"I really need to find this place," she told him. "It's near the Palazzo
Malaspina, I know. But I was never very good at directions. I've only been there
at night. I . . ."
For a moment he feared she was about to burst into tears. Then he corrected
himself. She was simply absorbed, in what he could not begin to imagine.
Caviglia smiled, then reached over her to press the bell. A cloud of rich,
somewhat cloying perfume rose from her body. French, he thought again.
"The next stop, signora, if you are willing to walk. I will show you where to
go. I have to get off myself in any case."
She nodded and said nothing. When the bus finally came to a halt, Caviglia put a
protective arm around her and pushed through the milling mob to exit by the
front doors, as a local would, in spite of the rules, saying loudly as he forced
his way forward, "Permesso. Permesso! PERMESSO!"
He waited for her to alight from the bus, his hands behind his back. Out in the
brief bright light of this December day, she seemed even more frail and thin.
"It's ten minutes on foot," Caviglia said. He pointed across the road. "In that
direction. There are no buses. Perhaps I can find you a taxi."
"I can walk," she said instantly.
"Can you find your way to the Piazza Navona from here?"
She nodded and looked a little offended. "Of course!"
"Go to the end," he instructed. "Then turn right through the Piazza Agostino for
the Via della Scrofa. Turn right again at the Piazza Firenze and you will find
the Vicolo del Divino Amore on your left along the Via dei Prefetti."
"Thank you."
"You are entering an interesting part of my city. Many famous artists lived
there. It was once part of the area called 'Ortaccio.' "
She looked puzzled. "My Italian is bad. I don't know that word."
Caviglia cursed his stupidity for mentioning this fact. Sometimes he spoke too
much for his own good.
Fearless, gripping, at once darkly funny and tender, spanning three continents and numerous lives, Americanah is a richly told story set in today's globalized world.
The story of an American family, middle class in middle America, ordinary in every way but one. But that exception is the beating heart of this extraordinary novel.
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