Serafim and Claire (25 page)

Serafim was feeling
light, having just finished work for the day, and was walking through the streets of Antonino's neighbourhood, his eyes floating from one side of the lane to the other. It was a week after he and Claire had taken what was sure to become the most lucrative photograph Serafim had ever developed, and what was more, he had woken up that morning, again, with Claire sharing his mattress, and not a hint of steeped tea waiting for him on the table. Birds were returning in greater numbers. Tulips, teetering on their thin stalks, were blooming in gold and crimson. And the fateful letter to the councilman was ready to be sent to his office with an offer to exchange the incriminating film for money (all four thousand dollars of it) this coming Friday at noon.

He and Claire had agreed to continue in their routines and habits as if everything were completely normal, so that nothing might be seen as suspicious if ever looked back upon by those around them. Serafim was about to pay Antonino an unannounced visit, as he did at least once a week, though more often twice. Beneath his moustache, he was smiling as he approached Antonino's apartment. Then he became aware of sounds that were somehow wrong — scuffles, grumbles, the severity of grown men tussling. Now came the sound of Antonino's stomach being punched, his voice coughing out a winded rasp.

Serafim broke into a jog, holding his hat down on his head, and rounded the corner of a long row of townhouses, a carriage driveway leading to a courtyard stable. Three stout men were at its centre, surrounding Antonino, two of them holding his hands back, the other throwing hooks and jabs into his stomach. Serafim stopped, paralyzed. He was no fighter, and even if he had been, there were three of them, every one of them husky.

The one who was throwing the punches stopped to catch his breath. Hunched over, he spoke in Italian, taunting Antonino, who replied in a scratchy whisper. The man then reached into his pocket, unfolded a jackknife, and held it up in front of Antonino's face.

Serafim looked round, trying to think of a way to help his friend, and quickly realized he could do something that he'd learned to do just a week ago. He sprinted back the way he'd come, ran into the alley, and searched for the gated entrance he'd seen through the courtyard, which accessed the stable from the rear. Finding it, he rushed up to its tall bars, through which he could see the men still holding Antonino. The knife was being waved in front of his face. Seeing that the gate was chained shut, Serafim took out his camera, stuck it between the bars, took a quick shot, then yelled, “Hey!” He snapped another photo, then another. When the men realized what he was doing, they let go of Antonino and raced towards him. Serafim took yet another picture, keeping his face hidden behind the camera.

The men's bodies clanged against the gate, expecting it to swing open. Fortunately for Serafim, the chain held. They were incensed, pounding the metal, commanding him to stop taking their pictures, one of them shielding his face as if from a bright light. Serafim backed away, continuing to snap photos, and advanced the film without dropping the viewfinder from his eye. The men reached their arms through to grab at him, spat, threatened, cursed, until they were so enraged they spun on their heels and set out in the opposite direction, to catch him in the alley. He watched as they jumped over Antonino, who was now lying prostrate on the ground. Two of the men swept to the right of the driveway and another to the left. They were coming for him from both sides.

As Serafim was trapped, there was no time to make sure Antonino was all right. Thinking creatively, he pocketed his camera and jumped a fence into a tiny backyard where he heard children playing, assuming that the back door there would be unlocked. It was, and Serafim galloped through a stranger's kitchen and living room, coarse shouts following him. He left the front door open as he leapt over a few stairs to a gate, unlatched it, and kept running, this time up the street.

He continued for several blocks then doubled back, increasingly confident he'd lost them. He finally stepped into an
épicerie
, where he pretended to peruse the shelves, watching the shop's window for his pursuers, his pulse thumping in his throat. After a few minutes he asked to use the proprietor's phone in the back, so he could finally check on Antonino.

It turned out he was fine and had locked himself in his house, though he doubted the men would return. He added that Serafim should wait until dark to drop by (using the back entrance) so they could talk things over. Serafim agreed and, waiting out the sinking sun, found a shabby café where he sipped watered-down coffee for several hours, and continually checked over his shoulders while trying to read a newspaper. He set off for Antonino's apartment just after dusk, faces and shapes in the street coveting their details in velveteen blurs.

