Flaw

by Magdalena Tulli

  Just like the space, the sequence of events here bears the marks of a drastic shortcut. And as usual in such circumstances, it’s a question of money. It was out of economy that the shortened perspectives of space and time arose. The cost of the whole enterprise is enormous even without the refugees, and the profit negligible. The losses that have been sustained thus far because of botched work, fraud, and deliberate sabotage – unbelievably brazen abuses carried out with absolute impunity – encourage the curtailing of expenses, though the latter will always end up being too high. Space is not cheap, but time costs the most. The more lazily it flows, channeling out its meanders, slowly revealing multiple strata beneath the ground and permitting events to gradually mature, the higher will be the final bills for sunlight. The refugees are refugees; their fate is sealed and is plain to see for everyone but themselves – there is no place for them, neither here nor back there. In this matter a miracle is the most they can count on. Then would it not be better if all that is ordained for them were to happen at once? Such is the inevitable conclusion of dry calculations which cannot be doubted and which also, in the final reckoning, can serve the interests of the refugees themselves, by sparing them hours of suffering.

  Time works to the advantage of the local people, though without their being able to claim any credit for the fact. They can pick and choose, rooting around in open suitcases, haggling, then paying. They lug home cheaply acquired still-lifes in heavy frames, table lamps with shades and a canary in a cage. The handles of plated silverware jut from their pockets. Feverishly animated, yet with absolute self-possession, they were fully aware that the appearance of other people’s property on the square was a unique opportunity – the best bargain of their entire life lay within arm’s reach. The more laughable foreignness became as it manifested itself in the cut of overcoats, the more it excited and attracted in the gleam of metal, in high-quality wood and immaculate porcelain. In light of the empty shelves in local stores, every carton of cheap cigarettes from someone’s emergency reserves was worth a silver cigarette case. Anyone who wanted could even have bought a gold medal for bravery and pinned it on their autumn coat.

  It was right there in the middle of the square that the school custodian, appointed messenger, went looking for the missing clerks. The latter, however, felt no sense of obligation, having learned from the radio that the government had been ousted. In the endless buzzing and crackling that had preceded the communiqué, the wily senior civil servants had recognized an approaching time of confusion. They foresaw that from now on until further notice, inactivity would be rewarded, while any manifestation of conscientiousness could meet with chance retribution. When the custodian found them, they shrugged and quickly slipped away into the crowd. Only two of the junior clerks obeyed the summons with a naïve readiness. Embarrassed by the circumstances in which they had been caught unawares, one with a crocheted napkin in his hand, the other carrying a box of lead soldiers, they straightened their jackets and their crooked neckties and let themselves be led to where new duties were supposedly awaiting them. Yet this does not mean at all that they returned to their offices and their hard chairs at desks by the windows overlooking the flower bed. Following the custodian, they calmly passed the gateway with the damaged emblem and continued on to the café at number one. The waiter had not received any instructions from the proprietor, so the café was closed and at the same time open: open for some and closed for others, its blinds half down. At an agreed-upon signal – the custodian rapped on the windowpane, rat-a-tat-tat – the key in the lock on the inside turned with a creak.

  Before the two clerks gave the waiter their hats, the student stood from his table and greeted them; he had known both of them for a long time, having been, let’s say, at school with them. One of the clerks had, for example, a brother-in-law in the fraternity, while another was impressed by the metal insignia on the student’s lapel. Only fifteen minutes earlier the latter had pushed his pant legs into tall boots and buckled a military-style leather belt round his jacket, which instantly destroyed the charm of his shapely and well-made civilian attire, but on the other hand gave his clothing an air of insolent arrogance that would not stop at anything. Before the student decided how tight to fasten the belt, in his attic he had spent a long time staring at himself in the shaving mirror, an operation that required complicated maneuvers, including many turns to the left and right as if he were on parade, so that from the fragments of reflections he could finally obtain some notion of the whole. The clerks had to agree that he deserved all the official and private assistance he could get, given the duties he had taken upon himself in the present situation. He smiled to himself at the very thought of how much now depended upon him. He dismissed the custodian right away – he was to go back to his post. The waiter danced around him, exercising his profession to the full, anticipating the other man’s wishes. Before the clerks appeared, the student had managed to knock back a glass of sweet liqueur; they drank one more glass together as a toast to the new order, all on the house.

