The Unseen

by Nanni Balestrini

  bits of television sets mattresses books strewn everywhere food leftovers clothes sodden with water and there was a stink of dampness and putrefaction lingering on in the corridor there was light in my cell in the doorway I stumbled over the violin gutted with its strings torn off I went inside and I saw the wreckage of my cell everything smashed up everything uprooted everything shattered everything lying on the ground in an inch or so of water a sludge that had been rotting away for two months now the guards looked and said nothing I didn’t know where to start I didn’t know what to do there was nothing recognizable anymore there were shirts sweaters rotting with stains of green mould I’d left everything there all my shirts and sweaters

  I took two sweaters that had been saved because they were on top and some other stuff then I also took a pair of trousers half mouldy and ripped too at the bottom but I really needed them in one corner I saw a little pile my letters ripped crumpled and torn I recognized the little yellow square of China’s last telegram her letters were there and other letters I gathered them up in a handful I saw her writing on the pieces of paper and I put them in my pocket I searched for my books one or two of them were still in good condition although wet I dried them a bit and I put them with the sweaters after trying to dry them a bit

  I searched around a bit longer but halfheartedly I raked around a bit kicking aside the plastic plates and the sodden newspapers I stood there staring about the guards didn’t seem to be in any hurry I looked through the broken window pane and I started wondering what was the point of this I dropped the books I only kept the sweaters and the mouldy trousers then I put my hand in my pocket I pulled out the shreds of the letters and without looking at them I dropped them on the floor too even her letters and before I left I also took off the red scarf that I always wore around my neck and threw that down too and I hurried away with the guards because by now nothing mattered to me any more at all

  43

  The date of the trial came round and I was transferred to the prison where I’d been the first time after my arrest we were in a small transit block for people who like me were there for trial a small block that was really awful a small block in continual darkness buried in a corner where the sun’s rays never reached that was where I understood because for the first time I saw it for myself about all these stories of pentiti* that had started just at that time I became aware then that the worst things about this whole business were still to come that everything that had happened so far had been nothing by comparison with what was starting to happen in fact it almost looked good by comparison for with all these things happening now it seemed to me that not only was it all over and done with but also that the whole thing had been futile that it had all been utterly futile every single thing everything that all of us had ever done

  it so happened that in this block of the prison there was someone who was reputed to have talked to have sent other people to prison what had happened to this guy was very unusual because he’d been captured as a result of a pentito’s statements and then early on he’d admitted to everything this guy had accused him of there was a murder involved too he admitted everything but went no further than that made no accusations against anyone else however his comrades in prison judged these actions of his to be an admission of the pentito’s statements and they gave him the option of getting himself sent to a prison where there were pentiti and taking a pentito and killing him

  when his comrades forced this on him he cracked in the face of this proposal he reacted by cracking up and he decided to become a pentito in earnest then he justified it by saying that this proposal had struck him as monstrous this thing they proposed to him in other words a murder to purify himself he cracked up and spent a few days in this state then he made up his mind he called the investigating judge and he talked in earnest and came out with a load of names he told them a lot he even told them the name of a guy who was his best friend the only one who defended him in prison and so further incriminating evidence turned up against his comrades who were in prison who were incriminated all over again by what he’d said

  when he finished his statements the judge told him these statements mean that you can’t go back to the special again with all the rest because they’ll kill you right away so they sent him to a prison for pentiti he went to this prison for pentiti sure that there he’d at least have the chance to discuss these experiences but once he’d got there in this prison for pentiti there came another shock even worse than the first because what he saw and heard in his talks with these pentiti was even nastier for he explained in the letters to his friend that I read too that these individuals weren’t pentiti at all but were just people making calculations about when they’d get out on the basis of the number of statements they’d made how long it would take them to get out on the basis of that

  and then he freaked out again and once more he called the same investigating judge to whom he’d made his statements and he withdrew the whole lot saying I know very well that the retractions I’m making are unlikely to exonerate the people I’ve incriminated but all the same I want to leave this prison because I don’t want to stay here any longer then the judge told him listen now if you go back where you were before they’ll kill you they won’t give you any option this time this time instead they’ll kill you as soon as they set eyes on you and that’s the end of it but he said it doesn’t matter I’m going there even if they kill me for I’m not staying here

  at a loss to know where to put him the ministry parked him in this block and he was there just when I arrived for my trial he was in isolation he even went out for the exercise period alone they put him on his own in one of these enclosed segments however as soon as his comrades arrived he started sending them notes and letters telling them about all his goings on and saying that what he was hoping for was to go back with his comrades despite having done what he’d done and saying that he was ready to accept whatever judgment the comrades would make on his decisions and his actions saying that he preferred the risk of being killed because he was aware of what he’d done and he preferred the risk of being killed

