“Albatross” by Edgard Telles Ribeiro
The letter, on top-quality paper bearing a letterhead, came from a notary public in a small rural town. The name of the town meant nothing to him. The contents of the letter, however, were so unexpected that he caught himself groping through the air behind him in search of a chair.
An island . . . He had inherited an island. . . . He who owned nothing more than a few books and prints—and whose rent had been overdue since January. But there was no doubt; the text was clear: “. . . approximately 1.7 square miles, including the woods and beaches contained therein, situated seventeen miles from the coast of . . .”
He telephoned the notary public and confirmed the news with the head officer, a soft-spoken lawyer. His great-uncle, the source of this miracle, a relative he hadn’t even heard from in twenty years, had died a few weeks before.
A small island . . . Would it have electricity and safe drinking water?
Inheriting an island at age fifty produces peculiar fantasies in the mind of a man without ambitions. He actually dreamed there might be a treasure chest buried under palm trees. And he was reminded of his childhood, when the greatest joys were always preceded by a certain uneasiness.
The legal formalities took about a month. When the day arrived, he went by bus to a village on the coast. The owner of a banana boat, after carefully inspecting his map, introduced him to a fisherman, who, in exchange for a modest sum, agreed to detour his normal route along the coast and take him to his domain.
His domain . . .
They left that same afternoon. In spite of the ocean’s calmness, the boat rocked a little. Low clouds covered the coastline, and islands went by one after another: bigger, smaller, inhabited, apparently deserted, sometimes no more than a pair of rocks. A light drizzle began to fall.
After two hours, the fisherman came over and pointed to a greenish spot on the horizon. He felt an unexpected surge of tenderness for that parcel of the universe, the destiny of which the gods had so casually deposited in his hands.
Was it really deserted, as the lawyer had said? Judging from his conversation during the trip, the fishermen didn’t frequent these parts. They preferred the open sea, or trawling along the coast. At most, they had glimpsed an occasional sailboat anchored in the island’s cove to shelter overnight.
In another half hour, they arrived. The island was much larger than he had imagined, though two small hills kept him from evaluating its size accurately. It would take a whole day, at least, just to explore it.
He was taken to the beach in a rowboat. It was agreed that he would be picked up in three days, a length of time that suddenly seemed a little excessive. But the quiet elegance of the bay, contrasting with a wild and varied abundance of vegetation, and the warm breeze that had replaced the drizzling rain completely eliminated any doubts he might have had about this adventure.
Because really, that’s what it was. An adventure . . . with roots in childhood and a random flavor. Except for the cold, gritty sand under his bare feet, everything in this story seemed unreal.
Besides a small tent and a lantern, he had brought two canvas bags. In the first were food, three bottles of drinking water, two of wine, towels, a blanket. In the second, clothes, a few books, notebooks, pens, a pair of binoculars, and the manuscript of his latest short story.
Once his things were unloaded, he said good-bye to the boatman. For an instant he again hesitated. Nothing remotely akin to fear: a sense of vulnerability, if anything, in the face of the unknown. For the first time in his life, he found himself truly isolated—in a place from which he couldn’t return on his own.
But the birds began to sing so cheerfully that he felt welcomed. He breathed deeply and looked with confidence at the man who was rowing back to the fishing boat. A little later, the throttle of the engine, dry and measured, fell on his ears. They waved to each other.
“Don’t forget me!” he yelled.
Had the fisherman heard? The boat disappeared around the curve of the island, leaving behind a small plume of black smoke, which soon faded, as well.
He pitched his tent in an elevated spot covered with grass, between the beach and the thick woods. He wanted to get settled before nightfall, which was approaching fast. This spot, he thought, would be ideal for building a house, if he ever had the means. He collected some kindling to build a fire. The damp wood resisted his efforts, so he lit the lantern and set it on a rock. Leaning against a tree trunk, he opened his manuscript.
The page was spattered with blood. Surprised, he glanced up, as if the red droplets might have fallen out of the sky. Then he realized he had cut his finger; there was blood on his shirt and trousers. Licking his wound, he glanced about him and saw the kindling lying on the sand. That was it, he decided, a thorn.
The blood had stained the last two sentences of his text: The only freedom left to him consisted in frequenting his wife’s nightmares. At night, under the sheets, she tossed among the ghosts of imaginary infidelities—and he must appease her jealousy when she awoke.
He reread the passage, under the asphyxiating spell that had marked the end of his marriage. He closed the notebook and walked down to the beach, wetting his feet in the white foam. The coolness of the water encouraged him. Taking off his clothes, he plunged into the sea.
With a few strokes he was beyond the waves, floating. The cold, however, forced him to go on swimming. Not wanting to stray too far, he veered toward the cove.