  They immediately faced many more tasks than glasses; flipping through the notes he had hurriedly penciled on rustling paper napkins, the student listed a significant number of jobs that needed doing, and it goes without saying that these were not inconsequential personal matters but quite the opposite, public affairs of great weight. The most urgent of them seemed to be the establishment of a volunteer guard for maintaining law and order. Its core was to be constituted by a handful of grammar school pupils waiting obediently by the cloakroom. They were the same ones who had earlier helped to set up the amplification for the radio address. The undertaking had not been especially successful, though the crowd gathered on the square had been too busy with other matters to notice. Before the speech came to an end, the loudspeaker gave a wheeze, burned out, and fell silent. This was its response to dangerous modifications being carried out by one of the boys. Let’s say it was the smart aleck in round glasses who had quickly turned the radio up and converted it by adding a megaphone. Though it ended up being destroyed, he was still proud of what he had achieved. The smart aleck in round glasses is the notary’s son, whose mother is waiting for him so impatiently. He’s in no hurry to go home. He did an honest job to deserve the prize awarded to him and his pals: the special privilege of standing sentry, that is to say the assignment of admitting volunteers, one after another, into the recruitment office set up inside the grammar school.

  It’s entirely possible that it was actually situated in the biology lab, among rows of dusty jars containing specimens in formaldehyde. Many things could be seen there that would later give one nightmares: a horse’s stomach in cross section, no longer capable of digestion; the innocent heart of the horse; its cloudy, tormented eye. But the commission to which the commander of the newly formed unit appointed the two junior clerks did not even look in that direction. They handed around cigarettes and lit up from one another like brothers in arms in the trenches. They scattered ash everywhere and told each other vulgar stories as a sign that now everything had changed, and that they themselves already knew this and had nothing against it. Quite the opposite, they liked the new state of affairs much better than the old one. The more uncertainty they felt, the louder the choruses of laughter exploded over and again. But whenever any one of them glanced out the window, he recovered his faith in the purpose and meaning of the whole enterprise, because volunteers were gathering outside the gate, already in uniform, wearing the same grammar school overcoats they wore every day, with the twin rows of metal buttons. They had learned from one another about the recruitment; each of them clutched in his sweaty hands an application written on a torn-out page from an exercise book. Many still had their school satchels on, though they were embarrassed by this, sensing that the contents were too incriminating. Especially the notebooks with correspondence between their teachers and their parents: these diminished not only their own dignity but also that of the selection commission and the honorable service they were seeking
to enter. At the sound of a handbell lent to the commission by the custodian, they came and went without asking any questions.

  Since there were more than enough candidates, the clerks did little more than skim through their scribbled applications, which all ended in a request that the undersigned be accepted; they slid the letters casually to one another across the tabletop, amid the ashtrays, while the commander dozed in his seat for a short while after his sleepless night, a thin ribbon of saliva dripping from the corner of his mouth. The contents of the application were of no significance. They took only the older-looking boys who were already starting to sprout mustaches, sending the smaller ones home and making an exception only for a handful of special cases who, for their contribution to the operation involving the loudspeaker on the square, had already been issued with armbands as order guards – these were white and bore the round stamp of their office, thus raising them in importance over all the rest. Among these individuals, however, one more exception was made, for the son of the notary. In the presence of everyone he was forced to remove the official stamped armband from his sleeve, after which he was dismissed without a word of explanation, even though he too had made his contribution, and was by no means one of the smallest. Convinced that there had been a mistake, almost in tears, he afterwards hammered on the door of the biology lab. He was still making a fuss when the commission locked themselves in the room and began to tidy their papers. Finally, at a command tossed over someone’s shoulder, his pals who had been accepted into the guard grabbed him by the arms, frog-marched him down the stairs, and threw him out the gate.

