The Museum of Things Left Behind Read online

  And now, high above in the sorting office, with a neat pile of letters to represent each quadrant, it was Remi’s job to shuffle the post into the order of his delivery route. His fastidious nature and eye for detail insisted that he should hand-deliver each letter to the correct address. But he knew, too, that this must be balanced with the knowledge that it was his duty to be efficient with time, the currency by which he was paid and the yardstick by which he was measured; if a letter happened to appear in the pile after its designated drop-off point, he would simply post it through the first available door, trusting that the resident would pass it on to the correct recipient at his earliest convenience. In the summer, when homeowners leave their doors and windows open to encourage safe onward passage of any air current, Remi would take the letters into the homes and stand them against a vase or milk jug so that they would not be missed. The people of Vallerosa were neighbourly by nature and were in and out of each other’s houses all the time. The arrival of a letter to any citizen was always noteworthy, and any intermediary handler who redirected a missive to its correct address would probably be invited to share the news so all were happy to play their part in the safe forwarding of mail.

  On a normal day (which this was not), with his mailbag adequately ordered, Remi would carefully attire himself in his uniform. To the Velcro strip above his left breast pocket he would stick the smart insignia of the post office and, to complete his transformation, don the navy blue peaked cap of the postman. Standing in front of the mirror, he would tweak and tug his uniform into its neatest possible configuration, polishing his teeth with his tongue and peering closely at his reflection for unruly nasal hair or other signs of personal weakness. It was undeniable: he was a good-looking, clean-smelling man with decent prospects. That he was still single was as mysterious to Remi as it was to his mother. There was nothing in the reflection that stared back at him that indicated why this should be so. Despite his bachelor status, he was comfortable with the man who eyed him squarely in the mirror. Proud to be an upstanding citizen with purpose, he saluted himself and received the returned salute with a grateful smile. At the threshold he would bend to attach his bicycle clips to his trouser hems and step into his shoes, which, with their rugged crêpe soles, were ideally suited to the long cycle ride ahead of him.

  Today, however, as already noted, was turning out to be far from routine. Having emptied out the post and spread it with his toe, as usual, one letter had immediately jumped out at him, his attention seized by its unusual colours. Remi could not have noticed its significance sooner had it been accompanied by a vision of blazing angels and a heavenly choir. Indeed, a well-aimed shaft of light from the window high above was now pointing it out to him. He dropped to his knees and crept forward on all fours. Fishing out his prize, he remained on his knees, barely able to contemplate this trembling fissure in a sea of the prosaic. He scrutinized the envelope with a curious, then greedy eye, scanning every detail. As the full significance of the letter began to sink in, the colour drained from Remi’s face and re-formed as two pink spots high on his cheeks. He held the envelope in both hands, holding it up to the light and then to his nose, inhaling deeply and picking out the exotic scents absorbed on its long journey. Among the dirty whites, greys and browns of the everyday post, the pale blue of the aerogramme was distinct enough to mark it out as unique, but the almost weightless paper and those two neatly affixed stamps, one gold, the other blue, each bearing the foiled outline of the profile of Her Majesty the Queen of England, were enough to make Remi’s hands shake. Never had he held such a precious delivery. The address revealed its intention. With ‘Vallerosa’ neatly printed as its closing directive and a double wavy line beneath it, drawing it to the attention of the postmen of many nationalities who had ensured its safe onward passage, the address insisted, politely but firmly, that it be directed without delay to the country’s Parliament Hall, the home of the government.

  Breathless, he bundled the mail into his satchel, barely cognizant of the order as he stuffed it in. He dressed hurriedly, buttoning his shirt with one hand while smoothing his hair with the other. He slapped the Velcro badge to his chest, at an inappropriately jaunty angle. He jammed his feet into his shoes, and only slowed to stow the precious letter between his string vest and chest, then tucked his shirt tightly into his trousers.

