LAVINIA “In the company of silence”

All rights are reserved to the author. Reproduction and any other use, even partial, not authorized by the author is prohibited. The publication of the text is allowed for non-profit educational and cultural purposes with the permission and authorization of the author.  For any contacts with the author: idarenzicchi@katamail.com or idarenzicchi@gmail.com

ASCOLTA il racconto su file audio o su Youtube.

Voce narrante Giuliana Poleggi Quaranta 

“Go straight to the room of silence! At once! And stay there all afternoon… that’ll teach you! Hurry up! Come with me!”

The girl, her head down, walked downhearted. The assistant had taken her hand and held it tightly while tugging her out of the refectory and dragging her towards a closed door at the end of a long corridor brightly lit by large, regularly aligned, ceiling lights.

The sudden darkness of the room with the shutters closed, made her stop at the entrance. With a push, the assistant made her go inside and immediately closed the door with two turns of the key.

Considering that lunch began at twelve thirty and that she had not finished eating yet, it should have been, around, at one o’ clock p.m.. Staying all afternoon in detention would have meant that, probably, she would have left the room of silence at seven in the evening, the time to return home.

She was an obedient and respectful child and this was the first time she had suffered the punishment of silence.

Meanwhile her eyes had become accustomed to the darkness of the room. The light  filtering through the louver-boards of the wooden shutters allowed her to evaluate its size and furnishings.

Perhaps due to the almost absence of furniture, the room did not look spacious. It was almost square in shape with a right angle offset on the wall to the left of the entrance door, all the interior was plastered in white, in the center there was a rectangular table, and a single high-backed straw chair positioned so that whoever sat on it would have had the door to their backs.

As soon as located the power switch to the right of the door, she tried to turn on the light but, surely, the button had to be broken because she did not feel any small click and, in fact, nothing happened.

The first thing she did was walk the entire perimeter of the room. When arrived under the window, she watched it closely. It was a very high double-doors window. The transparent glass allowed, through the slats of the shutters, to see strips of blue sky, barely veiled by a few, very light, white clouds. She took the chair, placed it underneath, and climbed onto it. With difficulty she managed to move the rigid handle and open the window glasses but the same thing was not possible with the shutters. On tiptoe, precariously on the chair, she had risked falling off balance in an attempt to force those shutters that resisted the pressure of her blows towards the outside. In the end, for fear of falling to the ground or even ending up outside the window, in case she, by dint of pushing, had managed to open it and it, could suddenly opened wide, she gave up.

Riccardo Sanna, L’alba all’imbrunire.

Olio su tela – dim. 80 x100 – anno 2022

A door, painted white, like the walls of the room, opened on the short side of the indentation. She slowly lowered the handle: it was a long, rectangular-shaped toilet made from the space created by the recess. A sink, a bidet, a toilet bowl and a half bathtub, all lined up along the length of the main wall of the rather cramped bathroom. At the bottom, the vasistas window consisted of a single opaque glass sash, fixed by hinges in the lower part, with the closure in the upper part. Here at least there was light and, from the open segment, air entered making current with the opened window of the room.

What was she going to do all afternoon? She decidedk she would have repeated “La pioggia nel pineto”, a poem that had been assigned to the whole class to be memorized for the next day. She was very diligent at school and, farsighted, she used to carry out her homework in advance.

She began to declaim the lines aloud. Once, twice, three times, more and more confident, always with more emphasis, like an actress in front of her audience. Then she tried to recite the poetry by singing its verses. She had found that she remembered the poems better by singing them. Who knows if any professor had ever thought of having his students use this method to learn passages by heart. She had tried, the first time, with Carducci’s “San Martino”. As she chanted them, the lines entered her mind more easily. Then she had continued with Leopardi, Pascoli and Manzoni. She had memorized “Il 5 Maggio” just like that. But D’Annunzio no. “La pioggia nel pineto”, in free rhymes, which her teacher had defined to be “musical”, of this lyric, she absolutely could not hum its verses, so, for the fourth time, she recited it. A passionate interpretation, exaggerated by the tone of her voice and her theatrical gestures. At the end of each verse, she pronounced Ermione as a man mad with love would have done. Eventually, she replaced Ermione with Lavinia, her name. What a fool! She laughed heartily. Fortunately, no one would have ever witnessed her absurd representation…! The thought of a passionate lover, dedicating poems to her, suited her adolescent romantic soul. She paused for a moment to dream: despite the difficulty encountered in learning it by heart, she liked it. She loved the idea that the poet had written it dedicating it to his lover. Had she had to paint it, she would have used all shades of green and had had to give it an adjective, she would have used two: “refreshing and light”, like rain … which she loved.