  Where he got to after that is hard to say. For obvious reasons he was unable to go very far. His family had heard something, perhaps from the concierge, who had seen him and his friends lifting the loudspeaker onto the stepladder, or maybe from the policeman, who had learned firsthand about the recruitment for the order guard. They sent the maid to the school – the boy’s mother demanded his immediate return home. The school custodian blocked the maid’s way and asked her for the password, which naturally she did not know. So he refused to allow her up the stairs until she reluctantly answered certain indiscreet questions that occurred to him in an imaginative moment, and until on top of that he had pinched her plump backside. He didn’t accompany her upstairs, as he had been on duty ever since he’d taken upon himself the duties of a watchman. On the other side of the lab door a hum of male voices could be heard. Before knocking, she peeped through the keyhole. But she could see nothing except billows of white cigarette smoke. The moment she opened the door and stood on the threshold, however, she was greeted with a burst of laughter. She thought they were laughing at her. Straight in front of her she saw the specimens in their jars. Her heart and her stomach were probably contracting even without this additional sight. Her gaze immediately encountered the disquieting stare of the horse’s eye. If I am the maid, as I peer through the white haze the last thing I would expect is to spot a familiar steel gray sweater on the other side of the table.

  In such a case there was nothing to be done but drop one’s eyes and stare at the floor. The laughter died down, but they did not offer her a chair. Let her stand where the recruits had stood before, in front of the commission sprawling in their chairs at the table. No one says anything, and it’s obvious to the maid that they are waiting to see what he will say – the handsomest and most important one among them. The student holds back for a long time. Instead of speaking, he rings the bell. He looks at the notary’s maid, right at her, but his gaze is cold. If I am her, it’s my turn now. Even if my legs collapse beneath me, I have to state the business I was sent on: that the boy inherited poor health from his father. Here I will throw into the balance the long name of the hereditary illness he suffers from. Let the majesty of medical science force the respect for the family’s wishes that the lady of the house expects. Yet the name of the illness has completely vanished from her memory. The student smokes, his elbows propped on the tabletop, while she stammers, by now counting only on his compassion. But he has no compassion for her. And even if on a whim he decided to help her, he could do no more than point through the window at his unit of recruits doing push-ups in the school yard.

  He gazed at his men in silence, for a moment forgetting anything else. Did they not look superb – tough and utterly obedient? She was supposed to point out which one it was. From a distance they all looked alike. Nevertheless, after a short moment she was certain he was not among them. Though she was frightened and in despair, still she could not conceal her admiration when she looked at him, and he could not fail to see it. If I am the commander, this chubby mare with fat fetlocks isn’t exactly my type. She hides her timid gaze under half-closed eyelids and keeps blushing, and on top of everything else there’s that unfashionable calico frock. From the screen in the dark movie theater he had known many women. None of them had a stutter. All carried themselves stylishly. He rang the bell again: her business bored him, and he’d had enough. Nevertheless, he followed her out into the hallway. For a moment he looked down onto the square, flicking ash on the windowsill. He watched her walk alongside the streetcar tracks, slowly, like a beast of burden loaded beyond measure. She could obviously bear a great deal. In fact, he had noticed this at once. He peered down to see where she disappeared from sight: she entered the gateway of number seven, as he suspected. The commander lost himself in thought, gazing into the depths of the entrance-way, till he was brought back to reality by the sight of the notary leaving the place. As commander of the order guard, he had to admit that the best thing the notary could do at this point was to begin searching for his son of his own accord without relying on other people.

