Nocturne (English version)



  English version

  This ebook, in origin “Zed Experiments series”, was published as an experiment in English language with Zed Lab.

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  Viola Victor

  Nocturne

  English edition edited by

  Carmelo Massimo Tidona

  Nocturne

  Copyright © 2012

  Zerounoundici Edizioni

  Published by Zerounoundici

  Cover: Image Shutterstock.com

  Introduction

  This book was born from a dream and a Voice.

  One night, Viola dreams of waking up and finding an unknown book beside her. In the dream she reads it: it is a story that tastes like the night, of a love and a mystery. Then she wakes up, this time for real. But she does not know how to tell the story of the dream book: it tastes of anxiety, but not of urgency, so she waits.

  One night, on the shore of a small lake – the only light that of an ancient abbey in the distance, on the hills – Viola is sleepy. She hasn’t been sleeping for two days, surprised by the unreal illness of insomnia, and she tries to go back home.

  In that moment, she hears a voice talking in her mind. No, not talking, dictating. Dictating the story it sent her in a dream some time ago.

  Viola writes at the most unusual times, whenever the Voice decides to talk. The Voice belongs to Viktor, it comes from the heights of a tower, from the fading distance of a lighthouse.

  It is the voice of punctilious oddities, as naughty as a child long forgotten, who befriended the shadow. And from the same shadow it learned the suggestion and the indulgence we owe to our irrational foibles. So there it is. Viktor does not like even numbers. It is to accommodate his express wish that chapters are numbered with odd numbers only.

  1 - The Clock Tower

  The clock tower is by far the darkest place in the city.

  It seems counterintuitive, if we are in the large square, the only one of this small cluster of a town, and look up at the impressive clock. Next to the clock there is always the moon. Sometimes on one side, sometimes on the other, sometimes over the embattled spire of the hands competing with it.

  The moon and the clock are the most important lights for those who roam these streets at night.

  That is, no one, apart from some drunk who is afraid to go back home to his wife and her rolling pin, merciless with short pastry and ravioli as well as with her missing husbands.

  But drunks do not care, neither for the bright dial interrupted by the clock hands, nor for the changing moon. How many things they have in common: they are constantly changing. You look at the hands, and shortly after they are no longer where you saw them. The moon too. It looks like a secret agreement.

  One evening I was sitting on top of the clock, on the brightest side of the tower, flanked by the big yellowish disc that casts long, slightly oblique shadows on the surface of the terrace, which then disappear, silently swallowed by the trapdoor. There begins the belly of the tower, without light, so that the moon itself, try as it might, cannot enter the bowels of the slender building.

  It seems incredible that I can do what it cannot: I can get out and come in from the trapdoor whenever I want. I do that to go out on the terrace and watch, emerging from the darkness, the silence of the sleeping city, from its brightest point, with the brightest companion that remains, however, always outside.

  Despite this limitation, and also because it is not a person but an object, I see how easy it is to write verses to the moon, distant and unattainable as it is, not to mention its light. Many poets do, and it is not bad to be a poet. Who knows how many people had things worth being said, also beautiful and important, still unknown because no one found the right words.

  A shame, really. I should try that, being a poet. After all, it is so easy to write verses to the moon. Beautiful, still, distant. It seems not to care about anything, indifferent to all the words that someone could devote to her, and therefore waste.

  When I find the right words to say important things, maybe I will become rich and famous, and I will leave this simple small town, where I am only the guardian of the tower, oiling its massive luminous hands and talking to the moon when, at night, I come up here, even though it doesn’t care at all.

  And why else would I be in a place like this in the middle of the night if I weren’t the guardian of the tower?

  All in all, I do not mind this job: it is simple and leaves a lot of free time. Time to search for hidden words with which to say the important things that certainly, sooner or later, will fight to come out. Even this small town is not so bad. True, we are far from the great life, the thunderous events of the century, the progress and the life of lavish fashionable entertainment of the big city. Which are not so great, after all, because they are crossed by nerves, in which travellers and news move relentlessly, making of the great city a slightly smaller city, all looking the same. Apparently it is the fashion phenomena, that distances are shortened. But then, why go so far, if then you have to waste so much effort to bring closer what was previously cast away?

  I can even understand that, sure. It must be because of the bewilderment of being in a large metropolis. One no longer knows what to do, it is a anthill without rules. So the spontaneity of the aggregation law unites every little lost ant – what is a man in a big messy built-up area, after all, if not an ant full of dismay? – making of it a city ant in a reassuring anthill.

  This is why I think that living in such a small place, with the bright hands, the big moon always closer to the tower and the drunken husbands pretending to get lost in the streets, is not that bad. Here happen things that do not happen where everyone knows what to expect.

