There’s something magical about the rèfola, a short enchanted breath that vanishes even before you notice it’s there. A faint awareness, perhaps the echo of a memory or the premonition of some future regret.
It presents itself as a sigh of cool air. It brings relief, it speaks of airy lands and snowy peaks, almond trees in bloom and foamy waves crashing on the rocks.
But it’s merely an illusion.
I should have been there.
I should have been there, while you were falling to earth. While you were abandoning your life, all your memories, all the people, the faces, the sounds, the flavors.
I should have been there, while the ground was rushing up at you at dizzying speed, as you were embracing death, you who had always lived every breath in full, as if you were immortal, as if there were nothing that existed outside of you.
I should have been there, to ask you while you were falling whether there was a a thought in your mind of the harm. Of all the harm that you might have done, with those arms windmilling through the air, with that brain that was about to be smashed open on the stones in just a second or so.
And I would have relished the show. I’d have laughed at your pain and your death. I’d have danced around all that was left of you, in the moonlight. I’d have spat on your corpse, a hundred times, mingling my disgust with your blood and your brains.
I should have been there.
That’s what it does, the rèfola.
It arrives when everything is stagnant, airless, when it seems as if nothing will ever change again, and that the world and the entire universe are going to sink into a sea of heat. When you feel, keeping vigil throughout the night as if wrapped in a boiling shroud, as if you’d been hurled down into the inferno, and that in just a moment Beelzebub might come to ask you to account for your sins.
But the rèfola brings a smile, vanishing before a single thought can be completed.
I love you, you know. I love you.
I’ll say it to you in the silence of this night I’m passing elsewhere, far from my bed and my things, far from the thoughts that I now know were those of a little girl. Far from you and your gaze through the window.
Perhaps one needs to go far away, in order to understand love. Perhaps one needs to get away from the books on the bookshelf, from the glass of water on the nightstand, from the dresses neatly hanging in the armoire, to understand how much one might want a kiss, how much one needs a hand, in the night.
I love you. Not because of an image behind the glass, not because of the color of your eyes in the half-darkness, not because of your lips, grazing mine in a strange snowfall.
I love you because I want you in this bed, here and now. Because I’d like to take you against my breast and in my arms, because I don’t know the flavor of your skin and I’d like to taste it.
I love you in the flesh and in the blood. That’s what distance has taught me, and I wish it had taught me the opposite, that it had told me of a silence to be filled with other music, of empty spaces to be furnished with other wood and other glass and other silver. I wish.
But I love you. Now and yesterday and tomorrow. I love you.
The rèfola tells, in a fleeting second, all the stories that we’d tell ourselves, if only we had the courage.
It doesn’t have the time to carry things through to the end, and it wouldn’t even want to. It suggests the beginning, the first notes of the song, the opening strains of a well-known symphony.
Our soul does the rest.
I’m not sleeping, no. And how could I sleep?
Death isn’t a joke. Death is an enormity.
It’s one thing to struggle, to stand up for your convictions, to affirm your will to survive. Death is another.
Death means you no longer exist. That by your hand, a person who once loved, hated, felt pleasure and pain, from one moment to the next becomes a heap of bloody rags, without breath and without emotions.
Death means that by your hand a creature that till then had been at the center of a spiderweb of feelings and passions, someone who might have been a father and a husband, a friend and a son, disappears from the list of the living and becomes a name engraved on a headstone, the phantom of a memory.
I’m not sleeping. I can’t.
Because death isn’t a game, something that you can patiently reassemble, with nimble fingers or careful eye. Once you’ve dealt it, you can’t take it back. Death is definitive. From death, there’s no returning.
Then why do I see you here, sitting on my bed? Why do I hear your voice, why do I still see the surprise in your eyes?
I’m not sleeping. I can’t.
Someone who’s dealt out death can’t sleep.
Ever again.
Since it’s feminine, the rèfola always knows what it’s doing. It never wavers from the task it has set itself.
Since it’s feminine, it seduces intentionally, never by chance. Who knows how much time it takes, in the cool depths where it originates, choosing the right plunging neckline, the right swivel of the hips. Since it’s feminine, it knows the right buttons to push in the fraction of a second it will have available to act. Since it’s feminine, it knows the power of a touch that barely grazes, apparently by chance, to churn the blood gone stagnant against the heat.
Since it’s feminine, it knows how much destruction lies concealed in a passion. And how much fun it is to trigger that destruction and then stand to one side, observing its terrible effects.
And now? What will we do now?
We’d gotten used to the prosperity, the tranquillity, as if they would never come to an end. To the gifts, the money, the clothes.
We’d gotten used to them.
Because they came from those womanly hands, smooth and restless, and from the desire to receive compliments and smiles. We thought they’d never end.
Of course, he could also be repulsive, with that body of his that had only ever had the vaguest semblances of manliness about it, with that double chin, that flat, hairless chest, that flaccid gut: an instant of imaginary masculinity after a few seconds of feeble agitation. He could be revolting.
But then he’d dole out his power, his wealth, in exchange for a smile. And in the end, it was a good price for a smile. And even for the glimmer of a moan, a heavy sigh.
