The Mountain

by Massimo Donati

  In fact, this umpteenth report had nothing new to add: investigations were underway, some magistrates wished to ascertain where responsibility might lie. It seemed that new information had emerged about the circumstances of the accident, but the journalist could say nothing more about it. At the end, various family friends and first-responders from the boy’s three days of agony popped up to add pointless details to the wrap-up.

  Back in those days of late June and early July, the tragedy had kept returning to television screens, but the most important aspects of it remained in people’s conversations, even their private thoughts. The idea that just a few hundred metres from home, on a shortcut back to his house, a boy could fall into a natural well hidden by grass and get stuck down there, somewhere between nineteen and sixty metres below the ground, was a tragedy so absolute, so gratuitous in its sheer absurdity that it affected everyone. It belonged to a special category of democratic human catastrophes: nobody could say that it could never happen to them or their family. But there was another factor stoking the fascination with the tragedy.

  For the first time, it was all in plain sight.

  Everybody’s sight. They had been able to follow—live—the slow unfolding of a destiny. The weight that swung between hope and disappointment as somewhere in the night-black ocean of fields and later of crowds a little boy, his mouth open wide, struggled to whisper his suffering, his terror, his steadily weakening resistance to the muddy evil that was claiming him. And everybody had heard. Because in their eagerness for a raw, unfiltered story, reporters from RAI TV had lowered a microphone down to the boy’s head. The child’s lament had penetrated people’s ears, it had risen above the day-to-day noise and media chatter and plunged deep into the guts of adults and children.

  Children. They, too, had seen everything.

  Only the very smallest were sent to bed, exhausted. The slightly bigger ones would receive tacit permission to stay up and follow the live reporting well into the night, sweaty and feverish as the nation’s cities burned up in the fire of a summer that had started too early.

  And then the end came. Silence; death.

  Three days in, after numerous risks and failed experiments in the desperate attempt to save him, the boy stopped breathing.

  The night of the long wait, Roberto had watched the live report at home: in bed with his parents, the mattress covered only by a shroud-rough sheet to ease the flush of bodies lying together in the sultry heat that lay over the city and the lake.

  Eyes glued to the screen, they exchanged opinions about what could be done to pull him out, until suddenly his mother exclaimed that it was time for bed, they couldn’t stay up all night, especially not an eleven-year-old. This sparked a dispute with Roberto, who of course resisted, mounting arguments about rights he did not have until Carlo intervened to support his reasoning, at which point the dispute shifted to the parents. In the end his mother, as she often did, appeared to give in. She ended the discussion, got up and went to sleep on the sofa. It was a bitter epilogue. It was always painful to score a win against Anna. His father had continued following the live broadcast, but in silence. Shortly afterwards he sent Roberto to bed, and this time the boy didn’t object. He lay there in the dark listening for his mother’s return to bed, but nothing happened, at least not before sleep interrupted his eavesdropping.

  Now Roberto was watching those replayed images with the other hotel guests, and recalling that night in his mind.

  When the report ended, the sound in the room returned to its normal volume, but not immediately; it took a few minutes, as though it was necessary to put some distance between that event and day-to-day life.

  ‘They should have lowered another kid down there. Someone like me.’

  He looked at his grandmother earnestly.

  ‘Someone like me. Because I’m not afraid of death. Not my own, and not other people’s.’

  She looked back at him with an air of superiority that turned to annoyance, at which point she could no longer ignore him.

  ‘Roberto, when you say things like that you sound ridiculous.’

  She brought her napkin to her mouth in a dignified manner, feigning indifference.

  Roberto was startled by the calm severity of his grandmother’s attack. He paused, and thought about it.

  ‘What I mean is that a kid can face death with courage and strength too. It’s not only adults who have got skills. Of course nobody wants to die. But even if you’re little you can be cool about it if you’re trained for that sort of thing. Someone properly trained but with a small build, they could have gone down into the well more easily, hooked the boy up to the cable and gone back up to the surface. And got out in time and survived. It’s a question of how small you are, not how big and strong you are.’ He spoke deliberately, emptying the words of any arrogance or impudence. Before his grandmother could reply he added, ‘I reckon they didn’t even think of it. Because adults have this habit of always doing things the same way, the way they know how, and they don’t try to do anything differently. Plus, there was a lot of bad luck.’

