The Road To The City Read Free Page B

you doing, Attilio?’
    â€˜This is the last straw,’ said my father. He turned quite pale as he sat down and ran his fingers through his hair. I had a bleeding lip and red marks on my neck and I was so dizzy that I could hardly stand up. My mother wanted to help me wipe away the blood, but my father took her by one arm and pushed her out of the room. Then he followed her, leaving me alone. His raincoat still lay across my bed, and I picked it up and threw it down the stairs.
    While the rest of them were at supper I crept out the front door. The sky was clear and starry. I was trembling with cold and fright, and the blood dripping from my lip had run down over my dress and stockings. I set out toward the city, but I was uncertain as to where I should go. I thought first of Azalea, but her husband would have stormed me with questions and reproaches, so I went to Nini instead. They were all sitting around the dining-room table, playing parcheesi. The children took one look at me and screamed. I threw myself down on a couch and began to cry. Antonietta brought an antiseptic to put on my lip, gave me a cup of camomile tea, and set up a cot for me in the hall.
    â€˜Tell us what happened, Delia,’ said Nini.
    I told him that my father had attacked and tried to kill me because I was going with Giulio and that they must find me a job in the city because after this I couldn’t live at home.
    â€˜Get undressed and go to bed,’ said Nini, ‘then I’ll come and talk to you about what to do.’
    They all went away and I put on a lavender nightgown belonging to Antonietta and slipped into the cot. After a while Nini came and sat down beside me.
    â€˜If you like I can find you a job in the factory where I work. You’ll find it hard going at first because you’ve grown into a big girl without ever lifting a finger. But you’ll get used to that. If I can’t find you anything there you’ll have to do housework.’
    I told him that I’d rather work in the factory than do housework any day. But why couldn’t I sell flowers on the steps of the cathedral?
    â€˜Don’t be silly,’ he said. ‘You don’t know enough arithmetic to sell anything.’
    Then I said that Giulio was going to marry me as soon as he had his degree.
    â€˜Put that notion out of your head,’ he said. And he told me that Giulio was engaged to a girl in the city, whom everyone knew, a thin girl who drove her own car. I started to cry again, and Nini told me to go to sleep and brought me an extra pillow.
    The next morning I got dressed and went out early with Nini into the cool and empty city. He went with me as far as the outskirts and we sat down near the river until it was time for him to report to work. He said that every now and then he felt an urge to go to Milan and look for a job in a bigger factory.
    â€˜But you’d have to shake off Antonietta,’ I said.
    â€˜Of course. You can’t see me taking her and her two brats and her stationery shop along, can you?’
    â€˜Then you don’t love her?’ I said.
    â€˜Oh, I love her after a fashion. We’ll stick together just as long as we like it, and then we’ll call it quits without any ill feelings on either side.’
    â€˜Then turn her over to Giovanni, who’s crazy about her,’ I said.
    He started to laugh. ‘Giovanni? Antonietta’s not so bad, you know. She makes faces every now and then, but that’s not serious. Only I’m not in love with her.’
    â€˜Who are you in love with, then?’ I asked, and it flashed across my mind that he might be in love with me. He looked at me and laughed and said:
    â€˜Does everybody have to be in love? It’s possible not to love anyone and to put one’s mind on other things.’
    I had on a thin dress and my teeth were chattering.
    â€˜You’re cold, little girl,’ he said, taking off his jacket and throwing it