The Parrots Read online

  “Believe me.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “I tell you that’s how it is.”

  “It can’t be.”

  “If I pull out it’ll be a real mess, it’ll screw everything up.”

  “Who gives a damn?”

  “Come on, I can’t involve other people when it’s my fault.”

  “Then lose.”

  “How do you mean lose?”

  “Lose.”

  “…”

  “Compete and lose.”

  “And how do I do that?”

  “That’s up to you.”

  “Don’t you think that’s enough? I slept on a sofa bed, my back’s broken… If I lose, will you forgive me?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Come on!”

  “We’ll see.”

  “…”

  “…”

  “Why don’t we meet?”

  “It’s too soon.”

  “Please. I need to see you.”

  “After The Prize.”

  “…”

  “…”

  “Darling?”

  “What is it?”

  “Tell me the truth. You’d never have done it.”

  “What?”

  “The baby.”

  “…”

  “You’d never have had an abortion.”

  “…”

  “Would you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I knew it!”

  “I really have to go now.”

  “Do you love me?”

  “Hang up.”

  “Do you love me?”

  “…”

  “Come back to me.”

  “Do what you have to do first.”

  “…”

  “Lose. Or at least, try not to win.”

  The vegetable carbonara was a success. Free-range hen’s eggs instead of bacon, courgettes lightly fried in oil, and onions—actually leeks or shallots would have been better, but it was Sunday and everything was closed.

  Maybe a little too delicate, according to The Publisher (at any other time he would have openly called it “bland”), maybe “a little undercooked” for The Second Wife—the fact was there wasn’t anything left on the plates. Then with what there was in the fridge (veal cutlets and some leftover ham) The Writer had improvised a delicious Roman saltimbocca, picking fresh sage from among the herbs in the garden, herbs The Second Wife was not even capable of recognizing, except on the spice shelf of the supermarket.

  It was a small trauma for her to see The Writer standing by the oven in a black apron with the word Bistrot on it, nimbly chopping the onion, tossing the pasta with a sharp blow on the handle of the non-stick pan. She had never before seen him cook, and had never suspected that he had a passion for it, let alone the ability.

  If the father of her daughter could cook without her being aware of it, what else was the man capable of? The thought made her shudder.

  “Where did you learn to cook?” she asked him, her eyes open wide in amazement, as soon as The Publisher had got up from the table and gone to the toilet.

  “I learnt when I was young.”

  “…”

  “When I was a student.”

  “And why have you never cooked before?”

  “I didn’t feel like it.”

  Then The Publisher returned, and the conversation turned to other matters. Sitting at that round table in a circle of light, his elbows planted solidly on the peach-coloured tablecloth on either side of the art-nouveau china dinner service and behind the thick palisade of crystal glasses, The Writer struck The Second Wife as more affable and relaxed than she had ever seen him before. There was a light in his eyes, a light that made them gleam more than the silverware. And watching him serve the steaming pasta with a waiter-like allure, uncork the bottle of Bonarda dell’Oltrepò with a mere flick of the wrist, fill the glasses without spilling a drop, eat with a napkin tucked into the neck of his shirt, break the bread with his hands and clean his plate with it, she felt a kind of quiver of excitement: he was so manly and reassuring… For the first time since the birth of The Baby, she wanted to make love to him.

  After dinner, while waiting for The Nanny to come home, The Second Wife lay down in The Baby’s room, and the two men withdrew to the study.

  The Publisher took with him the crocodile-skin briefcase and the bottle of Japanese whisky with which he had arrived.

  They lit two Havana cigars, and beneath a mushroom cloud of smoke, by the light of the desk lamp, like an undertaker dealing with the widow of the dear departed, The Publisher opened the briefcase and showed The Writer every article in his sample selection, one after the other. First they saw the proofs, then the various cover designs, for the soon-to-appear opera omnia.

  The two men talked for a long time and agreed about many things. For example, about the photograph to appear on the boxed set, the choice of which, after a long and judicious scrutiny, boiled down to a dead heat between a black-and-white portrait of The Writer—a few years younger, with a boastful little smile, his head propped on his fist—and a more recent shot, also in black and white, of The Writer sniffing a small white flower, pushing his nose deep into the corolla. After weighing up the pros and cons, the choice of both of them fell on the photograph with the flower.

  It would be a unique edition, a collector’s edition, on high-quality paper, binding made by hand according to an old process, Morocco leather cover, tanned using only natural products, with gilded head and tail bands. On this point there arose a brief but lively discussion. For the colour of the cover, The Publisher leant towards an austere Prussian blue but The Writer did not agree. He found that solution, that blue coupled with gold, too aristocratic, a kind of blazer with showy buttons that would make him feel alone and melancholy, like an admiral at rest: to him, it was out of the question. Basically he had always been a popular writer, close to the masses, accommodating to his readers, and that was the image he wanted to leave behind him.

  So why not red, stronger but still elegant, maybe in a dark shade? A wine red, Bordeaux or better still Burgundy—yes that was it, a Burgundy red with gold lettering would be perfect.