Serafim found Antonino alone at his table with a bottle of gin, the house quiet except for the creaks of wood shifting in the ceiling from the flat above. He shook Antonino's hand and, insisting the poor man stay seated, found himself a glass in one of the cupboards, poured himself some gin (which Serafim hated drinking straight), and sat at the table across from his friend. “Are you okay?” he ventured, after looking Antonino over for a moment.

“In truth, I am not so well,” he said in a hushed tone. His eyes lagged slow and pensive, and judging by how much gin was left in the bottle, it wasn't the drink.

“Are you hurt? Should we get you to a hospital?”

“No, no. It's not that. It is . . . many things. All piling up at the same time.”

“I see. May I ask why those men were beating you, what that was all about?”

“Oh” — Antonino flicked his wrist — “the fault was mine. . . . . received some bad news for the second day in a row, and was passing a stoop where those men — a few simpleton thugs really — were singing a
fascio
march. I wasn't thinking, and shouted at them, some ill-advised remark about that bastard son Mussolini. Insults were exchanged. They followed me to my doorstep, pulled me into the courtyard. It was for posturing purposes only, nothing more.”

“How can you be so sure? They had a knife, Antonino. A knife, in your face.”

“Well, yes. But it would have ended there.” He paused, his gaze drifting. “Though, who knows? Maybe it would have gotten worse. Maybe I am a lucky man, and you saved my life. But I don't think so. What's more, I think it was unwise of you to intervene. First of all, there isn't a person you could show those photos to who wouldn't instantly burn them. The corruption in this city, and those who enforce it, is more endemic than you know. Those men are just brawn for hire, dimwits, but they can still work a few things out on their own. They could make the connection that it was you. They know you and what you look like. They know you're a photographer, and clearly a good friend of mine. I tell you, you shouldn't have intervened.”

Serafim drank some gin, winced, and set his glass firmly on the table. “Well, I do not care what you think. If I saw the same thing this moment, I would do exactly as I did earlier. In spite of the danger — and your ingratitude.”

Antonino laughed. “That is what you don't understand, Serafim. You would be introducing danger where, without such a reaction, there is none. I have been in situations like this before, you know. I happen to understand that I have . . . ways of getting out of them — proven ways, of turning things like this around.”

Serafim crossed his arms over his chest. “Antonino, can you hear yourself? What could you possibly have that could turn that around? A Tommy gun?”

Antonino hesitated. “I happen to have a belief — and the deepest that a person can have — in humankind.”

Serafim fought back a smirk. “You will forgive me for saying this, Antonino, but that is the only time I have known you to say something that I would call naive. I am confident that all the faith in humanity that exists couldn't stop a mindless brigand from doing what he wishes.”

“You see, that is, perhaps, one of the reasons it works. Because I believe in those men, Serafim. And I
will
believe in them, no matter. Even if they do not stop. Even if they cut my throat like a butchered pig.”

Serafim spat out an uncomfortable chuckle. “You are drunken, man. You are not making sense.”

Antonino let out a long sigh and reluctantly leaned forward over the table. “Okay, I will explain it to you, if only for fear you may need it. Now, when I say I believe in humankind, it isn't the belief that human beings will do what is ultimately right or best or humane. As you know, it's often the contrary. Instead, what I believe is that inside every man, however far he lets himself fall, however depraved and brutal he lets himself become, there exists, at his core, a kind of nameless inclination, which is impelling him back in the direction he came from, in the direction of dignity.”

“Ah, and you think you possess the ability to somehow
activate
this dignity?” Serafim said, acutely aware he was fighting back a smile.

“No. What I'm saying is, be it the most corrupt official, the most hardened beggar, the most desperate opiate addict, all of them simply
feel
this same indescribable tug, which is straining to lift them, return them to a place where they are more human. Of course, most of them lose the struggle daily. But my belief is only that that struggle is there, that it is present, always gently pulling at their centre, as quiet as gravity. Now, what has gotten me out of these difficult situations is that belief.”

