What can I say now? That I gave the matter no further thought? Or that it casually occurred to me, like a distant aeroplane, etcetera? It was quite a troubled week, with disturbances in the streets that had to be dealt with severely. Ten days went by before my next trip.
Without further ado, I will copy the note I found in the visitors’ book in the next hotel, where the staff bent over backwards to shower me with all kinds of attention, congratulations, bows:
There is nothing wrong with offering a guest the possibility of choosing pornographic films, and more precisely, sadomasochistic ones. But it would also not come amiss to soundproof the bedrooms. Greetings from N.N.
I believe that the receptionists, who were staring at me expectantly, their fingers interlaced, could see my embarrassment. Fortunately, they decided this must mean their presence was inhibiting me from writing. They therefore withdrew, leaving me alone with the visitors’ book, staring at those messages that obviously by now could not be a coincidence.
I reflected: was this person following me? Did he know my movements and make sure he stayed in the same hotels as I did? Even though my escort guards whatever room I am in twenty-four hours a day, this hypothesis sent a shiver down my spine. How on earth could this person know my diary in such detail? And if he was trying to get in touch with me, why had he chosen such an extravagant method? Wouldn’t it have been much easier to send an email, a package in the post, or make a phone call? My next thought, albeit absurd, alarmed me still further: what if I was following him? Was I shadowing his footsteps without realizing it? How could I possibly know his dates, his itinerary, the hotels where he was staying? How could I be aware of any of this, when I haven’t the slightest idea where I’m going the day after tomorrow, or why I don’t sleep, or anything.
As I found more and more of these furtive notes, I confirmed something I already suspected: nobody reads visitors’ books, least of all the hotel management. However grandly they are presented, however ceremoniously the messages are received and the importance they are supposedly given, it is all for show. It is exactly like national constitutions: as soon as they have been written, nobody consults them.
One night, for example, I was obliged to read:
Considering how putrid your illustrious guest is, could the hotel authorities kindly carry out a thorough fumigation of the seventh floor. It’s a matter of public health and safety. Grateful thanks, N.N.
After this, the messages became increasingly hostile. N.N. no longer bothered making indirect references to me, but attacked me with complete impunity. People ought to read the visitors’ books, surely that is what they are there for. And yet no one seemed to realize what was going on, or at least no one said a word. Naturally it was not in my interest to mention the matter either. Given the unseemly revelations some of them contained, my best course of action was to keep them hidden. The worst thing was (and I sensed that this too was planned) the humiliation of raising my eyes from the books and having to smile, pretend, be friendly. For strategic reasons, I had at all cost to avoid appearing nervous or scared, at a time when my detractors were redoubling their attacks, and the foreign press was accusing me of having lost my sense of direction.
The warnings were not always on the last page. Plainly he, or they, operated within a certain margin of time. However, towards the end of the book I would without exception find the relevant, insidious message:
Rather than privatizing the universities, why not nationalize your mansions?
One can never know too much. Do you know what your wife gets up to while you’re travelling?
The judiciary is not room service.
Good luck to your daughter in the clinic. May your grandson rest in peace. This also happens to Catholics.
Etcetera.
Outside the hotels, nothing seemed to have changed. But the notes struck home like darts. I began to be more anxious to read the visitors’ books than the national press. My daily routine continued unaltered. At least until the evening when I read:
Shine my boots. N.N.
That was all the note said. There was no mention of a date or time. Was it nothing more than sarcasm? For some reason, I could sense it wasn’t. I signed the book (I had already grown accustomed to carefully tearing out these pages and then improvising lengthy paragraphs full of praise for the hotel facilities), thanked the staff individually, agreed to have my photograph taken with them, then went up to my room. To be frank, I was not entirely surprised to find a pair of worn black army boots I had never seen before at the foot of my bed. I looked all around me, then inspected the room, knowing as I did so that there would be nobody there. I sat on the edge of the bed to consider it. And realized I had no option.