How much time had passed? One hour? Maybe? Five more to fill in somehow. She would have then repeated all the lessons for the following day. She started with geography. She was more passionate about physical and human geography than political and economic one, which had to be studied anyway.

She decided that she would have played the part of the teacher and that she would have explained to her hypothetical students the various continents. She started from America, since this was the topic to be studied at home. Lavinia liked the Americas very much, so far away, so different… Surely she would have made evening just talking about them… she sat down. She was not comfortable with her sitting back to the room entrance, so she changed the position of the chair by placing it on the other side of the table so that, staying back to the wall, she could control the door. She approached the table to the wall, pulling it towards her and began to describe, as meticulously as possible, the physical geography of North America.

Through the bathroom door, which she had left open to better illuminate the room, she saw, in the back corner, that of the wall where the window was, a metal rod, certainly the support of a curtain that had been eliminated. She took the dipstick and, standing up, simulating to have a map behind her, with haughtiness, pretending to look like a teacher, she began to indicate seas, rivers, lakes and mountains on that imaginary map to her non-existent pupils. Every now and then, mimicking her professor, she stopped and scolded, in a severe tone, someone who was not attentive, pointing her wand at him like a weapon.

Damn, she had got tired. Above all, to hear and hear again only her voice.

She sat down in the chair and, crossing her arms on the table, leaned her head towards the window.

She was awakened by a ray of sunlight that now, filtering forcefully through the shutters, illuminated the whole room well, drawing light lines on the floor, on the table and on her arms. She kept still, her head resting on the table. A black spider was walking along the white wall. Without losing sight of it, she took off a shoe and carefully observed it waiting for it to come within range to kill it (she had always been afraid of insects … really … of all animals). She realized, however, that the little beast, almost perceiving her control, as soon as she fixed her gaze on it, it immediately stopped, to run instead along some stretches of the wall as soon as she looked away from it.

At a certain moment, the spider had even changed direction and returned quickly to the ceiling, where she certainly would not have reached it. She was quite sure it understood her intentions … In the sunlit room, enormous gray cobwebs, which, like draperies, hung at the corners of the ceiling and along the entire upper edge of the wall, could now be distinctly seen. At this point, fearing that some spider might end up on her head, she hurried to put the table back in the center of the room.

Riccardo Sanna, Pensieri in libertà.

Olio su tela – dim. 60 x 100 – anno 2022

The room of silence … the room of boredom … The assistant had forgotten to let her take the books, otherwise she would have studied or read something to pass the time.

She got up to go to the bathroom. Returning to the chair, she noticed the table drawer. No handle or knob to open it, just a slot to put in the key… which wasn’t there. She bent down and pushed it from the underneath. An inch or two, just enough to grab its edges with her fingertips and pull.

A rusty bottle opener, a pencil, a piece of eraser … and … at the bottom, a notebook with a black cover, the same as the one of the recipes that her grandmother jealously kept in the kitchen and that she had promised her as an inheritance. She put it on the table and began to leaf through those lined pages, yellowed by time.

A diary. The date and below, in beautiful handwriting, a simple and concise narration of personal facts and considerations:

The English test went very badly: 4 and 1/2. Eleonora is a malicious one … as if she had never been punished … we have hit each other because she has told my mother everything … mind her own business, no eh? So tonight I’ll be beaten by mom too …

The day after: History Test: 8. I’m too good! I knew I would get a good grade! Danger has been escaped … Mom last night didn’t tell me anything. She seemed absent to me. Maybe she missed something …

Later: I thought I was Priscilla’s best friend … she too … a false and a liar one … like the others she hungs out with. Anyway, they will have been annoyed seeing my new sneakers … fact is all of them have looked at them and none opened their mouths. It means they have liked them … the perfidious envious ones…

And then: What the fuck is going on at home? They are all nervous. I hate them. Grandma has arrived. At least I get along with her, she is the only one you can talk to…

Then: My parents? Two assholes! My father is never seen … always busy. Mom? For some time she has been devoting herself only to herself: a lot of care and attention. She has become more beautiful … I would say radiant … she buys clothes, accessories, perfumes … every week, appointment with the hairdresser and beautician. But she is already beautiful on her own… does she need all these things? She is so sophisticated that she no longer looks like herself… she doesn’t kiss me and she doesn’t hug me … she fears I could ruin her make-up and hairdo … I liked her more before. The fact is that, in my opinion, my father doesn’t even notice all these changes of her!

