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AT SCHOOL, the children would end up talking about Giovanna before their first class or during break, in small groups and in low voices.

“Maybe she leaned out too far.”

“She was angry and lost control of her movements.”

“She didn’t realize.”

“If you ask me, she did it on purpose.”

Once Ludovico asked, “What if she regretted it while she was falling?”

They shivered. Giulia said, “Well, it didn’t last long,” with an echo from her friend Angela, “Yes, five seconds if that.”

“So you’re saying that’s not enough time to regret it?” Ludovico sought reassurance.

But it was, which was why no one answered.

Martino burbled something about her maybe having been courting danger, the way you do when you’re riding your bike and you feel like closing your eyes to see if you can keep your balance.

“Who would do something so stupid?” Angela frowned.

There were a few scattered giggles.

Martino tucked his chin into his neck and crossed his arms. Let them laugh, he thought, but he felt hurt and a little ashamed. At least he’d stopped himself in time, before revealing that two summers previously he’d broken his wrist doing just that—riding a bike with his eyes closed. The accident had been very painful, but he’d made his entrance at school the next day with a fresh plaster cast on show and laughed about the exploit with his friends in a way that seemed completely different to the squawking of the Biellesi children. Like a hero who, disdaining danger, or rather inviting it, must reckon with the consequences of his audacity. He’d kept his cast. It was on the top shelf in his room in Turin.