Rage

by Sergio Bizzio

  It was true: Rosa was indeed all he missed from the outside world, she alone was really essential to him. So who was the guy ringing her?

  Maria had called her on 20th November. On that occasion he'd promised to call her back the following day, which he hadn't done. And not because he hadn't wanted to - if it were down to him, he'd have been calling her at any or every moment of the morning, noon or night - but because he had been left with the impression that Rosa had heard him "from too close at hand" and, just in case, decided not to phone again until the impression (his impression of Rosa's impression) had faded. In spite of the fact that various days of silence had followed his reappearance, it had succeeded in cooling the flirtation between Rosa and "the guy". The result of his call was obvious: Rosa preferred him to the other one. But it was also obvious that if he disappeared again, Rosa would be bound to revive the relationship with the other guy. And so it happened.

  Day after day, the guy's phone calls continued with increasing frequency. By the end, he was ringing her at all hours. Sometimes Rosa would be on her own, but most of the time Senor and Senora Blinder were there too, and Maria found himself obliged to undertake large detours around the house in order to locate himself somewhere within earshot. From what Rosa was saying, from the cadences and oscillations in her voice, her flirtatiousness had manifestly revived.

  Maria deduced that the guy was without pride and that, in consequence, could be a rival to be wary of, for even after Rosa had given him the cold shoulder, he had persisted to the point where the relationship could be rekindled, and so it did. On 3rd December, Maria called her again.

  "Rosa...

  "Maria! Where are you? What happened?"

  "Let's not go over that again, please. Are you well?"

  "Yes. How about you?"

  "I'm very well. A little bird told me that you're out seeing someone..."

  "What little bird?"

  "Little bird?"

  "I don't know. You mentioned a little bird..."

  "A friend, an acquaintance, if you like. I don't know whether you remember, one day when we left the hotel in the Bajo, we bumped into him and I introduced you..."

  "I don't remember..."

  "It doesn't matter. He told me he spotted you out the other day with someone..."

  "It's a lie."

  "Why would he lie to me?"

  "How would I know? I don't know him... But tell him to stop telling tales, and that certainly this one isn't true."

  "Are you sure?"

  "Maria, my love, what's happened and where are you, why don't you come? I beg you: don't leave me hanging on like this. Tell me something, even if... Hello, Maria?"

  "I'm here."

  "Don't you love me any more?"

  "I adore you."

  "Me too."

  "Me too."

  "So, now?"

  "Who's the guy?"

  "What guy?"

  "Does he work in the Disco?"

  "Why are you doing this to me?"

  "They told me you go out every week with one of the gardeners from the villa here. Is that him?"

  "Who tells you these things, your friend? Some great friend if that's what he's filling your head with."

  "Do they have a gardener, yes or no?"

  "Yes, but the guy they have..."

  "Is it him?"

  "He who?"

  "Don't you turn my words back on me, Rosa, you know full well what I'm saying to you..."

  "My God..."

  Maria was dying to be explicit. The real question was "Who keeps phoning you?" - but there was no way he could ask such a question.

  "They seized you," Rosa suddenly said.

  "Eh?"

  "They grabbed you, you're a prisoner," said Rosa, crying. "That's why you don't want to say anything to me, because they've taken you prisoner. My darling, you have no idea what I..."

  "I'm not in jail, Rosa."

  "It doesn't matter..."

  "I'm really not, I'm here."

  "Here, where?"

  "Free... here... here at large..."

  "I don't believe you. I know these things, Maria. Doesn't matter. Tell me where you are and I'll come and see you. It doesn't matter if you're a prisoner, I swear by my children. I don't have any children, but all the same, I swear by all I hold most dear. To me, you..."

  "Rosa..." said Maria.

  And hung up.

  He couldn't bear it. He was convinced that she had again managed to put her inclination to surrender to her new caller on ice, whoever he might be. What he could least bear was to hear her without seeing her, and to see her without being seen. He set down the phone and approached Rosa's room.

