Eco: Foucalt's Pendulum by eco foucault (important books to read .txt) 📗

The worst would be ananxiety attack. You are certain then that in a moment you willstart screaming. Periscope. Submarine. Trapped on the ocean floor.Maybe the great black fish of the abyss are already circling you,unseen, and all you know is that you're running out ofair...

I took several deepbreaths. Concentrate. The only thing you can rely on at a time likethis is the laundry list. Stick to facts, causes, effects. I amhere for this reason, and also for this reason andthis...

Memories, distinct,precise, orderly. Of the past three frantic days, of the past twoyears, and the forty-year-old memories I found when I broke intoJacopo Belbo's electronic brain.

I am remembering now (asI remembered then) in order to make sense out of the chaos of thatmisguided creation of ours.

Now (as then, while Iwaited in the periscope) I shrink into one remote corner of mymind, to draw from it a story. Such as the Pendulum. Diotallevitold me that the first Sefirah is Keter, the Crown, the beginning,the primal void. In the beginning He created a point, which becameThought, where all the figures were drawn. He was and was not, Hewas encompassed in the name yet not encompassed in the name, havingas yet no name other than the desire to be called by a name...Hetraced signs in the air; a dark light leapt from His most secretdepth, like a colorless mist that gives form to formlessness, andas the mist spread, a burst of flames took shape in its center, andthe flames streamed down to illuminate the lower Sefirot, and down,down to the Kingdom.

But perhaps in thatsimsun, that diminishment, that lonely separation¡XDiotallevisaid¡Xthere was already the promise of the return.

HOKHMAH

3

In hanc utilitatemclementes angeli saepe figuras, characteres, formas et vocesinvenerunt proposueruntque nobis mortalibus et ignotas et stupendasnullius rei iuxta consuetum linguae usum significativas, sed perrationis nostrae summam admirationem in assiduam intelligibiliumpervestigationem, deinde in illorum ipsorum venerationem et amoreminductivas.

¡XJohannes Reuchlin, Dearte cabalistica, Hagenhau, 1517, III

It had been two daysearlier, a Thursday. I was lazing in bed, undecided about gettingup. I had arrived the previous afternoon and had telephoned myoffice. Diotallevi was still in the hospital, and Gudrun soundedpessimistic: condition unchanged; in other words, getting worse. Icouldn't bring myself to go and visit him.

Belbo was away. Gudruntold me he telephoned to say he had to go somewhere for familyreasons. What family? The odd thing was, he took away the wordprocessor¡XAbulafia, he called it¡X and the printer, too. Gudrunalso told me he had set it up at home in order to finish some work.Why had he gone to all that trouble? Couldn't he do it in theoffice?

I felt like a displacedperson. Lia and the baby wouldn't be back until next week. Theprevious evening I'd dropped by Pi-lade's, but found no onethere.

The phone woke me. Itwas Belbo; his voice different, remote.

"Where the hell are you?Lost in the jungle?"

"Don't joke, Casaubon.This is serious. I'm in Paris."

"Paris? But I was theone who was supposed to go to the Conservatoire."

"Stop joking, damn it.I'm in a booth¡Xin a bar. I may not be able to talk muchlonger..."

"If you're running outof change, call collect. I'll wait here."

"Change isn't theproblem. I'm in trouble." He was talking fast, not giving me timeto interrupt. "The Plan. The Plan is real. I know, don't say it.They're after me."

"Who?" I still couldn'tunderstand.

"The Templars, Casaubon,for God's sake. You won't want to believe this, I know, but it'sall true. They think I have the map, they tricked me, made me cometo Paris. At midnight Saturday they want me at the Conservatoire.Saturday¡Xyou understand¡XSaint John's Eve..." He was talkingdisjointedly; and I couldn't follow him. "I don't want to go. I'mon the run Casaubon. They'll kill me. Tell De Angelis¡Xno, DeAngelis is useless¡Xkeep the police out of it..."

"Then what do you wantme to do?"

"I don't know. Read thefloppy disks, use Abulafia. I put everything there these last fewdays, including all that happened this month. You weren't around, Ididn't know who to tell it to, I wrote for three days and threenights...Listen, go to the office; in my desk drawer there's anenvelope with two keys in it. The large one you don't need: it'sthe key to my house in the country. But the small one's for theMilan apartment. Go there and read everything, then decide foryourself, or maybe we'll talk. My God, I don't know what todo..."

"All right. But wherecan I find you?"

"I don't know. I changehotels here every night. Do it today and wait at my place tomorrowmorning. I'll call if I can. My God, the password¡X"

I heard noises. Belbo'svoice came closer, moved away, as if someone was wresting thereceiver from him.

"Belbo! What's goingon?"

"They found me. Theword¡X"

A sharp report, like ashot. It must have been the receiver falling, slamming against thewall or onto that little shelf they have under telephones. Ascuffle. Then the click of the receiver being hung up. Certainlynot by Belbo.

I took a quick shower toclear my head. I couldn't figure out what was going on. The Planreal? Absurd. We had invented it ourselves. But who had capturedBelbo? The Rosicrucians? The Comte de Saint-Germain? The Okhrana?The Knights of the Temple? The Assassins? Anything was possible, ifthe impossible was true. But Belbo might have gone off the deepend. He had been very tense lately, whether because of LorenzaPelle-grini or because he was becoming more and more fascinated byhis creature...The Plan, actually, was our creature, his, mine,Diotallevi's, but Belbo was the one who seemed obsessed by it now,beyond the confines of the game. It was useless to speculatefurther.

I went to the office.Gudrun welcomed me with the acid remark that she had to keep thebusiness going all on her own. I found the envelope, the keys, andrushed to Belbo's apartment.

The stale, rancid smellof cigarette butts, the ashtrays all brimming. The kitchen sinkpiled nigh with dirty dishes, the garbage bin full of disemboweledcans. On a shelf in the study, three empty bottles of whiskey, anda little left¡Xtwo fingers¡Xin a fourth bottle. This was theapartment of a man who had worked nonstop for days without budging,eating only when he had to, working furiously, like anaddict.

There were two