He was tired when he reached it. With some difficulty he pulled himself up onto a rock. Rubbing his hands over his dripping body, he hopped up and down on the wet surface. He intended to return as soon as he got his wind back.
In the distance, the flickering light of his lantern sprinkled gold flecks on his tent. The prospect of a dry towel appealed to him. He considered going back on foot, over the rocks, but they were moss-covered and slippery.
Just as he was about to dive back into the water, he heard a sound from far away. Instinctively, he crouched. A breath of air and, again, the sound. A melody . . . carried by the breeze, coming closer and closer. Suddenly, the music stopped. And on his left, almost at his side, a large white sailboat appeared, crossing the space directly in front of him.
Three masts cutting the silence, their sails flapping against the wind with a half-ghostly elegance. A phantom ship . . . But at once he distinguished a figure maneuvering the craft from the stern. Beside the central mast was another silhouette. That of a woman, he noticed when she moved.
On the beach, the wind had put out the lantern, plunging his campsite into shadows. The darkness reduced him to an intruder, a feeling his nudity intensified. The couple had by now dropped anchor and fastened the sails.
He left his rock, entering the water without a sound. He swam back to the beach, plagued by doubts. Not that the couple threatened him; on the contrary, the sailboat signaled well-being and security. But it was impossible not to associate its arrival—coming, as it had, on the very heels of his own—with an invasion.
His teeth chattering, he gathered his clothes up from the sand and went into the tent. Vigorously, he rubbed himself dry with the towel. As he dressed, he heard the clinking of dishes, silverware, and glasses in the distance, then a bucket of water being thrown into the sea.
By the time he left the tent, the music had started up again. A baroque piece—Vivaldi, possibly. A table was being set up on the stern as the couple prepared for dinner. Anchored about fifty yards from the beach, the sailboat offered itself up for his inspection. He remembered his binoculars.
Yet, for a moment, he remained motionless. Except for the intriguing coincidence of this meeting, nothing had occurred on either side, up to that point, that would suggest real intrusion. But if he gave in to the temptation to spy on the couple, the precarious balance would be broken. Better to sleep. With any luck, the sailboat would be on its way by morning.
He considered facing his manuscript again. Could the blood have injected new life into his words? Impossible to know without lighting the lantern. His resistance weakened second by second. A desire—intense, secret, dangerous—contaminated him with an almost youthful energy. He found himself rummaging feverishly through his bags. That intimacy, soon to be violated, would become his treasure.
He looked through the binoculars; the tips of the masts appeared in his lenses. Slowly he lowered his angle, adjusting the focus. As his field of vision descended, the light filled it with details of every sort. He passed over them all without pausing. Above all, it was the couple he wanted to see. At the bottom of the mast he stopped, his heart pounding fast.
The music seemed to be louder now. Or was it an illusion, induced by the closeness of his lenses? The refined melody dominated the air with the clarity of a live performance. The woman had disappeared inside the cabin. On the bridge, the man was calmly opening a bottle of wine.
He, too, calmed himself. Time was his ally. Better yet, his accomplice. He turned the binoculars toward the bow, trying in vain to read the boat’s name. The woman was coming back; immediately, he focused on her.
He was surprised she had dressed so formally for dinner. She wore a pearl necklace, a white tunic that swept down to her sandals, and a turquoise-blue stole, which slid off one shoulder. Her casual, almost careless gestures as she approved the wine, one hand on her waist, the other holding a glass up in the air, suggested complete affinity with a world of sophistication and refinement.
They sat on opposite sides of the table, both in profile to him, the woman to the right, the man to the left. The slight elevation from which he watched permitted him a privileged view. Wrapping himself in a blanket against the cold, he once again leaned against the tree.
He studied the woman first. She was young, barely thirty. Blond, slender, with a short hairdo. More than the freshness of her youth, he envied the shower she had just taken. The sailboat undoubtedly possessed generous facilities with plenty of fresh hot water, the only luxury he missed so far—his skin, saturated with salt, chafed under his shirt. He imagined her to be lightly perfumed. The man, in his forties, was tall and stout. His tanned skin suggested a healthy outdoor lifestyle, which the very dimensions of the sailboat seemed somehow to confirm. In shorts and a T-shirt, he savored the wine, tilting his head back toward the sky.
Suddenly hungry, he remembered the chicken sandwich he had prepared for his first night. He took it out of its wrapper, embellished it with two leaves of lettuce, and opened a bottle of wine, raising a toast to his visitors’ health.
The three of them dined, united by the melody. From time to time, he consulted his binoculars. At one point he heard them laughing. He felt an enormous desire to get closer to them, the way a stranger in a tavern draws near the fireplace, rubbing his hands together. If it weren’t for the cold and his fear of being discovered, he would have swum over to the sailboat, just to listen to them.
