by Marco Vichi
He headed towards Piazza Tasso, paying close attention to where he stepped. There might be all manner of things hidden under the muck, and one could get hurt. He turned to look at the shrine at the corner of Piazza Piattellina; the black mark of the oil ran just below the Baby Jesus’s head. He continued on, taking small steps, circling round a Fiat 600 on its side that blocked half a lane. Looking out from a first-floor window was a woman wrapped in a blanket, shivering.
‘I’ve lost everything … everything …’ she muttered, head swaying back and forth. Men were hoisting old and young on to their backs to carry them to the dry areas. Here and there a few transistor radios could be heard croaking. A man was telling everyone to be extremely careful; there was an open manhole in the middle of the street, hidden by the mud, and a woman had fallen in and broken her leg.
In Piazza Tasso the oily line on the walls was barely a yard above the ground, and the remaining muck was much shallower. Just off the pavement the carcass of a large dog surfaced, black with oil. Along the Viale two or three cars rolled along at a walking pace. In the public gardens a number of ruined cars lay piled up between the flower beds. There were even two Volkswagen Beetles, caked with mud only halfway up the doors. One was his. He went up to it and walked around it. It was dented on every side, and the headlights were broken. He looked inside. The interior was intact. On the back seat he saw the blouse he needed to return, spared by the flood, and it forced him to think of the pretty salesgirl. Not even in that hell could he manage to get her out of his head.
He started walking towards Botta’s place, sloshing through the stinking mud. The blue sky promised a beautiful sunny day. He still had that last cigarette, all crumpled up, but wanted to resist a little longer. He would light it before entering the first open tobacconist. In Via del Campuccio all that remained was about an inch of black slime, and the mark left by the oil was very low. Men and women were sweeping the mud towards the manholes with brooms and mops, emptying out basement flats with buckets, rummaging through ruined shops.
Drawing near, Bordelli saw Botta come out of the front door of his building with a bucket in hand, covered in mud, and made a gesture of greeting. Ennio poured the putrid water into the street.
‘Good morning, Inspector. I’m afraid I can’t invite you inside for a cup of coffee today,’ he said, forcing a smile.
‘Another time, then,’ Bordelli replied, patting him on the back. Poor Ennio. He never had any luck. The flood hadn’t reached much farther than his place, stopping only a few yards up the street.
‘If they hadn’t woken me up in time I would have drowned like a rat, Inspector. With all the mud pouring down, climbing the stairs wasn’t easy.’
‘Did you manage to save anything?’
‘I brought a bundle of clothes up to the first floor, to Signora Maria’s flat. But I didn’t have much more than that.’
‘So it could’ve been worse …’
‘My grandfather always used to say that sometimes it’s better to have nothing, and now I know what he meant.’
‘So where were you hiding all this time, Ennio? I’ve been looking for you for the past two days.’
‘I was away on business,’ said Botta, smiling only with his eyes. The inspector didn’t bother to ask what kind of business.
‘When did you get back?’
‘Thursday night. I got your note, but it was raining so hard, and I didn’t feel like going out to look for a telephone … What did you need?’
‘I’m afraid there’s no longer any need.’
‘Are you just going to leave me in suspense?’
‘I’ll tell you another time. Have you got a place to stay until you’ve finished cleaning out your room?’
‘I haven’t given it any thought yet.’
‘You can come and sleep at my place, if you like. You’ll never believe it, but I even have a guest room,’ said Bordelli.
‘If I can’t find anything else, I’ll definitely come and impose on you.’
‘I’m not sure when I’ll be back home. You can go there whenever you like, since you don’t need keys. The room’s at the end of the hall.’
‘Thanks, Inspector.’
‘Ciao, Ennio, I’m going to try to go to the station.’
‘Have a good day,’ said Botta, disappearing into his building, bucket in hand.
The inspector went back to Piazza Tasso, which was filling up with people trudging through the mud. He got into his Beetle and put the key in the ignition without much conviction. It couldn’t possibly start. He tried all the same, and to his great astonishment the small engine started to turn, making its usual whirring sound. The car lurched and the pistons were misfiring … As the battery began to show signs of fatigue, the engine backfired twice and then fell into a regular rhythm. People gawked at him as if they had just witnessed a miracle.