  Rosa had just come in. Maria could hear her sobbing and hugged himself as if he were hugging her. He bore her in his heart, as if he had truly embraced and enfolded her.

  11

  One night he helped himself to a book by Dr Wayne W. Dyer entitled YourErroneous Zones from the library. It was a revelation. He felt the book spoke to him (something which had never occurred with the novels, which merely kept him occupied).

  Given that at least for the time being he no longer needed to concern himself with phone calls from his rival, since his own most recent call to Rosa had caused a further cooling between her and him, he devoted himself to reading. He read with a dedication and a concentration hitherto unknown to him.

  It was all true. There was no phrase or idea, or statistic, or commentary, or fact, which did not resonate with a note of truth in his conscience. Every time he opened the book (something he would do only very infrequently in the course of a day, since he almost never closed it) he had a light-bulb moment. A light went on in his brain and he was dazzled. And at the same time the book left him feeling utterly stupid: he could scarcely believe he had never previously noticed that things were like that, or that they functioned in this particular manner.

  The application with which he had pursued his domination of the house (so that he now knew it right down to its trivial details, including all about the bidet in one of the second-floor bathrooms, a bidet somehow designed in such a way that it was impossible to sit on the rim and dry your feet with a towel, or to engage in any other activity which failed to conform to its principal function, for fear of falling in, as though the bidet were inclined to swallow you up) was now directed towards his own internal world, where the revelations provided in the sugared pills proffered by the book affected him in a particular fashion. His desire to derive benefit from everything he read meant that his reading became tortuous. He would read phrases like: "there are men who manipulate forgetfulness with malice, much as if they were dealing punches", asking himself what to "manipulate forgetfulness with malice" actually meant, what was Doctor Dyer alluding to with "manipulate forgetfulness" and even questioning the meaning of the word "manipulate".

  Using a few blank sheets of paper he had previously taken from the desk, he jotted down the most important sentences. He went back over it, rereading passages; he paused, but he also progressed. Ten days later, when he had finished the book, he felt different, enriched, vindicated.

  That night he undertook his most daring action since moving into the villa: he went out of the kitchen... out into the open air... The excursion hardly lasted more than a moment, just enough to cast a glance over his surroundings. But on seeing the street (and the starless sky above) for the first time in a long while with his feet on the ground, an idea arose which doubled his daring: to exit through the barred gate, make a hurried copy of the key; return and ring the bell, embrace Rosa, make love with her, bid her farewell; all before returning indoors... He knew the house by touch, including its sounds, its movements... Nothing there at all to prevent his projected undertaking.

  Back in his room again, he recounted his idea to the rat. All of a sudden, he heard the sound of a struggle on the ground floor; he was so enraptured with his daydream that it took a while to realize he was overhearing a struggle which had been initiated several minutes ear
lier. He ran full tilt downstairs.

  Alvaro was harassing Rosa. He was pursuing her from the kitchen into the corridor, and from the corridor into the bedroom. Indignation cloaked Maria with invisibility: for an instant he believed himself capable of emerging from his hiding place and coming to Rosa's defence, without being seen by either of the pair of them.

  12

  The scene of Alvaro's harassing Rosa had replaced the miracle of Your Erroneous Zones. For days now he had been staring at the dust jacket of the book lying on his bed, with the sensation of never having read it. He thought of nothing and no one but Alvaro.

  One morning he was cutting his hair in the bath when he heard strange noises coming from the ground floor. He took fright, knowing that both the Blinders and Rosa had only just left the house. It was one of those extremely rare occasions when nobody else was in the villa. The Blinders had gone out in a hurry, leaving an odour of perfume hanging in the air behind them; Rosa had accompanied them as far as the garage and, once the car had departed, had locked the side gate: no doubt she'd gone off on some errand or other... Maria heard a grunt, a muffled crash, and his freshly cut hair bristled. Who could be in the house? Hurriedly, he gathered up some curls that had fallen on the floor, wrapped them in a piece of newspaper, and secreted them in his pocket.