It was then he noticed something. Something so unnerving that he lowered the binoculars, as though needing to confirm with his naked eyes what the lenses showed: a pistol.
It was under the table, on the woman’s lap. A silver-handled pistol, half hidden under her napkin. He focused on the man. He was laughing happily.
Jumping to his feet, he upset his glass of wine. He took a few steps forward. On the deck of the sailboat, the man had also risen, and was going down toward the cabin.
Alone at the table, the woman lit a cigarette. She turned her eyes toward the island. It was improbable that she could distinguish the beach or the forest in any detail. Nevertheless, his hands tightened on the binoculars, as if her gaze could pierce him.
My God, he thought, his breath short. She was going to shoot. Any minute now. Those eyes didn’t suggest bitterness or ferocity, only determination. Between one remark and another—after dessert, before the liqueur—she would shoot.
The man returned with another bottle of wine, already open. Standing with a napkin draped over his arm, he bowed ceremoniously to his companion, serving her with the rapture of an adolescent. For the second time, she approved the wine.
What if he yelled? If he tore the night with a bloodcurdling scream?
The cold water at his feet brought him up with a start. Without realizing it, he had strayed toward the beach. With the change of angle, however, he could no longer follow the woman’s gestures. The music stopped; neither of them seemed disposed to change it. A dangerous silence weighed down the air. His heart was beating out of control. From the bottom of his chest, he heard his voice rising like a wave gathering in the dark.
“VIVALDI!” he yelled.
The woman startled in astonishment. The man, jumping up, bent over the rail. With surprising agility, he ran to the other end of the deck and put out the lights on the sailboat.
“Who’s there?” he bellowed.
A strong voice, but hesitant. He said something to the woman, who went down to the cabin. Again he called out, more irritated than alarmed. “Who’s there?”
The woman reappeared, carrying something in her hands. A powerful beam of light flashed across the beach. Waving his arms, he shouted, “Good evening!”
Still waving, he repeated his greeting. “Good evening! Welcome!”
And when the searchlight finally hit him, he called, “I heard music.”
Blinking in the harsh glare, he felt the most pathetic of men. Once again he shouted, “Welcome!”
He kept the binoculars behind his back, fastened to his belt. Now it was the couple who examined him, with lenses sure to be powerful. Never did he cease waving or smiling. He added additional information to his speech. “I’m the owner of the island! Make yourselves at home.”
The searchlight played over him, scanning the night. A voice echoed, this time lower, almost tired. “What a scare!”
An enormous pause followed.
“We always stop here. We’ve never seen anyone before. Do you live here?”
“No. I’m just camping. I was over on the other side of the island when you arrived.”
He couldn’t seem to lower his voice, in spite of the difficulty of maintaining a dialogue at the top of his lungs with any degree of naturalness. He added, “Beautiful sailboat.”
The man, relaxing a little, repeated what he had said before. “What a scare.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No, that’s all right. . . . Are you a fisherman? Is this island really yours?”
Instead of answering, he asked, “Was that Vivaldi?”
“What?” the other yelled back, surprised.
“The music. Was it Vivaldi?”
“Corelli,” said the woman. And again, louder, “Corelli.”
He latched onto the name like a drowning man would a life ring.
“Corelli! Of course, Corelli.”
The man cut him off. “Well, good night, then. See you in the morning.” The light went out abruptly.
Lost in the darkness, he replied, “Good night.”
Sweat was rolling off him in streams and his legs trembled. He thought of the gun. Once more he called, “Hey!”
“What is it?” asked the man almost roughly.
“Your sailboat! What’s her name?”
“Albatross.”
“Albatross . . .”
“Good night!” It was her voice this time.
Had she left the pistol in the cabin when she went down? Or was it still wrapped in the napkin?
“Good night!” he called back.
He sat down on the sand, completely exhausted. A cold breeze blew over him. I’m leaving, but I’ll be back, Death whispered in his ears. He breathed with difficulty. I know, he thought. I know.
A night . . . He had gained a night. Maybe a day or two. He crawled back to the tent and relighted the lantern. On the sailboat, two lights came on also, one inside, the other, weaker, on the stern. The music started again: jazz, this time.
I’m leaving, but I’ll be back, Death whispered in his ears.
Piano, bass, percussion, saxophone . . . He moved around outside the tent, with the express purpose of being seen. Then he strolled toward the trees, as if to urinate. Protected by the vegetation, he took out the binoculars again.
In the kitchen, the man was busy doing the dishes, his body swaying to the rhythm of the music. Directly above him, the woman was smoking, leaning over the rail as she watched the island.
She could not possibly see him. Even so, he felt he was being observed. For his part, he couldn’t discern her features in the shadows, only the lighted point of the cigarette and the outline of her figure, arms crossed.
