Numbers in the Dark and Other Stories - Italo Calvino [56]
But why do even we end up finding it so strange that we are here now to do our duty? All our lives haven't we been hearing people insist that the republic's freedoms are the most sacred thing there is? Wasn't the whole purpose of our civic life to guard against whoever tried to usurp the powers of the Senate and the consuls? Yet now that it has come to this, everybody has begun to equivocate - the senators, the tribunes, even Pompey's friends, even the learned men we most admired, Marcus Tullius himself for example - to say that, yes, Caesar is violating republican statutes, is gaining strength from the veterans' bullying, is blathering on about the divine honours he supposedly deserves, yet all the same he is a man with a glorious past, a man with more authority than anyone else to negotiate a peace with the barbarians, the only one who can steer the republic through this crisis, and, in short, that amidst a sea of evils, Caesar is the lesser. Then, what do you expect, as far as the people are concerned Caesar is just fine, or rather they don't care, after all it's the first holiday with spring weather fine enough to bring the Roman families out into the meadows with their picnic baskets, the air is mild. Perhaps we missed our moment, we friends of Cassius and Brutus; we thought we would go down in history as the heroes of freedom, we imagined ourselves with arms raised in statuesque gestures, when in fact no gestures are possible now, our arms will freeze, hands opening in mid-air in defensive, diplomatic poses. Everything's taking longer than it should: even Caesar is late, no one wants to do anything this morning, that's the truth. The sky is so delicately veined with gossamery ribbons of cloud, and the first swallows are darting about the pines. From the narrow streets comes the clatter of wheels bouncing on the cobbles and screeching at the bends.
But what's happening at that door there? Who are those people? There, I was daydreaming and Caesar is here! There's Cimber grabbing at his toga, and Casca, Casca's already pulling out a dagger red with blood, everybody's on him, and oh, here's Brutus, he'd been standing to the side as if lost in thought, but now he's rushing forward too, and now it seems everyone's tumbling down the steps, Caesar's down that's for sure, the surge pushes me on top of him, and now I get my dagger out too, I strike, and below I can see Rome's red walls opening out in the March sun, the trees, the carts hurrying unknowingly by, there's a woman's voice singing at a window, a notice announcing a circus, and withdrawing my dagger I'm overcome by a sort of vertigo, a feeling of emptiness, of being alone, not here in Rome, today, but alone forever after, in the centuries to come, the fear that people won't understand what we did here today, that they won't be able to do it again, that they will remain distant and indifferent as this beautiful calm morning in March.
Tales and Dialogues
1968—1984
World Memory
Here's why I called for you, Muller. Now that my resignation has been accepted, you are to be my successor: your appointment as director is imminent. Please don't pretend this is such a big surprise: the rumour has been doing the rounds for some time and I'm sure you will have heard it yourself. Then, there's no doubt that of the young elite in our organization, you are the most competent, the one who knows, you could say, all the secrets of our work. Or so at least it would seem. Allow me to explain: I am not speaking to you on my own initiative, I was told to do so by our superiors. There are only one or two things you don't yet know, Muller, and the time has come to fill you in. You imagine, as does everybody else for that matter, that our organization has for many years been preparing the greatest document centre ever