She was intrigued by the modern language and that way of writing, characteristic and essential of young people, in stark contrast to the old notebook with a black cover.

She went on reading: Grandma took me to her house. She says she likes having me with her … that I keep her company. I’m fine by her because I can do almost everything I want. Grandma doesn’t scold me … she doesn’t  constantly bother me… even if she told me to keep the volume of the music low because it could be annoying. Dunno… To whom? It’s me and her in the villa. Mathematics teacher gave me 7. I’m not satisfied: to others, with the same mistakes, she gave 8. I don’t understand why… instead it was a long ago that I have understood it … but it’s a mutual dislike …

At that point she heard footsteps approaching. She immediately returned the notebook to the drawer, which she closed just in time before the assistant opened the door. “I forgot to let you bring your books and exercise-books. Go straight to the classroom to study … there are still two hours left to go home … I would not want you to make an excuse tomorrow for not being prepared because of me! “.

She spent the time until her mother arrived reviewing and doing her homework. She was top of the class and she was keen not to give up her position.

When it rang the bell that interrupted their afternoon studies, the girls, like leaves piled up by the wind, gathered all around her. “So? How did it go? Were you afraid? What have you been doing all afternoon?” Sure to please them at the very thought that something had frightened her: “Of course I was afraid… spiders… huge … I didn’t do anything… I looked all the time at the ceiling to keep them under control. There was also some hidden mouse… or rather more than someone… you could hear them squeaking… “. She hadn’t heard any squeaks and she hadn’t seen any mice… certainly there weren’t any… but do you want to imagine the satisfaction of seeing them shiver with disgust?

“Well, what’s the matter with you? It is the second time that you have broken the rule. What are we doing? Was last week’s punishment not enough? Do you want to go back to the room of silence? “

To tell the truth, she wouldn’t have minded at all. Alone, she was fine. She liked the silence. So why had she broken it in contravention of the rule?

The first time she had disobeyed by replying to the point to a companion who, believing Lavinia was not listening to her, had made unpleasant remarks gossiping about her family. But only she had been punished because everyone had heard her yelling to the girl that she was a false, a gossiper and a liar.

Now the reason was the curiosity to know what was written in the exercise-book with the black cover by continuing to read it. She had deliberately sought punishment by speaking just as the assistant was passing between the benches. Now, what Lavinia didn’t want, was the woman to use leniency to her!

With her backpack on her shoulders, she entered the room, voluntarily this time.

It was a rainy day and the room was even darker, but the assistant, who was not the same as the previous week, threw open, with some effort, the shutters closing then the glass doors along which the pouring rain came down in rivulets, and turned on the light, a simple bulb made opaque by the dust that, from the ceiling, hung from the yellowish thread of the current.

“Finally someone has decided to fix the switch! Damn! And how long has it been that these shutters are not opened? Make sure you do your homework and study. I had to register that you were punished … expect an interrogation tomorrow … you know the rules … I don’t understand you … and luckily you were the good one … “

She left, locking the door.

Riccardo Sanna, La via della giustizia. Dedicato a Ebru Timtik.

Olio su tela – 50 x 100 – anno 2021

The first thing to do was to open the drawer and continue reading. At least a little more. Then she would have done her homework and studied.

Grandma scolded me. I told her I wanted to go home to mom. She replied annoyed that the fact she welcomed me into her house was a courtesy she was doing to me … and not vice versa … that my mother wasn’t fine … that I couldn’t go home … for now … She replied to my grievances that she would have talked to my father … that, for her, I could leave when I wanted, even immediately.

What’s the matter with mom? I do not know. Nobody tells me anything. Grandmother has withdrawn in offended silence. But what have I done to her? I just wanted to go home… Good heavens! I’m making a mess at school. I can’t concentrate on studying and homework. From tomorrow I will start with zeal …

There is a strange atmosphere around me. I don’t understand what is happening but I have the feeling that everyone is too kind to me … that they look at me with different eyes … yet I am always the same.

My father came to get me. I came back home but all my clothes are still at my grandmother’s.

Yesterday my mother was not at home. My father explained to me she is in the hospital: she is not well and needs treatment. When I asked  him when she will come home, he spread his arms and raised his chin making a facial expression as if to say he doesn’t even know either. What’s the matter with mom? Still no one has answered my question. They tell me she isn’t fine … and I have understood this … but what’s the matter with her?