Vivaldi . . . she must have been thinking.
Vivaldi . . . A single despairing cry had landed him in the tangled center of someone else’s labyrinth. The man hadn’t even noticed. How could he, if he didn’t know what was at stake?
But the woman suspected something. And there she stood, smoking, watching him, wondering. Somewhere in the firmament, Death drummed its fingers impatiently on a barroom countertop. It would be back, surely. But when?
Unless . . .
He felt assailed by a strange force. Back at the tent, fully illuminated by the lantern, he deliberately fixed the binoculars on the woman.
She moved back two steps and looked in all directions, as if a thousand demons were spying on her.
In the kitchen, the man was now drying his dishes in sync with the music. At the bow, the woman threw her cigarette into the sea, as though she had come to a decision, and strode quickly toward the rear of the boat. Was she going to denounce him?
When she reached the stairway, however, she stopped and came back to the rail. Placing both hands on the varnished wood, she stayed there directly in his line of vision, as though to defy him.
He lowered the binoculars and turned his gaze away, overtaken by a weariness bordering on disgust. There was nothing to be done. Now it was only a question of time.
Seeing his glass overturned on the ground, he refilled it with wine. He lifted it in a toast to the sea without looking at the sailboat. Have a great trip, he thought. Kill each other, devour each other . . .
But somewhere else, far away . . . He hadn’t landed in his new domain that precise afternoon for nothing. The gods hadn’t entrusted the destiny of that island to him by chance. Discounting the few drops that had fallen on his manuscript, blood wouldn’t be spilled here.
After a few more minutes, he raised his eyes to the boat again. The music had now stopped for good. The woman, her back to the island, was completely still.
Something in her attitude had changed. Something almost imperceptible. He grabbed the binoculars. Her body had lost its rigidity. Head down, she seemed to be sobbing.
He put out the lantern, leaving the couple alone. So they could tally up the scores, without violating the natural order of things. It was asking too much, he knew.
Just before sleep overtook him, however, he heard the music begin again, and he identified the piece. This time there was no doubt: Vivaldi. He slept.
The next morning when he woke up, the Albatross had left.
The three days following those first hours spent on the island passed slowly. No matter how rich the vegetation around him, or how varied the number of butterflies and birds flying overhead, he thought only of the woman. Not even the discovery of a tiny coral beach surrounded by palm trees, directly across the island from his hills, could distract him from his obsession.
His memories of her blended into the perfume of the sea breeze and the shades of the evening colors, insinuating themselves into every fold of his imagination. What was her relationship to the man? Was she a wife, lover, friend, sister?
We always stop here. We’ve never seen anyone before.
The remark suggested a degree of familiarity with the region. She had obviously participated in other sailing trips at various times, possibly happy ones. What was she doing now as she skirted an abyss?
The abyss had been hers; the vertigo was now his. Would she honor the terms of her promise? Suggestion, really, more than promise. Validated, at most, by a few measures of music.
He spent a good part of the second night sitting on the grassy hill, his eyes on the sea. The third night found him swimming toward the cove in the dark.
Over and over he recalled the first glance she had given the island—the glance he had immediately captured in his lenses. As time passed, he retrieved from the depths of those pupils a dimension of sadness that had at first eluded him.
Had it really been there?
The doubt, uncomfortable and relentless, began to occupy an ever-greater space in his thoughts. Had the episode originated from a coolly designed plan, motivated by greed? Or had the whole drama been rooted in fear or despair?
He spent his nights revisiting every word of the conversation they had had.
“Vivaldi!”
He saw the silhouette jumping up from the chair, the man’s shadow sliding toward the stern, the beam of light slicing the darkness.
“Who’s there?”
Each of them had played a different instrument in an improvised score. He had shouted firm notes imbued with certainty, which reverberated like those of a trumpet. The man had deflected each one, as if they had been dull bullets ricocheting from his cymbals. Until the woman had brought harmony to the scene: “Corelli.”
In that baroque mirror they had found each other. From that point on, they would proceed together, on the same score, she vulnerable in her waiting, he powerless in the dark.
“Corelli! Of course.”
His decision to search for the woman matured gradually, as he came to feel responsible for her destiny. Without defining precisely what form this affair might assume, he counted the hours left until the fisherman’s return.
They finally passed. And the little fishing boat came back, preceded by the syncopated drumming of its engine. He said good-bye to the island.
On the return trip, he felt he was being observed. Was it his imagination? Maybe . . . In any case, the fisherman respected his silence, limiting his remarks to comments about the weather and the duration of the crossing.
It was raining when they got to the village. He walked on the wet cobblestones toward the bus stop. His bus wouldn’t be coming for a while, so he went into a bar and ordered a cup of hot coffee, which he savored as he planned his next moves.
