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.I came downfrom the cabin. Some of my family was killed by the bombardments, hesaid. I thought I d find them here, instead. He smiled. But my moth-er is fine. Good luck! he finally yelled out to the other soldiers, and moved awaybetween laughter and tears, followed by a swarm of people and children.Before going inside his house, he turned his large torso around again andawkwardly waved.*The soldiers arrived at their houses one after the other; some sorrowfulscenes were alternated with many of exultation.One of them, however, wasbarely interested in his family:  Where s my motorcycle? Did you keep ithidden? Even during the war, he always talked about his motorcycle.So, in one way or another, everyone met their family.*Morandi was the second to last we took home; the last that day.The sun was setting as we began going up his steep valley; at its entrancewe could see several ruins of burned houses.In spite of the season, somesnow was falling.Although in the larger Ossola Valley, from which this onebranched out, we had met mostly blue partisans, here the few townsswarmed with partisans wearing red scarves around their necks.We halted at a handful of houses because an old man was tied to an iron310gate on the side of the road.The thin rope around his purple neck forcedhim to stay on the tips of his toes against the bars, like a badly tied-up beast.Six or seven partisans moved away from him to come closer to thetruck.We exchanged a few uncertain words; two or three recognizedMorandi.A partisan girl in men s clothes, decked in red, came beneath my win-dow and, without wasting any time, winked at me. What formation are you? I asked her uncertainly. We re Garibaldini.It was like saying that they were Communist partisans, although I didnot interpret it this way quite yet, because I still hadn t resolved myself toaccept their stance in my opinion, inadmissible between nineteenth-century patriotism and Communist internationalism. Garibaldini? Not Communist, then, I tested her. Not Communists, she lied. Thank goodness, I said stupidly. You sure do have a lot of red aroundthough!Maybe the death of that unlucky man tied to the gate resulted from thesewords (I become agitated still today, after so many years, just thinking of it!). Who s that wretch? I asked. What did he do? He s a Fascist spy.A young man who seemed to be the leader came forward. What do wedo with him? he asked. Can we kill him? Kill him without a trial? But.what s got into your head? I ex-claimed, feigning astonishment, as though such an action were inconceiv-able outside this valley.Unexpectedly, an old civilian who was witnessing the scene a few stepsaway came forward too. Enough, he said, turning to the partisans. He snothing more than a poor devil; you ve mistreated him enough, let him go.Since our truck had stopped, everything had been happening as thoughon stage: we were like tiny marionettes against the rough backdrop ofmountains.I realized this somehow, and I tried to also recite my part, butfoolishly I didn t fully understand my role and what was at stake: the life ofa man, who could probably have been saved by a few words, by my behav-ing in a well-chosen manner.The old man s intervention was very brave, Ilater realized, but useless because of my foolishness. Go away! the partisan leader yelled at him. Get out of here immedi-ately! And be very careful: I know that you don t have a clean conscienceeither.You be careful too!311The civilian took a few steps backward and no longer spoke; he limitedhimself to gesturing no with his head.The prisoner didn t even try to speak: his neck was clenched and pur-plish, his eyes closed, his hands tied one on top of the other on his stom-ach with a string, like in children s games.Undoubtedly, the best solution would have been to take him away.But would the partisans have let him go? There were only four of us sol-diers left on the truck and we were armed with only two pistols, mine andthe driver s. All right, we agree, the partisan leader decided finally, turning to meagain. We won t kill him.Do you know what we ll do with him? We ll givehim another sound beating, then we ll take him to the partisans commandof Domodossola.Domodossola was in the larger valley from which this one branched out,where there were also Christian partisans with blue scarves; as I mentioned,we had met several already (among others, a large formation busy movinga captured column of German trucks).They weren t people who killed pris-oners or let them be killed.I remembered the burned houses at the entranceof the valley; they were almost certainly the work of the Fascists.This man,perhaps, could have been one of their friends too.After all, if these fellowswere Garibaldini, in short Mazzinians, why would they deceive an Italianofficer? But they were Communists instead, and I let them outwit me. Yes, I decided,  it seems like the best solution: bring him to the Do-modossola command. Turning to the driver, I said,  Come on, let s keepgoing.*We kept going and dropped off Morandi in his small town, which wasthe highest one of the valley, at the end of the road.No family came to meet him because he didn t have any; even his grand-mother, who had brought him up since birth and raised him instead of hisparents often beating him with her knotted fist had died years before.One last time, Morandi invited us to spend the night with him; then heleft, with his everlasting swinging bear walk, toward his log house, refinedby the geraniums on its windows.Each time that I had seen him arrive somewhere during the war, I re-flected, it had been an allusion to this arrival.But did this one really have ataste of finality? Maybe this didn t have it either; maybe it also was only a re-flection of the only true arrival that each man makes, unaware, his whole life.312 Get to the plain before it s dark, the people told us,  because there arestill some Germans and some Fascists on the mountains. So we did.We didn t know when we left the steep valley that the unlucky prisoner,against whom rested only very vague evidence, had already been murderedby the Communists.Morandi informed me a few days later [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]