From then on, the orders intensified. The notes never contained an explicit threat or any mention of the reprisals that would be taken if I did not comply. Rather than reassure me, this alarmed me still further: the subversives must be very sure of their strength to know I would obey. The fact is that the instructions could be very odd (“At midnight, put your dirty laundry in the lift”; “When you go out, make sure you leave the television switched to Channel 11”; “If the phone rings three times, don’t answer”; “Look out of the window at 18.47”; “Turn all the taps on at once”), and yet they did not prevent me from carrying out my activities as if nothing was happening. At first I felt humiliated. But eventually I got used to it.
The more orders I have obeyed, the more numerous the demands. Each note now contains two, three, or even four tasks, sometimes interconnected, although never impossible to fulfil. Everything else is under control. My position appears safe, my family is undisturbed. But N.N.’s messages pursue me in every city, every hotel, just before I tear out the page, add my signature, thank the staff, have my photo taken with them and go up to my room to toss and turn in my bed, open and shut my eyes to see always the same darkness, listen to the hum of the air-conditioning that inevitably reminds me of an aeroplane engine, consider that perhaps, before I manage to fall asleep, I could do with a glass of Napoleon Grande Reserve.
END AND BEGINNING OF LEXIS
PIOTR CZERNY’S LAST POEM
AS HE DID every morning when the weather was fine, not very late (because he was hungry), nor very early (because he liked to sleep), Piotr Czerny went out for a walk. He caught a glimpse of himself leaving the front entrance to his home in a looking glass being carried by two uniformed young lads. The looking glass continued on its way, and Piotr Czerny was tempted to invent an aphorism concerning the paradox that a transparent object could be the worst obstacle. He denied himself that pleasure until after his espresso.
His portentous stomach swaying from side to side, Piotr Czerny gratefully inhaled the breeze the morning offered him. He walked several blocks down his street, then turned right towards Jabetzka Square. There he came across two birds disputing the same crumb of bread, and, a little farther on, a pair of truanting students disputing each other’s mouth. He came to a halt to catch his breath, stroked his moustache and since he was there, spied on the two teenagers. A simple, effective verse he could use to portray both lovers and birds leapt into his mind; he considered it for a moment, only to reject it. He walked on, and almost immediately Piotr Czerny saw himself pushing open the glass doors of the Central Café II.
He ordered an espresso, and the waiter soon brought it, together with two sachets of sugar and a glass of water: Piotr Czerny always asked for his water in a wine glass. After sipping the coffee, he opened his leather-bound notebook and took out his Mont Blanc. He waited until a slight tremor gave the starting signal. He immediately began to write in his minuscule handwriting. After a while he looked up from the page and put down his pen. He drank the glass of water in one long gulp, and managed a delicate belch, shielding his lips and moustache with two fingers. He mentally went through the poems he had written over the previous year. He was torn between two titles, but could not make up his mind: one, which had come to him unheeded as he was starting to write but still did not quite convince him, was The Absolution; the other, more hermetic and which he somehow preferred, was Flower and Stone. In any event, he had already filled two notebooks. If he continued at this rate, he would have the whole book ready by early summer. Since he did not like the idea of having to go over the poems during the summer months when the weather was at its hottest, he decided he would dedicate himself exclusively to aphorisms until the August inferno had abated. Calling over the waiter, he paid him with two coins. Keep the change, young man, he said as he always did, and the waiter gave the usual nod. As he walked wearily towards the exit, Piotr Czerny glanced out of the corner of his eye at the spotted surface of the oval mirror presiding over the Central Café II. He instantly felt a rush of consternation. Turning round, he looked for a free table. He sat down and used his Mont Blanc to write in his notebook: What we cannot see is what gets in our way. Contented, he put the notebook away, and let himself be swept along by the friendly current shuffling the lime tree leaves on the pavement like a deck of cards.