The Tenant and The Motive Read online

  Contents

  The Tenant

  I

  II

  III

  IV

  V

  VI

  VII

  VIII

  IX

  X

  XI

  XII

  XIII

  XIV

  XV

  XVI

  XVII

  XVIII

  XIX

  XX

  XXI

  The Motive

  I

  II

  III

  IV

  V

  VI

  VII

  VIII

  IX

  X

  A Note on the Author and Translator

  By the Same Author

  The Tenant

  ‘Have you never been in love?’

  ‘Yes. With you.’

  ‘And how do you love me?’

  ‘With this.’

  ‘That’s your liver.’

  ‘Sorry, that’s not what I meant. I love you with my heart.’

  SILVERIO LANZA

  I

  Mario Rota went out for a run at eight o’clock on Sunday morning. He immediately noticed the street was suffused in a halo of mist: the houses opposite, the cars parked by the sidewalk and the globes of light from the street lamps seemed to shimmer with an unstable and hazy existence. He did a few arm and leg stretches on the tiny rectangle of lawn in front of the house and thought: Fall’s here already. Instinctively, while jumping up and down and pulling his knees up to his chest, he reconsidered. He told himself September had barely begun, and vague threats flitted through his mind of ecological catastrophes. The initial symptoms, according to a well-known Italian weekly he’d been reading on the plane, on the way back from his summer vacation, would be a gradual disruption to each season’s normal weather conditions. After this worrying reflection he smiled somewhat incongruously. He went back inside and came out again a moment later, this time with his glasses on. The mist having dissolved, Mario began to run along the path of greyish flagstones between the road and the meticulous gardens, enclosed by flowerbeds and wooden fences lined up in front of the houses.

  Although the difficult relationship he maintained with reality withheld any benefits that might have resulted, Mario was a fanatic for order: when he went out for a run each morning he followed an identical itinerary. Last year he ran up West Oregon, crossing Coler, McCollough and Birch, turned left on Race and kept going till Lincoln Square, an early twentieth-century plaza dominated by the mass of new stone and strange capitals of the First United Methodist Church. There he took Springfield, now on the way back, past automotive repair shops, banks, supermarkets and pizzerias, and when he got to Busey, turned left again and carried on until arriving back at West Oregon. This year, however, he’d decided to modify his route. Since he’d resumed his morning jogging routine, having returned from his vacation two days earlier, he ran in the opposite direction: now he turned left on McCollough, where the First Church of Christ Scientist stood at the corner of West Oregon, and headed towards the west of the city, crossing Nevada, Washington and Orchard. Then he ran along Pennsylvania to the end, where it was cut off by Lafayette Avenue; beyond that he ran across a grass field and up a gentle slope topped with a bare spot. Mario stopped for a moment at the crest, inhaled and exhaled deliberately, trying to keep his breathing regular, briefly admired the scenery and then took the same route back: colonial two-storey wooden houses painted white, red or olive-green, with ironwork screen-doors and garden fences covered with creepers; brick bungalows with sloping roofs; big mansions converted into student residences; squirrels swarming walnut, plane and chestnut trees, their profuse branches occasionally obstructing the paths of greyish flagstones running between the road and the meticulous gardens.

  II

  It was eight o’clock on Sunday morning. The streets were deserted. The only person he saw during the first five minutes of his run was a young woman crouched down beside an anemone bush in the back garden of the First Church of Christ Scientist, as he was turning right on to McCollough. The girl turned: she bared her teeth in a devout smile. Mario felt obliged to return the greeting: he smiled. Later, by then on Pennsylvania, he crossed paths with a grey-haired man in shorts and a black T-shirt, who was jogging in the opposite direction. The man’s expression seemed concentrated on a buzzing emitted from two earphones fed from a cassette player strapped to his waist. After that came a postal truck, an old, bandy-legged black man, who supported his decrepit steps with a wooden walking stick, a young woman with diligent Oriental features, a family having a boisterous breakfast on the front porch, complete with laughter and parental warnings. When, on the way home, he turned back on to West Oregon, the city seemed to have resumed its daily pulse.

  That’s when he twisted his ankle.

