The Sense of an Elephant Read Free

entrance to the courtyard, toyingwith a lock of honey-blonde hair and awaiting the verdict on tiptoe. ‘It’s dried up, isn’t it?’
    â€˜Good afternoon,’ said the concierge, attempting to smile. ‘Give it a few more weeks and it will pull through.’
    â€˜You’re a miracle worker, you are.’ She bit her lip and came forward. ‘How is it going, Pietro?’ She winked at him and he smelled the scent of vanilla that lingered on the stairs each night.
    Dr Martini stood further back, their daughter in his arms. Set her down and the child skipped over to the gardenia. Poking from her pocket was a pencil that was a magic wand. She drew it out like a small sword and touched Pietro on the head.
    â€˜What have you turned me into?’ asked the concierge.
    Sara scrunched up her coal-black eyes and slipped her head among the leaves of the gardenia, disappeared and reappeared on the other side of the plant. Laughed from her gap-toothed mouth and stared at the snail in the pot. Touched the magic wand to its horns and the snail retreated. The child’s face darkened.
    â€˜He’s gone back into his shell to have a snack, honey,’ said Dr Martini as he picked her up. Blew gently against her neck as his phone began to ring. Checked the display and immediately passed the girl to her mother. ‘Hello, I’ll call you back in five minutes.’ Listened a moment. ‘I said I’ll call back in five minutes.’ Hung up.
    â€˜Who was it?’ asked Viola.
    â€˜The hospital.’
    â€˜You’re going in tonight as well?’
    The plants covered Pietro. Through the leaves the doctor’s face was a sliver of sparse beard chewing gum. ‘I’m not going, don’t worry.’ Then he turned to the concierge. ‘Is there any post?’
    Pietro went into the lodge as mother and daughter started up the stairs, leafed through the envelopes. ‘There’s a package and a registered letter. I’ll need your signature.’
    The doctor scribbled his name. ‘My daughter adores you.’ Held the gum between his teeth for a moment before returning to chewing. ‘If you have this effect on all children, come and see me in the ward.’ Screwed up his face in a grimace, the same as in the photograph on the Vespa. Drummed his fingers between an ashtray and the radio that the concierge had brought with him from the coast. Turned it on. His mobile phone rang again and he turned up the radio. The phone persisted and he picked it up. Before responding he stuck the chewing gum in the ashtray. ‘Hello.’ The doctor left the lodge. ‘We agreed that I would call back.’ He paused. ‘Tonight I can’t.’
    The concierge turned off the radio. The doctor said, ‘No, tonight I can’t. I’m on tomorrow night at the hospital. I’ll come over before, around seven. Yes, tomorrow. Don’t call any more, it’s risky. It’s risky, I said.’ The doctor was an attenuated shadow on the wall of the entrance hall. He put away his phone and rested a moment with a hand over his eyes. ‘See you, Pietro. I’m going.’
    â€˜Have a good evening.’ The concierge waited for him to goup. Then went to the ashtray.
It’s risky, I said
. Snatched up the doctor’s chewing gum and went into the bedroom. In the suitcase there was also an old matchbox. He stuck the gum inside, beside another, rock-hard piece of gum.

4
    Pietro had learned that they were looking for a concierge in Milan from the letter with the Emilio Salgari stamp. The postman delivered it one ordinary afternoon to his old address, an eighteenth-century church fronting on a piazza in Rimini. He put it into the hands of the servant, a wisp of a woman with shifty eyes and bow legs.
    â€˜I’ll make sure he gets it,’ she said. ‘Don Pietro hasn’t lived here for a year.’ And she walked over to the old priest’s