  Off he went into the fresh morning air, heart soaring and palms tingling with excitement and anticipation. Remi pedalled furiously for the last twenty yards of the steep hill, which allowed him to freewheel, at pace, along a dark alley, then diagonally across Piazza Rosa. He bumped over the cobbles, his bell ringing clearly in the quiet of the morning square, and leaped off, the bicycle continuing without him until it came to a clattering halt against the railings of Parliament Hall.

  ‘I have a letter! A letter for our president! I must deliver it at once! Look, it has, it has … a foreign stamp!’ The two guards knew Remi well, drank with him frequently and would probably be joining him for their regular light lunch of cold boar and bread later that day, but nevertheless each reached for his gun holster as the postman ripped at his shirt, buttons flying. They took turns to scrutinize the letter, looking closely at the address, the stamps and back again at the trembling postman. Undeniably, the seal of international airfreight was a persuasive argument and one that, upon lengthy reflection, neither felt able to resist. On the understanding that both men would accompany him until responsibility had been passed to a senior minister, Remi was allowed to enter Parliament Hall. As they pushed the double doors to enter, all three experienced a prickle of excitement as the building swallowed them.

  CHAPTER 2

  In Which Treason Is Narrowly Avoided

  The office of the minister for the exterior was an efficient one, run by the extremely busy Mario Lucaccia, whose intense industriousness manifested itself in an empty desk with just a notepad and a careful alignment of recently sharpened pencils, ordered by size and poised for action. The interruption to his morning was regrettable as he was on the verge of implementing a groundbreaking directive, the nature of which had eluded him for some years. He tutted audibly. With barely a pause and a brusque wave of the hand, the young minister swiftly passed Remi on, through an internal door that was partly shrouded by a heavy brocade curtain. It led to the larger and more cluttered office of Signor Rolando Posti, the minister for the interior.

  ‘What have we here, Remi-Post?’ the world-weary minister enquired, peering up at the visitor from beneath his once-impressive eyebrows.

  ‘I am here, with your kind permission, to deliver a letter from the United Kingdom of England, sir.’ Remi shuffled a little but took comfort from the presence of two palace guards and one minister for the exterior.

  ‘A letter you say. And how can you be so sure?’ The minister reached for the aerogramme and studied it carefully.

  ‘Oh, I know a letter when I see one, sir. It is my job to know these things.’ On safe ground now, Remi shuffled a little less.

  ‘It is, is it? And at what point, Remi-Post, does your job end and my job commence? For is it not within the remit of my job to recognize the difference between a letter and a formal application from a foreign entity?’ The minister for the interior let the possibility hang in the air.

  ‘A formal what, sir?’ Remi knew immediately that this was outside the realm of his training and fell silent, his mouth agape.

  The minister continued, ‘And as such, if it is determined to be the latter rather than the former, it requires an altogether different procedure. And here is a conundrum that immediately becomes apparent, Remi-Post, a quandary that a postman such as your good self needn’t ordinarily concern himself with, but I shall enlighten you because it is the wish of our president that wisdom is shared for the collective understanding of our entire nation and for the evolutionary betterment of future generations.’ He paused. ‘If it is just a letter, we needn’t worry our president with it. He is a busy man with an election to prepare for, and it i
s our job, as ministers, to act as filters and remove all that is trifling or troublesome from his immediate concern. If I were to go now to his chambers and interrupt his work with just-a-letter I cannot begin to second guess the consequences, but they would be grave.’ Signor Posti sighed heavily for dramatic effect. ‘If, however, it transpires that this is indeed a formal application from a foreign entity, and I were to hesitate before presenting it to our president, or to presume I had the resource or acumen to deal with it independently, then he would be quite correct to consider my action, or my non-action, as an act of gross treason.’

