When the Night (8 page)

I WANTED TO be near as well. Is that her?

Footsteps in the snow at night. My father would step out of the lodge to see who was there. He couldn’t accept that she was never coming back. He would stay up, waiting for her. Now I know. Until that night I was convinced he had been the one to send her away. That was what he said at first.

“I sent her away. She couldn’t live here with us. She wanted us to move into town, and I said no.”

I hated him. Why hadn’t she taken me with her? I would have hidden away with her, down in the valley, where the roads are straight and smooth, not like here where we have to take the snowcat, struggling through the snow and rocks.

That night I got out of bed with my brothers and we all went downstairs, quietly, in order of seniority: Albert, Manfred, Stefan. Albert’s feet were filthy; already back then, he didn’t like to bathe. Mother used to scold him.

“Albert, come here and take a bath! Do I have to strip you down?”

Standing in the doorway, we stared at our father. He was crying. Like one of us. Though, it must be said, we never cried in front of him, he didn’t allow it. But here he was, crying, with his head on the table. Next to him, a glass of wine, an empty bottle. If our father was crying, anything was possible. Without our shell, we are like slugs, like the ones we used to crush on the path with our boots, always a size too big, so they would last longer. Seeing him like that with his head
on the table, I felt like I no longer had a spine, or muscles. I couldn’t speak.

Why was he crying, if he sent her away?

I didn’t ask Albert. He always said that I didn’t understand, that I was dumb. He would tell me, and I would tell Stefan, like a chain. Albert was the eldest, and she had spoken to him the night before she left. I saw them. But he hated her, and never mentioned her. Now we watched him, awaiting an explanation for our father’s tears.

“Another man stole his wife.”

It took me a few moments to understand. Then, suddenly, it was clear: our mother and “his wife” were the same person. Stole? Who? Did he steal her from us as well? No one at school must know. We’re in the same shit, our father and the three of us.

I threw away the bluebells she pressed for me between the pages of a book. They were no use to me. We threw away everything she left behind. My father burned every photograph.

THE GONDOLA JOLTS to a stop. We have arrived. The Austrians get off first. Look how she shivers! She’s cold. Just wait! She’ll warm up during our walk. I tell her, “It’s cold, but you’ll be warm once we start walking.”

“Shall we let him walk a bit?”

“No, I’ll carry him in the backpack.”

“He might cry.”

“Marco is a mountaineer; he only cries when he’s around women, isn’t that right?”

He puts the baby in the pack. Marco doesn’t make a sound.

“Who told you his name was Marco?”

“He did. Why do you always call him ‘the baby’? He has a name. Let’s go.”

What a bastard. Now he’s telling me what to do, like everyone else.

The meadow up here is beautiful. Sun, wet grass. The cows chew happily. They look up as we go by. Marco answers them: “Mooo!”

I laugh. “He loves cows. He always does that when he sees them.”

The man doesn’t react. The Austrian tourists take the path marked “Rifugio della Dama—easy, two hours.” Why do we go the other way?

“Aren’t we going to the lodge?”

“We’re taking a shortcut.”

“How far is it? The sign says two hours.”

“This way is shorter, if we shut up and walk.”

How could his wife stand it? No conversation at all. I bet even in bed he doesn’t say a word, just touches and comes, what a bore! As my friend says about her husband: “Some nights when he comes home from work it’s like his pants are already undone. It’s written all over his face: he wants it.”

I’ll bet this bumpkin is the same. I’ll bet he takes off his shirt and leaves his pants on the floor, so it’s easier to put them on again the next day. He barely looks at you, and he’s already hard.

“The baby … Marco … will be hungry soon.”

“How soon?”

“About an hour.”

“We’ll take a break.”

I keep my eyes on his shoes ahead of me on the path. For now, it’s not too bad, but what about later? I feel out of shape.

