Wu Ming - 54

Ettore reciprocated, a full smile that vanished as suddenly as it came.

‘You wouldn’t be the only one taking a risk, and other people’s risks have to be paid for.’

Pierre stared at him. He wanted to ask him if he’d passed the test, but he held back.

‘How much?’

‘Let’s not talk about it here,’ Ettore interrupted, seeing the waiter come over. ‘I’ll get Gas to let you know when we can meet to talk about it in greater detail. And have no illusions: I don’t even know if we’ll manage to get the thing organised. Try not to think about it, and you’ll find out more in ten days’ time.’

The waiter approached and asked if they wanted anything else. Ettore ordered two more brandies, saw the worried grimace on Pierre’s face and said, ‘This one’s on me,’ and narrowed his eyes, which were irritated by the smoke.

Although perhaps it was a gesture of complicity.

Chapter 26

Bologna, Bar Aurora, 12 March

Friday, in the Bar Aurora, pools coupon day. In Bologna, especially in the centre, there are some bars where you turn up, pick up your pools coupon, sit down at a table somewhere off to the side and start filling it in. You can’t do that in our bar, it’s something only outsiders do, because in our place everyone gets involved, it’s a communal ceremony, and to do it well you need the good luck of many and the experience of a few.

Luck, as you know, is something you either have or you don’t, but there are things that can help, like the people who have been wearing the same tie to the ground ever since Bologna beat Inter. And if you point out that two easy goals slipped past them at the last home game, they’ll tell you that without the tie we’d have let in at least twice that number, and there’s no way you’ll get them to think any differently.

In the same way, the pools coupon shows up at one on the dot on Friday. While the rest of us are writing away, the few people who aren’t interested can just get on with playing billiards or chatter away without bothering anyone, but no one’s allowed to play tarocchi, tressette or scopa , because they’re all games that depend on chance, and at coupon time the Bar Aurora’s lucky star must on no account be distracted. Which amounts to saying that, on this point too, we communists are opposed to private property.

‘What do you think, Melega, shall we put two on Triestine — Juve?’ asks the Baron, sucking the tip of his biro.

The expert flicks through his notebook, then delivers his verdict. ‘Juve aren’t playing Hansen, who isn’t that great anyway, and nobody’s won in Trieste in the past season. I reckon they’ll draw, two crosses max.’

The Baron considers for a moment, then lowers his head and writes. Others nod and mark their X by the game. Walterún is still undecided. Pierre, leaning on the bar, tries to put two and two together, because everyone is doing his own coupon and writing whatever he wants, but he’s in charge of the bar coupon, the communal one, the one we’re going to buy the television with if we win. We’ve all agreed on that.

‘So what do I do, do I put an X?’

‘Go on, go on,’ urges Stefanelli, the other expert.

And because no one objects, the draw meets with general agreement.

In the Bar Aurora, every subject has its expert. Where the football pools are concerned, it has precisely two: Melega and Stefanelli. They’re the kind of people who read Stadio every day and write down important information in a little exercise book so that nothing slips past them. They know which players have been injured and which are in good form, they know the results of the games of the past twenty years, and they can tell you that if team A is playing team B, they haven’t beaten them in years. Usually they pretty much agree with each other, but plenty of times they don’t. And a few months ago there was a bit of a bust-up between those of us who agreed with one, and those of us who supported the other, and Capponi, to calm everyone down, decided to play an extra column. We did eight of the thirteen, and that was that.

‘Are you finished with that coupon?’ asks La Gaggia, poking his head through the door, his hand still on the handle.

‘We haven’t done the reserve and C Series matches,’ Melega, eyes on his notebook, calls back with a gesture.

‘Ok then, I can tell you those, you’ll never get them. They’re 2–1, I can feel it in my bones.’

‘Oi, Gaggia, aren’t you supposed to be tidying your shop?’ protests Bottone, given that La Gaggia never shows his face before two on a Friday, and his excuse is that he has to put all his tools away and finish his work as a shoemaker, but the real fact is that he doesn’t care for football, he doesn’t know a thing about it, and some people say that it’s because he’s a jinx, that he’d be happy to come but no one else wants him there, and all three things could be true.

‘I bet you haven’t even opened the paper yet, you animals!’ A glance around, no one protests, and he tries to go on: ‘Big news on the Montesi case: they’ve opened a parliamentary commission to inquire into the morals of the deputies.’

‘Hmph, what’s Montesi got to do with it?’ asks Garibaldi, after giving an X to Sanbenedettese — Arstaranto. ‘Why can’t they leave that poor girl alone?’

‘I agree,’ another man chimes in, but he can’t get his words out before La Gaggia silences everyone with an impatient glare, as though we were a pack of ignorant schoolboys.

‘What’s she got to do with it? Are you pulling my leg? It looks as though two of them killed her, with drugs, and one, Montagna, is a little pusher who’s thick as thieves with politicians, and the other, Piccioni, is the son of the Social Democrat minister. And as chance would have it, the police have hushed it up until just now, they’ve tried to make everyone think it was an accident. And now that’s it, final straw, they’ve got to clean up, time for all the politicians’ dirty tricks to come out into the open.’

La Gaggia breaks off with an air of satisfaction, waiting for us to share his enthusiasm. But many of us just scratch our heads, until Walterún says, ‘I don’t get it. It all looks to me like one huge great mess. Who killed that poor girl?’

‘Are you listening to me or not? They did it, Montagna and Piccioni, they gave her some drugs so they could fuck her, and the heads of the Chamber of Deputies tried to hide everything, but they couldn’t, and now all the politicians’ dirty tricks are floating to the surface!’

‘Well it’s about time,’ observes Bottone. ‘And you, Garibaldi, what do you have to say about this Montesi business? Are we going to get them this time?’

Old Garibaldi has already set aside his coupon, and is sitting at the table flicking through the newspaper, as though he didn’t give one fig about the Montesi girl.

‘You lot are kicking up a fuss about four fat rich perverts, while important things are happening in the world. Things that will change history, unlike the Montesi girl.’

‘What’s happened?’ asks Pierre from behind the bar.

‘What’s happened is that Ho Chi Minh has decided to send the French packing once and for all!’

‘Really?’ asks Bottone in disbelief, putting on his glasses to read the microscopic letters of the newspaper. Even the most inveterate pools devotees look up from the table and listen attentively, because on Friday, at this time of day, no one has read the paper yet.

Garibaldi nods seraphically. ‘Yes, sir. The Vietnamese have attacked the general HQ of the French forces.’

Bottone reads out loud: ‘On 10 March Vietnamese troops laid siege to the entrenched camp of Di Ben —’