Numbers in the Dark and Other Stories - Italo Calvino [23]
He was in a busy street, and with this thought in mind he started looking at people, and noticing the jerky movements they were making, hands lifting almost to the face in annoyance, brows furrowing as if overtaken by a sudden worry or an irksome memory. ‘What a miserable day!’ Pietro said over and over to himself, ‘what a miserable day!’ and at the tram-stop, tapping his foot, he realized that the others waiting were likewise tapping their feet and reading the tramlines noticeboard as if looking for something that wasn't written there.
On the tram the conductor made a mistake giving change and lost his temper; the driver rang his bell at pedestrians and bicycles with painful insistence; and the passengers tightened their fingers round the handrails like shipwrecked sailors.
Pietro recognized the physical bulk of his friend Corrado. Sitting down, he hadn't seen Pietro yet, but was looking distractedly out of the window, digging a nail into his cheek.
‘Corrado!’ he called from right over his head.
His friend started. ‘Oh, it's you! I hadn't seen you. I was thinking.’
‘You look tense,’ said Pietro, and realizing that he wanted nothing better than to recognize his own state in others, he said: I'm pretty tense myself today.’
Who isn't?’ Corrado said, and his face had that patient, ironic smile that made everybody listen to him and trust him.
‘You know how I feel?’ said Pietro. I feel as if there were eyes staring at me.’
What do you mean, eyes?’
‘The eyes of someone I've met before, but can't remember. Cold eyes, hostile …’
‘Eyes that hardly think you worth looking at, but that you must at all costs take seriously.’
‘Yes … Eyes like …’
‘Like Germans?’ said Corrado.
‘That's it, like a German's eyes.’
Well, it's understandable,’ said Corrado and he opened his paper, ‘with news like this…’ He pointed to the headlines: Kesselring Pardoned… SS Rallies… Amencans Finance Neo-Na^is… “No wonder we feel they're on our backs again …’
Oh, that… You think it's that … But why would we only feel it now? Kesselring and the SS have been around for ages, a year, even two years. Maybe they were still in gaol then, but we knew perfectly well they were there, we never forgot them…’
‘The eyes,’ said Corrado. Tou said you felt as if there were eyes staring. Up to now they haven't been doing any staring: they kept their eyes down, and we weren't used to them any more… They were the enemies of the past, we hated what they had been, not them now. But now they've found their old stare … the way they looked at us eight years ago… We remember, and start feeling their eyes on us again …’
They had many memories in common, Pietro and Corrado, from the old days. And they were not, as a rule, happy ones.
Pietro's brother had died in a concentration camp. Pietro lived with his mother, in the old family home. He got back towards evening. The gate squeaked as it always had, the gravel crunched under his shoes the way it did in the days when you listened hard every time there was a sound of steps.
Where was he walking now, the German who had come that evening? Perhaps he was crossing a bridge, pacing along a canal, or a row of low houses, their lights on, in a Germany full of coal and rubble; wearing ordinary clothes now, a black coat buttoned to the chin, a green hat, glasses, and he was staring, staring at him, at Pietro.
He opened the door. ‘It's you!’ came his mother's voice. ‘At last!’
knew I wouldn't be back till now,’ said Pietro.
Tes, but I couldn't wait,’ she said. ‘I've had my heart in my mouth all day… I don't know why… This news … These generals taking over still… saying they were right all along…’
Tou too!’ Pietro said. ‘You know what Corrado says? That we all feel