The Girl on the Via Flaminia Read Online Free Page A

English sergeant emptied his glass of wine. There was a sour and puckered taste in his mouth. Back in his barracks he had nailed a picture of his wife to the wall above his bed. He would look at the picture and say, “Well, neither of us are a ravin’ beauty,” and then he would think of the incredible length of time he had not seen London. The beds in the barracks were two-bunk affairs, of wood, and there were no mattresses. There were seven other sergeants in the small room with him. The other ranks slept in a big common loft on beds which were made of wooden slats and wire. Because he was a sergeant, he had a double bunk and he slept in a room that housed only seven other sergeants. The officer he drove for slept in a big hotel on the Via Veneto. The English sergeant stood up.
    â€œTime I went too,” he said.
    â€œGrazie, Mamma,” the American said. He held the envelope with Maria’s address. He was very pleased with the address. He was anxious now to find the house on the Viale Angelico.
    â€œGo out through the back,” the Signora Pulcini said, somewhat glad they were going. “I do not want you seen leaving the house. Come, I’ll open the gate.”
    They went together to the French door in the rear of the dining room. The Englishman humped his shoulders into the warmth of his overcoat. “In the House o’ Commons,” he muttered, “she stood up, her ladyship . . .”
    They went out into the darkness and the cold.
    The room was quiet.
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    T he doorbell rang. There was the sound of the door being opened, and of Mimi’s voice asking a question, then Mimi came into the dining room, and a girl was with her. “Sit down, signora,” Mimi said. “I will call Nina.”
    â€œGrazie,” the girl said.
    When Mimi had gone, the girl looked about the room. She was a pretty girl, rather tall, with good shoulders, and soft blonde hair. She wore a raincoat, a gray wool skirt, a wool sweater and, because of the cold, thick white ski stockings and walking shoes with tasseled laces. She sat in the room, looking at the mahogany table on which the wine still stood where the English sergeant had left it, the radio, the lithograph of the pierced and bleeding heart. The look she gave the objects in the room was that of someone who did not like what she saw and yet was curious about the very objects that she disapproved of. From the garden, bringing a blast of coldness with her, Adele Pulcini opened the French door and entered the room. She saw the girl in the raincoat sitting there.
    â€œBuona sera,” Adele said. “Che brutto tempo fuori. What ugly weather. Even the winters are worse.” She looked inquiringly at the girl.
    â€œI am Lisa Costa,” the girl said.
    The Signora Pulcini smiled. “But of course,” she said. “We were expecting you. Does Nina know you are here?”
    â€œThe little girl went to call her,” Lisa said.
    Adele went to the door.
    â€œNina!” she called into the hallway. “The Signora Lisa is here.”
    From her room, Nina answered: “I am coming . . . in a minute . . .”
    Adele turned. “And your husband,” she said, “he is with you?”
    The girl looked up quickly.
    â€œMy . . . ?”
    â€œThe American,” Adele said. “Your husband. He is with you?”
    â€œNo,” the girl said. “He is not with me right now.”
    â€œEh, you girls,” Adele said, lighting a cigarette. “All of you marrying Americans. Suddenly, all the women in Rome love Americans. But . . . it’s smart . . .”
    â€œSmart?” the girl said.
    â€œYes,” Adele said, smiling, for it was a kind of understanding between all the women of Europe now, the thing about Americans. “Escape, my dear. Escape! What’s left of Europe? A memory. If I were twenty, I’d do exactly what you’ve done.”
    â€œWould