“We always stop here. . . .”
The adverb implied they had not come from too far away. He would concentrate his search—at least initially—within a radius of one hundred miles along the shoreline, to the north and south of the island. Unclear as to the probable outcome of his investigation, he wavered between a boyish excitement and a sense of anguish—the contours of which he preferred to leave undefined.
At home he took a long shower and fell into bed, exhausted. He dreamed about his island, and woke with the sails of the Albatross beating the wind amid the curtains of his window.
The inquiries he made during the next two weekends produced no results. No one had heard of the sailboat in the places he visited. It didn’t matter; in a way, he actually preferred to postpone a discovery, the consequences of which he still had no way of ascertaining. In spite of the long bus trips over potholed roads, he sighed with relief at every dead end. And he wrote avidly, as if the deeper background of that episode had fertilized his ideas.
But as time went on, he started to get impatient. He even began to cultivate the illusion that the Albatross was avoiding him. This sensation grew even sharper on his third trip, when a boy promised to take him to the boat—and led him instead to a plain fishing vessel beached on a sandbank.
He finally paid a visit to the port authorities—an alternative that, till then, he had chosen to avoid. It bothered him that dusty old registry books might facilitate a reencounter he would have preferred, as much as possible, to leave to chance.
He discovered two vessels registered under that same name, both in private marinas situated between ports he had visited. The first was a yacht, the second a sailboat.
The following weekend, he rented a car. The day was bright, and there was little traffic on the roads. He arrived at his destination within three hours. At a gas station, the attendant pointed out the side road that would take him to the property.
The narrow road descended toward the shore. After driving a short distance, he left the car hidden among the trees and walked to the edge of a cliff. In a small bay, moored at a pier, stood the Albatross.
It was the same sailboat, without a doubt. So still, however, it looked more like a domesticated animal. Its sails rolled up under canvas covers and fastened to the masts, its hull against the wooden pier, the Albatross now seemed part of a setting that included the ocean and the thick woods beyond. The sailboat shared the stage with a colonial-style house and a beach of reddish sand—both deserted.
The house, one story tall, was surrounded by an ample lawn. Its ivy-covered roof projected out over a veranda. Five blue window frames were outlined on the white facade, and closed venetian blinds highlighted the loneliness of the sailboat in the morning sun.
Suddenly, very close, he heard children laughing, and immediately afterward the barking of a dog. He walked a little way through the trees. Almost at his feet, a second house appeared. It was much smaller, rustic, and a circle of banana trees grew around it. In the bare yard of beaten earth, half a dozen chickens pecked at the ground. A little girl ran outside, followed by a smaller boy. Laughing, they scampered up the hillside, the dog bounding after them. When they saw him, they came to an abrupt halt. The dog began to bark furiously. A woman appeared in the yard, wiping her hands on a dishcloth.
“Good afternoon!” he called.
“Good afternoon,” replied the woman.
The dog stopped barking. A silence loaded with curiosity fell on the scene. Before their surprise could turn to suspicion, he gestured vaguely in the direction of the road.
“My car broke down,” he said quite naturally. “Is there a telephone around here?”
As he spoke, he went down the path, the children backing away, the dog growling. He asked the girl playfully, “Does he bite?”
The woman was sorry, but there was no telephone here. The closest one was back at the gas station. Right along the main road, about a mile away.
He sat down on a rock and shook his head, feigning good-humored discouragement. A mile! He sensed that his city clothes imposed respect, and that his graying hair would inspire confidence. He patted the dog.
“It’s not so far, really,” said the little girl, trying to cheer him up.
“And there’s a mechanic there,” added her brother.
Smiling at both of them, he commented, “I saw a house from the road up there . . . and a sailboat.”
“In the boss’s house, there’s a phone,” the little girl said, interrupting, “but we can’t use it.”
“It’s out of order,” the mother added quickly.
“That’s all right,” he reassured her. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll walk to the gas station.”
For a few seconds, he looked at the shabby house. The woman was watching him closely, the children beside her.
“Nice-looking boat,” he commented in a conversational tone.
“It’s sailed all around the world!” exclaimed the boy.
“They’re selling it,” said the girl excitedly.
“Selling it?” He couldn’t disguise his shock. For the first time, his voice sounded real. The details all around him came into sharper focus.
“Yes, it’s for sale,” confirmed the mother.
“Then I’ll buy it!” he joked.
The woman giggled, hiding her wrinkles in the dishcloth. The dog wagged its tail, pleased with the children’s happiness.
“It must be very expensive,” he went on, more at ease.
“Millions!” cried the boy, stretching his arms wide into the sky.
“But why sell such a beautiful boat?”
Here mother and children exchanged awkward glances.
