History (33 page)

In the refugee group, she was the most educated, but also the poorest; and this made her more shy and frightened. Even with the children of The Thousand, she couldn't shake off her feeling of inferiority, and only with the twins did she achieve some familiarity, because they too, like Useppe, were born of an unknown father. The fi days, if anyone asked her about her husband, she answered, blushing: ''I'm a widow . . ." and the dread

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of further questions made her still more antisocial than she already was by nature.

She was always afraid of disturbing, of being in the way; and she left her corner only rarely, living huddled behind her curtain like a prisoner in solitary confi When she dressed or undressed, she trembled for fear some outsider might look in at the curtain, or catch a glimpse of her through the holes in the sackcloth. She was embarrassed every time she went to the latrine, outside which it was often necessary to wait in line; but still, that fetid little room was the only place that granted her, at least, a respite of isolation and peace.

In the common room, the rare moments of silence aff her like a breath of open air in the depths of a circle in hell. Those alien noises, which assailed her from all sides, were now reduced, in her ears, to a single, eternal roar, with no more distincti of sounds. However, on recognizing Useppe's bri voice in their midst, she felt the same little glory that stray cats feel when their enterprising kittens venture into the public square, out of their hole in the cellar.

Usually, when supper was over, Useppe was dropping with sleep and he was seldom to be found at the hour when The Thousand prepared their great pallet for the night. He considered such rare occasions a great stroke of personal luck, witnessing those preparations with profound interest, trying to mingle in their midst. Then, as Ida's hand drew him beyond his own private curtain, he would look back with longing.

Now one night, in the universal darkness, he happened to be waked by a call of nature; and in satisfying it heroically without any help, so as not to disturb his mother, he felt curious at the enormous choir of snorers from outside the curtain; and he lingered on his pot, pri king up his ears until, rising, he went out, barefoot, to explore the dormitory. How did they manage, the sleepers, to produce such varied sounds? One seemed a com bustion engine, one a train-whistle; one brayed, and another sneezed re peatedly. In the shadows of the room, the only glow came from a small votive candle, kept always burning by The Thousand in front of certain photographs, on a kind of little corner altar at the end of their pallet. That dim light could barely reach the opposite corner, where Useppe stood, on coming from behind his curtain. But he gave up the idea of going farther, not for fear of moving in the dark, but because, instead, his curiosity in observing the mechanism of the snores prevailed at that point over any other attraction. And with a li ttle laugh, seeing that the pallet of The Thousand, at the point nearest him, left a tiny empty space towards the edge, he promptly settled there, covering himself as best he could with an available blanket's hem. He could just make out the shape of the sleepers nearest him. The one at his side, to judge by the enormous swell beneath

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the blanket and also by the odor, had to be Sora Mercedes. At her feet, a much smailer shape was lying, the blanket puiled over its head, and this might be Carulina. Before stretching out entirely, Useppe tried cailing her very softly : "UB . . ." but she showed no sign of hearing. Maybe it was somebody else.

None of The Thousand noticed Useppe's intrusion. Only the big form beside him, in sleep, instinctively moved a bit farther in, to leave him a little more space, then drew him closer, perhaps believing him a grand child. Huddled next to that great warm body, Useppe feiJ asleep again at once.

That same night, he had the fi dream of which any trace remained in his memory. He dreamed that on the grass the
i
e was a little
si
(ship) tied to a tree. He jumped into the boat, and almost immediately it came

loose from its rope, while the fi had become very glittering water, where the boat, with him inside, swayed rhythmicaily as if it were dancing.

Actually, what his dream translated into the gay roll of the boat was a real movement going on meanwhile at his feet. The little infantile form covered almost to the head had become a couple. A male of the tribe of TI1e TI10usand, seized by a sudden stimulus, had slipped noiselessly down along the row of mattresses, and without a word to her, lying on her, was releasing in brief jolts his nocturnal urge. And she Jet him ha.e his way, answering only with an occasional little somnolent grumble.

