I remember how as a child I also never knew the sounds and smells of the weekday mornings. I never missed a day of school – until my father died. Every year I received a certificate of good attendance.
I look out of my window. It has been raining all morning, and it is now clearing slightly from the west, and beams of light pierce the clouds and shine on the slanting rain where it falls on the sea and disappears. As children we would call this a monkey’s wedding; it brings back memories of damp clothes steaming in the sudden unexpected sunlight, warm and wet at the same time. I often used to wonder at the name, wondering whether monkeys really mated or had courtship rituals in these times of confusion. As a child I used to imagine a girl monkey dressed in white posing for a photographer as the rain poured down and sunlight played about her shoulders.
It is difficult to see far, the mainland is shrouded in mist. Only here, nearby, does the play of light on rain relieve the monotony of the greyness, and I know that it will soon close in again to a solid downpour. I feel glad that I have taken the day off and can lie in my bed, dry and comfortable.
Friday 4 January
I have been painting again, but differently now. I am not painting eyes any more. Now I squeeze paint on to the canvas, burnt Sienna and burnt orange as a base, then I cover it over with thick black paint, clotted lumps of it, and with the nail of my forefinger I scratch deep into the blackness, the scratch lines revealing the dark bitter red tones below.
Saturday 5 January
Sunday 6 January
Today is La Befana. Epiphany. The end of the holidays. Tomorrow I must go back to school.
I know I have been to the mainland again. I found the torn stub of the ferry ticket in my wastepaper basket yesterday. But I don’t remember going there. I am so afraid. I have been watching other people’s expressions to see if they notice anything strange about me. I am very careful what I say.
I also found a knife in my handbag, wrapped in wedding gift paper, silver wedding bells on a white background with the words Tanti Auguri written over and over again. I unwrap it slowly and draw it from its sheath. The blade is shiny, lethal. I draw it against my thumb, perhaps willing it to be obtuse, but a line of red blood springs up immediately and I stop. It is sharp. I wrap it up again carefully and replace it in my bag.
Monday 7 January
Everything seems to be coming in bits and pieces now. There is no continuity. I spend all my free time in my room, uncertain of what will happen if I go out. I have examined these paintings again and again, but I have absolutely no memory of having painted them. How is that possible? If I didn’t, then who did?
A sense of panic rises in me as I try to grasp the meaning of this. It feels as if everything inside me, everything I know about myself, is unreal. I can’t bear to stay here in my room, losing myself in these thoughts. I feel a desperate need to get into my body, to find at least a physical sense of wholeness. I set off up the hill even though it is already late in the day, but I soon come into the mist, thick swirling white sheets of mist that surround and envelop me, cold and wet against my face and hands, and I remember faces and sounds from long ago as if they were with me here now. I see my dog, Manfred, dead years back, come bounding down the path out of the mist, warm brown eyes full of love for me, and I am about to bend and embrace him but he slides away past me and is gone. And I see my mother, firm and young and pretty, laughing at a joke, and then she sweeps past me too and dissolves into nothing.
Tuesday 8 January
I have stopped marking the children’s homework. I just can’t find the energy any more, now that I know it is all coming to an end.
I feel restless. I need to move, I can’t sit still, I walk and walk the full extent of the island, but it is too small, it takes me hours to walk to the end and back and still this feeling of seething restlessness grips me and I set out for another turn. I can take it no longer, and after school on Friday evening I will catch the ferry back to the mainland.
Wednesday 9 January
Signor Cappi tells me that there have been three phone calls from Ispettore Lupo at the Questura in Rome. He says that Ispettore Lupo is expecting me at the Questura on Friday. He looks at me quizzically. His face is kind and I wish I could tell him about it all, but there is just too much. I feel strangely indifferent.
Thursday 10 January
Friday 11 January
The policeman at the door to the Questura recognises me, I can see from his eyes, but he does not greet me. Perhaps he has orders to be severe, impassive. I tidy my hair and put on some lipstick as I stand and wait for the lift, determined this time to sort things out with Ispettore Lupo once and for all. He is in his office sitting at his desk, staring blankly out of the window. I tap on his door. He smiles to see me, but it is not a smile I want to see. I sit down.