  He glowered at the men in the room. The palace guards were almost imperceptibly retreating, a backwards half-step at a time, in a silent bid to put distance between themselves and these treasonous associations. Signor Lucaccia, meanwhile, who had been listening intently to the exchange, was now eyeing the older minister. The younger minister’s scrutiny sported a glint of nervousness and he was chewing his lip anxiously, but he knew, too, that there was much he could learn from studying the older man’s handling of the situation. All the power was in the interior, everybody knew that, and progressing from his own inferior ministerial duties would be easier if he took his lead from this sagacious elder statesman.

  Signor Posti drew himself up in his chair and looked coolly at his audience. Now was a time for decisiveness and clear thinking. A letter would be quicker to deal with, but there was no precedent for receiving one at Parliament Hall and the stamps upon this communication certainly appeared to bear the mark of the United Kingdom’s most senior stateswoman. The minister was a cautious man, and his caution was one of the virtues that had earned him high office. It would be safer – both for the sake of his career and for the sanctity of his country – to assume this was not just-a-letter but an official communiqué. In this instance, hasty action would mitigate any potential risk to the president. With the first part of the decision already made, it was now simply a case of determining the correct protocol.

  Swivelling his chair, Signor Posti turned slowly and deliberately to the shelves behind him and heaved one of the tomes back to his desk. He wetted his finger and flicked through the pages, conscious of four pairs of eyes upon him as he scanned the headings and sub-sections, many of which he had authored over the years. After several tense moments he found the right page and, smiling knowingly to himself, began the laborious task of form filling. This required the dispatching of the hovering minister for the exterior for two fresh sheets of carbon paper to allow the execution of the paperwork in triplicate. Glad once more to have volunteered interest, the less-experienced man hurried off importantly.

  Remi jigged from foot to foot, anxious to learn his fate and, if protocol decreed it, to take hold once more of the important document. A lifetime of training had prepared him for this very scenario and, while the minister before him had an evolved understanding of the machinations of Parliament, he alone understood that the royal blue of the par avion sticker, fixed jauntily to the left-hand corner, insisted upon the most urgent of handling at all times. But, as anxious as he was, his strict sense of hierarchy ensured that he must do nothing to interrupt the process of government. As patiently as possible, he observed the complex ritual, quietly respectful of the enormous amount of bureaucracy his not just-a-letter had already generated.

  At last, the postman’s conscientious approach was rewarded. After a brief discussion between the two ministers, who huddled forehead to forehead in a corner while they decided on the best course of action, Remi was invited to hand-deliver the not just-a-letter to its final destination, proceeding further into the echelons of Parliament Hall, using another, narrower, flight of stairs. Shaking with excitement and accompanied now by two guardsmen, one short, eager minister for the exterior and one tall, craggy, breathless minister for the interior, he hesitated, then politely rapped on the carved wooden door of his president’s private chambers. Upon hearing the call from within, he was barely able to still the knocking of his knees.

  CHAPTER 3

  In Which a Formal Communication From a Foreign Entity Is Delivered

  Until twenty-two minutes past ten, when Remi’s bicycle had bounced its way, riderless, to a halt in front of the railings, President Sergio Scorpioni had been contemplating life and the complex paradigms it dealt him. Each new dawn seemed to reveal to him another bewildering puzzle to solve, and nightfall brought disappointment and impotence in place of the sense of completion and resolution he craved. Today his own dissatisfaction was the source of his troubles. ‘To what do all men aspire?’ he asked himself. ‘Great wealth? Good looks? A beautiful wife with generous hips?’ Pausing for effect, even though the conversation was playing out in the confines of his own mind, he answered, ‘No, the ultimate status symbol comes in the shape of a position of power.’ And there he was, appointed to the highest office in the land, with all its associated amenities and privileges. At his disposal he had catering staff and cleaning staff, he had a dozen vice-presidents, who were the clearest thinkers and his dearest friends in the land, yet he remained unfulfilled.

  He shook his head and chewed his lip as he surveyed the material manifestation of his power. As a centrepiece, his sumptuous private chambers boasted an intricately carved mahogany four-poster bed, with a firm but forgiving mattress on which to rest at night, several goose-down pillows on which to lay his head, cool cotton sheets and warm angora blankets, surrounded by the finest bombazine hangings.