But Useppe, sleeping, noticed nothing. At dawn, Ida, upset at not fi him beside her, rushed out into the dormitory. In order to see, she opened a window slightly, and in the faint light she glimpsed him at the edge of the great couch, serenely sleeping. Then she picked him up and replaced him on his own mattress.

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That early autumn brought various remarkable events to the refugees in the room.

At the end of September, the summer heat still continued, and to keep from suff they slept with the windows open.

It was the 29th or 30th of that month when, late one evening, around eleven, shortly before the curfew, the cat Rossella jumped into the room from one of the low windows over the ditch, announcing herself-she usually so taciturn-with a long, ardent mewing. Everyone was already in bed, but not all were yet asleep; and a moment after Rosseila's announce ment, Giuseppe Secondo, still awake, was the fi to see a male shadow outlined in the frame of the window:

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"Is this the shelter for the refugees?" "Well? \Vh do you want?"

"Let me in." The voice sounded hoarse and exhausted, but peremp tory. In that period, anybody who turned up by surprise was suspect, especially at night. "Who is it? Who is it?!" various alarmed voices asked around the room, from the common couch of The Thousand, while two or three of their number hastily got up, summarily covering their hot, almost naked bodies. But Giuseppe Secondo, the only one who wore pajamas to bed, was already going towards the window, with his shoes on, his jacket around his shoulders, and his hat on his head. Meanwhile Rossella, with unheard-of concern, never stopped urging him on with her special call MYEEEEW! running back and forth from the window to the door, clearly insisting this man be welcomed without delay.

"I . . . I
ran away . . . from the North! a soldier . . . !" The stranger

was shouting, heightening his highwayman's manner.
"0
mama mia
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. I'm going to fall . . ." his voice suddenly changed, and he was talking to himself in a Northern dialect, in a desperate and helpless abandonment, leaning back against the outside wall.

It wasn't the fi time passing soldiers had happened by, men who had thrown away their uniform and wanted to reach the South. As a rule they didn't stay long, they ate something, rested a bit, and then resumed their journey. But they generally turned up during the day, and were more polite.

"\Vait . . ." Because of the wartime blackout, they closed the window before turning on the central lamp. He must have believed they were shutting him out, because he started hammering on the door with his hands and feet.

"Hey!!! Hang on a minute . . . Come in!"

Immediately, the moment he was inside, almost sinking to his knees, he sat down on the fl resting against a sandbag. Obviously he was at the end of his strength, and he was unarmed. The entire tribe of The Thousand (except for some of the kids and the twins, who were sleeping) had crowded around him, the men bare-chested or in undershirt and shorts, the women in slips. Useppe had also popped out from behind his curtain, all naked as he was, and he followed events with extreme interest, while Ida looked out cautiously, always afraid any newcomer might conceal a Fascist spy. And the canaries, wakened by the light, remarked on what happened with a few cheeps.

But the most obsequious was Rossella, clearly smitten with that man. After rubbing fl rtatiously against his legs, she sat before him in the pose of the Egyptian sphinx, never taking her copper eyes off him.

The man, however, paid no attention to the eat's special welcome. On

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entering he had not given the room the slightest glance, nor had he ad dressed anyone in particular. Indeed, even in asking for hospitality, he openly declared, with his demeanor, a total rejection of places and their inhabitants, animal and human.

1l1e ceiling lamp, though faint, bothered him, so that, once seated, he moved his face away from it, gri and then, with jerky movements like a paralytic's, he shielded his eyes behind a pair of dark glasses, dug out of a fi sack he was carrying with him.

That canvas bag, with a shoulder strap, about the size of a schoolboy's bookbag, was his only luggage. His haggard face, beneath a several days' growth of beard, was of a gray pallor; but, on his anns and chest, covered with wispy hair, his natural coloring could be seen : dark, almost a mu latto's. His hair was very black, stiff cut short over his brow; and his rather tall physique, even in its present deterioration, seemed healthy and fairly sturdy. He was wearing a pair of summer pants and an unbuttoned knit shirt, with short sleeves, all in a condition of indescribable fi And sweat poured off him in streams, as if after a Turkish bath. He looked about twenty.