  Lia knitted her brows and then suddenly relaxed.

  ‘I hear your father talking when you launch into these meaningless pseudo-logical speeches, but never mind that. I disagree. The idea of risking the life of a child to save another is so unimaginable it’s not even worth discussing. However: you defended your opinion without losing your temper or sulking, even though I offended you. That’s what I like to see. That is how a Beltrami must always behave.’

  And then she smiled playfully, skewering Roberto’s self-possession so that he became a boy once again.

  ‘Nonna, you never take me seriously! And you turn every conversation into a character-building exercise.’

  ‘If I know that lunatic of a father of yours at all, it won’t be long before you have to start taking responsibility for yourself. Best to be prepared.’

  4

  That morning, one of their favourite pastimes: hanging out in the hotel bar, the meeting place for the elderly people. Guests who didn’t want to, or couldn’t, get out and about; a handful of villagers, as well as people from the valley who commuted to Madonna del Bosco for work.

  ‘Mayor Pichler.’

  All the others, even the oldest people, started saying Mr Mayor, Mr Mayor, as soon as they saw him, bobbing up and nodding to indicate respect for the man they had elected to govern the small area.

  ‘Don’t get up, please, don’t get up.’ He said it with a certain kind-hearted embarrassment. He was around forty years of age, clearly overweight, the sort of man you wouldn’t have noticed if it hadn’t been for that reception. He greeted the barman, took a glass of white wine and sat down with the old men.

  ‘What’s new?’

  They launched into various tales about borders and logging rights in the woods, disputes that had remained unresolved for centuries.

  Mattia and Roberto particularly liked spending time in the bar because that was the only place they could hear adults’ conversations without filters. Nobody bothered to censor themselves; in fact the explicit purpose of the bar was to allow everybody a place to vent, to laugh, to express malice and wisdom and to gossip. With the quick banter and the changing cast of characters there was never a dull moment. The two boys would settle themselves at a table near the big windows that looked out onto the valley and keep a low profile. They were not the protagonists here and they preferred not to attract attention, just in case anyone discovered any scruples. They had got hold of a pack of cards to pass the time, but that was just a front.

  Roberto sometimes found himself struggling to follow and would need to guess, or ask Mattia to fill in the gaps—not just because everyone else knew all about various issues and events and therefore didn’t need to spell things out, but also because when a hot topic came up the valley’s residents would invariably switch into dialect, which was a whole different language. Roberto understood little of it. He would avoid eye contact and eavesdrop wit
h intense concentration, especially any time they talked about women.

  That day, as the morning was drawing out towards lunchtime, Aldeno arrived. Aldeno was twenty-six and known to everyone in the valley as an eccentric. He was there to drop off the mail to the hotel, because that was his job—he was employed as a postman, he would stress—but everyone just knew him as the poet. The valley poet. It was partly a joke and partly in earnest, because he took the profession of poet extremely seriously, as a basis for his whole lifestyle. The lifestyle of a modern poet. Whether he had actually written any poems, and what they were like, was unclear. On important occasions he would be invited to read something: whether his own work or someone else’s nobody ever bothered to ascertain. Not that he was especially good even at that. His pronunciation combined quirks of dialect with various individual ones: a lisp and a hiss, a funny ‘r’, a stutter. He displayed none of these in face-to-face conversation but they cropped up when he was nervous, producing a muddle of sounds, a surreal sonic arabesque that made people burst out laughing even at the saddest events. And in fact, if you listened closely, that was his most intense poetic expression. Short and thickset with the blunt features of a peasant, he wore a heavy metal black leather jacket all year round and rode through the valley every weekday on his perfectly maintained red Fantic Caballero.

