Ardor (9 page)

I
n the Happy Pig, Fernanda Ponderosa mopped and polished, sliced ham, packed sausages, dressed pigs' heads, stacked shelves, and served customers with a hauteur that doubled her attractiveness. The shop had never been so crowded. Every man in the region, it seemed, had come in today, and Primo Castorini knew it wasn't his pork products luring them.

Luigi Bordino had found his muse in Fernanda Ponderosa. Learning of her fondness for monkeys, he carried in a life-size bread replica of Oscar. Miniature turtles followed. Fernanda Ponderosa treated Luigi Bordino like one of her pets and laughed at his attempts to ingratiate himself. He responded by scampering about like a puppy.

Others were not laughing. Next door, Susanna Bordino was foaming at the mouth. Her foolish father-in-law was behaving like a love-struck teenager, but what could she do about it? The delicate hairs on Melchiore's ears were soon singed by her complaints. Despite that their fathers, grandfathers, and indeed all their ancestors had been neighbors, friends even, Primo Cas
torini had decided to slit Luigi Bordino's throat with the big knife. He would do it, too, if this foolishness continued. Yes, he would stick him like a pig. Let his blood gush out. String him up. Flip out his guts into a pail. Make him into sausages. He knew he would do it soon. Any moment now. God help him, he was going mad.

He brooded the day away. He thought about closing the shop to keep them all out. He couldn't stand other men looking at her. Every lewd glance was an affront to him. So what if the business folded? He didn't care. It wasn't important to him anymore. All he wanted to do was to look at her.

Yes, Fernanda Ponderosa was driving him insane. She had completely possessed him. He looked back on the last forty-eight hours in disbelief. He couldn't even recognize himself. He wasn't Primo Castorini, pork butcher, anymore. He was someone else. But who? He didn't know.

And yet she took no notice of him. None at all. Why was that? He wasn't used to this sort of treatment. He was something of a favorite with women throughout the region. Many had vied for his attentions. His male pride blistered. What was wrong with him that he should be scorned like this and have every other fool preferred to him?

That evening Primo Castorini was entertained by the fragrant widow Filippucci, one of his lady friends, with whom, before this catastrophic change, he had been more than happy to while away a few hours now and again. Yet now he could not tear his mind away from Fernanda Ponderosa.

Even while the widow sang love songs to him and strummed her guitar, even while she was performing for him naked the Dance of the Velvet Doves, even while she assumed the tantric yoga positions she had been practicing for this very purpose, even then he was cursing her for not being Fernanda Ponderosa. How could any woman compete with her? The widow was foolish to even try. He wasn't just bored. He was disgusted.

After he left the widow's boudoir, Primo Castorini pounded the streets. He didn't know where he went or what he did. His boots wore out the sidewalk. Those that watched him were concerned lest he trigger an earthquake, or at least a rockfall. It had taken less than that before now, for the town was built directly above a large fissure in the earth's crust, and in the past even the overenthusiastic cracking of a hard-boiled egg had been sufficient to cause devastation.

Primo Castorini didn't care. Let him cause an earthquake. Let him die. Let them all die rather than he continue to feel this misery. An itching right in the core of him was crucifying him. He held himself stiffly, taut, attempting to control every single one of his muscles, but he could not ease the rubbing, the chafing, the coiling and uncoiling, the contracting, the throbbing, the pain, yes, the outright pain that had sprung a leak within him and gushed like a flood.

My mistress, who just then happened to be passing, gave Primo Castorini a wink and handed him a tube of soothing ointment.

“Rub this in,” she said kindly. “It will help.”

But Primo Castorini knew no medicine could cure him. Fernanda Ponderosa's face dominated his thoughts. Although she bore a superficial resemblance to Silvana, he could see that they were not similar at all. Silvana was ordinary. Although their features were undeniably the same, some witchcraft had been involved in the formula that made up Fernanda Ponderosa. Her body, her bearing, her strut, were all designed to ruin a man. And how badly he wanted to be ruined.