  Since he was feeling agile and keeping his breathing even, he picked up the pace for the last part of his run. When he got to West Oregon he tried to take a little short cut by jumping over a bed of dahlias. He landed badly: his left instep took the weight of his whole body. At first he felt a piercing pain and thought he’d broken his foot. With some difficulty, sitting on the lawn, he took off his running shoe and sock, checked that his ankle wasn’t swollen. The pain soon eased and Mario told himself that with any luck the mishap wouldn’t matter at all. He put his sock and shoe back on, stood up and began to walk carefully. A sharp pain tore through his ankle.

  He arrived home with an obvious limp. On the porch, accompanied by a man, was Mrs Workman.

  ‘Mr Rota, what happened?’ said the woman with alarm, pointing at Mario’s ankle. ‘You’re limping.’

  Mrs Workman was a tiny old woman, a widow with white curly hair, scrawny hands and lively green eyes. She was also Mario’s landlady.

  ‘Nothing serious,’ said Mario, grabbing on to the railing to pull himself up the porch steps. Neither Mrs Workman nor the man came to help him. ‘I just twisted my ankle in the most idiotic way.’

  ‘I hope it’s not serious,’ said Mrs Workman.

  ‘It won’t be,’ said Mario, as he reached the top of the steps.

  Mrs Workman changed her tone.

  ‘I’m so pleased to have bumped into you, Mr Rota,’ she said, stretching out a hand: Mario felt as if he was shaking a bundle of dry skin and bones. ‘Let me introduce Mr Berkowickz. Barring unforeseen circumstances he’ll be the new tenant of the apartment across from yours, where Nancy used to live.’

  ‘Nancy’s moved?’ asked Mario.

  ‘She was offered a job in Springfield,’ said Mrs Workman. ‘A good job. I’m happy for her, she’s a nice girl; I loved her like a daughter. I suppose you’ll also be pleased that Nancy’s moved to Springfield,’ she added ambiguously.

  ‘Of course,’ Mario agreed hurriedly.

  ‘As for her apartment,’ Mrs Workman went on, looking at the new tenant with eyes that sought confirmation of her words, ‘I got the impression Mr Berkowickz was pleased with it.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Berkowickz said. ‘It’s exactly what I need.’

  He paused, then looked at Mario. ‘Besides,’ he added, ‘I’m sure I’ve found the perfect neighbour.’

  Berkowickz cited the title of the only specialist article Mario had published in the last three years, in Italica. Smiling and turning to Mrs Workman, he declared that he and Mario were colleagues, researching matters of a similar nature, and that they’d undoubtedly be working in the same university department. Mrs Workman could not hide the satisfaction this happy coincidence gave her: a surprised smile lit up her face. Only then did Mario take a good look at Berkowickz. He was a tall, broad-shouldered man with suntanned skin and a f
rank expression in his eyes; his incipient baldness didn’t contradict the youthful air his face exuded. He was dressed with elegance but without affectation. Otherwise, his appearance was less that of a university professor than of an elite athlete. But perhaps his most striking feature was his solid self-confidence revealed by each and every one of his gestures, as if he’d planned them in advance, or as if they were ruled by necessity.

  ‘I assumed,’ Berkowickz went on in the same cordial though distant tone of voice, ‘that Professor Scanlan would have announced my arrival.’

  He said he’d decided to take up the university’s offer last month and had only signed the contract two weeks ago. He was sure the misunderstanding would soon be cleared up, although, he added, they shouldn’t be surprised: summer vacations easily lend themselves to these kinds of mix-ups. Finally, he was delighted it had all led in some way to this meeting, as pleasant as it was unexpected.

  Berkowickz brought these words to a close with a tidy smile. Mrs Workman joined the new tenant in his optimism with a sort of clucking that for an instant threatened to dismantle her fragile frame of skin and bones. Mario felt uncomfortable: the blood of all his veins was throbbing in his ankle. Soaked in sweat, his T-shirt clung to his chest, and his armpits stung. Brushing against the grass had made his legs itch.

  Mario forced a smile.

  ‘I’m sure it’ll all be cleared up,’ he said. ‘And I’m absolutely delighted we’re going to be neighbours.’

  Mrs Workman and Berkowickz remained silent. Mario supposed he’d better add something.

