Eco: Foucalt's Pendulum (61 page)

Police stations and
carabiniere headquarters had been alerted. Anonymous phone calls
were already coming in and being sifted by the investigators. Two
Libyan citizens had been detained in Bologna. A police artist had
made a sketch, which now occupied the whole screen. The drawing
didn't resemble Belbo, but Belbo resembled the drawing.

Belbo, plainly, was the
man with the suitcase. But the suitcase had contained Aglie's
books. He called Aglie. There was no answer.

It was already late in
the evening. He didn't dare leave the house, so he took a pill to
get some sleep. The next morning, he called Aglie again. Silence.
He went out to buy the papers. Luckily the front page was still
occupied by the funeral; the story about the train and the copy of
the police sketch must be somewhere inside. He skulked back to his
apartment, his collar turned up, then realized he was still wearing
the blazer. At least he didn't have on the maroon tie.

While he was trying once
more to sort out what had happened, he received a call. A strange
foreign voice, a slightly Balkan accent, mellifluous: a completely
disinterested party acting out of pure kindness of heart. Poor
Signor Belbo, the voice said, finding yourself compromised by such
an unpleasant business. You should never agree to act as someone
else's courier without first checking the contents of the package.
How awful it would be if someone were to inform the police that
Signor Belbo was the unidentified occupant of seat number
45.

Of course, that extreme
step could be avoided, if Belbo would only agree to cooperate. If
he were to say, for example, where the Templars' map was. And since
Milan had become hot, because everyone knew the Intercity terrorist
had boarded the train there, it would be prudent to deal with the
matter in neutral territory: for example, Paris. Why not arrange to
meet at the Librairie Sloane, 3 rue de la Manticore, in a week's
time? But perhaps Belbo would be better advised to set off at once,
before anybody identified him. Librairie Sloane, 3 rue de la
Manticore. At noon on Wednesday, June 20, he would find there a
familiar face, that bearded gentleman with whom he had conversed so
cordially on the train. The bearded gentleman would tell Belbo
where to find other friends, and then, gradually, in good company,
in time for the summer solstice, Belbo would tell what he knew, and
the business would be concluded without any trauma. Rue de la
Manticore, number 3: easy to remember.

Saint-Germain... very
polished and witty... said he possessed every kind of secret....He
often employed, for his apparitions, that famous magic mirror of
his...and through its catoptric effects summoned up the usual,
well-known shades. His contact with the other world was
unquestioned.

¡XLe Coulteux de
Canteleu, Les sectes et les societes secretes, Paris, Didier, 1863,
pp. 170-171

Belbo was devastated.
Everything was clear. Aglie believed his story, he wanted the map,
he had set a trap for him, and now Belbo was in the man's power.
Either Belbo went to Paris, to reveal what he didn't know (but he
was the only one who knew he didn't know it, since I had gone off
without leaving an address, and Diotallevi was dying), or all the
police forces of Italy would be after him.

But was it really
possible that Aglie had stooped to such a sordid trick? Belbo
should take that old lunatic by the collar and drag him to the
police station; that was the only way to get out of this
mess.

He hailed a taxi and
went to the little house near Piazza Piola. Windows closed; on the
gate, a real estate agency's sign, FOR RENT. This was insane. Aglie
was living here just last week; Belbo had telephoned him. He rang
the bell of the house next door. "Oh, that gentleman? He moved out
yesterday. I have no idea where he's gone, I knew him only by
sight, he was such a reserved person. Always traveling, I
suppose."

The only thing left was
to inquire at the agency. They had never heard of Aglie. The house
had been rented by a French firm. The rent was paid regularly
through a bank. The lease was canceled overnight; the firm
forfeited the deposit. All their communications, by letter, had
been with a certain M. Ragotgky. That was all they knew.

It was impossible.
Rakosky or Ragotgky, the colonel's mysterious visitor, wanted by De
Angelis and by Interpol, and here he was going around renting
houses. In our story, Ardenti's Rakosky was a reincarnation of
Rachkovsky of the Okhrana, in other words, the inevitable
Saint-Germain. What did he have to do with Aglie?

Belbo went to the
office, sneaking upstairs like a thief, and locked himself in his
room. He had to try to think things through.

It was enough to drive a
man crazy, and Belbo suspected he had finally gone mad. There was
no one he could confide in. While he was wiping the sweat from his
face, and mechanically¡Xwithout thinking¡Xleafing through some
manuscripts that had come in the day before, at the top of a page
he suddenly saw Aglie's name.