  he set out all these self-critical arguments and sent them to his comrades from isolation but they were all rejected he received no replies and then one day after these futile attempts to establish a dialogue he made a decision he went down to the exercise yard and spent half an hour pleading with the sergeant who was on duty to put him in with his comrades he pleaded and pleaded the sergeant was doubtful however in the end he let him go through and then he started talking to his comrades telling them his story which they knew already the comrades told him don’t come in here again tomorrow or we’ll kill you and then he said he’d come anyway tomorrow because if that was what they decided whatever it might be he accepted it

  and then his comrades discussed what’s to be done and if the guy really does come to the exercise yard tomorrow they really do have to kill him otherwise he’ll stay there and it’ll blow over and besides in the end word would get round all the prisons and it would get known that this guy that they regard as a bastard is having exercise with them in their yard quite undisturbed and so the next day this guy does in fact turn up in the exercise yard the comrades had a blade but they decided not to knife him but to strangle him with knotted shoelaces they’d woven a cord from shoelaces and then right on time he turned up in the exercise yard as on the day before he’d had himself taken into the section where the comrades were and he knew that they were going to kill him and he was there waiting for them to kill him

  and in fact they put him against the wall and they put this cord of shoelaces around his neck and he didn’t put up the slightest resistance he didn’t say a thing he didn’t struggle at all he didn’t move he let them go ahead he let them put the cord around his throat when one comrade started pulling the cord around his neck the last thing he said was no not like this the guy who was pulling it was a friend of his he said no not like this I beg you use the bl
ade do it with the blade and the guy kept on pulling the cord and by now the other one was turning blue he was purple he was quite purple his eyes popping out of their sockets he was gradually suffocating because the whole thing was taking a long time then slowly he fell to his knees

  then suddenly the cord broke the cord made of shoelaces broke all of a sudden and the guy pulling it was left standing there with the broken cord in his hand and by then the guards who’d followed everything from their booth on the closed circuit cameras had rushed up and this guy on his knees stayed there huddled there on the ground they could have gone ahead and killed him with their bare hands he wouldn’t have put up a fight but they left him there they all looked horrified the guards arrived with their dogs with their helmets pulled down their truncheons their shields this guy was there huddled on the ground half-conscious but his body was jerking I don’t know he was coughing he was trying to get his breath there was froth coming out of his mouth then he vomited I don’t know but what a fucking shitty business I was watching what a shitty business I’m telling you about

  only the story wasn’t over there because after the guards took him away and as soon as he recovered this guy was talking from the window of his cell to the guys in the next cell saying tomorrow I’m going down again tomorrow I’m going down and they were saying but the guards won’t put you with us again and he was saying I’ve tried to kill myself but I can’t kill myself you have to kill me and so in the end he went down to the exercise yard the next day too but the next day that friend of his had arrived the one he denounced along with the others the guy went down to the exercise yard and the guards naturally put him on his own the guards were very tense for these weren’t nice things to see and when they see scenes like this they tell themselves they’re dealing with murderers people who’ll kill at the drop of a hat they become even surer of this

  his friend arrived he’d heard about what had happened in the exercise yard and then the first thing he did was he went up to the gate the other guy was at the next gate and by wriggling their heads through they were able to speak face to face the first one went over there wriggled his head outside and started talking to the other one and this action led to a certain amount of embarrassment among their comrades however the last thing they could do was set upon that guy who was much too impeccable a comrade much too blameless just for having said something to him and the guy didn’t just make this gesture but then he also took off a ring he took a ring off his finger and gave it to him through the gate the guy had denounced him but they were friends they’d been friends since childhood

  then the next day this guy still talking through the cell window told his comrades that he planned to call the investigating judge and attack him and so he asked them to give him a primus stove so that he could make a skewer and then the comrades told him okay but don’t imagine that if you do this your problems are over if you want to do this do it but it doesn’t change a thing the blood of a judge won’t wash away your problems this is exactly what they said the blood of a judge won’t wash away your problems however at the same time they gave him the primus stove and he’d made the skewer he sent for the judge to whom he’d made the statements and the judge came probably thinking that he had more statements to make and in the visiting room he managed to stab him in the arm after which the guards intervened and put a stop to it

