IV + 

That day he said: “Rosa, tell me, who is Olga-how-lovely-she-was?” + 

Rosa went crimson. “You listen!” she chided, frowning at him darkly. + 

He ignored this remark and clung to his point: “Who is Olga?” he persisted. At the back of his mind was a far, faint memory of having heard that name before. + 

“You come quick, or I go tell Nonna! You come quick out!” scolded Rosa; and then relenting, “Oh, look, look, caro! See those pretty flowers, Rosa buy you a bunch.” + 

He was not deceived, though he took the flowers and allowed her to stoop and kiss him. For some reason she did not like Olga, that was plain⁠—perhaps because Olga had his sort of hair. + 

At dinner he looked up from a plate of macaroni and said suddenly, “Who is Olga?” + 

There ensued a long moment of deathly silence while Teresa and Fabio stared at each other; then Teresa said quietly: “Where have you heard?” + 

And Gian-Luca answered: “Last night.” + 

“Olga,” said Teresa, “was my little girl. She is not here, she is dead.” + 

“Olga,” said Fabio, “was your mother, Gian-Luca.” And getting up slowly he went to a drawer. “This is her picture when she was small⁠—this is Olga, Gian-Luca.” + 

Gian-Luca clapped his hands: “Pretty, pretty!” he babbled, delighted with what he saw. + 

Teresa and Fabio exchanged a quick glance, then Fabio put away the photograph. Teresa took up her knitting again⁠—she was knitting a waistcoat for Fabio. Gian-Luca watched her efficient brown hands moving in the bright-colored wools; he was thinking of Nonna’s little girl. Nonna’s little girl was a matter of importance, was something that he could understand; moreover, it was comforting, it brought Nonna nearer, it made her seem so much more accessible somehow, and more⁠—well, a trifle more like other people. Rosa, for instance, had a little girl now, a plump, fretful creature of two and a half; her name was Berta, and she grabbed Gian-Luca’s toys with amazing acquisitiveness for one who was so young. Rosa would dump her down on the floor while she swept and dusted his room in the morning, pausing now and then to exclaim in admiration: “Bella, la mia Berta!” And then to Gian-Luca: “Bella, la mia bambina, non e vero?” + 

Gian-Luca thought that Berta was cross and fat and ugly, and in any case he was rather jealous of her, she took up too much of Rosa’s time. But Nonna’s little girl looked neither cross nor ugly; on the contrary, she was pretty and had masses of dark hair. He stared across at Nonna; had she ever played? he wondered⁠—with him she was anything but playful! + 

Nonna must have felt that his eyes were upon her, for she raised her own eyes and said, not unkindly: “We will not talk of Olga, Gian-Luca.” + 

“Why?” he protested. + 

“She is dead,” said Nonna: “one does not talk of the dead.” And after that nobody talked any more, so the meal was finished in silence. + 