  The Publisher paused. Gravely, he extinguished his cigar and poured a finger of whisky into his tulip-shaped glass.

  “But the collections of complete works have always been blue, we’d have to do it outside the usual collections…”

  The Writer relit his cigar, which had gone out, solemnly took the bottle and poured two fingers of whisky into his tulip-shaped glass.

  “Then do that.”

  “Do you know how much this whim of yours over the cover is going to cost me?”

  “Would you believe me if I told you that I don’t know and don’t want to know?”

  “I wouldn’t do it for anybody else.”

  “Liar.”

  “You know how many copies we’re going to print?”

  “How many?”

  “To start, two hundred thousand. That’s just to start.”

  “In such a short time? How will you manage?”

  “I’ve bought an old printing works in Serbia. They used to print phone books under Tito. They’re just waiting for a phone call from me.”

  “I really like you, you son of a bitch.”

  “I like you too, you bastard.”

  Quite tipsy by now, the two men embraced with masculine vigour.

  “Then we’re almost there,” said The Publisher when The Writer had let go of him.

  “Yes.”

  The Writer’s face clouded over. He stood up abruptly from the desk, went over to his collection of LPs and became absorbed in combing through them.

  “I hope you don’t mind me asking…”

  The Writer still had his back to The Publisher. He chose a record with a colourful sleeve.

  “Have you already thought about…”

  “About…?”

  The Writer turned abruptly and looked The Publisher
right in the eyes.

  “About ‘how’?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “All right. Besides, in art, we judge by the results, not the process.”

  The Writer wiped the record with a cloth until it gleamed like petrol and looked at himself in the shiny surface: he saw a handsome man, with an arrogant little smile and a slightly wild look in his eyes.

  “It’s getting late. I’d better go.”

  The Writer carefully placed the record on the turntable.

  “I’d like to hear a bit of music.”

  “You can do whatever you want this week. In fact, you should take advantage.”

  “You can bet on it.”

  The Publisher left the room.

  The needle crackled and the record started turning slowly like an eddy in the middle of a pond. The Writer turned up the volume up to maximum. Heather Parisi’s 1980s hit Cicale boomed out. The whole house started shaking. He took off his shoes and started dancing barefoot, with his eyes closed, on the cold floor.

  “Darling, is everything all right?”

  The agreement was clear. He was the one who was confused. If they wanted to get back together, he mustn’t win The Prize. “How” didn’t matter—what mattered was the result. He had to lose, as The Girlfriend had asked. Or do everything he could not to win, as he preferred to put it in order to beautify the concept.

  But was there a way he could make sure of not winning? And above all, was it worth it? Maybe the decision had been a hasty one. Men do unthinkable things for women, that’s true, but the proof of his love which The Girlfriend was asking of him was more than unthinkable—it was inconceivable.

  How many writers would do it in his place? How many of his colleagues would give up the recognition that would for ever rescue them from the obscurity in which they were vegetating? Very few. Maybe nobody.

  Moreover, although it was true that The Beginner was young, and had plenty of time, all the time in the world, to write other books and win other prizes, it was equally true that he also had all the time in the world to make other children, with other women.

  Emboldened by these thoughts, and playing on her compassion, he had managed to obtain a late-night confrontation that had begun on the landing and had ended up in the bedroom, demonstrating how even the most implacable logic melts in the heat of bodies.

  In again making love with The Girlfriend, instead of smelling the stale odour of burnt soup he had savoured the pulp of a fruit, a semi-adulterous sensation which had reminded him of his adventure in London.

  But all these sensations, savoured in the night, had faded by morning, when we repent not only the things we have done but also those we are about to do. As The Girlfriend finished dressing, resentful at having sold her pride so cheaply, The Beginner remained in bed, wrapped in the warmth of his sense of guilt, buried in the certainty that he had once again made a promise he was in no position to keep.

  “It was a mistake. It’s best if you don’t stay here.”

  “I’m going to take a shower.”

  “OK, but then go. What happened last night doesn’t wipe out our agreement.”

  “But darling, I—”

  “We’ll talk about it after The Prize.”

  “Whatever you like.”

  “I’m going. Make sure you shut the door when you leave.”

  The Girlfriend grabbed her handbag, took a light coat from the wardrobe and left.

  The Beginner looked at the sliding door that led onto the terrace. The new pane of glass gleamed in the morning light, like a widescreen TV tuned to Rome.

  As naked and hairy as a hominid, The Beginner got up and pattered over to the coat stand. He searched in the pocket of his jacket. In his notebook he had numbers his press officer had strongly advised him to call. Numbers of people whose votes counted and could alter the outcome of The Prize.

  Uncertain votes, votes offered and suffered, bought and sold, promised and denied, votes that at the uttering of a single word could sway from one side to the other.