“How? Why weren't you busy
believing
the situation away when I came across you earlier?” Serafim uncrossed his arms, adjusted his glass of gin on the table.

“Well, had you not interfered and just watched, I would have. First, you see, I need to break the dynamic that automatically arises between those trying to assert their dominance and those trying to prove their submission — between the tyrant and the pleader for mercy. I have found that the only way to do this is by shocking them, saying something that stands completely outside the borders of that dynamic, outside what they would ever expect me to say or do. The moment I do that, I have their full and befuddled attention, I look at them in the most open way I can, and I communicate that belief to them, that whatever they do, I will understand, I will forgive it. They can do with me whatever they will, but I know — and, if they so choose, will go to my grave knowing — that at their centre was something nudging them, silently, subtly, to be more. Experience has proven to me that if they become aware that I hold this belief, they will stop what they're doing. Of course, they'll inevitably give a last kick or spit, to save face in their underworld, but it usually ends there.”

Serafim considered this for some time before speaking. “I am still not convinced.”

Antonino shook his head, smiled. “Serafim, I am not trying to convince you.” He stood up gingerly, like an old man at twenty-eight, and made his way to the kitchen sink, where he leaned on its edge, his back to Serafim at the table. “I wonder,” Antonino said, his voice unassuming, “if you have ever been in love. What I mean is that first, precarious, universe-swallowing kind of love.”

Serafim's tone was confessional. “I have. Yes.”

“So you know . . . how it changes you. That it pulls you apart, and when you put yourself back together again, you find that the pieces don't quite fit. Not the way they did before. For me, it was a girl in Floridia, my hometown, in Sicily. We were childhood companions first. That changed in adolescence. It was her that was coming to marry me. Only that she recently caught wind of my being in trouble with the authorities at immigration, and twice over at that.

“You see, when we met on the boat, Serafim, I wasn't emigrating but fleeing. I was the youngest child of five in my family, and the most promising in my neighbourhood, and so my parents had made great sacrifices in order for me to get an education. I was studying law at the University of Naples, and got involved as a journalist for the student paper. I wrote an anti-fascist article, a stunt I was warned never to repeat. I did — as many times as I could. A warrant was issued for my arrest. I had heard tales of worse than confinement, for those the police took away. So I took the money I had and hopped on a boat, changed my name from Antonio to Antonino, on my passport and birth certificate and everything else I've signed since. My family doesn't know my whereabouts, and doesn't want to, for fear the Italian government would have me deported from wherever I happen to be. The only one who knows I am in this country is this woman. When she heard I was in trouble with the immigration office
here
as well, it seemed all too clear to her that I was on my way to jail, or to becoming one of the disappeared. So she has accepted the hand of another.

“That was the news I received yesterday. Today I got another letter, from the deputy minister of immigration this time, granting me the right to stay in Canada, only on the condition that I cease publication of
Il Risveglio Italiano
immediately. As you see, I have no choice. I have been beaten. The game is up.”

Serafim found himself thinking about the logistics more than anything else. “So, what will you do for a living?”

“I can bake bread. I might try to open a bakery. Sell coal, or cement work. I don't know. But I will find a way. I had hoped to save a little money with the paper and put it in a few stocks, like everyone else, but it seems my chance has run dry.

“You can see,” he continued, “how all of this has got me thinking of something we once talked about, you and I, about whether or not the world (or God, as you put it) might be taming us, gradually turning us into beings who are more obedient, less wild and inspired. You talked about a horse. I seek solace in the idea that I might, right now, be like that horse, newly broken, compliant, apparently thoughtless. But tell me, in that creature, is there not still the potential to rear up, break away, run amok? And is that potential not always present there, inside him, trembling just beneath the surface, biding its time, waiting for the ripe moment to emerge again?”