Ilja Pfeijffer - La Superba

This brings me to another matter. I received your money order. Many thanks again for that. It makes me feel good to know that there’s someone left back home who understands that temporary financial problems can be solved elegantly. My self-sought loss of status in foreign climes comes with certain material repercussions in the short term. I’m no longer available for commercials and I no longer give readings. And that was exactly enough and I’m grateful for your understanding. You’re a true friend.

And something else: I’ve just learned from my accountant how much the tax authorities in the fatherland want from me despite all the things I did for my former fatherland in the past. There isn’t the slightest chance I can meet their obligation. But I don’t want to bother you with that.

4.

There are women who go somewhere and sit down, and there are others who make an appearance. This second type can be divided into two categories, too. There are those who make a haughty appearance a chic hour and a half late to splice the world with a glance, and there are those who approach with an expansive display of power and forcefully request with a false smile the place she deserves. Film stars and duchesses, that would be an easy way of summing up the dichotomy. The difference between knock-knees and awe, hope and fear, wet dreams and nightmares. What they have in common is that they are goddesses in the depths of their minds and that every man believes in her because she believes in herself. Whenever she makes her appearance, people stand up spluttering excuses to give her the most comfortable seat, which she’ll sit down in with such stunning matter-of-factness without thinking for a second to thank the person who made the sacrifice for her or even deigning to look at him, thereby reducing him to the worm he is while giving the rest of the company ample time to gape at her.

Since the beginning of the summer, there has been a blonde woman who makes an appearance as a duchess almost every day on the terrace of Caffè Letterario on Piazza delle Erbe. Just as Her Majesty’s arrival in former times was announced by a chorus of trumpets, her appearance is preceded by her barking lapdog, which isn’t on a leash and which runs along ahead of her barking hysterically because it has learned by now that Caffè Letterario’s terrace is a place where they serve aperitif snacks that little dogs can cajole for themselves if they look cute enough, or, if that doesn’t work, tenaciously make it clear with irritating barking that the only way to shut them up is with a tasty morsel. She follows along at an appropriate distance. She has long, blonde, frizzy curls that stand out quite noticeably among this Mediterranean constellation and wraps herself as a rule in long, loose garments. She’s of an indeterminate age above sixty. She walks just a little too slowly, as though suffering from physical discomfort, and along with this, the smile she bestows on everyone who stares at her is a little too forced, as though to show that she’s a brave, strong woman who won’t be daunted by physical discomfort. But both the painfully slow walk and the fake smile she tries to mask are put-on. She is consummate phoniness. Although there’s nothing wrong with her, she plays the role of someone who is smiling bravely to show there’s nothing wrong with her.

When she finally reaches the terrace and the dog is jumping up at her barking enthusiastically, her gaze grows fixed. There are actually a few tables free but they don’t come up to her strict requirements. As everyone in her duchy ought to know, she drinks dry martini cocktails, and these are served in low wide glasses with a stem and filled up to the brim. That’s why it would be impossible for her to sit down at a sloping table. That almost every table on the slightly sloping medieval cobblestones of Piazza delle Erbe is sloping is no excuse in her eyes. And as she stands there in a posture that radiates head-shaking incomprehension at the shocking lack of class awareness in her subjects, one of the waitresses comes running outside to set up a new table especially, while uttering exhaustive apologies. “Thank you, waitress,” she says without looking at her, before draping herself over her chair with a sigh.

Her whole attitude doesn’t suggest that she has come to Piazza delle Erbe to merely enjoy drinking dry martini cocktails — she is granting an audience. Sitting there the whole evening drinking while her lapdog barks incessantly is a favor she bestows on the people out of kindness and generosity. When no one appears to lap up her wisdom, which sometimes happens for unknown reasons, she reaches for her mobile phone to provide random victims from her almost endless list of contacts with unrequested hours of good advice. She adopts a pained smile when confronted with so much ignorance at the other end of the line and is visibly impressed with herself for not losing her patience while she generously explains for the nth time how the world works, if you look at it objectively. She understands every imaginable topic: politics and spirituality, men and dogs, gastronomy and health, astrology and ethics, interior decorating and exorcism, psychology and the weather — and when anyone else offers a different opinion on these subjects she considers it a waste of her precious time. Worse still, it’s a failure to appreciate the inexhaustible well of knowledge she delves into and, in fact, nothing less than an insult to the generosity with which she imparts it to those lucky individuals, but she’ll hide her disappointment at so much ungratefulness behind a fake smile that actually means she’s hiding her disappointment at so much ungratefulness. She’ll never ask a question because she knows all the answers, even to the questions we’ve never asked ourselves. If it had been up to her, she could have solved everyone else’s problems before they even happened. Her thankless vocation is to explain everything, to just keep on explaining everything over and over again to the deaf ears of the blind populace because she is, as we ought to know, a good person.

And as soon as anyone sits down at her table, the true source of her wisdom is revealed. It’s her voluminous handbag, along with other objects that she lugs around with her each day that mark her out as a woman of the world, prepared for anything — like a glue gun, mace, a spare wig, a roll of barbed wire, a goldfish bowl, underwear in all sizes, an angle grinder, and a spirit level. And what she fishes out of the bottom of her bag are the Major Arcana.

For a dry martini cocktail or five euros in cash, she’ll read your cards. In Italian they are called tarocchi —elsewhere, tarot. She has a large pack of cards with the most traditional illustrations and they are well used, anyone can see that from a few feet away. And the people who make use of her services aren’t all superstitious old women, who are beyond rescue in any case. A remarkable number of uncertain young women turn up at her table. For them, five euros or the equivalent in martini is a serious amount of money. She shakes her old, wise head of frizzy blonde curls as they drink in her every word, shaking with nerves in the hope of catching a glimmer of good news about their future, or, if that’s not possible, an ambiguous phrase that might also be interpreted positively with a bit of good will. Unfortunately, the cards leave no room for doubt. All character failings are visible and mistakes made in the past will be avenged and hope is an expression of naïveté or ignorance. And she can see in the cards that a young man will soon announce himself, but there isn’t anything good to be expected from him, either. The witch smiles apologetically. The girl has to understand that she, unlike the many charlatans, doesn’t beat about the bush. She tells them what the cards say, even when the message is tough. This is proof of her goodness. The girl goes up to the register, salty tears on her cheeks, to pay for one cocktail. She had hoped for better news, but still, she’s grateful. Now at least she knows the truth. And that’s worth more than wishful thinking. Isn’t it?