I USED TO swim when I was little. We went to the mountains as well, but I always felt cold when we went skiing, and I would fall because I was distracted. I preferred skating, because it was like dancing. There was music and I could lean on a boy to steady myself. I liked to be lifted. I felt light, like I could become part of a boy’s body. If he was good, he didn’t have to push much, a touch was enough. If only life were like that. Instead, the music ends and then the same boy who seemed so perfect, made for you and you for him, can barely hold a conversation. Mario doesn’t like to dance. No boy worth spending time with likes to dance. Why is the world divided between the men who dance and the men you can really fall in love with?

THE BUMPKIN WALKS quickly, effortlessly. It’s all he does, after all. He climbs up rock faces and glaciers with ropes. Who knows how many mountains he has climbed. I’d like to ask him about his wife, his children, his brothers. But he doesn’t speak. Even so, it’s nice of him to bring us here and carry the baby on his back. Marco is asleep. His head bumps against the metal bar of the backpack.

“Wait a minute, let me put something under his head.”

He stops without turning around. I pull out Mario’s sweater, the one the baby sleeps with, and fold it under his head. Ever since that night, I can’t look at him when he has his eyes closed. When he opens them I feel better.

“Done.”

He starts walking again. We’ve just begun, and I’m already tired. Two hours! I’ll have to push through the fatigue. I’d rather die than slow down. He leans on his ice axe as he walks.

When the carpenter came to nail two planks over the hole in the door, he was impressed by the damage.

“Manfred really did a number with that axe!”

The following day in the hospital, I reconstructed the series of events. The banging, his screams. I didn’t answer; it was as if I weren’t there. He broke through the door and found me hiding behind the kitchen door. The baby was on the floor, alone. I wonder what he
really
said to the police?

And now this morning he decides to take me to the lodge. I wonder why? I mentioned the idea a few days ago; I wonder if I should pay him? Yes, it’s better, that way I don’t owe him anything. Even if he thinks he knows something, he has no proof. And after all, why should he? What does he care? It’s none of his business.

We reach the forest. The sun doesn’t filter through the branches. The man chops a mushroom with his axe, and it rolls down the slope. It must be poisonous.

“What are these trees?”

“Larches and firs.”

“You know the area well.”

“I grew up here.”

“You have two brothers?”

“Yes.”

“No sisters?”

“Luckily.”

And not the faintest trace of a mother, I’d like to add; that’s why you are the way you are. You barely utter three words, and there’s no one waiting for you back home.

“I have two sisters.”

“Your poor father.”

“He says he’s a lucky man, because he has four women to look after him.”

“So he says.”

I can’t stand him. As soon as we get to the lodge, I’ll go my own way, of that you can be sure.

“You have two children, don’t you?”

“Who told you?”

“Didn’t you say you got that backpack for them? And I saw the bicycles back at the house.”

“Simon and Clara.”

“Beautiful names.”

“If you say so.”

“How old are they?”

“Ten and seven.”

I’m a little frightened to ask about his wife, or why the children don’t live with him. But if I don’t ask, it will seem like I already know, like I’ve been asking around.

“They don’t live with you?”

“No. They’re coming at the end of the month.”

I’m out of breath. The bumpkin is going too fast. This path is steep, and I’m getting tired. How much time has gone by? If only Marco would wake up. If he cries, we can stop. But he’s sleeping like an angel. He never sleeps this time of day. I’m out of breath. Perhaps it’s the altitude.

WE USED TO go for hikes in the mountains. Mamma never came. Our father would line us up and tell stories to make the time pass and help us forget how tired we were.

I would daydream, embroidering on one of his stories and imagining myself as a character in its plot. With a bit of stardust, I could make the others around me disappear one by one, first my father, then my two sisters. I would imagine I was climbing the mountain on my own, that I wasn’t afraid of encountering the bear who lived in the cave just around the corner. Under the fur there was a nice man, but first I had to tame him, otherwise he would tear me apart. Under the first layer of fur, there was another, and another; it took hours to strip him down to his skin, even days, centuries. If you weren’t careful, he would kill you and you would lie there, in a pool of blood. His claws would carve out parallel furrows in your flesh, then he would bite off a chunk of your cheek and the veins, tendons, and nerves would dangle like electric cords. You could see them hanging outside of your body. Dead. The bear would sniff at the sockets where your eyes once were and the gaping gash in your cheek. Then he would leave you there, and you would just lie on the ground, observing your own body, separated from you forever.

