Numbers in the Dark and Other Stories - Italo Calvino [39]
They'd hardly got going before a man appeared from behind a billboard at the side of the road. He was scrawny, lanky and badly dressed; he had been watching the two workers from a distance for some minutes. His name was Fiorenzo, he was unemployed, and he spent his time looking through dumps in the suburbs in search of anything usable. It's an occupational hazard of people like this that they always nurse a stubborn yearning that one day they will discover treasure. On his regular morning round of these fields, Fiorenzo had seen the car set off and the workers run down the embankment to pick something up. And immediately he realized that he had missed a rare, even a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity by less than a minute.
Tommaso was a member of the internal commission that was supposed to see Dr Starna. Deaf and stubborn he might be, with obsolete attitudes and a spirit of contradiction, but still Tommaso always managed to get elected in internal factory votes. He was one of the oldest workers in the company, everybody knew him, he was a symbol; and even though his workmates on the commission had long felt that it would be better to have a more able negotiator in his place, somebody sharper and better informed, all the same they recognized that Tommaso had the advantage of a prestige that came of tradition, and they respected him for it and would repeat the most important things said at the meeting in the ear without the whistle.
The day before, one of Tommaso's sisters who lived in the country and who sometimes came to see him had brought him a rabbit for his birthday, even though his birthday had been a month ago. A dead rabbit, of course, to be casseroled at once. It would have been nice to have kept it for Sunday lunch to have with the whole family round the table; but perhaps the rabbit would go off, so Tommaso's daughters immediately steamed it and he was carrying his share to work with him in a stick of bread.
Whatever they were having for lunch - tripe, stockfish, or omelette - Tommaso's daughters (he was a widower) would cut a big stick of bread in two and squash the food in the middle; he put the bread in his bag, hung the bag on his bike and set off in the early morning for his day's work. But though this loaf stuffed with rabbit should have been the consolation for a worrisome day, Tommaso never managed to take so much as a bite of it. Changing for the meeting and not knowing where to hide the stupid necklace, he had had the bad idea of stuffing it in the bread inside the steamed rabbit meat.
At eleven o'clock someone comes to tell Tommaso, along with Fantino, Criscuolo, Zappo, Ortica and all the others, that Dr Starna has agreed to the meeting and is waiting for them. They wash and change as fast as they can and then go up in the lift. On the fifth floor they wait and wait: comes the lunchbreak and still Dr Starna hasn't seen them. Finally the secretary, a blonde with the beautiful body and ugly face of a cycling champion, appears to tell them that the doctor can't see them for the moment, they should go back to the factory floor with the others and as soon as he's free he'll call them.
In the canteen, all their workmates were waiting with bated breath: ‘So? So, what happened?’ But union talk was forbidden in the canteen. ‘Nothing, we're going back in the afternoon.’ And already it was time to return to work: the men on the committee sat down at the zinc tables to grab a quick bite and get back, because every minute they were late would be docked from their pay. ‘But what are we going to do about tomorrow?’ the others asked, leaving the canteen. ‘As soon as we've had the meeting, we'll tell you and we can decide what to do.’
Tommaso reached in his bag and pulled out a head of boiled cauliflower, a fork and a tiny bottle of oil. He poured a little oil on to an aluminium plate and ate the cauliflower with