Davide Longo - The Last Man Standing

Leonardo shook his head, dismissing these words.

“I’d like you to speak to Alberto and tell him to come to me.”

“Why not call him yourself?”

“I have, but he pretends not to hear.”

“He won’t come, even if I ask him.”

“But ask him all the same.”

“He’ll only come if Richard tells him to.”

“Then tell Richard I’d like to speak to Alberto.”

“No one speaks to Richard unless Richard himself wants it.”

Leonardo leaned back against the bars and looked at David. Since they had started sharing the cage, he had never seen the elephant angry or showing any sign of impatience.

“Do you ever speak to the kids?”

“No.”

“If I’m the only person you can speak to, why is it so difficult for you to do it?”

“Your questions are out of place. They come from a concept of the world that no longer exists. Though being a writer, you must have gotten used to imagining other worlds. That’s what this is.”

“I’m trying to understand what sort of world it is.”

“Understanding belongs to the old world. I also studied and had a home, profession, and family. That wasn’t very long ago, but it no longer makes sense to think about it. These things don’t mean anything anymore. There’s nothing to be said and still less to understand.”

Leonardo nodded.

“Why are we always on the move? What are they looking for?”

The doctor put his hands on the edge of the cage, the left hand with three fingers missing hidden under the other. The stakes facing Leonardo were stuck with black sculptures of desiccated flesh.

“Fuel for the cars,” the doctor said, “and for the generators.”

“Only that?”

“And prisoners, especially women and children. Richard wants them educated according to the new law.”

Leonardo tried to understand whether the man believed what he was saying or was just repeating it automatically, but the doctor’s face was expressionless, his eyes like cold ash.

“What are those bullet holes on the cars?”

“An airplane machine-gunned us. We’d gone too close to the frontier.”

“Is that where Richard’s trying to go? To France?”

The man did not answer. The camp, with its recumbent bodies and stream of coarse smoke from the bonfire, was reflected in his glasses. The wind had begun to shift it to the west.

“What if we run into another gang?”

The man stuck his hands into his jacket pockets.

“If it’s smaller we attack it. If it’s bigger we keep our distance or try to twin with it.”

“Twin with it?”

“Exchange prisoners.”

Leonardo studied the man’s face. The strengthening light was tingeing their faces blue.

“You say you don’t know where your son is. Which means he may be alive. Why don’t you go and look for him? You may find him again.”

The doctor shook his head.

“Do you care about anything at all except David?”

The man took his time before answering.

Finally he said, “No,” then turned and slipped into a pocket of darkness among the trees where the morning light had not yet reached.

He recognized the field beyond the ditch and the safety barrier where they had sat down for a drink and Sergio had met them again. During those two weeks the snow had melted, but the ground was still hard and wintry with a thin layer of ice.

As soon as he heard the squeaking of brakes on the truck, he understood. It took them about ten minutes to get situated, after which the cripple and some twenty youths cut quickly through the field and disappeared into the forest. The music had already been off for a couple of hours. Leonardo had thought the generator must have run out of fuel. Now he knew that was not what had happened.

The first shots rang out an hour later. At first few and far between, then more frequent.

David, hearing them, began to move nervously around the cage. He never did this when the youths went out on a normal hunt, but now, for many hours, explosions could be heard echoing from the hills. He called to the elephant, who came to rest his head against Leonardo’s chest. He scratched under his ears and talked to him for a long time, asking him many questions about his past to distract him and chase away the black images passing through their minds. David curled his trunk around Leonardo and held him close. Neither moved until Leonardo heard the animal’s huge heart slow down so that it was beating in time with his own. Then they sat together with their eyes turned to the hills and waited. The afternoon slipped away and, as the sun sank, darkness emerged from the woods and besieged the road. An opaline mist lifted from the fields.

When the first raiders reappeared, it was already night and they headed for the bonfire at the head of the convoy, which was normally led by a couple of cars used by scouts, the van where the guns were kept, and Richard’s trailer. They were carrying two chests full of cans on their shoulders. The next to arrive had a can of gasoline and another full of a dark liquid that might have been wine or kerosene. A roar of shouts and shots greeted their arrival, but Leonardo did not lean out to see what was happening at the head of the column; he kept his eyes on the forest, from where the cripple and the main party had not yet appeared. He did not have to wait long. They were somewhat spread out, each carrying something: one had an animal that had already been skinned, some had weapons, and some a box or large piece of dried meat. Four of the boys who had originally left the trailer were missing. The cripple was gripping the arm of Salomon, the elder son. There was no sign of Manon or Sergio or their younger son.

Leonardo heard the cries of excitement at the head of the column get louder, followed by a chorus of “Alberto, Alberto, Alberto…”; then the usual music started up again, drowning everything else.

He knelt down, took a piece of David’s dry dung and some straw and mixed them together to make two small balls that he stuffed into his ears, then lay down on the floor and, with the muffled noise filling his head, looked inside himself. He found himself in an empty church, stripped of all trace of the thousands who had once prayed there so earnestly. Vetch had climbed the pillars and water dripping from the roof had formed stalactites of red lime that hung down like scraps of ulcerated flesh. A wooden candelabrum was the only altar fitting. There were no pictures on the walls, only shirts, pants, and dresses tacked up with old nails. There was a door into the sacristy from the aisle to the right. It was open, and a rocking sound emanated from the room.

When he opened his eyes, Leonardo could see shadows projected against the wall of trees that marked the edge of the forest.

“Once people used to read your books, and now you dance for kids and suck bones like a dog.”

“That’s how it is.”

“But why do that?”

“For her.”

“She’s not here.”

“She’ll come back.”

“Are you so sure?”

“I shall dance and suck bones until she comes back, and I shall be here for her.”

He turned his back on the dancing shadows and closed his eyes. The church was dark and he could hear footsteps wandering in the aisles; the footsteps of Manon and Sergio and their child. “I’m here,” he said. “Don’t be afraid.”

In the morning, when everyone was asleep, the cripple opened the door and ushered the little boy into the cage.

“You’ll stay here for a bit,” he said, then went away without a glance at Leonardo or the sleeping elephant. Leonardo looked at the child: he had some sort of soft encrustation in his hair but did not seem to have been injured. But he was clearly very tired. Tired and dirty. Infinitely tired, dirty, and depressed.