  Throughout his chambers the floor was covered with layer upon layer of hand-woven carpets, each overlapping the next and telling its own elaborate tales. Their rich and complex threads wove the stories of many lifetimes, winding together the narratives of peasant childhoods with high holidays, of marriages made in Heaven and useful lives reflected upon from the comfort of an old age well accounted-for. Carpets owned by his mother, stitched by his grandmother, trodden on by his father and forefathers before him.

  His desk, carved, like his bed, of the very finest hardwood, was solid, vast, and shone with decades of polish. With inset inkwells and a large blotter that was regularly refilled with a clean sheet, that desk had been the seat of power for his father, and his father’s father. And look! It was all his! As he paced from bed, to desk, to window and back again, in a circle that showed, after four and a half years of office, a faint trace of a path in the carpets, he tried to count his blessings on his fingers. ‘One, I have my health. Two, I have the tools for change. Three, I don’t have to make my own bed in the morning …’

  It was no good, his face crumpled and his fingers balled into fists as the full weight of the responsibility that was attendant upon his comfortable life came crashing back upon his shoulders. As he continued to pace, his lips formed silent pledges but the acid that rose from his stomach, giving him almost constant pain in his lower chest, came from a dark, dismal place that countered those promises and told him that he would never, ever, be as successful as his father.

  He stopped at the window, resting his forehead against the damp glass and allowing a little pool of condensation to gather there. Below him, Piazza Rosa was gloomy. Puddles from the previous night’s rain had gathered between the cobbles, and wastepaper clung miserably to the rims of gutters, refusing to be swept away out of sight but lingering to add to the forlorn landscape. Plastic webbed chairs were tilted forward against moulded white tables, and metal shutters were drawn at the majority of shop windows, giving the country’s finest meeting point an air of neglect and dejection. Sergio looked at his watch, which showed twenty-five past ten, and then up at the landmark clock opposite him. It remained stubbornly, accusingly, at ten to seven and the painted clay figurines, crafted to represent the finest attributes of Vallerosa, who should have been lining up to announce the next fifteen-minute interval, had long been stilled. Today was the beginning of spring, a time of festivity, traditionally used to commence courtship and slaughter the last of the winter pigs, but no one was celebrating. Even Franco, the town’s alcoholic, would have
been a welcome sight, but not even he was prepared to liven up the square with his clumsy lurching and unintelligible mutterings. Sergio scanned the piazza, his eyes sweeping across the left edge, with its arched walkway, along the grand façade of the town hall and clock tower and back down the right edge, but all was damply silent.

  Inside, the electrics hummed, the ancient heating system clicked and sighed, and the building itself creaked under the oppressive atmosphere of a period of celebration when the public had chosen – unanimously – not to celebrate.

  The winter months were dismal, as for any city that thrived on its long, hot summers, whose very livelihood depended on clear blue skies by day and clement nights. Each year, work in the tea plantations remained at a standstill until the sun heaved itself over the mountaintop to awaken the first shoots in April, when labour could once again resume. A sluggishness of pace that was forgivable in the unrelenting summer sun took on a less condonable tenor, tinged with apathy and inertia, when the days shortened and the thermometer seldom rose above twelve degrees.

  The red façade of the city’s main square that, under the kind light of the summer months, shone with every tone from a pale, dusty rose to a deep, bottomless burgundy, looked tired in the winter, shrinking in fear from each day’s onslaught. The flaking plaster and crumbling stone glared accusingly at the president, reminding him of the enormous cost involved in maintaining the piazza in its present state, let alone restoring it to its pre-1900s glory.

  He returned to his desk and took up his pen. After allowing it to drink thirstily from the ink, he resumed writing. His current train of thought was complex and the recent round of pacing had done little to unlock his dilemma. He reread the last passage he had written.