Numbers in the Dark and Other Stories - Italo Calvino [41]
Tou've got a friend in the management, Tommaso, and you never told us!’ his friends joked.
But Tommaso went pale: he had just that moment realized it was the smell of casseroled rabbit the dog had caught.
Guderian went on the attack. He put a paw on Tommaso's chest, almost knocking him over in his chair, then licked his face, smothering it in saliva; to get rid of him the old man made as if to throw a stone, as if to shoot at a thrush, as if to jump a ditch, but the dog didn't understand his mime or wasn't taken in, and wouldn't get off him; on the contrary, apparently seized by a sudden enthusiasm, he jumped up raising his front paws right above the worker's shoulders, all the time looking to push his nose in the direction of that jacket pocket.
Off, boy, come on, off! Come on, boy, God damn!’ Tom-maso spoke under his breath, his eyes bloodshot, and in the middle of its demonstrations of affection the dog felt a sharp kick in one side. The animal threw itself at the man, baring its teeth at head height, then suddenly snapped at the flap of jacket and tugged. Tommaso just managed to get the bread out before the dog could rip off his pocket.
Oh, a sandwich!’ his friends said. ‘Very smart, he keeps his dinner in his pocket, obvious the dogs go after him! Wish you gave us your leftovers!’
Raising his short arm as high as he could, Tommaso was trying to save the bread from the assaults of the Great Dane. Oh, let him have it! You'll never take it off him now! Let him have it!’ his friends said.
‘Pass! Pass to me! Why don't you pass?’ Criscuolo was saying, clapping his hands, ready to catch the thing in flight like a basketball player.
But Tommaso didn't pass. Guderian jumped even higher than before and went to lie down in a corner with the sandwich between his teeth.
‘Let him have it, Tommaso, what do you think you're going to do now? He'll bite you!’ his friends said, but crouching down beside the Great Dane the old man seemed to be trying to talk to him.
“What do you want now?’ his friends asked. “To get a half-eaten sandwich back?’ but at that moment the door opened and the secretary reappeared: ‘Would you like to come through now?’ and everybody hurried to follow her.
Tommaso got up to go after them, though he was still far from resigned to losing the necklace like this. He tried to get the dog to come in with him, then thought that having the thing appear in front of Dr Starna with the necklace in his mouth would be worse, and struggling to twist his angry face into a smile as grotesque as it was pointless, he bent down again to whisper: ‘Come on, here boy, here you wretched beast!’
The door had closed again. There was no one left in the waiting room. The dog carried his prey into a secluded corner, behind an armchair. Tommaso wrung his hands, though what really upset him was not so much the loss of the necklace (hadn't he insisted throughout that it meant nothing to him?) as his having to feel guilty towards Pietro, having to tell him how it had happened, having to justify himself… and then the fact that he didn't know how to get out of here, that he was wasting time in a situation at once completely stupid and inexplicable to his friends…
‘I'll snatch it off him!’ he decided. ‘If he bites me, I'll ask for damages.’ And he got down on all fours beside the dog behind the armchair, then stretched out a hand to the animal's mouth. But the dog, being extremely well fed and trained, what's more, after his master's school of procrastination, wasn't eating the bread, but just nibbling at one side of it, nor did the animal react with that blind ferocity typical of the carnivore whose food you are trying to steal; no, he was playing with it, displaying certain decidedly feline traits that in such a bull of a beast could only amount to a serious sign of decadence.
The others in the committee hadn't noticed that Tommaso hadn't followed them. Fantino was presenting their case, and, having reached the point where he was saying: ‘