Free The Garden of the Finzi-Continis by Giorgio Bassani Page B

it, and, unlike him, without referring to marchese Barbicinti’s letter. She mentioned nothing, in fact, but the simple pleasure of seeing each other after so long, and of enjoying together, in spite of everything against it, whatever was enjoyable in the season.

Chapter Two

    I was not the only one invited.
    When, that Saturday afternoon, having avoided corso Giovecca and the middle of town, I came out at the end of corso Ercole I from piazza della Certosa, I immediately noticed a small group of tennis players in the shade outside the Finzi-Continis’ gate. There were four boys and a girl, all with bikes like me; and they all, as I realized at once, were regular players at the  Eleonora d’Este tennis club. Unlike me, they were all dressed for the game, in gaudy pullovers and shorts: only one, who was older than the others, about twenty-five, and was smoking a pipe, and whom I didn’t know even by sight, was wearing white linen trousers and a brown corduroy jacket. Eager to be admitted, they must have already pressed the bell at the gate several times, but with no result, that was obvious: and in light-hearted protest, and quite oblivious of the very occasional passers-by, they stopped talking and laughing, now and then, and all together, rhythmically, rang their bicycle bells.
    I braked, tempted to turn back. But it was now too late. Two or three of them had already seen me, had stopped ringing their bells and were looking at me curiously. One of them, whom as I approached I suddenly recognized as Bruno Lattes, was actually signalling to me, brandishing his racket at the end of a long skinny arm. He wanted me to recognize him (we had never been friends : he was two years younger than me, so even at Bologna University we’d never met very often), and at the same time was trying to urge me on. I stopped right in front of him.
    “Hello,” I said. “What’s this get-together about? Is the big tournament over? Or are these aU the vanquished?”
    I had talked to them all and to no one in particular, and I think I was grinning, my left arm on the smooth oak of the gate, my feet still on the pedals. As I did so, I looked them over: Adriana Trentini, fine coppery hair loose on her shoulders, long and admittedly marvellous legs, but an over-white skin curiously splotched with red, as always happened when she was hot; the silent youth with the pipe, linen trousers and brown jacket (who was he? definitely not from Ferrara !-I said to myself at once); the other two boys, very much younger than him and even than Adriana: maybe still at school or at the technical institute, and for that very reason, since they had “come on” in the past year, during which I had gradually drawn away from every circle in town, hardly known to me at all ; and lastly Bruno, there ni front of me, taller and drier than ever, and, with his dark skin, more than ever like a young, vibrant, worried Negro: in such a state of nervous excitement, even that day, that he managed to transmit it to me through the light contact between the front tyres of our bikes.
    The inevitable flicker ofJewish understanding passed between us, quickly; as, halfanxious and halfrevolted, I had already foreseen it would. Then I went on, looking meaningly at him :
    “I hope you asked signor Barbicinti’s permission before coming to play somewhere else.”
    The unknown outsider, obviously surprised by my sarcastic tone, or perhaps uneasy, made a small movement beside me. Instead of soothing me, this excited me even more.
    “Now come on and tell me,” I insisted. “Are you allowed to do this, or have you just slunk off?” “What are you talking about!” Adriana burst out, with her usual thoughtlessness: it was quite innocent, of course, but no less offensive for that. “Don’t you know what happened last Wednesday, during the finals of the mixed doubles? Don’t tell me you weren’t there: and do drop this eternal