26
ALBERTO MORAVIA
there and hungry cats prowling. Three men came out of
the
brothel laughing .and talking ·
in;
loud voices, and made for the
_ urinal. '.'This
is .~
nice sort of place," Sergio was on the point
of remarking. But he had no time to do so, for Albina stopped
in
front of the restaurant and announced: "Here we ate."
On the glass panes of the entrance door,
in
fact, was
painted in a maroon color, in running script:
Paolone. Specialita
romane. Vino dei Castelli.
Albina pushed the door open and,
followed by Sergio who looked round disgustedly as he closed
his umbrella, went into the hot, smoky atmosphere of the restau–
rant.
This
consisted of a row of minute little rooms. In the first
room, larger than the rest, there was a central table upon which
were pyramids of oranges and a few bunches of fennel and a
large ice-box of rough wood, surmounted by a lordly pair of
horns. It was a restaurant with no pretensions at all, as could
be gathered from the frequent call of "half-portion" echoing
from one room to another. Sergio noticed that the customers
all resembled, in some way, either Albina or Luciano: the
.women were young, very much made up and badly dressed, the
men dissipated-looking, jaded, and showily dressed with dubious
elegance. Albina made her way slowly from room to room,
constantly greeted by one or another of these unlovely custom–
ers; and she appeared to be looking for something or somebody.
When she reached the far end of the restaurant, she beckoned
to
Sergio, as much as to say: "I've found what I wanted."
Sergio went forward in
his
tum and saw a tiny room, like
a cell, containing only two small tables. One of them was free,
and Albina had already sat down at it; at the other were sitting
Luciano and a woman.
"Ah, so that's what it was," he thought. Luciano did not
appear surprised: "Hullo, Sergio," he said in a quiet voice.
Sergio went to Albina's table and said in a low voice, stooping
forward: "Let's go away ... I
See
Luciano's here."