  In his own way, he had earnt a position of some respect in the local community, in that everyone knew and liked him, even though they considered him half-mad, or at the very least, as they put it, not all there. Though in those parts it didn’t take much.

  After handing over the post to the barman, Aldeno, as was his habit, stopped for his mid-morning aperitivo.

  ‘Gigo, give me the usual, I’m in a hurry.’

  He wasn’t in a hurry, he was just impatient. He called everybody Gigo, and no one knew why. The barman said nothing, took out the white wine, then the lime soda, poured some wine into a glass and then opened the soft drink and placed them both on the bar in front of the young metalhead. Aldeno poured the lime soda into the wine and added a sachet of sugar.

  ‘Only you could stomach that crap. And you’re even willing to pay for it, eh, Poet?’

  The comment was punctuated by two slaps on the back of his neck: Leo had arrived. On his way in he had glanced at the two boys at the table and Roberto had raised his hand to wave—this was his friend’s father after all—but then he put it back down with some embarrassment, because Leo had taken no notice of either him or Mattia and headed straight for Aldeno.

  ‘So?’

  Aldeno lowered his eyes the way you lower a roller door. Leo’s blue eyes, looking out from under his long brown hair, could do damage if you owed him something, as was the case here. Aldeno hesitated, stirring the sugar into his drink with a teaspoon.

  ‘What.’

  ‘Don’t be a dickhead, Alden. You know.’

  ‘They said to tell ya fifty per cent.’

  ‘Arseholes. I’d be running at a loss.’

  Roberto already knew from Mattia that his father owned a small machine shop, just three CNC lathes which he worked himself, along with two other men. He produced things for suppliers, mostly across the border, which wasn’t far away. But the business wasn’t going well and one of the workers had recently quit.

  Aldeno remained silent and averted his eyes. If he was mixed up in something, you could be sure it wasn’t legit. And in fact their voices were lowered, although no one would have dared to stick their nose in. Not with Leo involved.

  ‘I’ll give them a discount of two hundred lire a piece. Delivery next month because I’ll have to work on it after hours.’

  ‘They told me this month or not at all.’

  Aldeno had now turned his head and his face revealed a certain tension, because when Leo got angry he was frightening.

  But Leo was calm. He was reasoning.

  ‘They’re trying to play clever buggers and they don’t know they’re just a bunch of wankers. Nice. Tell you what: you say okay, give them the discount…Not fifty per cent, though—if they’re that desperate they can go to their kraut friends, see how they get screwed over there. When time comes for delivery I just give them half the stuff, I can’t get any more done by then, and the rest within a month.’

  Aldeno looked at him, unconvinced. Leo had regained his bullishness.

  ‘Or would you rather we pack it in? The alternative is you make up the difference.’

  ‘And what if they see it’s only half the stuff and they won’t pay?’

  ‘If they want the pieces they’ll pay, otherwise we stop the machines.’

  Aldeno nodded, looking Leo in the eye, as though he had something to say but didn’t have the strength to say it. He clearly was getting himself mixed up in something dodgy.

  ‘You’ll go meet them when the stuff’s ready, you’re their man and you’ll convince them that everything’s in order. On your fancy red bike with your postie’s saddlebags. Full up with the pieces.’

  What little cheer there had been on Aldeno’s face when he came in had well and truly evaporated by now. He sank his white wine and lime soda in one gulp, smacked his lips in a way Roberto was never allowed to do and banged the glass down on the table.

  ‘Are we agreed?’

  ‘Agreed.’

  Aldeno got out some money to pay but Leo’s mood had improved. He gestured to put it away and raised his voice. ‘My round, Poet. And speaking of your motorbike, you couldn’t lend it to me this Saturday, could you? I took mine to Bucci down in the valley, waiting for a part to come in.’

  Aldeno was fiercely protective of his Caballero. He eyed Leo suspiciously, even though it was widely acknowledged that Leo knew his way around a motorbike; was in fact the best in the area. A few years back he’d raced professionally, even won sometimes. Aldeno shared the passion but didn’t have the competitive edge.