He goes straight to the point:
– È stata indaffarata, vero? You’ve been busy. Allora, si è decisa a dire la verità?
– You showed me a picture of a woman.
He nods imperceptibly.
– I have been thinking. Yes, I do know her. But what I do with her is my own private business. It has nothing to do with the police.
– La donna è una, come si dice, una donna di facili costumi. A woman of easy virtue? Insomma, una prostituta. A prostitute.
I don’t reply.
His tone changes.
– Ma cosa fate insieme? Ti piacciono le donne? What do you do together? Do you like women?
There is an edge of excitement in his voice, which I pretend not to hear. I still say nothing.
– Mah. Bisognerebbe sentire la Buoncostume. Peròc’è un’altra storia qui. We’ll need to speak to the vice squad. But there’s something else.
He pulls out the file again, the one I am beginning to know so well. There is the photo of Sabrina again, but there are also two new photos, one of Ugo and one of a mustard-coloured Cinquecento.
I breathe deeply. There is no longer any use hiding.
– I think you need to tell us what you know. What do you know about this man? Si spieghi.
– If it is the person I think you are talking about, he gave me a lift a few weeks ago. There was a strike and I couldn’t get into town.
– Il 20 dicembre c’era lo sciopero. The strike was on the twentieth of December. His body was found on the twenty-first in the woods at Ostia.
– I don’t know. I can’t remember.
– Ci deve dire quello che sa.
His attendant knocks on the door, salutes and addresses Ispettore Lupo.
– Il capo l’aspetta in Direzione.
He looks at me.
– Aspetta qui. Wait here, I’ll be back in a minute, he says and goes out.
I grab the folder and race out into the street without thinking.
An icy cold wind is blowing through the streets of the capital tonight, catching up dry leaves and scraps of paper and swirling them around me as I walk. The light from the street lamps is harsh, mercilessly dividing shadow from light. I am the only person out, apart from a solitary prowler creeping by in his car in search of excitement. As he comes abreast of me he slows in anticipation and winds down his window and calls in a low hungry voice, then speeds up when he catches a glimpse of my eyes.
The high-vaulted porticoes near the station are empty. I stand in the shadows invisible to the loiterers driving past in their cars. I wait for about half an hour, hoping that one of the women will arrive, but no one comes.
Either Sabrina has found a client for the night or has decided to stay indoors. I wonder briefly about her home. I imagine a small apartment, a warm kitchen with a pot on the stove, Sabrina in slippers stirring, a television set talking and laughing endlessly to itself. A bright neon light over the kitchen table, a man dozing with his head on his arms, an empty flask of wine in front of him.
I turn my thoughts away from this vision of domesticity as a lame pigeon flutters up at my feet, startling me, then settles back into the dust in a co
rner. I wait a few more minutes, reluctant to go to a hotel alone, but at last I begin to feel my toes ache with the cold and I turn back towards the station. It is just beginning to rain and the streets are black and oily, shining lividly in the light from the street lamps traversed by the thin metal tramlines. I leap over a puddle, and as I look up I see a man step out of the shadows for an instant. There is something familiar about him, about the set of his shoulders. It is him. Ispettore Lupo. He looks at me in half-mocking recognition. I feel a rush of fear and race away. Shadowy white light, silvery streetlight sparkling on the tramlines, the last few black leaves hanging from the bare branches.
Breathless I let myself in through the small service door in the gateway to the pensione and ring the bell. There is no reply at first, but after a few minutes the concierge comes out buttoning his trousers and grumbling at the lateness. He lets me in, takes my document and payment for the night, and makes me sign the register. I feel his eyes on my legs as I wait for the rickety glass lift to arrive in its wrought-iron cage.
