Rosa told her that this Ferruccio had enquired about her on two or three occasions and Ginia had replied, ‘Tell him to go and clean his nails first’. The next time she was hoping he would laugh at her but he had not even looked her way.

But a day came when Ginia emerged from the dressmaker’s shop adjusting her hat, and found Rosa of all people in the doorway, who rushed up to her. ‘What on earth’s the matter?’ ‘I’ve run away from the factory!’ They walked along the pavement together as far as the tram and Rosa did not bring the matter up again. Ginia felt irritated and did not know what to say. It was only when they got off the tram near the house that Rosa mumbled that she was afraid she was pregnant. Ginia said she was a little fool and they started arguing at the street-corner. Then it all passed off because Rosa had only frightened herself into thinking it. But Ginia in the meantime had got into much more of a state than her friend, feeling she had been cheated and left out of it as if she was a child while the rest of them had a good time, particularly by Rosa, who did not possess the least pride. ‘I’m worth two of her’, reflected Ginia, ‘sixteen’s too soon. So much the worse for her if she wants to chuck herself away’. Although she spoke like this, she was unable to think about it without feeling humiliated. She could not get over the idea that the others had gone down to the meadows without a word to her about it while she, who lived on her own, still felt thrilled at the touch of a man’s hand. ‘But why did you come and tell me about it that day?’ she asked Rosa one afternoon when they were out together. ‘And who did you expect me to tell? I was in a jam’. ‘But why hadn’t you ever told me anything before?’ Rosa, who was quite at her ease again now, merely laughed. She changed her tactics. ‘It’s much nicer when you don’t tell. It’s bad luck to talk about it’. ‘She’s a fool’, thought Ginia, ‘she laughs now but only a short while back she was going to commit suicide. She’s not grown up yet, that’s what it is’. Meanwhile when she did her journeying to and fro in the street, even on her own, she thought how they were all very young and how you would have to be twenty years old all of a sudden to know how to go on.

Ginia watched Rosa’s lover a whole evening, Pino with his bent nose, an undersized fellow whose only accomplishment was billiards; who never did anything and talked out of the side of his mouth. Ginia could not understand why Rosa still went to the pictures with him when she had found out what a nasty piece of work he was. She could not get that Sunday out of her head when they had all gone out in a boat together and she had noticed that Pino’s back was covered with freckles as if it was rusty. Now that she knew, she recalled that Rosa had gone off with him down under the trees. She had been stupid not to see how it was. But Rosa was stupider still and she told her so once more in the cinema-entrance.

To think they had all gone in the boat so many times, had laughed and joked and the various couples lay around in each other’s arms. Ginia had seen the rest of them but had failed to notice Rosa and Pino. In the hot midday sun she and Tina, the lame girl, had remained alone in the boat. The others had got out on to the bank where their shouts could be heard. Tina, who had kept on her petticoat and blouse, said to Ginia, ‘If no one comes along.