‘Are you the bloke from Bologna?’
Pierre tried in vain to wave away the cloud of mosquitoes that was attacking him. ‘Yes, that’s me. Are you Robinson?’
The man gave a little grunt, which Pierre interpreted as agreement. ‘I’ve been waiting for you for two hours.’
‘I didn’t think it was so far. I’ve had to come from Ravenna on foot.’
Pierre noticed that the man was entirely immune to the mosquitoes. ‘How come they don’t bite you?’
The man didn’t move. ‘Bitter valley blood. They like sweet city blood.’
‘Can I come in? They’re eating me alive.’
Robinson studied him for a moment longer, then nodded to him to follow him in.
Inside it was bare: camp bed, table, three chairs, cauldron on the fire and rolls of fishing nets in the corners.
‘The money.’
‘Ettore didn’t tell me I’d have to pay you first.’
The expression on his face didn’t change. ‘You’re the one who wants to go.’
Pierre thought he didn’t have much choice. He opened his wallet and handed him the money.
When he had finished counting it out, the smuggler slipped it into a pocket in his jacket.
Pierre felt cramps in his stomach. ‘Haven’t you got anything to eat? I’m starving to death.’
The man looked at him as if he’d said something ridiculous, then handed him a plate that looked very much like the only one available.
Pierre served himself from the cauldron: bits of something dark and indefinable.
‘What is it?’
‘Eel.’
It tasted of brackish water, but he was too hungry not to eat.
Robinson started fussing about with some petrol cans, completely ignoring him.
When Pierre had finished his eel, Robinson picked up the plate and said, ‘We leave in two hours.’ He pointed to the camp bed. ‘You can sleep a bit. Tonight we dance.’
‘How long is it going to take?’
He shrugged. ‘We’ll get there tomorrow evening. It’s dangerous by day. If we get there before, we’ll wait till it’s dark.’
The longest sentence he had come out with. He looked annoyed at having used so many words.
Pierre lay down on the camp bed and felt his leg muscles stretching until he groaned. But he knew he wouldn’t sleep, the emotion was too intense, his heart was thumping.
His father had crossed this sea as well, many years before, never to return. He was going in search of him.
He was agitated but satisfied. He was risking the most hazardous enterprise of his whole life. Leaving the country, going to an unknown place, among unknown people, but with a goal. Whatever happened, this journey would mean something. Fanti said that journeys meant change. And if he said that, when he was so well travelled.
He felt different, amidst the pine trees and the mosquitoes, and with this grim-looking character Robinson. Ettore had told him he smuggled between Italy and Yugoslavia. Smuggling what? Cigarettes? Petrol? Maybe he was heading into difficulties that he wouldn’t be able to get out of. It didn’t matter. He felt alive, for the first time away from the bar, the dance hall, the life assigned to him.
He had said goodbye to everything he loved. Angela had told him not to go. ‘You’re crazy, Pierre, if they put you in prison there, you’ll never get out.’ She had reminded him about Odoacre’s conference, a fortnight all to themselves, at the end of April. ‘Now of all times you had to decide to leave!’ But she hadn’t been able to give him a real reason to stay. She couldn’t, when she was so stuck in her own life: her husband on the one side, her brother on the other. And Pierre in the middle. ‘I love you, Pierre. I will always love you. Even when you decided to stop seeing me.’ To stop seeing her. He was in love with Angela. Every time he had thought of putting an end to the relationship, his stomach had tightened and he hadn’t been able to do anything.
‘You men deceive yourselves, and for your self-deceptions you destroy everything. I can’t leave my husband, you know. Love is a luxury for the rich. And you and I aren’t rich, Pierre.’ But perhaps everything would change now. After his journey, he would be a different person. Stronger. Perhaps he would also find the strength to say goodbye to Angela. As he tossed and turned on the filthy camp bed, Pierre thought that this journey would give him the strength to clear the situation.
It wasn’t flight. It was like the Odyssey that his father had told him as a child, on those long evenings by the fire. His father was Ulysses, he had left all those years before to fight a war that wasn’t his, and had never come back. And Pierre was Telemachus. That was how the story began: a son setting off in search of the father he had never known.
Someone shook him and he started awake.
‘It’s time to go.’
Robinson had two guns on shoulder belts: the rifle and a Thompson submachine-gun, like the one that Nicola had in the cellar.
Pierre leapt out of bed and picked up his case.
Robinson picked up one of the two cans. ‘You take the other one.’
It was heavy, but he pretended it wasn’t. He followed the man out of the shack.
They walked in the dense darkness, along a path that ran through the pine forest.
When Robinson stopped, Pierre nearly crashed into him with all his weight. He kept his balance, and managed to glimpse a little inlet in the canal, where it widened to reach the sea.
The boat was smaller than he had expected. He was frightened, and about to confess that he couldn’t swim. He held his tongue. It wasn’t the moment to show that he was afraid. They climbed aboard. As Robinson started the engine, Pierre looked towards the sea. The night showed him nothing.
Chapter 36
Adriatic Sea, 16 April
Nothing.
Spasms shook his stomach and his throat, but by now there was nothing left to come out.
Robinson, sitting solidly at the stern, by the engine, didn’t react; the spray licked at him as he bobbed with the rhythm of the waves, but he kept hold of the rudder. Every now and again he consulted the compass, then went back to staring straight ahead once more, as though he could see the route ahead of them.
Pierre wiped his mouth with the sleeve of his coat and thought that if he could get through this crossing, everything else would be a stroll in the park. He gritted his teeth and anchored himself more firmly in his seat.
He would have liked to speak, not to think about his nausea, but the boatman wasn’t the right person.
He decided to try anyway, shouting over the noise of the wind. ‘Why do they call you Robinson?’
Silence.
He thought he hadn’t heard him, but when he was about to raise his voice, the reply arrived from stern: ‘Because I look after myself, like Robinson Crusoe.’
The tone was less dry than usual. Perhaps the boredom of the journey was getting to Robinson as well.
Pierre decided to try again. ‘Ettore told me you were a partisan. Were you in the 28th?’
‘No. But I lent Bulow a hand.’
‘Were you in the Battle of the Valleys?’
The reply came back sharply: ‘I took them into the valleys.’
‘Seriously? Did you get a medal?’
The wind carried away his reply.
‘What?’
Robinson raised his voice. ‘What would I want with a medal?’
Pierre didn’t know what to add. He said, ‘My brother was a partisan as well. Up by Imola, in the 36th. He got a silver medal.’ Silence. ‘Did you kill any Germans?’
Robinson raised his hand with four fingers raised. Talking made Pierre feel better, his nausea had subsided.
‘And how was it?’
Silence again. For a moment Pierre thought he had asked the wrong question.