Letter from Casablanca Page 7

  At our house there was a lemon tree. It grew espaliered against the facade facing south. Its branches reached the window of the upper floor. He spent his childhood playing with a Pinocchio, this one here in the photograph. “Oh, ho! Here comes Pinocchio! …” I still hear his voice repeating that refrain down there in the courtyard. At that time Rodolfo was already sick, I spent a lot of time in the bedroom taking care of him. His little voice came to me through the window. He was always playing with Pinocchio, it was his only company. He usually made him die, hanging him from the lemon tree as the cat and wolf disguised as brigands do in the book, and then he would make him a little grave of earth with a cross of reeds, but naturally he hid Pinocchio somewhere else. Then the fairy with the dark blue hair would arrive and go and cry over the tomb of her Pinocchio—that is, over the flower bed by the lemon tree. I was the fairy. He would watch me mischievously, because it was all arranged between us. I would kneel down in front of the lemon tree and cry, “Pinocchio, my poor little Pinocchio, I’ll never see you again, oh! oh! oh!” And then I would hear a weak voice, because the pretense was that it should seem to come from under the ground, which said, “My beautiful little sister, do not be in such despair. If you love your Pinocchio, he’s alive!” I would look around in amazement, searching for that voice, and see him standing like a puppet on his matchstick legs, thrusting out his arms to me, moving them like a marionette, and I would run to hug him and hold him tight to my breast. And while this scene was going on, he was laughing crazily, jumping up with his hands behind his back and doing a kind of ballet, singing, “Oh, ho! Here comes Pinocchio!” And the game was over.

  Yvette gave him his name, Piti, but it was he who called himself Piticche, pointing to his chest. It was ’49. Elsa had brought Yvette and Gustave, she’d found them in the station at Livorno some years before. They didn’t know where to go. They had with them four frying pans and a Siamese cat they called Mayer that died a month later. He was a beekeeper in the Ardenne. They escaped to the south without a plan, just to escape, otherwise they’d have been deported. Elsa told them they could come, to our house, soup was always a good remedy. They said they’d go when the front had passed, then they stayed for four years. They were refined persons, they became like relatives. Yvette died last year. They have a son, a dentist in Marseilles, she was pregnant later when they returned to France… . Am I straying from the subject? I know that I’m straying. Let me stray, then I’ll come to the point.

  I’m sure we loved him very much. Do you have children? Do you love your children? I know, there is more than one way. Look, it was ten years before we had him. We’d done everything. I had a fibroma, not that it bothered me, but if I wanted a baby I had to have an operation. It was ’39, there wasn’t penicillin then, I got septicemia. To save me they gave me paraffin injections in the thigh so the infection localized there—an abscess comes and the surgeon cuts it. I have legs full of scars. He was born in ’46, it wasn’t a good time to be born. Many were born in ’46, the soldiers came home, those who hadn’t died. No, Rodolfo didn’t get his illness in the war, he returned healthy, only a little thinner. He got sick the first time in ’51. Who knows why? If we knew why we get sick, we wouldn’t get sick. But he lasted a long time, until ’61—ten years. A little longer, in fact, he died in December. Excuse me if I cry. I didn’t want to cry, but the tears come down by themselves. It’s good for me to cry? You’re right, it’s good for me to cry.

  The film I liked best among the few I’ve seen was called Roman Holiday—I remember that one as if it were yesterday—with Gregory Peck, and I liked Gregory Peck very much. I don’t remember the actress, she was very good. I know it doesn’t interest you, but it has something to do with it, I’m just telling you that Rodolfo had promised that all three of us would take a trip to Rome. He seemed to be better, there were years when he seemed to recover, we made a lot of plans for a long time, Rodolfo even bought a map so he could study the two-day tourist itineraries. I won’t repeat it to you, but I could, I remember it perfectly. Then all of a sudden Rodolfo needed dialysis, there wasn’t any money to go to Rome, so we went to see Roman Holiday. We even took the boy, though maybe it was a boring film for an eleven-year-old. However, we did see a lot of the famous places in Rome. There was one very funny scene when they go to visit some historic buildings and at a certain point he puts his hand into the mouth of a big stone mask on the porch of a church, and the legend says that if someone tells a lie, the mouth bites off his hand. He turns toward her—oh! it was Audrey Hepburn—and I think he tells her, “I love you,” and at that point he gives a cry and pulls out his arm without his hand, because he’s hidden it in the sleeve of his jacket, and they both laugh and hug each other.