Who knows how he could ever fool himself into believing he gave pleasure, with that horrible belly, that old man’s face, those girl’s hands. People always find ways to fool themselves.
But now it’s over. And we’ll have to find something else.
For that matter, we should have expected it.
We should have expected him to die.
He was bound to die, wasn’t he? He was bound to die.
But you have to be ready for it, for the rèfola.
An open window, a door left ajar. Because the rèfola may touch your soul, but it’s something physical, concrete, real, it needs space and time to reach you, it requires a moment’s attention from the body.
Provided you want the rèfola to hit you, naturally.
I can smell the breath of death.
I can smell it in the air. A heavy, lurking stench, that lingers in your mouth more than in your lungs. Death lies in the heat; its stink befouls the air down in hell.
A transition, nothing but a transition. Like crossing a field: you can take a minute or a whole month, but the end comes eventually, and there are shadows in the forest, beyond the field’s edge.
It wasn’t hard to make the journey. It wasn’t always easy, but I’ve been lucky, Barone’. Truly lucky. I’ve loved wholeheartedly, more than a mother can love her son, listening to his breathing while he sleeps, gazing into his eyes. I didn’t understand him, Barone’. And I didn’t understand you either, when you stopped in the middle of your embroidery and sat there, in silence, staring into the empty air.<
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But it’s not as if you necessarily have to understand, in order to love. Loving isn’t something you do because you want something in return, for compensation. Loving is loving, period.
I’m not afraid, Barone’. If there’s a place where you are now, we’ll see each other and we’ll have a nice long chat the way we used to on the patio by the garden. And if there isn’t a place, then there’s no reason to be afraid, because we just won’t be there, and that’s that. Inferno? And what did we do wrong, you and I? People like us, Barone’, don’t have it in us to do wrong.
I feel it in the air, the breath of death. I have to hurry. There are lots of things to take care of. Lots of things to set right.
The breath of death. A cold breath.
It may seem like a gust of wind, perhaps you’ll think that you merely imagined it. But it’s not a gust of wind, it’s a rèfola.
And a rèfola can bring with it all the good and all the ill in the world, because it provides you with a dream in the inferno of heat in which you’re sunk. A single dream, the length of a sigh.
So take it from me: close that window. The heat is better.
Better the inferno than a single despairing dream.
XXIV
Ricciardi found Maione catnapping on the wooden bench in the hallway outside his office.
As always, Ricciardi had come in very early, and as always there was almost no one else at police headquarters. Spotting the brigadier’s large silhouette in the half light while he was thinking about Professor Iovine’s case made him jump. He felt as if he were witnessing what Coviello, the goldsmith, had seen on his way out of the victim’s study: a great big man waiting to go in.
“Raffaele? What are you doing here at this hour? I mean, have you decided you just don’t want to go home anymore?”
Maione started.
“Nossir, Commissa’. It’s just that in this heat I can’t get to sleep so I came in early. But then, since it’s actually relatively cool in here, I fell asleep. Forgive me.”
“No apologies needed, as far as I’m concerned, you’re welcome to move in here. I’m just sorry for you, spending more time at work than with your family. Come on, let’s go into the office and try to figure out what our next step is in this investigation.”
The early morning hour, the fact that schools were closed, and the massive heat meant the piazza was deserted; Ricciardi’s open window let in only the lazy sound of a vendor’s cart.
The commissario motioned at Maione to sit: “All right, this is how things stand: we are certain that we’re looking at a murder, so our approach has to change. Now we’re looking for the person who did it. The person who murdered the professor. What do we know about this person?”
Maione scratched his forehead and concentrated. He counted on his fingers: “First: it’s someone very strong, because he tossed him out the window like a twig, picking him up by his shirt collar and his trousers. Second: for that reason, we can assume he’s a man. Third: if we give credence to the goldsmith, who was the last to see the professor alive, he’s big and tall, which fits with the fact that he tossed the man out the window without even letting him brush against the windowsill.”
Ricciardi nodded: “Exactly. And what we know about the professor, on the other hand, is that he was someone who was hiding a few flaws in a life that was apparently respectable and honorable. First and foremost Sisinella, the name engraved inside the ring found in the drawer. What’s more, there must be something to the hesitations we heard in the voices of Nurse Zupo and the director’s head assistant, Rispoli.
“And I’d talk to them again, Commissa’, if for no other reason than to understand clearly what happened when Peppino the Wolf swore he’d kill the professor.”
“Sure, but first we need to learn where the Wolf was at that time of night, otherwise we might start digging where we don’t need to. And let’s not forget the letter from the owner of that clinic, which was pretty threatening too. In other words, we have plenty of work ahead of us. Like I told you yesterday evening, I’d start by gathering information about Sisinella and this guappo, the Wolf. And for information, as you know . . .”
Maione threw his arms wide, disconsolately: “I know. I have a long climb ahead of me. All right, Commissa’, I’ll go, give Bambinella her assignment, and then come back.”