  I should be clearer, I know. It is not an immediate idea. This is why I should be a poet. If I were, you all would have immediately understood what I was thinking. But I am not, and you will have to settle for a lopsided report – the moon collapses, dragging away the now-slanting shadows – and incomplete suggestions, which I am really regretful for. So with difficulty: do you see how words stumble and collide with one another? And the confusion? I'll try to be more precise.

  It is only in places like this, I mean, that a girl and her nightgown tucked into the folds of her clothes can climb to the top of the dark-bellied tower of the skinny town whale.

  Of course I was very surprised when, barely emerging from the trapdoor with the strength of her thin arms, she cried aloud: "How dark in here!"

  She asked me why I smiled. Not even with smiles I can say what I want, how can I aspire to be a poet? My smile with the broken left incisor meant to tell the girl that I was very happy to no longer be the only one who knew this secret. Happy she had noticed it too, whoever she was.

  "From down there," she explained, smoothing the wrinkled dress, from which the hem of her nightgown, still under the clothes worn in a hurry, hung, "it seems a bright place. But when you get here there is only darkness. What disappointment!"

  My smile faded, hiding the broken incisor along with the healthy one. I was surprised that one could infer from the evidence before the eyes of both of u
s that that place – the brightest place from the outside and the darkest one from the inside – could be disappointing and not magnificent.

  "I find it magnificent" I made it clear.

  "Don’t be upset. I didn’t want to offend you, sorry. You live here? How can you bear to be so in the dark? How do you do when the moon isn’t there?"

  Not having clear memories of moonless nights, I shrugged absently, hoping she would understand that it was a minor, if not irrelevant, problem, and I accepted a biscuit that she pulled out from a handkerchief she kept in a small bag.

  She came and sat beside me on the edge of the big raised step, trying to look at the city and find its charm, but failing.

  "I thought better," she confirmed, chewing on the ginger biscuit she had taken for herself and pulling down the hem of her skirt that had risen almost to her knee while she was climbing the step and finding a position comfortable enough. I looked away, so she would not think that I was looking at her ankles. Actually I had had the chance to see them earlier, while she was distracted. I was a little ashamed: I had taken advantage of her indifference to enjoy the view that the light of the moon offered of her ankles, which she seemed to have forgotten about. They seemed to me white and thin, ending with little and graceful feet. But I didn’t want to leave a bad impression, so I did not look at them again for the rest of the evening. She would become a beautiful girl, when she got older. I liked her little oval face and jet-black hair almost as much as her feet and thin ankles, but she never seemed to forget about her face, perhaps because that's where the eyes were, and behind the eyes there seemed to be someone. Her, of course, who never forgot to be there, but forgot about her ankles so easily. She was there, I noticed. Behind the eyes, I mean, not on the tower. She would be there wherever she was.

  I wondered how old she was exactly. "Twelve," she said, I don’t remember what about, also because I don’t think I ever asked her. Might I be becoming a poet? So much as to communicate without even a word? But what kind of poet is it, one who does not use words and forgets when he uses them? I really don’t know.

  Anyway she was twelve. She didn’t ask me how old I was, not even in that sloppy way in which she had told me twelve. I'm not even sure she was talking about her age, but I think so. Certainties, ladies and gentlemen, are but a few, but we'll make do with them. The tower, the clock. The moon, the girl with her nightgown caught in her clothes watching from behind two black eyes that hid her, for sure. Who else? And I still think it’s not so difficult to write beautiful verses in a night like this.

  "Sure it is, silly. What do you think? That it is enough to sit perched on a tower and howl like a hound to churn some nice verses? How naive! It takes much more!"

  What? She wasn’t able to explain, but certainly – whatever it was – I didn’t display it.

  Never mind.

  "Anyway I’m glad I found someone here. It will be less boring."

  "What?"

  "My escape from home."

  "Oh, right. Is that why you are still wearing your nightgown?"

  "Yes, or rather not. I mean, it's a rehearsal, not the real thing. First I wanted to see how it would go. I thought of inspecting the tower to make sure it was deserted, to have a place to hide for a while. But..."

  "But here I am."

  "Yeah," she admitted, sighing faintly, as if my presence – legitimate, of course – was for her yet another disappointment in her cherished attempt to run away from home.

  "But still better than what I was afraid to find. I mean, you seem fairly innocuous. You won’t get in the way."

  Then I stiffened. For a bout of pride, obviously. I wanted to look scarier, even though it was sure that she was running no risk. What on earth could I do? Push her down from the tower? Of course not: it would be an awful sight, and probably I would have to pick her up myself. Not only. What kind of guardian would I be if I allowed any stranger to climb on my tower and even jump from it? This is no amusement park.

  "And what where you expecting to find? What would you be afraid of? I don’t know, pirates?"