  We were always close to him. He never lacked affection, if this is what you were thinking. We were a very united family and he never gave us any worry, with Rodolfo in that condition, only comfort. He was so intelligent and particularly gifted in school, he was always an exceptional student—diplomas, medals, prizes. I didn’t want to send him to the lyceum, it didn’t seem to me a school appropriate to our situation. Afterwards what can a person with a lyceum certificate do? On the other hand, with a diploma in bookkeeping or surveying it’s always possible to find a job. But it was his professor who prevented me from doing it. He said that it was a crime, it really was, a boy of exceptional intelligence with A’s in Italian and Latin—to send him to a technical school was a crime. Besides, I never had to spend anything for his studies, not even later. He always supported himself with his splendid intelligence. He’s a little poet, his professor told me. This he got from Rodolfo. You say also his political ideas? Lei’s not talk nonsense. When Rodolfo died, he wasn’t yet fifteen years old. What ideas is it possible to think about at that age? Of course Rodolfo had his political ideas, they were well-known, I’m proud of them, yes. He was in the Resistance, of course, and also the war in Spain with the International Brigades, he took part in the battle of the Ebro. He knew the great people of that time—Longo, El Campesino, La Pasionaria. He always talked about this, you know, they were his favorite memories, especially in his last years. When he talked about La Pasionaria he called her Dolores, or else Ibarruri, as if she were an intimate friend. I see him again on the divan, he spent the afternoons on the divan with a lap robe. He was emaciated, hollow cheeks, the shadow of my Rodolfo… . And Piticche stayed to listen to him with his eyes watchful, he liked his father’s stories very much. Then they sang some Spanish songs together that Rodolfo knew, Piticche had learned them right away, too, “Gandesa,” for example: Si me quieres escribir ya sabes mi paradero, en el frente de Gandesa primera linea de fuego … No, he was not a communist, he was a libertarian socialist. He said that La Pasionaria had been a friend, too, that they had fought side by side, that she was an exceptional woman. Then they had had a furious quarrel, she said ugly words to him, and he retorted that one day she would cry bitterly over the mistakes she had made. He talked about it with much pain. He said that she had sold herself to the Russians, that she had committed atrocities against her comrades.

  He was a dreamer, my Rodolfo. This he taught our son. And then he loved culture, books, he read a lot of them in his life, a kind of adoration. He said that in every book there’s always a man, and that to burn a book is like burning a person. He taught him the pleasure of reading … and writing, too. They wrote each other letters. They played a game, it was a beautiful game, I mean I think it was a very poetic thing. They read the books and then they wrote letters to each other as if each of them were a character in the books that they’d read, imaginary characters or historic personages. It was the last year of Rodolfo’s life. They wrote each other dozens of letters. Whoever received a letter read it at supper that evening. For me they were very beautiful moments. Excuse me if I cry. Rodolfo received many letters from Livingstone—Piticche liked being Livingstone so much—and then from Huckleberry Finn, from Kim, Gavroche, Pasteur. They were written with much maturity. I must have
them somewhere, someday I’ll set out to look for them. And yet he was only fifteen years old, a child.

  Rodolfo died in December of ’61, I know that I already told you. He spent his last days very upset, but not because of his illness. He was tormented by what was happening in the world, that is in Russia, I wouldn’t know exactly, I know that Khrushchev had revealed the atrocities committed by his predecessors, and he was in anguish. He didn’t sleep anymore, even the sleeping pills had no effect on him. Then one day a letter arrived for him. The return address said: “La Pasionaria, Moscow.’’ And inside was written: “Dolores Ibarruri sheds bitter tears.”

  So, that was my son. What did they do to him? I saw his photo in the newspapers. They slaughtered him, and I couldn’t even see him. They wrote that he did … I don’t have the courage to say it … dreadful things. Did they say dreadful? However, you’ve heard another story, the story of a person you don’t know. I’ve talked to you about my Piticche. I’d be grateful if you didn’t mention this name in your newspaper. Excuse me if I cry. I didn’t want to cry, but the tears come down by themselves. It’s good for me to cry? You’re right, it’s good for me to cry.

  THE LITTLE GATSBY

  The evenings were slow, lingering, bloodstained by magnificent sunsets. Hot, languid nights followed, punctuated by the green sob of the lighthouse on the other side of the gulf. You’d like my story to begin like this, right? You’ve always had a certain predilection for the stereotyped. Under your docile and discreet refinement—your charme—you’ve always hidden a veneer of bad taste which perhaps deeply belonged to you. And yet how you hated ‘bad taste”! It disgusted you. And the banal, the everyday, they were monstrous things. Well, then, I can begin my story this way. Of course I loved the villa. The evenings were slow, lingering, bloodstained by magnificent sunsets. Hot, languid nights followed, punctuated by the green sob of the lighthouse on the other side of the gulf. I was at the window. I always slept very little. You never noticed. I would get up and stand at the window behind the curtains. Sometimes around two o’clock a light breeze arose which rippled the surface of the water. It slipped above the overheated tiles of the portico and reached my face almost tepid, comforting. There was always some ship that glided into the windowpane, freighters for the most part, I think, guided by the call of the lighthouse. In the background, on the left, the harbor teemed with lights. It seemed to be waiting. For what? Was I waiting for something? The minutes passed slowly. The breeze blew the awnings. Desire flowed in my blood. With difficulty I managed to control it. I leaned on the windowsill overlooking the sea. The coast was a promise. Its lights glittered. It was like a holiday. I repeated to myself that my story was inside me. One day I would have written it. I would have sat down, as in a dream, at the table, without even looking at the white sheet of paper that was in front of me, and the story would have gushed out like a spring of water. And then I would have written as if by magic. The words would have arranged themselves on the page as if enchanted, drawn by a magnet called inspiration. Would you expect that I had thought this way, leaning at the window? I never thought so, naturally. It never crossed my mind. I wouldn’t have written another line.