  44

  A few days before the start of the trial Gelso and Ortica arrived in this block too I was very excited about them coming because it had been so long since I’d seen them Gelso had been arrested at the same time as I’d been arrested but right away he’d been put in a special even further south and in all this time I’d had no more news of him whereas Ortica had only been arrested a few months before and he’d ended up in the same special as Gelso I was very excited and emotional about seeing my comrades again through the spy-hole I saw them arrive at the end of the corridor surrounded by guards Ortica was loaded down with rucksacks Gelso carried nothing at first I didn’t even recognize him he was very thin short hair no glasses he looked straight ahead without returning the greetings from the spy-holes of the cells

  then I called to them and Ortica heard immediately he knew who I was even though he couldn’t see me because the guards were putting them in a cell quite far from mine I heard Ortica’s voice calling to me saying where are you then pressing my face to the spy-hole I saw him for an instant in the middle of the corridor waving to me in greeting as a guard was pulling him back by the other arm as soon as they’d locked them in I called the sergeant and told him they were my co-defendants and that they were there for the same trial as me and I immediately put in a written request to have them come into the cell where I was on my own the sergeant told me that he would take it to the administration and that maybe the cell transfer could be made that same evening

  meanwhile right away I set about preparing supper for Gelso and Ortica I didn’t have much stuff in my cell I called the working prisoner and sent him to other cells to get things for me wine in particular meanwhile I swept the floor and I also washed it with a rag I lifted the mattress off its base because were was no table in the cell just a bit of metal shelving fixed to the wall when the working prisoner came back he brought me three plastic mineral water bottles with a quarter of red wine in them which is the way they sell them to us and other food which didn’t amount to much so I was at a bit of a loss because I wanted to make a nice supper for my friends

  and then I thought of making a dessert in my cell I had two packets of instant pudding I made two puddings a chocolate one and a vanilla one heating the milk in a saucepan on the stove and then I put them on the window sill to cool down in two plastic bowls I made coffee and mashed up some dry biscuits in it and then I layered the pudding and the biscuits on a plate I beat up the white of an egg with some castor sugar to whip it into a white cream that I put on top and on the bed base I put a clean white sheet then I unscrewed the gas stove and round it I wound a cone of tin foil so that the flame came out like a candle

  I put out the light and I was setting the table when the guard opened the armoured door and let in Ortica but Gelso wasn’t there and Ortica told me he’d explain later we hugged one another and as soon as the guards had left he told me that Gelso was sick he was sick in the head he’d been ill for a good while already prison was too much for him to begin with all he talked about was escaping and then he stopped talking altogether he no longer seemed to recognize people he no longer wanted to talk to anybody and then during exercise time he also started going around the courtyard on all fours growling and making faces like a crazy man muttering that if he was a dog they’d let him out

  to start with I’d cut some bread with slices of salami and some mayonnaise we started eating and Ortica started telling me about Scilla I’d already heard the story a rumour was going round but I hadn’t believed it what they were saying seemed impossible that Scilla had become a spy a police informer who’d betrayed his comrades even though I’d never liked him but Ortica told me that by now all the comrades outside were convinced that Scilla had turned informer to the carabinieri that he’d had a whole lot of comrades arrested it had all started when the carabinieri had carried out a search on him and maybe because they found arms on him or whatever nobody’s sure exactly how the fact is that they took him to the barracks and he stayed in the barracks for a whole day and then they released him during the night

  Scilla had explained this business telling his comrades that the carabinieri had spent the whole day threatening him but had to let him go because they had no evidence the comrades had believed this they were even pleased because nothing had come of it but nobody had even the slightest suspicion it didn’t occur to them that that was the start of a collaboration with the carabinieri Scilla was quite above suspicion everybody would have staked their lives on his honesty yet the fact was that when the carabinieri asked him to collaborate he agreed and they released him and shortly af
ter this there was the ambush and death of Cotogno and then once he’d denounced all his comrades Scilla disappears nobody knows maybe they gave him a passport and money and he’s vanished abroad

  Ortica brought direct proof that Scilla was to blame for Cotogno’s death from Valeriana who he’d met shortly before being arrested he’d run into Valeriana outside a chemist’s shop it was a while since he’d seen her and hardly recognized her he’d heard that she’d become a junkie but he was really shocked when he saw what a state she was in clearly that day she was going through withdrawal because she couldn’t get her hands on any stuff I can’t tell you what a mess she was in Ortica told me she was crying and screaming she was outside the chemist’s screaming help me nobody will give me any methadone I’ve gone round all the chemists in all the villages nobody will give me any methadone none of these bastards these shit pharmacists I’ll kill the lot of them I feel rotten I’m going crazy

  it was another week before I saw her again then one day she was waiting for me in the street outside my house she was dressed like the time before with the same black woollen cap pulled down over her forehead she asked me if I could find her some money because she owed Nocciola a million lire Nocciola had become the local pusher this was something else I found out from Ortica Valeriana had been selling heroin for him but she’d spent all the money on her own habit in short she was in real trouble and there was nobody else to turn to any more she was in debt all over the place she talked without stopping saying that she wanted to kick it that now she was taking methadone because she wanted to kick it but first she had to sort out the debt with Nocciola