“Perfect. I’ll wait for you here, then we’ll go to the clinic together. Enjoy your walk.”
After Maione left, Ricciardi concentrated on what he’d heard at the site of the professor’s death. The feeling that had flooded his skin and soul, the victim’s final dying sorrow, had been focused entirely on the mysterious Sisinella.
It was the commissario’s theory that behind every murder was either hunger or love, the two eternal forces that ensured the survival of the human race. And so, each time he was confronted with a case, he did his best to figure out which of the two was directly responsible for the crime he was investigating. He’d never been wrong yet: one of these two faces of passion had always been at the root of the motive.
True, Iovine’s last thought had been of love, but he had been a man of power, and the hunger for power is one of the most devastating emotions that can shake a heart, can even turn the power gained perverse, as the letter that the professor had received at home suggested might have happened in this case. On the other hand, the fury propelling the Wolf, who had sworn vengeance in front of witnesses, was the fury of love amputated. Who could say what the Deed would have said to him, if he had been present at the site of the guappo’s wife’s death; who knows what thoughts of extreme love and extreme pain would have been left behind by a young woman facing the miracle of motherhood.
His mind turned to Rosa. Rosa who had been his mother in every way, shape, and form, Rosa who had tended to his skinned knees a hundred times, Rosa who cooked those terrible Cilento specialties that only his trained stomach could digest. Rosa, who wasn’t doing well at all.
Once again, the night before, he’d found her asleep in the easy chair where she liked to sit and sew. Dinner was ready, made by Nelide, who was standing in a corner, arms folded across her chest. He’d asked the young woman how long her aunt had been sleeping, and Nelide had replied that Rosa had closed her eyes half an hour ago, and that she’d just tried calling her to see if she was still alive. The commissario realized that he was not alone in his concern for his tata’s state of health.
He’d put her to bed, overcoming her objections; with all the times you’ve put me to bed, he’d told her, for once I can return the favor.
After dinner, he’d gone into his bedroom, turned out the light, and looked out at the windows of the Colombo family’s apartment. But again that night there was no trace of Enrica.
Where are you, he’d asked the darkness. Where are you. For months now, in the building across the street, he’d seen on the floor above Enrica’s the ghost of a woman who’d killed herself for love. At last the image upstairs had dissolved and the sentiment of grief no longer filled the air, but the figure he so loved to watch on the floor below had vanished as well. Perhaps it had all been a dream, and Enrica had never really existed at all. Perhaps she was just yet another figment of his diseased imagination.
A middle-aged man with glasses and a mustache had come to the window. Ricciardi was certain that, with the light turned off, he wasn’t visible from outside, but still he’d had the distinct impression that the man was looking in his direction. That must be Enrica’s father, because he too was tall, and he had the same way of tilting his head to one side. After a few seconds he turned and left, and it seemed to Ricciardi that he had shaken his head with some sadness.
He wished he had the courage to push his head out into the scorching hot evening air and to shout, just like that, from one building to the other: Signore, Signore . . . buonasera, we don’t know each other, my name is Ricciardi, Luigi Alfredo Ricciardi. I’m in love
with your daughter and I was just wondering if you might be so kind as to tell me where she’s gone, because I don’t see her around anymore.
Sure, he said to himself, as the piazza below began filling up with women on their way to the market and workers heading to their jobs on bicycles, that sounds like an excellent way to be found insane or catch a few well-chosen insults. And perhaps Enrica’s father, if that’s who he really was, might say to him: My dear sir, if you’re in love with my daughter, why haven’t you said anything? Why haven’t you come here, to my home, and asked me for permission to see her? That’s the way civilized people behave, don’t you know that? That’s the normal way.
And he, Ricciardi, would reply just as courteously: No, sir, I can’t. Because, you see, it just so happens that I’m insane. Yes, insane like my poor late mother. Just think, I’m convinced I see dead people, and they tell me their last thoughts. Strange, no? You have to agree, it’s a bizarre situation, and I’m sure that a man like you, a man who seems to love his daughter deeply, would never want a man like me for a son-in-law, not if the father knew that such a man might well hand down the same defect to his grandchildren. Do tell me what you think, good sir.
Ricciardi moved away from the window and sat down at his desk, his head in his hands. Yes, I’m crazy. And I’m inconsistent, too, he thought, because I ought to be happy that you’ve gone away, I ought to hope that, for your sake, you meet someone who can make you as happy as you deserve, and instead here I sit, wallowing in despair at the thought that I can’t see you again, at the fact that I don’t know where you are, terrified that I’m about to lose my Rosa and so will be crushed by an eternal loneliness.
Perhaps the smart thing was to spend time with Livia. Dull his senses with laughter, shows, and spumante, convince himself that superficial conversations could keep the suffering of others, which so haunted him, at bay. The widow wouldn’t want a family and children of her own, she’d be satisfied with someone incomprehensible, someone with the unfamiliar allure of distance, of distraction. Seeing him with Livia, Enrica would abandon him once and for all. And perhaps Rosa would be persuaded that he was about to settle down at last, and she’d be happy.
The Bottom of Your Heart Page 13