‘I’m sorry,’ says the girl. ‘You’re mistaken.’
I listen to her without batting
an eyelid, nodding my head as if being mistaken were the most natural thing in
the world. Because there’s no other explanation. I’ve made a mistake. And I do
a quick mental run through all the other times I might have made a little
mistake and I can’t think of anything that comes close. But I shouldn’t blame
myself. I’m tired, bogged down with work and, to cap it all, I’m not sleeping
properly. This morning, in fact, I almost called my landlord. Why on earth did
he rent out the apartment upstairs to such a noisy family? But what’s uppermost
in my mind now has nothing to do with the neighbours or the landlord or my
tiredness, it’s all to do with the weird experience I seem to have had just
half an hour ago. A mixture of unease and conviction that made me rush out of a
shoe shop and run down the street after a woman who I insisted on calling Dina.
And the woman ignored me and walked on without paying any attention to me.
Because it wasn’t Dina. Or at least, that’s what the real Dina Dachs says,
sitting opposite me at her tidy desk, wearing the same innocent smile as she
had when she received the offer of a permanent position with the firm just a
week ago. ‘No,’ she says, ‘I’ve haven’t left my desk since nine o’clock this
morning.’ And then, shaking her head sympathetically, she adds, ‘I’m sorry.
You’re mistaken.’
Yes. Now I understand that it
must have been a mistake. Because, although I’m still astonished by the
likeness, the girl in front of me is just an ordinary girl, well mannered,
polite, an efficient secretary. And the woman, the unknown woman I’ve just run
after down in the street, had a face that bore the scars of a lifetime of
suffering, with a cold, enigmatic stare that never wavered, in spite of me
shouting and the crowds shoving past me in a busy shopping street the day
before a holiday. And that must have been what caught my attention, what made
me think that the woman (who I thought was Dina) was having a turn, a momentary
loss of identity and wasn’t quite all there. But now I know that I was only
half-mistaken. Because the unknown woman, whoever she was, did need help. And I
look at Dina once more, at her angora jumper and her winter coat that’s hanging
up on the coat stand and I think of the woman again. She was wearing a green
silk dress in the middle of December. A thin party dress with a plunging
neckline and she had a violet necklace around her neck. Indifferent to the
cold, the traffic, the crowds. I leave it at that. The fact that I’ve mistaken
a mad woman for this girl makes me smile. And I shut myself away in my office,
leave the shopping on a chair and start to go through my correspondence. It
will be a busy month, but it’s only one month. And then I’ll be in Rome, with
Eduardo. I’m happy. I have every reason in the world to be happy.
Neither of the two pairs of shoes
fits me properly. One pair is too narrow, they pinch my feet and I have to
scrunch my toes up. The problem with the others is the complete opposite. I
have to scrunch up my toes as well but the end result is very different. The
shoes are like barges refusing to be steered and won’t do as they’re told, my
feet slipping and sliding inside them. It’s too late to go back home now so I
decide that I’ll just have to choose between the two forms of torture. I opt
for the second one, but I don’t do it lightly. Half an hour from now I have to
go to a work dinner. That’s why I came to the office all dressed up and that’s
also why I went to the shoe shop earlier. It was silly of me to buy them. I was
in too much of a hurry. I’ll return the ones that are too narrow tomorrow.
Because now I realise that I’m not in the least bit hungry and in a half hour’s
time I’ll have to sit down and eat. I’ve had to suffer this form of torture
ever since I became a successful executive, although it’s nothing like the
mirror opposite (starving with hunger and having nothing to eat) and that often
makes me feel ashamed. That’s why I choose the slidey gondola shoes (I can’t
explain why but they seem better suited for what’s in store for me) and that’s
how I turn up at the restaurant, right on the dot, dragging my feet and not in
the least bit hungry. I feel sick when I look at the menu. It’s a ridiculous
feeling. Boorish. Just as the ten dinner guests seem boorish too, talking about
their secretaries in a conspiratorial tone and about their wives with a certain
respectful admiration. Just as the shoes, which I slipped off a while ago and
left on the carpet, seem ridiculous as well. All I can do is wait for the
dinner to be over and done with and hope that at some point someone will
mention Eduardo, the last time they saw Eduardo, how well everything’s turning
out for Eduardo. Luckily it doesn’t take long for someone to oblige. They ask
me about the branch we’ve just opened in Rome and (even though when I mention
Eduardo I call him “the boss”) I feel a slight sense of relief at being able to
think about him out loud, despite the fact that what I’m saying doesn’t
actually have anything to do with what I’m really thinking. But they don’t know
that. Nobody, not even our work colleagues, could have the faintest suspicion
about my relationship with Eduardo. No one in the office and of course no one
at home (I mean his home). And sometimes I like to think that even Eduardo
himself isn’t too clear about our relationship. I don’t care what his wife
would say if she knew about it, but I do care what Eduardo might think, and
that’s my strongest weapon. Eduardo doesn’t think. He doesn’t think of me as
his lover, even though that’s the word that would best describe our situation,
and I’d rather he didn’t think of me as his lover. Eduardo is scared of words.
