The Sense of an Elephant by Marco Missiroli

his wine glass full and his son’s nappy in his lap. A wheeze escaped him. ‘I’m glad you met, very glad …’ He drew the wadded nappy more tightly closed. ‘Please tellyour son, please tell him to come and see us. Just one visit will do, my Andrea always told me so before he got like this. He’d say, “Just one visit, Papa.” ’ The old man brayed like a donkey, wiped the snot from his nose and headed toward his son’s room. He returned to Pietro with the handheld recorder in hand. He spun it between his fingers like a playing card then turned it on. The voice of Andrea drawled beneath the buzzing of the tape. The old man raised the volume.
    â€˜My name is Andrea Testi. I am thirty-four years old and I know how to dribble. You have to have strong ankles to dribble well, and I have strong ankles. But what really counts is your eye. Look straight at your opponent, straight at him. Then ankle, ball, ankle. I can dribble right past people. I want to do it again.’
    The old man stopped the tape. Rewound it and extended the recorder to Pietro. ‘Your son will understand. He wouldn’t accept it from me, but your son will understand if you give it to him,’ he insisted. ‘Please.’
    Pietro did not move to take it.
    â€˜My Andrea wants to dribble again.’ His father continued to hold out his arm.
    The concierge accepted the recorder, slipped it in his pocket. The old man said thank you, pulled himself up and went to the shelf. ‘My wife and I arrived here a lifetime ago. The first thing I did was to plant two pomegranate trees.’ He paused in front of the bowl shaped like a tortoise. ‘They say they don’t grow in Milan, but we got the first fruit from it the month Andrea was born.’ Chose one of the pomegranates, its dry skin bruised and scratched, and held it out to him.‘It’s what’s left of the three of us.’ He coughed and the nappy slid to the floor.
    Pietro accepted the fruit into his chapped, scarred hands and headed toward the door. Before leaving he looked back once more on that weary father. Saw him kneeling on the floor.

19
    The witch’s mother was looking for her and when she saw her among the huts she said, ‘What are you doing over here, Celeste?’
    The young priest slipped from the pillow, getting sand in his hair. Struggled to his feet.
    Her mother noticed him and said, ‘May God bless you, Father, if you manage to set my daughter straight, because there are sins here as well as misfortune.’ But he was already away, beyond the beach facilities and running across the space in front of the Grand Hotel, to the fountain with the four horses. He hurtled down the boulevard leading to the station and then through the piazza, arrived in church,
Punish me
, climbed to his room.
    The priest’s housekeeper asked him, ‘Everything all right? Are you hungry?’
    He took off his shoes. His feet were quivering. He knelt down, then began with his sides. Beat them, moved on to his back and carried on down to his legs, beat them. Bent forward, reached back for his feet, squeezed them in his fists.

20
    Pietro left the house of the pomegranate trees and sought out his sycamore. Powerlessness in the face of a son’s fate binds all fathers. He leaned his back against the trunk. They are distinguished by devotion. He looked at his hands holding the pomegranate. He himself had never been devoted to anyone. Clutched the fruit, which was hard but not heavy, scratched it with a fingernail. Pietro continued to scratch it the entire way back and when he returned home he left it on the night table. Drew the recorder from his pocket and pressed play.
My name is Andrea Testi. I am thirty-four years old and I know how to dribble
. Pressed stop and dialled the Martinis’ number on the lodge phone. No one picked up. He called again. It rang and rang. He took the keys and went out into the entrance