Zeno's Conscience

  She smiled at that happiness, maternally. She told me that in a few weeks’ time they would be married.

  I had a bad taste in my mouth, and I would almost have turned toward the door to leave. Then I lingered, hoping the old woman’s nattering would inspire some good idea in me, or give me some hope. The last error I had committed with Carla had been to run away before I had studied all the possibilities that might have been available to me.

  For an instant I believed I had my idea. I asked the old woman if she had actually decided to be her daughter’s servant until she died. I told her I knew that Carla wasn’t very gentle with her.

  She went on working diligently at the fire, but she heard me out. She possessed an innocence I didn’t deserve. She complained of Carla, who lost her temper over any trifle. She apologized: “Of course, I grow older every day and I forget everything. It’s not my fault!”

  But she hoped things would go better now. Carla’s moods would be fewer, now that she was happy. And then Vittorio, right from the start, had shown her great respect. Finally, still intent on making some shapes with a mixture of flour and fruit, she added: “It’s my duty to stay with my daughter. There’s nothing else I can do.”

  With a certain anxiousness I tried to convince her. I told her that she could easily free herself from this bondage. Wasn’t I here? I would continue to give her the monthly allowance that I had given Carla till now. I wanted to support somebody! I wanted to keep with me the old woman, who to me seemed part of the daughter.

  The old woman showed me her gratitude. She admired my goodness, but she had to laugh at the idea that she could be advised to leave her daughter. It was something unthinkable.

  The hard word struck my brow, forcing me to lower my head! I was returning to that great solitude where there was no Carla, nor was there any visible path that led to her. I remember making a final effort to delude myself that some sign of such a path might remain. I said to the old woman, before leaving, that after a while she might change her mind. I begged her to remember me then.

  Leaving that house, I was filled with outrage and bitterness, as if I had been ill-treated when I was preparing to perform a good action. That old woman had actually offended me with that outburst of laughter. I could hear it still reechoing in my ears, and it signified more than mere mockery of my final proposal.

  I didn’t want to go to Augusta in this condition. I could foresee my fate. If I went to her, I would end up ill-treating her, and she would get her revenge with that great pallor that so hurt me. I preferred to walk the streets at a steady pace that might bring a little order to my spirit. And in fact that order came! I stopped complaining about my fate, and I saw myself as if a great light had projected me, full-figure, on the pavement I was looking at. I wasn’t asking for Carla. I wanted her embrace, preferably her last embrace. How ridiculous! I dug my teeth into my lips to cast some sorrow, or rather a modicum of seriousness, on my ridiculous image. I knew everything of myself and it was unforgivable for me to suffer so much because I had been offered a unique opportunity to be weaned. Carla was gone, as I had so often wished.

  With such clarity in my spirit, a little later in a remote street of the city, which I had reached without paying any attention, when a heavily painted woman made a sign, I rushed to her without hesitation.

  I arrived quite late for lunch, but I was so sweet to Augusta that she was immediately happy. But I wasn’t able to kiss my child, and for several hours I couldn’t eat, either. I felt very soiled! I feigned no sickness as I had done other times to conceal and attenuate guilt and remorse. I couldn’t seem to find solace in any resolve for the future, and for the first time I made none at all. It took many hours for me to return to the usual rhythm that drew me from the gloomy present to the luminous future.

  Augusta realized there was something new in me. It made her laugh. “With you, there’s never a chance of being bored. You’re a different man every day.”

  Yes! That woman of the slums resembled no other, and I had her in me.

  I spent the afternoon and also the evening with Augusta. She was very occupied, and I remained beside her, inert. I felt that, inert, I was being carried along by a current, a current of clear water: the honest life of my house.

  I abandoned myself to that current that carried me but didn’t cleanse me. Far from it! It emphasized my filth.

  Naturally, in the long night that followed, I arrived at the resolution. The first was the most rigid. I would acquire a weapon to destroy myself at once if I caught myself heading for that part of the city. This resolution made me feel better and soothed me.

  I didn’t moan once in my bed, and on the contrary, I simulated the regular respiration of the sleeper. Thus I returned to the old idea of purifying myself through a confession to my wife, as I had thought to do when I had been on the verge of betraying her with Carl. But now the confession was very difficult, and not because of the gravity of the misdeed, but because of the complication in which it had resulted. Facing a judge like my wife, I would also have to adduce extenuating circumstances, and these would emerge only if I could tell of the unforeseen violence with which my relations with Carla had been ruptured. But then it would be necessary to confess also that now-ancient infidelity. It was purer than this latest one, but (who knows?), for a wife, more offensive. Through studying myself, I arrived at more and more rational resolutions. I thought to avoid the repetition of a similar misdeed by hastening to organize another attachment like the one I had lost and of which I obviously had need. But the new woman also frightened me. A thousand dangers would have besieged me and my little family. In this world another Carla didn’t exist, and with bitter tears I mourned her, Carla the sweet, the good, who had even tried to love the woman I loved and who had failed only because I had put before her another woman, precisely the one I didn’t love at all!