  In the meantime, the crowd encamped in the square was growing more and more exhausted. Rumors were starting to circulate about taxicabs that at a cost would take anyone who wanted to a better place. That better place was supposedly America. Word spread in the blink of an eye. With renewed hope, though not without a struggle, the refugees tried to imagine America, with its lofty mansions, its sleek skyscrapers, its metal needles thrusting upward in profusion. Many of the refugees, not knowing what still awaited them and what opportunities would present themselves, had already sold their more valuable possessions, and were now beginning to regret their hasty transactions, for how would they be able to make a home in America without their belongings? They could no longer digest the mouthfuls of dark bread they had swallowed. For the truth is that hunger can be tolerated so long as there is hope, and it is not advisable to give in to doubt too readily. Others regretted the missed opportunity to get rid of part of their luggage, which would not fit into any automobile. Resignation would develop slowly in minds and hearts like an insidious disease, reaching its final, overt stage no sooner than when it was already evident no taxicabs would be arriving from the side streets, where the pavement ended just beyond the corner; nor, even more obviously, would any leave from here. Looking for them in the distance was useless. The fact that the rumors about America were dreamed up out of nothing was obvious to the locals from the start. They simply shrugged, because they happened to know that there is no America. They counted rather on local means, on orderliness being restored by their own efforts – in brief, on the order guard, which embarked on its duties without delay.

  Even if the memory of a good life in peaceful times was still fresh in the minds of the refugees, that life was over, and now others were making the decisions in matters that concerned them, driving them from place to place, with their luggage or, if need be, without. But when the luggage was finally gathered in one place, and the refugees in another, and it seemed certain that in just another moment the worst chaos would be under control, and order reinstated – suddenly, out of nowhere, the streetcar returned, crammed with new refugees exhausted from the crush, half-suffocated, barely alive. There were newlyweds fresh from their wedding, the confetti still in their hair, he in black, she in white; the smiles had not yet entirely faded from their lips, yet in their eyes
there was already consternation. So they held one another firmly by the hand, just in case circumstance conspired to separate them. There was a woman with a large bouquet of roses in her arms; the flowers were still striking, though they had gotten a little squashed. The bouquet is heavy, so as if out of habit she looks round for someone who up till now she could always hand them over to – perhaps a chauffeur. But here there is no chauffeur and no automobile. No one knows how she ended up in the streetcar, nor who pushed her in there. Her white fur stands out conspicuously against the background of dark overcoats; if someone had been waiting for her, they would have spotted her at once.

  But no one is waiting and no one even stares at her, neither the members of the order guard nor the policeman. She’s already hidden behind other new arrivals – thin ones, fat ones, each less attractive than the last. What about her, the beautiful woman in the fur? Perhaps she too would eventually reveal some defect of appearance? Yes, indeed. Puffy eyes, a tear-streaked face, and running mascara. No doubt she would wish to call her agent and have him extricate her from all this without delay. But where is there a telephone? Perhaps in the café across the way? The guards block her path: she is not allowed to cross over there, and besides, the café is closed. Since this is the case, the woman in the fur coat mentions the notary, giving his name and address. Winking at one another, they promise to inform the notary of her presence. It’s not hard to predict that they will do nothing for her whatsoever, yet she expects help, since it is beyond her comprehension that her voice and her looks could have lost their charm. Even if they were well-intentioned, the two guards would do no more than ask the policeman for his opinion. If they were not afraid to bother him with trivial matters. Because from the very beginning the policeman made a show of ignoring the order guard. He was immune to the lofty atmosphere surrounding it. He avoided the guardsmen; he was not interested in collaborating with them, and instead of carrying out the commander’s instructions he preferred to give orders himself, though even that he did reluctantly. Left to rely on their own judgment, the guards knew only that the crowd was not allowed to spread out. One exception would immediately lead to another. They had this principle from their commander in his tall boots, and lacking anything else they could cling to, whether experience or their own opinions, they had to follow it blindly.