Words and his wife. That’s why, for once in his life, he’s found the courage to
cheat on her, without even managing to say to himself, ‘I’m cheating on her’.
As far as the dinner guests are concerned I just went to the same college as my
boss. I’m his right-hand woman. That’s what his wife thinks, too. And that’s
what I want them to carry on thinking. What’s more, I can play the part to
perfection. When anyone asks me who’ll be in charge of the office in Rome I
shrug my shoulders. Eduardo’s over there, hiring a team. Eduardo will oversee
the work for the first year, commuting between here and there. Then, when he
finds the right person, he’ll leave it all in their hands. Most likely it will
be an Italian. And I think about an apartment in Trastevere. A life of freedom
with no schedules, no family, his wife thousands of kilometres away. Someone
tells me that I seem to not be eating, I’ve hardly had a mouthful, and he trots
out the line that “a woman who doesn’t enjoy her food…”, and I take the
opportunity all of a sudden to remember an important call. A business call,
naturally. My feet search out my abandoned shoes, I scrunch up my toes and
leave the table. But instead of going to the telephone I go to the toilet. I
splash some water on my face and dry myself off with a paper towel. Then, when
I’m about to touch up my make-up, I see her again.
I’m sure I did. I’ve hardly eaten
anything but then again I’ve had a lot to drink. But she was there for a
moment, a few seconds. I saw her quite clearly. Her green dress, her violet
necklace, her cold, enigmatic stare. I don’t know whether she opened the door
and then left the minute she saw me. I don’t know if she was already there when
I came in. It all happened so quickly. I was drying my face with the paper
towel, trying out the three-way mirror, checking my hair, my face and she
passed by the mirror in a green flash, like a cloud of breath evaporating in the
cold air. I readjust the mirrors, opening and closing the wings and, still in a
state of shock, I manage to capture her for a few seconds. The woman is there.
Behind me, beside me, I’m not too sure. I turn around quickly but only to see
the door closing. ‘She ran away when she saw me,’ I think. And I can’t help
remembering those eyes. A cold stare – enigmatic – but also, I now realise,
full of hatred.
Dina Dachs is just like any other girl. That’s
what I tell myself in the morning and again in the afternoon. In the evening I
take the file with all the details of the new employees home with me. There are
five of them altogether. They all have similar CVs, they’re all the same age
and they all have the same prospects for promotion in the firm. Dina has a
slight advantage. She speaks three languages fluently, has excellent references
and was remarkably adept at filling in our application form. That’s why she was
the first candidate I chose. That’s why, I realise now, I remembered her name
so clearly that day I ran down the street after the woman in green. But then
Dina Dachs is a difficult name to forget, perhaps because it doesn’t seem like
a real name. It makes me think of a pseudonym, a stage name, DINA DACHS
emblazoned across the front of a variety theatre in gigantic letters, cabaret
stars. I’m not sure what to think any more. With the constant din from the
neighbours upstairs I can’t get my thoughts in order. I’ll complain about them
tomorrow, I’ll have a word with the landlord or I’ll move. And tomorrow I’ll
speak to Dina as well. Tactfully.