My aunt, my father’s sister, took me back to grandma. During the drive, to my question, she replied that my mother suffers from depression, exhaustion, and that she was admitted to a nursing home. Eventually, someone spoke! I dislike my aunt but at least she doesn’t hide things from me! I noticed a certain sadism in her way of making me aware of the problem … but, in general, she doesn’t do anything to win the benevolence of others … she always says she doesn’t give a damn about pleasing people … (when I, use the term “not to give a damn” I am reproached for it … my aunt, on the other hand, is allowed to use this word with impunity … and the grown-ups would be the right ones? … and when ever?).

I didn’t go to school this morning. Grandma told me to get dressed and stay home. Last night there was some bustle and I thought I heard my father’s voice… maybe I was dreaming… I stayed in my room all morning. I thought grandma had forgotten about me… then she entered the room and hugged me tightly, squeezing me to her breast. I could smell her unmistakable scent. “Mom is gone…” Gone? And where? Where did mom go?

In the car, me, my grandmother and my aunt … I understood everything: my mother is dead. My aunt, without any regard, started talking to grandmother. “Do you know what I tell you? That’s how it went! Useless to be here going around the problem… a choice of her… what could we do? Did she want to die? Eeeeh she… she is dead!”. Grandma gave her a blow on her hip: “Sssssh! The little girl… the little girl… behind…” “So what?  Don’t we want to tell her that her mother is dead? What are we waiting for? That, is… useless to go around it… And then… I don’t understand why you insist on calling her stil a child…” The aunt, who was driving, turned and looked at me. Then she again turned her gaze to the road we were traveling on. My grandmother, sitting in the front next to the driver, stretched her hand back looking for mine, but I didn’t take hers. She can’t turn around because of her cervical arthrosis, better this way.

Riccardo Sanna, Il mio vicinato.

Olio su tela – dim. 60 x 80 – anno 2014

Mom died. She left … without even saying me goodbye … Since grandma came to pick me up, to take me to her house, I hadn’t seen her anymore. Now everyone is very nice to me but I’m not used to these unusual displays of affection. Only my mother, only she until recently, held me tightly to her, she kissed me, caressed me, hugged me. Then, for some time, neither she did. The others? Grandma did, but when I was younger and my father… very rarely and in his own way… he seems almost uncomfortable when he expresses love and tenderness towards me. I don’t think he is cold or indifferent but, usually, he has a severe attitude towards me and towards my mother. But now Mommy is gone.

I went back to school. My aunt and grandma have come to us to take care of me and the house. They have no problem moving in because my aunt is a spinster and  grandma lives alone. They said it will be for few days… This afternoon they took me for a walk. Aunt didn’t buy me a pair of jeans I had seen in a shop window. She said I have too much … of everything … It’s true, but my mother would have bought me them …

There are a few days to go until the end of the school year. On the one hand I don’t look forward to it, on the other I wonder what I’m going to do this summer.

Lulù bought the jeans that I had liked very much. Yesterday I described the shop-window and the pants so well to her that she couldn’t be wrong. This morning, she arrived all satisfied. I didn’t understand her glance. She almost seemed to challenge me as she told everyone that her mom had bought them for her… mine too would have bought them for me, if she had been there … Anyway they don’t fit her at all … she can put on what she wants … she is fat and fat she remains!

My grandmother and aunt have returned to their respective homes. It’s better that way. My father and I stay at home. Who knows if I will pass this school year or if I will have to repeat some exams in September. I haven’t been tested lately. I also skipped several assignments in class. By now I wouldn’t even have time to recuperate my gaps.

Riccardo Sanna, Il labirinto della mente.

Olio su tela – dim. 100 x100 – anno 2014

Finished. The girl quickly leafed through the yellowed, blank pages. She heard footsteps approaching so she in a great hurry closed the notebook, then she rapidly slipped it into her backpack and took out her English book and exercise-book. She began to do her homework for the following day. She had only the foreign language grammar exercises left to do. As she was used to do, she had carried out the other subjects during the week. An other simple quick revision would have been enough. She knew she was going to be promoted. She had never had a problem with school. The footsteps moved away and she continued absorbed in grappling with the rules of that language which, unique among all school subjects, struggled to get into her head.