“It’s ’cause the lady died,” the boy said, scuffing the ground with his foot.
“The boss is very sad.” The girl sighed.
“He may even sell the house,” added the woman resignedly.
Their sadness turned to apprehension as his shadow suddenly swayed menacingly over them.
“Are you all right, sir?”
The boy huddled close to the mother. The girl clapped her hand to her mouth, as though stifling a cry.
“It’s just the heat,” he managed to mumble as he sank down on the rock again.
The woman went into the house and came back with a glass of water.
“Died? But how?” he asked with such a feeble voice, he could barely listen himself.
“Drowned, poor thing.”
Still pale, he drank the water.
“She was very nice. She liked the children.”
“She gave me a doll,” the girl said. “Want to see it?”
He smiled at the woman as the girl ran inside the house. She smiled back, full of sympathy for his shock.
The little girl came back, bringing the doll, accompanied by her brother, who carried a toy car. The four of them sat there in the yard examining these treasures. Little by little, he distanced himself from the desire to know more. He only wanted to sit there, lost in the contemplation of the toys. Above all, he wanted to forget. He had been part of a story—which had changed course. And from which he now felt excluded.
Perhaps for that very reason, the facts came to him in a natural and calm manner, as though his silence generated a vacuum that sucked in all the details and regrouped them at his feet. Pieces of information emerged delicately, none of them requiring any immediate reaction on his part.
He had been part of a story—which had changed course. And from which he now felt excluded.
The woman had slipped on the wet quarterdeck and fallen from the sailboat in the middle of the night, three weeks ago. A few days later, her body had washed up on the beach not far away. “Her face was all eaten by the fish,” the boy added, taking advantage of a pause.
They spoke slowly, in soft voices, each solemnly bringing back a fragment of the past. The words hurt him—he had no way of assimilating them. He thought about the woman, whose flesh by now was rotting beneath the earth.
“We heard about it from the boss. That same night. He came to get the spare key to the house, you see. My husband gave it to him.”
“He was shaking from head to toe.”
“They found the other key in her pocket.”
In panic, the man had radioed for help from the sailboat when he realized she was missing. Various boats had spent hours combing the waters in vain, over a radius of several miles.
“She wasn’t a good swimmer.”
“She drowned fast. It was very dark.”
That was true. On that night, he remembered well, he had spent hours sitting on the grass, gazing into the darkness, redrawing the silhouette of the woman on the Albatross. Meanwhile . . .
“He cried so hard!”
The mother bent over her son.
“Cried?” she asked, puzzled.
“First he talked on the phone. Then he cried. He banged his head on the table.”
The boy hadn’t been able to sleep. He had crept outside, gone down the path to the big house, and peeked through a window. Now he confessed his mischief.
“And he didn’t see you?”
“He was drunk.”
The man had guzzled two bottles and then passed out, slumping onto the table. The boy had only left the window in the wee hours of the morning, when the police arrived.
The inquiry confirmed the accident. The woman had been buried in the city.
“My husband went. There were lots of people. Lots of flowers.”
Three weeks . . . So it had all happened on the trip back from the island. Three weeks . . .
She must have changed her mind. She must have tried to kill her husband.
Only she had hesitated. A struggle, a bullet that missed the mark—and she had fallen overboard. Or had she been thrown into the water?
Had she screamed?
The boat had sailed away, disappearing in the night.
Worse, it had stayed just out of her reach, sails furled, rocking in the water.
So many hypotheses . . . and they all made sense. Except that none of them sounded real. They paled before the emptiness that overwhelmed him.
He had no reason to judge the husband, or to incriminate him. Suppose a wave hadn’t thrown the woman off balance—then he might have disappeared into the sea. With a bullet through his forehead and an anchor tied to his feet. Perhaps that was why he had drunk so much that night, why he had wept in despair.
He considered taking a closer look at the sailboat but couldn’t find the strength to do it. He said good-bye to the woman and children and went up the hill, walking away from the questions he left behind.
Six months went by. When summer came, he began to feel an intense desire to return to the island. This time, he decided, he would stay longer. He wanted to look over the collection of stories that consumed his nights, and catch up on his reading. He might have other reasons for going back to his domain. But he had long ceased thinking about them.
At the small port, the fisherman he knew was having problems with his boat’s engine and couldn’t take him to the island. But the man introduced him to a friend, who agreed to do the job. The fellow even left him the dinghy he was towing as a bonus, fruit of a spontaneous camaraderie developed during the crossing.
Thanks to the dinghy, he gained mobility. He paddled daily around the island, uncovering all sorts of details from various angles. On his first visit, he had familiarized himself with the physical dimensions of the landscape. Now he had the luxury of courting the island from a distance, discovering its bends and cliffs with renewed enchantment. He spent hours floating in the water, reading, half asleep, his fishing rod propped at his feet.