‘Damned Germans …’ he muttered to himself, shaking his head. Hitler’s ‘car of the people’ was born the same year that Mussolini instituted the ‘racial laws’, but it had survived Nazism. Further proof that good things can sometimes issue from bad.
He checked the petrol gauge; a little over half a tankful. He began to manoeuvre, pushing away the other cars blocking his path. At last he came off the pavement. The tyres slid this way and that in the mud, and driving wasn’t easy. Pulling out of the piazza, he started looking for a parking spot on the uphill Via Villani. He wanted to go to the centre of town, but preferred to go on foot, not knowing what he would find. The street was full of salvaged cars, but in the end he found a space for the Beetle.
Retracing his route on foot, he glanced at his watch. Nine-twenty. He crossed Piazza Tasso again and went up Via del Leone. The water had receded even more. Dozens of brooms swept the mud away from the building entrances, while silent shadows moved about inside the flooded shops.
He made a right turn into Piazza del Carmine, which was strewn with wrecked cars and large clumps of brush. Despite the sun, everything was opaque, dead. He heard the helicopters flying over the city but still couldn’t manage to see them. The great portal of the church had been forced open by the flood, and a Fiat Giardinetta had ended up on the staircase in front. There were animal carcasses everywhere – dogs, cats, but also chickens and rabbits washed in from the countryside.
He crossed the piazza diagonally, exchanging long glances with the people he passed. In Borgo San Frediano the muck was a bit deeper. He walked past the carcass of a cow, black with heating oil, lying on its side with two legs suspended in the air. A bit further on he had to climb over a large tree and very nearly fell into the slime.
Legions of people were sweeping the mud out of entrance halls, as detritus from the shops was piled up on the pavements. It looked like Italy just after the war, or worse. A tiny woman with a scarf round her head wept in silence while carrying armfuls of rotten vegetables out of her shop.
When he came out into Piazza Nazario Santo, he heard the Arno rumbling. The small square was cluttered with ruined cars, some of them belly up. A twisted Fiat 850 had ended up on the roof of a large saloon. It was anybody’s guess how long it would take to get things back in order.
He continued on to Via di Santo Spirito. The scene was the same everywhere. Devastation, detritus, mud. Sulking faces and elbow grease. Every so often he heard a bitter wisecrack, which met with ironic smiles. The layer of smelly muck stagnating in the streets added further gloom to a city already marked by centuries of bloody conspiracies, violent intrigues, betrayals, deceptions and swindles, a city forever dominated by morbid tensions hidden under the false playfulness of wit. As they shovelled up the mud they were already cracking jokes about the flood, inventing jokes in a never-ending effort not to succumb.
He arrived at Piazza Frescobaldi. Borgo San Jacopo was jammed with automobile carcasses and debris, so he turned towards the Arno. The flood hadn’t quite reached the Ponte Santa Trinita, and it was a relief to walk for a stretch without slipping. The huge mass of water coursed majestic
ally, roaring like a four-engined plane, making the cobblestones vibrate underfoot. A small group of people on the bridge were looking at the chasms left by the collapse of the Lungarno Accioli and the Lungarno Corsini. Another public works project that would soon strike up another dance of kickbacks and graft, Bordelli thought sadly. Catastrophes had always been good for business. Nothing new there. The Italy of the boom years had found its vital lymph in corruption, shady business and tax evasion. Which was fine for everyone, so long as there was more money in their pockets and they could lie on the beach in summer. The Italians had no more sense of state than a flea, perhaps less. They were infected with a taste for privilege and cronyism, fascinated by the rich and powerful, devoted to nepotism and whoring. They’d been nursing this mentality for centuries and would probably never be rid of it. In The Leopard Lampedusa said there was no hope for Sicily, but he could easily have extended the concept to the whole country …