Why would she not give anything about herself away? He had tried to engage her in conversation. Draw her out. After all, they were practically relatives. Throughout the two torturous, glorious days they had worked closely together, she had revealed nothing. No personal information at all. It was sinister. What was she hiding? What game was she playing? Who was she? What was she? What was her past? What was her future?

Should he go to her now? Throw himself at her feet? Hurl her onto the bed and show her the love of a real man? Only one thing stopped him: he couldn't risk her rejection. He knew he could bear anything except that. That alone would destroy him. Oh, for tomorrow to come so he could be with her again. Feast his eyes upon her. Inhale the overpowering scent of her. Feel the thrill of her body in passing close. How could he endure the slow hours of the intervening night?

His legs took him in spite of himself to his old family home. He just wanted to catch a glimpse of her, that was all. But there wasn't a single light burning. The place seemed deserted. And
immediately his jealousy began painting painful pictures for him: Fernanda Ponderosa and a mystery man dining by candlelight at the Ristorante Benito, dancing the tango at Divina, or worse still, lying in one another's arms in a huge circular bed made up with black satin sheets.

But Fernanda Ponderosa wasn't out on the town with another man. Of course not. Romance could not have been further from her thoughts. She was in the ancient kitchen of the Castorini, nursing a cup of cold coffee she had forgotten to drink. It had grown gradually dark as she sat at the long table, remembering the past, trying to draw Silvana into a conversation, but Silvana resolutely refused to appear.

As Primo Castorini stalked off in a bitter rage, he failed to notice the figure of Susanna Bordino, lurking in the shadows, watching and waiting. She, too, had become preoccupied with the stranger, but for a different reason.

T
he baby grubs in Arcadio Carnabuci's closet curled up and died for want of sustenance. The mother moth lay in a corner, her wings crushed by the weight of her grief. In vain they had hung on day after day for the return of the suit, but it never came.

In truth, the suit had been consigned to the trash by Concetta Crocetta, who had found it abandoned in the hallway when she had come to call on Arcadio Carnabuci. With her amazing instinct my mistress had divined that something ailed him and had come without being called.

She entered the kitchen to find the figure of my olive grower slumped in his chair wearing nothing but dripping long johns—which he discarded only during the month of August—and an undershirt. I have to say, whatever he wore, I always found him adorable.

What she could not have predicted was the severity of the affliction that seemed to have cut him down so cruelly since the day before. His eyes were open but unseeing, he was unconscious, barely breathing. His flesh was cold and gray, much
grayer than usual, and his hair, perching like a pile of tar on his head, gave her a feeling of alarm she had seldom experienced during her long and distinguished career. His whole being indicated the presence of some rare and horrible infection.

Concetta Crocetta took the precaution of donning a pair of rubber gloves, gloves purchased in bulk from one of those very same salesmen who traveled on the
Santa Luigia
in fear of Fernanda Ponderosa, and performed the usual tests. She discovered him to be only half-alive. Perhaps not even that much.

She made him as comfortable as she could, removing the ham that had fallen into his lap, and covering him with a rug from the floor that was strewn with crumpled-up pieces of card. The presence of the ham was of concern to her. She had heard of some bizarre fetishes in her time, but none featured cold meats. Quickly she telephoned for an ambulance.

Through the window I watched anxiously, my nostrils pressed up close against the glass. If only I could have stepped into the cottage myself, I would have saved him: given him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, cardiac massage, whatever was necessary. I had watched my mistress enough times to be able to perform such procedures myself.

Why did Concetta Crocetta do nothing more? Administer shots of medication? Slap him around the face? Pour cold water on him? Something. Anything. To rouse him from this terrible torpor that so filled me with fear.

In my anxiety I wore away the earth beneath the window with my pacing and left a frost of mucus on the glass that made
it increasingly difficult for me to see much of what was going on inside.