  She looked at me from head to toes, laughing scornfully. She pulled out another biscuit that I grabbed with both hands and began to munch. Perhaps that was what made me so little scary, my weak spot for ginger. Could the biscuits be poisoned? Did she aspire to take my place in watching the clock?

  I ruled that out.

  "We're a thousand miles from the sea! There are no pirates here."

  "And how do you know? If I were a pirate – and who tells you I’m not? – and I wanted to hide, the last place on Earth where they would look for me is right here, a thousand miles from the sea. A cave in a deserted bay is the first place they would look, if that was what you were thinking about."

  "And the ship? You should leave it to come here. A pirate never leaves his ship."

  Touché . The girl seemed to know much more than me about pirates.

  "Let’s say criminals. A gang of vicious kidnappers, for instance, or thieves."

  "Better thieves or kidnappers?"

  "Both worse! What a question. But if I have to choose, I’d say thieves. With kidnappers I’d start from scratch. They would ask for a ransom and bring me back home, so all my efforts to escape would have been vain. And with the ransom, farewell dowry. I would end up in a convent, and it seems that it is impossible to escape from one of those."

  "You want to marry?"

  "No, I don’t, blockhead! If I wanted to get married I would stay home, why to escape? You’re not that smart, uh?"

  She was really good at confusing people. And she wasn’t even that, half-saying things like that. With less than understandable allusions. We had something in common and that pleased me, though honestly I should have been upset for having been called blockhead.

  I kept chewing the biscuit I had left half-eaten, nodding slightly, so she could imagine that whatever she wanted to tell me was clear to me, although it wasn’t at all. Maybe I could get another biscuit, they were pretty good.

  She moved to change position, adjusting her dress in which, hard as she might try, her light, white nightgown didn’t want to enter. She looked around and stood up, starting to walk back and forth, flashing glances of the coal-black eyes, behind which she was sheltering, towards the dark houses. Perhaps she was wondering where hers was.

  "Do you always stay here alone? Obviously you don’t know the good society, you don’t have a bit of education or tact. You didn’t even ask my name or why I want to run away from home. Aren’t you curious?"

  No, I was not. But something in the tone of her voice suggested me that I had better ask those questions, even though it was obvious that I didn’t care. Why should I? She had climbed up there and was offering me good biscuits from behind coal-black eyes. Couldn’t I just kept enjoying the city in silence as I did every night?

  "In fact, I spend most of my time alone. If you want, however, I'll ask. What is your name? Why are you running away?"

  She turned her back to me, annoyed irritably, resting her elbows between two battlements of the parapet she could barely reach.

  "If you don’t care, I won’t bore you with my story."

  No good: I had to change strategy. I looked at the bag of biscuits hanging from her belt.

  "Forgive me. You're right. I'm always alone and sometimes I don’t know how to behave, but I really care. Tell me your name."

  "You first, silly. You introduce yourself to a girl before asking her name. You really don’t know anything."

  Her little hand went up to the bag at her belt, which she settled without giving the impression that she would take out another biscuit. I could only sigh and humour her.

  "I'm sorry. As I said, I’m not used to socializing. My name is Viktor. Now may I know your name? "

  Her look without conviction nevertheless convinced her mouth to emit the sound "Martina".

  Martina, I thought. Martina, Martina, Martina. I must not forget it or she will be angry again. Martina. Fact is tha
t names are the easiest thing to forget, for someone as absent-minded as me.

  I can remember only what requires no effort. Perfumes, for example, entering your nostrils as a creeper you cannot eradicate. Or faces, eyes perceive them with no intention, they are self-impressing.

  Martina: along with your name I won’t forget the coal-black eyes, the scent and ginger flavour of your biscuits, and your ankles, I promised myself.

  "Now I'd love to know why you decided to run away from home."

  "I'm not really running away, though. It is only a rehearsal, remember? But soon I will. I just need a place to stay. It is not recommended for a girl to go around alone at night."

  "Then how did you get this far?"

  "You're simply impossible! It is obvious that if you escape you have to go out of the house. But then you have to find a safe place to stay, you cannot go wandering around. A place where no one would ever think of looking for you. Here, for example."

  "If someone ran away from home, this is the first place I would look."

  "Because you come here. But who does, besides you?"

  "Martina."

  "Okay, I give up, you're impossible. You don’t have a shred of logic. No one besides the two of us would come here looking for me, and we are not a danger for my escape. Naturally, you should not tell anyone. But where do you live?"

  "I live in the tower. I am the keeper of the clock, so it's natural for me to have a comfortable accommodation to do my job. Moreover, I am a light sleeper. If someone tried to climb while I’m sleeping, I'd notice."

  "And then what would you do? Certainly you wouldn’t scare them. And who might want to climb up here anyway? There’s not even anything worth stealing."

