But when she helped me study, that was great, yes.
She would read the textbook and immediately understand it, then she’d
summarize it for me in a simple way. There have been, and still are today,
moments when I think: If I had been born a woman I would have wanted to be
like her. In fact, in the Carracci family we were both alien bodies, neither
she nor I could endure. So her faults never mattered to me, I always felt on
her side.”
“斯特凡诺还生她的气吗？”
“Is Stefano still angry with her?”
“我不知道，尽管他很恨莉娜，但他有太多麻烦要解决，现在莉娜是他最无关紧要的问题了。”
“I don’t know. Even if he hates her, he
has too many problems to be aware of it. Lina is the least of his troubles at
the moment.”
对我来说，他的这个断论是诚恳的，也是可信的，我不再谈论莉拉。我开始问起了他玛丽莎的情况，还有萨拉托雷一家人，最后问到了尼诺。他的回答很不具体，尤其是关于尼诺，现在没有人——他跟我说，这是多纳托的意愿——敢请他来参加这让人无法忍受的婚礼。
The statement seemed sincere and, above
all, well founded. I put Lina aside. I went back instead to asking him about
Marisa, the Sarratore family, finally Nino. He was vague about all of them,
especially Nino, whom no one—by Donato’s wishes, he said—had dared to invite
to the intolerable wedding that was in store for him.
“你不乐意结婚吗？”我斗胆问了一句。
“You’re not happy to be getting married?”
I ventured.
他看着橱窗，外面雷电交加，但还没有下雨。他说：“我不结婚也挺好的。”
He looked out the window: there was
lightning and thunder but still no rain. He said: “I was fine the way I was.”
“那玛丽莎呢？”
“And Marisa?”
“她不行，她这样不行。”
“No, she wasn’t fine.”
“你想让她当你一辈子女朋友？”
“You wanted her to be your fiancée for
life?”
“我不知道。”
“I don’t know.”
“因此最后你满足了她的要求。”
“So finally you’ve satisfied her.”
“她去找米凯莱了。”
“She went to Michele.”
我用难以置信的目光看着他。
I looked at him uncertainly.
“找他做什么？”
“In what sense?”
他笑了，是有些神经质的笑。
He laughed, a nervous laugh.
“她去找米凯莱，他们联合起来对付我。”
“She went to him, she set him against
me.”
我当时坐在一张墩状沙发上，他是背光站着的，他的身体像电影里的斗牛士一样，紧绷着。
I was sitting on a pouf, he was standing,
against the light. He had a tense, compact figure, like the toreador in a
bullfighting film.
“我不明白，你娶玛丽莎，是因为她让索拉拉告诉你，你应该娶她？”
“I don’t understand: you’re marrying
Marisa because she asked Solara to tell you that you had to do it?”
“我娶玛丽莎，是不想得罪米凯莱，是他把我安排到这店里的，他相信我的能力，我对他很感激。”
“I’m marrying Marisa in order not to
upset Michele. He put me in here, he trusted my abilities, I’m fond of him.”
“你疯了吗？”
“You’re crazy.”
“你这么说，是因为你们都不理解米凯莱，你们不知道他是什么样的人。”他的脸有些扭曲，枉然想忍住眼泪。最后他说：“玛丽莎怀孕了。”
“You say that because you all have the
wrong idea about Michele, you don’t know what he’s like.” His face
contracted, he tried vainly to hold back tears. He added, “Marisa is
pregnant.”
“啊！”
“Ah.”
原因是这个。我非常尴尬，我拉着他的一只手，想让他平静下来。他很艰难地平静下来了，对我说：
So that was the real reason. I took his
hand, in great embarrassment I tried to soothe him. He became quiet with a
great effort, and said:
“生活是一件很丑陋的事情，莱农。”
“Life is a very ugly business, Lenù.”
“这不是真的，玛丽莎将是一个很好的妻子，也会是一个很好的母亲。”
“It’s not true: Marisa will be a good
wife and a fine mother.”
“玛丽莎怎么样，这关我屁事儿。”
“I don’t give a damn about Marisa.”
“你不要夸张了。”
“Now don’t overdo it.”
他眼睛盯着我，我觉得他在研究我，就好像要搞清楚一件我没有明说的事儿。他问：
He fixed his eyes on me, I felt he was examining me as if to understand something about me that left him bewildered. He asked:
“莉娜对你什么都没有说吗？”
“Lina never said anything even to you?”
“她应该对我说什么？”
“What should she have said?”
他摇了摇头，忽然很开心。
He shook his head, suddenly amused.
“你看，我说得对吧？她不是个普通人。有一次，我跟她说了一个秘密，我当时很害怕，我要找个人说说我害怕的缘故。我就跟她说了，她在那里仔细地听我说，后来我就平静下来了。对我来说，和她谈论这件事情非常重要，我觉得她不是用耳朵听，而是用一个只有她才有的器官在听，那些话才变得可以接受。最后，我没有对她说，就像通常人们会说的那样：‘你要发誓，拜托了，你不会背叛我。’但现在很明显，假如她没对你说这事儿，那她谁都没有告诉，甚至是在对她来说最艰难的时刻，就是那些充满仇恨，我哥哥打她的时候。”
“You see I’m right? She is an unusual
person. Once I told her a secret. I was afraid and I needed to tell someone
the reason for my fear. I told her and she listened attentively, and I calmed
down. It was important for me to talk to her, it seemed to me that she
listened not with her ears but with an organ that she alone had and that made
the words acceptable. At the end I didn’t ask her, as one usually does:
swear, please, not to betray me. But it’s clear that if she hasn’t told you
she hasn’t told anyone, not even out of spite, not even in the period that
was hardest for her, when my brother hated her and beat her.”
我没有打断他。让我觉得难过的是，尽管我一直是他的朋友，他对莉拉说了一些隐秘的事情，但却没有对我说。他似乎也觉察到了这一点，他想补偿。他紧紧地拥抱了我，在我的耳边低声说：
I didn’t interrupt him. I felt only that
I was sorry because he had confided something to Lila and not to me, although
I had been his friend forever. He must have realized that and he decided to
make up for it. He hugged me tight, and whispered in my ear:
“莱农，我是个飘飘，我不喜欢女的。”
“Lenù, I’m a queer, I don’t like girls.”
当我要离开时，他很尴尬地说：“我还以为你已经看出来了呢。”这让我更加难过，实际上，对此我连想都没有想过。
When I was about to leave, he said
softly, embarrassed: I’m sure you already knew. This increased my
unhappiness; in fact it had never occurred to me.