“Buonanotte,” said Afonso. And because he did not realize Paul spoke Italian, he said to Teo, right in front of us, “Puoi fartela quando vuoi.”
Teo had just taken a sip of wine, and he nearly spat the drink across the table. Then Paul got all belligerent and said in Italian that he didn’t appreciate Afonso talking about his wife like that. Except he said, “Tieni mia moglie fuori dalla tua bocca,” which translated to something like “Keep my wife out of your mouth.” This made all four of them, even Gianna, laugh hysterically.
Teo tried to hush them, but it was too late. “Sorry,” he said to me and maybe to Paul, but Paul was already dragging me over to Joe Stearns’s table, where he told his boss that we’d have loved to stay and chat, but—unfortunately—I wasn’t feeling well.
As we walked back to the hotel, I tried to get Paul to tell me what Afonso had said, but it was a lost cause. All he would say was that Teo Manca and his friends needed to learn some damn manners.
63.
PAUL AND I HAD APPARENTLYentered into a tacit agreement that we would not discuss what had happened at Bar Fiume. But this did not stop me from telling Francesca all about it at my next lesson. When I was finished, I thought she was going to have a stroke right there in the kitchen.
“What exactly did Afonso say?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “And Paul wouldn’t tell me. So I guess it was bad.”
“I’ve never liked him. He was the same year as Bianca in school. Always in trouble.”
“What does he do now?”
“He tells people he’s in real estate, but I don’t think he’s sold so much as a monolocale since he got his license.”
“I wouldn’t think he and Teo have much in common.”
“Oh, they don’t. But on an island this small, it hardly matters.”
“That’s kind of nice,” I said.
“Except that I’m sure Teo wants to kill Afonso right now.”
“Well, he shouldn’t. It’s not worth it. Paul will get over it, or he won’t. But it has very little to do with Teo.”
“Maybe,” said Francesca, but she didn’t seem convinced.
We had barely gotten settled out on the balcony when a young woman, whom I immediately recognized as Bianca, came barreling into the apartment.
“Accendi la radio,” she said, then went to the living room, where Francesca and Bernardo had one of those integrated consoles that combined a turntable, an AM/FM radio, and an eight-track player. She turned on the radio, and while she fiddled with the dial, Francesca and I came in from outside.
“Cosa sta succedendo?” asked Francesca.
“C’è stato un attentato a Brescia,” she said as she found the station.
For a few minutes, we listened to the program in silence. Of course, I barely understood a word, but I knew just from watching the women’s body language that it was bad. Francesca covered her mouth with her hand,and at one point, she whispered, “Oddio.” Finally, she sat down in an armchair, as if she couldn’t take this news—whatever it was—standing up.
I didn’t want to interrupt, but I had to ask what was going on.
“Someone set a bomb off in the middle of a big antifascist rally in Brescia,” said Francesca. “The rally was in a piazza, and there were hundreds of people there, so there are many, many people who are presumed wounded or dead.”
“Guardateli mentre cercano di dare la colpa alla sinistra,” said Bianca. “Come se piazzassimo una bomba al nostro comizio.”
I looked to Francesca for a translation, and she hesitated before saying, “Bianca is worried they will blame it on the left.”
“Wait,” I said. “Doesn’t antifascist equal left?”
Francesca acknowledged that this was largely true.
“Why would the left do something like this at their own rally?”
“They wouldn’t,” she said with a bitter laugh. “But they’ll point the finger at them anyway.”
