My husband was extremely dispirited. Days and days passed during which he barely uttered a word. He didn’t even enjoy being with the children any more. I saw he had grown old and his clothes had become scruffy; his cheeks were covered in bristly hair. He came home very late at night and sometimes went straight to bed without eating. Sometimes he didn’t sleep at all and spent the entire night in the study.

On our return I found the house in complete chaos. Felicetta had grown old; she couldn’t remember anything, and argued with the male servant, accusing him of drinking too much. They would exchange violent insults and often I had to intervene to calm them down.

For several days I had a lot to do. The house had to be put in order so that it would be ready for the coming summer. The woollen blankets and cloaks needed to be put away in the cupboards, the armchairs covered in white linen, the curtains taken out on the terrace; the vegetable garden needed sowing, and the roses in the garden needed pruning. I remembered the pride and energy I had given to all these tasks in the early days after we had got married. I had imagined that every simple job was of the highest importance. Since then hardly four years had passed, but how I now saw myself changed! Even physically I looked more like an older woman now. I brushed my hair without a parting, with the bun low down on my neck. Looking at myself in the mirror, I sometimes thought that having my hair combed like that didn’t suit me, and it made me look older. But I didn’t care about looking pretty any more. I didn’t care about anything.

One evening I was sitting in the dining room with the wet nurse, who was teaching me a knitting stitch. The children were sleeping and my husband had gone to a village a few miles away where somebody had fallen seriously ill. All of a sudden the bell rang and the servant went barefoot to see who it was. I went downstairs as well: it was a boy of about fourteen, and I recognized him as one of Mariuccia’s brothers. ‘They sent me to call the doctor; my sister is not well,’ he said. ‘But the doctor isn’t here.’ He shrugged his shoulders and went away. After a while, he came back again. ‘Hasn’t the doctor returned yet?’ he asked. ‘No,’ I told him, ‘but I’ll let him know.’ The male servant had already gone to bed, so I told him to get dressed and go and call for the doctor on his bicycle. I went up to my room and started to undress, but I was too anxious and on edge; I felt that I should do something as well. I covered my head with a shawl and went out. I walked through the empty, dark village. In the kitchen Mariuccia’s brothers were dozing with their heads resting on the table. The neighbours were huddled by the door talking among themselves. In the room next door Mariuccia was pacing up and down in the small space between the bed and the door; she was crying and walking, leaning against the wall as she went. She went on walking and screaming, and stared at me but didn’t seem to recognize who I was. Her mother gave me a resentful and hostile look. I sat on the bed. ‘The doctor won’t be long, will he, Signora?’ the midwife asked me. ‘The girl has been in labour for some hours now. She had already lost a lot of blood. The delivery is not going well.’ ‘I’ve sent for him to be called. He should be here soon,’ I said.