When her mother arrived in the late afternoon to take her home, she threw her arms around her neck in a rush of irrepressible love. “Hey, what’s wrong with you? What are you doing? I couldn’t believe my ears when the assistant told me she had punished you again. You! You, who do not respect the rule of silence! Punished! What’s happening to you? And at the end of the year… Come on, let’s go home… and let it not happen again! “

She had looked down guilty.

The school year was over. It was in summer that, during the long days at the beach, in the company of her mother, she began by asking her if she knew anything about a student whose mother had died. After some initial reticence, in the end she replied: “Yes, yes. I understand. A sensational fact. The Prefect’s young daughter. Good people. A tragedy within a tragedy … mother and daughter … an infinite misfortune … But what do you know? Who told you about it? “

She didn’t tell her mother about the black-covered exercise-book.

Mother and daughter … what had happened? A few days later, she returned to the subject. She wanted to know… after a few years, the daughter had also committed suicide, like her mother. A protective wall had been erected around the family. People so reserved that nothing had leaked out. In the city it was spoken of it as a terrible misfortune… a young and beautiful girl who had not been able to get a reason for her mother’s death. She had retired into her shell, in a strange silence, almost a mutism until the terrible gesture that had left everyone stunned.

All summer, the black exercise-book remained in the backpack along with the books and notebooks of the now got over year. The next one would be the last in the boarding school. Only at the beginning of September, all the contents of the satchel had been pulled out to make room for the new school kit.

She had never looked through the black exercise book again. Now she treated it like a relic. She would always carry it with her to school, at the bottom of her backpack, in the flat part of the bag, where it would bear the weight of all the other books and exercise-books. It was when she took it to put it in the place she had assigned it that, among the blank yellowish pages, she saw a writing on one of them. It was all in capital letters with such a pressed down handwriting that it would have been possible to read the same on the next page so much the writing had been heavily imprinted on it. At first glance it seemed to her an apology for silence. The final part of it left her upset: “I LOVE SILENCE, I KNOW IT AND LIVE WITH IT. I HAVE MADE SILENCE MY ONLY COMPANION. IN THE SILENCE I FOUND MY MOTHER AND MYSELF. ME AND HER, IN THE COMPANY OF SILENCE. “

The girl, her mouth open, tried to understand that last, lonely page among other empty ones. When was it written? Why was the exercise-book in the drawer of the silence room?

The beginning of the school year distracted her attention from the black notebook which, at the bottom of her backpack of the same color and under all the rest of the kit, went unnoticed for a few months.

That year she was supposed to take the state exams and she was determined to make a good impression.

When her mother was sent away on a temporary business to another city, the woman did not feel like taking her with her and having her change Institute so asked the Headmistress for permission to let her stay full time, that is, to let her daughter stay in the boarding school day and night, obviously paying the required fee.

Many things had changed from the previous year. There was a new manager. The Assistants had also been changed, all but one, the one she, the other years, had thought to be the kindest.

Riccardo Sanna, Ricordi del passato.

Olio su tavola – dim. 50 x 60 – anno 2005

It was during her flu that Lavinia, in bed, alone in the room due to her fever, tried to ask if she knew the author of the notebook precisely to that collaborator who had come to bring her lunch. She seemed like an old lady, but in reality she was only fifteen years older than her.

“The Prefect’s daughter? Of course I met her! A beautiful girl, from an excellent family. Unfortunate… poor thing… but I really don’t know anything about that story… a bad depression… how to explain it otherwise? “

Then, without being further urged, she told of the suspicions that had hovered around the girl’s father … that, in reality, in the end, nothing had come out of it … but that the fact remained that mother and daughter had committed suicide … that, no longer enduring the climate around him, he had resigned from the position he held and had moved to another city with his elderly mother and his spinster sister.

“I remember that the girl had asked to be accepted for a period in the boarding school even though she had finished her studies. The Director had hosted her for a few days, until her father came back to pick her up to take her home. Everyone said she was a presumptuous girl, but she was always kind and respectful to me. She was taciturn and lonely … yes … she had asked to be allowed to sleep in the room of silence and the Director had satisfied her by arranging a bed and a bedside table there which were later brought back to the dormitory. She had changed a lot… before, when she attended the school, she was a blithe, calm girl. What more can I tell you Miss? “

Lavinia had listened in silence. Two fragile women, certainly suffering from the same psychological weakness. But what had brought both of them to the extreme act of taking their own lives? And why the suspicions about the girl’s father? She tried to find out something but her little inquiry had no effect.