I’ve spent the whole day watching her,
studying her, monitoring her phone calls. I haven’t come across anything out of
the ordinary so far, nothing to make me suspect a double life, to explain her
strange appearances, first in the street and then in the restaurant. Dina tells
me she doesn’t go out in the evenings. She says so very calmly, not knowing
that it’s a trap question. She doesn’t mind staying on at the office, doing
overtime, getting everything up to date. She hardly knows anyone here in the
city. She doesn’t have any brothers or sisters or even parents. No brothers or
sisters? No, none. Then I ask her to make a reservation for this evening in a
particular restaurant the name of which, for some strange reason, has slipped
my mind. I tell her the street, the exact location, the revealing detail that
it has carpeted walls and the toilets have three-way mirrors. Dina doesn’t
usually eat out but it suddenly occurs to her that she could ask one of her
work colleagues. I leave her to it and, discreetly, listen at the door. She
doesn’t seem to be pretending. Then I dictate a letter to her, then a second
one and a third. They’re made-up letters that won’t be going out to anyone.
Their only purpose is to let me observe Dina, trap her in a corner, catch her
out in some way. She knows that what I’m dictating to her is completely absurd.
She also knows that I’m watching her all the time. At one point, flustered, she
instinctively smoothes her skirt down and uncrosses her legs. I make an excuse
that the room is full of smoke and open the window. It’s cold outside. It’s a
biting cold, almost as icy as the silence that has just come down between the
two of us. It’s all getting embarrassing. I’m going to turn around, tell her to
go home, she’s done enough for today, she should go home. But I can’t find the
words. For the first time in my life I get vertigo, looking down from the fifth
floor. Because she’s there. I can’t believe my eyes, but the woman is standing
there, on the street corner opposite. I can see her green dress, the violet
necklace, her hesitant figure standing out amid the bustle of the street. She
looks like a beggar. Her dress strap has slipped off one of her shoulders. Her
hair’s in a mess, she’s all dishevelled, she looks like she’s going to freeze
to death at any moment. And her arm’s raised, stock still. But from the way
she’s standing she doesn’t look like she’s begging. Unless she’s mad. Or drunk.
Or unless her arm is pointing at nobody else but me. Here, on the fifth floor,
looking out of my office window.
‘Anything else?’ asks a tired voice behind me.
I ask Dina to come over to the
window. I make room for her and point to the exact place where she should look.
‘The beggar woman,’ I say. ‘That beggar woman over there.’ A bus stops right in
front of the woman in green. I wait for it to move off. The woman appears now
and again behind the cars. ‘Have a good look. There she is. No, she’s gone now.
Wait…’ Without realising it I’ve clutched her shoulder. She gets annoyed and
moves away from the window.
‘I can’t see a thing,’ she says.
She’s angry, cross. As she leaves
she does something that no other secretary would have dared to do. She snaps
the door shut behind her, almost slams it.
I can’t discuss what’s worrying
me with anyone. Eduardo’s still in Rome, with his wife. I know it’s a
consolation prize, a non-event, a clever tactic to enable him to engage in his
forthcoming project without a guilty conscience. But I also know I mustn’t call
him. His wife will be with him. She’ll be in the hotel, in the office,
everywhere. I can’t confide in anyone else either because I’m not sure how to
go about it. I briefly think about talking to Cesca, the firm’s longest-serving
employee. Cesca likes and respects me. But Cesca likes to snoop around, poke
her nose into other people’s business, pass around comments, spread gossip.
Even so, if the woman in green appears again tomorrow, why would it seem
strange if I asked Cesca to look out of the window? ‘Look at that woman. She’s
been loitering around here for days now. It’s as if something strange is
happening to her.’ And then Cesca, putting on her glasses, would tell me that
she’s just a beggar woman, there’s so many tramps on the streets around this
time of the year, maybe she’s mad, or a lush, or a prostitute. Maybe all three.
And then, looking more closely, Cesca would realise that she reminds her of
someone. She can’t quite put her finger on who, but she does remind her of
someone. Or she’d call the concierge. And the concierge would go out to
investigate. Or perhaps there’s no need. ‘She’s mentally disturbed,’ she might
say. ‘Either that or she’s faking it. She always turns up around here at
Christmas. People give her money because they’re scared of her.’ But I haven’t
seen anyone stop to give her any money. In fact, from up here on the fifth
floor, all I’ve seen is her down there in her green dress and her arm raised,
pointing towards me, asking me for something, telling me something. And I’ve
also seen Dina. Next to me, leaning on the window sill while I pointed towards
the beggar woman. I say this to myself several times. The beggar woman down
there, in the street. Dina next to me. This should be enough to reassure me and
to put it all down to pure chance, a coincidence, a striking resemblance, to
realise that it’s impossible for the same woman to be in two places at once.