He looked at the title.
A little work by some run-of-the-mill Diabolical, The True Story of
the Comte de Saint-Germain. He read the page again. Quoting
Charcornac's biography, it said that Claude-Louis de Saint-Germain
had gone variously by the names of Monsieur de Surmont, Count
Soltikoff, Mr. Welldone, Marchese di Belmar, Rackoczi or Ragozki,
and so on, but the real family names were Saint-Martin and Marquis
of Aglie, the latter from an ancestral estate in
Piedmont.

Good. Belbo could rest
easy. Not only was he wanted for terrorism, not only was the Plan
true, not only had Aglie disappeared in the space of two days, but,
into the bargain, the count was no mythomane but the true and
immortal Saint-Germain. And he had never done anything to conceal
that fact. But no, the only true thing, in this growing whirlwind
of falsehoods, was his name. No, even his name was false. Aglie
wasn't Aglie. But it didn't matter who he really was, because he
was acting, had been acting for years, like a character in the
story we were to invent only later.

There was nothing Belbo
could do. With the disappearance of Aglie, he couldn't prove to the
police that Aglie had given him the suitcase. And even if the
police believed him, it would come out that he had received it from
a man wanted for murder, a man he had been employing as a
consultant for at least two years. Great alibi.

To grasp this whole
story¡Xmelodramatic to begin with¡Xand to make the police swallow
it, another story had to be assumed, even more outlandish. Namely,
that the Plan, which we had invented, corresponded in every detail,
including the desperate final search for the map, to a real plan,
which had already involved Aglie, Rakosky, Rachkovsky, Ragotgky,
the bearded gentleman, and the Tres, not to mention the Templars of
Provins. Which story in turn was based on the assumption that the
colonel was right. Except that he was right by being wrong, because
our Plan, after all, was different from his, and if his was true,
then ours couldn't be true, and vice versa, and therefore, if we
were right, why had Rakosky, ten years ago, stolen a wrong document
from the colonel?

Just reading, the other
morning, what Belbo had confided to Abulafia, I felt like banging
my head against the wall: to convince myself that the wall, at
least the wall, was really there. I imagined how Belbo must have
felt that day, and in the days that followed. But it wasn't over
yet.

Needing someone to talk
to, he telephoned Lorenza. She wasn't in. He was willing to bet he
would never see her again. In a way, Lorenza was a creature
invented by Aglie, and Aglie was a creature invented by Belbo, and
Belbo no longer knew who had invented Belbo. He picked up the
newspaper again. The one sure thing was that he was the man in the
police drawing. To convince him further, at that moment the phone
rang. For him again, in the office. The same Balkan accent, the
same instructions. Meeting in Paris.

"Who are you, anyway?"
Belbo shouted.

"We're the Tres," the
voice replied, "and you know more about the Tres than we
do."

Belbo took the bull by
the horns and called De Angelis. At headquarters they made
difficulties; the inspector, they said, was no longer working
there. When Belbo insisted, they gave in and put him through to
some office.

"Ah, Dr. Belbo, what a
surprise!" De Angelis said in a tone that suggested sarcasm.
"You're lucky you caught me. I'm packing my suitcases."

"Suitcases?" Was that a
hint?

"I've been transferred
to Sardinia. A peaceful assignment, apparently."

"Inspector De Angelis, I
have to talk to you. It's urgent. It's about that
business...."

"Business? What
business?"

"The colonel. And the
other thing... Once, you asked Ca-saubon if he'd heard any mention
of the Tres. Well, I have. And I have things to tell you, important
things."

"I don't want to hear
them. It's not my case anymore. And it's a little late in the day,
don't you think?"

"Yes, I admit it. I kept
something from you years ago. But now I want to talk."

"Not to me, Dr. Belbo.
First of all, I should tell you that someone is surely listening to
our conversation, and I want that someone to know that I refuse to
hear anything and that I don't know anything. I have two children,
small children. And I've been told something could happen to them.
To show me it wasn't a joke, yesterday morning, when my wife
started the car, the hood blew off. A very small charge, hardly
more than a firecracker, but enough to convince me that if they
want to, they can. I went to the chief, told him I've always done
my duty, sometimes went beyond the call of duty, but I'm no hero.
My life I'm willing to lay down, but not the lives of my wife and
children. I asked for a transfer. Then I went and told everybody
what a coward I am, and how I'm shitting in my pants. Now I'm
saying it to you and to whoever's listening to us. I've ruined my
career, I've lost my self-respect, I'm a man without honor, but I'm
saving my loved ones. Sardinia is very beautiful, I'm told, and I
won't even have to lay money aside to send the children to the
beach in the summer. Good-bye."