One day, to protect himself from the sun that had been beating down since early morning, he improvised a tent roof on his small boat. There he stayed, under its canvas, bent over his book, waiting for the fish to bite. From time to time his line would jerk, though nothing much materialized on his hook. Twice he replenished the bait. Till he finally gave it up, he was so absorbed in his reading. After a length of time he couldn’t have estimated precisely, he heard, behind him, a dull thumping sound.
A keel beating hard against the water, he thought. He turned around and saw the sailboat. So close—almost on top of him—that it seemed about to cut his dinghy in two. A line of letters, painted on the leaning bow, paraded before his eyes. And the Albatross, in a salty cloud, passed within a few inches of him.
He struggled to get up, losing his balance in the waves. The canvas shelter and the oars fell into the ocean. Gripping the seat of the fragile boat, he saw the man waving at him.
So it hadn’t been sold. . . . The Albatross hadn’t been sold! Lifted by a luminous flash, which in one fell swoop eliminated all and every hint of melancholy from the face of the Earth, it again put his island on the map.
The woman was back. With all the honors bestowed upon her by ghosts from countless seas, she was back for a last sailing trip.
He fished the oars out of the water, collected and folded up his canvas, and returned slowly to the beach. He pulled the dinghy onto the sand, leaving it under the bushes, as was his habit. For a moment, he stood motionless, looking at his hills.
He thought about the man who, on the other side of the island, was busy anchoring his sailboat on the little coral beach. It seemed natural that he should come back. This route was familiar to him. One could even say that there was something predictable about this reencounter. It was the way it had happened that worried him.
They had almost collided. . . . With great dexterity, however, the man had managed to avoid the worst. Steering the sailboat away, he had waved an apology and disappeared around the bend of the cove.
The sequence of events hadn’t lasted more than a minute or so. But it had left in its wake a sensation bordering on uneasiness. As if the episode fulfilled a function that he failed to grasp.
He had a bite to eat, without much appetite, and settled down under the trees, book in hand. Sooner or later, the man would show up.
Hours passed. He had a long swim; the afternoon fell. When the sun went down, he lit a fire. The green wood gave him some trouble, and he blew on the coals for a long while. He was still squatting down, puffing, when the man approached, carrying a bottle of liquor. He had come by way of the trail that twisted among the trees to the right of the hills.
Drawing closer, the visitor nodded with a somewhat studied formality, and produced a remark calculated for effect.
“My respects to the owner of the island.”
Owner . . . The greeting, spoken in a jovial tone, transported them offhandedly into the past, and reinstated the woman between them.
“You are the owner of the island?” the man insisted good-humoredly.
“Yes, I am,” he replied in the same tone.
“I’m sorry I startled you today,” the man said, holding out a hand.
Another echo from the past. Wasn’t it he who had startled the couple on that remote night?
“It was a bit close,” he admitted, shaking the man’s hand.
He offered him his folding canvas chair, and went to get some glasses. His feet felt like lead. The man poured them drinks.
“Cheers.”
“Cheers.”
Brandy . . . Two men drinking brandy on a deserted island.
“An inheritance,” he commented vaguely, with a gesture that embraced the island, the ocean, and the stars.
The other didn’t react to this explanation. He was examining the tent with interest. Was he thinking about his wife? Had he been witness to, or agent of, her death?
“I still don’t really know what to do with it,” he went on, aware that he spoke with the express purpose of filling the silence. As if the island were a painting he couldn’t decide where to hang, or an old piece of furniture acquired at some third-rate auction. In a last attempt, he added, almost to himself, “It’s a shame there’s no drinking water.”
“Drinking water?” The man turned to face him. “But there is. And lots of it.”
The man’s tone was attentive, almost solicitous.
“Where?” he asked, surprised.
The other laughed and replied, “In the pirates’ cave.”
“The pirates’ cave?” He laughed, too.
To his surprise, however, the man wasn’t joking. Drawing in the sand with a stick, he explained where the place was. The entrance was hidden by vegetation, and in the afternoon the tide rose to cover it. But in the morning it was visible. The springwater came from a pit below the rocks. It was fresh and abundant. Taking another swallow, he added, “It was my wife who discovered it. By accident.”
He shuddered at how effortlessly the wife had entered the scene, and wanted to change the subject, out of fear or shame. It was too early for her to take shape between the two of them. But the man continued.
“She was lying on the floating mattress, half asleep. The current took her there.”
He seemed determined to bring her into the conversation. He was creating a stage setting for her, rich in suggestive detail, almost forcing the other to visualize her drowsing in the sun, one arm trailing through the water.
What had she been thinking about as she floated on the clear sea? The death of the husband who was now recalling her to life?