But then there’s that look in her eyes. Brushing my arm off her shoulder,
flushing with anger, snapping the door shut. It’s all a question of degree, I
reflect. Because Dina Dachs’ look of irritation could so easily become the
woman in green’s angry stare. A cold, enigmatic stare. Full of hatred.
But I can’t blame her. For the
past few days all I’ve done is shower her with work, telling her to do one
thing and then the opposite, calling her into my office or bursting into hers
and making sure she’s still there, buried under a mountain of paperwork,
grappling with accounts, documents, reports. It reassures me to know she’s busy
and that it will still take her ages to finish the day’s tasks, that she’ll
probably be the last one to leave the office at night. And meanwhile I think
about the woman in green. I wait at the window for the woman in green to
appear, holding the telephone in my hand, ready to call Cesca or the concierge.
But not Dina. Dina’s not like the other girls. I’ve realised that after
spending so much time watching her. Dina’s proud and dignified, and God only
knows how long she’s going to endure the pressure I’m putting her under without
facing me out. I know that I’m beginning to seriously annoy her and I also now
know that Dina’s much more charming than she comes off as at first. She’s one
of those calm, reserved women who win you over with time. So I confine Dina to
her office and wait. Staring out of the office window, I wait.
She doesn’t make the appearance I was
expecting the next day nor the one after that. All the work that I can’t manage
I delegate to Dina. From my place at the window I can hear her typing
frenetically in her office next door, but I’m not thinking about her anymore
and I don’t care what she thinks about my behaviour either. All my senses are
attuned to the prospective appearance of the woman in green. Maybe, I think,
the poor amnesiac has got her memory back. Or she’s frozen to death. Or the
local police have taken her away. I sit in my armchair and decide to call
Cesca. ‘I don’t feel well,’ I’m going to say. ‘You’re in charge until
tomorrow.’ But I don’t even get to dial her number. Suddenly I feel cold. It’s
a damp, biting coldness behind me and it makes me react, realise that I really
do feel ill and that it’s sheer madness to keep the window open in the middle
of December. A gust of wind makes the pile of papers flutter around the room. I
haven’t given that pile of papers the slightest thought for days and I’m not
going to be distracted from my mission now. I turn around suddenly, although I
already suspect that the sudden rush of cold has little to do with the bad
weather at this time of the year or with the state of my nerves. The woman is
down there. Across the road, on the corner. She seems resolute, determined,
about to cross the road towards me. She dodges between the cars as if by a
miracle. With her arm raised, always pointing towards me. The way she’s gone
downhill is pathetic. Her green dress is in tatters, leaving her breasts on
show and, suddenly, she’s not so much walking as staggering, unsteady and
grotesque. What could have made me think that this monstrosity looked like
Dina? I try to get a better look and leaning even further over the windowsill I
notice something green on one of her feet, only one of them, and then I
understand why she’s started to hobble. She’s lost the other shoe by the side
of the road. But nobody picks it up, nobody kicks it away, nobody trips over
it. Nobody, in short, takes pity on this poor woman and takes her to a place of
safety. City life is inhumane, cruel, pitiless. Frozen stiff, I close the
window and dial Cesca’s number. ‘I’m exhausted. Could you take over until tomorrow,
please?’ And I go home, take a sleeping pill and, for once, not even the
neighbours upstairs can stop me falling asleep.
It’s the same story every year on
23rd December. ‘I’m feeling exhausted, Cesca. I shan’t come in tomorrow.’ And
every Christmas Eve I do the same running around, the same searching, the same
wandering around the shops and department stores clutching a list of all the
employees’ names. It’s one of the firm’s traditions. A childish ritual that
starts with Cesca pretending to be worried about me supposedly not feeling very
well and the wink I can imagine at the other end of the telephone line, then
the “what will I get this year?” that I detect from everyone I come across as I
leave my office, put on my coat and let the concierge open the door for me. On
27th December they will all find a gift on their desk. Something personal, that
hits the spot, an inspired choice that was all down to me, but everyone without
exception will thank Eduardo for it, as if they knew that he’s the one who always
takes the most delight in this childish game, even though, like now, he happens
to be thousands of kilometres away and, as usual, doesn’t have a clue about
what they like, what they might need or what they might be interested in. I
remember Cesca’s spectacles. She’s always losing them and they turn up hidden
in some corner or in the most unlikely places, and I buy her a silver chain.