I found many different ways to tell the story; sometimes the girl would have a sword, or she would suddenly become a woman and the story would start over, with a different ending. That way, I didn’t feel tired on the way up the mountain, or bored. Boredom is more tiring than hiking.

SHE’S A GOOD walker, I never would have guessed it. With those skinny legs and no muscle. She’s all nerves, this one.

I speed up little by little, so she doesn’t notice. She stays right behind me. I’m in command here, and she knows it. Only a few people know this path, and we have yet to cross anyone on the trail. But I need a plan. I’ll make her walk until the baby wakes up. It will take some time. Clara could sleep for two hours straight in the thin mountain air, lulled by the steady movement. If she walks for two hours at this speed, she’ll be exhausted. We’ll stop to feed the baby and I’ll say something. Not everything, just a little. She’ll wonder how much I know. She’ll contradict herself and be forced to tell the truth. I’ll be like the police, little by little I’ll back her into a corner, until there is no way out but the truth.

Why are you doing this, Manfred? To punish her. And because the child is in danger; they should take him away from her. My father was right, women don’t know how to raise children. I’ll threaten to tell her husband, good idea; that’s what she fears the most. She didn’t ask him to come and he fell for it. Men don’t want to know, they close their eyes. I would have sacrificed Clara and Simon to have Luna with me at night. My father would have given us up to have her back. It wouldn’t have been enough.

“Love turns into hate.”

My father said that once, when I told him I was getting married. Before.

“Good for you.”

Then he started to tell me about what had happened. He hadn’t explained anything when I was a kid, and when I was getting married, I didn’t want to know. But now that he’s an old man, he’s different. He has a lady friend in the city. He can keep talking as long as he likes.

“The night before she left, your mother still wanted me. She served tables in the dining room, worked, helped with your homework, bathed you, undressed, and came to bed. We talked about the work that had to be done around the lodge, about the guests. She mentioned the American too. ‘He’s alone,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t like American women, he finds them fake.’ ‘Maybe he likes you,’ I said.”

I interrupted him. “So you knew?”

“I could tell. She barely spoke to him, and never looked him in the eye.”

“And you did nothing to stop her?”

“I thought it would pass. I played cards with the American in the evenings. He didn’t look at her either. Your mother cleaned the tables, poured our drinks, and went to bed. She said good night, and so did he. They never looked at each other. He came up here to hike, and he knew what he was doing. I went out with him a few times. He said that American mountains were fake. ‘Like the women?’ I asked. He said yes, laughing. They must have spoken when I was out in the snowcat, because they never did in front of me. ‘Maybe he
likes you,’ I said, but I didn’t look at her, I didn’t want to see it in her eyes. We couldn’t look each other in the eye. She embraced me. ‘I have you and the children. You’re my man.’ She held me close and we made love. That was the night before. For days, months, and years, I’ve gone over every gesture from that night, turning every caress into a blow to the head, the skin … until my hands are covered in blood. Love turns into hatred.”

“What was he like, the American?”

“A man. He knew how to do things, he came from far away. He wanted a real woman, I can understand that. He wasn’t the point. It was about her.”

Like Luna. Maybe she has someone now, but not when she left.

WE HAVE TO cross the stream. If I don’t help her, she’ll slip and hurt herself.

“Give me your hand, and put your feet exactly where I put mine.”

“I can do it by myself.”

“No you can’t.”

Give him your hand, Marina, or you’ll fall. Your legs are trembling.

She’s all sweaty and red in the face. She’s exhausted but won’t admit it.

Her small hand is covered in sweat. She has nice nails. She turns around and I see her face. Red. Exhausted.

“I’d like to stop and wash my face.”

“The cows do their business in that water. You’d better not.”

“At least my hands. I’m sweating.”

“Let’s get to the other side, then we can stop.”

Why did I follow him? There’s no one around. Marco is asleep, and I’m exhausted.

“Are we far?”

Finally.

“Don’t talk. You must be careful here.”