After what seemed to me at the time an eternity, but was in truth only a matter of some twenty-seven minutes and eleven seconds, the jangling of bells announced the arrival of the region's antiquated ambulance. The paramedics, Gianluigi Pupini and Irina Biancardi, were saddened by the state of Arcadio Carnabuci, but they were not surprised. Health professionals everywhere had long expected some such calamity to strike him down.

Together they got him onto the stretcher and carried him out. Concetta Crocetta, still wearing the rubber gloves, snared the suit lying in the hallway and struggled to get it into the trash can out in the yard.

I attempted to clamber into the ambulance behind my mistress, but it was clear I was not welcome, and they thrust me outside again, applying their vicious hands to my tender parts and leaving me with bruises. My eyes were full of tears. Was it not natural that I should go with him? I, who loved him best in the whole world? I will never forgive my mistress for her brutality that day. From that time on I carried a piece of grit in my heart toward her that will never go away.

Concetta Crocetta, who was making the journey with the patient, saw fit to apologize on my behalf to the ambulance's crew and with some wadding attempted to wipe up the muck I had left on the floor. She said she didn't know what had come over me. Gianluigi Pupini and Irina Biancardi then struck ter
ror into my already wounded heart by hinting at what they had long known: that the new chief of the District Health Authority was seeking to phase out the use of mules altogether and replace us with mopeds. Standing outside the doors that were just closing upon me, I suffered a double blow. The life of the love of my life hung in the balance, and in addition I was facing dismissal. How could things possibly get any worse?

When they were finally ready for departure, a figure dressed in running shorts and vest scudded into the yard. It was Amilcare Croce, who, now that running had almost become an end in itself for him—he seldom visited patients anymore—was out running when he had got wind of Arcadio Carnabuci's affliction, or perhaps what was more forward in his mind was Concetta Crocetta's presence at the scene.

Whatever his motivation, he made a detour and ran as fast as his powerful legs would carry him in the direction of the Carnabuci olive grove, and the little cottage beside it that bordered the road. He was, as usual, too late. He caught just a fleeting glimpse of Concetta Crocetta within before the door of the ambulance was finally secured, and with Irina Biancardi behind the wheel, it set off for the infirmary in the distant town of Spoleto.

Yet in that fragment of a second, between the closing of the doors, the nurse caught sight of him; their eyes met and Concetta Crocetta knew that he had come there for her. Yes, their eyes enfolded one another in an embrace that became a melting pool of revelation and desire.

Did he only imagine that Concetta Crocetta held out one of her little hands to him? Did she imagine that he held out one of his long, slender hands to her just before that door shut between them so terribly, and Gianluigi Pupini, having carried out the safety checks, jumped into the cab alongside the driver?

As the ambulance trundled over the bumpy yard and turned into the lane, I, of course, followed, for in the midst of the crisis my mistress had forgotten to tether me up. Behind me I could hear the flap of rubber soles as the running shoes of the doctor met the asphalt.

In the lane, our little cortege gained pace, and inside, Concetta Crocetta could see the figure of the doctor as he loped along. How she longed to throw open the double doors at the back and fling herself into his waiting arms, but it wasn't to be.

With her foot on the gas pedal Irina Biancardi eased away as gently as she could, but for all the doctor's training in athletics he could not keep up with the speed of a motor vehicle. And neither could I. Although I trotted along valiantly, I was also soon outpaced and outdistanced.

As the ambulance sped away, its bells jangling, our figures running along the road in its wake grew smaller and smaller until we became just moving dots on the highway, and Concetta Crocetta did something that she had long ago sworn she would never do, and that was shed a tear, for Amilcare Croce, and what might have been.

Arcadio Carnabuci, who lay in a semisomnolent state throughout, was largely forgotten by all the other occupants of
the vehicle. But attention would have benefited him little. It breaks my heart to say it, but he was too far gone for anxious looks and the application of a damp washcloth to his clouded brow.

