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even Josipina, even Karlo and
Tata
, who’s still at the
barber’s.
Mama says that Albert and Srečko are very fond of each
other. That they used to fish together in the pond, they
rode bicycles together and wherever one went, the other
followed.
How time passes, eh, Srečko, she says and looks through
the window at the yard.
Now
Tata
is coming. We all see him through the window.
He’s in the yard. He stops. I see the back of his neck and
the straw hat. You can see his hair has been cut, you see it
under his hat, on the back of his neck. When
Tata
’s hair has
been cut, I feel as if I want to cry, I want to sob, because he
looks like a little boy, like Ivan when he goes to school or
when they cut his hair for the holidays. We must look nice
on holidays, says Mama, and today is a holiday, and she
goes out into the yard where
Tata
is.
We’re all in the yard.
We’re standing under the chestnut tree, in which birds
sleep at night, looking at the gap where, Mama says, Karlo
will bring Albert. It’s nice in the shade, says Srečko, wiping
his forehead. I see his hand, how it trembles. He wipes his
forehead with a trembling hand and says: Oh, they should
be back from Venice by now.