As he was about to turn on to Via Tornabuoni, he slipped on the slime. Looking at the desolation of the collapsed Lungarno, he’d actually felt a twinge of pleasure, as if some sort of vengeance had been achieved at last. If only the Ponte Vecchio had also collapsed, and with it the Duomo, Palazzo Vecchio and all the Philistines with them … Florence thought she was saved by her glorious past, like a degenerate son resting on the laurels of his father and grandfather. Even Panerai the butcher and the offal seller in San Lorenzo believed that in their veins still coursed the blood of Dante, Michelangelo, Leonardo and Brunelleschi coursed still. All the beautiful things you see, as you look around in awe, are the work of our very own hands … The work of us Florentines. From here came the spark that renewed the world, and all must bow before our genius. Come and spend your money in the birthplace of the Renaissance, buy our knick-knacks, our artistic postcards, our statuettes of the David, our jewels forged in the soul of Benvenuto Cellini, sleep in our hotels, eat our steaks, our pasta e fagioli, our offal, our lamprey, take a ride in a horse-drawn carriage, touch the snout of the Porcellino …40 Why should we care about creating new immortal works of art when we can sell the ones we’ve already got? Our true soul has always been commerce – the god who protects us is the god of thieves …
And today Florence trembled because her treasures were spattered with mud. Rich or poor made no difference. The rich were cynical and indifferent, and the poor envied them, dreamt of being like them, of becoming even worse than them …
Lost in these thoughts, he turned down Borgo Santi Apostoli, which the Arno had submerged in ten feet of water. Piazza del Limbo looked like a rubbish dump. In front of the tunnel that led to the Lungarno, an old woman looked on with a broom in her hand, all wrapped up in a coat and scarves.
In Por Santa Maria, Bordelli saw a number of traffic officers standing in front of the Ponte Vecchio and went up to them. One of the officers raised his hand.
‘Nobody is allowed to pass this way,’ he said in an authoritarian tone.
‘What’s going on?’ Bordelli asked, flashing his badge. The officers sprang to attention.
‘At ease, at ease … What are you two doing here?’
‘We’re making sure nobody gets close to the Ponte Vecchio, because of the jewellers’ shops.’
‘Gold first and foremost,’ the inspector grumbled, and moved on. Behind the two policemen he caught a glimpse of some jewellers rummaging through the sludge in search of lost treasures. Finally forced to dirty their hands, he thought. He set off along the Lungarno Archibusieri and then turned round to look at the Ponte Vecchio, which seemed to be in pretty bad shape. The jewellery shops were half in ruins and great clumps of shrubbery, and even a whole tree, had accumlated above the arches.
He went under the portico of the Uffizi. He was getting rather good at walking in the slippery muck. From the corner of Via della Ninna he glanced back at Piazza della Signoria, which lay entirely under a thick layer of slime. In the middle of the square a small crowd of people had gathered round a tanker, waiting their turn to fill bottles and plastic cans.
Walking alongside the Palazzo Vecchio, he found a good foot and a half of water at the end of the sloping street. He turned down Via dei Neri, keeping to the pavement to gain an inch or two. Tired faces looked out at him from the windows. Men and women in rubber boots made their way through the mud. He crossed paths with a lanky chap with a bitter smile on his face.
‘Bloody Arno … Jesus bloody Christ … Why couldn’t it wash away my wife instead of my car?’ he muttered, shaking his head. Further ahead a wooden scow slid silently through the mud, ferrying old folks and children.
When Bordelli arrived at Rosa’s front door, he found it smashed in by the flood waters. Ducking into the building, he went up the dark stairs, lighting his way with the torch. Behind one door he heard some shouting and a little girl crying. By the time he reached the top floor, his legs were giving out. He knocked at Rosa’s door. No reply. He knocked harder. At last he heard the sound of high heels drawing near.
‘Who is it?’
‘It’s me, Rosa,’ said Bordelli.
The door opened and Rosa appeared in her short red coat, the little kitten in her arms. Her pallor seemed to indicate that she hadn’t slept, but she hadn’t forgotten to make herself up.
‘Darling …! I was so scared …’ she said with tears in her eyes, laying her head on his chest.
‘It wasn’t the Great Flood, but it was close,’ Bordelli whispered, stroking her blonde hair. Briciola was between them, clinging to their coats with her claws. Rosa was sniffling.