  There was something else much more urgent. I murmured the beginning of a novel. Yes, of course, if it’s fine tomorrow, said Mrs. Ramsay. But you’ll have to be up with the lark. The wind moved the awnings, you slept, the lighthouse sobbed, the night was peaceful, almost tropical. But I would have arrived at my lighthouse soon. I felt it, it was near. It was enough to wait for it to send me a signal of light, at night, and I would have understood. I wouldn’t have let this opportunity escape (my only opportunity). I wouldn’t have spent my old age regretting missing a trip to the lighthouse. And in the meantime, I realized I was already getting old. And yet I was still young, I was a “good-looking man.” When I went down to the terrace I was aware of lingering, appreciative glances from your friends. But the age that I felt did not pertain to a registry office. It was suffocating, like a curtain over one’s face. I looked at my hands leaning on the windowsill. They were long, strong, agile. And they were old. Not you. The old age that you feared was something else. You tried to avert it with creams and lotions. You were afraid of those little spots that appear on the backs of hands. Your worst enemy was the midday sun, and when you smiled, two little menacing lines marked the corners of your mouth. You looked enviously at your guests who basked in the sun, plunged into the swimming pool, went down to the beach heedless of the saltiness. What a fool! You suffered for nothing. You were really young. This isn’t old age. You would have understood it then, you understand it now. You had a splendid body. I gazed at your legs, long, smooth legs, the only part of your body that you dared to expose to the sun. It was the Mediterranean midday. Gino wandered around the veranda serving Calvados, Bacardi, and Mazagrán. Someone stood up lazily. “We’re going down to the beach, Marline, we’ll wait for you down there …” You half-opened your eyelids, an imperceptible smile marked the corners of your mouth. Only I realized why I recognized those two little lines. You didn’t move. You remained in the deck chair immersed in a pool of shadow. Only your two legs glowed in the sun. The breeze moved the fringe on the big umbrella.

  Of course I loved the villa! I liked the two mansards with their crowns of vertical wall tiles on the tiled roofs, the portico with the bell tower like that of a monastery, the white shutters renewed every summer. Early in the morning, when you were still asleep, the palm grove was full of seagulls. They came to spend the night there, leaving traces of coming and going on the sand. The afternoons were sultry, so Mediterranean, smelling of pine and myrtle. I was in the wicker chair under the colonnade, next to the little granite stairs invaded by creepers, waiting for Scottie to wake up. Around four o’clock she arrived barefoot, with pillow marks on her flushed face and a doll trailing by one leg.

  “Do you like best to be called Scottie or Barbara?”

  “Scottie.”

  “But Scottie isn’t your real name.”

  “Miss Bishop gave it to me. She says that you invented it.”

  “I didn’t invent it.”

  “Anyway, a friend of yours, the one who’s a writer. And when I grow up I’m going to be a little fool.”

  “Did Miss Bishop tell you this, too?”

  “Yes, because she says you can’t escape the destiny of all the ‘flappers.’ ”

  “Of what?”

  “Of the little girls, that is, but Miss Bishop calls them ‘flappers’ because a lady called Zelda said it, too.”

  In the evening we talked about Fitzgerald, listening to Tony Bennett sing Tender Is the Night. To tell the truth, nobody liked the film, not even Mr. Deluxe, who really wasn’t very hard to please. But Tony Bennett had a voice “all-consuming, like the novel,” to hear him gave atmosphere, and Gino had to put on the record again who knows how many times. Inevitably I was asked for the beginning of the book. Everyone found it delicious that I knew the beginnings of Fitzgerald’s novels from memory—only the beginnings, which were a passion of mine. Mr. Deluxe, solemn as usual, invited those present, to be silent. I tried to be evasive, but it was impossible to refuse. The Tony Bennett record played softly. Gino had served the Bacardi. I stared at you. You knew that that beginning was dedicated to you, it was almost as if I had written it. You lit a cigarette and slipped it into the cigarette holder. That, too, was part of the scenery. You played the flapper, but you had nothing of the flapper about you, neither the mop of hair nor the rayon stockings, much less the soul. You belonged to another category, you could even be in a novel by Drieu, maybe, or by Pérez Galdós. You had a tragic, sense of life, perhaps it was your insuperable selfishness, like a condemnation. And then I began, amid the impatience that had already begun to manifest itself. Gino avoided serving in order not to disturb. Only the voice of Tony Bennett and the lapping of the Mediterranean could be heard. On the pleasant shore of the French Riviera, about half way between Marseilles and the Italian border, stands a large, pro
ud, rose-colored hotel. Deferential palms cool its flushed facade, and before it stretches a short dazzling beach. Lately it has become a summer resort of notable and fashionable people; a decade ago it was almost deserted after its English clientele went north in April… .