After her, there’s the caretaker, the concierge, the cleaning lady, the
messenger boy, the personnel manager, the new secretaries. I suddenly realise
that I scarcely know anything about the secretaries, having focussed on just
one of them. And I think about Dina. I wonder if perhaps she deserves a bigger
present. Something extra to apologise for unfairly taking advantage of her,
bullying her, bossing her around.
But wouldn’t that make her even
more confused? I decide that all five girls in the office have very similar
jobs and all of them will receive a similar gift. I go into department stores,
perfumeries, record shops. I’ve got all the cards in my bag, signed by Eduardo
and with the employees’ names already written out. That way I can put them
together with the presents as I go along, so there’s no risk of any mix ups and
in two days’ time everyone can show their surprise and admiration and gratitude
for Eduardo’s attention to detail, as if it were the first time ever. The same
as every year.
It’s bitterly cold on this
December afternoon but I’ve always liked cold December afternoons. Despite the
time of year and in spite of the shops’ bright lights, the Christmas carols and
the profusion of Christmas trees with all their decorations, there aren’t too
many people on the streets. So I can amble along and peruse the shop windows
quite calmly, in the same good mood as when I woke up this morning. Sleeping
pills. That’s the solution. An artificial sleep has let me recover from all
those hectic, tiring days. Now I can begin to see things in a different light.
Eduardo was expecting too much, leaving me in charge of the office for three
weeks. I’m not up to it. I don’t have the right temperament. My nerves were
shot. Who knows what blunders I could have made? But I’m happy now. For the
first time in days I feel happy and all of a sudden I realise I’m singing along
to a Christmas carol that’s being spat out by some loudspeaker in a nearby
shop. People must think I’m mad. I burst out laughing. And that’s when, like a
recurring nightmare, I see her again.
I’m not scared anymore and I
don’t feel tired. I’ve just had enough. I’ve had it up to here. I’m going to
follow her, get a good look at her, reassure myself that she’s just a tramp,
ask her if she needs any help. Now she’s leaving the well-lit avenue and turning
down a dark passageway. I run and almost catch up with her, then I hold back,
keeping a safe distance, watching her walk. She’s barefoot, gliding across the
cobbles like a cat. Her hair is a tangled mess. Her dress is in tatters. I
don’t call her by her name anymore because I don’t know her name. Suddenly she
stops dead, as if she were waiting for me. In spite of the dark I realise that
we aren’t in a passageway, as I’d thought, it’s a dead end. But it’s too late
to turn back now. My inertia has made me bump into her. ‘Excuse me,’ I say.
‘Just a moment, please. Listen.’ And then I’m mystified to find a piece of
green silk in my hand, a bit of moth-eaten material that disintegrates between
my fingers, and she turns and smiles at me. But it’s not a smile, it’s a
grimace. An awful rictus grin. And her breath! I’m enveloped in a fetid stench.
I feel sick, my senses cloud over. When I come to I’m alone, leaning against a
wall, with the shopping bags scattered across the ground. I’m not surprised to
find them still there. I pick them up one by one. Carefully, almost fondly. Now
I know who the woman is. And I think of Dina again. Poor Dina Dachs. Shut away
in her office, going back to her apartment, walking along the street. Because
Dina, wherever she happens to be at the moment, still doesn’t know that she’s
been dead for a very long time.