In the middle of the school year Ernestine arrived at the boarding school. The parents of the new student, the French father and the Danish mother, had their residence in a neighboring village, but, due to their work commitments, they had had to temporarily move to a small town in the south of France. Ernestine would have liked to go with them… she spoke French perfectly, and would have had no difficulty in entering the new environment and get through the school year but her parents who, due to their work commitments could not have taken care of her, had decided to leave her in Italy where she would have resided full-time in the college during the few months until the end of her studies.

Ernestine, bold and impetuous, and Lavinia, reserved and silent, had immediately become friends. Both very good at school. To tell the truth, the newcomer, more for the self-confidence she flaunted than for merits superior to hers, at least so Lavinia believed, had immediately undermined her first position in the ranking of the best ones. To Ernestine, at least according to what she reported, even though she was very young, her parents had not forbidden to frequent her age guys by accompanying her regularly to the disco on weekends. She owned a cell phone and a computer which her parents, outside of all boarding school rules, had asked her to be allowed to use, but which the Headmistress, impartial and loyal to the rules of the Institute, had demanded to be handed over to her in custody.

At that time, it was only the two of them who made use of full time in the boarding school and the girls slept in the same room. Ernestine, who, despite her age, felt like an adult, was very free in speaking and in her manners, and she enjoyed scandalizing Lavinia who had lived, until then, under the protective wings of her mother and the boarding school. It was clear that she had dated older girls and that she knew a lot more than her, especially about the lives of their peers.

Riccardo Sanna, L’ultima scena. Partiamo nudi e senza maschera.

Olio su tela – dim. 80 x 100 – anno 2023

Among other things, she told her about a maid who had worked for a short time with her family and from which she had been fired because she had been discovered to be entertaining, at home, with her of the moment boyfriend. During her stay, the young woman, hired to take care of the housework, had revealed things to her about intimate life and man-woman relationships that Ernestine’s parents, although modern and open-minded people, had never mentioned to her. The maid had opened a new world to her about which Ernestine, in that period of her life when a girl feels her first physical impulses, was curious to know about. Once, she had even talked to her about a family, with which she had been in service only a few months, where in her opinion, behind the facade of respectability, there was a bad incestuous situation. She told her that she had been fired after having noticed something wrong… that in that house, years earlier, the mother had committed suicide, destroyed after learning of an extramarital affair of her husband who, according to the maid’s story, had even abused or had  tried to abuse her psychologically fragile daughter.

“But I never believed in this! That woman, and I tell you with certainty, was a bad person. The family about which she said those disgusting things was one of the most prominent in the city … When, after she had also been fired by us, I reported the fact to my father who, after hearing the shocking confidence, curtly replied me never to name those people affected by a terrible tragedy again and denounced her immediately for slander. Our former maid, already indicted for the same crime, was convicted. Given her behavior, at home we often wondered who knows what she had gone to tell about us, before leaving the city for good … “

It was immediately clear to Lavinia that the family in question was that of the girl in the black notebook. “You know, I think the Prefect’s daughter studied at this boarding school, in fact I’m sure of it. What do you think happened to her? ”

“I answer you with what, in this regard, my father once told me: “Between the four walls of a house and in the soul of a person, things happen and thoughts arise that no one is able to know and judge … so,  remember: never talk about people and situations without being properly informed… at best, you risk saying inaccurate things and hurting someone…” Hereditary defects exist and mental illness is part of them. My father is a psychiatrist and, shortly before the tragedy happened, he had been called for a consultation by the professional who was treating the Prefect’s daughter. The girl was very ill and she did not have a good relationship with her father. After her suicide, the wickedness of that person thrown out of the house, who did not have scruples to throw mud on a man hit hard by life, ended up annihilating an already destroyed family and the existence of a decent man who because of the many suspicions that ensued, also saw his career ruined. You know, later on, I heard that the maid would reveal to someone that she wanted to avenge herself because she had been rejected by the Prefect after having clearly offered herself to him shortly after his wife’s death. At that time, in the city, rumors also circulated about an alleged relationship of the Prefect with a lady … rumors … which dissolved almost immediately like snow in the sun … nothing more … also because, in the meantime, he embittered had moved to another place… You can do more harm with words than with weapons…” Lavinia was amazed by the wise and measured words of her new friend. Until that moment, she had considered her simply a cheerful and self-confident girl, a good company, nothing more.

Riccardo Sanna, Il mondo delle donne.

