G. Read Online Free Page A

It’s a word you use to get what you want. Like all men.
    It is a word you have used too, Laura.
    Yes, I was in love with you when we went to Venice three years ago. You were like no man I had ever heard of. You could have made whatever you liked of me. But you did nothing. A woman isn’t like money that you put in a bank and it will bring you interest without your doing anything about it. A woman is a person. How do you expect me to live ten months of the year, kicking my heels until you somehow contrive to make a little trip to see me? That is not a proper life.
    All this I intend to change. You will live in Pisa or Florence and we will be together often and without interruption. The boy will see more of me than many boys see of their fathers. And I will make him my heir. Let us try to make a life together for all three of us.
    Four!
    Four?
    You have forgotten you are married.
    I have explained to you already.
    You say you are proud. Me? I am ashamed. You make me ashamed for all of us. How could I look into the eyes of my child whilst waiting, day after day, year after year, for news of her death? Sit now,
passeretta mia
, and I will talk to you. I am older than you. I am nearer to the earth. If I compare us to most, we are fortunate. You do not know what their lives are filled with. Life is never as we want it. It is of no use to ask for everything. In the end you get nothing. Our life will not be a perfect one—that is for those who believe in the good God after they are dead. But it will be better, and I will make it better, than you believe possible. We have both been mistaken. I am older than you and I have been mistaken more. But not you either can begin life again like an innocent
fidanzata
of seventeen. With you I have the last chance of happiness. I know it. No chance will come again. You have come to me like an angel to deliver me. Angels come once only. I will spare nothing to make you happy.
    Would you come and live here?
    I can try. But how can I? It is too far.
    Too far from your home?
    From my business.
    Your business comes before us?
    My business is for my son. He will inherit it. He will not be poor.
    You intend to disinherit your wife?
    I have told you what will happen.
    You are shameless.
    No, I am not shameless. I see things for how they are. I want you and my son. Without both of you my life is over. All my life depends on this one chance. I love you as nobody else will love you. Not even a younger man. He will not be as faithful to you as me. I know what you are worth, believe me. Come to Pisa. Give me the opportunity to show you—
    —Where I shall be in jail.
    I will be a father to our son. If you knew what paternal feelings are filling me, if you knew how patient, how adoring, how proud I will be as a father! In him I will see you. He will have your impatience and your love of dreams.
    And what will he have of you?
    You know what they call me in Livorno behind my back, I have told you already, they call me
La Bestia
, That is because I am cunning and close to the earth. Perhaps he will have my realism.
    You, realistic!
    Yes. You will see. We have one chance now. There will be no more opportunity.
    What do you mean?
    For you to be the mother of your son. For me to be the father. For all three of us to be happy.
    I intend to bring up my child as I choose, not as you choose. I will teach him myself. If he is a boy, he will begin life with the advantage of never having been told lies. If she is a girl, she will be loving and sincere and realistic. No child of mine is going to be satisfied with your half-measures. And to make sure of this, I will devote the next ten years of my life to my child.
    You deny me the right to my own son?
    You have none.
    Laura!
    It’s too late to call me now.
    The sheets on the unmade bed, the carpets, the furniture, the wrought-iron balcony outside the window, the lake which is the colour of steel and lavender, the Alps—everything within their sight—is unaffected by