Or maybe I can still stop it. I forget all
about the dictates of reason, which have turned out to be useless, and for the
first time in my life I listen to a voice that comes from somewhere deep inside
myself. Dina, even though she may not have died yet, is dead. The woman in
green is the dead Dina. I’ve seen her decomposing, her impossible appearances
in busy streets, in three-way mirrors, in dead end streets. I think of mirages
on a hot beach. Maybe it hasn’t happened yet but it’s going to happen. And it’s
fallen to me, by some inexplicable chance of fate, to bear witness to these
strange events. It doesn’t stretch the imagination to conclude that I’m the
only one who can do something about it. And I don’t feel frightened. It’s
strange, but I don’t feel frightened, just resolute. So I do what I always do
on every Christmas Eve. I leave the employees’ presents in the caretaker’s
office, I check that none of the cards have come unstuck, remind him of exactly
what needs to be done in two days’ time. The caretaker, as ever, tells me not
to worry and sends me off, pretending he doesn’t know that one of the parcels
is for him, then he locks up his office and goes home. But I don’t go home. I
go outside and I walk a short way down the street, but there’s a light on up on
the fifth floor and I know who’s there, typing away, sorting out files, working
overtime again as a result of my ignorance and confusion. I open the street door
with my key and call the lift. When I get to the fifth floor landing I hesitate
for a moment. But I don’t ring the bell. All the lights are out except in one
office. I go in quietly, cautiously, because the last thing I want to do is
give her a shock. So I knock on her office door and wait.
‘Oh, it’s you,’ says Dina. But
she’s really thinking, ‘Not you, again.’
Dina has her coat on and there
are piles of papers, letters and files on her desk. ‘I was just about to
leave,’ she adds. She opens her handbag and puts in a couple of letters, snaps
it shut and then, since I haven’t moved away from the doorway, she says, ‘I
needn’t remind you it’s Christmas Eve.’
I draw on all my strength and ask
her to stay on for a moment. To sit down. To allow me a few minutes to tell her
something. Dina obeys me resentfully. With a sigh of annoyance, weariness,
disgust. She drums her fingers on the desk top.
‘I’m meeting friends on the other
side of town in fifteen minutes. Please be quick.’
I’m not put out by her arrogance.
Nothing that poor Dina does or says could upset me now. But I can’t find the
words. How can I explain that it’s not worth rushing? How can I make her
understand that, sometimes, time doesn’t follow the usual rules? Maybe it’s all
an illusion. We see things as we’ve been taught to see them. Her desk, for
example. Can we be sure that it’s a desk with four legs and a desk top? Who can
be sure that in fifteen minutes’ time she’ll be on the other side of town? A
quarter of an hour. It’s just a convention, isn’t it? A way of measuring,
pigeon-holing, tying down or controlling things that are beyond us, things we
don’t understand. An artifice to reassure us, so we don’t ask too many
questions.
‘I’d appreciate it,’ she says,
noticeably irritated, ‘if you would try to be more specific.’
But I can’t. I tell her that I’ve
just seen her in the street. ‘Again?’ she says, with a sarcastic sneer. ‘Don’t
you think you’re becoming totally obsessed?’ Any moment now she’s going to
explode, force me to leave the office, threaten to call the police. That’s why
I need to be quick. Yes, I saw her. Today and yesterday too, and the other day
in the restaurant, and that first time in the busy street. At first I thought
that she had something against me, was following me, searching me out. Later, I
thought that it wasn’t her, but someone who looked strikingly like her.
‘And now?’
Dina looks at me. She’s running
out of patience. I insist that she stays a little while longer. I take off a
glove and put it back on. I’m lost for words again. I don’t know how to tell
her. I don’t how to let her know that the process is irreversible. That less
than an hour ago, in the dead end alleyway, I saw the grimace of death on her
mouth with no lips, her fetid stench, her decomposing flesh. All I can manage is
to stutter out, ‘Be very careful, please. Maybe we can still stop it. Or delay
it, delay it for as long as possible.’
Dina has got to her feet.
‘I’m sorry. Everything you’ve
just told me is very interesting. But I have to go. Maybe you don’t have any
plans for tonight, but I do.’
Dina hates me. She loathes me or
thinks I’m mad. All I can do is let things run their course. I get up too,
convinced that any explanation, any warning, is pointless. I feel small,
insignificant but at the same time presumptuous and arrogant. I wanted to
change the pages of destiny, but this poor girl’s destiny has already been
written.
‘Why are you looking at me like
that, if you don’t mind me asking?’
