«Ferdinando was clamouring for money and writing long letters to his wife which embittered her relations with Ferruccio still more. He had somehow become obsessed with the idea that his son was living a life of riotous immorality and was doing his best to convince Anna of this belief. It became gradually evident to Ferruccio that his father really had no great desire to live with his wife; he never admitted this, but he was always ready with some pretext or other for refusing to consider his son's plans for bringing them together. It was urgent, he maintained to Anna, that Ferruccio should have his mother to look after him, for then 'certain things' would not happen. Ferruccio retorted that it would be very much better for her to be looking after Ferdinando. Anna refused to allow her son to say a word against his father. Throughout the whole spring and summer of 1890 these anxieties continued without respite. In the early summer Ferdinando managed to leave Empoli and go back to Trieste; but Trieste was evidently a place where he was too well known to be comfortable. He tried Gorizia, gave a concert, lost money and sank deeper into debt. Ferruccio advised him to try Milan; in a big town he might find occupation both as a clarinet-player and as a journalist. Ferruccio was by this time firmly determined to be rid of his mother. Had she been a widow he would have borne the burden, but as she had a husband living, it was only reasonable that the parents should live together and leave their son to marry and lead his own life. He was perfectly prepared to support his parents, but he pointed out to them plainly that what he had to spend in maintaining Anna in Helsingfors would serve amply for the two if they would only join forces. [DENT, pp. 90-91]