Olio su tela – 80 x 100. Anno 2020

At the end of February, upon returning from her mother’s trip, Lavinia had returned to her previous day-boarding situation. One evening, waiting for dinner to be on the table, as she warmed herself in front of the large fireplace in the living room, she took the black exercise-book out of the folder. “What is it?” Her mother, who was coming in with the steaming tureen, asked her. Lavinia handed it to her.

When finished reading, her mother, who seemed particularly upset, looked at her and, as she held her arm with the hand holding the notebook stretched out towards the fireplace, without speaking, after giving her a questioning nod to which she replied with an another nod of assent, she threw it into the flames. Among the yellow, red, blue, orange tongues of fire, black pieces of burnt paper raised by the heat… some would have come out of the fireplace, scattered in the clear sky of that cold winter evening, others, falling back into the embers, would have ended up in the ash bucket like the painful story that had been written there.

Meanwhile the soup had cooled and so was the rest of the dinner. Lavinia followed her mother as she carried the bowl back to the kitchen. “How about we heat it up tomorrow and make two sandwiches tonight and eat them in front of the fireplace?… Then, if you like, let’s review the poem. I love it when you recite its lines! You could also be an actress… in the theater … ” Despite the attempt to hide it behind the deliberately light tone, the girl clearly perceived a great sadness in her mother’s voice.

In the short period that was missing now to the end of the school year, she would have paid attention not to end up in the room of silence again.

A few months passed. After school and vacation, Lavinia, out of boarding school, had made new friends and spent a lot of time with the new company… walks in the public park, long chats, games, jokes. One late summer afternoon, a few days before the start of university courses, sitting lined up on a low wall, more or less all the boys in the group found themselves observing passers-by. “But then it is true that they are together! He’s back in the city …” Lavinia turned to the girl who had spoken. It did not escape her that the one who was sitting next to the girl, was conspicuously elbowing her. Too late. She did not immediately understand the sudden silence that had fallen among her companions… the chaotic traffic of the small town prevented her from seeing the people who were the subject of the brief observation. In the end she managed to see, between one car and another, her mother arm in arm with a man. Only then she realize that the girl was referring to the couple across the street and she understood the general embarrassment.

The girl who spoke had only recently joined the group… maybe she didn’t know that the daughter of the woman she was talking about was two meters from her … or maybe she had spoken before thinking … her discomfort was obvious … at first she had pretended to not understand, as if she hadn’t said anything, then when it became clear that an explanation was being demanded of her, she had hastened to stammer an apology, addressing not to Lavinia who, indignantly, had left immediately, but to the other members of the company… a clarification, useless, which was based, as her only excuse, on having only reported chatter that was common knowledge heard around. The boys sitting on the wall listened more with morbid curiosity than in sympathy with their offended friend. The result was that now even those few who were not aware of it knew about the story and that, given the absence of the concerned person, almost all of them ended up, some more or less, adding comments and gossip.

For Lavinia it was quite simple to compose the mosaic: she was reminded of the few malicious words of the girl in the boarding school that had made her so angry and to which she had responded in anger only to end up in punishment in the room of silence … the withdrawal of people from her questions … the reticence of her mother and her upset after reading the diary … those last two sentences overheard by chance on the low wall …

It was not easy to discuss that topic with her mother. It was true: they had known each other many years ago and had discovered each other they had such and many affinities that they themselves were amazed. A deep friendship cut short immediately, by mutual agreement and without hesitation, at the first hint of gossip. Then, the serious illness and the death of his wife. After his daughter’s misfortune, a period of great prostration had followed that led the man to leave his job and change residence.

Riccardo Sanna, Il labirinto della mente.

Olio su tela  dim. 80 x 80

Years had passed and, after that the passed time had not healed, that would have been impossible, but soothed, the painful wounds, they had searched for each other… like two castaways. The man had clung to her trying desperately not to sink into the hell of his memories and she could not help but accept his heartfelt request for help. They could have kept their relationship hidden, but it was nothing more than a sincere friendship … there was nothing wrong with it … so what? Why act guilty? Lavinia had been kept in the dark because her mother had not seen fit to inform her of a situation that did not exist.

Unfortunately, theirs was a small provincial town that fed on gossip, like all other places where people know each other. It could be that the person who had insinuated in the Prefect’s wife the suspicion of a love affair of her husband with another woman and had even spread the terrible gossip of incest just to get revenge had not realized the gravity of what she was doing, of the danger of her words, poisoned to the point of being deadly … in any case, with unprecedented wickedness, she was guilty, by law, of slander only … but, in fact, she should have felt responsible for a double murder.