  ‘Well.’ He smiled again, spread his arms in an apologetic gesture. ‘I’m going to go have a shower now. I’m at your service if there’s anything I can do to help,’ he added, looking at Berkowickz.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Berkowickz. ‘If Mrs Workman has no objections, I’ll move in this very afternoon. I’ll let you know if I need anything.’

  ‘OK,’ said Mario. ‘In any case, I suppose we’ll see each other tomorrow in the department. And in the evening there’s a cocktail party at the boss’s house.’

  ‘Excellent,’ said Berkowickz, smiling. ‘See you tomorrow. And take care of that ankle.’

  ‘Yes,’ chimed in Mrs Workman. ‘Do look after your ankle, Mr Rota. Sometimes life gets complicated by the silliest little things.’

  III

  Mario had a shower when he got home. After carefully examining the injured ankle, he took an anti-inflammatory spray and cream out of the cabinet and applied them to the swollen area. Then he made breakfast (peach juice, scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, coffee with hot milk) and ate hungrily while listening to the news on the radio.

  He washed the dishes and went to his study. Sitting at his desk, he wrote out a few cheques for overdue bills (water, gas, electricity) and sealed them in envelopes ready to be mailed. Then he read over various circulars from the university and the department, threw a couple of them in the wastepaper basket and filed the rest away. He made a note in his diary of the telephone calls he should make the following day from the office, he outlined the plans for the courses he’d probably be teaching that semester and postponed a more detailed design until the department had confirmed them. Classes began on Wednesday: he’d spend Tuesday preparing for them.

  At eleven-thirty he went into the living room. He put on a record, opened a can of beer, sprawled out in the armchair in front of the television and lit a cigarette, trying to ignore the annoying tingling sensation in his foot.

  Then he thought of Berkowickz.

  At first he felt flattered that he’d known his article, the only one Mario had published since finishing his doctorate; but the flimsy research, to which Mario was the first to admit, as much as the utterly undistinguished quarterly where it had been published, made him think again. He came up with just two hypotheses to explain Berkowickz’s curious erudition: either he’d recently been working in the same area as Mario had been when he’d written the article, in which case he’d perhaps felt obliged to examine everything published on the subject in recent years, however insufficient or faulty it might be, or else he belonged to that limited caste of academics who, solely for intellectual pleasure or to satisfy their curiosity, read through the regular publications with morose assiduousness and keep up to date on any and all investigations in their field of interest. Mario discarded the second notion out of hand, not only because it didn’t fit with the impression Berkowickz had made on him, but also because in such a case the new tenant would undoubtedly be notorious in the profession, and truth was his name didn’t even ring a bell with Mario. This conclusion comforted him.

  There was not the slightest doubt, in any case, that Berkowickz was aware of the unrefined intellectual bouquet of Mario’s work – unless he only knew the title of the article or had merely leafed through it distractedly without gaining an appreciation of the poverty of its contents. This fact, however, did not worry him: though it was certain to put him in a slightly uncomfortable situation vis-à-vis Berkowickz, it was no less certain that his departmental colleagues (among them Scanlan, who was, all things considered, the only one who mattered) would never read the article, as they hadn’t read the ones he’d published before nor would they in all probability read the ones he would publish in the future. There was nothing, therefore, to worry about. Furthermore, it was unlikely, according to his earlier reasoning, that Berkowickz would turn out to be anything more than a novice in the profession; from there it could be hoped that his own work might be either immature and incipient, or as mediocre as Mario’s. If, to either of those two possibilities, he added the knowledge Mario possessed of the explicit and implicit rules that governed the mechanics of the department, the result was that he found himself in an advantageous position in respect to Berkowickz.

