Three-Card Monte Read Online Free

But it’s more than enough to break the spell. The voice belongs to one of the two girls who were outside at the table next to the tamarisks. She has come into the bar and is looking at the group with a pair of very, very large blue eyes, like those you see in Japanese cartoons. Behind her, her friend also enters. She has the expression of an innocent child combined with cleavage that’s decidedly maternal. Massimo looks at the first girl in a manner at once questioning and polite, while the old-timers unconditionally approve of her friend.
    â€œI wanted to ask you a favor. I need to use the Internet, but it isn’t working very well at our table. Umm . . . . I’ve seen that there’s a good signal at the next table, so I wanted to ask if it’s possible to change tables.”
    This is followed by a moment of palpable embarrassment.
    â€œDon’t ask me, ask these gentlemen, it’s their table,” Massimo says with ill-concealed perfidy, pointing at the old-timers.
    Having, with mysterious feminine wisdom, identified Ampelio as their leader, the girl looks at him and smiles. “Would you mind changing?”
    She underlines the question by opening and closing her big eyes persuasively. Ampelio mutters something in embarrassment, while Rimediotti says gallantly, “Good heavens, signorina, you don’t even need to ask. Please, we’d love to.”
    â€œIf it’s really no trouble . . . ”
    â€œOh, no,” Aldo assures her, “no trouble at all.”
    â€œReally? Thank you.”
    The girl thanks them again with a final big smile and goes out with her friend.
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    Silence follows this little scene. Total silence, given that Tiziana has switched off the radio. The old-timers, who were previously targeting Massimo and barking in unison like a pack of long-sighted wolves, are now each looking in a different direction and vaguely recalling a group of strangers waiting for the number 31 bus.
    Massimo, on the other hand, takes a tray and quickly starts filling it. He leans under the counter to get a chinotto, saying as he does so, “Tiziana, one regular espresso and one with a shot of Sassolino. And then remind me that I have to go to the optician’s.”
    â€œAll right. Do you have problems?”
    â€œNo, no. I’m just going to buy a pair of blue contact lenses. Maybe next time I ask for something, I’ll flash my big blue eyes and somebody might actually listen to me.”
    â€œMaybe you should also hire a nice pair of boobs,” Ampelio says in a surly tone. “You’re already starting to talk as much crap as a woman.”
    â€œWhat would you like, Pilade?” Massimo asks casually from under the counter. “An amaro?”
    â€œThe trouble is, Massimo,” Ampelio continues imperturbably, “that even with contact lenses, fake boobs and whatever, you were always ugly and you’ll always be ugly.”
    â€œI know,” Massimo says, reemerging from under the counter. “It runs in the family. We’ve been ugly for generations. With a few peaks, like Aunt Enza.”
    Massimo and his grandfather look at each other, and both start to laugh.
    When Enza Viviani née Barontini, Ampelio’s sister and Massimo’s mother’s aunt, came into the world, Signora Ofelia Viviani née Medori (Massimo’s great-grandmother and Ampelio’s mother, known to the whole family as “Ofelia of Windsor” because of the amount of gold and jewelry she would put on for solemn occasions) received visits from all the relatives and acquaintances, including Romualdo Griffa, Aldo’s father and an old friend of the family. Romualdo, having bent over the crib and offered the infant a finger as big as a baguette, stood up again and thundered in a stentorian voice, “Dammit, Ofelia, congratulations. He really is a handsome boy.”
    â€œLook, Romualdo, she’s a