  ‘Why, is it broken down?’

  ‘My bike? Come on. No, top-secret upgrade. I’ve ordered the part from the UK.’

  Aldeno’s face flashed with childlike curiosity.

  ‘If you’re good I’ll let you have a go on it.’

  Like a kid, Aldeno regained his cockiness. ‘You bet you’ll let me have a go.’

  ‘Okay, so I’ll come and get the Fantic on Saturday afternoon ’cause after that I’ve got things to do.’

  Another slap on the back of the neck and the conversation was over. Leo turned to leave. But sometimes Aldeno forgot himself and this was one of those times.

  ‘You gonna pick up that chick in San Martino?’

  Leo stopped suddenly. When he turned back towards Aldeno his expression had changed. Aldeno knew at once that he’d said the wrong thing to the wrong person but he managed to stay calm. Leo took his face into his hands, squeezing his lips between his cheeks.

  ‘What chick, Alden?’ He squeezed hard.

  Aldeno’s lips formed a kind of duck’s bill and he went white.

  At that point a lot of people fell silent. They turned to follow the argument but stayed where they were, not wanting things to get too heated. Even Pichler the mayor, sitting with the oldies, was watching.

  ‘What’s this nonsense, Aldeno? You’re sounding more like the village idiot than the village poet.’

  ‘You just behave yourself,’ the barman put in calmly.

  Leo let Aldeno be. It was more a calculation than a spontaneous choice—this was his wife’s family’s hotel and it wouldn’t be a good idea to kick up a fuss.

  ‘You talk too much, Alden. Loose lips. You need to be careful, ’cause one day you’ll trip up and your lips’ll drop right off onto the floor without you even noticing. Get it?’

  Leo gave him a hard look.

  ‘Got it?’

  Aldeno nodded and lowered his eyes like a child. After a few seconds Leo turned and headed for the door.

  ‘Saturday afternoon, remember.’

  Everyone resumed their conversations. The moment had passed.

  Once Leo was out the doo
r, Roberto looked at Mattia with an embarrassed smile, hoping to gauge how he should react—laugh, look serious, pretend it was nothing—but his friend wasn’t engaging.

  Mattia was holding the pack of cards in his hand and dealing them nonchalantly, one by one, onto the little pile on the table without looking up.

  Then he said coldly, ‘My father’s the only one with balls around here.’

  5

  Although the time he spent with Mattia was the most intense, Roberto passed most of his days with his grandmother, despite her desire to see him start to develop some independence. In this quiet mountain setting, she wanted him to make his own choices about where to be and what to do, to show accountability towards himself and towards her—and she also expected to know exactly where he was at all times. It was a conditional freedom she granted Roberto, in an unspoken agreement that left no room for negotiation, subversion or impulsive behaviour. Roberto guaranteed—and delivered—complete peace of mind; in exchange Lia allowed the bonds of rules and limits to be stretched but never broken. This was how she had raised Carlo, and this was how her son wanted Roberto to be brought up.

  To Roberto, the periods of absolute freedom felt more limited than they really were. They felt like intervals, intense periods inserted into the routine set by the rhythms of the hotel and his grandmother’s habits. Their mountain life unfolded effortlessly, punctuated by daily moments that each of them found pleasant in their own way. Morning and evening ablutions, lunch and the card game that came straight afterwards, homework time, evening chats with the other guests or with the owners of the hotel.

  And their walk.

  Lia was thoroughly familiar with the area around Madonna del Bosco—she’d been going there for forty years. For the Beltrami family, the valley was a kind of second home, a second homeland, despite their decision not to buy a house there as others in their financial position had done. Nonno, with Nonna’s agreement, had chosen a more casual option that allowed them to live there in the summer without the commitment of running and maintaining a property—which, according to Nonno, would only have thwarted the simple, frugal lifestyle they were seeking there in the first place. Later, once they had found their ideal home in the Hotel Miravalle, any lingering doubts were quelled: such was the connection for all of them that the thought of going anywhere else would have been an unthinkable betrayal.