  “Hello? Good morning! Sorry to disturb you, I’m calling about The Prize… We met at the presentation in the theatre… Do you remember? What? No, the other one, the young one, that’s right, that’s right… Well, I was calling to… I don’t know how to put this, it’s about your vote… What? Oh, I’m very pleased you liked it, thank you, thank you, no, as I was saying, about your vote… Of course… I understand… Oh, you’ve already voted for me… No, no, of course I believe you, I wouldn’t dream of… It’s just that, actually, I wanted to ask you NOT to vote for me… What?… Am I joking?… Well… Yes, of course I am.”

  “We’re not moving!”

  The Director of The Small Publishing Company beat on the steering wheel with his fist.

  “What’s happening now?”

  “How should I know? There’s always something in this fucking city!”

  “Excuse me, why aren’t we moving? Has there been an accident?”

  The Master had lowered the grimy window of the van and tackled a traffic policeman who was talking into his walkie-talkie.

  “No, there’s a transport strike.”

  The policeman went back to his radio.

  “There’s a strike.”

  “I heard.”

  “What time is it?”

  “Six o’clock.”

  “Shit, we should have been there by now.”

  “Take the Aurelia Antica, we can cut across.”

  “If only that guy would move…” The Director of The Small Publishing Company hooted his horn. “That’s it, get out of our way!”

  The van, once white, now blackened by diesel fumes, managed to free itself from the steel vice of the other cars and turned onto the old Roman road.

  “Tell me the street again.”

  “Lungotevere something… I can’t remember the exact address. But I know where it is… Anyway, if it’s ‘Lungotevere’, that means it’s by the Tiber. We can’t go wrong.”

  “Yes, just like the event at the Parco della Musica!”

  “That again? That was an oversight.”

  “Let’s not get into that. But are you sure there’s any point to these things?”

  “Of course there is.”

  “So tell me, what’s the point of presenting a poetry book to a rowing club?”

  “Don’t worry. That’s my job.”

  The Director of The Small Publishing Company accelerated, and a light came on on the dashboard.

  “No!”

  “What is it?”

  “The radiator. The water’s overheating.”

  “Now what do we do?”

  “It’s the washer on the cylinder head. I was supposed to change it but they were asking eight hundred euros.”

  “Like my advance! So what do we do now?”

  “Let’s look for a drinking fountain. The first drinking fountain you see, I’ll stop.”

  “There!”

  “Where? That’s a rubbish bin!”

  “Oh, sorry, I can’t see from a distance… There!”

  The Director braked suddenly and turned right. A big scooter passed him with a roar.

  “You go and get the water, I’ll look for a rag to open the valve.”

  “How do I get the water? I need something, a bottle.”

  The Director searched in the van. Under the seat he found a bottle of citron juice that had gone flat. “Here.”

  The Master took it and walked to the drinking fountain. It was a quiet street. Beyond the automatic gates, the perimeter walls and the hedges, there were glimpses of well-tended drives, guard dogs and big, powerful cars.

  The Master leant over the drinking fountain. He unscrewed the top of the plastic bottle, which slipped from his hand and fell into the drain below the fountain. Before throwing away the little bit of citron juice that was left, he suddenly felt like tasting it. It was a disgusting, sugary swill.

  The Director of The Small Publishing Company was standing by th
e steaming bonnet with a rag in his hand, trying to unscrew the top of the radiator. The Master started back towards the van, with the water overflowing from the bottle, so icy that it steamed up the plastic. On the way, he slipped on something sticky, lost his balance for a moment, swayed, then straightened, thinking he had been betrayed by his wet shoes.

  “Here!”

  The Master held out the bottle to The Director, who did not turn, his head still stuck under the bonnet. A cloud of white smoke, like a lighting effect in a disco, billowed from the engine. The two men avoided it with a timely leap backwards. They waited for the water in the radiator to stop boiling. Then The Director topped up the water, slammed the bonnet shut, and the two of them got back in the van, hot and weary.

  “Bloody hell, what’s that stench?”

  “What stench? I can’t smell…”

  A foul smell of shit seemed to be trapped in the passenger compartment, as if a demon had suddenly appeared from the sulphurous pit of hell. The two men looked at each other in embarrassment, each secretly hoping he was not the source of that stink. Unfortunately one of them had to be. And it wasn’t The Director.

  The Master hadn’t slipped because of the wet ground, but because he had stepped in a huge pile of dogshit, the kind with which the pavements of Rome are covered, yellow and as mouldable as clay, a substance that was no longer shit but was not yet something else different from shit, a product the chemical industry would call “semi-processed”.

  “It can happen. They say it brings good luck.”

  “What do you mean, good luck? These things always happen to you.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “Maybe you have the evil eye.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Have you ever checked?”

  “I don’t believe in such things.”

  “If I were you—”

  “I never thought you could stoop so low.”

  “I want you to get out now. Go on, move. Get that muck out of here, I can’t breathe!”

  The Master got out of the van to get a better view of the situation, which was becoming increasingly compromised. Because if there’s anything worse than stepping in one of those turds, it’s stepping in them with uppers like a tank. And this was the case with The Master: an old pair of worn but magnificent Timberlands, the only decent shoes he had left, which he wore on special occasions.