  He got up from the armchair, turned over the record and sat back down again. He took a long drink of beer, lit another cigarette. Then he tried to foresee the immediate consequences Berkowickz’s arrival might produce. According to his contract, Mario taught two phonology courses per semester; in practice, however, they’d always ended up turning into three, rounding his annual salary up to a satisfactory sum. If, as happened the previous year, the department didn’t manage to attract a sufficient number of students to fill three classes, they’d come to a tacit agreement by which Mario would teach a course in another speciality, either semantics, syntax or morphology. So, three classes were practically guaranteed. Seen from this basic perspective, the presence of Berkowickz could not alter things in any essential way: in all probability, the new professor, recently arrived in the department and therefore with fewer rights, less experience and, surely, with a more skeletal curriculum vitae even than Mario’s, would take one of the phonology courses he regularly taught, completing his workload with one of the leftovers from the other specialities. As for Mario, he’d undoubtedly add to his two courses – leaving aside the possibility, which they’d considered in the first semester of the previous year, of opening a fourth phonology class – a third in semantics, syntax or morphology, or else – which might even be preferable – some administrative work, not only ensuring his income would not suffer from Berkowickz’s arrival, but might well benefit from it.

  After this series of petty reflections, the vague anxiety planted by the aggressively optimistic and healthy air the new tenant had brandished on the porch dissolved into a sort of pity not lacking in sympathy. And although he didn’t deny that Berkowickz could eventually become a threat to the preservation of his privacy – for Mario considered the separation of work and private life indispensable, on a par with an adequate salary – nothing led him to believe that it might make him feel uncomfortable or, in the last resort, oblige him to toy with the possibility of moving to a new apartment, especially since the one he occupied now satisfied him from every point of view. Not only was it located in a nice residential area relatively close to campus, but it also had a veranda, back yard and garage, and furthermore, he’d managed, with some effort, to furn
ish it entirely to his taste during the year he’d been living there.

  The apartment consisted of a study, living room, bedroom, kitchen and bathroom. As well as the typewriter and computer, there was a dark oak table in the study, with drawers on both sides, which served as his desk, a filing cabinet, several bookshelves; there was also a wicker armchair, an easy chair and a few other places to sit. The bedroom furnishings were sparse: two closets built into the back wall with full-length mirrors on the doors, a chest of drawers made of a pale wood against the right-hand wall across from the bed, which was covered with a deep red eiderdown. An extension of one wall divided the living room in two. On the left-hand side was a pale wooden table surrounded by metal chairs; two vaguely cubist pictures hung on the walls, along with a poster for an exhibition of the work of Toulouse-Lautrec in a gallery in Turin. On the right-hand side of the living room there was a television, a record-player, a cream-coloured sofa, two armchairs of a similar colour but different design, a transparent, low double-decker table (through the top level periodicals, books and magazines piled on the lower level were visible); hanging from a hook on the wall was a reproduction of a medium-sized Hockney painting. Separating this part of the room from the dining area was a glass cabinet crammed with valuable and not so valuable objects: a marble elephant, an Algerian pipe, an hourglass, three antique pistols, a frigate imprisoned in a Chianti bottle, several clay figures and other trifles that Mario had collected over the years with neither acquisitive nor sentimental zeal. Except for those of the kitchen and bathroom, the walls of the house were covered with grainy wood panelling; the baseboard and door and window frames were painted white.

  He could not have found the apartment more satisfactory, which was why Mario considered it foolishness even to raise the possibility of leaving it, for no other reason than the fact that a colleague had suddenly turned into a neighbour. Furthermore, he thought optimistically, it’s hard to imagine I’ll be worse off for the change. There was no doubt that Nancy had been at the very least an annoying neighbour. She was an untidily stout woman, careless about her appearance, with dry, straw-coloured hair, quite ugly but at the same time endowed with an obvious and aggressive sexuality. The feminist ideas and prejudices against Latin men that Nancy brought up in any conversation, no matter how casual or brief (on the stairway, taking out the garbage, while washing the car), had not facilitated pacific cohabitation in the building. Otherwise, the strange affection Mrs Workman professed for her translated into a blind trust that had always made Mario feel uncomfortable, for it put him in an awkward position not only each time Nancy accused him of getting drunk on his own, but also when she denounced him to Mrs Workman for spying on her whenever a man entered her apartment, especially at night. On another occasion, Mrs Workman and the rest of the tenants in the building – a married couple of Belgian origin, and a young woman who worked in the admissions office at the university – had to intercede to keep Nancy from filing an official complaint with the police for his alleged sexual aggression: she insisted she’d caught him masturbating behind the curtain in his living room while she was sunbathing on a lounge chair in the back yard.