Dina’s indignant, standing in
front of me, with her handbag over her shoulder and the office keys jangling in
her hand. Maybe I’ve made a mistake. But when she slung her handbag over her
shoulder so brusquely, her coat gaped open for a second or two and I caught
sight of something that for all the world I would rather not have seen.
‘You’re wearing a green dress. A
green silk dress.’ Dina Dachs’ eyes are spitting fire. ‘For the record, your
position in the firm doesn’t give you the right to…’
I’ve no idea what she’s saying
anymore. There’s something in her voice, in her tone, that defies any response.
‘And you can stop spying on me,
following me around all the time. You give me the creeps. Don’t think I haven’t
noticed.’
Now her words are coming out in a
torrent, compulsively.
‘Whatever it is you want from me
you’re not going to get it. And if you’re interested in my clothes, well here
you are. A green silk dress. Brand new. I hope you like it.’
Dina has taken off her coat,
brusquely. Now she looks like the same woman I’ve been seeing again and again
over the past few days. There’s only one detail missing: a small accessory that
she must have hidden away somewhere. I can picture her in the lift, putting on
the necklace in front of the mirror. Or in the taxi. Or the bathroom in the
office.
‘Your handbag,’ I say, ‘let me
look in your handbag.’
Now, for the first time, she
seems frightened. I try to do the impossible: persuade her that she shouldn’t
go out into the street dressed like that. That everything I’m doing is for her
own good. But words are not enough. Now, more than ever, I know they’re not
enough. I don’t know whether I’m going mad or obeying the voice of destiny.
Because I grab her and shake her. And she fights back. She clings to her
handbag and fights back and tries to open a penknife. She’s frightened and
won’t listen to reason. So now, resolute, I have no choice but to stop her, to
reveal the awful truth, to shout at her, ‘You’re dead. Do you still not get it?
You’re dead!’ But Dina’s not fighting back anymore. Her eyes are staring at me
wide with shock and her body slips from my grasp down to the floor, powerless,
terrified. There’s no time to waste and I snatch her handbag. I search
desperately for a case or a box containing the necklace; maybe without the
necklace none of what’s been predicted will come to pass. All I find are sheets
of paper. Sheets of paper that are of no interest to me, that I ignore, throw
away. Sheets of paper the exact contents of which I’ll discover in two days’
time, together with everyone else in the office.
And then Cesca will shake her
head sadly. And I’ll hear rumours, footsteps, I’ll feel cold. The electricity
bill, a note pad, a letter… Dear Eduardo… words that I remember well because
they’re Dina’s. She’s always spying on me, following me around all the time.
She gives me the creeps… And others I recognise even more clearly because
they’re mine, even though the letter is signed Dina Dachs and I myself have not
yet dared to write them down on paper. I think about Trastevere. Our apartment
in Trastevere, counting the days until we meet in Rome… Memories that I don’t
remember. I shall never forget our first night, in the hotel on the seafront…
Absurd, ridiculous, obscene sentences. Promises of love intermingled with the
sound of footsteps, keys, doors opening and closing, the neighbours in the apartment
upstairs moving furniture, a man in a white coat telling me, ‘You’re exhausted.
Relax.’ And, above all, Cesca. Cesca looking at me, full of compassion.
But that won’t happen for another
two days. Right now I’m kneeling down, determined to prevent the inevitable,
holding the empty handbag, surrounded by sheets of paper that I’ve not the
slightest interest in reading, that I sweep aside angrily with my hand. I
remember, ‘In fifteen minutes’ time, on the other side of town.’ And then a
light comes on. It’s as if she were there, at a party, a gathering, at midnight
and people are exchanging presents. But Dina will never receive the fateful
gift. I’ve managed to frighten her, warn her. ‘I’ve stopped it happening,’ I
say. I look at my hands. Still in their gloves. Still shaky, still possessed by
a strength that I never knew I had. And then I look at Dina, on the floor, with
her eyes still bulging in terror, in shock, at what she must have thought was
the vision of a madwoman. But Dina doesn’t move. She’s wearing a green dress.
Green dress, green shoes . . . And only now, as I get up slowly, do I notice
the bruising around her throat and I understand the cold truth that nothing is
missing. ‘It’s too soon yet,’ I say out loud, even though no one can hear me.
‘But by tomorrow, or the day after, it will have become a violet necklace.’