I close the door of my room behind me and take off my coat. I am afraid to let my thoughts run anywhere. I wish I had some activity to keep myself busy, to keep my hands busy, my thoughts deadened. I know I am a danger to myself. I pull aside the faded net curtain and peer through the grimy window. I can make out the outlines of a blind service courtyard, covered in pigeon droppings. There is a broken nest on the windowsill with the remains of a dead chick caught up in the dry grass and sticks and bits of rubbish that the bird had chosen to build its nest. I quickly drop the curtain and return to the room. For a while I pace up and down trying to stave off the agitation I feel in my legs and arms, but aware of the absurdity of my movement at last I sit down. I rifle through my bag in the hope of finding something, anything, to distract me. I empty everything on to the chest of drawers. Keys, wallet, lipstick, tranquillisers. I check the bottle. Only four left. Not enough. Tissues. Penknife. Pen. Notebook. Address book. Ferry ticket. Nothing that will resolve anything. No passport.
The knife. I quickly take it to the window and drop it into the service courtyard. I hear it clatter on the cement below and then all is still once more. I return to the bed.
I pull the folder towards me and open it. Inside are several thinner folders, each containing just a few loose documents. The first is the one that Ispettore Lupo has had in his drawer for the past few months. It is divided into two sections – the first contains my personal documents, birth certificate, residence permit, my passport and anagraphical details. The other is thicker and contains the photographs I have seen, the case reports about the Pensione Arcadia, the mustard Cinquecento, Sabrina. There doesn’t appear to be anything I don’t know about. Then there is a folder from the South African authorities – everything they know about me. And then my medical records. This is what I have been dreading.
I open the folder. Brown manila. Valkenberg Mental Hospital printed in black across the top. Below, my name and my file number F 56789. Below that again the date of admission and discharge. Then the words Improved and Unimproved. The second has been ticked.
The room is bare. I clutch my body and hunch over, rocking backwards and forwards and keening under my breath. I lie down fully dressed on the bed and curl up and pull the grimy covers over my head. I can feel my heart thumping in my chest. Agitated: I am agitated tonight. I try to slow down my breathing, to deepen it into my lungs. I am cold and stiff, my shoulders and arms ache with tension as if I have been carrying heavy weights although I have carried nothing heavier all day than my handbag. Gradually my breathing slows. I pull my head free of the covers. Nothing has changed. The room is still here in all its dreariness and squalor. I reach out my hand and switch off the light.
In the dark all the sounds are suddenly amplified. I can hear plumbing gurgling in the walls. I hear a clock ticking somewhere in a room below me. From far off I can hear the siren of an ambulance howl across the empty streets of the city. I follow it in my mind’s eye, recognising the streets, the buildings it passes, until I see it turn in at Regina Coeli prison. Then silence except for the clock. I hear, down at the bottom of the stairwell, the muffled sound of a door closing. Then footsteps, slow, uncertain on the stairs, the drag of an arm using the wall for guidance. Whoever it is has not switched on the light and is feeling his way up in the dark.
I know it is him.
The footsteps grow closer. Now I can hear him breathing too, slightly out of breath from the two flights of stairs, heavy breath, a big man, not too fit, middle-aged. I search the air for his scent. Nothing, just dust; no, wait, a vague smell of stale sweat, growing stronger now, a metallic smell of city transport, of money changing hands, of hands clutching tram straps, of old cigarette smoke. The sounds stop, he is here, outside, he has discovered my door. I hold my breath. My senses are all ajangle, nerve endings almost painfully alert, overstimulated. I wait. I know he is trying to find me, sniff me out, is waiting to catch a trace of me. Aah, there, he has it. In the dark and silence and airlessness only taste and smell can betray me. My animal scent. I hear him breathe in deeply. I am discovered.
I release my breath. It is no use hiding any longer.
From where I lie, I stretch out my hand, unlock the door of my room and push the door ajar.
I have let it begin. I have turned the key in the lock. Oh dark, dark, dark. Slipping into the infinite confusion of my mind. I lie back again and close my eyes tight. The only sound I can hear is the pounding of the blood in my ears and head. I wait without daring to move. Slowly the pounding subsides.
He moves again, his hand touches the door gently, then grips it, finds it ajar, pulls it open.
I wait for him. The sheets are rough and hard against my cheek. His scent is overwhelming now, filling the room; his breath catches in his throat. He pushes the door shut with his shoulder. He feels his way to the edge of the bed. Now it is just him and me in this tight space, so close I can hardly breathe, yet still I don’t move, still I lie and wait.
