He remembered it welclass="underline" his parents’ senility did not start with forgetting small, unimportant objects, just the opposite, it started with things nobody could believe could be forgotten. They did not really forget objects as such, they remembered how they looked, they just could not think of their names — often they would wave their arms around, trying to catch the lost word:
“Well, that thing, what do you call it, that, you know, that thingumajig!”
And that was only the start of a long process of forgetting.
They turned out of the village and started climbing up the hill. Luka turned on the floodlight on the turret and lit up the road way up the hill. The pine trees at the side stopped the light getting even further. In his earphones he could hear Bruno and Adriano talking and it struck him how funny, how everyday their conversation was, as if they were still sitting on the bench.
“I CAN TELL YOU THIS! YOU CAN DRIVE! NOT LIKE THAT SON OF MINE, WHEN I VISITED HIM ON THE MAINLAND AND HE LET ME DRIVE HIS CAR. NEVER AGAIN! HE SAID, I’D RUIN THE ENGINE! ME, RUIN THE ENGINE! I ONLY PRESSED MY FOOT DOWN ENOUGH TO HEAR THE ENGINE PURR QUIETLY! WHAT WOULD I RUIN! RUIN, HA! WHEN I’VE DRIVEN MORE KILOMETRES IN MY LIFE THAN HE EVER WILL!”
Bruno did not interrupt Adriano’s monologue, knowing that there was no point. Luka looked at the road in front and thought about what was ahead of them. Had Aco planned it all back then? Was it possible? He had talked them into stealing one of the tanks which were on the island waiting to be transported back to the mainland once the war was finished. They hid it in the woods in one of the gullies. Aco did not have to persuade them for long, it sounded like a wild adventure. They had all been among the soldiers who had disembarked in Naples two years earlier, at the time of a theft of a destroyer, an enormous ship. The crew had left it there in the evening and when they returned in the morning they found the tied up guards and no ship. The case remained unsolved. Just like the case of the tank. The American officer shouted at the villagers who did not understand him anyway and just stood there stoically in the warm spring air. They knew it would not last long. The soldiers were eager to get home after four years of absence. The tank was left in the gully until it was flooded during a big storm when they had to take the engine completely apart, clean each bit and put it all together again. Luka himself then asked where they were putting it and they talked about various hiding places, caves and hollows which were all rejected by Aco because they were too far. They may need it urgently, he had said. Miro said how great it would be to be able to keep their eye on it all the time and Aco jumped up with excitement. So, they put it up as a monument and whenever any politicians came from the mainland, they always praised the islanders for their model patriotism and continuous loving care in keeping that monument to the glorious past. Luka could not stand those visitors — they behaved as if the islanders were all savages or at least idiots. And that campsite, it was created by those from the mainland, without asking the islanders. And to top it all, all the young people went to work there instead of rejecting the intruders. Shame on them!
Luka always had a feeling that the tank was somehow connected to that night at the villa. Aco would sometimes become very restless, constantly looking towards the other side of the island as if he was expecting something terrible to come from there. He only calmed down when he looked at the tank nearby. Luka suddenly realised that the barrel was always pointing towards the villa. How could he not have noticed that before! Maybe he should make a note of it to stop himself forgetting, just like he always did.
Whatever, he was sure that only a tank could destroy something which could turn an eight-year old boy’s hair white in half an hour. I hope so, anyway, he said, trying not to show his despondency, standing in for their commander and thus having to set an example to the common soldiers, who were down in the belly of the tank still hearing about Adriano’s son’s driving abilities.
He corrected himself: not the pensioner Adriano, not the old Adriano, but machine-gunner Adriano, just like in times past. A smile floated above the floodlights.
Max managed to free himself at just the right moment before he heard his father’s arrival. He could not be mistaken: the noise was very fatherly, a remote thunder without a body.
He jumped up, held the material with which he had been tied and ran towards his father as fast as he could.
“A storm!” thought Ana, “that’s all we need.”
The receptionist opened both eyes and swore. The pensioners were getting more and more daring, now they were riding around in the middle of the tourist season! The first, decisive tourist season! He sighed over the selfishness of the old people: they could not sleep and they thought that everybody was like them. He really hated people who judged others by themselves. And anyway, he was really fed up of these particular senile old buggers. So what if they had been heroes in the war. The war meant nothing to him. They sat on that bench boring everybody with their stories, and even though nobody wanted to listen to them they had to because the island was so small that there was nowhere to escape to. There they were, rabbiting on while he had to work!
A disgrace!
It had started!
Raf stopped whimpering. The madness was starting. He could hear thunder, the clanking of the iron, soon the ground would start shaking and then… He did not know when it would come and what shape his madness would take, but it had undoubtedly started. He ran to the edge of the cliff and looked down. He could only see one half of the body, the rest had been dragged into the darkness by the waves. A look at the unnaturally bent arm stopped him.
Everything could end down there. He would not go crazy and start killing or slowly cutting bits off himself!
Jump! said the voice inside him! Finish it all!
Maybe he would have done it if he had just run up to the edge without stopping. But as it was, with that body on the rocks, it was like seeing his own remains, and he could not do it. He knelt on the edge and looked at the waves. The white foam seemed to be winking at him, not invitingly, more like not caring one way or the other. He cried.
How can I live when I can’t kill myself? A weakling, without courage or willpower. I’ll just kneel here, waiting to become a lunatic and a killer, without trying to prevent it, even though all it would take is a movement, all I would have to do would be to lean forward, forward, the air would embrace me and take me. He imagined falling into the darkness — a sweet feeling — and then a quick smash against the rocks and that would be the end. I’ll do it! Another promise, just like the one he gave Aco, who had relied on him and who was now down in the darkness, or rather his remains were there, or to be even more precise the remains of his remains.
He heard the noise coming nearer. He did not have much more time, he had to decide.
The child stepped out of one tent and was going to go on to visit the three family tents which stood together in the corner. But then he stopped by the motorbike and had a good look at it and then turned towards the noise coming from the hill and saw a tiny ray of light flashing from time to time. The light was becoming brighter and the noise noisier. He made a decision, stroked the motorbike, left the campsite and started walking up the hill.
The receptionist tried to sleep in spite of the noise. He closed his eyes tightly, cursed the pensioners and tried to come up with a plausible excuse to tell the tourists in the morning.