  "Someone who wants to make a prank, for example. It happened once. A young man, a little drunk, went as far as the gears to move the hands. He thought it was fun. The next day everyone would be confused, if the clock hands were not at the right place. But I watch so they are always where they should be. I could have let him fall in the gears, when he slipped, but I didn’t want any trouble. So I even had to save him: if I hadn’t grabbed him, he would have died inside the clock."

  "Did someone really try to tamper with the clock? And you saved him?" she said, visibly impressed.

  "Yes, but there’s more. There are also people who think it's a good idea to jump down from the tower. Now, you won’t hear me saying that it is never a good idea to jump off a tower. But when it is this tower, it’s another matter. That is, I don’t like that people jump down from my tower."

  "Why so? And it's not your tower. It’s the tower of the city. So it is as much yours as of anyone who wants to jump off it."

  I was certainly right, so I was surprised that she wanted to be too, and even more so that she succeeded.

  "But when someone fails the jump and gets caught in the hands, who has to get them back up? I’ll tell you who. Me. And when those who jump well enough get to the street, who gets to clean? Me. It’s not pleasant at all. You wouldn’t think, but I am easily frightened. And I don’t like to see what's inside things, because usually the outside is better than the inside. And then I fear that some mechanisms are quite unreasonable. It is as if, if you find out how they work, they stop working. Apart from the clock, that's another story. If you get what I mean."

  "No, not at all."

  "Cars, for example. You know? That beautiful mischief they unleashed on the streets? Have you ever seen one inside?"

  "No, never. Why, you did?”

  "Yes. And I assure you it cannot work. It is full of things, like pipes and boxes. You cannot fill an object with pipes and boxes and expect it to walk alone."

  "But..."

  "Yeah, a nice mystery, uh?"

  "No. If you were smart and educated enough you would know how those pipes work. Except that you're not, so you don’t understand. And anyway, when you see the inside of a person, it means that they definitely stopped working, so it can’t make you afraid."

  "You don’t understand. The point is that also other people, inside, are like that, and they work. But no one knows how. If all of a sudden everyone stopped working, what harm would there be? It happens all the time. Isolated cases, of course. But what prevents them all to stop working all at once one day?"

  "You're twisted, and I don’t like this discussion. Stop it, please."

  I guess I had done something wrong again.

  "And anyway, now it's late. I must go before they notice I’m not in my room," she said without taking a single step towards the trapdoor. I kept sitting on the stone step, watching her. I thought she wanted a sign of encouragement, so I nodded, trying to look depressed. And I even was, a little. You know, because of the belt that the biscuits were not leaving.

  "And you? You don’t say anything. I am leaving and nothing? You sure are a weird guy!"

  Here we go again. What did I forget this time? Maybe I didn’t look depressed enough? I pouted my lower lip, to be more eloquent, hoping it would be fine.

  But it wasn’t, and she got very angry. She stood right in front of me, crushing me with her huge shadow, her angrily clenched fists on her hips.

  "You are impossible. I mean, first of all a gentleman would offer to walk home a lonely girl in the middle of the night. But you didn’t even think about it in the remotest recess of your little brain, right? And then, you no longer asked me why I want to leave home. It’s clear that you already forgot, and you're not interested. There is no other explanation. And above all..."

  All in one breath, poor child, without pause or hesitation. She must have had a very straightforward anger in her head, blessed her.

  "And above all you didn’t even ask me if I’ll come again."

  I didn’t understand why I should have asked. Then I looked at her clenched fists, her belt. The biscuits.

  "Will you come again?"

  "I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not. And certainly not for you."

  I didn’t see why she should be back for me.

  "And if you really want to know, your haircut is ridiculous!" she shouted, rushing to the trapdoor. Then I stood up, chased her. I managed to grab her shoulders while her little feet, as white as cream, were diving down, finding support on the first steps, as dark as coffee, into the trapdoor. Mine wasn’t a strong grip, but as soon as my hand touched her shoulders she froze, as if petrified.

  Coal-black eyes stared at me with an expression that I couldn’t decipher and didn’t know. No one had ever looked at me like that, and I did not know what that meant. Perhaps she would get angry again, but what harm could come from trying? At worst, it would be the same as if I hadn’t tried.

  "Martina" I said to show that her name was a trophy. "Martina. You're wrong. I don’t have a ridiculous hairdo. Also, could I have one more biscuit before you go?"

  I soon realized my mistake, a big one. She frowned horribly, and squinted, forcing mountains of coal behind two imperceptible slits, what a waste! But, her hands trembling with anger, she undid the bag containing the precious booty, and threw it on the ground.

  Why was she angry? I just didn’t understand. If she wanted to keep the biscuits, she could have said so. Might that be one of those incomprehensible rules only known to the good society?

  As I bent down to pick up the spice-scented bag, she and her childish anger had already dissolved in the dark.

  "I have her bag" I thought. "She'll be back."

  And I smiled.