He sits on the edge of the bed. For a moment he is still, finding his bearings in the dark, he coughs, then coughs again. He turns to me, reaches out his hand and touches my arm. He grunts, then stretches out beside me on the bed, pulls out a packet of cigarettes and puts one between his lips. He breathes heavily. A match flares in the darkness. The flame glints off his pale face then dies and the darkness returns. I catch a glimpse of heavy stubble, wide pores. He inhales deeply, and the air fills with the cloying smell of smoke. He sighs then turns to me.
– Mi dispiace che sia scappata prima. I’m sorry you ran out this afternoon. I’ve been looking for you everywhere.
I can’t move. I lie there still, barely breathing. Having opened the door I have spent my last energy.
Wordlessly, with certainty and clarity of movement, he pushes up my cardigan and fumbles and gropes at my chest, then his hands drop, hard, penetrating, the thick hairy fingers pull and push and enter. He withdraws, and lies back on the pillow breathing hard.
– Ti piacciono le donne, eh? You like women, eh? Ti faccio vedere cos’è un vero uomo. I’ll show you what a man can do.
He laughs.
I say nothing.
– E il bambino? And the child? You didn’t tell me about that.
– Puttana.
I hear the sound of a zipper opening, the rustle of clothes and now he is on me, I feel his weight, I feel the loose springs of the bed beneath me, I feel his hardness tearing at me, in me, the rhythmical movement begins again as it has before. I open my eyes.
In the gloom I can see the side of his head beside mine, the large ear, large with hairs sprouting from the centre. There is something about this ear that feels unbearable, that fills me with outrage.
I reach out to the little table beside the bed, unsure of what I am seeking. My hand touches, discards, touches again, at last finds what I am looking for. I run my fingers over its surface, touching, touching, like a tongue touching, touching ever so gently, the bloodied place w
here a tooth has come out. I brace the muscles of my forearm, then my belly as I test the weight.
Heavy.
I lie, uncertain, in the half-dark, the orange light reflected from the city sky through the grimy window. I turn my head, once more see the side of his head, the fleshy ear, the hairy sprouts, and all my nausea and rage rise in me like bile. My hands feel the heavy marble ashtray, in the dark I lift it. In my mind’s eye I hold the door handle with the other hand. He thinks he has me there in that flaccid humid embrace. But I am there, firm, cool-bodied, upright, ready to run.
I pick up the ashtray, I feel the weight in my arm and back and belly. I hold it high above my head and then smash it down on to his head, again and again, like beating a carpet. I feel flesh open wide, fragments of bone separate, embed themselves in the grey flower-like whorls of his brain. He rises, half-rises on his forearms, a prehistoric monster trying to free itself from the mud, the ooze, where its heavy body is trapped. He bellows, then collapses back into suffocation and drowning and death.
But after a while he begins to stir again, and then suddenly he is awake – in the dark I hear him chuckle. Still not dead.
He rolls off me and starts talking, but his thoughts are confused, the speech long and rambling, and I watch the glow of his cigarette in the dark, and sometimes he dozes off in mid-sentence so that I begin to relax but then he starts talking again. And now his speech is slurred so that I can hardly understand what he is saying. At last he falls silent. And when the morning begins to filter into the room he just lies there, inert.
I hear the landlady move in preparation for the day in the rooms below me.
Towards dawn, as the first light fingers its way through the dirty curtains, I get up, wash quickly in the washbasin, straighten my clothes, put the folder into my bag and leave the room, not glancing even once at the bed. I retrieve my identity card from the concierge’s desk where it lies in the same place I had left it last night and slip out into the drizzle of the street. The grey light of early morning touches the grey buildings. Someone has strewn breadcrumbs on to the pavement and dirty pigeons peck listlessly at them. Early commuters wait grey-faced at a bus stop, huddled in thick jackets and hats. A few puff raggedly at the first cigarette of the day, anxious to finish it before the bus arrives.
The Story of Anna P, as Told by Herself Page 10