  He descended slowly, scissors in hand. He could see Rosa from up on the first floor: she was retreating in the direction of the living room, followed by Alvaro. Whenever had they arrived? How come he never heard them enter?

  Alvaro caught up with Rosa in the corridor on the way to the lounge.

  "Alvaro, I beg you..." she said.

  "Just a minute," Alvaro had grabbed hold of her uniform with one hand, as if he'd just captured a thief after a lengthy chase through the entire house. He was out of breath.

  Maria descended another floor down the main staircase into the entrance hall, hiding behind a wall at the end of the corridor, barely a few yards' distance from them. He peeped around the corner and saw Alvaro grabbing Rosa. He inhaled sharply.

  "Why are you trying to escape me like this?"

  "Please..."

  "That's quite enough of `please'. What's up with you? Do I scare you?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Call me Alvaro... it wasn't so long ago you called me Alvaro... So why are you scared of me, might I ask?"

  "I don't want to..."

  "You don't want to tell me?"

  "No... Yes... I can tell you. But I don't want what..."

  "You don't want what I want?"

  Rosa nodded. Alvaro clicked his tongue, grabbed her by the belt and attempted to kiss her. Rosa threw her head back and tried to shake herself free, tugging from side to side and struggling to break loose, but Alvaro subdued her by force. He had buried his face in Rosa's neck, and was kissing it violently and spasmodically, like a vampire.

  Maria emerged from his hiding place without thinking: Alvaro had his back to him, maybe four or five yards away. He had just taken a first step towards him, scissors raised, when suddenly Rosa succeeded in breaking loose. She turned on her heels and set off running towards the library.

  Maria backed off.

  Alvaro straightened up, and ran his fingers around the inside of his collar. He stayed there a few minutes, breathing irregularly. He seemed inclined to let her go. He took a small hip flask out of a pocket deep inside his jacket, just a quarter bottle inside a leather sleeve, took a large gulp and swallowed. He then dried his lips off with the back of his hand, stowed it away again, and paused for a moment, flicking through some papers lying on the table. Finally he set off in the direction of the library.

  Maria followed him. The library covered a vast area, and was filled from floor to ceiling with books with dark spines. There was nowhere for Rosa to hide in there, but Maria entered softly calling her name, as if they were playing hide-and-seek. He slowly made his way towards the door leading into the living room, and from there continued on into the dining room.

  "Rosa?" he called out.

  He searched for her in the annexe to the dining room and in the study, before finally going down the service staircase. Maria kept one room behind him: he only entered each room as Alvaro left it. Everything was quiet. All his attention was focused on not missing his footing, on not being discovered. He couldn't afford to let himself be seen. He knew that if Alvaro spotted him, he'd have to kill him. He would have enjoyed killing him, but that would necessarily have spelled his own end. What would he do if Alvaro found Rosa and resumed the attack? It was clear that this was why Alvaro was pursuing her, but what would he - Maria - do if this actually happened? It was possible that Alvaro wouldn't find her: Rosa knew every nook and cranny of the house as well as he did. In any case, the best course of action for Rosa was to leave the house if she wanted to escape being raped; if she was going to be intelligent about it, she'd stay away from the villa until Senor and Senora Blinder returned.

  Just then Maria heard the sound of a door slamming. For a moment he stood still in confusion; then he realized it had been a door on the ground floor. Had Rosa done what he knew she needed to do in order to escape Alvaro? No. It wasn't the street door that had slammed. It was the door to her bedroom. Maria clenched his teeth with frustration: Rosa had taken refuge in the worst possible place. And no doubt Alvaro had heard her too. Maria could imagine him smiling... Alvaro paused on the bottom step; he took out the bottle again, and gulped another couple of swigs. Then he went back out into the corridor.