He examined the man closely. He wore a scuffed pair of tennis shoes, shorts, and a T-shirt. The man was older than he had imagined a few months ago, when he had framed him in his lenses. He decided they were about the same age.
The man pulled his chair closer to the fire, poured himself another shot, and passed the bottle to his companion. He then asked how he spent his time on the island, and what he did for a living. Learning that he was a writer, the man seemed interested. His gaze, however, remained distant, veiled.
So he told him about the book of short stories he had just finished, knowing full well that his words were being lost in the shadows of the night. As he spoke, he thought about the woman, and how best to bring her back into the conversation.
For a moment, she had allowed herself to appear, exposing her warm, salty skin and graceful body to the universe. Then, as if by magic, she had left the scene again. Now she swayed between fire and breeze, life and death. Waiting.
At some point they would have to face her. But when? The man was gazing at the ocean. There before them, in the space the moon was just beginning to illuminate, they had dined together for the last time. Did he remember in detail what had happened that night?
An unexpected thought flashed through his mind: The caretaker had talked.
The caretaker had talked. . . . Alerted by his wife and children, he had mentioned to his boss that a stranger had visited the property. Odd, his interest in the sailboat, the caretaker had probably said. Odder still, the intensity with which he had reacted to the news of the accident involving the boss’s wife. And what about the lie regarding the car’s breakdown? His kid had followed the stranger all the way to the main road—the car was fine.
Intrigued, the husband had asked around. At the gas station near his property. In the marinas where his boat sometimes docked. He had grown convinced that someone was on his trail. Who could it be? And why?
At first, he must have thought it was the police. Maybe an extra zealous inspector or a private detective. But as the months went by, he had discarded that possibility—and gone further back in time. He had returned to that night on the island when he and his wife had dined on the deck of the Albatross. Gradually, sifting through every detail of that night, he had come to the singular cry that had pierced the silence.
The man’s eyes were fixed on his. He heard him murmur, “I always did like short stories. . . .”
His words sounded calm enough, conspiratorial, almost sleepy. But they came from far, far away. “Even as a boy I liked to read.”
The other woke from his torpor, realizing that they had both been silent for some time. The man was in no hurry. But now he was inviting him to continue.
“Well, I didn’t,” he replied casually. “I wasn’t interested in literature until I was much older.”
Night was falling, the bottle almost empty—it was time for the woman to reappear. He decided to escort her through the wings and bring her onstage.
“I started writing through the influence of a girlfriend. Later we married. When she left me, many years later, the passion remained.”
“For your stories.” The other chuckled.
“For my stories,” he confirmed.
And mentally he thanked his ex-wife for coming to his aid. In her honor, he added a specific detail. “Her name was Regina.”
“Was?” the other asked.
He hadn’t blinked. Nothing seemed to escape his attention. Depending on the role he had played in his wife’s death, it was entirely possible he was bent on violence.
The discovery, softened by the brandy, made him dizzy. The feeling was not altogether unpleasant. Could he be drunk? He felt somehow invulnerable. His island had become a huge parchment, where many stories could be written in arabesques of fire. If the man chose to postpone the rituals ordained for that particular night, he would insist the man continue. He would force him to, if necessary. He wasn’t afraid of death. Moreover, he had an advantage over him: He had saved his life. Surely the gods couldn’t be indifferent to that.
Taking a deep breath, he repeated the verb that still echoed between them. “And your wife, what was her name?”
The words hung suspended in the air. His heart was pounding. He swallowed the rest of his drink in one gulp.
The other, shaking his head pensively, seemed not to have heard. Was he leaning over the ocean once again, watching his wife disappear under the waves?
He stared hard at the man, knowing that he was witnessing a decisive moment in the life of a human being. As he watched, an emotion sprang up from the ground between them, almost palpable. A second theory took shape in his mind, less dramatic, more complex.
Then he understood. And when he saw tears running down the other’s face, he was not surprised. The man knew nothing about him. He had come back simply to relive, on the island, the last night he had spent with her. This was the cloak he had chosen for the occasion—this mantle of sadness. Whatever had happened on the sailboat, the man was innocent. The despair the caretaker’s son had witnessed, now clearly written all over the wrinkled face, was eloquent proof of that.
“I’m sorry,” the other said finally, his trembling hand wiping the tears from his face.
He, too, was deeply moved. So much so that he hardly understood what happened next. The man had drawn a pistol from his pocket.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated sadly, as if he deeply regretted what he was about to do.
They stood up slowly, each haunted on opposite sides of the fire. He turned toward the sea, aware that the woman awaited him. An instant before the shot, he heard her voice.
“Corelli . . .”
The bullet hit him. Smiling, he slumped slowly down as the man fired again.