  THE STORY OF A BUSINESS PARTNERSHIP

  IT was guido who wanted me with him in his new business firm. I was dying to be a part of it, but I’m sure I never let him guess this desire of mine. Obviously, in my inertia, the proposal of this activity, in partnership with a friend, appealed to me. But there was more to it than that. I still hadn’t abandoned the hope of becoming a good businessman, and it seemed to me easier to progress through teaching Guido than through being taught by Olivi. Many in this world learn only by listening to themselves; in any case, they are unable to learn by listening to anyone else.

  There were also other reasons why I wished that association. I wanted to be useful to Guido! In the first place, I was fond of him, and although he wanted to appear strong and self-confident, he seemed to me helpless, in need of the protection I was glad to provide him. Further, to my own conscience and not only to Augusta’s eyes, it seemed that the more attached I became to Guido, the more my absolute indifference to Ada was clear.

  In short, I was awaiting only a word from Guido to place myself at his disposal, and this word would have come even earlier, but he didn’t believe I was so inclined toward commerce, as I would have nothing to do with the business offered me at my own firm.

  One day he said to me: “I’ve taken every course at the Higher School of Commerce, but still I’m a bit worried about having to handle competently all those details that ensure the smooth functioning of a firm. True, a businessman doesn’t have to know anything, because if he needs books, he calls the bookkeeper and if he needs the law he calls a lawyer, and for his accounts he goes to an accountant. But it’s hard to have to hand over my accounts to an outsider, right at the start!”

  It was the first clear allusion to his intention of having me join him. To tell the truth, I had no experience of accounting beyond those few months when I kept the books for Olivi, but I was sure that, for Guido, I was the only accountant who wasn’t an outsider.

  The first time we openly discussed the eventuality of our partnership was when he went to pick out the furniture for his office. Without hesitation he ordered two desks for the director’s office
.

  Blushing, I asked him: “Why two?

  He replied: “The other one’s yours.”

  I felt such gratitude that I could have hugged him.

  When we had left the shop, Guido, a bit awkwardly, explained that he couldn’t as yet offer me a position in his firm. He was leaving that space for me in his office, only to induce me to come and keep him company whenever I liked. He didn’t want to commit me to anything and he too would remain free. If his business went well, he would give me a position in the management of the firm.

  As Guido talked about his business, his dark, handsome face turned serious. It seemed he had already thought of all the procedures he wanted to adopt. He stared into the distance, above my head, and I had such faith in the seriousness of his meditations that I also turned to look at what he was seeing, namely those procedures that were to make his fortune. He didn’t want to take the path our father-in-law had already followed so successfully, or the less adventurous and more secure route trod by Olivi. For him they were all old-fashioned merchants. He would strike out in a new direction and he was glad to have me with him because he considered me not yet ruined by the old men.

  All this rang true to me. I was being offered my first commercial success, and I blushed with pleasure a second time. So it happened that, out of gratitude for the esteem he had shown me, I worked with him and for him, at times intensely, at other times less so, for a good two years, with no compensation beyond the glory of that position in the director’s office. At that point it was surely the longest time I had ever devoted to one occupation. But I can’t boast about it, because that work bore no fruit for me or for Guido, and in business—as everyone knows—you judge only by results.

  I remained confident that I was on my way to a great business success for about three months, the time necessary to establish that firm. I knew it would be up to me not only to handle certain details such as correspondence and accounts, but also to keep an eye on our transactions. Guido still exerted such a great influence over me that he could also have ruined me, and only my good luck prevented him. At a sign from him I would come running. This provokes my amazement even now as I write, after I have had time to think about it for such a long part of my life.

  And I write of those two years also because my attachment to him seems to me a clear manifestation of my sickness. Why should I attach myself to him to learn about big business, then immediately afterwards remain attached to him to teach him about small business? Why should I feel good in that position simply because I believed my great friendship for Guido signified a great indifference toward Ada? Who was demanding all this of me? Wasn’t our reciprocal indifference sufficiently proved by all those tykes we kept bringing into the world? I had nothing against Guido, but he was surely not the friend I would have chosen freely. I saw his faults constantly and so clearly that his thinking often irked me, when some weakness of his didn’t seem touching to me. For a long time I offered him the sacrifice of my freedom, and I allowed him to drag me into the most hateful situations only to assist him! A genuine, outright evidence of sickness or of great goodness, two qualities that are very closely related.

  This remains true even though in the course of time a great affection grew up between us, as is always the case among decent people who see each other every day. And my affection was really great! After he left us, for a long time I felt how much I missed him, and indeed my whole life seemed empty, since such a large part of it had been taken over by him and his business.

  I have to laugh, recalling how, immediately, in our very first venture, the purchase of the furniture, we mistook one of the conditions in a certain way. We had acquired the furniture and couldn’t yet make up our minds to set up the office. On the choice of office, between me and Guido there was a difference of opinion which delayed us. From my father-in-law and from Olivi I had always observed that in order to keep your eye on the warehouse, your office should adjoin it.