"I want to sleep!" he said in a weak voice, but still with his truculent manner, full of menace and rancor. He continued making certain strange grimaces, distorting his facial muscles in such a way that Carulina was irresistibly moved to laugh, and had to hide her mouth with both hands to keep him from seeing. But he wouldn't have noticed anyway, since his eyes, concealed by the dark glasses, looked at nothing.

Al of a sudden, he frowned in a meditative expression, as if better to pull himself together; and planting both his hands on the ground, he made an attempt to stand. Instead, he turned his face to one side and threw up a little whitish foam on to the floor.
"Mama mia
. . ." he murmured, his breath tainted with vomit. Then Carull, perhaps repenting her earlier laughter, came forward, barefoot, in her rayon slip ( which, like the other women, she kept on when she went to bed ).. And on her own initiative and responsibility, she went to the fourth comer, shaking out as best she could the straw-fi sack that was there, at anyone's disposal.

"If you want," she said to the man, "you can sleep here. It doesn't belong to anybody."

Nobody expressed opposition. And Giuseppe Secondo, seeing the young man had trouble getting to his feet, came to his aid considerately, as if helping a wounded dog. However, once he was standing, the stranger repulsed him brutally. And, alone, he went and fl himself on the sack, like a dead weight.

"Meeeew!" and the cat leaped to join him, settling herself near his

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feet, at a point where some straw spilled from a large hole in the sack. Before curling up there, she busily arranged the straw more neatly with her paws, amusing herself by playing with the wisps for a while; but when this momentary diversion was over, she crouched down with her belly over that hole, and stayed there, calmly contemplating the stranger with her huge open eyes. She was purring with pleasure, but at the same time in her eyes you could perceive a glow of sincere concern and responsibility.

The others present couldn't believe their eyes, seeing her so diff t: she who never made friends with anyone, and, rude by nature, spent all her nights away from home. But in reality, unknown to all, she was now pregnant and perhaps was developing some instinct which made her feel upset and strange, having so far experienced nothing of the sort in her life. This was, in fact, her fi pregnancy, and at the age of less than ten months. And she had been pregnant already for several weeks; but the swelling of her belly had remained minimal, so nobody had noticed it.

Th stranger, the moment he dropped on the sack, fell at once into a sleep that resembled total unconsciousness.

He had left his bag on the fl where he had sat down on entering, and one of Caruli's sisters-in-law, before putti it at the head of his bed, explored its contents. It contained the following objects :

three books, one of Spanish poetry, another with a diffi philo sophical title, and a third entitled :
Paleochristian symbols in the cata combs;

a grease-stained notebook with ruled pages, which bore on every page, lengthwise and sideways, in pencil, in larger or smaller wri but always in the same hand, only these repeated words : CARLO CARLO CARLO CARLO VIVALDI VIVALDI VIVALDI;

a few stale crackers, soft, as if they had been in water;

some ten-lire notes, crumpled and scattered in disorder among the other objects;

and a personal identity card.

This was all.

On the identity card, facing the photograph of its owner, they could read:

Surname:
VIVAL

First name:
CARLO

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Profession: student

Birthplace:
Bologna

Birth-date:
3
October 1922

etc., etc.

In the photograph, taken some seasons earlier, the young man sleeping on the sack was still recognizable, though now he suffered by the compari son. His cheeks, emaciated at present, in the portrait were full and fresh, in their intact oval form. There he looked neat, even elegant, with his half open collar, white and pressed, and a handsome, loosely knotted necktie. But the most indecent change aff his expression which, in the por trait, even that ordinary passport-snapshot, had an amazing innocence. It was serious, to the point of melancholy; but that seriousness resembled a child's dreaming loneliness. Now instead his features were marked by something corrupt, which perverted them from within. And these marks, fi with a terrible stupor, seemed to have been produced not by a grad ual development, but by a lightning violence, like a rape.