When we first entered the vast, airy science amphitheater, with its windows overlooking the gardens and its semicircle of benches, the professor had not yet arrived and all of us awaited his entry with curiosity and anxiety. Word had it that Professor Fedi was extremely strict, very unpleasant, and often unfair.

When he did enter and we first saw his grey face we understood immediately, and instinctively, that what we'd been told was true. Standing behind his lectern, erect and ostentatiously stiff, he gave the Roman salute fascist style, signaled that we should sit down, and slowly, one by one, passed us in review with a cold eye, a half-smile on his thin lips and his face livid against the black of his shirt. His eye fell on each of us as if defiantly and the room fell silent as a tomb and so tense as to be absurd.

Mario and Lisette exchanged glances, and I whispered to my bench-mate, "What does he want?" Professor's eagle eye immediately caught the glances and the whispering. "Let it be known," he said icily, "that there will be no noise in this room, nor do I condone any lack of attention. Let that sink in once and for all, because I do not like repeating myself." The huge room fell into an even deeper silence. Following which the class prefect rose, intending to ask the title and author of our textbook. "Excuse me, Professor…" he began.

Only to be immediately cut off.

"Ah. Let's all understand one thing," said the man in the black shirt. "You will address me as Signor Professor, because I have a servant and I go away on holiday."

The tone wasn't joking, nor did anyone risk a smile.

"I beg your pardon, Signor Professor," the prefect said: while we thought that what we'd heard about the professor, and hadn't wanted to believe, had now been confirmed. That same sentence had been delivered to every class before ours and would probably be repeated to all the classes that would come after ours until the day when a providential retirement would send Professor home, his conscience satisfied that for nearly all his ex-students he had ruined their memories of school.