The Mysterious Flame Of Queen Loana   ::   Эко Умберто

A whirlwind, no room to think or ask questions, barely enough time to unload my suitcases and carry them to the left wing, the one where Paola had settled with the girls and where I too could stay, unless I preferred to stay in the central wing, the wing of my grandparents and my childhood, which had remained closed upstairs, like a sanctum ("Well, you know, I go in pretty regular to give things a good dusting, and every now and again I air it out some, but just every now and again, so as you don’t get nasty smells,and without bothering the rooms, which for me is like being in church"). But on the ground floor those big empty rooms remained open, because that was where they set out the apples, the tomatoes, and many other good things, to ripen and to keep cool. And indeed, just a few steps into those entrance halls you could smell the pungent scent of spices and fruits and vegetables, and the first figs were already laid out on a long table, the very first, and I could not help tasting one and venturing to say that that tree always had been bountiful, but Amalia shouted, "What do you mean that tree: those trees, there’s five as you well know, each prettier than the last!" Forgive me, Amalia, I was distracted. And no wonder, with all the important things you’ve got in that head of yours, Signorino Yambo. Thank you, Amalia, if only I really did have lots of things in my head-the trouble is they all flew away, whoosh , one morning in late April, and one fig or five, it’s all the same to me.

"Are there already grapes on the vines?" I asked, if only to show I still had my wits about me.

"Well, the grapes are still just itty-bitty clusters like babies in a mamma’s belly, though this year what with all the heat everything’s ripening sooner than usual-sure hope we get some rain. They’ll be ripe in time for you to see, I reckon you ought to stay till September. I know you’ve been a mite under the weather, and Signora Paola tells me I’ve got to give you a boost, something good and nourishing. For tonight I’m fixing what you liked when you was a boy, salad with a dressing of oil and tomato, with little pieces of celery and chopped green onion and all the herbs God could want, and I got them rolls you used to like for sopping up the dressing. Then one of fat cockerels-none of that store-bought chicken fatted on garbage-or if you’d favor rabbit with rosemary… Rabbit? Rabbit; I’ll go right over and give the prettiest one a whack on the neck, poor little critter, but that’s life. Lord, can it be true Nicoletta is leaving so quick? What a shame. That’s all right, we’ll stick around just the two of us and you can do whatever you like and I won’t get in your hair. You’ll see me in the morning, when I bring you your coffee, and at mealtimes, and the rest of the time you just come and go as you please." "So, Papà," said Nicoletta as she was loading the stuff she had come to retrieve, "Solara may seem a long way from here, but behind the house there’s a path that goes straight down into the town, cutting out all the switchbacks of the road.