Sometimes silence should be imposed on oneself … for life.

Lavinia and her mother spent silent days, one engaged in study and the other in work. A strange embarrassing lack of communication had descended between them. The girl did not forgive her mother for not having made her share in an aspect of her life that she had come to know by chance, through the mean words of a superficial girl and, her mother, who thought that she had not done anything improper or wrong, felt, in her turn, offended by her daughter’s attitude. “You’re judging me!” She had told her one day with bitterness. “It is not up to you to condemn and, moreover, it seems to me that you are doing it, not evaluating the facts as they really happened but on the basis of malicious gossip … and that I’m sorry … and it hurts me deeply!” Before leaving the room she turned and added: “He’s not your father anyway. Someone might have said or told you this as well … but it’s not him… ” The speech about her father had not been dealt with since when, many years earlier, her mother had told her that he was dead… a double death, the biological one occurred some years after the other, when she had erased him forever from her life and thoughts after being abandoned three months pregnant.

Then one evening a faint knock on the door. Her mother was in the kitchen with the television on and hadn’t even heard. She went to open the door. The man who stood in front of her had sad but good eyes. Embarrassed, with her heart beating madly, before inviting him to enter, she called her mother. “Good evening! Excuse me, I was passing through here. I just wanted to say hello before going home.” The three of them found themselves in front of the lit fireplace after having eaten a frugal dinner together. Then the mother broke the silence: “How about reciting something to us? Please! You are so good! A piece you’re studying, a poem, whatever you like…” She wouldn’t have recited anything at all that evening. How dared her mother! In front of a stranger! Because such was for her the man from whom she was, at the same time, intrigued and intimidated.

Then, day after day, slowly, having overcome the initial distrust, she began to feel in the presence of that reserved and quiet person a kind of familiarity to the point of making her feel his absence those times that, for some reason, he had not come. One evening when her mother was busy in the kitchen, he, very discreetly, asked her about her studies, her plans, encouraging her not to be afraid of life: “Actually, I haven’t decided anything yet. First of all, I want to finish my studies at University and, but this is just a dream, I’d like to be an actress … to play in theater. Anyway, I think I’ll end up being a teacher …” “You are right to get a degree. But don’t be afraid to make your dreams come true … to take risks. Learn to analyze situations and know how to evaluate the people in front of you… then put a little courage and live your life. You are young … you have every right …”  His tone was calm. He was about to say “my daughter”, but he had held back in time and his gaze had turned sad.

One evening, again the request of her mother. Initially reticent, then more and more self-confident and calm, Lavinia began, at first to chant, then to recite the lines of a famous poem. “La pioggia nel pineto” … please Lavinia … let us listen to D’annunzio’s lyric too ..” Her mother and that man, illuminated and slightly reddened by the glow and warmth of the fire lit in the fireplace, looked at her with admiration mixed with sweetness. Lavinia suddenly felt light, at her ease. It was as if a drizzle, in a sultry summer day, gently was refreshing her forehead and her soul, like it washed the air all around her. The past no longer existed, as if that fire in the fireplace had purified everything. She felt she was precious in their eyes, she clearly perceived a general feeling of well-being and relaxation. She was calm, like the placid sea, after the storm. Suddenly, she realized that her mother and that man felt a mutual feeling which they would have been willing to give up in order not to disturb her serenity … she felt that … on her … that it depended on her. When she had finished, they both stood up, her audience, to cheer her enthusiastically.

Riccardo Sanna, La melodia del mare.

Olio su tela – dim. 70 x 80 – anno 2023

That evening, at their house front door still closed behind him, about to take his leave, while he took her hand that she, as she always did, had formally offered him to greet him, she saw a slight smile and an imperceptible nod of assent appearing on the man’s face. Neither the man nor Lavinia said a word to each other, not even their usual polite “good evening”. Suddenly it was she who released that filial, new and unexpected feeling that had been filling her soul for a while and that she now felt was overflowing. Suddenly, instinctively, she had spread her arms, sinking her face into his shirt that smelled of good heat … while, from above her head, her mother, behind her, and the man who, trembling with emotion, had wrapped her in a fatherly embrace, they looked at each other in silence.

ASCOLTA il racconto su file audio o su Youtube.

Voce narrante Giuliana Poleggi Quaranta