‘Early yesterday morning … I went out to look at the Arno … In Corso Tintori I saw a man running … running away from the water, which was chasing him. I raced back home … I tried to ring you, but there was no answer …’
‘I had a high temperature … I unplugged the phone …’
‘… I went out on the terrace and saw everything … the water got higher and higher … stronger and stronger … cars were crashing against the buildings … they sounded like bombs … I even saw some corpses floating by … oh, God, what a fright … what a fright …’
‘The worst is over now.’
‘Good Lord, do you stink …’ said Rosa, raising her head with a grimace.
‘I had a good sweat last night and haven’t been able to wash,’ said Bordelli by way of explanation. Rosa sniffed him again, wrinkling her nose.
‘You smell like a circus … it’s like sniffing a lion’s bum,’ she said, a hint of a smile on her lips.
‘No woman has ever paid me such a sexy compliment before,’ he said. ‘Can I come in for a minute?’ He needed to sit down, even if only for a minute.
‘Not with those filthy boots you can’t,’ said Rosa, horrified. Bordelli sighed and took them off, setting them down on the landing.
‘Is that better?’ he said, waiting for Rosa to give him the go-ahead.
He shuffled into the sitting room, leaving damp footprints on the floor. He sat down on the sofa, not taking off his coat, and leaned back. The day had barely begun and he already felt like a wreck. But he had no cause for complaint, since he’d felt much worse the night before. Rosa sat down on the armrest beside him, smothering the kitten with kisses as the animal tried to squirm away.
‘Naughty little pussycat … Where do you want to go?’
Rosa was back to her usual self, as though nothing had happened.
‘You wouldn’t happen to have a glass of water, would you, Rosa?’
‘I’ve got a whole case of the effervescent stuff. Would you like a bottle to take away with you?’
‘Just a glass’ll be fine,’ said Bordelli, hoping to get some of the bitterness out of his mouth. Rosa set Briciola down on the rug and went to the kitchen to fetch the water. The kitten took advantage of the situation and jumped up on the table. In a matter of seconds she had managed to reach into the fruit bowl with her little paw and take out a hazelnut, which rolled on to the floor. She then jumped down and started playing with the nut, batting it back
and forth across the room. Bordelli glanced at his watch; it was already half past ten. He stood up and went to intercept Rosa, who was returning with the water. He emptied the glass in a few gulps, with more pleasure than he could ever have imagined.
‘I have to go,’ he said, heading for the door.
‘You’d better wash as soon as you can; it’s not easy to be around you,’ she said, following behind him. Bordelli put his boots back on, said goodbye to Rosa, and headed down the stairs, starting to shiver again. He hoped his fever wasn’t coming back.
The Santa Croce area was still flooded. To get to Piazza Beccaria without trudging through the water, he had to take a long detour by way of Piazza d’Azeglio. It was the same everywhere: dead animals, uprooted trees, water heaters, television sets, piles of rotten fruit reduced to mush, and hundreds of automobile carcasses, free gifts for the car wreckers. He even saw a large expanse of dead fish and a couple of grounded scows.
In the areas now free of water, the piles of rubbish accumulating outside the shops were getting taller and taller. The smell of oil polluting the air made it hard to breathe, especially in the narrowest streets. Every so often one saw amphibious military vehicles drive by, as well as a few jeeps, fire engines and ambulances. The sound of the sirens rolled across the roofs and cast a sorrowful pall of uncertainty over the city, but the most familiar sound was that of brooms sweeping away the mud.
The Piazza Beccaria gate rose up amid a pile of cars stacked one on top of the other. The streets leading to the centre of town were blocked by military vehicles. There was traffic on the Viali, the cars’ wheels sloshing through the slime. Bordelli crossed the Piazza and went down Via Gioberti, eyeing the black line of heating oil cutting halfway up the first-floor windows. He walked slowly, legs aching. He passed under the Via Luna archway, which had been completely submerged during the flood. He was about to do something totally useless, he was well aware of that. He turned down the little street that had fed his illusions, and stopped in the square. As he expected, the door of interest had been smashed in by the water. He crossed the threshold just to taste his defeat. Four rooms utterly devastated by the mud. The floors were covered with detritus. A small door led to a basement still brimful of water. He lit his last cigarette, tossing the packet to the ground. The Arno had wiped out his last hope, cutting the very fine thread, the only thread, that might, perhaps, have led him out of the labyrinth.