  Maria decided against going down the same route again: the service staircase was narrow and dark, and there was always the chance that Alvaro would also retrace his steps and make a detour to catch up again with Rosa in the kitchen, blocking her exit to the street. That would mean Maria would have to take him on from the front, without the least chance of hiding himself. Rather than take this risk he ran up a flight of stairs, along the length of an L-shaped passage, down again via the main staircase, to reappear at the other end of the service wing. No sign whatsoever of Alvaro.

  Maria approached the door to Rosa's bedroom. Silence. He put his ear to the door. He couldn't hear a thing, but something told him Rosa and Alvaro must be inside. He bent down to look through the keyhole. There was no one inside.

  He left and proceeded along the corridor on tiptoe, pausing at every door on the way to the top of the staircase. Disconcerted, he went on up. They didn't seem to be anywhere... Where on earth could they have gone? That was when he heard unfamiliar voices, those of a woman and children on the ground floor... The children had just come in and were running to and fro. The woman scolded them, but the kids evaded her and carried on running and shouting until a man intervened, whom Senor Blinder asked to calm down. Now it became possible to hear a child's sobbing. Maria, who on hearing them enter had retreated with his back to the wall, took a step forwards and caught a glimpse of a blonde woman and a young man crossing the entrance hall, dragging their suitcases behind them.

  He had seen the woman in a photograph: she was the Blinders' daughter. The man had to be her husband, and the children their offspring. One of the kids must have been about fifteen. The other two - a boy and a girl - appeared considerably younger than him, maybe between six or eight years old.

  Senora Blinder called for Rosa. Every second that Rosa failed to appear increased her irritation. The man deposited the suitcases at the bottom of the staircase: it was clear they had arrived to stay for a while in the house and they were going to install themselves on the first floor. That was when Maria heard Rosa's voice as she entered the room.

  It was impossible to see out from his hidden position, but he could hear her perfectly clearly, and she sounded agitated.

  "Senora Loli, what a pleasure..."

  "How are you, Rosa?"

  "Very well. Goodness gracious, how the children have grown. Can this really be Esteban?"

  "Wherever were you?" This was Senora Blinder.

  "Esteban, come here and say hello to Rosa..." called Loli. />
  "I was in the garden, Senora. I didn't hear you arrive... "

  Senor Blinder told her:

  "Be off now and prepare the guest room." She swivelled round to look at her daughter. "Do you want the kids to sleep here?" She pointed at the ground floor.

  "Yes, it's probably better."

  "Good afternoon, Senor Ricardo," said Rosa, greeting Loli's husband.

  Maria couldn't hear the reply, leaving him to assume that Ricardo had responded with a shrug or a smile.

  Next he heard Esteban.

  "Hello, Rosa."

  "My goodness, look how big you've grown..."

  "It's been so long..."

  "How old are you now? Fifteen?"

  "Fourteen."

  "So it's that long since I've seen you..." Rosa thought aloud.

  "Two years," agreed Esteban.

  The smallest ones also came up to greet her. They were talking in English. Neither Maria nor Rosa could understand a word of what they were saying. Esteban translated:

  "Tony says he wants to eat veal escalopes. And Rita wants to know if you'll take them out for a treat."

  There followed a silence. Rosa must have been looking at Rita's mother or father - the little girl had the same name as Senora Blinder - in search of approval, before promising yes. Esteban added:

  "I've told her about your wonderful escalopes."

  "Of course I'll make them for you..." said Rosa.

  Just then, Maria heard a "hello, hello, hello", feigning a welcome. It was Alvaro.

  Senor and Senora Blinder were clearly surprised to find Alvaro in the house. They said as much. Alvaro didn't bother to reply, but immediately went over to say hello once more to Loli and Ricardo. Neither they nor their children appeared in the least pleased to find him there. Loli asked him if he'd been asleep: his face looked as if it had only just left the pillow, Senor Blinder commented loudly, adding - but as if he'd really intended muttering under his breath - that he hoped he hadn't slept in his bed. It seemed Alvaro was in the habit of going to bed - drunk - in his parents' bedroom. He himself had seen him there on at least one occasion - and this was a source of annoyance to Senor Blinder.