  Guido protested with a grimace of disgust: “Those Trieste offices that stink of salt cod or tanned hides!” He guaranteed that he could arrange surveillance also from a distance, but still he hesitated. One fine day the furniture dealer ordered us to collect our purchases, otherwise he would throw them into the street, whereupon Guido rushed to decide on an office, the last one offered us, without any storage space in the vicinity, but right in the center of the city. And so we never thereafter had a storeroom.

  The office consisted of two vast rooms full of light, and one little room without windows. To the door of this room was fastened a board with the word accounts in clear lettering. One of the other two doors also had a sign: cash, while the third was adorned with the very English designation: private. Guido had also studied business in England, and had come home with some useful ideas. The cash room was equipped, properly, with a magnificent iron safe and the traditional cage. Our private room became a luxurious chamber, splendidly papered in a dark, velvety color and furnished with the two desks, a sofa, and several very comfortable easy chairs.

  Then came the purchase of the books and the various utensils. Here my director’s role was beyond debate. I ordered the things and they arrived. Actually I would have preferred not to be obeyed with such alacrity, but it was my responsibility to list all the things required in an office. Then I thought I had discovered the great difference between me and Guido. Whatever I knew enabled me to speak and him to act. When he came to know what I knew, and no more than that, he did the buying. It’s true that in business sometimes he was quite determined to do nothing, neither buy nor sell, but this also seemed to me the resolve of a man who believes he knows a great deal. I would have been less decisive, even in my inertia.

  In making these purchases I was very prudent. I rushed to Olivi to take the measurements of the correspondence register and the account books. Then young Olivi helped me set up the books and also once explained to me double-entry bookkeeping, none of it difficult, but it was very easily forgotten. When it came time to balance the books, he would explain that to me as well.

  We didn’t yet know what we would do in that office (I know now that Guido, at that time, didn’t know either), and we were debating every aspect of our organization. I remember that for days we discussed where we would put the other employees if we were to need them. Guido suggested fitting as many as possible into the cash room. But young Luciano, our only employee for the time being, declared that if the cash box was kept in a room, nobody should be put there except those having actually to handle the cash. It was quite hard, having to accept lessons from our runner! I had a moment of inspiration: “I seem to recall that in England everyone is paid by check.”

  This was something I had been told in Trieste.

  “Fine!” Guido said. “I remember that too, now. Strange, I had forgotten it!”

  He started explaining to Luciano at great length how it was no longer the practice to handle so much cash. Checks passed from one to another in any amount you wanted. Ours was a splendid victory, and Luciano remained silent.

  He benefited greatly from what he learned from Guido. Our runner is now a highly respected Trieste merchant. He greets me still with some humility, tempered by a smile. Guido always spent a part of the day teaching first Luciano, then me, and in due course the secretary. I remember that for a long time he had toyed with the idea of doing business on commission so as not to risk his own money. He explained the essence of this kind of business to me, and, seeing that I obviously understood it too quickly, he began explaining it to Luciano, who stood and listened to him at length with an expression of the liveliest interest, his big eyes shining in his still beardless face. It cannot be said that Guido wasted his time, because Luciano is the only one of us who has succeeded in that branch of commerce. And yet they say that knowledge is what wins!

  Meanwhile from Buenos Aires came the pesos. This was serious! At first it seemed an easy matter to me, but on the contrary the Trieste market was not ready for that exotic valuta. Again we had to call o
n young Olivi, who taught us how to cash those checks. Then, at a certain point, when we seemed to be on our own, as Olivi had steered us safely into port, for several days Guido went around with his pockets stuffed with crowns, until we found our way to the bank, which relieved us of the uncomfortable burden, handing us a checkbook, which we quickly learned how to use.

  Guido felt called upon to say to Olivi, who had helped him with what might be called the installation: “I assure you I will never compete with the firm of my friend!”

  But the young man, who had a different concept of business, replied: “If only there were a larger number of contractors handling our articles! It would be better!”

  Guido was agape, he had understood all too well, as he always tended to, and he clung to that theory, dishing it out to anyone who would have it.

  For all his Higher School education, Guido had a rather hazy notion of credit and debit. He watched me with surprise as I set up the capital account, and also as I posted our expenditures. Then he was such an expert in bookkeeping that when a deal was offered him, he analyzed it first of all from the bookkeeping point of view. It actually seemed to him that a knowledge of accounting gave the world a new appearance. He saw debtors and creditors being born everywhere, even when two people were trading blows or when they kissed.

  You could say that he went into business armed with the maximum prudence. He rejected a number of transactions, and indeed for six months he rejected them all, with the serene attitude of a man who knows more than he’s letting on.

  “No!” he would say, and the monosyllable seemed the result of precise calculation even when it concerned an article he had never seen. But all his reflection had been lavished on picturing how the deal and its eventual gain or loss would look in the accounts. Bookkeeping was the last thing he had learned, and it came to dominate all his ideas.