"Wait, I'm in
trouble...."

"You're in trouble?
Good. When I asked for your help, you wouldn't give it to me.
Neither would your friend Casaubon. But now that you're in
trouble... Well, I'm in trouble, too. You've come too late. The
police, as they say in the movies, are at the service of the
citizen. Is that what you're thinking? Then call the police, call
my successor."

Belbo hung up.
Wonderful: they had even prevented him from turning to the one
policeman who might have believed him.

Then it occurred to him
that Signor Garamond, with all his acquaintances¡Xprefects, police
chiefs, high officials¡Xcould lend a hand. He rushed to
him.

Garamond listened to his
story affably, interrupting him with polite exclamations like "You
don't say," "Of all things," "Why, it sounds like a novel." Then he
clasped his hands, looked at Belbo with profound understanding, and
said: "My boy, allow me to call you that, because I could be your
father¡X well, perhaps not your father, because I'm still a young
man, more, a youthful man, but your older brother, yes, if you'll
allow me. I'll speak to you from the heart. We've known each other
for so many years. It seems to me that you're overexcited, at the
end of your tether, nerves shot, more, tired. Don't think I don't
appreciate it; I know you give body and soul to the Press, and one
day this must be considered also in what I might call material
terms, because that never does any harm. But, if I were you, I'd
take a vacation.

"You say you find
yourself in an embarrassing situation. To be frank, I might
say¡Xnot to dramatize¡Xbut it would be unpleasant for Garamond
Press, too, if one of its editors, its best editor, were involved
in any kind of dubious business. You tell me that someone wants you
to travel to Paris. It's not necessary to go into details; I
believe you, naturally. So go to Paris. Isn't it best to clear
things up at once? You say you find yourself¡X how shall I put
it?¡Xon conflictual terms with a gentleman like Count Aglie. I
don't want to know the details, or what happened between the two of
you, but I wouldn't brood too much on that similarity of names you
mentioned. The world is full of people named German, or something
similar. Don't you agree? If Aglie sends you word to come to Paris
and we'll clear everything up, well then, go to Paris. It won't be
the end of the world. In human relationships, it's always best to
be straightforward, frank. Go to Paris, and if you have anything on
your chest, don't hold it back. What's in your heart should be on
your lips. What do all these secrets matter!

"Count Aglie, if I've
understood correctly, complains because you don't want to tell him
where some map is, some paper or message or whatever, something you
have and are making no use of, whereas maybe our good friend Aglie
needs it for some scholarly reason. We're in the service of
culture, aren't we? Or am I wrong? Give it to him, .this map, this
atlas, this chart¡XI don't even want to know what it is. If it
means so much to him, he must have his reasons, surely worthy of
respect; a gentleman is always a gentleman. Go to Paris, shake
hands, and it's done. All right? And don't worry more than
necessary. You know I'm always here." Then he pressed the intercom:
"Signora Grazia... ah, not there. She's never around when you need
her. You have your troubles, my dear Belbo, but if you only knew
mine. Good-bye now. If you see Signora Grazia in the corridor, send
her to me. And get some rest: don't forget."

Belbo went out. Signora
Grazia wasn't in her office, but on her desk he saw that the red
light of Garamond's personal line was on: Garamond was calling
someone. Belbo couldn't resist (I believe it was the first time in
his life he committed such an indelicacy); he picked up the
receiver and listened in on the conversation. Garamond was saying:
"Don't worry. I think I've convinced him. He'll come to Paris...
Only my duty. We belong to the same spiritual knighthood, after
all."

So Garamond, too, was
part of the secret. What secret? The one that only he, Belbo, could
reveal. The one that did not exist.

It was evening by then.
He went to Pilade's, exchanged a few words with someone or other,
drank too much. The next morning, he sought out the only friend he
had left, Diotallevi. He went to ask the help of a dying
man.

Their last conversation
he reported feverishly on Abulafia. It's a summary. I was unable to
tell how much was Diotallevi's and how much was Belbo's, because in
both cases it was the murmuring of one who speaks the truth because
he knows the time has passed for playing with illusion.