If she had given him a thought, which she didn't, Concetta Crocetta would probably have felt irritated that Arcadio Carnabuci had come between her and the fulfillment of her hopes and dreams. If there hadn't been the urgency to convey him to the infirmary, she would certainly have leapt out of the back of the ambulance, whatever broken bones may have resulted from her actions.

Yet the doctor and I did not give up on our pursuit of the ambulance; we went on, mile after mile. Through Gerberto Nicoletto's fields of mutant melons, through meadows dotted with blue sheep, through olive groves bearing pears. Through herds of mares suckling piglets, through rows of cabbages with human faces turned toward the sun, through vineyards where hazelnuts had replaced grapes on the swinging vines. Everywhere was the evidence of how thoroughly the balance of nature had been disturbed. And still we ran on.

Initially we declined to meet the other's eye; there was between us a small feeling of embarrassment; we had never felt truly comfortable with one another.

Amilcare Croce bore no affection for mules and found Concetta Crocetta wanting in taste for choosing to conduct her business upon me; but this was just one of the many quirks that made her, after all, so lovable.

I, for my part, distrusted the doctor. I could never under
stand why he had allowed his phobia of transport to mar his life. Why couldn't he get himself a mule for goodness' sake? I had no patience with the way these humans conducted their peculiar romance. They were of the same species, they spoke the same language, they had none of the diabolical obstructions and difficulties that formed a veritable mountain between myself and Arcadio Carnabuci. Why, therefore, could they not speak out, once and for all time, and finally find happiness together before it was too late? If I lived to be two hundred—I was already ninety-seven—I would never understand it.

Yet these thoughts were not uppermost in my mind as I ran along. I was totally dissolved in concern for my beloved Arcadio Carnabuci, not knowing if he would live or die. I ran on despite the pain that was slicing through my lungs like a knife, and the raw abrasions on my horny hooves being grated with every step. I ran on and would continue to run on until I dropped.

Amilcare Croce, however, scarcely knew why he ran after the ambulance mile after mile. He had a sense of urgency, that feeling of if not now, then when? And he could not stop himself. His legs, programmed to run, ran on. With Concetta Crocetta in the ambulance, he wanted to be where that ambulance was. It was that simple and that complicated.

After a while, I took a surreptitious sideways glance at the doctor. It was easy for me as my eyes are set very much in the side of my head already. What did I see? I saw a creature in love, as I was in love, and I saw coiled up inside him all the fear and anxiety and longing and pain and beauty and joy and the frantic, urgent, bursting, unbearable, delicious, tingling, crazy, bub
bling, screaming, squealing, laughing, crying, goose-bumping kind of stuff that I had inside me. It was ardor. And the doctor had a severe case of it.

From then on I felt more sympathy for him, and I think he, in turn, was softening toward me. And so, united we ran along, occasionally encouraging the other when the going got harder, the incline got steeper, the breath grew shorter, and like this we covered some five miles with the ambulance still in view, but far in the distance along the long, straight road.

Yet the human or the mule body is only capable of so much. We could not go on thus indefinitely. Inevitably over time we slowed from a robust canter to a trot and thence to a walk. The doctor finally got a stitch in his side and bent over double to relieve it. I walked on a little, hobbling on my painful hooves. The ambulance was no longer in sight. When the doctor stood upright again, I was already some distance ahead of him on the road. I gave him one final glance and went on again in a purposeful way, and the doctor's legs turned him around and headed him for home.

He had a pinking muscle in his calf and his shoulders and neck were grown stiff. Concetta Crocetta inside the ambulance was gone, and he couldn't really go all the way to the infirmary. He did not resent the actions of his legs or seek to reverse their decision. He knew their need of rest, and so, giving me a cheery wave, and wishing me well on my journey, he set off at a slower pace for Montebufo.