The Sense of an Elephant Read Online Free PDF Page A

appeared piled high even without the bell. He went over to the hall stand and brought his nose to a black trench coat. It smelled of vanilla. He stopped sniffing and lifted his head.
    In the middle of the room were two red couches set at right angles. Bookshelves covered the long wall and surrounded the door to the kitchen. More books strewed the floor. As he stepped over them he read
The Razor’s Edge
on one cover. He walked around. The little girl’s toys crowded the carpet. Some dolls sat up on a chaise longue beneath the window.
    Through the glass he could see the courtyard, a bit of the Madonna and an arc of his porthole window. He continued to wander, the parquet floor squeaked, he slowed his steps and arrived at a pair of men’s slippers beside a couch. Sat down, took off his shoes and put on the slippers. Wiggled his toes, working them all the way in. They fitted him perfectly. As his feet warmed up Pietro approached the one wall painted crimson. On the right hung a photograph of a lavender field. Among the flowers appeared the doctor and Viola in an embrace, perhaps from when they were at university. He ran a finger along the outline of the pale young man with a patchy beard and a lavender flower over one ear. Viola was looking at the camera and he was looking at her. They were beautiful. On the mantel he spotted their wedding picture: she full of soft curves in her white gown, he a mannequin in morning dress. Another photograph was of the doctor arm in arm with Riccardo, the radiographer, their faces deformed with laughter. A final one showed a man in sunglasses holding a fishing rod, a fish hanging from two fingers. He knew it was the doctor’s father, who had died a few years back.
    The voice of Fernando came through the wall, ‘Papa and Jesus, I will offend you no more.’ Then silence.
    Pietro went into the kitchen. A bouquet of sunflowers hung down from the wall above the table, a card pinned to the paper:
To Viola, who passes beneath the windows
. He read the doctor’s signature. The
a
in
Luca
had a long, curly tail. A shelf held an aquarium with striped tropical fish. Beside it a long, narrow loaf of bread poked out of its bag. He pressed a finger against a crumb and put it in his mouth. The bread was fresh. Then he stood in front of the refrigerator. On the door were a magnet shaped like the Eiffel Tower and a black-and-white Polaroid, the ultrasound of Sara in her mama’s belly. He ran his finger slowly over it, recognizing the upturned nose and little round head, caressed it and noticed a handwritten date in the lower right corner: 14-9-2008. The same as the bracelet found in the courtyard. He pressed the corners down and heard another voice, of the lawyer this time: ‘Theo Morbidelli, where are you? No swimming today because your owner doesn’t feel so good. I’m going into the bathroom, so kindly get out of the way, c’mon now …’
    Pietro checked his watch, went back into the sitting room, and slid open a door leading to the bedrooms. He passed the little girl’s room: the walls were plastered with drawings; a pink quilt covered the bed; a stuffed Winnie the Pooh sat atop the pillow. He continued down the corridor to the last room, the one sharing a wall with Fernando’s sitting room, the doctor’s study. A laptop peeked out beneath piles of papers and books on the desk. The leather armchair was buried in old newspapers. A stringless guitar rested on a stand. On the wall he saw the doctor’s diploma. He walked around the desk and touched the frame, read
with the highest distinction
and pressedhis fingers against the glass. Held them there, then stooped over the desk. Some doodled sheets of paper and a bowl of grape stems. He crouched down in front of the three drawers below the work surface.
    He undid a button of his shirt and felt his throat pulsing. Pulled open the first drawer. Inside were a packet of liquorice gum, a mobile-phone