Read The Girl on the Via Flaminia for Free Online

and some obscure village they come from.”
    â€œMy husband talks,” Adele said to Lisa, apologetically. “He talked himself into the Regina Coeli once.”
    â€œHave you been in prison, Signor Pulcini?” the girl asked.
    â€œMy dear, we have all been in prison,” Ugo said. “It was not too unpleasant. My wife used to come with chicken soup . . .”
    â€œWhile he played cards in his cell,” Adele said.
    â€œShe resents my martyrdom,” Ugo said, smiling. “Well, one makes all sorts of mistakes in one lifetime.” He looked at Nina. “Would you possess, my dear,” he said elegantly, “an American cigarette? All day I’ve smoked nothing but Nazionali.”
    â€œFor a martyr?” Nina said.
    â€œPerhaps,” Ugo said gently, “I should fall in love with a captain?”
    â€œOr a schoolteacher.”
    â€œEh, my schoolteacher days are over,” the old man said. He took a cigarette from Nina’s extended pack, and lit it. Smoke flowed from his thin nostrils. “Even a cigarette has become a luxury in Europe,” he said.
    Outside, in the hallway, the doorbell rang again.
    â€œAh!” Nina said, hearing the bell. “Finalmente!”
    She went out quickly into the hail.
    Ugo smiled at the blonde girl. “Your husband, signora, does he like Italy?”
    She was looking toward the door.
    â€œI don’t know,” she said.
    He came into the room, smiling at them because he was not sure of his reception, and because they were strangers, carrying a musette bag, a little wary, a little uncomfortable, with Nina holding his arm. “Ecco,” she said, “the husband!”
    He looked at them and at the girl. He was not quite sure yet, and he was being careful, and he was being polite. “Buona sera,” he said.
    â€œSignor Pulcini . . . Signora Pulcini . . .” Nina said, beside him, and he smiled again at the tall dark woman with the gray hair and the black dress, and at the old man holding the cigarette elegantly between his thumb and forefinger. The girl in the raincoat had not moved, and she did not smile. “This is Roberto,” Nina said. “Guarda! Isn’t he intelligent looking for an American? And such a mouth!” She sniffed at him. “How many cognacs did you have?”
    â€œOne,” the soldier said.
    â€œOne?”
    â€œAnd a chaser.”
    â€œWhat chaser?”
    â€œA cognac.”
    â€œYou must make him stop drinking, Lisa,” Nina said. “None of them will have stomachs by the time they go home.”
    â€œI was asking your wife, Signor Roberto,” Ugo said, “just before you came if you liked Italy.”
    He glanced again at the silent girl. He did not know how much was understood among them, and he was not sure of the kind of house he had come to.
    â€œDo I?” he said to the girl sitting there in that taut quietness at the table.
    She still did not smile.
    â€œDo you?” she said.
    â€œYes,” the soldier said. “I think it’s pretty nice.”
    â€œBut very much destroyed, no?” Ugo asked.
    â€œNo,” the soldier said. “Surprisingly. I didn’t expect it to be as nice as it is.” He slipped the musette bag from his shoulder. “As a matter of fact,” he said carefully, “it’s much prettier than I thought it would be. Much more.” He hoped she understood, for Italy now was much more beautiful than he had thought coming across the Ponte Milvio in the cold, looking for a house on the Via Flaminia. And he thought, by the quick glance she gave him, that perhaps she had understood, and he hoped that she was pleased.
    Behind him, now, somebody said, “Mamma,” and then a young man come into the room. He was handsome, intense, and he was very tightly belted into an almost bleached raincoat. He stopped as he saw the strangers. “Scusate . . .”
    â€œThis is my son,