Everything was fine with the first three, but not with the fourth. With the fourth Lissy, Keller began to realise that something was not right with the sows. When the fourth had her first fit, foaming at the mouth, eyes rolling up, legs going stiff, he thought he would go mad. It only lasted a minute or two, but to him it felt like an eternity.
The following day, he took his holdall, went down to the village and caught a bus to San Valentino, where there was a vet.
Dr. Kaser – that was his name – listened to his story, then reassured him. It was nothing dangerous. Some animals did suffer from epilepsy. It was rare but it was not unknown. Epilepsy? Keller had never even heard the word.
Dr. Kaser explained that it was a problem with the brain: every so often it would short-circuit. Epileptic fits, he said, were not risky per se. Epilepsy was almost never deadly, and the person actually suffering the fit did not even remember it. There were two kinds of problems. One was if the sufferer fell and hit his head. The other was if he swallowed his tongue, which might lead to his choking to death.
In any case, the doctor concluded with a broad smile, he had nothing to worry about. “Epilepsy has no effect on the quality of the meat.”
“The quality of the meat?”
“If your sow had an epileptic seizure, you could still slaughter it and sell it.”
Keller’s eyes opened wide. “Slaughter Lissy?”
“Lissy?”
“That’s the sow’s name.”
“I see,” Dr. Kaser said, even though he didn’t.
“How can she be cured?”
The vet put his hands together on the desk. “You can’t cure epilepsy. It’s a genetic condition.”
“Aren’t there drugs?”
The vet laughed. “Of course there are, to keep the condition under control. Not for animals, though.”
“But for people, yes?”
“Yes. Epilepsy is a condition that’s been known for a long time. People used to say that epileptic seizures were a sign of benevolence on the part of the gods.”
“Can you give me these drugs?”
“I’m a vet, not a neurologist.”
“Can you give me the name of a neurologist?”
The doctor shook his head in disbelief. “Trust me, not for a pig. You’d be wasting your time.”
All the same, Keller insisted so much that Dr. Kaser wrote the name of a drug on a piece of paper. Sodium pentothal.
Keller approached a smuggler. They haggled a little. Keller slaughtered three boars and a sow and sold the meat at market. With the money he made, he bought the phials of sodium pentothal.
They were not enough to provide a cure, but they did keep the seizures under control and avoid serious damage.
Lissy number five and Lissy number six did not need the drug. Lissy number seven, though, had a fit every three months or so. The one that had come on a few hours earlier was the longest to date. He really did think she was going to die, and if that happened, what would he do? He did not want to think about that, so he picked up his pace.
Lissy was hungry. That was all. All he had to do was get her food. Then she would get better. Much better.
“Sweet Lissy, little Lissy . . .”
It did not take him long to catch up with Alex, the young poacher whose disappearance would not cause a stir. That was what the Voice had told him. Lissy’s Voice.
Nobody will miss him, Sim’l . . .
The Voice was right, as usual.
Keller stopped behind some snow-covered rocks, watching him.
The young man was walking a little crookedly, his hands in his pockets. He was in a rush. Maybe he was scared. For sure, he was cold. Keller slipped the rifle off his shoulder, lay down flat and aimed at the poacher’s heart.
Less than seventy metres. He could have hit him with his eyes closed.
“Lissy is . . .”
He did not finish.
His finger failed to obey his command. He tried but it was no use. The rifle remained silent. The hand holding the weapon shook. The barrel of the rifle collided with the heap of snow behind which he was lying. Keller tried to shoot, but he could not pull the trigger.
He ducked down behind the rocks, panting.
He should have felt startled, bewildered. Instead, he felt at peace. Keller thought about Wegener’s smile of gratitude when he had killed him in the villa on the Passer. He thought about sledges and eyes carved into the wood. He thought about a little boy with blue eyes and a beauty spot at the end of his smile. He thought about Elisabeth and how she had trembled as her life drained out of her along with all that blood.
Then he thought about Wegener again.
His was the last blood he would ever spill. That death had broken the circle. It was over. He could not kill anymore. He must never do it again. Above all: he did not want to.
Peace.
He closed his eyes, smiling. Peace.
But only for a short while. A very short while.
The Voice screamed in his head. A roar that drew an exclamation from him. Lissy is hungry, Lissy is hungry. The Voice wanted blood, wanted it now.
Lissy is hungry. Kill him!
“Opa Simon,” he whispered. “Opa Simon.”
He heard the young man’s voice from down below. “Who’s there?”
Keller peered out.
Below him, as the shadows of night turned into darkness, Alex the poacher was aiming his rifle. He was shaking. Keller could see him even at that distance, lurking amid the snow-covered rocks. The young man was shaking. Keller was sorry for him and the fear he was feeling.
All because of him.
Then he thought of the fear of all those he had killed. Some had been lucky: death had caught them unawares, like a black curtain falling, putting an end to all joy and pain. But others had seen it coming. They had known.
And death had not been gentle with them.
Kill him, Sim’l. Please.
Keller hid again.
“I won’t do it.”
Why, why, why?
Keller counted to a hundred. And then he checked. The young man had gone.
Keller blessed him with a prayer, dug a hole in the snow and laid the poacher’s woollen gloves in it. He set fire to them with a match, waited until the wool was burnt to a cinder, then closed the hole and got back on his feet.
The Voice whimpered.
Lissy is hungry.
“Yes,” Keller murmured, “I know.”
Lissy was hungry, and he would take care of her. Because, even though the circle had closed, Lissy loved Sim’l, and Sim’l loved Lissy, and Lissy had not abandoned him.
Keller would continue to care for her. But he would do it differently. How, he did not know, nor did he know if there was another way. He only knew that he would not kill anymore.
Never again.